A lot of stuff

The king of the sea

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King Neptune on the Virginia Beach, VA Boardwalk

Compare Neptune’s size to the bike rider!

Neptune and his turtle

The octopus

The bronze statue of King Neptune is the spectacular creation of artist Paul DiPasquale. It was dedicated in 2005 and to this day reigns over the sea (and the boardwalk). Neptune holds his trademark trident with a hand on a sea turtle. He is also surrounded by many other sea creatures on the statue base.

We lived in Virginia Beach in the 90’s and loved the beach and boardwalk, spending hours and hours enjoying the ocean waves. Imagine our surprise when we returned in 2016 and saw Neptune as we strolled north along the boardwalk. Photos do not do him justice. Virginia Beach is a marvelous vacation destination with year round activities. Hopefully the city will be getting back to post pandemic conditions sooner than later.

Looks a bit like a Hitchcock film

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Of the same ilk as 1963’s The Birds

We wintered in Harlingen, Texas 3 years ago, and one of our jaunts out and about led us to a community theater in Brownsville. Coming back from the show at dusk we saw a huge flock of black birds perched on wires. There were twice as many feet of bird covered wires as shown in the picture.

It put us in mind of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1963 movie The Birds, one of his scariest and creepiest movies.

It’ll be nice again… sometime

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We’re expecting sub-zero wind-chill and 8+ inches of snow over the next 36 hours

Signs of hot summertime

As always, February seems like such a dragging winter month with the cold and snow and ice and other icky weather stuff.  But, spring always does come, and it appears that the vaccinations are beginning to roll out more and more. There is some glimmer of hope that the country is making some progress on beating this pandemic. Guess it’s better to be optimistic.

Space can be very puzzling

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Ok, the title is a bad pun on the third puzzle we set out to finish.

Of the three puzzles we have put together so far, this space scene has been just incredibly hard to complete, compared to the other two. But with persistence we did finish as you can see in the picture. Whew, this seemed like it had 2000 instead of 1000 pieces!

We’re one week away from our appointment to get the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. When we get the second dose of the vaccine we’re planning to get back on the road shortly thereafter. Sunny warm Florida is in our sights.

A great pair of ducks

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Back again with another obvious (and blatant) ad for our Etsy online store. Today we listed more items, including this fine pair of solid brass duck head bookends. These  weigh in at a respectable 1 pound each and will support several of your most treasured volumes.

Update: The bookends have sold. Please visit our store from the safety of your home, especially this year. Here is the link: Roadtirement Vintage Etsy Store

A thrilling sighting of our nation’s symbol

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On my walk  a very nice fellow on a bicycle pointed out a bald eagle on a dead snag several hundred feet away.  What a thrill it was to see a bald eagle, which is not at all a common sight in our area. This magnificent bird was in a tree overlooking a river with farm fields on the other side. Best photo I could get on the iPhone.

Get outside, you never know what you might see! Just do it safely!

Been there a while now

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This new sidewalk stone base has been laid out for quite some time. The traffic cone next to the engineering stake has been there long enough to become home to a plant that has finally made it to the light of day.  An example of slow construction progress?

Big, I mean BIG decorations

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In recent years decorating your home for Halloween has become quite the big deal. It seems that the decorating schemes for October are beginning to rival Christmas.


 

 

 

 

 

 

These massive spooky displays showed up this week in a yard I saw on one of my walks.