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Well it’s officially day one of our vacation.  I don’t count yesterday, the day we actually left Kansas City and landed in Florida because it sucked.  Flying sucks.  Traveling sucks.  And on top of that, I had to go to Wal-Mart after we got here!!  It was awful.  But it’s Sunday now and so far all I’ve done is lounge on the beach and finish my Jodi Picoult book.  That’s a lie.  I did come back up to the condo and make myself a wrap and eat it.  My brother-in-law is currently monitoring my sister as she creates a sandwich for his consumption.  He’s alternately giving her pointers and makeing fun of me for blogging.

We are at a different location this year than the one we usually go to.  We usually stay at the Destin Beach Club but this time decided that there just wasn’t enough room there for all six of us and so, April, the official family events coordinator, set out to find us something different.  What she found is something different that’s for sure.  When we pulled up, we were all a little bit affraid to get out of the car.  Our mother apparently knew that we were staying in a condo, I on the other hand did not.  This is most likely entirely my fault as I rarely pay attention unless the conversation is about me.  Odds are, they started talking about the new locale at one of our family meetings and I heard the word house and assumed and then wandered in and out of the conversation as is usually the case.  Anyway, in the dark, from the front, it looks a little better than a shanty.  Lots of really thin, long things all clumped together into one.  We came in, preparing ourselves for the posibility that we might need to find somewhere else to stay (remember, this is after I’ve already been on a plane and in airports that don’t like smokers most of the day so I’m already  grumpy at this point.  I don’t think I had been able to smoke a whole cigarette since I left my house at 9 that morning, never a good idea.) and were pleasantly surprised by how nice it was!!  The inside is what we wanted.  It’s got just the right amount of space, we have enough bedrooms, we have 3 bathrooms and no one has to share, there’s a common room that we can choose wether or not we want to be in because it’s not the only space to be.  It’s perfect!!  Now, how to make sure we don’t have to go outside again??  The view of the back is 10x worse than the view from the front.  Dad and I went out front this morning to take another look and decided it wasn’t as bad as we’d first thought but the back, it’s just plain embarassing.  But onward and upward, we’re here to spend time with each other and enjoy the ocean and the beach, not to sit in a beautiful house.

So the boy and I are staying downstairs and we have our own balcony down there.  I love it.  I sat out there reading for about an hour or more last night.  The second level is the common space with living room and kitchen and balcony.  It is here that Dad and I spent an hour or so this morning enjoying the sound of the waves and the fresh air when the neighbors just to the west of us woke up.  Dang.  They sat outside too and the balconies are right up against each other.  Great, we’re next door to hippies with annoying laughter.  We’re not so secretly hoping that they pack up and leave soon.