Various forms of transportation in These titles mean nothing.

The Nina and the Pinta have been making their way up the Mississippi River. This weekend they are at the waterfront park in LaCrosse. We combined a car buying trip with a look at Columbus’s fleet. We didn’t pay the eight dollar entrance fee, so maybe my photos are stolen. If so I apologize. They did seem to have a pretty good number of mothers and kids and retired couples touring the boats.

I have no idea of the provenance of the wooden boats - whether they were movie sets, which seems likely - or who owns them and where they live normally. I wondered where the third ship = the Santa Maria - was. The first one - the Nina - was very tiny. The Pinta was roomier. I enjoyed seeing the sails and the ropes and there was this real desire to experience them under sail. Imagine the creaking and the other sounds from the sails and the wind.

The sky was blue, it was a warm day, with rain threatening from time to time.
We had lunch at Fayze’s. I had a Greek omelet which is my current favorite. Spinach and tomatoes and onions and generous feta cheese and black olives. Close to heaven. Plus rye toast. The cruise fare on the Nina and Pinta would have been a lot less appetizing.

I went by the book store without stopping in. Though.... I found a big fat paperback of James Jones - WWII author of From Here to Eternity, Thin Red Line, and famous Parisian. It was one of those good, well bound on quality paper vintage paperbacks. The title was Go to the Widowmaker and it was only a couple bucks. It was in a box of books on the sidewalk and I knew if I went in I would end up buying an armload of books and I - for once- resisted temptation.

(Just looked up Go to the Widowmaker. It’s about a playwright - second in fame to Tennessee Williams - who goes to the Caribbean and falls in love with diving. It came out in 1967.)

I did stop in one of the do it yourself painting stores - not the one LBH and I went to but one operated by the same people. I told them about LBH’s art career and gave them credit for getting her started again as an artist. I’m not sure how impressed they were but I enjoyed telling them the story. I saw one of our pink tree/yellow sky pictures there too. I like connections. The world is full of good stuff.

So then we went and bought a car. It’s been wrecked and it’s been fixed and it looks good. It’s a dark gray LaCrosse. Another Buick. It looks remarkably like son John’s VW Passat. We bought it from a guy named Chuck who has a son named Kyle - who looks like him. When I called their attention to the resemblance, Chuck said, ‘He’d better look like me.’

We needed a car. The loyal blue Buick has been pumping water through its leaky (to the outside of the engine) head gasket all summer. The power windows are beyond dodgy - the drivers window has been perfectly immobile for several years. The air conditioning is non-existent. And the right turn signal keeps burning out. It’s been a really good car. I totally trust it. It has never stranded me. It has a really good radio and tape deck. I listened to the Highwaymen last week when I tired of public radio. But it’s time to move on.

Have a good rest of the weekend everyone.

Last updated July 30, 2016