Saturday, March 29

You know you’re not in Michigan when the trees have coconuts on them and you can sit outside without shivering. I like it.

Coconuts. We’re not in Okemos anymore Toto.

Our trip started last night with Molly’s water polo tournament down in Saline. They did great winning 15 – 0. They’ve won their first two games but didn’t look as good as they could have. At the tournament the whole team clicked into place and they were looking like one smooth operation. Found out today they won every game in the tournament, by good leads. I like it.

After the game Lise and I headed down to stay by the airport. Then it was up early to catch the 6:30 AM shuttle to the airport, followed by a cramped bumpy ride to Miami. I’m talking real bumpy, like people moaning. I had Laverne and Shirley sitting beside me. They were thinking we were about to meet the choir invisible. But we made it safe and sound to balmy 80 degree temperatures. It was 35 degrees in Okemos today. I like it.

The ship doesn’t sail until tomorrow so we’re in a motel near the airport. I’ve heard a lot more Spanish here than English. In fact, the only English speakers have this pasty white pall to their skin. You can spot them glowing down the street. We ate lunch in an Ecuadorian restaurant and we were the only native English speakers. I think we were the only English speakers period. At least the menu had enough English on that we could figure out what we were getting. Plus they had big pictures of the food up on the wall that you could point to. So in the middle of the NCAA basketball tournament we are sitting in an Ecuadorian restaurant watching South American soccer in Spanish. All sportscasters are alike. You don’t need to know Spanish to figure out something great just happened. I like it.

There’s a park nearby that isn’t much more than a running trail around a large pond and some soccer fields in the middle of a built up area. We took a little stroll and got 10 new birds for the year. So far the list is boat-tailed grackle, northern mockingbird, palm warbler, blue-headed vireo, Eurasian collared dove, moorhen, white ibis, green heron, purple martin, and Caspian tern. I like it.