Tues.-Thurs. 1/29-1/31/13

Today I was surprised to see Joyce (the new volunteer) come in again.  I thought I might have pooped her out yesterday, but she is a gutsy woman.  We put out a lot of new items that had come in yesterday afternoon, but more than half of it was sold by the time we left.  It was another hot day - in the 80's, so after lunch, Dave and I went for a swim in the pool.  We cooked our last dinner and then cleaned out the fridge.  We didn't have too much left over - 3 eggs and a stick of butter which I will take to bingo tomorrow night to give away.

Today was our last day and wouldn't you know it - Dave was throwing something away and cut his finger on a piece of glass that was in the bin.  We drove to the clinic, but it was not a candidate for stitches as it was more of a gouge than a slice.  The doctor put a gel sponge on the wound and then wrapped it up in a huge bandage.  Of course, it is his middle finger so if he raises it, there will be no doubt about his message!  He lost a bit of the meat on the finger and says he will go to any lengths to lose some weight!  We have both been dieting while down here so we will be anxious to see how much weight we have lost in a month.  We went back to work to finish out our day - Dave just had to take it a bit easier.  The bosses surprised us with a lovely thank you card and a cake (there goes the diet)!  They were so nice and good to work for.  We came home (skipping lunch because of the cake and because we are eating out tonight) and did laundry, vacuumed, etc.  We packed the suitcases and the car just keeping out our clothes for tomorrow and a change for on the road.  We ate out at Cody's which was a good choice.  Although we had to wait for a table, it was well worth it.  I went to bingo, but didn't win anything this week.  I said goodbye to some of my bingo buddies and got to bed by 9:30.  I didn't read as long as I normally would as I knew we would be getting up on the early side.

We got on the road at 5:45 AM.  The temp was 62.  We drove up to the Florida border and then into Georgia.  The stories about the cops in GA are true - we saw 11 police cars either at radar traps or having pulled a car over to the side of the road.  I kept strictly to the speed limit and we stopped for lunch in South Carolina.  We saw a bald eagle cross in front of us on the highway which was thrilling!  We soldiered on, changing drivers every three hours until we finally got to Hopewell Springs, VA at 6:30 PM.  This is on the ring road just south of Richmond.  We checked into a motel and walked down the block to an Italian restaurant.  We chatted with the motel manager about how long a drive it is until we hit the Washington beltway and have pretty much decided that we shouldn't get on the road until about 8 AM tomorrow so as to let most of the commuters into DC to get where they are going.  I really hate sitting in bumper to bumper traffic!  We will be home sometime tomorrow and will be happy to sleep in our own beds.

Sunday/Monday 1/27 and 1/28/13

We had a call from Kelly last night saying that she has been battling a cold for the last few days so we won't be going there for dinner tonight.  I'm just glad we got to spend as much time as we did together - we had a great time!  We went out early and picked up four grocery items to last us through Thursday morning (the day we leave to go home) and stopped at the Farmer's market to pick up strawberries for Ed and Betty.  We had an easy drive up to Ed's (about an hour and a half) and only got lost when we were trying to find their place in the park.  Ed, the brat, saw me drive by, but had tried to fool us by moving his car across the street!  We visited for a bit and then jumped in their car for a trip to a place called The Villages.  This place was amazing!  It is a planned area with shops, schools, post office, restaurants surrounded by houses of all sizes: from cottages to million dollar homes.  They don't sell houses here - you purchase a lifestyle!  The place keeps expanding - must be thousands of acres!  We drove to the main square and had a great time walking around taking pictures of golf carts.  Some of them are really duded up.  We stopped for lunch just off the square and then headed back.  We had a lovely day visiting and decided to just snack for dinner as we were both still full from lunch.

Today was another busy day at the store.  I had a helper today - Joyce, who is buying a cottage in Old Saybrook, is down for the winter and I chatted with her on Friday when she purchased a couple of items.  I told her what we were doing down here and she said she thought she might want to volunteer also, so she showed up today and we put her to work.  She is a hard worker and we got a lot done.  We had four deliveries this morning and got most of it out, but the Habitat truck went out this morning and hadn't come back yet when we left so I imagine there will be more to put out in the morning.  We came back for lunch and I took a dip in the pool and dried off in the sun while reading another chapter or two in my current book.  We have enough food for dinner tonight and tomorrow night, but will eat out on Wednesday after we pack the car.

Friday/Saturday 1/25 and 1/26/13

Another busy day at the store.  We had someone come in and buy the long line of cabinets we just put out as well as some lovely front doors that came in last week.  There were lots of smaller purchases also.  I took my camera in this morning to take a few shots of the store.  I don't know if you can tell by looking at them how immense this place is and how stuffed with items to sell.  Dave and I had lunch out today as we then headed down to the beach for a great shell hunt and walk.  The weather is so nice right now - about 75 in the afternoons.  We came home and made dinner and watched a bit of TV tonight.

We worked today as we will be taking off on Thursday.  Saturdays are incredible!  Every day seems so busy, but Saturdays are crazy.  We sold lots of things today from furniture to appliances as well as some office equipment that came in a big truck this morning.  We were both pooped after work, but headed into Largo as they were having a book sale at their library.  One of the other couples that volunteer at the ReStore also volunteer at the library.  It was a humongous building!  It could have swallowed our library 6 times and still have room left over.  Today was $1 a bag so I chose a few books that I hope the kids will like and a few for myself.  This place is so big that it has a permanent bookstore for their nicer donations and a coffee shop where you can also purchase light meals.  We came back to sit in the sun by the pool for a bit.  We will go out for dinner tonight and then I will do some laundry tonight.  Tomorrow we will go to visit brother Ed in Bushnell and then drive to Kelly's for dinner.

Wednesday/Thursday 1/23 and 1/24/13

We had a busy morning with lots of new and used cabinets coming in today.  We were both pretty tired when we got back so we had lunch and then read by the pool before going for a walk.  We ate a little bit early as bingo is on Wednesday nights.  I forgot to mention last week that I won twice for a total of $35.

Well, I didn't fare as well this week - only won $7, but since I only paid $6 to play, I still came out ahead of the game.  We were wicked busy today both selling and moving things out and dealing with new deliveries.  We got some more new cabinets in - I don't know where we are going to put them so they had better hold a cabinet sale soon.  We also got a cute marble topped vanity for a powder room as well as a load of trim boards and cloth blinds.  I had a lady come in looking for a caned chair as she wants to learn how to cane.  I took her number and told her I would keep an eye out while we are still here.  I sat out by the pool with my book for a bit after lunch, but the breeze is picking up so maybe we will go for a walk down on the beach before dinner.  I heard from my brother, Ed, and he and Betty got here on Tuesday.  We will drive up to see them on Sunday.  I also heard from our friend, Pat, who thought we might hook up down here, but she is unable to make it.  She is near Sarasota for a cousins reunion.

Monday/Tuesday 1/21 and 1/22/13

What a wonderful day we had today.  We got up early and drove to Kelly's.  We then drove to Walt Disney's Animal Kingdom where Kelly and her friend, Kim, did an awesome job as tour guides to the park.  It was raining when we got there which was not good news for us, but was perfect for viewing the animals.  They were very active!  We saw a 3-D film on a Bug's Life which was actually 4-D as we were poked in the back by "bugs".  We then went on Safari in Africa which was a wonderful ride through many animal habitats.  We saw elephants, lions, rhinos, hippos, ostrich, zebras, giraffes, etc.  It was truly awesome!  We saw also saw mountain gorillas in another part of the Africa exhibit.  In Asia, we saw some lovely tigers - they were a bit less active, but beautiful none-the-less.  We stopped for a salad lunch and then continued on through other parts of the park.  We saw a show called Flights of Fancy which was fabulous.  We finished by watching the Lion King show - it was amazing and I was in awe of the dancers on stilts!  Dave and I stopped for "breakfast for dinner" at Perkins when we got near to our place.  No one had to rock us to sleep as we were both pleasantly tired from our day.  I will post some of the many photos I took of the animals at the park.

From top to bottom: roseate spoonbill, the Tree of Life (hand carved, portraying animals, mountain gorilla, white rhino, beautiful fish and a lazy tiger.

Today was another busy day at the ReStore.  We had some deliveries from yesterday that needed to be put out on the floor and we also had a lot of customers looking for different items.  I asked to learn the register today as we will be working again on Saturday and there is only one person on the register that day and he is busier than a one-armed paper hanger!  I took in a few sales including debit and credit charges so I think I will be okay on Saturday.  We also had a delivery of new, but discontinued items from a major hardware store - we will finish putting those out tomorrow.  We came home for lunch and then did a bit of housework and laundry.  It is a cloudy day and a bit cool.  The weatherman is predicting sun for the rest of the week so we hope to get out and walk somewhere tomorrow.

Thursday/Friday 1/17 and 1/18

Yesterday, the promised front came in.  We made it to work okay, but shortly thereafter there was a wicked rain and wind storm.  At one point, I looked out and couldn't see our car in the parking lot and we park in the row closest to the store!  The rain continued most of the day, but in a lesser form, and the temps dropped into the low 60's.  Needless to say, we came home after work and stayed in until we were finally able to take a walk around the compound after dinner.  We had two truckloads of kitchen and bath materials come in yesterday - real high-end cabinets and appliances.  The kitchen it came out of must have been huge as there were at least 40 feet of cabinets plus the upper cabinets.  Dave helped the guys get it out onto the floor while I helped customers most of the day.

Today started out quite chilly - mid-40's (I know, that sounds pretty good for at home, but does feel quite cold after the 80's we have been enjoying).  We had a customer come in this morning who bought 20 feet of the new cabinets we just got in yesterday.  I spent much of the morning measuring doors that had been donated so we can get them on the floor.  At about 10:30 a man came in with 10 huge cartons of books to donate!  Sorting and filing those took me 2 hours.  We came home for lunch and then took a long walk on the beach (collecting shells along the way, of course).  It way cloudy and windy this afternoon - temperature at 64.  The waves were about 4 feet so the beach had a totally different feel than the last time we walked it.

Saturday/Sunday 1/19 and 1/20

For some reason, my Thursday/Friday blog didn't publish so I have corrected it, but it is now out of order - oh, well.

We had a phone call from Kelly last night saying she and a friend are going to Animal Kingdom on Monday (MLK day).  We decided we would work today and take Monday off to join them.  We will drive to Kelly's in Tampa and then all ride up in the same car.  We are excited to go as we have never been there.  It was extremely busy today at the store.  There is a lot of traffic in and out of the store on Saturday - I shouldn't be surprised, but I didn't know it could get busier than it has been!  We sold a lot of furniture today.  We had a brand new washer and dryer come in and it was sold in 15 minutes for $750!  We also sold a stainless steel fridge for the same price.  We got a leather living room set in, but I'll bet it won't last long.  We were beat after working so hard so after lunch we just chilled by the pool and then took a walk around the compound before dinner.  No one will have to rock us to sleep tonight!

We went to the Flea Market for fruits and veggies this morning and then did a light grocery shopping.  We are trying not to buy too much as we only have a week and a half to go until we leave.  I have a few meals put up in the freezer that we can eat.  I took a dip in the pool and then read while I was drying.  We then drove to a bird/nature sanctuary down the road and went for a nice walk.  We saw egrets, ducks, and other shore birds, a turtle, but no gators.  I am including a photo on an anhinga drying its wings with a cormorant on the ground.  The white bird is an ibis.  The other picture is of Dave after not shaving! - just having fun with some Spanish moss.  We drove down to Gulf Blvd. and ate at Guppies tonight - very nice.  Dave had a sampler of mahi-mahi, tuna, and wahoo while I had sea scallops.  We are nicely full.

Tuesday/Wednesday 1/15 and 1/16

We had a busy day at the store yesterday.  When we left we stopped for lunch and then took a lovely walk on the grounds of the Florida Botanical Gardens.  They had lots of lovely flowers, trees, plants, herbs, water features.  One of the photos of trees is of a thousand fingers banana tree and the other is a tree covered with Spanish moss.  We walked around a good part of the area and had a nice time.  We then went to the movies to see Django Unchained.  It was a good movie: about slavery with a love angle, lots of blood and a major comedy in places - very unusual.  I usually don't like the blood stuff, but there was so much in such large quantities that it looked fake!

This morning was the busiest day ever at the ReStore.  There was a ton of stuff waiting for us when we came in this morning.  We spent the first hours just putting it out!  Dave brought out an old wooden tool chest, about a hundred years old, filled with tools from the 20's to 40's.  A woman saw it and bought it immediately for $140!  She also bought a number of other items and gave us her number in case anything else old came in.  We had about 50 "grass" shades come in, brand new, and one person bought them about an hour after I put them on the shelves.  I sold quite a bit of furniture today, but we also had a lot of people dropping things off for donation.  Busy, busy busy!  We came home to have lunch and then I did some laundry before coming out to the pool area.  It is supposed to get cooler tomorrow - mid 70's instead of mid 80's.  I know, I'll bet you are all feeling sorry for us.  I promised some of the ladies that I would show up for Bingo again tonight so will get away from the pool and go make some dinner.

Sunday/Monday 1/13 and 1/14

Yesterday was a weak sun day - quite warm, but not a lot of sunshine.  We grocery shopped in the morning and on the way back, we stopped to see something that we learned of at the BBQ.  There is a person nearby who takes in endangered exotic animals.  Your can't enter the yard, but you can look through the chain link fence to see the animals.  There were a boatload of parrots, three beautiful tigers, a bear, and a baboon.  It was quite unique to see the animals in the yard of a regular home and right around the corner from a school!  The animals were well taken care of and looked very healthy.  We came home, did a bit of laundry, baked some banana bread (and a small one for Kelly) and then sat at the pool with our books for a bit.  We drove into Tampa and met Kelly at a mall.  We left our car there and piled into Kelly's car.  She took us for a tour of downtown Tampa and down on Bayshore Drive.  Most of the houses there were in the $1,000,000 range or better - huge homes overlooking the water. We drove to the restaurant, Bern's Steakhouse, and got quite a surprise as it didn't really look like much from the outside.  It had been a grocery store before it was converted.  The inside was magnificent!  Everything was fabulous - from the decor to the impeccable service to the fabulous meal!  Dave had grouper while Kelly and I had steak.  The steaks are aged and cut and cooked to order - it was so tender, you could cut it with a fork!  The meal came with French onion soup, a lovely fresh salad, garlic toast, onion strings, baked potato, veggies (although Kelly and I both opted for extra onion strings as the veggies were marinated in bourbon).  Everything was delish!  We then had a tour of the kitchen, which was enormous - they can cook up to 200 steaks on the grill.  They even had a separate kitchen for the seafood.  The wine cellar was next - room after room of wine, 100,000 bottles there and another half million in a nearby warehouse.  The oldest bottle of wine was from 1815 and sold for $2700!  They had a bottle from the 30's that commanded a small price of $30,000!  We then went upstairs to the dessert room - we sat in booths that looked like oversized wine barrels with one end cut out for the door. We listened to live music while dreamily eating our desserts.  There were many things to choose from, but I decided to have chocolate, chocolate, chocolate - a light chocolate cake with chocolate mousse filling and dark chocolate crust. Kelly had chocolate mousse and Dave had strawberry/key lime tart with raspberry/strawberry sorbet.  Needless to say, we were stuffed when we left - although, I confess, we each had a doggy bag with us.  It was a lovely evening and I highly recommend that if you get to Tampa, you try it.

Today we were wicked busy at work.  Someone had put away the books that came in Friday afternoon despite the note from Doug telling people to leave them for me.  I had to look through every section to find all of the misfiled books - it took me about 45 minute to put everything where it should be.  We had a lot of things in the back that had to be brought out and put in place.  I washed some appliances that came in on Saturday and then, of course, we had the usually buyers and individuals who dropped merchandise off.  We were steadily busy until 11 and the next hour was really slow, but it picked up again for our last half-hour.  We did the pool bit this afternoon as the sun was great!  We haven't decided where we will go tomorrow - I will have to give it some thought.

Saturday 1/12/13

We had a lovely day off today.  We did a few errands and then went to Indian Shores to visit the Suncoast Seabird Sanctuary.  They take in injured birds here and rehabilitate them and release them back into the wild if possible.  We saw owls, pelicans, egrets, boobies, herons, hawks, vultures and assorted smaller birds.  We then walked out onto the beach and took a walk and picked up some shells. We thoroughly enjoyed the experience.  After lunch, we went for a dip in the pool and enjoyed the sun.  Tonight we are going to a BBQ at the complex.  You bring your meat, fish or chicken to grill and a dish to share and just enjoy the company.  Everyone here has been very nice and we have enjoyed chatting with many of the residents.  Most people seem to come at the first of the year and go back home in April although there are some who come for a shorter time and others who live here year round.  We passed a Tastee Freeze building on our travels today.  It dated from the fifties - shaped like an ice cream cone - very funny!  We hear that the weather will be turning next Wednesday and it will get colder - highs of 75!  Such a touch life we have.

Friday 1/11/13

We had another busy day at work today.  I spent some time straightening out the art sections.  They have a lot of donated art and posters in frames and they were all willy-nilly.  I was able to put them into the racks by size so now you can flip through and see what you are looking at.  We had a lot of glassware come in, some old decorated screens and a stained glass window.  The screens went in the first hour.  Someone also bought an old frame that came in this morning - she is going to spray paint it gold and I'm sure it will look fantastic!  We had two 60 inch HD TV's come in and one customer bought it right off the truck as it was being unloaded!  After work we drove up to the Clearwater Marine Aquarium.  We were a bit underwhelmed with most of the aquarium, but we did get to see Winter (of the Winter: a Dolphin's Tale fame).  She lost her tail and was fitted with a prosthetic.  (see photos)  They do a lot of rehab here - turtles, otters, dolphins, pelicans.  The other photo is of a spotted moray eel who seemed to be smiling at us.  They have a trolley that goes across the causeway to another building that features the film.  This building was in much better shape - full of movie memorabilia and showing clips of the films.  They did have a hurricane center which was kind of cool even though the wind seemed like it was blowing less than 50 mph.  The sounds were pretty awesome - electric lines snapping and the sound of rain.  We came back and sat by the pool for a bit before dinner.  Kelly texted us and we found a meeting place for Sunday night.  We will meet at a shopping mall and she will drive us to the restaurant.

Thursday 1/10/13

Another beautiful day in Paradise!  We were busy again today at work.  We had about 20 of the small TV's go out today along with some of the larger ones.  We sold a lot of tile and some cabinets.  Dave and the guys put out 20 or so counter tops today that came in from the manufacturer and we sold two of them in an hour.  I spent an hour or so straightening out the cabinet doors and drawer fronts.  They were a big hodge-podge and I organized them by size and design.  The display looks so much better now and I even sold a pair of doors to a customer just after I was done.  We came home and after lunch went to the pool to swim, relax and chat with some of the other residents.  There are a lot of people here from Canada, but we chatted with a man from Long Island, another from Chicago, some ladies from Ohio, and a fellow math teacher from Kansas City.  We had leftovers for dinner tonight - yummy!  We had a near disaster last night as Dave and I realized that we had each come away from the condo without our house keys!  Fortunately, there was a lady playing bingo who had a key to the office.  Everyone leaves a key with the office in case of an emergency and this certainly was one!  It took quite a while to find the key to the lock box where all the keys are kept, but we finally located it and got in okay.  I dropped the extra keys through the slot in the office door on the way to work this morning as the office is only open from 9 to 12.  We now ask each other if we have the keys whenever we leave - we might not be so lucky the next time!  We talked to Kelly last night and we may go out to dinner together this weekend.

Wednesday 1/9/13

Another beautiful day!  We were busy at the ReStore again.  We got in 40 13 and 1/2 inch TV's in carrying bags.  I'm not sure where they came from, but at $15 each, I'm sure they won't last long on the floor.  Dave helped a woman put a huge flatscreen TV into the back of a Cadillac - he hoped she would have help getting it out when she got home as it was heavy.  I helped some people pick out tile and find some wood for shelving.  We also moved some of the merchandise out that had been around for awhile.  After work, we stopped for a salad and then drove to Fort DeSoto.  There was hardly anyone there!  We walked around the fort (Spanish/American War vintage) and then down the beach to a pier where we watch the fishermen for awhile.  The greatest populations on the beach were the gulls and oyster catchers (see photo).  We came home and I got in the pool for a bit.  It got up to 89 degrees at one point this afternoon.  We had seafood casserole for dinner.  They seem to be setting up for bingo at the club so I may join them for a bit.

Tuesday 1/8/13

Wow!  It was a perfect day!  Bright sunshine and in the low 80's.  Dave and I spent the first part of the morning dealing with a truckload of donations that came in.  There were a lot of chairs and a huge assortment of paints, weed killers, and grout from Home Depot.  We then rearranged the tile area.  It was a huge sprawling mess.  We lined up about a dozen pallets and put the tile in categories by type, size and color.  It looked so much better when we were done, but we were both hot and sweaty!  We came home to find the repairmen waiting for us.  They discovered that the oven was wired incorrectly - it only was getting 120 volts instead of 240 so they took care of that.  Obviously, the owners of the condo have never used the oven.  I spent some time in the pool this afternoon, but not too long as I don't want to get burned and the sun was hot.  I made quiche for dinner.  I think we will head to the beach for a walk tomorrow after work - it is supposed to be lovely for the next week.

Monday 1/7/13

We had a busy day at the ReStore.  I began the day by labeling the bookshelves so hopefully people will sort the books as they come in.  We had quite a bit of merchandise come in to the store today.  As it comes in we clean it and get it out on the floor.  We also test it if it is an appliance.  We got a cute little roll-top desk in this morning and it was sold by 10:30!  It went for only $35 which is a real steal.  The prices are awesome.  We sold a home gym (like the ones you see advertised on TV) for $75 and a cherry dining room table with two leaves and six chairs for $125!  One man came up to me and said he was looking forward to sleeping in his own bed tonight.  I asked him if he had been traveling and the said he was a guest at the Sheriff's hotel.  It didn't dawn on me until later that he meant he just got out of jail!  (Boy, I can be really clueless sometimes!)  We stayed busy all morning and then went home for lunch.  The property manager came by to tell us that the home owners have a service contract on the oven and that the repairman would be out tomorrow afternoon.  I sat by the pool for awhile until the clouds came in.  We decided to go out to dinner tonight so we drove down to the beach.  We found a place called Seabreeze - the food was good.  Dave and I had hogfish, which doesn't sound appealing, but was quite delicious.  The waiter was very friendly and we sat next to two chatty women.  One of the ladies had her dog tied outside of the restaurant and we could see her through the full-length windows.  She fed the dog some french fries so Dave gave the dog a piece of his fish because he thought it might like some protein.  It is raining lightly now, but we hear that it will get up into the 80's tomorrow (if we can believe the weatherman!).

Sunday 1/6/13

We decided to have a lazy day today.  We did some laundry, vacuuming and grocery shopping and then whiled away the time, for me, out by the pool and for Dave, shaping a new wooden spoon.  We have a call in to the real estate agent as our oven does not seem to be working.  He is supposed to come over this afternoon to see if he can fix it.  I had baked chicken last night, but when it was supposed to be done, it was still raw - yuck!  We dined on stuffing and vegetables!  It was quite foggy this morning, but the sun came out after a while and it got up to 80 degrees for a while.  The clouds are coming in now and we are supposed to get heavy rain tonight.  Tuesday and Wednesday are supposed to be great days so maybe we will get to the beach.

Saturday 1/5/13

We woke up to overcast skies today, but it was warm.  We went to the nearby Wagon Wheel/Mustang Flea Markets.  They sold everything there - from junk to some pretty nice merchandise.  Dave bought a pair of flip-flop sandals as his last ones bit the dust last year.  There was some great looking produce for sale so we will keep that in mind for next weekend when our supply is low.  We came home and after lunch drove down to St. Petersburg to visit the Haslam's Book Store.  They have over 300,000 books for sale - new and used, but their prices were a bit out of whack - $1 for a used paperback?  I did find some nice birthday cards.  We then went down the street to visit the Florida Craftsmen Gallery.  They had some lovely things for sale, but the prices were astronomical!  The atmosphere was a bit hoity-toity also, so we just looked.  We stopped for gas - $3.07!  That is the cheapest we have seen.  It seems to range up to $3.34, but even that is cheaper than it is in Connecticut.  We had a few peaks of sun, but it is clouding up again - supposed to rain tomorrow.  I'm not sure what we will do tomorrow in the rain, but we will think of something.  We may postpone going to the aquarium or museums though as tomorrow is the last day of school vacation for the kids here so most places will be busy.

Friday 1/4/13

We went to work today for the first time.  I spent a little while cleaning appliances so they could go out on the floor.  Afterward, the manager asked me if I would straighten out the book section - a busman's holiday.  What a mess!  It took the rest of the morning to make some kind of sense of the mess, but I did manage to finish just before our quitting time at 12:30.  Monday I will label the shelves so that customers can figure out what they are looking at.  Dave loaded several trucks of furniture, kitchen cabinets, floor tile for customers.  This is a very busy ReStore - they had a lot of customers throughout the morning.  We came home and had lunch and then had a quiet time reading.  I promptly fell asleep and had a lovely nap.  The weather was rainy this morning, but it has cleared up now - cloudy, but no rain.  We plan on a low key afternoon and then dinner.  We will have to make a plan for tomorrow as it will be cloudy again with rain predicted for Sunday.  I'm sure we can find some inside things to do.  

Thursday 1/3/13

We drove to the Habitat ReStore this morning to see where we will be volunteering.  It is only about 15 minutes away from the condo (at least at 9 AM - it may take longer to get there for an 8:30 arrival with commuter traffic).  The manager, Doug, and assistant manager, Glenn, were very nice.  They sell much of the same items that we have at the local ReStore - furniture, fixtures, doors, windows, appliances, knick-knacks, etc.  We will begin tomorrow and work half days 8:30-12:30 M-F.  Doug is not sure what we will be doing yet, but I'm sure he has some projects in mind.  We came home and had lunch and then did a bit of laundry.  The weather was rather misty this afternoon so we decided to go to the movies to see the new Jack Reacher film.  Tom Cruise, who isn't my favorite actor, did an excellent job portraying Jack if you can forget that in the books he is 6'4"!  Dave and I both enjoyed it.  We didn't get home until 6:30 so had a quick dinner of eggs (breakfast for dinner as the kids use to say).  We will probably watch a bit of TV and then hit the sack.  I will upload the photos that should have gone onto yesterday's blog.

Wednesday 1/2/13

We ate dinner last night at a family restaurant around the corner – it was quite tasty.  We came back and watched a bit of TV before going to bed.  We slept through until 5:30, which is quite good for us.  We had breakfast of banana bread which we had brought from home and then showered and went to meet Kelly, Lana, and John at the Tampa Zoo.  We had a wonderful morning walking around and watching the animals.  When we first arrived, a zookeeper showed us a three-banded armadillo – he was very cute (see photo).  Dave fed the lorikeets and a giraffe – he loves to feed the animals (see photos).  We drove across town to have lunch at Bahama Breeze.  We were able to find a table outside on the patio and the food was delicious.  Dave had a Cuban sandwich and I had fish tacos – yummy!  When we left Kelly, Lana and John we drove back to our neighborhood and went grocery shopping.  Now we have enough food in the house so we don’t have to eat out unless we choose to.  We will have dinner soon and then probably settle in for the night as it is supposed to rain tonight.  We didn’t take a walk today, but I figure we walked quite a way at the zoo.  I just noticed I am low on power so will have to import the pix tomorrow.   

New Year's Day Tuesday 1/1/13

Happy 2013!  We slept like rocks last night and woke up refreshed and ready to go.  We had breakfast in the motel and got on the road at 7:15.  The temperature was a balmy 50 degrees!  We drove on through without stopping for lunch as we had crackers and water in the car and made it to the condo at 2:45 PM.  We had clear sailing on the roads except for a slowdown on Route 301 due to a traffic accident.  It is 78 degrees here and sunny!  We drove 480 miles today so after unloading the car, we went for a long walk around the area.  It felt good to stretch our legs.  We found a grocery store just around the corner so later we will make a grocery list and get enough food to last until the end of the week.  The condo is great!  It has a bedroom, a bathroom, a small kitchen, a small lanai and a large living room/dining area.  The living room has a sleeper couch.  There is a flat screen TV in the living room and another in the bedroom.  There is a tennis court and two pools on the property.  We are at the clubhouse now using the free wi-fi.  We called Kelly Flynn when we got here and we are going to the zoo tomorrow with her, Lana and John.  Lana and John will be flying back home on Thursday so we are excited to see them while we are down here.  Well, we are both getting hungry so I guess we will walk down the street to get something to eat.  We noticed a pizza place and a family restaurant on our walk today so we will flip a coin to see which one we will patronize.