Many people would be thrilled to have a fridge full of food, but it’s not really my preferred state of affairs.

One reason is that I enjoy having options.

Like when I say to Michael, “Wanna go to (name almost any of St. Croix’s fabulous restaurants), or eat at home?” He’ll say with his usual adamant decisiveness, “Either way’s fine with me.” Then I’ll say, “Okay let’s go out to ____, so I don’t have to cook.” And off we’ll go.

Last week, however, we bought a bunch of beautiful locally grown produce at the farmers’ cooperative market (spending under $20) and it has taken us the entire week to get through it all. We bought eggplant, green pepper, beets, okra, cucumbers and cherry tomatoes. I got some cilantro at the grocery store and we had celery, onions, garlic and carrots, so there were a million lovely vegetarian possibilities.A friend gave me a huge papaya that took us three days to eat. We actually grilled some of it – yum!

We made mango gazpacho with some of the cucumber and tomatoes and cilantro; we steamed the eggplant and mixed it with green pepper and onion to serve over pasta or make into mini pita pizzas; we used more tomatoes for breakfast egg sandwiches; I fried the okra for dinner last night (that was the entire meal); and Michael steamed the beets to make his famous beet salad. He will create dinner tonight because I will be working late.

We’ll still have stuff left. I’ll probably make another batch of mango gazpacho and we’ll have it for lunch on Friday. We’ll go out for dinner some night this week-end, and be a little less avid at the farmers’ market when we get there.

When there’s too much food in the fridge I can’t easily find what I’m looking for.

I can’t believe it happened to me. There was no warning at all. A few weeks ago we were with a group of people and the conversation turned to the subject of centipedes. We all agreed that before one encounters a centipede, there is usually a dream or some sort of premonition-type incident. It’s happened to me before. For some reason the though of a centipede enters my mind and shortly thereafter, I will see one scurrying across the floor.

Quite a few years ago while I was asleep in bed, a centipede walked across my foot. My subconscious knew exactly what it was and I woke with a start and kicked that leg hard so the critter went flying out of the bed and into the corner of the room. The lights were turned on and I was able to kill the bugger before it did any damage.

Last night, I received my first actual centipede bite. We had been sleeping for a couple of hours when I felt a pain in my lower left calf. I said aloud that I’d just been bitten, but Michael thought I was talking about a mosquito bite. It didn’t hurt that much at first, but I did shuffle around to turn the light on because I was pretty sure what it was.

Michael was startled by the bright light, but he got up and moved the covers aside exposing the 4-inch long culprit. He grabbed his flip-flop and hit it. The centipede merely sunk into the soft sheets and quickly wriggled away. My leg was starting to hurt by now, so I went into the bathroom to get something to put on it, while he tried to find it again.

He finally did and was able to dispatch it quickly while I applied “wounded warrior” to my injury. It soothed and cooled the bite for a minute. Then I put benedryl sting stop on it and Michael got me some ice. It was throbbing and painful, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep for a while. Finally after an hour and a half of reading, we were able to drift back off.

This morning it was still a little sore, but we walked the Southgate beach in search of turtle activities (a leatherback had come up during the night!), and the leg was fine.

My first real centipede bite in almost 16 years of living here. And without warning. I need get my mojo back or something….

Lots of mangoes are falling from the trees now. But this year they’re falling at a pretty manageable rate. We processed a bunch of them this morning after we made a gigantic papaya and mango salad with passion fruit yogurt sauce. Yes, the passion fruit that we planted around the pool deck is starting to come now, too.

I love passion fruit. I love the unruly vines, the fragrant flowers and the tart juicy seedy slimy insides. Michael doesn’t like the seeds, so we usually scoop out the pulpy insides and run them through the blender to loosen the fibers from the seeds, then strain the juice into a bowl or cup for use in smoothies or just to drink.

There are still a couple of mangoes in the bowl that should ripen tomorrow or the next day.

We will bring whatever falls tomorrow, along with the ripening ones to our massage clients. They have a three kids and a live-in nanny to feed. And they all love mangoes. To eat, in smoothies, in daiquiris, etc.

Yesterday I made a mango upside-down cake. My first attempt at it. It’s just okay. Needs cinnamon. Maybe I’ll get some vanilla ice cream. That’ll help us eat it faster. Next on my list is a mango cheesecake. But we’ve gotta eat this one first.

Another new and exciting outlet for the abundant fruit this year is a sorbet shop which just opened in Gallows Bay. The proprietor used to wait tables at the Galleon. We’ve seen him most recently at the Buccaneer. He told us what his next venture would be and that he’d be looking for any local fruit for his sorbets.

Great! So besides giving them to friends and clients, we can bring stuff there!

I hope his business does well so we don’t start drowning in fruit again.

….Puerto Rico and St. Croix.

Okay. This will be easy since we have just returned from a week in Rincon, on the west coast of the “enchanted island”.  A surfer’s paradise.

Both places are green and lush and have nice beaches, warm weather year-round and warm sea water. Both places have lots of people who speak Spanish and English quite well. Both places have nice, friendly people working in the tourism industry. Both places have tons of mangos falling from trees and rotting all over the place during this time of year. Business is slow this time of year for restaurants and bars frequented by tourists.

Here’s where our experience of each place differs. There are many more roads in Puerto Rico. They are much better maintained  than our, at least in the communities we drove in. Maybe they are able to maintain their roads better because they roads are so small. Many of the “two-way” streets we drove on were barely wide enough for one compact rental car. And with people parking on the sides of many of these roads, they were practically impassable.

Other differences: Our restaurants are sooooo much better. Better food, better atmosphere, better presentation, better wines…..The servers were all very nice and helpful, but the food was not even in the same ballpark.

Our first night there, we went to a local place which came highly recommended by the people at our guest house. It was kind of a shabby looking place, but the owner is a fisherman and they always have fresh local seafood. We ordered two different local wines by the glass to go with our tuna and mahi entrees. Ugh! The wines were sweet red wines! We were forced to order a bottle of Castillo del Diablo, a familiar red to get us through the meal. The bottle was only around $20. The entrees were $8.00 each and came with choice of heavy starchy fried or boiled side dish (yucca, green or ripe plantain, yam, tostones…..). The fish was gristly,  the cuts small, and served on styrofoam plates.. We ate most of it, though and tried a local “corn” ice cream (served in styro with plastic spoons) for dessert. It was interesting. Not very creamy, though, and we drank our sweet local wines with that.

Whew! Since we had cooking facilities in our room, we bought a few items for snacks and breakfast for a few days. I usually boil some eggs which we have with english muffins or bagels and cream cheese instead of having to go out every morning. There’s not much in the way of breakfast restaurants in the area either. There was one that looked interesting, so Sunday morning we went looking for it. They advertise 100 different garnishes and hot sauces for their bloody marys. That was a big selling point for me. But by the time we got there, breakfast was over. I had a bloody anyway (there were 4 hot sauces, and the garnishes were a lime and a celery stick), and it was okay. Michael tried a rum drink. Drinks were served in plastic  cups. The food was just okay here, too. I had a taco salad or something and Michael had fish tacos. Not memorable, but not bad.

