beneath an active volcano…

Here we paid a quick visit (or two) to the local brewpub to determine the most direct route to Red Bay…

and finally WE decided that it wasn’t really necessary to look any further than “the girl next door”…

  The Return                                                                    July 18, 2007

with the devil incarnate as her escort…

After a few of the local beverages, and a brief consultation with one of the local trailblazers, we decided that a straight line is not necessarily the shortest distance between two points.  So we headed for the Gulf coast and spent the next several weeks in Summerdale, Alabama…a mere three hundred miles south of our intended destination.  Queen Bee, hereinafter referred to as “QB”, was feeling a bit lonely and decided to purchase some companionship (NO!!! Not that kind!) in the form of a pair of Australian sugar gliders…

In a manner reminiscent of the swallows returning annually to crap all over the small seaside village of San Juan Capistrano, our wandering band of vagabonds has once again taken wing and descended upon the small southern hamlet of Red Bay, Alabama, to engage in acts of similar defilement.  The journey to this particular nest was rather circuitous and included a stopover in Natchez, Mississippi…

With that we shall end this month’s episode of, “Survival: Norwegian War Brides."   ‘Til next time… Hugs, Chuck and Zookie

or simply finding a cold beer and a cool deck overlooking the Tennessee River where you can while away an afternoon…

We have several more photos of this lady’s husband chasing Jim through the market with a machete but didn’t feel they were suitable for the G-rated members of our audience.   Meanwhile, back on the home front…

These critters are marsupials, the female has a kangaroo-type pouch and they are about the same size as a chipmunk when fully grown.  They also have “hands” on all four legs complete with opposing thumbs.  I believe that this fact, coupled with their size and love of confined spaces, would make them the perfect pickpockets, given the proper training.  My Bride decided that a two-week trip to Guatemala to study Spanish would be a pleasant diversion and only needed to hire someone to keep me out of trouble during her absence.  Since I already speak perfect Spanish (“cerveza, taco, cerveza”), I opted to forgo the Latin adventure.  A call to the local “Rent-a-Wench Agency” provided us with several potential temporary companions.  There were those that SHE liked…

one that I especially liked…

Okay, this is not really the devil, it is actually our pal, Jim Bomberg, who had previously scheduled this educational interlude and inspired my Bride to tag along with him.  It was fortunate that he had her to look out for him since he decided to “cruise” the local market in search of women and didn’t seem to mind that his “targets” were usually married…

QB and I spent one day of cultural enlightenment aboard the USS Alabama on Mobile Bay and most others hanging out at one my favorite biker bars, The FloraBama…

I really tried to get a nice picture of this place to include with this month’s ravings but I am now convinced that The FloraBama, much like my brother-in-law, is simply photogenically deficient.  Things here in Red Bay never seem to change much and the calendar seems to have ceased all forward momentum when it reached “Mayberry.”  This is truly the epitome of Small Town, USA, with not much to do beyond admiring the sunsets…

And so, my future United Nations interpreter headed to Guatemala and spent the next two weeks living in a nunnery…