The Blonde Excuse: August 2006 Archives

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August 24, 2006

Florida Part Two

On Sunday, my dad and I drove to Orlando to pick Brent up at the airport. On the way, we saw the smoke from a forest fire:

There was also a huge thunderstorm that made me VERY nervous, but I told it it had one hour to be out of Brent's way and it complied. Brent and I always have so much fun together, and one of the first things we did was the Slingshot. We went on the Slingshot last year too and got videos of ourselves doing it both times. Brent has our DVD right now because he's going to show his family, but I'll try to get a copy of it up on the blog ASAP.

Slingshot:

We survived!

Playing poker back at the condo (Brent lent me sunglasses to look the part):

I won, just so you all know =)

Brent eating:

Brent and I then practiced for our retirement years by playing some shuffleboard:

Later that night, we all went to the Inlet Harbor for dinner and had a beautiful view of the water.

Grandma's drink:

Ponce de Leon Lighthouse:

Brent and Me:

Outside at the Inlet Harbor:

Brent by the pirate ship:

Pretty clouds back at the beach:

The water:

Brent and Me:

All dressed up for our dinner date at Stonewood:

We had a lovely date followed by a movie night in the living room where we had our beds set up.

Brent hiding:

Sleeping:

I looove this picture of my adorable boyfriend:

Aww....

We watched the moon come up over the water and it was beautiful:

Starry sky:

The next morning, we got up early and watched the sunrise:

Later that day, we caught a lizard and Brent named him Jed. He was only a baby and didn't like being our pet so we let him go:

That night, we went to Chili's for dinner with my family:

Grandma, Poppy, and Dad:

Brent, Me, and Mom:

Brent and I did a lot of swimming in the ocean, watersliding at Daytona Lagoon, the local water park, and playing in the pool. Brent's idea of "playing" in the pool is throwing me around nearly drowning me, but it was still fun. Our last night in Daytona Beach, we went to dinner at Aunt Catfish's, an old family favorite.

Poppy and Dad at Aunt Catfish's:

Brent and Me:

Classic picture of Poppy talking to Grandma and Grandma having none of it:

After dinner, Brent and I went outside to feed the seagulls. We started with just one that Brent was throwing food to...

And then we created quite a commotion...

Aunt Catfish's:

The following day, we all went to the Animal Kingdom Lodge in Disney World and Brent and I went to the Animal Kingdom, MGM, and Epcot. Make sure you check back soon for a TON of Disney pictures!!

Posted by lauren at 09:14 PM | Comments (0)

August 23, 2006

Florida Part One

We got to our condo in Daytona Beach on Friday, August 11th for two weeks of sun and that's just what we got! We've had the most amazing weather and a really great time. Brent came down to visit us for the first week of our trip but didn't get here until Sunday, so here are all the pictures I have from Friday and Saturday.

Lizard:

"Cheap Red Wine" in the grocery store:

Kayak:

Pelicans:

Sitting in our living room on Saturday afternoon, I heard a thud outside and saw a very hairy man straddling our window:

I think he was painting, but it was still very unexpected.

I love palm trees:

Saturday night after dinner, we went to Lighthouse Landing for drinks and to watch the sunset. Lighthouse Landing is right by the Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse, site of my very first panic attack as I discovered my fear of heights. Moving on....

Here are the pictures from Lighthouse Landing. They have all sorts of funny signs all around their outdoor bar/restaurant and if you're ever in the area you have to check it out around sunset.

Lighthouse Landing (take the time to read the signs, a lot of them are very funny):

Happy Hooker:

The view:

Crab:

Sea... stuff:

Rope:

Lighthouse Weather Station:

Sunset:

Lighthouse Landing:

These were some of the strangest plants I've ever seen. I guess it's some sort of water plant at low tide with its roots exposed:

This boat is part of the dining area:

I love this tree:

Poppy and Mom:

Mom and Dad:

Grandma and Poppy:

Grandma, Poppy, Mom, and Dad:

Ladder:

Parts of that big tree you saw were entirely enveloped in some sort of web:

I saw what looked like a dog running on water, but it turned out to be... a dog running on water:

This dog jumped out of a boat and just started running, so I think he was actually on some sort of sand bar.