Pizza signs abound on Puerto Rico. We wanted to rename it Pizza Rico. We never got pizza out, but the subliminal thing must have worked because we bought a frozen pizza from a health food store to have one night in our room. We ended up having it for breakfast one morning.

I really wanted to have a nice veggie omelet with home fries and toast for breakfast one morning with a bloody mary or two, but the rest of the times we went out in search of recommended places, they were closed or not at all up to par. One place was a bakery. Highly recommended. I really didn’t want to try it, but Michael insisted. Well, it was gross. Slimy kid snot on all the tables, flat omelets and frozen, fast-food-type hash browns.I didn’t want coffee, and could not get a bloody, so I ordered a beer. They looked at me like I had five heads. Whatever.

Our last morning we drove way out to a place at the top of a windy ridiculously narrow road for what promised to be an awesome breakfast. They were closed for the month. There is a “slow season” in Rincon, between the winter tourist season and the summer Puerto Rican season, when PR families with kids travel out to the resort areas. Ha ha ha. So we went to a hotel/condo restaurant right on the beach. It was 10:29. They stopped serving breakfast at 10:30. Hahahahahaha.

We had found a place with a breakfast buffet a few days earlier. Michael called ahead to make sure they were still serving, and they were – for fifteen more minutes. We told them we’d be there in ten minutes, and they did make us a nice veggie omelet, but I couldn’t get a bloody because the bar wasn’t open yet. Oh well. I eventually got one and Michael had one of their Pirata Cofresi special rum drinks served in a coconut.

For our last evening there, we decided, after some deliberation, to go to a nice-looking place just up the hill from our guest house and a few doors up from the place with the corn ice cream. They had decent wines and a nice looking menu. We sat outside. The only other occupied table was inside. It was a dark and stormy night……and we felt like eating lobster. They had a few different preparations like thermidore, scampi, stewed, in butter sauce, with onions, etc. We started with a bowl of delightful French onion soup, and had a lobster thermidore and a lobster scampi. with the requisite choice of bland starches. We were surprised when they brought each of us a small “salad” (ice burg shreds with a hard pink tomato slice – and french dressing). We thought, “okay the place is much more expensive than the others we’d been to, so the lobster should be good”. Well, it was just okay. The thermidore consisted of a few chunks of lobster in a half shell, swimming with frozen vegetables in a cheez wiz  sauce. The scampi was better, but they used garlic powder and not fresh garlic.

A couple of nights before this, we were on our way back from a disastrous “day trip” and came upon a seaside restaurant where we were greeted very warmly by the host and waitress, served a nice wine, and a fabulous meal. The place looked over a surfer’s beach in the town called Isabela. The entertainment was great. As the surfers caught small but rewasonable waves, we watched grackles in a coconut palm performing their mating rituals.

We started with a cup of cream of plantain soup. It was good, and the seafood ceviche was nice as well. We shared the “best mofongo in Puerto Rico”and loved it, although we hadn’t tried all the other mofongo, so we couldn’t really vouch for their claim. This was our best meal of the whole trip, so I didn’t want it to end. We even had cheese flan  and nice Puerto Rican coffee for dessert. Yum!

So, in the restaurant department, St. Croix is definitely superior.

Because of the rough seas /crappy weather, we only snorkeled once, at Steps Beach. It was beautiful though. A little murky, but fabulous elkhorn corals, lot of sea fans and fish and a ham of a hawksbill turtle. She swam right up to Michael begging to have her picture taken. He took some video of her, which will appear somewhere on this blog sometime in the future.

The Rincon rea as a whole seemed pretty safe. It was quite disconcerting to me though, that there were big signs all over proclaiming: “Pelligro! Zona de Tsunami!”

Yikes! That’s gotta be pretty bad for tourism! I did lie awake a couple of times wondering if the sea would disappear while we were there and then return to sweep us away. I imagine there is some sort of alarm system, but who knows…..

The guest house we stayed in was chosen by me. It was a little off the beaten path, not in Rincon proper. I wanted to stay there because the sea frequently hits the building. Our room was on the second floor, and we commonly felt the entire house shake when the waves were larger. Our hosts were in the room directly below us. They must have gotten splashed a lot.

A couple of times, we walked right off the porch onto the beach, and walked in the sand (with a few rocky areas) among the waves for an hour or so. It’s an interesting place to be, but I’m too nervous to ever live in a place like that.

It was nice enough. It differed from SunDog House in that it was a smaller space than we’re used to. An electric two burner stove top wouldn’t have worked in a power outage. It had a jacuzzi tub, which also wouldn’t have worked in a power outage. It lacked a pool, dogs (of course), and it wasn’t as clean as our house.

It was on a side street, but there was frequent loud traffic at all hours. It was charming in that horses were ridden by a few times and the cat, Irene, was friendly and cute.

All in all, our vacation was not as good as we expected it to be. But the company was good, we read a few interesting books (discovered a new-to-us author!) and had a change of scenery.

We’ve gotten quite a few more inquiries for the rental, but mostly from people with children. We can’t have children at SunDog House because the dogs are afraid of children. This is because some of our former neighbors allowed their mini hoodlums to throw rocks and sticks through the fence at our wonderful four-legged kids.

Fortunately those neighbors are gone. Unfortunately, our dogs are still very wary when other peoples children are around. We can’t risk a child making the wrong move and getting hurt by one of our dogs, and we don’t want our dogs to be afraid of our guests. Not a good precedent for future guests….

Friends or relatives (without children) from off-island can help contribute to the continued rescuing of animals on St. Croix by staying at SunDog House (or getting massages from Ambrosia Body Care).

We have purchased a nearby property which we’d like to develop into another sustainable short-term rental property/pet adoption center. We will not be able to do this without the support of our local community to get us through the slow season.

So far this month I have spent over $600 on dog food and medication. Not every month is this expensive, but this month I bought three months worth of  Revolution. I buy some of the meds in bulk for a discounted price from one of our local vets (Duke Deller is the only one who gives me a discount on revolution, which is quite expensive, but it takes care of fleas, ticks and heartworm).

So that’s the scoop. We’ve not been able to do a thing with that other piece of property because there is not an extra penny. We’re still paying off the credit card bills from getting SunDog House together.

Tell your friends and relatives (who love dogs, care about the environment and don’t travel with their kids) to come visit us soon! 

The sun rose. Lots of people woke up before it did. Many went into town to start the grueling triathlon. Many actually finished. A few people won in their categories. For all that information, you can check the newspapers.

This is what we did:

We slept in. We played with the dogs, took them for walks around the yards and did yoga. We ate bananas with our Dean’s Beans organic coffee and had a late, lazy breakfast of omelets and toast.

Michael then began the gutter-on-the-carport project while I did dishes and laundry. I went out to help Michael with the project and we didn’t quite finish before it was time to get ready for our 4pm triathlete massaging appointment.

In past years, we have volunteered in the massage tent. We don’t any more. I need my hands to make my living. At my age, I can’t really afford to spend hours giving free massages. Besides, how many of our numerous local triathletes  (many of whom get free massages on the day of the race), actually have supported Ambrosia Body Care over the years?

One.

And that was for a few months, around 5 years ago.

We do a lot of other volunteer work around the island, so we don’t do this particular thing anymore. We did help clean up the roads last week. That was a blast. I’m tired of picking up after the lazy slobs of this island, too. But we did it to show our support for the island-wide team effort.

