Ia Ora Te Natura - It's Lobster Season

UA PAU TE MAITAI NO TE FENUA
RE ZAI NOA RA TE ORA O TE MITIE

"Bounty of the land is exhausted
But there's still abundance on the sea"

So goes the end of Jimmy's "One Particular Harbour", a nod to Cook's Bay in Moorea - listen to this clip from the end of the song, and you can hear the soprano voices in the background with those Tahitian lyrics. With that in mind, Fred and I hit the open water in search of spiny lobster as the mini-season for lobster began at 12:01am Wednesday morning. ("Mini-season" is a 2 day event that preludes the official commercial lobster season that starts next weekend) It's a lot easier to rise for the 5am wakeup call when there's diving and crustaceans involved, even if it means heading out before sunrise while passing shipping containers on their way into Port Everglades.

The water off the first of Ft. Lauderdale/Dania Beach's 3 reefs was packed with vessels and divers, so after floating behind the boat (Doreen's cousin Jeff drove) and running into divers left and right, we headed a little further south towards Hollywood and ended up with a nice spot without a boat for a mile in each direction. It was my first experience diving for lobster, and it was quite a rush. It takes some patience and a good eye to locate them in the underwater terrain, but once you get used to spotting them, the fun begins. You "tickle" them out of their hole with a stick, then pounce on them with a net as they shoot away from you. I got the hang of it quickly, Fred was an old pro and was digging into the coral outcroppings to get the real stubborn ones. I had to abandon the fight when my oxygen tank hit 50 PSIs (a full tank is ~3000, so there were only a couple minutes of air left) but floated to make sure Fred was OK and was able to get those last few. Plus, he had the catch bag, so if anything happened to him, I needed enough air to go down and get the bag (I mean, help him out)...

In the end, 14 of those suckers put up a good fight but lost the war, and only 1 got away (plus one more female that we didn't notice until back at the dock and let go; luckily we didn't get stopped on the way in b/c that's a pretty substantial fine). Fred and I had a great time and we'll eat good over the next couple of day. And I made it to work by 10:15, which assuredly was not nearly as much fun as diving for lobster. Full pictures here.

Random Links and stuff

Back to the quick hitters - will try and post stuff here instead of emails.

• As if there's a need for another reason to be a Flyers fan... (NSFW)
• The Last Lecture CMU professor passed away last weekend...
• The Spectrum is shutting down, what a shame, Flyers games at the CoreStates/FU/Wachovia Center (while great) just don't have the same atmosphere as those at the Spectrum (nor do Pearl Jam concerts on the Flyers bench). How the Daigneault goal didn't make the list is beyond me...
• Man, you can't even try and be responsible while getting a load on these days...
• Great story about a SEAL who made the ultimate sacrifice...
• Biggest jerk tourists? Not the Americans, but... go figure... THE FRENCH!! F them...
• I'm famous... ok maybe not...
• Don't let old women with poor eyesight loose near the tiki bar!!
• A brothel on wheels, right down on South Beach. Go figure
• And finally, this could be the illegitimate son of any number of people I know.
  

The Phitans

MLB All Star game week has come and gone, thankfully. Chase Utley’s performance wasn’t exactly stellar in Yankee Stadium but at least America got to hear how every Philly fan feels about the bottom-feeders that are New York sports fans. Whatever, he didn’t know his mic was on for introductions, and I’d bet plenty of Red Sox fans feel the same way after Papelbon got booed as well. My enemy’s enemy is my friend, or something like that (even if RSN is becoming the sports version of that friend of a friend that no one really likes). Besides, they might be shipping us their malcontent LF, which would be an interesting mix, to say the least. (I know, I spend way too much time on the700level.com)

At least those neanderthals cheered for John Hamilton and his comeback storybook season. And *had* Utley played the entire game, maybe he could have avoided the disaster of a night that Dan Uggla had – 3 E4’s, 3 K’s, and a GIDP after replacing the 2008 MVP. Me and my “Hit It To Uggla” sign were at Dolphins Stadium on the following Friday night. And finally, a big Chase Utley F You to Billy Wagner, the turncoat Mets reliever who shouldn’t have even been AT the game, much less IN the damn thing, for blowing the lead and costing the Phils home field advantage in the Series this year. Since the AL team will have Games 6 and 7 (again) this year, I’m now a big Tampa Rays fan. Now, if we could only get Selig to schedule a 162 game season against the Braves and their batting practice pitchers.

