My skate blog editor went to Florida…

I brought all my stuff, but in-laws, illness and weather conspired against me. I had five days of vacation. I packed all my stuff. All the public parks in Florida seem to require a helmet and pads. I think elbow pads were required at the last one I hit. Enterprising locals had cut off tube socks over their elbows. Point is, I was meeting my kids out there, and if I skated, my oldest would want to go to. So I had boards and a full set of helmets and pads for two packed. I was staying near Sarasota, which has a Team Pain park that is nice, but I’ve ridden it a bunch before and I wanted to hit soemthing new like the Bro Bowl or Dunedin, which is about an hour and a half away.

Warning: Boring story for adults ahead.

Friday. I flew out to Florida from Oregon on the red eye, arrived at 9 in the morning, three hour time difference. Spend the rest of the day semi-catatonic due to not sleeping on the plane.

Saturday was a bust. Morning by the pool with kids, had to be back for dinner at 5:00 (Florida old people time schedule) with mother in-laws “special friend.” It takes an hour to get the kids (and wife) ready to go anywhere. It would have been rude to blow it off.

Sunday was a bust. Not much sleep last night. Baby sure is getting fussy at night. Everyone is crabby. Pool time with kids in the AM. Naps. We had an afternoon BBQ scheduled with more friends of the mother in-law. I was going to bail early and hit the local Sarasota park but then it started raining. No problem, I looked up the Dunedin park on the web. They had an “old school” session on Monday nights. I don’t like to pigeonhole myself, but I figured I could surely enjoy that. I could do the family thing in the day and skate at night.

Monday was a bust. My increasingly crabby 7 month old lost his shit on Sunday night. All his fussiness bubbled over into a volcano. He only slept for an hour at a time (no exaggeration) and would wake up crying loudly and inconsolable. There were four of us in one bedroom. At about 6:00 am the baby finally passed out for a couple hours. After he woke up and we got moving we spent the afternoon a jam packed walk-in facility trying to get the kid to see a doctor. He had a nasty throat infection that had spread to his ears. He was in pain, so that explains all the screaming. By the time evening rolled around I was too drained to make the hour and a half drive out to Dunedin. Even if I had, I would have been useless, or worse, been sloppy and gotten hurt.

Tuesday. The meds had a miraculous effect on the infant. He had one stretch where he slept three and a half hours. Everyone was in a good mood on the last day of vacation, so a session was eminent right? Yes!

Florida Tourist Session!

I spent the day giving my oldest a quality Florida tourist experience. It was our only day without external forces scheduling things for us, so we did vacation stuff. The skateparks aren’t going anywhere anytime soon, and there are parks in Oregon I still haven’t checked out. So maybe next year.

My skate blog editor went to Florida and all I got was one lousy entry.

I use this joke a lot and it occurred to me a lot of people won’t get the reference. A popular florida souvenir used to be shirts for kids that said “My Grandma (or Grandpa, or Mom, etc..) went to Florida and all I got was this lousy T-shirt.” I don’t think they make them anymore. In any case, they aren’t en vogue anymore.

Today is the last day. I have to stop typing, finish packing and go to the airport. That picture of my kid holding an alligator is worth the whole hassle. Wheee! Vacaction! See you in Oregon, hope it isn’t raining.