Well that's just beachy

Beach trip 2009 was a success. We had fun despite the rain and the cooler than usual temps. And once again we laid waste to the Morehead City/Atlantic Beach area of the North Carolina coast.

We had great weather all the way on the drive down and for once we hit no construction zones. But we paid for that good fortune the next day.
The skies opened up and rain issued forth like racist comments at a conservative political meeting. The rain that fell wasn't light summery rain, it was soul deadening rain that would make lesser people tear their hair out and commit suicide. Actually, it didn't rain so much as it gushed water from the skies.
But despite moisture, some brave souls still went about their beach business.
And some fat bastards didn't give a damn if it rained or not, they had missed going to the beach last year because of they were in the midst of buying a house and packing and moving so they weren't going to let a little liquid sunshine stop their fun. (That photo of yours truly was actually taken on Thursday morning. Yes, it rained then too.)
No, we didn't go in Monkey Bar & Grill but I was glad to see Atlantic Beach is getting more classy as the years go by. What we did do when the rain was falling was go sightseeing, go to antique stores, go to the movies, hang out, and read.

When the sun was out I not only went to the beach, I went into the future as well. I journeyed to the year 2050 and there I saw on the beach blog bud ReRe and her husband James. I did not talk to them because I did not want to break the time space continuum. Any sci fi fan knows you don't fuck with the time space continuum.

It didn't rain on Wednesday so we spent the day on the beach in the sun and in the ocean. Thursday it was overcast so we got in the car and drove around and we made our way to the Down East/Sea Level area. Yes, there is actually a town named Sea Level, well it's not a town really so much as it's a wide place in the road. It's an non tourist area and it's loaded with great old derelict buildings like this one:
After taking in the sights of Sea Level and Cedar Island, we drove back to civilization and got some lunch at this place:Despite the odd name, it's a decent place to eat, as long as you stick to dishes that are their strength that is, dishes like deep fried seafood, she crab soup, and hush puppies. We had a massively good late lunch and we ate enough deep fried food to last me for the year but man oh man was it good.
The sun finally came out to stay on Friday so we spent the day once again on the beach under our canopy. And boys and girls, canopies are the way to go on the beach. Umbrellas break and get taken off in gusts of wind but canopies stay put and you can move in and out of the shade when you feel like it. The sunny days that we spent on the beach, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday made us forget all about the cold and rainy days like this one:
The surf was a little high on Saturday but it didn't stop us or this cute little family from enjoying the beach:
On one of our trips into Morehead City we spotted this scene:
I half expected to see those birds begin to attack people while Tippi Hedren ran screaming down the street. Luckily, I didn't see that but I did see this scary sight:
Damn Bill Collector, he follows me where ever I go, even on vacation! He won't give a monkey a break. But we still had a nice time despite him.

If you agree that we had a good time Sparky, stand in the cold rain with your arms out above your sides.
Now, there you go. Would Sparky lie? We had a good time at the beach, as we always do, but we're both glad to be home. And now here's some useless lists:

Seafood eaten on Beach Trek 2009:

• flounder
• scallops
• shrimp
• mahi-mahi
• grouper
• tuna
• crab
• oysters

Movies seen:

• Julie & Julia

Books read:

• Going Postal by Terry Pratchett
• Pepper by Amal Naj
• In The Devil's Garden: A Sinful History of Forbidden Food by Stewart Lee Allen

Yay beach trip 2009!

Mystery solved

I wondered what was behind the rash of bad parking jobs in my town.

So I did some snooping and I came to the conclusion that those who are parking badly are also partaking of the dreaded 'SPECIAL DRINK' from Vision!
Damn upscale nightclubs, pray they never come to your town. Pray you'll never run afoul of those who have been imbibing in Happy Hour 3.8!

Bele Chere 2009

Bele Chere is a street festival that's held the last full weekend in July in Asheville, NC. It's chock full of artists selling their wares, non profits trying to get you to get into their message, food vendors, and much more. My favorite part of the whole shebang is the watching the people who attend the soiree, I love to watch and make up stories about them in my head as they go by.

We, Sparky and I that is, do Bele Chere every year and we always seem to go on Saturday during the hottest part of the day. Sometimes we can talk some of our friends into going but this year we went solo. It was pretty hot but not as hot as it has been in years past.

This kid was typical of how people dressed their babies this year:However most other people gave their babies food or something to chew on, these folks were going in a different route. Good for them, gnawing on an empty tray will build character in that kid some day.

Speaking of food, I'm pretty sure those hippies fried the chicken and tater tots in Patchouli oil and they laced the waffles with Mary Jane.

Here's a brief summary of some the things I learned at this year's event:
Video games are not just for inside play anymore.

Some white guys can't keep their shirts on, no matter how much other white guys want them to. And by other white guys I mean me.

Kids with hair-dos like this always crack me up.

Turns out that the long lost black member of Dexy's Midnight Runners was not an urban legend after all. He's real and he was in Asheville yesterday.

The gal at the candy apple/fudge/ice cream booth is kind of okay with fat bastards who take her picture. And by fat bastards I mean me.

Some people have waaaay more balls (or in this case ovaries) than me. This chick was doing a karaoke version of Little Drummer Boy. It was Christmas in July for about three minutes.

I also learned that douchebags come in all manner of shapes and sizes. Here's 'Hong Kong Phooey Douchebag':
Here's 'Jesus Hates Anyone Who Isn't White Douchebag':
And finally we have 'Hey Look At Me, Aren't I Super Clever and Amusing Douchebag(s)':
I also learned that buskers are everywhere.

Hey look, it's the little drummer boy:
It's the angsty guitar girl:
And finally we have the white noise busker:
I also learned that superheroes walk amongst us and they dig ice cream just like we do:
But the biggest thing I learned from this year's Bele Chere was that you can take the granny out of the trailer park, but you can't take the trailer park out of the granny:
I'm betting she was on her way to eat some of that patchouli fried chicken, get the letters 'G-I-L-F' tattooed on her lower back, or to see if Spiderman would shower her in a stream of his hot wet 'webbing.'

Oh Bele Chere, how I love you and I'm already looking forward to seeing you again next year!

Quinn wants you all to know something

"I kicked Monkerstein's booty in disc golf today. I beat him by ten strokes! Sure I've got a two shot handicap but come on, I would have trashed him either way. Oh and the next time I'm on here I better be in a post where I'm close to some hot chicks like the ones in this post, or I'm suing."

I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaack!

Well boys and girls we're back from the beach. We've gotten our fill of Atlantic Beach, North Carolina for another year, and since they can't very well move it, we may go back next year despite the loud and noisy protestations of the locals.

It was a damn fine week. We had hot sunny weather all week long with nary a rain drop in sight, well there was a stray cloud that put a drop or two on us but it was short lived and it ran away as soon as we shook our fists at it. The wind kicked up a day or two but it was nothing in comparison to what we've been through in years past. All in all we could not have asked for better weather.

Even though we started off an hour late due to the some people, and those people's initials would be the girlfriend's sister, sleeping in, we hit the road last Saturday morning.
Damn, look at that great pack job. I was proud of myself for getting all our stuff stuffed in the Scion with room to spare. The gf's parents Jeep Cherokee however had a decent pack job but it was nothing like mine.

We drove all day last Saturday with only a few stops and we got to the beach at around 5:30 PM.
After we unpacked he went for a walk on the beach. I saw this little girl surf fishing and she could not have been more than five or six and that rod she is using was about three times her size. She was cute as a button so I had to take her picture.
After our cheap ass made in China beach umbrellas bit the dust on Sunday we went to Wal Mart, I know I know "Mr. I hate Wal Mart with a passion and so should you" went to Wal Mart after telling you to boycott them for months. Well, I had to, I was out voted. Anyway we went and bought a beach canopy and it was the best damn sun protection, outside of sunscreen that we've ever used. (While we were in Wal Mart a female voice came over the intercom and said, "I need a male member of management to help a customer load something heavy. I repeat I need any male member..." Before she could finish I was laughing my ass off and my gf said, "Calm down, Mom and Dad are with us Mr. Smart Ass.")


The gf peeking out of the aforementioned canopy. Notice that she is wearing her bucket hat. Now, notice that this fat bastard, me, is not wearing his bucket hat that he bought specifically to wear at the beach. Notice also how I could stand to lose about 50 pounds. Yeah, yeah, one of you smart asses is saying that I could lose ten ugly pounds by chopping off my head, funny. Real funny. Leave the jokes to me. This is my blog after all. Just for that insolence, you get an extreme close up of me:Don't feed me or I'll follow you home. Notice how red my nose is. It got blistered over the next two days. From what you ask? Why fishing of course!


I lost my bucket hat in the first ten minutes of fishing off the pier. It was really windy and when I bent down to unhook my hook from under the pier, my first cast went horribly awry, my hat blew off into the ocean and it quickly floated off. Some damn dolphin is probably wearing it now.


I go fishing exactly once a year and that's when we go to the beach and if we went without her parents and sister I would not go fishing then but I actually do like it when I'm at the beach because we usually catch enough to cook and it's fun hanging out with the gf's Dad. He loves to fish but he won't go by himself since he's getting on up there in age so it's no skin off my nose to take him fishing a couple of times while we're on vacation.

Here's the gf's Dad with one of the many Blue Fish he caught and that we later filleted and cooked and ate.

Here's the biggest fish I caught. It looks small but it was about 13 and a half inches long and it weighed about 3 pounds. Unfortunately I had to toss it back because it was under the size limit. Had it been another inch long I would have filleted it and we would have ate it. That was the biggest fish I was to catch all week. The rest I caught we small fish that we used for cut bait.
However Sleepy, the gf's sister, stepped up and caught a shit load of Bluefish. And the ho even caught a flounder that we filleted.This one barely measured out and we cooked him later. She and her Dad caught a bunch more Flounders but they had to toss them back because they were under the size limit.This was from about half way through the first day's fishing. Later we turned them into this:

After soaking the Bluefish and the Flounder in Buttermilk the gf's Mom breaded them lightly and fried them. They were mmmm mmmm good.

We did a bit of sight seeing while there also. We saw Sand Henge.

And the famous pastel houses of Atlantic Beach.

Actually these houses are for rent and I checked into renting one of them. It turns out $5000 a week is a bit out of our price range. But the condo we stayed in was super nice anyway. It was spacious, clean, and tastefully decorated.

We saw some celebs at the beach. I know I was as shocked as you to see A Flock of Seagulls in North Carolina, but there they are. They hung out with us for a moment then they ran so far away.

The beach was kind of crowded on Sunday and Monday so I asked a bunch of people to write in the sand what their favorite blog was and they all wrote this:

Well there was one gal who started to write "Politits" but I told her that a shark was eating her kid so she ran off. And there was another chick who started to write "FranIam" but when I started to cry she quickly changed it to "Never What You Think It Should Be." I gave her five bucks to change it so she did and I took the picture above before she could change her mind.

I took a shit load of pictures so I'll be posting more soon and I'll also tell more vacation tales as well so stay tuned. I'm wiped out right now after driving all day and then grocery shopping and then cooking dinner tonight so I'm gonna leave you now with a spooky looking picture of the dunes and vegetation from behind the condo where we stayed.