Week of July 30, 2000

We have returned from Holden Beach safely. I am working on an update to chronicle our week at the beach and hopefully will have it up later tonight.

In the meantime, this many be an indication that I am on too many listservs or subscribe to ones which generate too much email....I had better then 200 messages waiting for me when I fired up my system upon returning. Ugh.

We have returned safely from our trip to Holden Beach.

If you were going to judge the successfulness of this trip on the weather, then I would say the trip tipped the fun meter only around 50 percent. However, if you judged the trip's successfulness on being able to get away, relax and forget about everything, then the fun meter was pegged. This in itself says something, I only checked my office voicemail twice and each time that was in the evening when it was too late to answer the calls that day. In addition, I only called back to the office twice and both times the conversations very fairly short.

We left Winston-Salem around mid-morning on Sunday and arrived in Holden Beach, after a lunch stop, around 3:30 PM in hopes of being able to get our rented house prior to the 4 PM check-in time. The house wasn't quite ready, so Katie and decided to wait the short time there in the real estate office and were able to grab the keys, head the house and begin our unload and get the temperature adjusted.

Once we were unpacked (it was still drizzling some) we headed off to dinner and to Shallotte, NC, where we hit the Wal-Mart and Food Lion (grocery) stores for the week's provisions.

On Monday the weather looked hit and miss and that's exactly what it turned out to be. I wanted to keep up my exercise routine, so I decided to head out for my walk/trot and headed east, which sounds weird. You would think if I was heading East I would end up in the ocean, but Holden Beach is on that part of North Carolina that curves back in, so when you're looking out into the ocean, you're actually looking South.

I was reaching the eastern tip of the island, which was about a mile and a half away and the rain drizzle started. It was then that I thought I should turn around and head back before I got caught in a nasty storm. By the time I reached our house it was a full-on rain storm with dark skies thunder off in the distance. In fact, I was eyeing the wooden walkways which lead from houses to the beach as a place to hide from the thunder storm, but was able to make it safely back to the to the house, albeit thoroughly soaked. Into the dryer went everything, including my shoes.

But all was not lost, the storm headed away and by mid-afternoon we were able to get a couple of hours in on the beach and frolicking in the surf.

Monday evening was the day for our planned return trip to Betty's Waterfront Restaurant where they serve you a basket of hot and delicious hush puppies as soon as you sit down. Actually, they're not hush puppies as I most folks around here know them, but are more light and fluffy like little balls of funnel cake or fried dough like you would get at the county fair. In most seafood restaurants hush puppies and made of a mixture of corn meal and other goodies.

We wanted to return to Betty's, because this was the place that Andrew announced last year that he wanted Flounder, much to my and Suzy's surprise and even more of a surprise was that he actually ate it and enjoyed it. Flounder has been a staple of his diet for more than a year now.

The same could not be said for Tuesday. It was hit and miss all day and mostly mist. Only a couple times did it rain really hard, but for the most part of the day it rained just enough to be aggravating and keep you from the beach. Tuesday was a washout and time for dive deeply into my first book of the trip, Sidney Sheldon's Rage of Angels.

Suzy and Katie decided to go exploring, with Suzy heading to the northern end of Myrtle Beach while Katie and a friend sought refuge in Wilmington. Andrew and I manned the house and kept ourselves entertained throughout the afternoon.

By the end of the day it had cleared enough that we could enjoy an evening bike ride of about six miles around the island. The bike ride also included a stop for ice cream for the kids. I, however, was a good boy and abstained.

Wednesday was starting out much the same way as Tuesday, however it was still rather overcast and not yet time for any beach activities, so we tried another bike ride. However, I cut my portion of the ride short as I needed to phone my boss at the office. He'd left me a voicemail the day before asking me to call and when we spoke he was very apologetic, forgetting that I was on vacation on not on a business trip.

By the time Suzy returned home from the bike ride around the island I was finished with my phone call and you guessed it, the rains were moving back in.

This gave me the opportunity to finish the Rage of Angels and I needed another book to occupy my time. We had taken a grocery bag full of books, so this time I chose Joseph D. Pistone's Donnie Brasco: Deep Cover. This turned out to be another page turner for me.

