ybor the cigar city

Time to visit Ybor City just northeast of downtown Tampa (itself once nick-named as Cigar-City).

Ybor was founded in the 1880s by Vicente Martinez-Ybor and other cigar manufacturers and was populated by thousands of immigrants, mainly from Cuba, Spain, and Italy.

There's still a mixed vibe of Cuban-Italian-Spanish and a few cigar stores still hand-rolling some of their products.

The city was unique in the American south as a successful town almost entirely populated and owned by immigrants.

The neighbourhood had features unusual among contemporary communities in the south, most notably its multi-ethnic and multi-racial population and their many mutual aid societies.

The post depression decline in cigar sales created a corresponding slide for Ybor until the 1980s, when an influx of artists began a slow process of gentrification.

We've visited before and the area around 7th Avenue has continued its development into a bohemian night club and entertainment district with many old buildings were renovated for new uses, although this time I noticed a few had indeed emptied again.

Things don't really kick off here until well into the evening, after the last bus has passed through the centre of the district.

a day at the beach

February. Not the most obvious month to hit the beach but thoroughly enjoyable and a chance to relax in the sunshine.

It's not too crowded either, looking out into the Gulf of Mexico. We've enough space to build new castles and to make plans for other parts of this journey.

The family WhatsApp group may get more of the overtly holiday snap pictures, and it is but a small indulgence to show the white-sanded beaches here in the hot sunshine. I know that something is missing though?

Yes, a palm tree.

cross town - so hard to get through to you

We've been using an OnStar satellite navigation system for part of the time.

It doesn't seem to like a British accent.

As an example, I was asking it to go to one of the four or five biggest locations around here and it offered me a selection which didn't include the place at all, but did mention a yoghurt shop about 300 miles away.

It's hilarious if it gets behind the conversation too and will just keep saying the same thing over and over again.

The system doesn't actually provide any maps, just the turn instructions. I suppose it could be so that I'd opt to get the expensive additional satnav option added to the car rental. It would be less expensive to pop into Walmart or somewhere similar to just buy one.

I'd be furious if I'd bought a car with one of these things expecting hot to work.

In another example, the same voice satnav took me around three sides of a lengthy square to reach a destination.

I can't help wondering how the system's finance works. Did the yoghurt shop pay to get mentioned? Is google or someone paying g to get the tracking information?

I've mainly switched it off now, although the 7 inch screen in the middle of the dashboard looks somewhat untidy with a scrappy partial menu related to radio stations on it.

There's no overt design aesthetic. Someone should be ashamed.

I'm instead using my own knowledge and navigation, which seems dramatically better than this particular high-tech voice operated system. I'll get the blame if we get lost, so it might as well really be my fault rather than a piece of not so well-designed technology.

Luau interlude

Ever onward, this time to a Luau. It's years since I attended one and has been on the revisit list for quite some time.

Plenty of dancing and some Samoan flaming spears as well.

My pictures from this are somewhat impressionistic. It took me some time to figure out how to capture live performance with a DSLR and I think I'll have to relearn the approach with an iPhone, although currently I think it may be towards the limits of what is do-able.

alligator swamp without metaphors

There we were, heading along the river, past the alligator swamp just as the wind changed. We could see the rain approaching along the water, turning a flat surface into one boiling with raindrops.

Most sought shelter, but I pulled on a cagoule and stayed out in the weather, so different from the sun scorch an hour earlier. The rain shower didn't last more than a few minutes with a resultant pleasant cooling which lasted for the next couple of hours.

say cheese

News from Blighty seems bitter at the moment. It's as if both the main political duopoly are in a new turmoil and about to suffer defections related to the power politics of party first thinking.

I decided it might be more useful to study this cheese spread wrapper until things settle down. Notice the use of 'cheese flavoured' in the description, rather than 'cheese based' or similar.

There's also an extensive reference to Worcestershire sauce in the list of ingredients. Maybe they are hinting at a Welsh Rarebit vibe?

It appears that the genetic engineering highlighted on the pack don't quite achieve the same result as the old fashioned way to make cheese. Presumably the manufacturing is speedier doing things this way.

We tasted it. Nope. No discernible cheese flavour, more one of a sharpness, maybe a bitterness - which links back to my opening thought.

The quest for a decent cheese around this area will continue.

House of Blues Sunday Brunch

You go to the fields on week days, and have a picnic on Labor Day.
You go to town on Saturday, but go to church every Sunday
Today wasn't exactly Nutbush city limits, but a stompin' festival of gospel music, served up hot, hot, hot with a meaningful side order of brunch.

I'm not talking about quiet brunch with scrambled eggs and bacon. Oh no, this was the full on deal with everything from blackened catfish, through macaroni and cheese to brisket from the skillet.

Same with the music. High energy, loud and proud. The band and singers owned the stage. Yes, we were once again at the House of Blues.

sunshine in February

Here's a short sequence of sunshine photos. It's an ideal way to spend February and maybe March, trapped in a sunny climate, with at-elbow support to provide refreshment.

I'm still taking all of the pictures on the iPhone, and it is clear that I should have adjusted the aperture on the top one.

On the other hand, I'm wearing sandals on the lounger, at the smaller pool, so what was I thinking?

And an obligatory snap of some palm trees. I had to crop the hot air balloon out of the shot in case it made it look too staged.

Pass the suncream.

Convenient emergency

It was an accident that we witnessed the Trump C-SPAN declaration of a national emergency in front of reporters on the White House lawn.

A rambling speech of over an hour, with many of the reporters sat on what looked like childrens' chairs. That alone reminded me of a tyrant dispensing egotistical pronouncements.

Then the expressions on most of their faces as they attempted to ask questions. A Fox reporter got some answers but most of the others were dissatisfied and in several cases told that they were part of fake news and essentially got nothing.

Whether Trump intends to award the initial $1.3 billion for 55 pricey miles of wall to his own companies or to those of cronies remains to be seen. We'll never know what happens now that he has a pocket attorney general. The man that will probably close down the Muller investigation too.

Trump has normalised a kind of fantasy corruption of politics. Unfortunately we are usually only a few steps behind with similar weather in the UK.

Sharkey’s town

No real chance to take a deep dive into anything at the moment.

We are all too busy having fun around the pool.

I'm using the little iPad as a keyboard again but it is still infuriatingly slow compared with a laptop because the keys don't always register.

There has been another shark in the water too. The double quote mark is different from the one used in html which makes editing picture widths rather labourious.

I'll hammer on with it for this post but may then need to make alternative arrangements.

Meanwhile we have discovered another pool and a chance for a few more minutes tranquility away from the inquisitive stingrays,

the road goes on forever

Sometimes you start out along a road and then it changes character. There's whole novels and movies about this kind of thing.

Part of the trick is paying enough attention and always remembering to take care at any notable junctions.

Our current journey will have those branches and mysterious signposts and we'd be foolish if we didn't stop to take stock and modify our plans from time to time along the way.

snakes and alligators

I could go into extended metaphor mode now, what with the slippery dealings in the UK and the swampy ones across the pond in the USA.

Instead it might be better to ponder upon the physics of a disc world, perhaps with four elephants balanced upon the back of a giant turtle?

But wait.

Here, right in the back garden, is a turtle candidate. Answers to the name "Great A'Tuin".