Home at last, Home at Last, Thank God Almighty, Home at last!!
We had supper, not "dinner," at a new place last evening. The Up The Creek Raw Bar is north on Water Street and take the -- is this the only elevator in town, I certainly never saw one here before, this is even more of a violation than the traffic light -- lift upstairs, it opens right into the young, packed and noisy restaurant. A long room looking east out across the Apalachicola River, and south toward the John Gorrie Bridge that Mayor Jimmie Nichols opened and I sprinkled holy water on in blessing -- what? -- twenty-five years ago? Tass had scrumptious crabcakes, she wanted two, but I also wanted one, and adding one to her order instead of ordering one of my own added four dollars to the bill instead of eight for just one. A delightful, atypical place for the south, nothing fried was on the menu. I had two dozen steamed oysters -- whether they were Apalachicola oysters or, in the water and harvesting debacle that eventually will kill The Bay, trucked in from Texas, I didn't ask. They were delicious if a bit small. Several of Tassy's friends from Apalachicola High School came over and chatted. My main dish was an enormous bowl of steamed clams that the menu said are from Alligator Point, twenty-five of them and in delicious broth. We agreed we definitely will come again!
But this is sort of "ole home weekend" for us and there are several seafood meals to go, and I am thinking of The Grill and Boss Oyster, which years ago was Frog Level, and The Owl Cafe. The Owl serves the most delectably fried oysters under the sun, so that may be for lunch.
Back in the rectory of Trinity Church for the weekend is our nuclear Apalachicola family from 1984, grown in size -- what a joy to be here! Linda, Tass, me, Jeremy, with Caroline and Charlotte meeting the wonderful old 1900 house where their mother grew up. Linda and I slept in our old bedroom, Tass and Jeremy slept in hers. The bathrooms are new but nothing changes, does it. There's the wood paneling I installed in the back wall of the kitchen years ago to cover holes in the wall, there's the door I brought from my 1912 house in Panama City and installed between the parlor and the family room because there was no door in the doorway and Linda's mother was using the parlor for her bedroom toward the end of our time here. There by golly, despite the new metal roof, is water still dripping through the family room ceiling onto the furniture beneath it. If the rain and leak drip continues, we will need to move the rector's sofa out from under the drip. Sans the ceiling drip, it wouldn't have been our old family home.
TW+
But this is sort of "ole home weekend" for us and there are several seafood meals to go, and I am thinking of The Grill and Boss Oyster, which years ago was Frog Level, and The Owl Cafe. The Owl serves the most delectably fried oysters under the sun, so that may be for lunch.
Back in the rectory of Trinity Church for the weekend is our nuclear Apalachicola family from 1984, grown in size -- what a joy to be here! Linda, Tass, me, Jeremy, with Caroline and Charlotte meeting the wonderful old 1900 house where their mother grew up. Linda and I slept in our old bedroom, Tass and Jeremy slept in hers. The bathrooms are new but nothing changes, does it. There's the wood paneling I installed in the back wall of the kitchen years ago to cover holes in the wall, there's the door I brought from my 1912 house in Panama City and installed between the parlor and the family room because there was no door in the doorway and Linda's mother was using the parlor for her bedroom toward the end of our time here. There by golly, despite the new metal roof, is water still dripping through the family room ceiling onto the furniture beneath it. If the rain and leak drip continues, we will need to move the rector's sofa out from under the drip. Sans the ceiling drip, it wouldn't have been our old family home.
TW+