Beautiful Barbados

Monday, August 24:

Rain! I got up about 8am and it wasn't long before there was a drenching rain. There had been families in the pool complex already and they got up to leave. I'm never sure about that. They were already wet, some playing under a waterfall but when the rain starts they leave.

After a while, the rain stopped and I took the laptop over to Reception where there's a better wifi connection. Several people were amazed that I was online since another area didn't have coverage. It rained again and people from the beach who'd come here just for that experience were trying to decide if they should leave or not. They finally took a taxi back to the west coast.

I tried to log into Facebook but couldn't since it didn't recognize my new location. I was supposed to identify a number of other members by their avatars. I can't remember all those and some people seem to change them daily. So, I was locked out for at least an hour. Maybe I'll take my phone over tomorrow and log on with that – I don't think I ever logged out.

I checked email, added some bios to http://www.cushie.info updated some other pages, checked banking records to be sure that none of the debit card thieves had gotten our card numbers yet. Downloaded Picasa to organize pictures to add to this.

The rain stopped again and I went back to 211A. Did some reading, more rain. Napped a bit, more wet you-know-what. I'm thinking that this is fallout from a hurricane that's out to sea. Next time I go online I'll check my favorite weather source for here – http://www.stormcarib.com – and see what's brewing out there. I remember reading before we came that we were supposed to get a cyclone on August 30. It hadn't even started raining yet but somehow the weather forecasters think that there will be a hurricane here on the 30th.

We've never had a hurricane here. They almost always veer to the north. I think the last one that came here was in the 1930s. One year, they thought that one would hit Barbados. We were out on a small cat (catamaran) and the owner was sure that a hurricane was coming so he took the cat to Trinidad and Tobago. Guess where the hurricane hit instead of here?

Others were pretty sure that wed get hit here, too, so housekeeping brought around emergency instructions, candles and so on. We already knew where the hurricane shelter was which was helpful. All the window shutters were closed and bolted down, the pool chairs sunk into the pool. We hunkered down and waited. We were in the historic hotel still at that time and we had the wonderful wrap-around second-floor deck. We sat out on that and so did our next-door neighbors. We watched the storm out to sea and waited.

The storm turned north for the cat's Appointment in Samarra...

I must be getting old with all these reminiscences and memories. It's sure nice to have them, though!

Tonight is the manager's welcome party but we've been welcomed in past years so we didn't go. I noticed on the invitation that the location had been changed to inside. They probably thought it might rain again. And it did.

Sunset on this coast is always amazing. It's light, light, light, dark! It seems like the whole sunset takes 15 minutes, like a shade dropping over the horizon. The moon right now is full, big and bright and in about an hour and a half a US telecom satellite will pass overhead.

It gets so dark here that we can see all kinds of constellations, which is pretty cool. We went out one time with an astronomer who brought telescopes and showed us all kinds of stuff. He had lots of information to share including that he was an alien from one of the planets he was showing us. When he invited us to the place he said he was living temporarily in Barbados, we politely declined...

It's so peaceful and relaxing here. No stress, no doctors, no deadlines to meet, no places to be and people to see. Very easy to take.

We decided to take a stroll down to the pool complex and sit there for a bit. Unfortunately, most of those chairs were still wet from the rain. We found some under a little roof that were dry enough and sat for a while enjoying the evening breeze, the stars and the tree frogs.

Back home we discovered we got the Game Show Network. Oh boy! More TV for me coming up! LOL