Memorial Day Weekend

Gene and I decided to get an early start on the day (Sunday), and go for a ride before the heat and the traffic get too bad. In the background, you can see a golfer who had the same idea. It was a great ride, nice weather, good roads, and a fast pace, all the ingredients for a perfect ride.

Later in the morning, Nomi & I went to the Naples Art Museum.

They had several exhibits:

• Furniture and textiles by Frank Lloyd Wright
• Miniature houses, with incredibled detailed floors, carpets, and furnishings
• Miniature theater sets. I finally get to see what it looks like "behind the scenes"

After all that we went to a local mall for some of those holiday weekend bargains. I wandered through the bookstore, camera shop, Radio Shack... while Nomi looked for clothes. Here she is at the end of a long day.

The Day the House Changed Colors

After living in our pink house (excuse me, it wasn't pink, it was salmon), we decided to have it painted. It was overdue, some of the paint had faded and some of the trim was beginning to rust. We decided to go with more conservative colors, beige with white trim.

Here's a picture of the house as it appeared before the new paint. When we bought the house, it was pink inside and out, even the grout between the floor tiles was pink (ooops! salmon).

The only drawback... I keep driving past the house, looking for my pink house.

Visiting friends in Cape Coral

Some friends of ours in Cape Coral threw a nice get together. As you can see, they get to enjoy a beautful sunset everyday.

Eating Ice Cream at Sunset

The weather had been cool and dry lately, (a front passed through the other day bring some needed rain), so we thought we'd catch a sunset after dinner. Nomi and I went down to Fort Myers Beach, bought some ice cream and watched the sun go down.

Things have been a bit quiet the past week (my excuse for not writing any entries), but next week I'll have something really exciting ... pictures of paint drying! We finally decided to have the house painted. No more pink, now it'll be beige.

(P.S. the photo was taken with my cell phone camera.)

Riding in Naples

After a morning of thunderstorms (badly needed to put out some of the brush fires), Yoni & I decided to to go bike riding around Naples. It was on the hot and humid side, but the scenery was worth it.

We rode down Gordon Drive where the most expensive mansions and estates are, admiring the architecture and landscaping. Then we turned down one of the side streets and stopped to walk on the beach. At first we thought that there was several large pieces of cardboard floating in the water, but on closer examination, we found a school of brown Stingrays swiming close to the shore.

We ended our trip with a visit to the only Carvel in southwest Florida, and cooled down in the airconditioned store.

A Walk on the Beach

We got a surprise visit from Yoni today! He drove a friend's car all the way from New Jersey, and will be staying till Wednesday. After dinner we decided to end the day with a walk on the beach and watch the sunset from Fort Myers Beach.

The ocean was bathtub warm and since since the tourist season is over, the beach was empty. I've always enjoyed going to the beach in the off-season, that's when it's your personal, private preserve. As a boy growing up in Brighton Beach, I spent many wintery days playing on the beach, enjoying it all to myself or with a few friends. In the summer I had to share 'my' beach with thousands of other people.

Anyway, we took off our shoes and walked along the beach, watching the pelicans diving for fish, the dolphins feeding in the schools of bait fish that were just offshore, and the boats heading for port before nightfall.

We walked, talked and watched the sun set. A perfect ending to a lovely day.

Tinting the Windows

With summer fast approaching (temperatures have already hit the 90's), we decided to keep the house cool by applying a heat reflecting film to the large windows and sliding doors. We were a bit hesitant to do the work ourselves, but the instructions on the box made it look very easy, and we were confident we could do it ourselves. But then, everything at Home Depot claims to be easy-to-do.

With a careful reading of the more detailed instructions inside the box, a bit of luck, a lot of patience, and a few (dozen) swear words, we got the first panel done. It took us about seven hours to do the livingroom. Now I know why professional installlers charge so much.

In the end, we did a very nice job. The film cuts down the glare and heat dramatically (see the picture, the film is on the right side), and doesn't distort our beautiful view of the lake.

Opening Night at the Movies

Nomi's company supplied a 500 balloon drop for the opening of a new 16-plex cinema, and was given invitations for the opening ceremony. A classy event from the start, we walked into the theatre on a red carpet rolled out to the street. The lobby was set up for a fancy reception, plenty of food and drink for everyone there.

But what really got us was every kid's dream... we just walked up to the candy counter and got soda and popcorn for FREE! While I never buy snacks at the movies, this was too good to pass up.

After the opening ceremony, with such exciting celebrities as Miss Tampa, some TV newscasters, and County Commisioner John Albion (who is a friend from shul), they declared the theatre open. No, they didn't "cut the ribbon," but rather "tore the first tickets", and then they dropped the balloons.

Once all that was over, we got to see the new movie "Mission Impossible III" a day before its official opening. As the first people to see a film in this new theatre, you cannot imagine how nice it is to walk into a movie and not have your shoes stick to the floor.

Anyway, we learned two things from that movie:

1. Don't sit up close to the screen. There was so much action, it was all a big blur.
2. Don't drink two beers before sitting in a dark room for two hours.