Anyway, all told, when the visiting athletes have gone back to reality, we will have massaged around a dozen triathletes. Some before the race and some after. I love listening to their stories. Most of them complained about the heat this year. One guy lost his bike computer because the roads are so bumpy that the rattling loosened it to the point that it fell off.

But he says he’ll come back next year. His wife wasn’t so sure, but she says that every year. This was their fourth year competing.

We look forward to seeing them again.

I know that my ‘inbox’ is always full of stuff from Humane Societies and Environmental organizations. I usually delete them because I have enough to do right here in my back yard as far as animal welfare and environmental protection go. Besides, I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night being reminded of the atrocities animals fall victim to at the hands of screwed-up people.

Anyway, I’ve been wanting to do this for over a year, so here’s a letter to our local senators which anyone can copy and paste onto an e-mail to our them. It IS an election year, after all. Let’s get this territory to enforce the well-written laws against animal cruelty.

I’m sending this to

Adlah “Foncie” Donastorg  712-2252 AFD@legvi.org

Nellie Rivera-O’Reilly 712-2280 teamnellie@gmail.com

Sammuel Sanes 712-2251 sammuelsanes@yahoo.com

Wayne James 712-2216 wagj91461@hotmail.com

Michael Thurland 712-2321 senatormichaelthurland@msn.com

Craig Barshinger 712-2261 craig@visenate.org

Terrence Nelson 712-2210 positive__1@hotmail.com
That’s a double underscore before the “1”

Neville James 712-2277 njames3033@yahoo.com

Usie Richards 712-2276 senatorrichards@hotmail.com

Dear Senator,

“According to a 1997 study done by the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) and Northeastern University, animal abusers are five times more likely to commit violent crimes against people and four times more likely to commit property crimes than are individuals without a history of animal abuse.

The FBI has recognized the connection since the 1970s, when its analysis of the lives of serial killers suggested that most had killed or tortured animals as children. Other research has shown consistent patterns of animal cruelty among perpetrators of more common forms of violence, including child abuse, spouse abuse, and elder abuse. In fact, the American Psychiatric Association considers animal cruelty one of the diagnostic criteria of conduct disorder.
If you break it down to its bare essentials:
‘Abusing an animal is a way for a human to find power/joy/fulfillment through the torture of a victim they know cannot defend itself.’
Now break down a human crime, say rape. If we substitute a few pronouns, it’s the SAME THING.
‘Rape is a way for a human to find power/joy/fulfillment through the torture of a victim they know cannot defend themselves.’
Now try it with, say, domestic abuse such as child abuse or spousal abuse:
‘Child abuse is a way for a human to find power/joy/fulfillment through the torture of a victim they know cannot defend themselves.’
Do you see the pattern here?”
The above paragraphs are from the website: www.pet-abuse.com/pages/abuse_connection.php

Since, in this territory animal abuse is actually a crime (we have very comprehensive animal protection laws), it behooves us to make certain crimes committed against animals are acknowledged and dealt with accordingly.

This can only happen if the animal wardens hired by the Animal Welfare Center are able to enforce the law. The police department rarely if ever responds to cases of animal abuse and neglect, so we must give the wardens status as peace officers so that the victims of numerous and often heinous crimes are truly protected.

Please sponsor, co-sponsor, or at least support a bill to bestow peace officer status on the animal wardens to help make our islands a safer place for all of us.

Thank you.

Our one remaining cat (at one time we had ten cats, along with the twelve dogs) is named “OK”, for “Orange Kitty”. He showed up a little while after “OJ” another orange tabby. It was a time when they just kept showing up. I was ready for the next one, with the name “OL” (continuing with the alphabet, but also a sort of submission to the will of the universe which kept them coming to us…….”oh well, another one”). But we haven’t had to use the name.

I call OK “Bigmouth” too, because he talks a lot. He’s our last living kitty. Right now.  We generally lose someone when we go through major trasnsitions. Milo didn’t survive the opening of SunDog House.     Of course I blame myself. But Milo had been playing with fire for years. He’d used up more than nine lives living amid the dogs who killed many of the others.

Anyway, the other day as I was going out to the pool deck for my morning yoga session. I opened the door to a bird head. OK ,the cat had killed a dove and eaten almost all of it! The head remained attached to the heart and lungs by a blood vessel. The tail and wings and a few feathers were scattered about. There was blood smeared all over the new tiles.

“BAD CAT! I’m not going to feed you now!”

That’s actually what I used to call Milo, because he’d sometimes pee on people to mark them as part of his territory. In any case, this goofy cat had killed a Zenaida Dove and eaten it. It wasn’t a small bird, either.

OK looked pretty smug, but I told him that those birds are slow and stupid so I was not impressed. I secretly wondered, though, how he could have dragged a bird a third of his size to the porch and consumed it almost entirely. At least he had cleaned himself up.

Quite a few years back, Milo dragged one into the house through a cat door. He left the carcass on the living room floor and when I arrived home,  looked at me with feathers on his lips. I had to laugh. He looked so funny.

I was not laughing this time, though. I could hear the dead dove’s mate in the trees, calling for it, with no reply.

It’s been almost two weeks since I found the puppy with the broken leg on the side of the road.  It took the vet more time than it should have to pin his leg, for various reason (a hawksbill turtle took precedence – a second opinion about the x-rays, etc) , but it was finally done.

Poor baby, his femur was snapped in half!

Anyway, we picked him up on Friday morning and were presented with a bill for over $800!!!

This was two days after paying over $300 for a dental for Goliath. Talk about sticker shock! No “Good Samaritan” discount, no “you’ve been a good client for 15 years and have lots of animals which will need care for many years to come” discount, no discount for paying with cash or a local check rather than a credit card.

After a really slow work week during what is supposed to be our busiest time of year, I was beside myself. This year we missed all of the auction/fundraisers due to lack of funds, and you haven’t seen any restaurant reviews for the same reason. Oh well. Puppy chow is now on our menu. Harvey’s not eating it.

We named him Harvey, because last year, for Michael’s boss’ 70th birthday party (what do you give to a guy who can have anything he wants?), we prepared a proclamation which declared that the next 4-legged child we’d adopt would be his namesake. And he’d be the “Dogfather”.  So the puppy’s  official name is Harvey R. Clapp IV.

Well, us being the way we are, he already has a bunch of AKAs. “Harvarooni”, “Harvito”, “Harvums”, etc.

He’s only about 4 months old. Really skinny and lanky. Slightly mangy, of course, and has ticks and tape worms, but he doesn’t eat much at all. I guess he grew up on chicken bones or something, ’cause he doesn’t know how to eat dog food. He is even cautious about a small milk bone. We bought him a couple of toys, but he doesn’t know what to do with them. This is actually fairly typical of dogs here from what I’ve heard and seen, though.

But the eating thing has me stumped. He’s a puppy. He should chow down everything in sight. But he’s a fussy little thing. Oh, he did eat a used tampon from the bathroom trash can. It’s always pleasant to find the contents of the little basket strewn about, but missing something that you knew was there just 30 minutes ago……

Guess I’ll have to get him some ground beef or something until he gets healthy enough. And hope he’s not stopped up from last nights “snack”….

Is it just me, or are others sick of companies calling themselves “green” without really making the commitment?

First, here on island, there was the Buck Island tour company that had a new “green” boat built. It already had two sailboats (sailing is the greenest, non-manual mode of transportation on the planet), but this new “green” machine has electric engines in addition to its diesel ones. Interesting, but not “green”, in my book.

Then, there are the new “alternative energy” companies. Whatever. A bunch of people have jumped on the bandwagon that one guy started here on St. Croix YEARS ago. But few, if any, have the experience to put the systems together properly and in a timely manner. They get front page articles in the paper, though. I’d also like to see how many of the people selling “green energy”  products actually use them. That would show me some true commitment.

The Alpine Energy Group is a whole other can of worms, which I may discuss in a future post.

Now, for the past few months, a local grocery store has been calling themselves “completely green”. I spoke to the owner a while back, after I heard the radio ad about this. I was excited and asked if she’d be putting solar panels on the roof to run the refrigeration, etc. Well, no, but they’re not using styrofoam containers anymore for their take-out items, and the plastic bags are degradable, too. Well, that’s a start. But no wind generators and no solar panels, so no “completely green”.

Okay?

An Idea for Tourism on St. Croix

St. Croix has needed an economic boost for too many years. We just can’t seem to catch a break around here. A few years ago, I had a great year business-wise, but it was one out of twelve that I’ve been in business here.

During this year’s Super Bowl, Home Away, a company which promotes renting homes out as vacation “villas” ran a big ad about the benefits of staying at a private home rather than a large, expensive, impersonal resort.

Could this be the future of tourism?

Let’s think about it. Does St. Croix really want more resort/casino/golf course monstrosities? Do we want to be like Aruba, St. Maarten, San Juan?

I think most of us don’t. Many local people say they want big resort developments because of the promise of jobs. But the resorts we already have are frequently looking for help and have difficulty filling positions.

I’ve worked in some of our resorts, but want more job satisfaction than I received working for someone else. I am still involved working with tourists, but I am self-employed and I love what I do now.

Many of our visitors love St. Croix specifically because it’s not overdeveloped with wall-to-wall high-rise hotels.

So here’s an idea: St. Croix has a wonderful rich history. We are still fortunate enough to have much of our beautiful natural environment intact.

What about a joint-venture between some of our historic neighborhoods and tourism which assists homeowners in remodeling their homes to be rented out to visitors?

CHANT, the Department of Tourism, the St. Croix Foundation and the St. Croix Chamber of Commerce, etc. could work together to secure funding for loans toward this end.

A three bedroom house could be converted into accommodations for 3 couples or 2 couples and 2 kids, or any combination thereof. People could offer a B&B option and rent out part of their homes to visitors. This would provide another low-cost and unique option for visitors.

Each neighborhood could have a small museum with information about the people who lived and worked on the estate over the years. There could be walking paths to showcase beautiful trees and gardens….

This would accomplish quite a few goals:

1.) More people would be gainfully employed.
2.) They’d have the satisfaction which comes with being self-employed rather than toiling for someone else’s benefit for their entire lives.
3.) Their properties would be enhanced and the history of the area preserved
4.) Pride in neighborhoods would be instilled
5.) Crucian Heritage and Nature Tourism would flourish
6.) It would make St. Croix unique and at the forefront of a new type of tourism rather than just another Caribbean island.

And that’s only the beginning.

Please take the time to think about this and discuss it with family, friends and colleagues.

Let’s start working together as a community to create a sustainable future for our children, our island and our planet.

What a great experience we had with our first guests at SunDog House!  

But now they’re gone. Back to the ccccold nnnorth.  

They are such awesome people that they adopted a little dog from the shelter and took her home with them!  

OK the cat misses them.  

Many people will wholeheartedly agree with this sentiment (and perhaps even add that I’m EXTREMELY disturbed – but that’s a different can of nuts).

A local political situation has me disturbed.

We have been very supportive of Senator Adlah “Foncie” Donastorg in the past, but in my humble opinion, his extreme criticism of Governor deJongh has gone too far. Foncie’s been acting like a total ass and blowing a relatively small issue way out of proportion.

He’s beginning to remind me of the wacko former senator who pulls microphone plugs out on people expressing differing opinions. (You know, the one who killed his own son by shooting him in the back and then got elected as delegate to the constitutional convention.)

I hope Foncie is not so desperate that he continues pulling his political weight in this way. There are some things that deJongh has done that we completely disagree with, but he’s responded to many many of our territory’s issues much more eloquently than any governor we have seen before.

I hope Foncie takes a long deep breath and decides to take the high road instead of stooping to the extent that he seems to be.

He will have his time, if it is meant to be. And we will all feel better about it.

It’s probably not politically correct to call it a “Chinese fire drill” anymore. Would an “Asian fire drill” be better?

Anyway, because Innovative Telephone Company is so third world that it doesn’t have to adhere to FCC requirements about porting land-line numbers to cell phones, we have been forced to get a new phone number for Sun Dog House.

That’s okay, over the next year, we’re going to slowly switch all of our advertising to reflect the cell numbers and get rid of our expensive business land line.

Anyway, we have ordered installation of our business number at the house across the street and a new residential number (773-DOGS) for SunDog House .

So this morning before beginning another busy work day, we had to run across the street and call a special number to get our business line transferred to there. Then we had to come back to SunDog House and repeat the process. We also ordered call forwarding, so that if we are staying at SunDog House, the business number will ring here.

The successful transfer of the business number took only a couple of minutes. (Surprise!) but when we came back to SunDog House to repeat the process, there was no dial tone. (Surprise!)

Ha! So we had to run back across the street to let them know, since we couldn’t call from SunDog House!

Actually, Michael called from his cell phone. But we only have one phone which is not cordless, so I did have to keep running back and forth in the rain and mud to plug it into this jack and that jack, just to be sure. A comical situation indeed.

Eventually, the phone company was able to get us a dial tone and the new number, but they can’t do the call forwarding thing until tomorrow. So the nice, cordless answering machine phone is across the street in the crappy house where the business number is and I’m at nice comfy SunDog House with a crappy corded phone with a ridiculous shrill ring.

Tomorrow, Ida at Innovative has promised me that she will activate call forwarding first thing in the morning.

I hope so.

Wish I were a weather forecaster here. It’s gorgeous most of the time. But when it’s not and you screw up, you still get paid even though people have depended on you. I guess it’s like being a government employee.

One Daily News article said “Sunday could be better….with the rain dissipating, leaving partly cloudy skies.”   Weather underground said, ” 70% chance of rain on Saturday and 30% on Sunday”. Mary Ann is back for a short time, so we FINALLY decided to take a day (Sunday) off to kayak to Buck Island with Mary Ann and Karen.

It was partly cloudy when we left Solitude Bay, but it looked like there might be a shower coming. Seas were choppy and it was windy. Then once we got through the reef, the swells were pretty good size, too (3-5 feet, I’d say). But our Hobie Mirage pedal kayaks were up to the task of getting us safely across the salty divide.

