Beautiful Beaches and an April Fools Story

Perdido Key, Florida  Non Travel Day (sorta)
Day 6 

We are staying at the Perdido Key RV Resort  until Saturday.  The weather is cooperating with brilliant sunshine, low humidity and it finally is warming up. 

The forced march was FOUR MILES LONG this morning...my 'trainer' is going to kill me with all this  exercise! 

By the Waterway

Perdido Cove RV Resort

Later, after lunch, we sat out in the sun by the Intercoastal.  We don't spend too long 'soaking up the rays' these days...at this age we seem to soak up skin cancer too.  Then we climbed in the car for a drive along the oceanfront, through Orange Beach and Gulf Shores.  Spectacular beaches continue for miles. We drove about 25 miles to the end of the island and then back on the canal side.  It was  a perfect day for a ride.  This is a great vacation spot that sometimes gets overlooked in favor of  Panama City beach, or Pensacola Beach.  This really is the gem of the gulf coast. 

We drove by several ice cream places before we caved.  It was only a minor indiscretion...both of us getting a small cone, but after the four mile walk, we deserved it.  Funny thing we realized on the drive down to this area.  We've visited this area often over the years and the ONE THING that we always have perfect recall on is where the ice cream shops are...right down to the brand.  

 Yesterday Jim pointed to a strip mall and asked, "Isn't there an ice cream store in that plaza, and didn't we stop there with  Ray and Carol?"

Without missing a beat, I replied, "Yup...it's at the far end of the building, and it's Hershey's ice cream!" 

Why we can't remember practically anything important these days, but CAN remember in perfect detail, exactly where we got ice cream, 12 hours away from our home and a few years ago, is pathetic!  Must be hot-wired in our brains.  I mean, if ancient man didn't remember where the good food could be found...well, we wouldn't be here! Right?  Okay, that's my story and I'm stickin' to it!

Today is April Fool's Day.  No jokes here today.  Besides, I got Jim  so good years ago, that I could never top it and won't even try.  Not to mention that he...um, doesn't have as good a sense of humor as me!

The year was 1974.  Rhode Island was one of the first states to begin a Lottery.  We had three kids, eight and under, a new mortgage and I didn't work.  In other words, poor.  Jim had bought a few lottery tickets, the top prize was $25,000, quite a sum of money back then.  The winning numbers were announced on the radio.  I copied a few numbers, then wrote one of the numbers that was on one of our lottery tickets.  Jim can home  from work and I asked him to check the numbers that I had written down on a piece of scrap paper against the tickets on the kitchen counter.  I was watching through a crack in the door as he checked the first, second and finally the last ticket....the one I faked.  He checked, stopped, looked again....his eyes bulged.  I think I realized that I was in trouble when he started running in circles in the kitchen.  Then I KNEW I was in trouble when he started squeaking in a little girlie voice, trying to say my name in a voice I'd never heard before...or since.  "Kathy, Kathy....twenty-five THOUSAND dollars!   We WON, We won!!!  Twenty-five THOUSAND dollars...twenty-five THOUSAND dollars!!!!!"

I was so glad he'd already taken his gun off, because for a second there....  I had to come clean.  So I said, "Yeah, right....April Fools."  He kept saying, "NO, NO...NOT April Fools....it's true!"  Then he realized that *I* wasn't getting as excited as he, over our good fortune, and again I said, "April Fools"

Poor guy.  I thought he was going to cry.  As I remember, he grabbed his keys and left to drive around and cool down...before he knocked my head off.  It took a while before he could laugh about it. 

Said he'd get me back someday...Nah.