My haiku was inspired by my backyard, which is currently a pond layered in a sheet of ice.. or patches of ice rather. Today the seagulls have been standing on blocks of ice like little glaciers and it inspired my little haiku:
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Resolution #16 of 366: Fake Plan Your Dream Vacation
A month before that stupid volcano blew up in Iceland, Patrick and I had started mentally planning our trip there. Sometime in March, we’d decided that we’d go in late October so that we could possibly catch the Northern Lights without getting completely stuck in the wacky seasons of Midnight Sun or Polar Night. And then Ejyafjallajökull happened and travel prices went through the roof. They doubled if not tripled. What was once a moderately affordable trip was now pretty much absurd.
Thankfully prices have died down a little bit, so let’s see just how reasonable it is now. November 1st-8th, hypothetically.
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Resolution #15 of 366: Eat a Vegetable
After spending about an hour at the grocery store realizing that I do actually eat more vegetables than not, I decided to just do something more creative with whatever veggie I chose – turn it into a soup. After all, we had steaks set aside too, but Patrick decided that 6-degree weather was too cold to grill.
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Resolution #14 of 366: Watch a Movie From Your Childhood
We couldn’t get our hands on The Goonies and watching The Quest on YouTube seemed a little silly, so we went with our second favorites, Die Hard and Teen Witch. I’d never seen Die Hard (so sue me) and thought it was surprisingly badass. Pat had seen Teen Witch before thanks to having a sister, but we both never realized how “musical” it was. I’ve still got the “popular girl” song in my head.
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Resolution #11 of 366: Take a Silly Photo of Yourself
We spent all day taking really stupid, ridiculous, stupid photos, so I should probably share a few of them.
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Resolution #10 of 366: Wrap Up Early and Unwind
Maybe it’s some kind of sign that despite being on an island in the caribbean, I chose to unwind by brutally cracking that coconut I bought a couple days ago. Feeling all superwoman, armed with a YouTube tutorial and a corkscrew, I had at it. Unfortunately, a few accidental stabbings later, Patrick took a minute from his book (how he chose to unwind) and helped me out. Then we drained it and I smashed the crap out of it with a grill flipper and cracked that baby open. The coconut then got chopped up and went directly into my Rum & Coke. Patrick finished his book (Contact, by the way) and I did some night swimming.
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Resolution #9 of 366: Make a New Friend
Oh hello, welcome to the land of social butterflies, where Patrick and Amanda make new friends all day long and even end up getting rounds and rounds of drinks for themselves.
First of all, if you want good luck, hang out with us, because we’ve been known to win cashloads at the casino and today we’re going to pretend to take credit for our new friend winning $2700 right next to us at the bar. Lots of free drinks followed and Patrick is a mighty champ for accepting car bombs while I sipped on pineapple-filled girly drinks.
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In the past year, the one thing that we’ve tried out and have recommended to everyone we know (and are always greeted with a concern) is California Poppy Extract. I know what you’re thinking…. OPIUM! DRUGS! RUNNNNNNNNNN! …. but you’re wrong. The Opium Poppy is what contains opium. The California Poppy contains…. California?
In any case, the California Poppy does act as a very, very mild sedative. The effect is similar to drinking a cup of chamomile tea before bed (and you can put it in your nighttime tea if you want), but if you have any nighttime anxiety, this is known to help a lot in getting you to relax before bed.
More importantly, taking 30-drops (in a small glass of water or tea) before bed will keep you asleep and in our experience, can give you some pretty lucid dreams. This is probably the result of sleeping so soundly. We’ve tested around with a few different brands and definitely prefer the Herb Pharm brand because it tastes the best (like licorice) and seems to work the best.
So really you could take this every night ( no, you won’t get “addicted”) but it’s especially good for those nights where you worked late, are stressed out, or can’t unwind enough to fall asleep. It won’t “knock you out” like NyQuil or Benadryl, but you’ll be able to relax enough to fall asleep and will certainly keep you asleep. And if you need to sleep for less hours, just take less drops.
Conch | Source: Wikipedia
I think we get the gold star for today because we spent our whole day trying to find something “new”, which was surprisingly hard. Conch is supposed to be popular out here in St. Thomas, so I made it my mission to find some and eat it even though seafood is my enemy.
I won’t waste time explaining what Conch is because you’re gonna see this photo to the right and be all “oh that’s that shell I’ve bought in various sizes on every summer vacation I’ve ever been on!” Yup, that’s the one. I’m actually more familiar with it from playing Animal Crossing way too much back in 2004 (bonus high-fives to anyone who understands that).
Anyway, unfortunately, they’re big on conch “fritters” around here and I felt like that was cheating. But we DID find conch chowder and I think that totally counts because there were giant bits of it. Think of it like clams, but soft and not chewy. Same flavor, different texture.
Conch Chowder @ Molly Malones, Red Hook, St. Thomas
But… we one-upped ourselves later on over at some over-priced fake Italian joint when our waitress told us that a fisherman pulled up to their back door with two 50lb Wahoos this morning. Yes, our thoughts exactly… “WTH is a Wahoo?” An ape of some kind, perhaps? Sounds like an ape to me.
Wahoo! | Source: PesekCharters.com
Well according to Wikipedia (yes, we did this on the spot), it’s a “prize game fish”, “the body is elongated and covered with small, scarcely visible scales; the back is an iridescent blue, while the sides are silvery, with a pattern of irregular vertical blue bars and have razor sharp teeth” and “they are one of the fastest fish in the sea.” Also, they are sometimes confused with the barracuda.
That last part is the ticket got me to say “yes, we’ll take it!”.
It was served sort of like Tuna steak, mostly raw and only seared on the outside. Patrick dug in like a champ while I took a little time to swallow my fear of raw fishy bits. All in all, it was pretty good. The salted seasoning was pretty yum, but the Wahoo itself was pretty bland and flavorless. A novelty item I suppose since it’s somewhat hard to catch? In any case, we did it. I also had plantains and a few other items while looking for the conch and not wanting to miss this resolution but I’m glad we endured!
Wahoo!
Well thank heavens that on the ridiculously expensive island of St. Thomas, you can still get yourself some green tea for under $10. I can’t say the same for bacon, pickles, Oreos, hot dogs or any type of meat though. And even though we’re attempting a $100-dollar a day challenge (which pretty much just covers lunch), we were able to get our green tea. Patrick takes green tea extract daily anyway, but today he settled for a few hot cups (in 85-degree weather… we’re champs). As a bonus, I took in a green tea extract candy too which was a foreshadow-ey purchase I bought earlier in the week.
See the original resolution: Drink 3 Cups of Green Tea