sylvar

Last night I saw a special preview of S.O.A.P. (Snakes On A Porch). It was half a meter long, brown, and utterly panicked. It had obviously gotten in under the screen door but couldn't figure out how to get back there. I guided it back with a broomhandle and it slithered happily away.

After 11 hours of sleep (aah!), I woke up and went over to Starbucks for a dose of my drug of choice, LiveJournal. Oh, and their new green tea latte, which is only 70 calories with nonfat milk. (If you get the 'short' size -- which I didn't -- but it's still A LOT better than the chocolate chip Frappucino, which is a lower-sodium version of a Big Mac with a straw in it.)

I went back to the condo, watched a bit of TV, and removed the slab of ice from the bottom of the freezer in one huge piece. It didn't even entirely fit on top of the sink, so I used hot water to break it up into manageable pieces. Matt came by and helped me demolish it with a well-placed karate chop. Actually, he and I leaned on opposite sides of it, which snapped it in two across the sink's middle ridge. We got everything defrosted and put back in the freezer.

Then we went geocaching. Matt spotted a few caches before I did, and we picked up a very cute travel bug named Pat. She's sitting next to the GPS on my dashboard in this photo, though she has a habit of stage-diving as soon as I give it some gas.

We found three caches and took a travel bug from each, leaving two aloe-and-sunscreen kits for the next folks who come along. One of the caches involved decoding a hint written in a made-up language. If you want to try to translate it, you may find this page helpful. (If you don't want a hint, don't click that link!)

Greek salads, hummus, skordalia, and melitzanosalata (note: 'aubergine' means 'eggplant') with pita filled us up with healthy veggies. After dropping off the leftovers in the fridge, we came back to Starbucks to log our caches and upload a few photos, then went to Costco for $2.82 gas (the cheapest in the area). I dropped off a disposable camera and we shopped together.

I got a bottle of Panarroz Jumilla 2004 for $6.89 (hard to go wrong with a Wine Advocate score of 90 and a price under 1¢/mL, que no?), and Matt got two DVDs and a backpack with a two-liter water bladder that will serve him well in the American Cancer Society Relay for Life. It looks pretty good for long bike rides, too, but I'm going to hold off and just use 1L water bottles for now.

Matt is now on his way back home because he's got a lot of work to do (he's a third-grade teacher, so he's got loads of progress reports to write and tests to grade). I'm chilling at Starbucks again, and I think I may go play some NTN trivia at Pizzeria Uno tonight. There's a bar area with booths and stools, and I can think of little else I'd rather do right now than act the know-it-all while having a cold beer.

In fact, I've just invited my friend Mrs. Dana Anderson. Yes, that's right, Sheryl Andersen Morgan Anderson got married yesterday with all their kids watching. I'm looking forward to hearing the details!

This mini-vacation is going wonderfully. Tomorrow I think I'll go to Flea World. How many people can say they got a haircut at a flea market? Well, I probably won't, although there is an air-conditioned barbershop there. I'll probably just cruise the schlock and play a few games at Fun World. Eventually I'll want to go back to Tampa and make sure the apartment has been certified poison-free, then go get the cats and bring them home to piss out their annoyance. I'd better leave some dirty clothes on the floor to give them a target I'd prefer: feline realpolitik.
 

Tomorrow morning we're heading to Pittsburgh -- but first breakfast with my brother in St. Augustine, sleeping in Charlotte, and another day's drive. We'll be visiting Dover OH and State College PA while we're up there.

So I'd better go to sleep now, so I can get up at 4am...