Tales of a Florida Christmas – Part Two: Old McDonald had a Farm and a new oven

It was a miracle that Miriam was so good throughout the drive from
Fort Worth to Tallahassee (about 14 hours across Louisiana,
Mississippi, and Alabama). The highlight of the trip (Joe and I agree)
was just spending time with Alyson and the family, but we had several
fun adventures meanwhile. You've already read our best biking story,
but we also took a few more bike trips to Tom Brown Park as well as a
memorable bike date that Joe and I took alone from Tallahassee to St.
Marks. That one was forty miles round trip with a stopoff in St. Marks
township for some famous fish burgers. We also took a drive to St. Marks on a different day to visit the lighthouse and the gulf beaches.

Alyson cooked us up some tasty food while we were visiting,
notwithstanding that her oven was out of commission for most of the
time. In fact, Alyson had a near miss when an electrical surge and
fire instantaneously burned a hole clear through her new steel pot! No
more pot and no more stove, but thankfully Alyson escaped the blast
unscathed.

That was the lowlight, now for the highlight:

I think Miriam's highlight was firstly having three cousins to play
with and not least (I'm certain), playing with the schnouzer they were
dog-sitting for the holidays. That girl loves dogs. Miriam's first
words are "mama", "dada", "nana" (for banana and most anything
food-related) "night-night", and "didi"—her closest approximation to
doggy. She also has her own high pitched squeaky version of "woof
woof" too. She understands most things though and has begun following
directions like "Put it in the trash" or "Go get your ball." While I'm
on the topic of Miriam, her current most endearing qualities are that
she frequently gives hugs and pats on the back or comes and sits on my
lap.

So, now that you've read all that cutesy stuff, let me also say that
in Florida we saw alligators! We also saw manatees; For those among my
reading audience who are as uninformed about these things as I was
heretofore, manatees are large seal-looking creatures with flat
beaver-like tails and they bob around in the Florida waterways in the
winter time. The manatees were our most exotic animal sighting.

We also encountered a couple of fat cats at a New Year's Eve party at
a friend's house and some very tame speckled chickens at a neighbor's
house. For the record, you might also enjoy reading the following true
story: My brother, Dean owned some Chinese silky chickens once… A
python slithered into the hen house, swallowed Henny Penny and was
then too fat to slip back out of the chicken coop, so that's how the
culprate was caught—Don't ask me what they did with him.

No pythons spotted on this trip though. However, we did see a couple
of movies in the dollar theatre (which is really a three dollar
theatre): Despicable Me and Mega Mind. Both were good. I liked
Despicable Me best because the characters were endearing. I'd like to
go buy the classic book The Three Kittens which the old crotchety guy
reads to the orphan girls in one of the movie's best scenes.

Alyson and I also had several fun nights staying up to watch her
favorite movie, Wives and Daughters. FYI, any of you Pride and
Prejudice fans out there, Wives and Daughters is a must see movie
based on a book by Elizabeth Gaskell and I dare you to watch it and
not agree that it's even better than P&P. I'm currently reading North
and South, another Gaskell book.

Joe and his nephews had some daily boy time playing Wii games plus a
couple of trips to the laser tag place. Thus, fun was had by all.

Thanks Matkins for a wonderful visit and vacation.