8/24/2012 I Don’t Do Spiders!

(Rehoboth Beach, DE)

As the title says, I don’t do spiders! In any way, shape or form.

When I went to the marina this morning I was getting my golf cart ready, as usual, and I happen to look up over the seat and saw this side to side and top to bottom spider web framed by the seat, roof and roof supports. And then I saw IT! This spider with a body the size of dime and legs that extended out to a good inch to an inch and a half. It may as well have been as big as THIS as far as I was concerned!

Oh it creeps me out just to post this picture!

Anyway, the spider must have seen me because it ran up into a crevice where the roof meets the roof support. Oh great, what do I do now? I can’t leave it there because sure as I my name is Snookie Quinn it will crawl the length of the roof support all the way around to the front of the cart and then drop down while I’m driving which causes a breeze and it will blow back towards me and drop down the front of my shirt! Ewwww,,,I feel like something is crawling all over me now, why did I ever start this post?

So I keep looking over my shoulder as I drive the golf cart over to the boatyard. I see Ian first and tell him that I need a hero. He asks what the problem is and I tell him and he hands me a can of OFF. “Uh, no Ian, that isn’t going to work, you need to come out and KILL it!” He does look for it and can see it up in the crevice between the roof and the support. He tries his handy 8 in 1 tool but the pliers part isn’t long enough. He grabs a pair of needle nose pliers out of a nearby tool chest and is successful in nabbing that creepy-crawly thing and disposing of it.

Being me, I think out loud and say, “Gee, I hope it didn’t lay eggs in there.” Ian assured me that it didn’t. I asked him how he could be so sure and he replied that it was a male spider. I asked how he knew that and deadpanned, “I have good eyesight.” So the spider was gone and I could go on with my day. Of course the rest of the morning I did feel imaginary things crawling up my leg every so often.

I got through the rest of the morning and it was rough because it just wasn’t busy. I was working during the low tide but things would certainly pick up for Bob during the afternoon shift when the tide was coming in.

I spent the afternoon on the beach with forever friend, Elaine. We haven’t seen nearly as much of each other as we hoped to this summer due to our trips to Wilmington on days off, her frequent houseguests, rainy weather, way too hot for the beach weather and sometimes the ever popular reason, life just gets in the way.

We sure did enjoy ourselves today. I don’t think there was a 20 second pause in our conversation the whole afternoon.

That said, the very end of our beach time posed a problem. You see, we kept talking and I was aware that I had to go to the bathroom and I thought if I just didn’t think about it, it would go away. I used to be able to do that. Now that I’m older, eh, not so much anymore. So I sat there enjoying this girlfriend time until I could no longer ignore that my bladder was screaming,,,,,

“EMPTY ME!” “NOW!” “EMPTY ME NOW OR I’M GOING TO BUST WIDE OPEN!!!”

Now it was bad enough that I was going to have take the time to gather my belongings and trudge through the sand to get to the uphill ramp, which just goes on forever, which would ultimately lead me to the ladies room but I just didn’t think I was going to make it. I had to stop several times during that uphill climb and do a very, very modified version of the pee-pee dance, in hopes that I could hold it just a few minutes longer. Why, oh why, didn’t I keep up with those kegel exercises? Is it too late to start them again now? Elaine took my beach chair and my beach bag in hopes that in doing so I could walk faster. While I appreciated her offer its very difficult to walk with your legs squeezed tightly together from the knees up. I finally made it to the bathroom and quickly found an empty stall. I was kicking myself for putting my T-shirt on over my bathing suit because I had to take the time to take that off first. Needless to say there was no time to assume the stance, oh hell, I was lucky I could even hover at this point. Thankfully, the Goddess of Urine was looking over me and I didn’t pee on myself. Oh, and I did check to see if the toilet had a lid or not. It didn’t. (Remember this?) (Note to self: When the urge strikes,,,,GO!)

Bob’s sister, Carol, and her husband are down this weekend with two of their grandchildren. Not with us, they have their own RV. We all had Capriotti’s subs and steak sandwiches for dinner and sat around outside until the bugs chased us in.

Rain is predicted for the weekend, we’ll have to see how things play out.