Pretty boat:

Lighthouse Landing has three resident squirrels who are very well fed by the restaurant customers. They're so used to people, that they'll actually come right up to you and use their paws to take food right out of your hands. They're absolutely adorable and last year, Brent and I named them Maribel, Mortimer, and Maurice. We think this one is Maribel:

Inside:

O-BABY:

Just enough tackiness out front:

Lizard:

The beach:

The sky:

Mom and Dad taking a night swim:

Lightning:

These are the same pictures but zoomed in on the lightning:

Sky at night:

That's all for now, I'll update as soon as I can but I'm on the road back to CT tomorrow! Goodnight!

Posted by lauren at 11:41 PM | Comments (0)

Road Trip to Daytona Beach

I know it's a little late to be writing this entry since we're actually leaving for home tomorrow morning, but to entertain myself while we drove for two whole days to Florida, I took a bunch of road trip pictures. I don't pay much attention to the names and/or locations of the things we drive past, so I'm sure I'll get a lot of this wrong.

Some bridge... the Delaware Memorial perhaps?

Lots of traffic:

We didn't stop here, but this is "Mike's Famous Roadside Rest":

The bridge behind us:

Tall grass:

"Matilda's Pub & Barbie" somewhere in Delaware, I think. We didn't stop here either but I liked their kangaroo:

"Be Cool To Yourself," seriously:

I thought these looked like dinosaurs:

Giant pile of... salt?

Cool picture inside the Baltimore tunnel:

I think Davey should be in a Verizon commercial, showing him all over America on his cell phone CONSTANTLY. Somewhere on my computer I have a picture of him standing in a corn field in Nebraska talking on his phone. I'll have to do a "Davey talks around America" collage some day:

Yes, I took pictures of a Maryland rest stop:

Dad, Poppy, and Mom:

We thought we lost Grandma, but it turns out she was just wandering:

Poppy was the co-pilot when it was my turn to drive (Mom took the pictures when I was driving, so that should explain some things...):

Draw Bridge:

Me driving:

Another rest stop:

The usual:

Things we don't see much of in Connecticut:

I want to travel with my own golf carts:

Yes, we are!

A lot of nothing:

Fake rooster on top of a water tower:

Crazy North Carolina weather:

We chose our stop for the night by picking the most expensive hotel in the area which happened to be the Holiday Inn:

We had dinner at the very fancy Outback Steakhouse:

One of the hotel visitors:

A very American water tower:

If any of you have driven down I-95 from North to South Carolina, you've seen South of the Border which makes me think of a Mexican version of Coney Island. As you approach South of the Border, you'll see probably 50 billboards encouraging road trippers to stop in:

We always have a contest to see who can be the first to spot the giant sombrero. It was really foggy, but I won!

South of the Border:

We didn't stop, and probably never will in the future. I think we've all had our fill of Pedro's South of the Border from previous experiences.

Bad-Ass Ladies Don't Drive Mercedes:

The hood ornament on this truck was a flying pig:

Welcome to Florida!

This is one of the straps that was holding our luggage on the roof... hmm....

Luckily all of our things were still securely attached to the roof.

Giant 7-Up can:

At a Florida rest stop...

I got up really close to look for the poisonous snakes, but I didn't see any. I just saw a bunch of most likely not poisonous birds:

103 degrees on the highway in Florida:

Only 88 degrees on the beach where we live!

Luvey Bear sat in the back seat with me:

Welcome to Daytona Beach!

The racetrack that we have never been to:

That's it for the drive, more Florida pictures coming soon!

Posted by lauren at 02:18 PM | Comments (0)

August 20, 2006

Island Beach

First of all, it has been SO long since I last blogged so I wanted to explain myself. We are currently at our summer place in Florida where we only have dial-up internet... ugh. Anyway, my laptop with all my pictures wasn't working with the dial-up internet so I had to wait until I got an AOL CD in order to get online. I probably could have done it some other way, but that's all right, I'm not very technical.

A long long time ago.... probably a couple weeks ago, my grandma, Jocelyn, and I took the ferry over to Island Beach in Greenwich. For those of you who aren't from Greenwich, we have a couple islands off the coast of Greenwich that all town residents have access to during the summer. The ferry route goes right past some of the most beautiful waterfront homes in town, so I took a bunch of pictures of the boat ride and my future residences.

First, here's a picture of the Delamar, the hotel that Nicole Kidman stayed at when she was filming The Stepford Wives here:

Jocelyn:

Grandma and Me:

Pretty house:

Indian Harbor Yacht Club:

The water:

Harbor:

House:

I love the doorway to this dock:

This doorway leads to an underground swimming pool carved out of the cliff this house is on:

Boat:

I want one of these:

These people have a replica of the Brooklyn Bridge as their dock:

I love it:

Jocelyn told me about an island that had a tower on it, so I zoomed in really far and got this picture of what seems to be that island:

The lighthouse on Great Captain's Island:

Island Beach:

Great Captain's Island:

Two boats crashed somewhere in the water, so there was a big police boat "chase":

Island Beach again:

More beautiful homes:

Hopefully I can get Brent out on the ferry with me this summer to see all the houses. Brent might be a very important architect some day so I think he'd like it. Anyway, that's all for now, I'll have Florida pictures up as soon as I can!

Posted by lauren at 04:14 PM | Comments (0)

August 09, 2006

Treadmill Dancing

I'd be lying if I said I go to the gym for anything but the hope that we'll all break out into synchronized treadmill dancing:

Posted by lauren at 03:36 PM | Comments (0)

Sandcastle Contest

Apparently my blog is working again! I don't know if I have one of Jocelyn's blogging genius friends to thank or if it just worked itself out, but thank you to who/whatever saved The Blonde Excuse!

On Saturday, Greenwich had its annual sandcastle contest so my grandma and I went to go check it out. There were a lot of beautiful sand sculptures so, obviously, I took tons of pictures.

The beach:

Greenwich has really embarrassing police vehicles:

Ah, the life of a beach cop:

Sandcastle:

Seagulls:

Sailboat:

Grandma with the seagulls:

2-D sandcastle, "Tods Punzel"

Sea turtle:

Boat:

Alligators:

Castle:

Cars:

I'm not sure... but it looked cool:

Shark:

Train:

Lobster:

Alligator:

Sea monster:

Octopus:

Bug:

I don't have any idea how they got the mouth to stay open like this without collapsing:

Whale:

Mermaid:

Garfield:

A mouth sticking its tongue out:

Shark:

Spongebob Squarepants:

Sea turtle:

Dinosaur:

Mountain of some sort:

Garfield:

Elephant in progress:

Cat:

Hole:

Mermaid:

Cars again:

Rolled-up newspaper:

iPod:

Mermaid:

Pyramids:

Castle:

Doesn't this look like a mountain with pine trees?

Mountains:

This is actually pretty cool... this kid built a half sphere to look like the globe and to draw the lines where the land is, he blew through a straw. I don't know if that makes sense, but here's a picture:

Sun:

Seahorse:

Well, that's all for now. Hopefully I'll be back to blogging more, I've been really busy and I was sort of upset that my blog wasn't working properly. I'm going to bed now, goodnight!

Posted by lauren at 12:22 AM | Comments (0)

August 06, 2006

Happy Birthday Brent!

Friday was Brent's 20th birthday and I got to go up to Martha's Vineyard to see him which was a lot of fun. I only have this one picture, but here's Brent in the new sunglasses I gave him:

Doesn't he look amazing? I get to see him in exactly one week in Florida!

Well, that's all for now.

Posted by lauren at 08:34 PM | Comments (0)

Geoff's Birthday

First of all, there is obviously something really weird going on with my blog. I don't know why it has been blank for so long and I really have no idea how to fix it. Hopefully it will fix itself... and hopefully you can see this entry! Anyway, last Saturday we all went down to PA to visit Geoff, Kari, and Brady for a late birthday celebration for Geoff. Kari made the most delicious dinner of BBQ ribs and mashed potatoes followed by homemade cheesecake...mmmm.

Geoff and Brady: