Winterpaloozafestathon, January 9th to January 16th.

 "I think that if we are going to find Sasquatch's in Florida, I think it will be here". A quote from Tango Allejandro said on 1/16/2024 at 8:55 pm eastern time. But wait. Where is here? That is something I will divulge later, after we have moved on to keep the paparazzi confused. Wherever, here is at the moment, it is 21 degrees when we woke up this particular morning. In the news they are closing schools, setting up warming shelters and warning the populace of the impending temperature drop below 32. As born and raised Minnesotans, we just laugh and shake our heads.

In fact I was listening to one news report and they were discussing options on how to insulate your outdoor water faucet on your house just in case you were not able to get those insulated cups built for that. One option was to just use a styro-foam cup and place it over it. That might work if it fits. LOL. The next option was to place a diaper over it. A new one I hope. LOL again. Like everyone has a diaper in their house. I should stand on the corner with a box of Pampers and sell faucet covers for $20 bucks. I would be rich.

(Gladys said I could sell Pampers and depends. I'm not selling my depends to anyone. That's just crazy talk.)

Back to the blog topic. We left Waveland a day later than we were supposed to because of a terrible cold front that had moved through. Bringing inches of rain, cooler temps and high winds. Our next stop was not far away. It was in Mobile Alabama at Meaher State Park. Nice park on the Alabama Bay.

Sunset at Maeher State Park. That string of lights is I-10. Photo by Gladys.

Off in the distance you can see I-10 crossing the bay. Did you know that sound travels over water. It does.  So that is all you hear for 24 hours a day. We have been here before so we knew that. We sight see'd while we were there.

We went to "The Original Oyster House" for dinner one night. Not to be confused with "The Carbon Copy Oyster House" down the road. I was wondering if that cold front had produced a "Sharknado" because there were sharks on the roof. One of my biggest fears about being on the coast is being in the middle of a Sharknado. I've seen all 6 Sharknado movies (something I'm not proud of) and I am well aware of how dangerous it can be with flying sharks falling from the skies.

Did you know that Mardi Gras actually started in Mobile, Alabama? It did in 1703 when at the time Mobile was the capital of Louisiana (think about that for a minute). I looked it up on "The Google". So we went and found a King cake. 

They look good and we have never in our wildest dreams ever had one before. Jim told us that at first you have to play a ring toss game with it. Jim is so weird. Our cake came with a little baby in it.

Not knowing the significance of that, we had to go back to "The Google" and find out. "The Google" says that the baby is hidden inside of the cake and whoever gets it is "King" or "Queen" for the day. This is turning into a real educational trip. The cake was okay. If you were to ask us for our opinion, (which no one ever does), we would tell you it was just a fancy cinnamon roll with sprinkles. That's just us, you should find out for yourselves.

Our next stop on this whirlwind tour of "Dorks on Parade" was going to be Gulf Shores State Park in Alabama. We are still trying to find those warm temps that will put a smile on my baby's face. The key word is "still". Here at Gulf Shores we found some people we know of who are more secretive than us. Can you believe it? They are so secretive that they actually move their Super Secret Location every 2-3 years just so that no one can sneak up on them. But we found them. 

I agreed to change their names for the blog to keep their identities secret. They are Ford Ditchmower and Svetlana Roadkillpickerupper. We went out to lunch with them one day. The picture I have is a fake but this is a perfect example of how they eat.

I was like really? Do you need to eat each others foods out of your mouths. I was hoping a roll would come flying out of the darkness and bounce off their foreheads and knock them out. We visited a couple more times while we were in the area. 

We were talking to Ford and Svetlana about where we were going next. Ford's eyes lit up like a child's at Christmas. Rumblings could be heard from his stomach. All of a sudden he started to convulse and Lisa and I started to get worried. Svetlana said "Don't worry, this happens all of the time." All of a sudden he blurts out a single word. "BUC-EE'S!!!!!!"

Buc-ee's is a travel stop on the interstate in some parts of the country. If you get the chance you have to stop. Ford began to describe the sandwiches found inside. The way he described the food was as if he was talking about a long lost lover. Now we have to stop. We stopped at one a long time ago and we don't quite remember it the way he described it. So we put it on the "to do list".

We were in Gulf Shores for a few days. So you know what that means. Beach time! Gladys shell hunted. I treasure hunted with no success. So with my casino winnings and my treasures from Waveland, I am at 11 cents. Well worth the trip if you ask me.(Which I know, no one will ever ask me).

Still off the market ladies.

One day the waves were very angry.

Another day we just walked and walked. It really amazes me that people aren't out here enjoying the beach when the temps are in the mid fifties. Like us "Dorks on Parade".

Nearly empty beaches.

Gladys with a sack full of shells.

Gladys had her bag of shells in hand. She was staking out territories and battling other women when they got too close to her shells. Have you ever seen documentaries about Penguins and their nests. If so, it was kind of like that.

She found this one day and we weren't even sure of what it was. So we left it. Later on she found a Seashell collecting guide hand book and discovered that it is actually a shell called a Stiff Pen Shell. More education. Now we wish we would have taken it.

That is it for Gulf Shores Alabama. Thanks to Ford and Svetlana for taking time out of their busy schedules to visit with us. Until our paths cross again.

We did stop at Buc-ees on our way to our next destination. It was amazing. The sandwiches were just like the way Ford and Svetlana said they were. I ended up getting two. One for lunch that day and one for lunch the next day. The first one I got was a chopped Brisket sandwich.

Chopped brisket with Beaver tots.

I love brisket as my physique is living proof of that. Pilled high right in front of you. It was like OMG! The other sandwich was even bigger than that one. It was a three meat sandwich. It was piled high with smoked turkey, brisket and smoked sausage. If you don't get the meat sweats from that you are probably already dead. Another side you could eat if you wanted to was called Beaver chips. (Insert your own beaver joke here. Then PM me with it.)

"Gladys, just roll me to our next destination!"

As far as my sasquatch comment, that will have to wait for the next blog because we are currently still here.

Did you notice the new name change for the title of the blog. It's more inclusive now and sustainable.