KattyWilly

Tonight I went to the most recent Tampa Bay Blog Writers Meetup. I had a nice time listening to the discussion and meeting some of the local Blogging community.  It was interesting to finally put a person to the blogs.  Looking forward to more.

Today I did all the yard work early so I could spend the afternoon with my daughter. We got the bicycles out and rode down to the Pinellas trail and then up to downtown Dunedin. Parked the bikes and walked around town looking at some of the antique/junk shops. We had lunch at the Cafe Alfresco and watched the vibrant lively downtown area around the trail.

I can’t understand why other towns don’t take advantage of the trail like Dunedin does. I watch as every few years there is a new plan to redevelop downtown Clearwater in an attempt to bring people back to the downtown area. You might think that “they” would take advantage of this built in mechanism that brings in people on bicycles, roller blades and walking. Instead it has this feeling that the trail ends when you get to downtown Clearwater. I mean it literally just stops. You have to make a left turn go up half a block and ride down the sidewalks along East St. It totally loses the feel of “The Trail”, the sort of moving community of people. Oh well. I’m just glad that Dunedin has embraced the trail and I really enjoy the feeling of community and gathering that happens around the trail there.

So after lunch we did a little more shopping for antiques and we ended up with a new item to add to Lindsey’s growing collection of cameras. An old Kodak Brownie – Target Six-20. Now I have to figure out how to get some film that will fit in it and then figure out how to get it developed. Should be fun.

The second item we picked up was an old manual typewriter, a pink one no less. It’s an old Sears model that I haven’t been able to find much info on. It seems like all the keys work, although the mechanism seems a little sluggish. I was surprised at how much I remembered of the operation of a manual typewriter. I’ve been trying to remember what it was like back when I used the old manual at the house to type papers. I was at the transition point where we took typing in high school but it was called keyboarding or something like that.

So here is our new Brownie, and Pinky

BlogPaul is hosting the Tampa Bay / St. Pete area Bloggers Meetup next month.  I hope to be able to attend.

When?

Monday, Mar 5, 2007, 6:30 PM
20070305T233000Z

Where?

Panera Bread

3181 Tampa Road

Oldsmar, FL 34677

Last night was the Passport to Italy spaghetti dinner fund raiser for the girls Academy program at school.

The Juniors are the servers so Lindsey was doing her part serving and busing tables.

Next month we will be heading to Italy so this was a nice warm up.

Where’s the manatee?

Some new photos from this weekend’s concert posted. It was a nice evening, even after dad got lost somewhere in the port district on the way to the show. Only missed one song from The Higher, the band we were there to see, YIKES! It worked out ok as they did a little acoustic set after the show out by the tour buses. The girls we able to meet the band members and get some autographs and photos.

Every now and then I check the referers page for my weblog.  It lists the pages that visitors were on that led them to my site.  It ends up being mostly from search engines like Google and Yahoo. 

It is interesting to watch the changes in the searches as the seasons change.  During the holidays I get literally hundreds of hits from people searching for Merry Christmas From Heaven, and for some reason a good mix of searches for the song Gloomy Sunday.

This time of year I start to see searches for the song The Man I Love, and next month will start Irish Drinking songs.  I’ll have to try and pay attention to more of the seasons in searches.

I miss.

As the girls grow and do amazing things I feel the loss.  I feel the loss when I have this exploding excitement inside and I want to share how amazing these girls are, with, someone.  Someone who understands that feeling that wells up inside of you.  Pride, excitement, joy, happiness at an elemental level. 

And that felling passes.  And there is a sense of an experience that wants to be shared and can’t.  A frustration, a feeling of disappointment.  A feeling of wanting.

“Falling slowly, eyes that know me
And I can’t go back
Moods that take me and erase me
And I’m painted black
You have suffered enough
And warred with yourself
It’s time that you won“

Falling Slowly
Glen Hansard

Here are some links to Lindsey’s photos.

Photos on Flickr

Photos at JPG Magazine

So I’m watching the NFL playoffs and this commercial comes on.  I listen for a couple of seconds and recognize the backgound music as The Postal Service version of the Ben Gibbard song Such Great Heights.  And the commercial is for the UPS whiteboard ad campaign.  The Postal Service and UPS.

Ben writes good songs and put on a good show when we saw him with Death Cab for Cutie over in Orlando.