Making Up For Lost Time

I never realized how little free time I really had (or how much free time I waste) until I tried to do this blog thing a couple times a week. Man, what a pain in the rear... We’ve been working so much on the house at night I haven’t been able to do much typing, let alone get some pics and all up here. Will try and keep
the blogs shorter and more frequent

It’s more than a little appropriate that we now live in Shady Banks. Those of you from the Hoboken days will remember the apartment on Washington St. that Ninja, Rogish and I shared as the “Shady Apartment”, and the 90 Grand place as the “Shady Palace”, so it’s only fitting that Jen and I now live in Shady Banks. The “Shady Shack” does have a ring to it…

Thanks to some super work by Mom and Dad and the Facarazzos last weekend though, it might not have the Shack moniker much longer. We had a backbreaking Saturday that started at 8am and didn’t end until well after the sun went down; the heat, humidity, and lingering effects of the Phillies-Marlins game probably didn’t help matters. It was as productive a day as we’ve had with the house yet though – all three bedrooms are now pretty much set up, the kitchen has most of the stuff put away, and outside is much more organized thanks to the shelves we got from the Heinemann’s getting put together. Jen and I also traveled out to get a fridge, dishwasher, and oven/stove from some guy off of craigslist, so now we’ll actually have a fridge that will keep things cold (and at some point, a real dishwasher). Thanks to Fred, Dad got to get a fully operational powerwasher, and spent a good deal of Sunday afternoon making things clean in the backyard. To end the weekend, we finally got a chance to shove off from our dock, Fred and Doreen took the Sharpes out for their first sunset cruise from the casa.

This weekend was no different - work work work and some play thrown in. Our terrazzo floors were refinshed this week, and although they are still a little hazy, the difference in color was pretty dramatic and as they get mopped up. Since doing the floors required us to move all the stuff the 'rents has just set up, we spent a good deal of the weekend moving that stuff back into place. Friday night was Home Depot, dinner, and sleeping on a mattress in the living room - half of the Frank the Tank pretty good little day. Saturday night turned into the *other* half - after another day of cleaning up, and some great work by James the electrician and his plumber, to get our dishwasher, disposal, ceiling fans, light switches, etc... Jen headed out to a little waterfront place for Catie's birthday dinner, and I was going to drive over and meet them there after finishing up a little more housework. Those plans quickly changed when Fred's boat pulled up with some rum-soaked revelers wanting to join Catie's party. It was a quick cruise to Rendezvous, and we had a good time - and also found out that Cheryl and rum do not play well together. The party continued back at the new place - despite being a mess, we were able to set the Wii up and play golf, tennis, bowling, etc... Cheryl and rum AND tennis definitely DON'T mix!! This of course made for quite a slow Sunday today, but as the weekend winds down we're ready to hit this coming week with plenty more to do - finish the clean up from this weekend's construction, sand down the LR wall, and choose what windows to put in this place.

So much for quick posts... (pictures coming)

Birthday Bash in Lake Boca, and Wii Got a New Distraction

Mark this as weekend #3 that we didn't get a full weekend to work on the house; but I guess you shouldn't feel too bad as we spent most of Saturday on Kim and Jim's boat in Lake Boca celebrating Kim's birthday. (for all you non-Floridians, it's just through the Boca inlet from the Atlantic, it's a couple of feet deep where you can anchor up and hop out). Full pictures here.

Like usual when the gals get together down here, it was quite a day. Even though we probably should have been home working on the house, at 10:30 we hopped on the highway and headed north. Two boats ended up leaving Pompano beach heading for Boca, and eventually there were 5 (or 6 maybe) boats anchored up together for a day on/in the water. Kim's birthday present was this ridiculously large floating "hot tub" type thing that floated behind the boat, and corralled like 8 people at a time. It was even a great place to pass out, as a tired Kelly found out.

Unfortunately the rain clouds started to mass to the west, and even though Captain Jim was ready to weather out the storm for his wife's birthday, the anchor was pulled and Steel Towing and the rest the flotilla eventually headed back south to the relative safety of a Garden Islands harbour. We see some switched college allegiances, some "start-em-early!' parenting, several pool tossings (including the B-day girl), Kelly falling asleep again, and the party continuing despite some rain - gotta love the water-resistant camera. Thanks to Kevin and Belle (oops, wrong wife) for letting the loonies use their pool for the PM version of the party, and to Kim and Jim for having us on the boat!

Sunday brought us some much needed help from the Facarazzo family - both Jen's parents, her grandfather, aunt, uncle, Besty, and cousin all came over to help out. The biggest accomplishment? Setting up the Nintendo Wii, which is going to end up being our biggest barrier to accomplishing our house renovations. If you haven't tried this thing yet, find yourself a middle schooler with one and check it out for a couple of hours. It's definite entertainment, and from the little we have played, it can be somewhat of a workout too (well at least the boxing game breaks a sweat). However, I absolutely suck at Guitar Here (Mike has it) proving that no matter how good I think I am at video sporting games (something Jason and Casey both probably are laughing at) I am still a musical idiot even in a virtual world. Luckily, my wife is even worse than I am at the Wii Sports games, I've beaten her every time (save the first game when I didn't know how to play) in tennis so far. And, in true Sharpe form, she has already tossed the controller and pouted after the game. Our kids are going to be the worst sports EVER...

Independence Day at the Poynte

So we’re off for our first trip since the honeymoon, and as much as I love the Jersey Shore, it might not be entirely the same as Bora Bora. On the bright side, things don’t cost an arm and a leg in Somers Point like they do in French Polynesia, unless you want to count Spirit Airlines, who charges $5-15 to reserve a seat ahead of time (even a middle seat) and $3 for a freaking Sprite. Needless to say, my dissatisfaction with their company continues. Of course I have a price point at which I will fly them regardless of their lousy customer service, but for every $24 round trip like we got for Jay and Trace’s wedding, there’s the 11 hours a flight was delayed from Ft. Myers to ACY years ago (landing on a Monday morning at 5am then having to drive back to Hoboken, THEN go to work) or their refusal to change our tickets last January when I mistakenly booked them on the Monday morning (rather than Tuesday morning) of my Grandmother’s memorial service. So keep sending me $1 fares for Tuesdays and Wednesdays and I’ll continue to use your airline only when it’s convenient AND cost effective. OK… Back to the shore…

The one thing Jen and I have noticed is that time spent “back home” is busy, to say the least. It is almost always a great time and as action packed a travel weekend as you can get, but man do we feel exhausted by the end of the weekend. It’s the unfortunate side effect of having quite a few people who like to spend time with us when we make it home, and for that we feel very lucky… just makes for a tiring Monday morning! I’m sure staying up until the crack of dawn on Friday night didn’t help, nor did the game of Crazy 8’s that had Caniz informing the tiki bar that his wife did indeed wear the pants in this relationship. Mixed in with all of the debauchery was some good time spent watching fireworks, fixing the hot tub, taking a boat ride (and having the inevitable breakdown, just a couple hundred yards from our house), some great eating courtesy of Mom (and white house hoagies from Rogish) and getting to see a whole bunch of family and friends. The highlight of the weekend though (if you can call it that) was Dad flipping the waverunner back in the marshes, then having to get towed in by Dave and Jimmy. A Tom Sharpe waverunner or boat incident is almost an assured event over a Poynte holiday weekend; luckily this didn’t happen when little Jackson Rogish was on board (Alison already nearly had a heart attack letting her boy out there). As dusk settled and the Tall Cedar came back with a Sharpe waverunner in tow (again), the I-95 A-hole song was replaced with Pat Franklin’s song (trying to keep it clean for the kids).

Sunday Recovery Day left us all pretty tired, but we did get to go to AC for Mom's birthday before we left. Lehman drove us to the Philly airport; quick side note, there was NO traffic on the ride up. None. We didn't even slow down at the EZPass lane on the Expressway toll. It was crazy, for a Sunday late afternoon holiday weekend. Thanks to everyone who stopped by for all or part of the weekend, and apologies to those we kept up too late or woke up in the middle of the night. It was really good to see everyone, and even if my body might not be back to 100% until Wednesday, it was certainly worth it.

UPDATE: I'm too lazy and buzy to actually link words to individual pictures, so here's the link to the weekend pictures. Enjoy...

UPDATE2: This is what soldiers look like when they are resting... thanks to lehman...