Dispatches from the Jersey Shore, the 3rd Day

The weather was not on our side yesterday. Still conditions could have been so much worse. We were able to walk the beach a few times and Youngest Daughter got in the pool with a friend. We enjoyed a Tullimore in the evening breeze. This morning the wind gusts with a bit of mist after the weather people promised apocalyptic rain conditions due to Hurricane Franklin far offshore. We consider ourselves lucky. 

Seaplace is a humble collection of 500 + square foot condos gathered around a pool a hundred yards from the beach. Two bedrooms, a kitchen, a bath, and a small living area. We admit we love this place. Why not buy a condo? It's come up. But take away the pool and the beach, and one must from October to April, and you've got a tiny condo in the cold. We bring this up because the owner next door showed us his condo, he redid it last year. The condo looks great and he said he's thinking of putting it on the market for $750,000. Someone will fork that over, but not us. 

Glenn Reynolds laments, '"Hipsters, academics and outdoors types moved into the Boulder area, and after a while, with cougar hunting and trapping eliminated, the cougars came back. People liked having deer in their yards, and cougars liked to eat deer, bringing them into close proximity to humans. Then people’s dogs and cats started disappearing, and then people themselves started to be attacked, but community meetings still featured masses of people who “came to speak for the cougars."'

We have this problem with the family lake house in the Berkshires. Everyone backed off the wildlife and now we have bald eagles, also moose, coyote, mountain lions and bears that make themselves right at home around the house. It's getting downright dangerous to hit the Appalachian Trail, and we don't walk anywhere without making a lot of noise. We're no Les Stroud. But anyone who's ever had to so much as take care of a lawn knows how unrelenting nature is. If one doesn't cull the wildlife, they will end up on your front stoop. Oh, we got alligators in New Jersey now.

We spent a good chunk of cloudy, windy Monday researching Saab Viggen jets. Those babies look cool because they are cool. And bad ass, too. We're in good shape for Norway's Swedish intermission chapter. We're not quite sure how we're writing said chapter, though. Meeting engagement that gets out of hand? Set piece fight? Both for a meatier chapter? Maybe. Then we looked at the map and can't help but notice that Poland and East Germany are right across the Baltic from Sweden. Huh.