Humidity Hell

The humidity is back with a BANG! We had a little reprieve for a few days and that felt sooooo good. The pool was a bit cold but it is the end of October.

So what I dislike the most about humidity is the way it makes you feel and drip as if you were a slow moving waterfall. The problem with the drip-drip-drip is that it drips right down your face. That in itself makes wearing glasses in Florida extremely difficult. I walk around experiencing life in a fog. I trip, fall and stumble sometimes over my own feet.

Back to the humidity - it's tiring, yucky and it makes you smell like a dead animal. Your hairs soaked, your clothes are soaked and you just want to stay inside where it's cool. Or it would be if I turned the air condition on. But it's October almost November - how can I turn on the air?

I should be thankful my driveway is not covered in snow. I am - I am!!!!!

Coffee Break

So I'm hobbling around on this bum foot feeling a little like a drunk giraffe on an ice rink. The stitches have been removed it still tingles and the toes definitely have not gone back to work yet. They kind of sit there all crumpled up and useless.
Every morning my favorite thing to start the day with is sit outside on the lanai, sip coffee, stare at the few remaining stars and watch the planes coming and going. It's a quiet time before the noise of the day begins. It's still dark when I start my journey to the outside world to relax and enjoy the roasted brew.

I'm pretty good at traversing the darkened lanai and shuffling over to my favorite chair. This morning as I exit I notice a plane - lights flashing - getting ready to land and all of the passengers antsy to embark. I am captivated by this sight. I should concentrate on my own world and not get dreamy eyed about some far off adventure.

Still, my eyes are stuck like gorilla glue on the descending aircraft. I shuffle by the pool - eyes still resting on the flashing lights up in the sky. BAM, my fumbling feet stumble. It's the darn cat. Doesn't she know my movements are slow and unsteady? What is she doing in my path?

There is nothing to grab a hold of to break my fall - so down I go. Okay, if I hit my head on the cement - get a concussion - and fall into the pool - I will surely die. I won't be able to scream because I'll be unconscious. There goes my travel plans. Since I can't scream no one will hear my futile cries. It's 5 AM no one but me and the cat are awake.

I flail about on my downward spiral trying to stay away from the pool and the cement edge that is calling my name. I slip on the pool skimmer that someone always leaves by the edge of the pool. It throws my balance backwards toward the glass topped table. I start thinking hard and fast if it's the kind that doesn't break in pointy sharp pieces and could pierce my juggler veins. It was on sale - pretty cheap. I can envision the sharp shards of glass piercing my body.

My arm hits the corner of the table and my body takes another turn and hits the wicker chair. And like magic I am plopped down unscathed right in the chair still holding my coffee cup. The coffee is splattered all over the floor but the cup is safe and sound. It's truly a good thing as it is my favorite coffee cup.

Speak to me

So, I'm at this resort sitting by the pool people watching - with a book in my hand - it doesn't look do obvious. And I realize just how many people have cell phones and they are using them. You are on vacation - you are at a resort - you should be relaxing having fun. Put the phone away.

Two people were talking work related stuff - give me a break. One lady was feeding her baby setting up her poolside stuff and had the phone scrunched to her ear and talking to the baby at the same time. Where is the quality time?

One man was buying or selling stocks with someone. Another guy was doing a sales presentation on the phone while walking around with a freshly ordered pizza and juggling two glasses of beer.

Another person was doing the gossip tongue on her phone. Give me another break. Get a life and get off the phone. And then the teenagers texting away. And the friends we were with mostly likely the worst offenders. We were sitting about 15 feet apart and they were calling one another. Hello.

So I feel like I am a visitor in this bizarre world where everyone (except me) has a cell phone permanently attached to their ears. Why does this seem like an addiction?

Fay - in her path of destruction

I've heard numerous stories about the sound one hears just before a tornado strikes. High pitched locomotive sound. That suggestive talk is printed sharply in my mind.
Fay has sprouted many tornadoes in her wake throughout Florida. So I am on storm alert with the train sounds tucked away inside my pink mass.
This beautiful and windy morning I get up and trot to the pool for my morning dip. The waters a bit cold. I begin to walk slowly (cuz it's sooo cold) down the steps into the pool. I hear this sound - Is it a train? I don't live anywhere near a train track. I'm completely submerged in the water now and the sound grows louder.
Rescue workers will find my battered body floating face up in this pool if I don't act with urgency. I race out of the pool, grab my towel and run for cover. I listen as the garbage truck passes by my home. Well, it sounded like a train. I feel I was being proactive.

