Monday, February 15, 2016

Week 6 - Beach to Blizzard

Monday was my birthday and we woke up to rain. Since there was limited covered seating at the bar, I suggested we go out for breakfast instead of eating at the hotel. We found the Midway Café online and it looked great so we headed south for a delicious breakfast in a fun place. From there we went to the closest Sandal Factory Outlet, which are all down the Keys and have billboards everywhere. Anne and Rene both bought sandals and I got a Life is Good t-shirt. By the time we left, the rain was over so we headed back to the hotel. The storm had brought in Portuguese man o’ war jellyfish so swimming was out but I was fine with more sitting/knitting to while away the afternoon. We’d gotten muffins at the café so had those with tea mid-afternoon then went to a restaurant recommended by one of the staff for dinner and had the least impressive meal of our trip there. It wasn’t bad, just nothing special. I did get free key lime pie for my birthday but I wasn’t a fan of that either. Cross that off my list. Then it was back to the hotel to pack. We were scheduled to leave the next morning.

Now we’d be keeping an eye on the weather in Omaha, which had a blizzard going on. UNL had already cancelled and Lorri had emailed that 50+ Omaha had flights had already been cancelled. We were flying through Houston and didn’t want to get stuck there so we called the airline and they rescheduled us no problem. Now instead of a stressful day of travel worrying whether we’d make it home or not, we could relax on the beach. But since we were all dressed, we decided to head north for my free Starbuck’s drink and lunch. After a fun lunch in a vintage restaurant, we went back for some kayaking and knitting on the beach. Since we’d had a big lunch, we just snacked for supper, eating all the leftover snacks with chicken fingers from Anne’s lunch. Our new flight was leaving early so we had to be ready to go first thing. It was a lovely bonus day.

We were up and out at 7:00 on Wednesday morning and were graced with another gorgeous sunrise. We’d be driving through rush hour traffic so left 2.5 hours for the drive. We had intended to stop at a Dunkin’ Donuts for road breakfast but never found one so kept driving. We did hit some traffic in Miami but had left the extra time so were nearing the airport with time to kill so got off the highway and found an IHOP for breakfast. We then returned the car, checked in and were ready to go. The flights were both on time and uneventful, even getting in 25 minutes early to Omaha, where my car was mostly blown clear of snow. I was back home at sunset and found my driveway all clear thanks to Tim. Nice. I unpacked and settled in for the night thankful for such a nice travel day after the blizzard.

Thursday was a blur of catching up at work and home. Nora decided that we should do breakfast for my birthday on Friday morning so I got up and out Friday to be in Lincoln by 7:30 only to find that Nora had texted that she couldn’t come. Cindy, Cheryl and I had a mediocre breakfast and headed to work, where the day was another blur of post-vacation catch up. After a stop at Aldi for a big grocery stock up, I headed home for the weekend. I had tons of laundry to do. Go figure. I had lots of other catch up to do and totally enjoyed being home for the weekend after such a nice vacation. I could get used to these winter vacations in warm places. : )




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