Since we had to come in I jumped on the computer to see what was happening in the Facebook world and to play my next moves in the Scrabble games I have going on.

I also checked out the blog because I’ve been watching the stat counter closely these past few days. This blog has hit a milestone. Thanks to you frequent and not so frequent readers my stat counter has turned 250,000 hits! Now I have to be honest here. When I checked it the counter was reading 249,996. Just four more page views. I had to do it. I refreshed the page and expected to see 249,997 but instead saw 249,998 because someone had come to the blog. I had to act fast if I was going to do it. I refreshed again and then again. It was one time I was hoping no one was coming to read my blog! I did it!

Thank you readers! I appreciate every one of you!

5/20/2012 A Laid Back Day,A REALLY Laid Back Day

Let me start this with,,,,,yesterday a lot of beers were drank.

We went to breakfast at the VFW for their breakfast buffet. Bob’s sister, Carol, her guy, Pat, our friend Steve and a fishing buddy of his, Josh, Bob and I. We left the Inlet campground at ten and were on the other side of the bay within 15 minutes. We were surprised at so few cars in the parking lot as Bob, Carol and Pat ate here last week and it was packed. Carol did remember that it was Mother’s Day last week so that would certainly explain the crowd. However, these buffets are really good and we expected more of a crowd than this. The sign was still up outside, Breakfast buffet on Sunday’s so we were baffled. We soon found out that there isn’t a buffet this Sunday. I, for one, was really disappointed because they raved about how good it was last week. We were able to order off the menu so we did have breakfast there anyway. My pancakes were good and everyone enjoyed theirs except for the scrapple. It was cut too thin and cooked too long. Carol picked hers up and tapped it on her plate and it didn’t even bend, not even a little bit.

After breakfast, Steve and Josh went their way, Pat and Carol headed home to Jersey and Bob and his recliner were joined as if they were one the rest of the day.

It was a pretty miserable day too. A good day to stay indoors because of the cold, the rain and especially if you are hung over from the day before. Don’t look at me, I don’t drink!

One more week off before we start our summer workamping job.

5/19/2012 I Go To Work!

I was up early this morning. Before the alarm even went off. The wind was blowing pretty hard and that was not a sound I wanted to hear. Since I’m going to be right on the water I knew it was going to be on the chilly side. I got a sets of sweats out just in case. I got there right on time and went in to find out what I was supposed to do first. Keys to the golf cart in hand I went and picked one out and headed to the docks. I met up with Wayne, a full time employee and he went over a few things and then left me.

So here I am, its windy, chilly damn cold and there is no action at the docks. Not a boat in sight. This is going to be a long day I say to myself. Finally the first boat comes. I check to see if its registered to Delaware and it is. These guys paid me no mind. They knew exactly what to do and my help wasn’t needed at all. Twenty minutes later a fellow with a jet ski comes. A jet ski? Really? That water is cold! He got it offloaded, parked his truck/trailer and off he went. I did get the chance to ask him if he was nuts before he pulled away from the dock. Two more boats were put in and the next thing I know Jetski Man is back. I just looked at him and laughed. He laughed back and said, “I should have listened to you!” He had a wet suit on but it only covered his torso, upper arms and thighs. The rest was bare and subject to the cold water. He couldn’t get that jet ski out fast enough.

At 9:15 I was told to go home. The crowd they were expecting just isn’t here. Come back next weekend I’m told. They didn’t have to tell me twice.

By the time I got back to our site Bob’s sister Carol and her main squeeze Pat were there along with brother Gene and sister-in-law Linda. Hugs all around, I settled in a lawn chair, work already forgotten.

The sun had come out and jackets and sweatshirts were shed and we talked and ate and drank and laughed. Most of all we laughed.

Gene, Carol, Bob

Pat

Carol and Linda

Gene, Bob, Linda, Carol and Me

Gene, Pat and Bob

Take notice of how tan Bob is already. Can you imagine what he’s going to look like come August?

We had hoped Gene and Linda would spend the night but it just wasn’t in their plans this weekend. Hopefully, before the summer is over they’ll be back for a weekend.