Garlic Moon

I was floating quietly in the pool on my wonderful blue foam raft that hubby bought me for my birthday, just veggin out after a tough day at the office, trying to meditate and chill out, thinking about the good times that are sure to roll my way real soon and save me from purgatory so I can enjoy the good life and become a lady of leisure, and have all my wants and desires served to me on a silver platter (sterling) expensive chocolates and fruity fru fru drinks sitting by the poolside with no clouds in the sky, and wish upon a star - and then I saw it!

I was so mystified that I almost fell off my wonderful blue foam raft that hubby bought for my birthday but really wanted it for himself and I hardly ever get to use it because he's usually cruising the pool on it with his un fruity fru fru drink perched on the edge of the pool trying to veg out but he's not a vegetarian like me, only now it is referred to as a plant based diet, who knows where that term came from.

I looked up toward the heavens and saw the moon which didn't even look like a moon but truly looked like a giant clove of garlic suspended in mid air with bright strands of light surrounding the giant clove of garlic. I was so impressed that a moon could be so garlic-like or that my imagination has taken a turn down a curvy unpaved country road in the middle of the city, so perhaps I have discovered another planet or an alien spaceship while lounging on my wonderful blue foam raft waiting to be beamed up and begin my new life on an unknown universe but then I remembered that all alien space craft are sent to site 51 so this really must be a garlic moon and it is not made out of cheese like some say and I know from reading Anne Rice novels that garlic is said to keep vampires and other cruel ugly monsters away as they are repelled from the odor that to me is not offensive and I love garlic and I love looking up at my garlic moon while floating aimlessly on my wonderful blue foam raft that hubby purchased for my last birthday, in the pool in the dark of the night with no stars in the sky just an occasional plane flying low over the gulf passing silently in front of the garlic moon and my imagination.

3 Things

Three things from yesterday that made me happy.



1. I indulged in chocolate



2. For lunch I devoured Greek Salad.



3. Swam naked in the pool.

3 Things

Three things from yesterday that made me happy.

1. The pool temperature hit 90 degrees.

2. My bronchitis is under control.

3. The dog didn't pee on the floor.

3 Things

Three things from yesterday that made me happy.

1. my doctor gave me free samples so I didn't have to buy prescriptions

2. the dog didn't pee on the floor

3. the pool temperature hit 87

And then the rain

I'm still home fending for myself and the kid while hubby is off having a time of his life. I've been doing okay up until last night or to be more precise 1 - am this morning. The pool level has been quite high due to the daily afternoon rain showers. Hubby discussed what I needed to do if the pool needed bailing. I was off in lala land paying him no mind - as usual. The pool never overflowed not even during a hurricane. Never say never!!!!
The biggest problem during rainy season is the pool is attached to the house and covered by a screened in bird cage. There is about a three inch height difference from the pool decking to my bedroom floor. The rain outdid the 'raining cats and dogs' comment. It was raining elephants and hippos.
I turned on the outside light to get a peek of the rain and the lightening and then I noticed the water level in the pool. OMG - it was cresting. I ran outside in the cotton nightie and dragged a 2 gallon empty pail and started bailing water out away from the house. My progress was fruitless.
I ran back inside searching for a flash light. Found it - dead batteries. I unlocked the side gate and looked for the hose. Why didn't I pay attention to the old man? He said the hose, turn the nozzle and then can't quite remember. I stuck my face by the end of the hose, raining was plastering huge pellets against my cotton nightie. I looked up at the street light and then across the street. Looks like the neighbors were all snug in their beds -where I should be. The rain beat down so hard I could barely see.
I sloshed back toward the pump and opened the metal door. It creaked and raised the hair on the back of my neck. It was an electrical box and here I stand in 6 inches of water. That combination can't be good for my health. I sucked on the end of the hose thinking it needed to be primed. Not only did it taste nasty it still wasn't pumping our water.
Got to call hubby and tell him my dilemma. Hopefully he won't lecture me. That's what he gets for leaving me all alone with the kid to fend for myself. Ah, yes, the kid, perhaps he will rescue me.
I run inside dripping wet and take the corner a little too fast - down I go on the ceramic tile floor. Ouch. I crawl on the floor and bang on his bedroom door.
"What."
I need help with the pool it's overflowing, get up and help me.
"I'm tired."
Not a good thing to say to me in my condition. After a few words - mostly mine he trudges outside with me.
"It's raining. I'll go get an umbrella."
Like we don't have time to get an umbrella, I think to myself. I drag him outside in the monsoon rain to the electric box and tell him he needs to push the switch to the left. I say this with a smirk as we are both standing in ankle high water. He gives me that look, so I flip the switch and don't die.
I grab the hose and watch as water flows out the end. The kid disappears into the darkness. I stand beneath the street light feeling a little like a drowned rat. I slosh back through the water in the yard and hope I don't see a snake.
I toss my wet clothes in the shower and put on a dry silky nightie. I climb back into bed and listen to the rain beat ferociously against the pool deck and cringe when I hear the thunder. The lightening sends me under the covers. Some time during the early morning hours I drift into dreamland that somehow becomes a nightmare.
When the sun splashes across the side yard I roll over and look at the pool level. Oops. I should have turned off the pump a little sooner. A pessimist would say the pool is half empty while the optimist like myself would say - oh shit.

