Ed the Possum Trapper

We got a new member of the family last week. An opossum moved into our garage. He didn't cause a lot of fuss, but when my garage door quit working because SOMEBODY chewed up the wire, the list of suspects was quite small. I wasn't sure, until I started noticing things knocked off my workbench and then decided to clean the garage. I discovered him while picking up a dogbed and thought it was pretty heavy for an empty bed. A quick look inside and I see these innocent-looking eyes saying 'wassup?'. I'm thinking what big teeth possums have, so I dropped the bed and he ran for cover. After that nothing would coax him out where Pam could snatch him up by the tail, so I bought a trap. Don't worry, no possum's were harmed during this story.
We found out that opossums are one of the few marsupials in North America (that means they have a pouch like a kangaroo), and that they are not aggressive in spite of the sharp teeth. They are nocturnal, so I was pretty worried that I would be waking up at 12am in the morning with an animal going crazy in my garage. Instead, my daughter woke me up and I went out to see a forlorn-looking animal holding onto the sides of the trap (possums have opposable thumbs!), seeming to say to me, "I didn't do nuttin!'. I see how it is. Them dogs and cat can do whatever they want, but I knock over one small can of WD40 and I'm doin' time". My wife begged me to drive him to Ocala and release him into the wild. Me at 12am? I made it to the big tree in the front yard and said, "Tell it to the squirrels, Possy!" and released him into the general population.

A Different Sort Of Kayaking

This a view from our stop of the Outfitters at Nantahala. It was a beautiful, clear November day and I was surprised to see kayakers going out to practice on the rapids. I mean, this water is cold in the summer! I suppose if this is where you live, this is what you are prepared for. I noticed that each of the kayakers would get totally covered with wetsuit and spray skirt on their kayak and then, at the last minute splash riverwater on their face as they slid into the water. My idea is that this is to wake them up and make it so that the first surpise in the trip is not how cold the water is. It was amazing to see what you can do with those little kayaks, even just finding an eddy where you can sit still while the water flowed around you, looked like it took serious skill. This is the kind of sport where I'd rather watch!

If You're Comtemplating Complaining about the Weather

Morro Bay is a nice tourist town in California. It is pretty far away from the large crowds and you hit while traveling to Big Sur. What I noticed is that the photo here is the surfing beach. The day we arrived was weather was just about like it is right now in Florida, cool and sunny. The waves were like the waves we get here as well, except they had a dirt beach and full rubber on in September. Yep, this was the really cold water, not the stuff I surfed in down south. There were plenty of surfers in the water, on a weekday and in 2' shorebreak. Surfing is definitely the kind of thing that you take what you get, and not everybody gets nice warm water. So when you start to complain about the waves in Florida, think of the surfers in other parts of the world, even California, that get what we get for waves, only they have to wear big wetsuits to get in the water in the summer...

Beautiful Waves, The Ship, and the Brown Stuff

Big waves at the beach bring other things besides an opportunity to surf. We get the seaweed and this year there was more seaweed than I have seen in my lifetime. The seaweed is okay and probably provides extra food options for the birds, but the jellyfish? No, it wasn't the worst kind of jellyfish, just the big pink ones, the kind that break into pieces and become what we know as 'sea-lice'. Sea-lice, you can't see 'em so you can't avoid 'em. Nothing like falling off your board into the water and having parts of your body feel like an electric shock. The only thing worse is when you feel that in your pants!
Seaweed and jellyfish are part of nature, so we accept it for the price of having the waves...but the ship that sat out there at the edge of the horizon for weeks, what is that? And what is the brown foamy stuff we could see at times in the water? You can't help but think that something is either leaking or getting flushed. My wife noticed the brown stuff the most when she had her polarized sunglasses on, just chocolate colored sections of water with brown foam. You really do not know the origin, but when you see cruise ships going by with 5000 people on them and freighter after freighter marching into the horizon, you start to wonder if they really dump their waste far enough away and if they don't, who's going to stop them?

Finding the Excitement

This is a shot from the morning we had to leave Cocoa Beach and head back home. Is this normal Cocoa Beach surf? No Way! But whenever a hurricane strolls by and stays at least 300 miles away, we get surf like this. What made this swell better in my eyes, was that we did not seem to get the long lines of closeout waves that we sometimes get. For me the best days were Wednesday and Thursday, before the crowds descended, but I'm sure that the waves continued through Sunday. I'm all beat up and so is my board, but I would not have it any other way. I definitely learned that you don't have to be in the best spot, you just have to figure out how to get the best out of YOUR spot...something I might to apply to the rest of my life!

The Week of Relaxing Turned Into Something Else

It started off with a cold, and then the weather was going to be not so great, and then on top of all that, a possible hurricane. But what happened after that is the real story. Pam's home remedy of Vitamin C and Zinc got me back on my feet quicker than I could imagine and the one day of howling wind and unsurfable waves gave me the time I needed to recover. The rest of the time has been surfing more than I ever had before. I've been out on the largest waves on a paddleboard ever, and it has been consistently waves that rivaled my recent surfing adventure in Southern California. Thursday, I was out on and off until 6pm and I am still sore in places I didn't know about. Sea Lice are in the mix and now the crowd of surfers. I actually got to where I was taking it for granted that I could have any wave I wanted until yesterday afternoon, when the water became full of surfers that were hoping to get some of the hurricane swell. Today is supposed to be the big day, so I can only assume that the crowd will grow. If there is one feeling I have had on this trip, it is a growing sense of wonder. That I can do this, that we have surf like this, it all just blows me away. Pam has her umbrella on the beach and a good book and has become my cheering section. I feel like I am that soccer kid that is looking in the bleachers to see if they saw his goal...and she always says that she did!

The Beach Always Has Something, Even When You're Sick

This adventure has more twists and turns than usual. Getting sick right before was not in the plans, a great family get-together and excellent surf further kept me from deciding if this was the worst or best week ever. Even now, the wind is howling on shore for the second day and a whirly girl is cooking down in the islands. I could be there for the epic waves of the year, or clinging onto the remaining stanchion of the condo as a storm returns us to the Stone Age. No matter, I have definitely learned that this time is not just one thing, and even as I walk in the largest pile of seaweed I've ever seen, there can be beautiful sandcastles up ahead.
Regardless, I'm going out to walk the sand and admire the storm clouds building and know once more that the adventure is still on!