More Reasons to Be Glad I'm in Florida

Scott Hardie | December 21, 2001
First and foremost, our water/sewer and phone were disconnected in Macomb today. Kelly had spent the night at a friend's after seeing Lord of the Rings on Wednesday night and didn't even know until she got home from work today (Thursday).

Kelly is supposed to be taking care of it, but it will still be a few days. My mom was nagging me about it, saying "You can't let things like this happen, you have to keep paying the bills each month," etc, but what am I supposed to do? I only have so much money. I paid the bills myself for the first six months and it broke me. Now Kelly can be broke for a change. Jesse, if you're reading this, we can really use some of that money you owe us.

Big ups to my mom for taking me to a bird sanctuary today. I didn't think it would be anything special, just a few pens with birds in them. It was that, but with many pens, and a wide variety of birds: owls, hawks, ospreys, vultures, turkey vultures, a bald eagle, ducks, swans, geese, pelicans, herons, cranes, crows, ravens, egrets, and mallards, and usually several varieties of each. I was hoping to see some flamingoes or parrots, to make me feel at home in Florida, but no such luck there. The highlights were a pair of turkey vultures, each of them missing a wing, who were trying to chase each other around their pen but kept going in circles, and a talking crow that kept saying "Hi!" in an eerily human-sounding voice. It could say other things, according to the signs, but didn't. The confused old man at the counter gave us too much money in change, so we gave it as donations, and even bought some gifts at the gift shop, including a present for Kelly. Neat place. Most of it was a comfortable old boardwalk with benches everywhere and lots of shade and cool breezes. I'd love to visit there to write sometime. Peaceful place.

We watched the first half of one of my mom's birthday presents, the new DVD of Doctor Zhivago, with plans to watch the second half tomorrow night. (Damn long movie, 3 hrs 20 mins.) Unlike with my previous attempt at David Lean, Laurence of Arabia, I could actually follow the plot and dialogue with Zhivago. It's interesting. It's too slow in parts, there are unnecessary scenes, and for all of that time you don't get a full sense of the characters' personalities, but it's still a grim and compelling story with some fine character performances. And I never realized how much Rod Steiger, in his youth and with a beard, looked like a fat Liam Neeson. Hell, I never realized Omar Sharif was white, and this is the third movie I've seen with him in a leading role. Bottom line: If you've ever got three hours and twenty minutes to kill, you can't go completely wrong with Doctor Zhivago.

Tomorrow: More Zhivago, shopping for Kelly, and dinner at Hemingway's. Aww yeah.