Pumping Iron

It spit and sputtered and sent out a jettison of bubbles that drifted slowly across the water dispersing into oblivian. And then - silence! No gear grinding, humming noise, gurgling, popping and metal against metal causing the hair on the back of my neck to stand on end. So quiet - you could hear the hum of the air conditioner two doors down. Total quiet - too quiet. The all too familiar hum was gone. The pool pump had taken its last burst of energy and slipped silently to the underworld. A world where broken machinery clutters the landscape like weeds in my flowerbed.

Mr. Wonderful (he's mine) dismantled the sucker and spread the greasy parts across the kitchen table. Why he doesn't use his workshop is beyond my reasoning. I guess he likes to spread his projects around the house just to let me know how busy he is. So, with all his expertise he couldn't put humpty dumpty back in working order again.

Dollar signs loom like skyscrapers in my mind. How much do pool pumps cost? Do we sell our soul to the devil to purchase one? Take out a third mortgage (the second mortgage is to buy gas for the vehicles) on our house? I can't live here without that pool. I need that pool. I deserve that pool.

So off to the pool supply store for the bad news. But soon, oh so soon the humming will start and block out all the other neighborhood noises except for the sirens and we will be back in the swim of things.

Rain in Spain

The rain in Spain falls mainly in the plain - except when you fill your empty pool after months of repairs and take out a loan to pay the extremely high water bill you will be facing this month. Then it rains with total disregard to nature, nurture or the meteorologists prediction.

So now we face a pool overflowing with water and needs to be drained. Okay - why do these things happen to good people? Somehow I never read that book - if I did I might have answers to my questions. Where is Harold Kushner now? I will stand by and watch the precious ($$$) water make trails down the gutter on my cul-de-sac and slip silently into the drain.

If I were in charge of the universe I would have the rain start before I filled my pool. And being in charge of all that stuff I would not allow the solar heater to have a gigantic leak and the pool pump to get clogged and replacing the filter every few months and all the cleaning and the dog jumping in scratching the new surface or the old dog falling in and nearly drowning. Alas - I am not in charge and that's probably a good thing.

Snakes in Florida

The pool is sitting there - all bright, pretty and very very blue. The next task of filling her with water looms over us. I see $ signs. I was hoping for lots of rain but we have only received a small shower. So there is about 2 inches of water surrounding the drain in the bottom.

Yesterday I stepped outside into the sunshine and surveyed my empty pool when movement caught my eye. It was black and long and slithering along the bottom of the empty pool. It looked to be a black racer. Harmless - but I have a terror of snakes.

I grabbed the camera and stepped slowly and cautiously into the bright blue waterless pool. I guess the big guy felt cornered as he raised his head up and looked like he was going to leap at me. Okay, do I really want his picture? I climbed out of the pool and leaned over the edge. He reared his head again. Truly not a happy camper having his photo taken in a dry pool.

I snapped a few shots and then called for back-up to remove him from his hell. My trust Knight in Shiny Armour scooped him up with the long handled butterfly net and returned him to the wilds of my backyard.

I wondered if he was traumatized or this was just another day in the life of a black racer?

Global Warming

It's over - done - feenished. The pool sports a new face lift. And to think it only took 5 months. Five months of frustration, setbacks and dry tears. Lessons I have learned from this - NEVER-EVER do this again. Life is easier when you hire stuff done by a professional or just a regular old handyman.

We have bright blue paint EVERYWHERE - on the tile floor inside the house, under my fingernails, on shoes, clothes, the outside wall, the pool ladder, the roof of the lanai - even the dog wears a blue tail. And remove this ever lasting paint -OH NO. Like the energizer bunny it keeps staying and staying. Paint thinner removes the surface layer of skin, scrub with soap and water and it turns rough and red but still the blue tinge pokes through.

It's over and I feel relief. Now the task of filling the pool with water rears its ugly head. How many times did it rain when the pool was a work in progress? Let me count the ways (times). Do I think it will rain now the pool is complete and ready to hold water. No way!!! I can see the water bill $$$$$.

What the pool project has done to my mind is represented in the photo. And I feel blessed that we have the only Monet inspired pool in my neighborhood and that we are the only fools that decided to resurface our own pool.