Back from the beach

We had a great week at the beach. Fishing was less than spectacular. Waaaay less than spectacular but still I ended up managing to beach a few each day with a nice variety. Small sharks, sail cats, whiting, croakers, a weakfish, and a ladyfish. Except for the ladyfish they were all small. Over the week the surf conditions went from really windy and rough to lake smooth. The great thing is that I have the right tackle to basically deal with whatever conditions happen. As it turns out, I caught the most fish when the surf condition was the most difficult. Ate well. Flagler Fish Company still putting out the best Calamari around. We ate at the restaurant on Flagler pier. Don’t know why, but we never did that before. The food was just ok but it’s a great ambience with large windows overlooking the beach. We ate pizza one day at a place that always has lots of cars parked in front. It was edible but not worthy of a return trip.

The garden survived nicely without my constant watching. Picked the first summer item, a perfect zucchini and noticed that in our absence loads of green tomatoes had formed and the cucumbers were reaching 6” length. We should be seeing those sliced on the table next week. Also picked the last head of cabbage, the last head of lettuce and the last bunch of celery so the only remaining winter items of note are onions and a few brussels sprouts. The first wave of green beans will be ready in a week to 10 days so the transition from winter to summer goodies went more smoothly than ever before.

Got all the lumber for the dock expansion project and hope to have it done by the end of May. If all goes well, Joey and Mark will be coming up to the lake Monday and we’ll get the pilings installed. That’s the trick part of the whole job. You just hold your breath and hope there are no roots in the spot planned for the piling. It’s shaping up that there will be a major labor pool assembling at the house on Mother’s Day so I’m hoping that within a couple of days of that, we’ll have it up and ready for Simon’s graduation party – the lake segment of the festivities. The expansion adds a 12‘x14′ section to support a picnic table and general eating area. Seems like we have 3 or 4 events throughout a year that will greatly benefit from the addition.