I was holding Goliath and we’d get splashed occasionally. He was not a happy camper. When we got out to the beach at Buck, we spread our towels on a picnic table and chowed on veggies and two different dips, organic chips and salsa, brie and crackers, peanut butter sandwiches, chocolate chunk cookies from Schooner Bay and white wine (Michael had rum and coke). The sky started sputtering, but we were happily eating and watching some pearly-eyed thrashers teach their young to beg food from picnickers. And we were on the lee side of the island, so it was warm and pleasant.

While we went for a walk, the birds tried to get at the triscuits. Some adventurers living on their sailboat, visiting the islands from Wisconsin, shooed them away while we were gone.  It became windy as we walked around to the south side, where Goliath met a little poodly-type friend and shared a squirt or two.

When we got back to our table it was raining. So we went into the water and chatted with other crazy folks out at Buck on a crappy day. Goliath huddled under the picnic table staying out of the rain and away from the Wisconsin children, whose parents told us that one of the little ones was complaining about having to go to another beach! They seemed to be having a real blast, though.

I brought my big warm sweatshirt, but didn’t want it to get soaked, so Michael and I shared a damp towel trying to keep warm. It wasn’t overwhelmingly cold because we were back on the west side, but when we walked the other way toward the north side, it looked and felt  like the North Sea (it was sooo much colder in the wind), so we headed back to the relative shelter of the  ‘yaks.

An older gentleman came over to check out the kayaks and when Michael went to show him the pedal mechanism, he noticed that Karen’s was broken, so only one of her flippers was flapping. We weren’t quite sure when it had broken, and we decided that we might have to tow them back if it was going to be a problem.

Norma Jean came over from her boat to gab for a while, the rain got heavier and we resisted the idea of getting back out in the wind and choppy sea. A few times, the showers were so heavy that we couldn’t see St. Croix, and we were not quite sure exactly where the beach we were returning to was.

We eventually got into the boats and headed back during a break in the rain action. Goliath and I huddled with our only (now pretty wet towel) to ward off the chill from the wind and the splashing water. He was even less happy this time. Even though his life jacket isn’t very comfortable for him, it keeps him somewhat warm, but not necessarily happy.

Just as we were getting back to the iffy part of the journey where the reef is, a rain squall came through and our visibility went way down again. We made it safely through though, and Karen’s husband, Ken was waiting for us on shore when we got back.

She had been joking that he’d probably been checking her life insurance policy while he was supposed to be watching football.

Anyway, Ken helped us get the kayaks back on the vehicles and we were happy to get into a somewhat dry Land Rover. The rovers are not Goliath’s favorite mode of transportation, but he was so happy to be out of the kayak and off the water, that he’d probably have settled for a Conestoga wagon.

It will be sooo nice when we have a calm and normal life, living on a sailing catamaran and can take off to any other island when the weather is good…..

Sure, whatever.  

In my younger days, I was aware of what people were wearing. I got a job as soon as I could at age 16 so I could buy all my own clothes. I was always at the mall if I wasn’t at school or at work. I was buying the latest fashions from those stores full of dressed up dummies. I even wore stupid shoes with high platform heels.

In college, I was more practical. Hell, I had to be. I was married and had a child. My income had shrunk. No, not really, my expenses had increased, and there were fewer disposable dollars.

That was okay. After graduating from college, I worked a little but concentrated on mommy-hood. But I missed academia and the opening of the minds which takes place in that world.

I think that was when I started to care less about what people wore and concerned myself with the substance rather than the outer layers. Divorce happened and then there was extremely little income for other than just the absolute necessities.

Moving down to the islands gave a whole new meaning to everything. People here wear whatever they have. Most just wear comfortable cool cotton shirts and shorts. Some are pompous and dress like “celebrities” in ridiculously expensive suits and dresses, though.  I don’t hang around those types.

These days I don’t usually notice what people are wearing unless it’s something stupid. I will not generally make a comment about your clothing even if you look stunning. No offense. I’m just more interested in what you have to say about things that I find important or fascinating. I’ve learned a lot from my dogs, I guess. They don’t care about attire, or skin color, or if my teeth are straight.

Well, maybe if I had a little too much to drink and you wore a goofy polyester dress with pleats and stupid shoes I might say something like, “Are you heading for the circus or something?”

But I wouldn’t be caught dead wearing anything like that. I don’t even think I’d have worn anything that in the days when I cared about “fashion”. Well, maybe, but I’m not like that anymore. ☻

Terry Chretien is the owner of Ambrosia Body Care, providing out-call massage and spa services on St. Croix. She rescues homeless dogs and cats who reside with her and become the four-legged hosts of SunDog House, a St. Croix sustainable vacation rental villa.

Yipee! Barbara is here!

After waiting MONTHS for another mural artist to return my call, I called a much more responsible and professional one.

We’ve been wanting a mural painted on the front porch – a beach scene with dogs frolicking -for two reasons.

First, the dogs live on this porch and rub against the wall constantly, so a sandy scene on yellow paint would not show their “dirt” so much. Second, this is SunDog House and the whimsical theme inspired pictures in our heads of dogs surfing, climbing a coconut palm tree and doing other “fun in the sun”- type things.

I had forgotten that Barbara said she’d start today, and she magically appeared at 8:20 (yikes!) to start working. This would not have been a problem if I’d expected her at that time.  As it happened, we’d been gone all day yesterday, the house is a mess with boxes full of stuff to move across the street, and our cherished shop-vac cleaner bit the dust on Tuesday.

Needless to say, I was too embarrassed for words. The dog poop hadn’t been picked up in a couple of days, and I was still trying to recover from yet another night of menopausal insomnia. Fortunately, Yoda was in the right place for me to scoop her into the  master bedroom where she’d feel comfortable and not bark all day or bother Barbara.

I also had a 9am massage appointment on the beach, which I was running late for. Ah yes, the mellow life of a massaaage therapist………

Anyway, Barbara is very comfortable with our helpful pack of kids, and I was able to leave for my appointment knowing that she and they would get along just fine.

I enjoyed a great session with a first-time visitor who is enamored with our island of St. Croix and wanted to know about the best hiking and snorkeling spots. I was happy to show him our favorite spots on a map after we are finished getting him “de-crunched” as he called it. I also told him about SunDog House, the new National Park, and the soon-come bike path, which he was VERY interested in. We hope to  have him and his significant other as our very own villa guests in the future!

After I got paid for that, I went immediately to buy myself a  piece of jewelry new awesome shop-vac. It’s the best deal on island at GBH.

When I got home, I was amazed by what Barbara had done in a mere two hours. The yellow porch had been transformed into a beach! I was nearly speechless! It is so beyond my comprehension to be able to do that. I would need stencils and at least six months.The palm tree is outlined and the bottom has a cartoonish textured look. It’s exactly what we were looking for!

Can’t wait to see our happy little kids as they start coming out to play on the porch beach! It’s magic!

For us, anyway. It was a productive and pleasant work day, though. Yay!

We met a lovely couple who won one of our donated gift certificates in the last SEA auction. The only downside to donating  these GCs, is that we’re never sure where on island we’ll have to drive to and not get paid for our services. But it’s always interesting to meet the like-minded folks we haven’t met and, of course, to massage those who know and love our particular brand of TLC. We truly love our work.

These fabulous folks live out in Frederiksted in a modest home with 2 and 2 dogs. They love snorkeling and scuba diving and hope to see St. Croix become an eco-tourism destination, too. They enjoyed their massages, which they really needed, and will probably call us in the future.

The last time we were out west was during the application process for our business license for SunDog House. We did not love that work. We had to go to the police department, fill out their application, pay their fee for 2 record checks (the fact that we have business licenses from our massage business and had already gone through record checks doesn’t matter), go back after a few days to pick up the form and bring it to DPNR (Department of Planning and Natural Resources), pay the fee for them to okay the application (saying that what we want to do is okay in the zoning area we’re in), and then bring it to fire services, and pay their outrageous fee to have them come out and inspect the premises.

Anyway, we figured that since the last time we were in F’sted for fun was when Wreggie was here in September (how SAD is THAT?!), and since christmas day was sooooooovery crappy and new years day even worse, we’d enjoy lunch and a great snorkel in Freedom City.

Well, the universe thought it would play a joke on us again and create another cloudy, gray day. We sure didn’t feel like getting in the water with no sun and blue sky, but we did play along with the joke. We went to Polly’s at the Pier for the first time (awesome!) and walked along the waterfront (beautiful), we visited Marsha at Island Villas, bought some pencils from a tiny entrepreneur, and when the sun still hadn’t appeared, we went back to Polly’s for a scrumptious lunch.

I was hoping they’d have their menu on their website, but alas, you’ll have to bear with my description of our experiences. In the morning, Michael had a cup of coffee and I had one of their yummy Ghirardelli frappes. I thought it would hold me over while we went snorkeling. But since we never did go snorkeling, we thought we’d check out the museum center, but it was closed. Really. On a holiday, when people have time to go to a museum, it was closed. Tres Cruzan!

Back at Polly’s (we love that they named their cafe after their dog!) for lunch after our stroll, we started with a bowl of mushroom bisque – rich and creamy and flavorful topped with scallions. It went well with my sauvignon blanc, but not so well, in my opinion, with the yeasty pale ale Michael had. He didn’t seem to mind, though. The sandwich menu is limited, but everything sounded so yummy that we had to try two different ones. I had the grilled cheese, which comes with choice of three cheeses and veggies like spinach, tomato, onion, basil and avocado. I thought the cheeses would provide enough fat, so I opted to not have avocado. It was grilled on home-made whole wheat bread and was delish.

Michael ordered the Loveburger with avocado and tomato and sprouts on whole wheat. I had forgotten about Loveburger, but I used to sell it in my store in RI eons ago. It was good, too and we each ate half of the other’s.

Of course, after we were full, the sun started coming out, but now we were too full to snorkel, and we didn’t have time to lounge around. We had shopping to do! But we did go to Sandcastle beach for a quick dip, which was nice.

Off to kmart for cat food etc., then on to their appliance store to check on lawn mowers. We’re going to need one for the rental property which has an entire flat, grassy acre of land for the dogs to frolic. We’ll also need another washing machine, since we do at least one load a day of massage sheets.

We also stopped at the consignment store to see what was new and we bought a few small items and an outdoor table for SunDog House.

Quite a bit accomplished, for a holiday!

….my mother would say,”….don’t say anything at all.” So I’ve been stewing at the shit that the universe has thrown my way for the past month.

My mother didn’t practice what she preached either. And I believe more that “honesty is the best policy”.

After a fabulous but short vacation on Anegada, we came back to a ridiculously screwed up ad in “the publication formerly known as the pink paper”, loud music blaring into the night and a resulting altercation with one of “St. Croix’s finest”, a letter to the chief and commissioner of police reporting the offending (and offensive) “officer”, a small claims court battle with Juan F. Luis Hospital (still not settled), a negligent property manager for the property we’ll be renting for the next year, and the news of Michael’s job being terminated.

Needless to say, I’ve too depressed and pissed off and still busy with getting ready to move, to write.

We had spent all of our money fixing up SunDog House, and now the expected income for the season was not coming in due to the messed up ad (when there are 3 contact numbers and the first 2 are wrong, how many people will call the third?)

Anyway, our ad will be fixed next month, and we’ve gotten our first confirmed reservation for SunDog House, so things should be getting better.

If I get to meet him.

I’ll just slobber like a little child. I’ve said it to a couple of people.
I just have so much respect and admiration for this man.

I don’t want to embarrass Michael, but I know I’ll cry.

And we will be in the same restaurant at the same time on New Year’s Eve, even though we’ve been missing him by inches in Christiansted since his arrival.

The secret service are on every corner when he’s somewhere near there.

I cry just thinking about the magnitude of his work and the criticisms heaped upon him by some.

Business has been pathetic thanks in part to St. Croix This Week totally screwing up our ad (Michael will post about that one. I’m still way too pissed off). We’ve also spend every last dime we had fixing this house.  And since we’re  in the middle of moving, we’ve been mainly eating whatever’s been in the fridge/freezer and cupboards.

I’ve been coming up with pretty inventive meals, but I’m really tired of my own cooking. So, thanks to credit cards, we splurged and went to Galangal for dinner last night. I’ve really been craving their wonderful flavorful foods, so I was able to twist Michael’s arm (actually I didn’t even have to pull his pinky -  he’s pretty tired of my cooking too) and we went to town.

There was only one table of two seated when we arrived. More trickled in as the evening wore on, but it was slower than we’ve ever seen it. We were lucky though. They are pretty much the only restaurant on St. Croix that brings in fresh mussels, and the mussels had just arrived. They’d also just gotten in an 80 lb wahoo. That made our meal choices a no-brainer. I also love their green papaya salad, so we started with that and an soy-cured salmon with fresh greens salad. The temperanillo wine we ordered was out of stock, so we had a lovely pinot noir.

It was too awesome for words. Every single morsel. It practically brought me to tears. (Well, everything brings me to tears these days.) After weeks of pasta and cannned tuna and rice and beans and chili, it was absolutely heavenly. The papaya salad was a little spicier than the other times we’ve had it, but I was thrilled about that, and Michael seemed to thoroughly enjoy it too. The coconut curry sauce that the mussels come in is to die for. I wanted to lie down on one of the red couches and listen to Tobias describe the specials and menu items for the rest of the night. But alas, Michael insisted that we get home for a nice cozy Christmas Eve Eve.

The portions were just the right size, and we left feeling satisfied but not stuffed.

I   ♥  Galangal!

Even though hurricane (the rainy season) is officially over, we’re getting pretty good showers every day.

Not great painting weather. But……the hills are nice and green. And the painting will get done. This year even.

The Ginger Thomas are doing strange things, though. The hills are less yellow because there are fewer blossoms. Not sure if it’s because they are blooming later, or if they’re doing what some of the plants in our yard are doing. The ends of each stalk are becoming fuzzy with small wrinkled leaves rather than full of yellow flowers.

It rained so much the other night we still have puddles in our road. Unusual but not unheard of. We’ll have gleefully full cisterns!

A shower just went by in the middle of the first day this week-end that Michael is able to paint outside. Good thing he’s on the north side and the rain comes from the east.

I painted inside this morning and am spending the rest of the day cleaning the ceiling in the master bedroom. Oh what fun! Hopefully we’ll get that room painted (along with that bathroom, the small bathroom and the laundry room) next week-end.

I am officially refusing to pick up a paint brush on Christmas day.

Bah humbug, for now anyway, because I’m tired and stressed (more to come on THOSE topics)!

