Wow, the vacation started on a great note in Miami. We had New York Roma Pizza and it had been a while since I had some great pizza to talk about. This was certainly a hit, and the beers were cold, and only $2. Then, that evening we busted our guts laughing at Pablo Francisco and crew...there are too many funny things to tell and I can't do them justice.
The next day, we headed to the ship. We got there, showed our ID and birth certificate to a dozen people and then we were on the ship. Upon boarding the ship, Andrea and mom went to the counter and dad said, "Don't you think we should have our first beer?" The apple don't fall far from the tree, so we headed to the bar.
We had dinner on the ship and loved our drink-man, Daniel from Croatia. While waiting in line we met some good folk, Kurtys and Liz, they are from Northern South Dakota and were our ship-friends for the rest of the week.
Our first landing was in Key West. Here we saw the Southernmost point in America, which was fishy to me because I could clearly see a piece of land sticking out further south. We were riding bikes all across Key West and ran in to the Little White House and learned about my man Harry S Truman, the buck stops here! We had some beers and food at Hog's Breath Saloon and it was pretty cool as well, not as cool as Cowboy Bills! They had topless bull-riding streaming on one of the TVs in the bar, sweet.
Back to the ship for the chest hair competition---can you believe I lost? I can, I had the only song I had never heard of...the guy who won had Right Said Fred...I had no chance. The next day, we had the best time in Cozumel.
Gerry picked us up at our drop point, took us the Mexican WalMart called MEGA, which was the nicest place ever. Then, we got a tour of Cozumel's beaches, downtown and different areas around town. On the way to the prettiest side of Cozumel, we stopped at the PeePee Station...only because of their brilliant marketing. A little further down the road, we got to our Tequila tour. El Gallo, spanish for The Rooster gave us our tour. Basically, we got about 30 shots of tequila for free and I ended up playing their guitar and dice-poker with a man at the bar. Next we headed to the Playa Bonita (Pretty Beach) where we enjoyed some authentic mexican food and sat over the ocean. I accidentally ruined our romantic walk when I pushed Andrea over a rock, she got out of that ocean quick though :) The ride back to the ship consisted of us singing classic songs with Gerry, "red, red wine."
Our day on the ocean was peaceful and relaxing until I lost $200 at the poker table. I did spend my layout time listening to Leroy Powell and the Messengers. Can't go wrong there.
Poof, it was over and our return debacle started. Miami was ruined by my experience at the aiport. I am never flying Delta again for as long as I live.
Returned on Friday for the end of Stephen Salyers and friends. The music was great. Top to bottom, everyone was amazing. I ran into some familiar faces, had a cold beer or two and then went home to catch up on sleep. The pictures of this event were taken by Karrie Bond. You can see all of the photos on her site:
http://kporterphoto.zenfolio.com/febfirstfriday
A few great things happened on Friday. The snow melted and we saw the sun, I finished a long overdue piece of art, we got a new camera and had a fun dinner with friends.
The first charcoal drawing I did of the Nashville skyline was for a show at Take 121 and it sold! Fortunately, I have had a photo of that drawing in my portfolio since then and this is the second commission I have had for similar pieces. I finished this piece just in time for Andrea to test out our new camera. What do you think?
We had some really fun parties this weekend for Valentine's Day and to celebrate the Chinese New Year but I will wait to tell you all about that when I have some photos! But I will leave you with this as a preview courtesy of Laura Godwin:
