Final Days in Tampa

Wednesday - Saturday.  We are getting down to the wire for our visit with J and B.  We contemplated going to one of the beaches on Wednesday or Thursday but, instead, pretty much stayed home.  On Wednesday we did a little shopping, then I decided to pay for our keep by cleaning the window blinds in their house.  And they have lots of windows.  It was a two-day job, but I got all of them, including washing the inside of the windows, except for the two big windows. I left those two for them.  Joe rigged me up a pole in the shower, and I washed and dried each blind, slat by slat.  John told me I was hired and that I could come back next year and do it again.  So instead of sunbathing at the beach, we worked.  Got that out of our system, believe me.  The Florida summer rains finally started today, so we had a little shower about 9:00 p.m.

John got back from Puerto Rico on Thursday afternoon -- he wasn't too impressed with that country, especially the traffic.  Doug and Barbara came over for dinner for Bridgette's tacos, and John was happy to be able to eat food that he recognized.  We had another rain storm tonight, and it looks like we should be getting them every day for the next week or so.

Bridgette had to get blood drawn first thing Friday morning -- she is beginning the process of a physical, so she has lots of doctor appointments coming up.  She's really wanting to get her knee taken care of, even if it requires surgery, so she can get back to her marathon running.  So when she finished at the lab, we picked up Barbara and went to breakfast, then shopping at Beall's (Barbara's request), then came home for a while.  It rained off an on most of the day.  Bridgette took us to UT's marine science lab this evening, which is right on Tampa Bay -- a very nice facility.

Bridgette's boss, Heather, who is the Chair of Biology at UT, has a clear-bottomed kayak here, as well as a canoe, and has offered Bridgette free access to both.   I think that would be pretty cool to float around and be able to see what's underneath the boat.

This is also where UT's boats are docked -- the smaller one in dry dock (which they just pick up the phone and ask that it be put in the water -- my kind of deal), as well as the 50 foot one she went out on this week.  Both Bridgette and John have been around lots of marine labs and university boats, but UT is in a class of its own.

They use huge forklifts here to pick these boats up out of the water and store them in the 3-story drydock building.  I am thinking I should write a grant proposal to get one of these at Roosevelt Lake so I can retire from my job of backing the boat trailer down the boat ramp and into the water, not to mention finding a parking space for my truck and trailer in the skinny parking lot. 

Although it had rained off an on all day, we could see a bigger storm was probably going to land on us in the next few hours.  We were on our way to dinner and the dog tracks, but we knew we were probably on borrowed time.

We got to the race track just two minutes before the first race, and Joe and I actually won $27.40 on it (on a $6 bet).

We thought we would make our fortune here, but unfortunately, that was the only race we won.  John and Bridgette won the 8th race, and it started pouring during the 9th race, so John "manned up" and ran out to get the car, and picked us up under the valet parking roof.  We were in St. Petersburg, so we had to drive back across the bay bridge in heavy rain.  After we got into Tampa, it stopped raining.  And started again.  And stopped.  And started again.  Just like Arizona, we were in and out of the rainy areas all the way home.

Today, Saturday, is packing day.  I got up at 8:10 and went downstairs to find our two nerds e-mailing each other at the kitchen table.  They are getting ready for presentations they will be making at a conference in Minneapolis in 2 weeks.

I tried to get Joe on the move, unsuccessfully, so John sent up the 4-alarm final wake-up call.
Needless to say, they had more success than I did.

John fixed breakfast for all of us, and now they are on their way over to Doug and Barbara's to return the bed that Tyler slept in, and to bring the motorhome over so we can start loading.  We've carried in lots of stuff during the month we've been here, so I hope it all fits again.  We will have to go to the grocery store today too, but Bridgette has to stop by her work to feed the baby seahorses that were born in captivity at UT, and we certainly don't want to miss out on that trip!

AND A YEAR AGO TODAY, JUNE 25, WE WERE FLYING TO PRUDHOE BAY, ALASKA!  What a year we have had!