Return to Paradise

MOOOOOOOOOOOOO All aboard the Southwest Snowbird Express, leaving from Islip, NY and, God willing, arriving in West Palm Beach some time tomorrow evening. Assuredly we will witness at least a few miraculous recoveries from wheel chair bound to walking without the aid of a cane and I know we will also be subjected to the pissing and moaning of some idiot who "doesn't like standing in line". But we won't even notice because we are headed HOME. Aren't we blessed to have a home to go back to after spending 2 weeks in the company of some of our favorite people! And can you believe we are even related to some of those favorite people?
In case you missed us, Ger and I have been traveling again. A packed flight from PBIA brought us to Aunt AnnMarie's home on Long Island. (Aunt AM is Ger's big sister and an absolutely wonderful woman in oh so many ways. I'll have to write about her one of these days.) We crammed all our luggage in her car and the 3 of us set off to drive to Portland, Maine. Slight setback when our LARGE 9:30 AM ferry was cancelled and we had to sail across Long Island Sound on the small 10:00 ferry. This normally wouldn't have been a problem but it happened to be a very stormy day. We all managed to make the one and a half hour trip without loosing breakfast but we can't say the same for many of our fellow passengers. At least when we arrived in Connecticut the rain had let up and the further we traveled away from Long Island the better the day became. We arrived in Portland and had a noisy, joyous reunion with Glo. (She too will be the subject of a future blog.) We all packed up and drove another 45 minutes to Frye Island in Sebago Lake where we had the best week ever with Glo and her husband John, some two pound lobsters, a lot of vodka, gin or beer (depending on the time of day and the menu), and a ton and a half of cake and ice cream. (Glo and AM LOVE their ice cream. I just love food in general.) But then, before we knew it, the week was over. How is it that when you are with people you really love, the time just flies by and you just never get to telling them everything you want to say? But we'll just pick up where we left off when we see each other next year.
And so we packed our ever expanding bags* and headed to Boston to visit Ger and AM's baby brother, Joseph and his wife Sue. While we were there we got to see their whole family. I don't know when the little nieces and nephews grew up but suddenly we were visiting with these beautiful people who have children of their own. What a joy to see these "children" with their families. It was a whirl wind weekend of visits and a tour of the new Greenway in Boston. Ger and AnnMarie and I all decided we needed to make another visit to this quaint, historical city to spend some time walking the streets and seeing the sights. Put that on the list.
After a much nicer ferry ride back to LI and a fabulous, famous (to East Enders) Cliff's Marinated Steak dinner at the ELBOW EAST we are back at AnnMarie's. Our flight home is tomorrow afternoon and we are ready to return to our patch of Paradise.
All in all, a great vacation.

* It seems that when AnnMarie and I get together the shopping gene kicks into high gear and no matter where we are we manage to find something to buy. Since my suitcase was pretty full to start with we are traveling home with a laundry bag full of dirty clothes. Heaven help us if the bag breaks!