By the afternoon the rains were headed out to sea and we got to enjoy a beautiful afternoon on the beach. Things were beginning to look up.

Andrew had been negotiating to eat at the Seafood Peddler restaurant since before we left for the drive to Holden Beach. It's not that the food is all that great at this particular restaurant, but he likes the decorations there, to be more specific, the outside facade, which has a giant shark bursting through the roof gable of the restaurant. "I want to eat at the restaurant with the big shark" is his request. This restaurant offer a seafood buffet with all of the staples of the beach, including, you guessed it, Fried Flounder. Andrew was happy.

Thursday and Friday were beautiful sunny days at the beach and we spent the majority of the day laying in the sun, reading and playing in the surf. Katie, one not known for her adventuresome spirit, even got into riding the waves in on a "boogie" board. Between riding the boards and body surfing, we spent most of the day in the water.

Andrew turned out to be the Romeo of the family. In the house beside us was a family from Ft. Mill, SC and there was a little girl in the family about Andrew's age. Brittany and Andrew were inseparable for the rest of the week. In fact, I am surprised the both of them are not waterlogged as much time as they played in the water together. Of course, we were not silly enough to mention it was a boy -- girl thing. They were just friends. However, by the end of the trip, they wanted to exchange addresses. Brittany seemed awfully sad to see us going.

The folks who own one of the racing hangout restaurants in Charlotte, The Sandwich Construction Company, have taken over a pizza joint that was near our house and created Paradise Cafe. We checked this joint out on Thursday and when you enter you think you're in Margaritaville. The only thing missing was Jimmy Buffet. And the food was good.

I was able to get in another walk on Thursday, this time heading West towards what is left of the Holden Beach pier. The pier is about two miles from the house and by the time I had returned I had clocked a five mile walk, thanks to the information provided by my trusty pedometer.

On Friday we had discovered a sandbar that was in front of our house. At low tide we were able to walk out into the ocean about 100 feet and when arriving at our destination were in water about ankle deep. We never got into water above our waist on the way to the sand bar.

It was also time for my third book of the week. This time I selected Sebastain Junger's - The Perfect Storm, which was a perfect selection since I was on the ocean during a week of stormy weather. Knowing that books are always better than movies, I am glad I read this (yet another page turner) before heading to the theater. However, I am sure the movie has to have some fantastic special effects. As a coincidence I caught a documentary on MSNBC last night (Sunday 7/30) detailing the military's parajumper program which was heavily featured in this true story and therefore the book.

On Saturday there was no sanctioned walk, but we did head east down the beach to a place where Suzy and Katie wanted to go to look for shells, conch shells, shark's teeth and the stuff you find in the ocean water. This round trip walk was probably around five miles, the fact of which Katie bemoaned about all the way back. I didn't have the measuring device with me, but this point was well past where I had measured 1.5 miles earlier in the week. Therefore, Katie's guess of a five mile round trip for this shelling expedition was more correct than she knows.

It had rained on Saturday morning, but we were able to take advantage of the beach around noon, followed by this aggressive shell walk around three that afternoon, When we returned a couple of hours later it was high tide and we packed it in for the day.

We tried another seafood restaurant on Saturday evening, the Seafood Barn, and were surprised there was no wait when we arrived around seven PM.

There was a huge thunderstorm during the night on Saturday and you guessed it...we left Holden Beach just as we had found it...raining.

Even dodging the rain, we had good relaxing week. Heck, I even found myself falling asleep early in the evening and waking up to a bright sunrise and crashing waves every morning.

We like Holden Beach. We've tentatively reserved a house for next year for the week of July 15, 2001. And in keep with a trend we have established, we've chosen a different house, still on the eastern end of the island.

As a good Republican, I plan to watch some of the convention coverage tonight. I especially want to see Colin Powell speak and hope they have the good taste to put him on during prime time and before I hit the sack. I will be avoiding the commercial networks, choosing C-SPAN for this viewing. I don't need some talking liberal head telling me what I just heard.

I will NOT be watching Dennis Miller's debut as a color commentator on Monday Night Football. Hey, is ABC going to choose the political thing or the football thing. Since this is just a practice game for the teams and the TV crew, I'll bet I couldn't watch him if I wanted to. Good. But the fact that I am discussing Dennis Miller and ABC's Monday Night Football means they were successful. I am sure Miller was selected so people would once again be talking about MNF. Got us, didn't they?

