Chilly or Chilli

Well LL, I see it's pretty chilly over there. Here (today Tuesday 9 December) it's in the high 70's, that's around 25C for you. It's our winter so temperatures will drop to the high 60's F shortly. Having said that, this is the place to spend winter wouldn't you say....and you had the chance, albeit 9 years ago now. Must seem like a lifetime to you. I know it does for me and my wife, some of the best years of my life in fact.

So each Friday you head north as you have done nearly every week for 9 plus years. Then, generally, but not always, there's a chilli at the end of it. Not that it looks appetizing. There you go though, the man you recommended a salmon, tomato and prawn dish to once has moved onto much higher culinary skills and heights. You might have enjoyed them too but you decided otherwise.

Has it never occurred to you that FM is unlikely to make it to a full eight decades - I guess it probably has given his size - he will encounter some quite severe health problems in the next 10 years, I am guessing. You must be satisfied or reconciled to that thought. You have always lived your life for the moment rather than look forward. Or, you have looked forward and closed your mind to it. If you had taken just a few chances in life you wouldn't be where you are now. You haven't really moved on at all from when I knew you and you still spend the weekdays apart. Certainly, you haven't married again but then you refused me which was probably the biggest mistake of your life...and you've made a few. More than most, in fact. I guess I only made one and you know what that was.

So, PDC for you next.....again, and again and again. Seems your horizons never stretched beyond Spain, whereas mine encompass the whole world. You could have been on that journey to far horizons and discovered so much. Maybe a lot about yourself in the process, but you decided to remain a small town girl with little ambition beyond your roots. I guess it comes from those very roots and the environment they created around you. That is, you really don't know any different. But, it could have been different except you never had the courage....or the commitment. 

Lines of communication are still open but I doubt you have the courage to make the 'call' so to speak. We are flying ourselves and the family to our place in Barbados for, and over, Christmas so social media will be 'off' for a while. You would be so surprised to learn of all the detail of my life over the last 9 plus year, I'm sure. There's never been a dull moment and I reckon I have traveled further and to more places than I did in the Navy. Talking of which, there's a reunion in London in January so we and some friends/old navy guys and family will be over.

I think that will do for now, but as always here are a few photos for you. The first was taken earlier this year in Cambridge - yes, we still get back there. After all it's where we met and lived for a while until I gained my US residency and citizenship.

The second is Fort Lauderdale - we have recently spent a weekend there. This last weekend was on Sanibel at the cottage, a short drive from Naples as you know....

The last few are from a balloon trip we took whilst in Australia in the hinterland west of Brisbane. So here you go: