Thursday, July 8, 2010

Summer Sign Language


An old man gave me the finger today. He flipped me off as I was taking a left out of Seacoast Shores onto Rte 28. My first reaction was, "Seriously, Dude?!!!" He was at least 200 yards away when I initialized my turn. His big, red Buick Le Sabre was hard to miss as it inched along the road. That is, it was inching along until he noticed me, then he clearly sped up to claim himself "King of the Road". After I regained my wits, I regret to say I recovered quickly enough to retaliate with my own hand gesture. However, I'm not sure if he saw it. It made me feel better, anyway.
I'm usually pretty tolerant of the tourist influx beginning in late June,even when it peaks in July and August to just waning before Labor Day weekend but this is where I draw the line. There are rules of common courtesy, civility, especially when you are visiting, which I suspect this man was since he didn't understand the love we extend by letting people out in front of the line of traffic especially when the guy in opposite lane has stopped to let someone go. This old man is the type to cut of the UPS driver who is still delivering packages at 8:00pm on a holiday weekend, just trying to make his last stop before finally going home for the day. This old bag probably skimps on tipping the waitress, calculating down to the penny exactly 15% even though the service was excellent and the food even better. I know this guy, I think he cut in front of my four year old in line for the ice cream truck at the beach the other day. Well, maybe that wasn't him, but you get my point.
Why doesn't he just come to enjoy his vacation and relax? I implore people like him to please treat the locals well, tip their bartender and if they don't, I'll flip them the bird.

When I'm not employing lewd hand gestures, I keep myself busy by inventing a cool treat like this:

Smoothie Pops

(makes 10)

Ingredients:

1 cup vanilla low fat yogurt
1 cup fruit juice
2 cups chopped fruit

5 oz. paper cups such as Dixie
popsicle sticks

Blend all ingredients until smooth. Pour smoothie into 10 5 oz. Dixie cups. (Fill each cup about half way). Place in freezer for 1 hour. Insert a popsicle stick into the center of each partially frozen pop. Continue to freeze until solid. To serve, peel off paper cup and enjoy.