deep in the heart of alligator alley

It was a wild ride up to Sarasota today.

Before I even left Broward County I was in traffic with a guy who, alone in his car, was fist pumping at a speed and intensity that I've never seen before.  I'm talking sunroof open, full extension of his arm, at a frenzied pace.  I wasn't sure if he had friends in traffic with him somewhere or what, frankly I didn't want to hang around long enough to find out.

Then, in alligator alley, I start passing road signs proclaiming low visibility ahead.  No explanation as to why, just low visibility.  I began to notice a darkness on the horizon that looked like an impending thunderstorm, so I was surprised when none of the cars coming towards me had their windshield wipers on.  As I got closer and closer to the darkness I realized it was not rain at all.  Suddenly I was enveloped in a cloud of thick smoke, looking to the side of the road I realized I had found myself smack dab in the middle of a forest fire.  Like literally flaming palmettos at the roads edge, and trucks of firemen fighting the blaze, while traffic slowed slightly but continued on as normal.  I even saw a helicopter on its way carrying a load of water.

At the last leg of my journey I just hit completely stopped traffic on the interstate.  Another time when I was thankful for the map in my car.  I just found an alternate route of country roads and ended up finishing my drive cruising down the rural highways that wind through the orange groves.  It was actually quite nice.

And now I'm here, belly full of delicious Easter dinner, getting ready for bed with one of my best friends Miller.

Happy Easter!

I woke up this morning to this picture from Daniel.

: ((((

They are all so happy.

Definitely the right way to start off my day.  Now I've got to shower and wake up and prepare myself for a little road trip up north.  Hopefully updates to follow.

and it's definitely her best one

source

When I saw this mugshot last week I was impressed.  Compared to all of her others, it's such a different look.  So much darker, but she looks great and totally prepared.

It wasn't until just now reading dlisted and this article that I saw her full outfit and realized her jacket is from my store!

It could use a good steaming but otherwise amazing.

It will take just the right kind of customer for me to be able to use the line, "you know, Lindsay was wearing that in her last mugshot" to which I'm sure they will respond, "Oh she looked great!"

a very sexy vegan

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for my friend Jessie.  I mean, is it really twisting your arm to say he's a sexy vegan?

last day of staycation

This morning I got so wound up thinking about the errands I needed to run out west of town that I ended up just rallying to go get coffee and drive all the way out there right when I woke up while the traffic would still be bearable.  I needed to return something to an outlet store and then while I was in the area I decided to go to Ikea.  It didn't take long before I couldn't handle it though, at which point I called Daniel for help.  His immediate response was, "weren't we supposed to go do these errands together today anyways with one of the dogs?"

That plan made a lot more sense than me going alone and barely caffeinated.  As a back up plan Daniel offered that I could come down and walk his dogs with him.  I think he thought that idea would sound boring.  Quite the opposite.

I would much rather hang out with these nice guys than try to organize my life with cheap particle board furniture.  How is he so nice?  He just stands at that door slowly wagging his tail and methodically licking at the glass, as if it's a giant lollipop and he is making his way to freedom.  Sweet sweet freedom.

After dog walking (6 different dogs that each need to be walked individually so they all feel like they get special one on one time) we did make our way to lunch followed by the bed bath and beyond where I was forced to purchase things like fabric baskets to conceal my underwear.  I hate being an adult.

It was a good thing I had a support dog there:

He's so happy and just smiles all the time and doesn't ever bother anybody.  I love him : (.

While a part of me wanted to spend all day playing with the doggies I had also made plans with John to take a bike ride now that he's finally rolling in style on his own set of wheels.  I left Daniel and headed home, still not having showered or brushed my teeth from my unnecessarily rushed morning to run errands.

You can imagine my displeasure when I got home at 5 and discovered that my blue tire was once again flat.  I am not going to have any further comment on the subject as the good part is we still managed to salvage some daylight and get a good ride in.

It's just weirdly cold all of a sudden today and I would have preferred to have been able to ride more during midday.  Despite the chill it was a good time of day for sunset views.

And John even treated me to taco tuesdays for dinner.  The perfect end to my little staycation.  I'm ready for my haircut tomorrow, then heading back to work fresh and refreshed, ready to hopefully get my new uniform!

I got my beach day in

Yesterday I knew I had to take advantage of the perfect beach weather if it was going to be any kind of staycation that I'm on.

And it really was a great day for it, I have the slightly burned butt cheeks to remember it by.

The only thing that would have made the day better is if I had had a friend with me but it just wasn't in the cards.  I would say I was thankful that I finally got Jon to facetime with me but then I saw all the screen caps he took.  Apparently he was trying to imitate every dumb face I made when I would forget that we were facetiming.

So rude.

hanging out with Daniel, Yeti, and Neko

Yesterday I picked Daniel up from work with the intention of going to look at a nice little doggy that needs a home, but after a full day of everyone except Jon talking me out of it I ended up not even going to see him.

Instead Daniel let me play with his dogs for the afternoon.

Yeti is a little easier to photograph being that she's so white and fluffy and happy.

Neko, while just as happy, was much harder to capture on film.

Only partly because of his darker coloring, it had more to do with his need to nibble.  He would get so excited that he would open his mouth and kind of swing his head back and forth until something went in and then he would gently chew on whatever it was.  Sometimes it was my arm, sometime it was another dogs face, most of the time it was the contents of my pockets.  Once it was my butt.  That's when I learned not to turn my back on Neko.

I love them, they are two funny nice doggies.