THOUGHTS OF A POET IN THE RAIN

Tomorrow Jan, Tread, and I drive to the U of F in Gainesville to the Internal Medicine Department to get a reevaluation of the fungus problem in Tread’s hip and tail bones. 3 hours up and 3 hours back plus the time there. Long day.

Yesterday we drove down to Port Charlotte. I lived there in the 1960s when it was a sleepy community. Today it is overgrown and very commercial. I really dislike it. But we were there to visit a friend of Jan’s who owns a store there. Jody has had a great business there but has decided after many years there is more to life than running a specialty antique, unique furniture, jewelry store to enjoy her life and so the store will be closed in another week.

We then travelled back through a pounding rain (stayed off of I-75 as when had driven South to Port Charlotte we had seen two wrecks where drivers had left the road and gone into the woods) and so went US 41 into Venice and had dinner there. I phoned a friend, Dick Harrison hopping to meet but weren’t able to do that as we had a time constraint and had to get home. Dick will probably make comment here. I have to say that if you go to Amazon and look him up in the book sales section (put in his name in the search bar in Amazon) you will find some of the most wonderful writing. He is a great writer and I am very proud to have him as a friend and mentor.

So, after a great dinner at Abbys in Miami, we headed home (this time on I-75 as the rain had stopped) and saw where other cars had gone off the road and into the woods.

At Abbys we met the owner and discussed his problems with fake service dogs. He told us that Tread was welcome anytime. He hates the fakes that come in there and has had to tell people to leave. Sad. That hurts it for us with real service dogs to have people take untrained dogs into a business like that and they don’t go under the tables, get in the way of waiters and waitresses, sniff people, and more. Anyway, tomorrow Gainesville.