BUT Happy Chrismahannukwanzaadan to those who believe in those nebulous notions!

Not much in the way of photos yet, because we’re still cleaning up and painting.

But we’ve gotten a newish comfortable living room set and we’ve ordered 6 sets of organic cotton sheets, pillows, mattress pads, 12 bamboo beach towels, 12 sets of bamboo bath towels and are researching recycled outdoor furniture.

We’ve gotten cost estimates from a cleaning service, and we have some guys coming to do major grounds keeping and will contract with them to come back weekly.

Michael has been diligently working on our website, too.

Life is Goooood!

….will take place THIS Tuesday. And this is a really important one.

On Oct. 6, Rep. Donna M. Christensen, Virgin Islands, submitted a House Bill 3726 to the Natural Resources Committee to establish a National Park at Castle Nugent Farm on St. Croix.

So please e-mail your elected officials who are on the Committee on Natural Resources to support Donna Christiansen’s bill HR 3726. We here in the USVI can write Donna to thank her for her continued diligence in this matter, since she will probably vote in favor of it.

In the near future, there will also be a hearing to increase funding for the National Park System. We’ll keep you posted on that.

Meanwhile, let your friends in the states with committee members know that they need to send a quick e-mail out to them.

I could have sworn I’d written this post before, but I can’t find it.

Far too many people have died or have been physically and psychologically damaged for life because they have fought in wars and conflicts to preserve our freedoms.

We owe it to those brave souls to EVERY DAY, not just on Veterans Day, or our day off, or whenever we feel like it, to honor them by utilizing our freedom of speech/expression to speak out against injustices that we are aware of.

Write to or call your elected officials and protest that gay people continuously are denied the right to marry. This should not even be a matter for any state to vote on. It should be in the constitution. It is a basic human right!

Then, when you’re done with that, do Michael’s things so we get a National Park in our back yard and not a pet coke burning monstrosity.

I’m not perfect. I don’t purport to being even close to perfect. I’ve lived on this island for over 15 years, and I’m so much more lax in my life than I have ever been. Sometimes, I’d even refer to myself as a slacker. I  do try really hard to help my clients and my favorite non-profit organizations in whatever ways I can. But I know my limitations.

If there is something I am not emotionally, physically or financially able to do, I will not do it. Okay, I may try. But as soon as I know I am not up to the task, I will admit it and move on.

Unfortunately, this is not so for everyone. Just look at our Virgin Islands government.

There are also, a couple of people I have personally dealt with in the last week, that take the phrase “delusions of adequacy” to entirely new levels.

At this time, I will not talk about the first one, because s/he works for the attorney we are using to assist with property acquisition and incorporation. And we’re not done with this, so I don’t want to jeopardize any of it.

The other one, however makes me wish I had a punching bag with her face on it. Or a voodoo doll. For most of the day I was visualizing smacking her upside the head, then choking her.

I actually spoke to her on the phone at one point and wanted to scream, “ARE YOU F****** NUTS?! WHAT WERE YOU THINKING YOU RIDICULOUS MORON?!!”

Ahem. But I didn’t do that. I calmly spoke and listened to her while my blood pressure rose to the point that I thought my brain would fly out of the top of my skull.

The situation we were discussing involved a little dog that we tried trapping a couple of weeks ago. Since then, we have seen many people stopping to leave food for the little thing, and since we’ve been incredibly busy with turtle activities, work, household chores, and starting a new business, we decided to leave it to others who might have more free time and could therefore do a better job.

And then, when we went by the area of the little dog over the week-end, there was a BIG sign posted on a tree which read, “Please do not feed the puppy, we are trying to trap it…..” or words to that effect. And it had the person’s name on it. So we thought, “Oh good. Someone’s trying to do it right.”

Riiiiight.

When Michael was coming home from work yesterday, he saw the little dog and stopped to see if he could convince it to come home with him. But another car came up behind him and scared the little dog away. While Michael was there, he noticed that there was no trap anywhere in the area. So when he got home, he tried to contact the person whose name was on the sign.

This person no longer has a land-line, so he couldn’t call her directly. He tried her at work, but she was not there. He asked one of her co-workers to give her a message to please call us about the little dog. The co-worker said that her cell phone number does not work at her house, so he’d just have to leave a message and she’d get it whenever.

Sigh.

So today she called and told me that she hadn’t really set a trap since she needed someone to “help her with it”. But she’s leaving tomorrow for 10 days, and….Meanwhile, the dog has not been receiving any food because there’s a BIG sign on a tree telling people not to feed the dog because….well, you know. As she was explaining this to me, I felt like a crazed cartoon character. I wanted to reach into the phone and grab her by the neck and pull her through to my side where I could twist her scrawny little neck into a knot.

But I remained calm. I went to get the trap, and brought it to Michael who set it up on his way home from work. We went to check it tonight and we have set up a schedule with another competent and reliable dog-lover. We will catch the little guy and we know someone who will give him a good home.

I do not know the moral of this story. I just know that stupid, inept and apathetic people are the reason I am self-employed. If I worked in a situation where others were slacking off, I would feel responsible and probably either do their jobs for them, or I’d lose sleep over it. Unfortunately, I see over and over again, that they are everywhere. They haunt me. I could write my own version of Sartre’s Huis Clos.

Sigh.

Well, the new place at the corner where the South Shore Cafe and most recently, Kaleidoscope used to be, is (ugh!) a Santo Domingan-type “bar & rest.” Called El Azuano and opened last week-end with blaring music well into the wee hours.

I did call the police, but nothing happened. The music went on until the tylenol pm kicked in. Ugh!

Michael promised to go over to try and ask the people to keep it down in our nice quiet residential neighborhood, and today, on our way back from doing errands, we did stop by. We asked to see their business license. It does not say “night club”, only tavern, restaurant and tobacco retailer. We asked them to keep the volume down. They looked at us like we have twelve heads.

It’s pretty quiet there tonight. We’ll see what happens tomorrow. Hope I don’t have to call 911 again. Although that would be a fun blog post I’m sure. Hahahaha, they probably won’t be answering with halloween and all…..

Despite the fact that we are less financially healthy right now (at this time of year,  and since we’ve been doing soooo much home improvement) than we like to be, we are supporting our friends and family members in their new adventures in the restaurant arena.

The Pickled Greek is surviving the slow season. (Yay!)We go there because we love the food,  the people and, of course the prices.

Besides, my lovely and talented daughter, no longer a jewelry business owner (this is a relief in quite a few ways), has finally received recognition as an excellent customer service representative, so is suddenly is working at 3 (yes THREE) restaurants.

{The typical “rags to riches” story continues…..I was a poor jewelry store owner who became a waitress…. – (sigh)}. Steve Martin couldn’t have done it better…. 

So, Friday night, we went (on Mitchell’s birthday) to his soft opening at the new Cultured Pelican. It was absolutely lovely!

We wanted to try everything, of course, so we started with soup and salad. They had a roasted eggplant soup. We’d never had anything like that before. It was like eggplant Parmesan puree in a bowl. Perfect for these two eggplant lovers. (My daughter- one of the servers – go figure- reminded me that I ate eggplant parm just before giving birth to her. So, in my world, anything associated with eggplant is GOOD!)  And this soup was delizioso!

