Thought I’d start out the month by doing a little shout out….
First, Rosie Rendules, friend and neighbor, is running for the Homosassa Special Water District board. Go Rosie!
I couldn’t find any pics of just Rosie, but here’s a group pic from earlier this year. We were all dressed up fancy schmancy that night.
That’s Rosie way over on the right….
Rosie is also working on saving the Old Homosassa Water Tower that was scheduled for demolition. If you want to help out with the effort, go out to Facebook and search for “Save Homosassa Water Tower”. There’s a group that Marian MacRae started called Old Homosassa Historical Preservation Society (OHHPS). They are currently working on making the group nonprofit. They are also planning on putting up a website. If you want to help out, ask to join through Facebook.
I met a couple of people down at the Shed this week that have been following my blog. I was so glad that they came up and introduced themselves. Made my day! They are looking for property in the area and stumbled across my website. Fun!
Me, Myra and Kevin. Future new neighbors!
We rode our bikes to the River Fest Friday night. Crazy, right? Terry had lots of lights on the bikes. Everything would have been fine if I just hadn’t had that last glass of wine. Yes, I fell off on my way home while we were cutting through the woods. I landed in a big pile of fluffy weeds. No harm. I just like to admit that I’m occasionally really stupid!
This Saturday is the 2nd Annual Mullet Toss at the Old Mill Tavern. We’ll be riding our bikes, again, but this event takes place during the day. I should be okay! The money goes to the Homosassa Elementary school.
And last shout out is to Paul and Sue, wherever you are. Here’s some photos of your new neighbor’s property!
From your front yard…That gates’s gonna keep out the bad guys!And close up! Looking forward to the next upgrade!
OMG! This weekend was the Cobia Tournament. This is the BIG tournament for Old Homosassa. While there are two places to start out from, everyone has to take their boat to MacRae’s to get their fish weighed. The excitement starts Friday night with two captains meetings. Which means that everyone that is in the tournament is hanging out at the Shed.
We went to the Shed Friday evening to meet up with friends and check out the band. No parking. No tables. Glad we rode our bikes. We ended up sitting at the picnic table at the Bait Shop. Craziness. Got a picture of these guys as they came in.
This guide, Zack, he’s the guy in the back on the left and is about 21 years old, went out 105 miles to catch these red snapper. WOW!
It’s the tradition to get down to MacRae’s before 7 am on Saturday morning so we can watch the captains go out. We barely got there in time. We slept in a bit later than normal–could be from going to the Shed the evening before!
The StartWaiting for their numbers to be called.And they’re off! Almost as exciting as the Belmont!The Locals. See how far Gus and Maggie are from each other? Gus really wants to be friends with the Magster but she’s not having anything to do with that!My favorite team, I call them the Ladies in Pink. They always have a drink while they go by the starting line!MacRae’s have put in a new paver patio. Nice. And there’s the stage and a tented eating area. So calm. So empty.Compass
On Sunday I rode my bike back to MacRae’s. About 3:30. I knew that the captains have to be in by 4 to have their catch weighed. Thought that would be fun. Not so much fun. I don’t know where all of these people parked, but it couldn’t be legally! Plus they were way ahead of me on the beer consumption.
There’s that tented eating area!And the Shed.Judge’s stand at 3:30.Some of the catch
It was hot. It was crowded. I went home. Yes, I’m a party pooper. I’ll read in the paper who won!
Friends, we are still tasting those chicken wings. For this installment we went to Spring Hill–twice, Crystal River and Hernando. We were all over the place!
Our first visit was to Rookies II in Spring Hill on Anderson Snow Road and Spring Hill Drive. It’s tucked back inside a shopping plaza. We picked this place because it was close to the Suncoast Parkway and we were on our way to the airport. (Third time that weekend.) Anyhow, we invited a bunch of independent judges to meet us there. So there was Terry and me, Jes and Andrew, Donna, Yvonne, Vera and Michelle. This was over a month ago and someone ordered wings, and there was shrimp and quesidillas and a rueben, a taco salad and perhaps more. (Okay, truth in blogging, I should write about these bar hops as soon as we leave the pub. But sometimes I don’t, on this one I waited a month and I didn’t take notes. But, come on, we were on the way to the airport! Who takes notes after they’ve drank a few beers and they are on the way to the airport????? And no, I wasn’t driving.) So I can’t tell you who had what but we all had a really good time. There was some kind of crazy competition going on in the parking lot so we had entertainment, too. Service was good. Food was yummy. And beer was wonderful.
Wings from Rookies 2ReubenYum–deep fried!
Then Terry and I stopped at the original Rookies on 19 a couple of weeks later, it’s past Spring Hill Drive but not all the way to County Line Road. Great directions, right? Anyhow, we left ‘happy banjo lesson’ and this was the closest place that served food and beer. (Beer is always nice after ‘happy banjo lesson’.)
Wings from Rookies
Our next chicken wing visit was prompted by a friend telling me that she was performing at Crackers last Wednesday. Couldn’t miss that!
Paula Bateman and Leigh Humes
Crackers is usually crazy busy but it was kind of empty when we got there on Wednesday evening. We found a table back in a corner of the tiki bar where Paula was performing. But then the place started filling up and all the spaces were filled so we invited some woman to join us. Okay, they weren’t strangers–I probably knew at least one of them.
Beautiful view of Kings BayWings for TerrySo I got grilled grouper instead of my typical fried since I’m trying to eat healthier. Someone at our table had to point out that there was a whole lot of fried potatoes on that plate! Who put those there? I had to eat them because children are starving in Africa.Just in case you forgot what Terry looked like. He took my pic but there’s a guy’s butt behind me in it. Don’t want to show you that!
Our last stop was at Chicken King in Hernando. Terry had this place on his list of Chicken Wing restaurants.
Chicken King
I said to Terry, ‘I don’t know about this place, looks like there could be a bunch of little kids in there.’ But there wasn’t. No one in that dining room could have been young enough to have small children.
Chicken King probably shouldn’t have been on the list of chicken wing spots. But if you want good homemade food with friendly service and good prices, this is the place to go. We were met before we even got in the door by a guy asking if a table for two was okay. Seriously, this person met us out on the sidewalk. Our server was pleasant and efficient. Terry got “wing dings” which were pretty much fried chicken like my Mom used to make. I got Chicken and Dumpling and I’m pretty sure that my Mom was reincarnated and working back in the kitchen. I told a worker at the counter that I thought there should be some chocolate pie to go along with the meal since that’s what my Mom would have served. And she pulled one of the fridge. While Chicken King didn’t win the best wings contest, it certainly gets high marks for a friendly family style restaurant.
Wing Dings at Chicken KingChicken and Dumplings
With Terry as the wing judge, he said that Crackers wings were as good as Neon Leon‘s which was the winner thus far. But I’m going to put my two cents in and say that Crackers gets extra points for the view and the music!