As I was wading through my inbox tonight, I found these tidbits to be of interest:

It's hard to believe it's time for the kids to be heading back to school. Seems like they just arrived home on summer vacation a couple of weeks ago. However, I am sure Suzy would argue this point. I think she's ready to have her life back.

And in preparation for returning to school, tonight was open house night at the schools. The kids get a chance to meet their new teachers and get a glimpse of what the new year might have to offer.

Katie waited by the mailbox on Monday for our week's worth of mail to be delivered, for she knew that inside would be a letter from her school, Wiley Middle School, with her homeroom assignment. We had stopped the mail while we were in Holden Beach and she wanted to know if we could go to the post office on Sunday to retrieve the mail. Our mail doesn't arrive until late in the afternoon, so I am sure Monday was a long day for her.

When she tore open the envelope with her assignment, she was rather dejected. She had been chatting with her friends since returning home and it appeared they would be separated. However, as we left her school tonight she announced that she was feeling better. The teacher that she had been assigned to was not the one she thought it was and there were going to be some of the same folks in her class from last year. There was almost a hint of a smile in her voice. She's once again looking forward to returning to school on Monday.

Andrew, however, didn't suffer through the same emotion. He received word that he would be assigned to the teacher we all wanted, Mrs. Paula Warlick at Vienna Elementary School. This is the same third grade teacher Katie had at Vienna and the whole family truly enjoyed the experience. Heck, before he headed off to Kindergarten, Andrew even used to go into the class with Suzy as a volunteer. The meeting with Mrs. Warlick tonight was more like a reunion.

On his first day of class Andrew is going to be able to pick a keypal from Australia. Mrs. Warlick's class will be corresponding third graders down under via the internet and I am sure some of the first topics will be the Olympics.

Here's yet another sign that Microsoft is having problems getting people to upgrade their operating system at MS's whim. When the newest version of Windows (Windows Me) ships, Microsoft is going to start off discounting the product. Could there be trouble brewing in the West?

One of the things the FreeFind search service provides is a weekly recap of the searches performed on your site. At the end of the month, there's a monthly recap. Today I received a recap of the most recent searches at Wakeolda. I'll admit, some of the searches surprise me.

I have also noticed that traffic has increased substantially here over the past week or so. At first, I thought it was the search spider, but then upon further review it looks like it more than a spider's web. My stats are stored here.

Luckily the back to school shopping in the Tucker family still consists of buying notebooks, folders and paper. We are fortunate that we have not reached the back to school digital age, but if you are in that boat C|Net has prepared a buying guide that might help when you head out on the shopping spree. The closest we came to high needs this year was a calculator for Katie.

One of the first email packages I used on the internet was Eudora and for some reason most of us migrated away from this simple email system to the more complicated packages like Outlook and even Netscape Communicator. I suppose we thought we wanted more out of our email client, but when we got more power and flexibility, we also opened the door to more problems.

With the advent of email based viruses some folks may be thinking of trying an email client like Eudora again and Qualcomm has heard your calling. Eudora 5.0 Beta is ready for testing.

With more of us signing on to cable modems or xDSL there is more need that ever for firewall protection with these always on services. C|Net offers their advice on these products.

President Clinton made good on his promise today to veto Congress' repeal of the marriage tax penalty in the U.S. tax code.

This, coupled with the repeal of the death tax, will become major campaign issues and Al Gore senses that. He tried to have it both ways, saying the agrees and supports his boss' veto, but out the other side of his mouth saying he favors some kind of repeal of the marriage tax penalty. Can't have your cake and eat it too, Al. Of course he wants to take the typical Robin Hood Democrat stand, tax those who are working to make something of themselves so he can give it to those who are inclined to hold their hands out for government freebies.

The weather here in Winston-Salem has been very strange this summer. In fact it has been unseasonably cool. We've been having partly cloudy days for more than two weeks. Usually, in the throws of summer, we are suffering with stifling heat and no rain. No that way this year. Lots of cloud cover and intermittent rain showers. Wonder who or what will take the blame for this change in our weather?

Steve's Current Notes