A Land of Choice

By my calculations Florida has over 180 different official license plates. That does not count things like state government plates, commercial plates, etc. The "standard" plate consists of an orange in the center with the tag line myflorida.com across the top and the name of the resident's county on the bottom. There are 67 counties in this state. All well and good, but....

There are currently 114 (soon to be 115) different vanity plates available. Everything from the expected "Won't Somebody Please Think of the Children" series ("Family Values," "Kids Deserve Justice," "Choose Life," and "Keep Kids Drug Free" among others) to the rather surprising "Imagine" with a Picasso-esque semi-abstract portrait of John Lennon in the middle. Some are environmental...and beautiful.

Thirty-six of them are just for the various universities and colleges in the state. Another 9 are for the pro sports teams. "University of Florida" is, by far, the Number 1 plate followed by "Helping Sea Turtles Survive." I am somewhat surprised that dolphins, panthers, manatees and reefs all beat out "Choose Life." I'm also surprised "Imagine" made the top half at number 45.

If you ever see a license plate you can not immediately identify...it's probably Florida.

The Mom Is a Harsh Manager

Mom likes baseball. A lot. Her favorite team used to be the Atlanta Braves. She knew all the players and their stories (not so much the stats) until they sold off some of her favorites and TBS stopped carrying the games. Now we watch the Tampa Bay Rays (formerly the Devil Rays but you know how dangerous it is to mention Ol' Scratch's name down here in the South. Think of the children.).

Actually, Mom likes a specific kind of baseball. Less than two hours with a score of 8-5 plus or minus 3. She was bored to tears by Dallas Braden's recent perfect game. She yells at the batters if they take to many pitches (regardless of where they might be in the strike zone) and yells at the pitchers for taking too long between pitches. She goes to bed at ten and the game had better be in the bag, if not over, by then. She has limited tolerance for failure. If you throw to first you'd better catch the runner. If you try to steal you'd better make it. Hit the ball. Catch the ball. There is no try, young Jedi. Only do or do not.

Mom On the Loose

Sometimes I feel bad about letting Mom go out to get the mail. She has to use the walker to get to the end of the driveway and back and she fumbles with the inner front door and the screen door coming and going. (They're just far enough apart for the walker to fit between on the "porch" but close enough that they each block her from opening the other.) On the other hand, she wants to do it and apart from puttering around in the kitchen it's about the only exercise she gets nowadays. Still, it's 90+ out there most days by the time the postal person shows up so I time her excursions (surreptitiously, of course) and check out the window (discreetly, of course) until she returns. Perhaps I am overly concerned. Yesterday she came back dragging a 40 gallon trash can behind her. I think it was a hint to my brother to finish weeding the walkway.

Green Parrots

Green parrots!!!

I looked out my window this morning and there were three green parrots in the not-jacaranda assiduously breaking off dead twigs (some rather large) with their beaks and then flying off to wherever their construction project is set up. They hopped up and down on the branches side-stepping in parrot fashion examining various bare limbs before grabbing a satisfactory one with their beaks and twisting back and forth until it broke off. They are very particular about only taking fresh-cut twigs. One bird cut a branch and dropped it before he could maneuver it into a balanced position for flight. He looked at it on the ground directly below and then went to cut another. I am told they are part of a resident flock living nearby but this is the first I have seen them.

I know it was the not-jacaranda the parrots were in because it was identified to me as such by the same people who originally told me it was a jacaranda and they should know. I will take their word for it. When it comes to plants I am at the mercy of experts. But I know a green parrot when I see one (or three)!

Update: Upon interrogation, the not-jacaranda admits to being a bougainvillea. For now.

Small World

So...I'm driving along minding my own business, pull up to a stop light and a voice behind me yells out, "Whereabouts in Utah you from?" Over my right shoulder (it's a two lane wide left turn lane) is on old guy in a beat up pickup truck, looks like either half his teeth are missing or he left his dentures home.

I smile and say, "Salt Lake." Traffic is packing in behind us.

He yells something about Murray and the 2002 Olympics. The vehicle ahead of me starts to go. I wave at him and we both just make the light. I lost sight of him at another light but three miles further on, as I'm pulling into the library parking lot I see his truck making the same turn. So I intercepted him at the front door.

Turns out Chuck used to have his own business installing telephone equipment here in Fort Myers until a friend made him an offer he couldn't refuse (California union rates to install stuff throughout Utah, Nevada and surrounding areas) and he moved to Brigham City, living with his Presbyterian pastor for a while, before moving to the apartment complex at State and Vine in Murray where he watched the twin chimneys come down and helped out in the Olympics when he wasn't taking off to travel all over the west. He's afraid of heights and doesn't like all the new buildings in Fort Myers, the tallest of which is 30 stories, since he'd never been more than five floors up in an elevator in the old days although he'd been 90 feet up a transmission tower (where his knees buckled and he left white-knuckled grip marks in the handrail by his own account). Right now he's recovering from a heart attack and cancer so he's in unwanted retirement but as soon as he has his strength he wants to move back to Utah. He loved the dry cold and the dry heat and his Mormon friends including the family with five kids three of whom married in the temple and the Jacks in Moab who knew how to party. (He really wants to go back to Moab.)

Some days I just love people.