In which Dixie Finishes the Florida Trail

 Over at you-know where, the final episode.  Forty solid minutes of north Florida weirdness with a side order of yellow flies and ticks.  This is what you get when you skirt along the northern edge of a place named Tate's Hell Swamp in early springtime.

Yow.  It seems like it was all they could do to get from Sopchoppy to Defuniak without getting eaten alive.  Note to self: If I ever get the urge to do the FT, start NLT 31 January, and try to launch even earlier.  If any delays push completion into April, bail.

Yes, I've mentioned this series before, here, when they started the video series late April.  It seems that they began the through-hike in mid-late February, after recovering from covid.

ps: from today's Far Side.  Note the lack of yellow flies.

Something to Do

I started playing with the search bar on Atlas Obscura yesterday, and it's a pretty remarkable tool.  While by no means does it give a comprehensive listing of local sights, it does uncover – as the site's name would imply – some fairly obscure and interesting places for a day trip.

Take for example Bude, MS.  I've blasted through there on the way to the Clear Springs mountain bike trails for decades.  It's small, but in seconds the search function dug up about 15 interesting nearby places.  None of these were mountain bike trails, admittedly, but sometimes that is a plus.  It's not comprehensive, it's just unusual.

If you're looking for a day trip, Atlas Obscura's search bar is a pretty good place to start.  If you're just daydreaming, the random location button is pretty nice too.

Here, have some related music.

Expand Into What?

 The simplest, most concise non-technical explanation I've ever heard for the statement "the universe is expanding."  It addresses frequently asked questions in an understandable manner, without the all too common handwaving.  Here, go watch, it's only ten minutes.

Whenever a scientist, in any field, makes an honest effort to understand and answer questions that genuinely baffle people, science advances.

Wrong, and Yet Not Wrong

 From today's SMBC:

Be sure to visit the original (link at top, but hell, here it is again) for the mouse-over and big-red-button text.

Journey to the St. Marks Light

What to say, it's a historic lighthouse.  You can read about its history here, and you can read about the story it inspired here.  Nice weather, and quite a few people out on their road bikes.  Despite the narrowness of the road, traffic is generally slow and well under control.  Also, several interesting hiking trails run through there, including a section of the Florida Trail and a short out-and-back to the ruins of Port Leon.  Might get over there again before too long.  Here, have some pics:

As always, click to embiggen.  Well, so much for the lighthouse, too bad we couldn't locate the tower.  At least we didn't run into any moaning, shape-shifting horrors.

And Here We Go...

 

Yeesh.  Already.  Yeah, it's far, far away and headed away even farther.  Even so.

New from Buffett: Songs You Don't Know by Heart

Hey wait, I do know these by heart.  But I get the title, it applies to most folks.  Anyway, it's a largely acoustic re-recorded collection of various favorites that he selected from fan requests.  It all started as a "well, we can't tour this year, got to fill the time with something" project during mid-2020.  Maybe two Buffet albums is the best thing that can be said of that horrible year (here's the review of last spring's Life on the Flipside).  Released in October 2020, no wonder I missed it -- had a few things going on at the time, including Hurricane Zeta among several other inconveniences.

Back to the music, it's good and if you dig Buffett at all you should get it.  If Flipside was big and lush, this is back porch with a beer and a couple of friends.  You can hear Buffett precisely, methodically picking through some songs that his younger self would just blaze across.  It's been years, decades even, since he's performed some of these, and his style has, if not exactly changed, it has evolved.  I'm glad to have both versions, and in fact I plan to go back through my collection to put together the same tracks from the original studio albums.  It'll be an interesting contrast, all packed on one mp3 disc.

Re the song selections, it's 15 tracks so there's plenty of room.  While not downbeat at all, these are some of his quieter tracks: Twelve Volt Man, Love in the Library, The Night I painted the Sky, Chanson Pour les Petits Enfants, things in that vein.  I was glad to see a particular favorite, The Captain and the Kid, included.  Nothing downbeat, just not a rock-out Cheeseburger in Paradise-type song list.

Good liner notes too, and pics of Buffett in the same pose at maybe 27 and currently on the front and flip of the cover.  It's not over-done, but it is well done.  It fits the vibe, it fits the time in which it was recorded.

OK, there's your shopping list for the weekend.