Cold weather at last, even if only for a short while! Today is one of the few days so far that we’ve put on long pants and sweaters – we’ve been in shorts, tank tops and sandals for ages. It’s a bit like suddenly developing a new personality, or a whole new outlook on life. Long pants? And where is my sweatshirt? Seeing the neighbors in hoodies and other cyclists in tights and long sleeves is a different perspective for us…
Despite the “cold” weather – it was fifty eight degrees when we left – we were out on the road this morning for our usual twenty-five mile ride up to the Boynton Inlet and back. It was so cold that not even the pelicans wanted to fly – they clustered together shivering in the wind; and the Lady K fishing charter had maybe five hardy souls who braved the cold.
We opted for our usual Ex Officio shirts and Danskin full-length leggings, adding only our Pearl Izumi screaming-yellow windbreakers, and we were none too warm. Though we normally stay an hour or so at the Inlet, we lasted only about a half hour before heading back.
But it’s warming up to eighty today; we’ll be back in shorts by mid-afternoon.
This morning was a “Kids in Distress” century and metric century ride along A1A. We see hordes of riders on any given Sunday, but today we had close to three hundred century riders added to the mix. It was like being caught on the Los Angeles freeway system…except we could move, unlike the hapless Los Angelenos. The sheer number of bodies and bikes was intimidating – we are so used to riding alone!
Last Sunday we did a bike ride, but awoke to discover that Chelsea had a flat tire, on the rear tire, of all things. By the time we got it fixed and ready to go, we opted for going only to downtown Delray.
We took photos of all the local places so y’all could see them – Veteran’s Park with its fountain, art shows, and the Lady Atlantic yacht offering daily tours on the IntraCoastal; the downtown area, with its restaurants and shops (some, like Huber’s Pharmacy and Mercer Wenzel, date back over fifty years, which for this area is staggeringly old); Doc’s All American Grill, which has the best ice cream around and terrific chicken Caesar salads; the Delray library; the Green Owl, a great local breakfast place; and of course, our much beloved Old School Bakery, the undoubted king and queen of café mochas, freshly baked bread, and freshly baked pastries.
Old School Square is right at the center of the grid that defines the roads in Delray. It features the Cornell Museum; an outdoor theater with free movies on Friday nights; and various outdoor festivals all throughout the year. Now they have the city Christmas tree put together, in preparation for all the Christmas festivities downtown. The Christmas tree has doors to the inside, which reveal a small gift shop; Santa has a workshop there; they’ll have an outdoor “skating rink”; and my personal favorite, a carousel.
The Christmas tree and related attractions are up the entire month of December, acting as a focal point for the downtown festivities, drawing in both locals and tourists.
Speaking of Christmas, Chelsea and I got into the Christmas spirit yesterday – we put up seventy-five feet of double-layered Christmas lights on our roofline. I’ll spare you the details; suffice it to say that it took us three hours to do what should have been done in an hour and a half. It was a true comedy of errors. But we persevered, and we now have a layer of white overlaid by a layer of blue icicle lights along the front section of the house. They look wonderful. We may get inspired and add some lighting nets we have, with some red rope lights. Maybe later…it’s tough doing all that design work!
We’ve finally decided to move our entire website to Word Press. It’s a big job – not hard, just very detailed and time consuming. Chelsea’s been focusing on that. It won’t make much of a difference in the way the site looks, but it will be far easier for us with respect to security issues, updates and so on.
Since it’s cold and gray today, and it’s Sunday, we’ve decided to veg on the couch and watch the Bourne movies today (we watched the first one last night). We haven’t made it to the library lately – too windy and rainy all week – so we have to rely on ourselves today… We’ll do the library run tomorrow early.
Signing off from Delray Beach…