We needed to try the caesar salad, because housemade caesar dressing is a rare and beautiful thing. It was also fabulous, lightly dressed with shaved parmesan cheese.

For our entrees, Michael chose the housemade pasta dish called, “Fallen Hankeys”, created by former owner and chef, Dennis. (Yes, Dennis is still there working with the new guys. Is this an awesome place or what?!) “Fallen Hankeys” consists of sheets of fresh pasta in marinara sauce topped with ricotta cheese and pesto. Red, white and green, like the Italian flag. Magnifico!

I had the fresh local Mahi with charred tomato risotto and mixed veggies italiano. Eccellente! The mahi was exquisite. Tender, juicy and flavorful. Not over-cooked nor over-sauced, and therefore not overpowered by distractions. Perfetto!

I described dessert in detail, but the computer ate it, it was so delicious. So all I can say is. “Mmm, Mmm, Mmm!

We would definitely eat there again. So we made reservations for Sunday brunch, which would happen the day after their next dinner shift. 10am, right when they’d open because we needed to get to World Food Day festivities at the University of the Virgin Islands.

We were asked about how we like the paint job. Well, the paint job is great. It looks fresh and clean, but I am so totally not a white person, that it really does nothing for me. I like Caribbean colors and I loved the bold blues and purples of the last incarnation. But that’s just me…

Sunday’s brunch was also lovely. Again we ordered a bunch of stuff so we could adequately review the menu items. I started off with a Stoli bloody Mary topped with shrimp and olives. When they are officially open, they will have pickled asparagus and green beans along with the jumbo shrimp garnish. The shrimp were huge and delicious with the olives and the nicely spiced concoction. My food choices were: an omelet with roasted eggplant, artichoke hearts, spinach and goat cheese. I also needed to try the baguette French toast with banana kiwi sauce. Yum!

Michael started with their special cane rum drink with fresh limes. It was cool and refreshing – like a mojito with out the mint. He also ordered and enjoyed the lobster hash with eggs and homefries.

We  saw lots of friends there. Meredith back from MA brunched with Nancy and a large contingent from the Pickled Greek  came to celebrate and wish Mitchell well.

We were stuffed, but headed to the festivities at UVI hoping that we could work off those calories and eat some breadfruit…..

One of my “Snowbird” clients is back early! Another regular is back from a 4-month stateside stint, so business is.

Right. It’s not booming at all, but it is what it is. And since one of my snowbirds comes to our house for his massages, I have to clean the house twice a week. Time consuming and tiresome.

A few weeks ago, I got a call from Dee at Sail Bilinda Charters. She knew that I had worked on charter sailboats and loved sailing, so she asked if I could crew for her on her boat, Zulu few times during the month of October.

Yes! Back on a sailboat. And getting paid for it! Dee’s a great Captain and  offers a fun trip for her guests

I met with her at the dock on Sunday for a briefing for the Tuesday morning trip. Monday on my way home from doing massages   (    !), I saw a bicyclist friend on the side of the road with a puppy she’d just found running on the side of the road. Of course she flagged me down, we chatted for a minute, but traffic behind me told me I had to get going. Apparently, there was another pup in the bush that she wasn’t able to catch. I already have my quota filled, and someone was there to help with the  healthy, friendly pup.

Tuesday morning as I was getting ready to go to the boat, Michael called. He saw the other puppy, and couldn’t stop, so could I go see if I could catch it? Okay. So I rushed out and didn’t see the dog, but we decided to set a hav-a-hart trap for it as soon as we could. Well, we caught two mongoose and the last time we set it, someone released whatever we caught. Oh well. Done with that for now. Haven’t seen the dog in a while.

I did some errands in Christiansted town and ended up gabbing the afternoon away. I rarely get into town and I was lucky enough to see two of my favorite local people/business owners, Sue Victor at Cache of the Day, and Michelle Pugh at Dive Experience.

We’ve been doing a lot with the sea turtles. Patrolling three mornings a week and doing one all-nighter each week. I really believe I’m getting too old for the all-nighters, though. Exhausting!

We’re also back to painting now that the tile work is done. Last night Mitchell and Bob had their soft-opening at the Cultured Pelican (more to come about that) so we had to go eat and wish them well..

Today we have an early morning bird-watch, and tomorrow brunch at the Pelican and World Food Day Festivities at UVI.

So, Wreg, that’s partially why I haven’t posted in a while.

Saturday was cruise ship day, and we had an appointment to do a 90 minute couples massage on the beach at Carambola. A  honeymoon couple contacted us months ago and we agreed to meet them out there. We have had a few of these nice little jobs since the cruise ships started coming back. Hope they continue.

They were a nice young couple (everybody’s nice and YOUNG these days – I feel so old sometimes), enjoyed their massage and probably spent the rest of the afternoon lounging out there talking about coming back to visit, or what it would be like to live here. They had been to a few other islands and especially liked St. Lucia. They hiked up a volcano there and are into outdoor pursuits (like us).  But they liked our island, too, so hopefully, they’ll return.

When we were done massaging them, it was time for lunch, so we went to Cane Bay and ate at Eat @ Cane Bay, Frank and Katherine Pugliese’s new place. Aahhh! Beverages served in glasses and food served on real plates with silverware. If you must have a traveler for the beach or the road, they’ll give you a regular plastic cup instead of styrofoam. Add $1 for a take-out  meal since they use eco-friendly containers. Love that!

And, of course, with Frank in the kitchen, the food is superb.

Classy beach bar food. How perfect is that!

Menu items include create your own burgers and salads. Starting price for a burger with lettuce, tomato, pickle, onion, and choice of cheese is $8.50. You can add bacon, egg, avocado, mushroom and onion, blue cheese or jalapeno cream cheese for $2.50. Or duck chili, chorizo or pulled pork for $4, truffle aioli for $2 or foie gras for $12.

Your salad is $10 with a butter lettuce and romaine hearts base. You can add any 6 of the following: carrots, cukes, tomato, red onion, mushrooms, kalamata olives, red pepper avocado, croutons, roasted beets, chick peas or edamame; 2 of the following: roasted turkey, hard cooked egg, feta or blue cheese, bacon or strip steak; and dress it with herbed yogurt, passion fruit french, caesar, blue cheese or evoo (?) and balsamic.

When we were there, they had a special of fresh local wahoo sandwich and also a tuna sashimi appetizer on fried wantons. We had both of those. They had also just gotten in a 90 lb tuna. We wanted more, but we saw mussels on the menu and had to try them. We had onion rings (yum) and hand cut fries  (kind of limp and oily), but everything else was great.

The rest of the menu includes an open-faced BBQ brisket sandwich, a pulled pork sand, fried chicken, an oven roasted turkey club, mixed fried seafood. Fun sides include the ones we had along with sweet potato fries, roasted beets, smoked duck chili, peel and eat shrimp, orzo salad w/red pepper and edamame.

They have a kids menu, a couple of desserts,  and  a nice wine selection. Two whites and two reds by the glass, and bottles ranging in price from $18 for the Chilean Montes Cherub Rose, to $40 for the Italian Masua di Jago Ripassa.

We are happy to have the Frank and Katherine team feeding us again! Eat @ Cane Bay! Bon appetit!