What I did on my summer vacation, Part 4

I had a nice chat with the Positive Morning Crew this morning. I kinda miss those guys :) I guess I must have, to have gotten up so early on my vacation!

We had intended to go to the Kennedy Space Center today, but since it is vacation we were a little lax about bedtimes and what time we were planning on getting going today. By the time everyone was up and had eaten, it was noon. I wasn't too stressed because the tickets that we were going to purchase were for 2 days and we are only about 10 minutes from the center.
But as we were waiting and looking out at the ocean, all of a sudden there were helicopters going out to a boat about a half mile out that was heading toward the port. They were coast guard helicopters and one of them dropped really close to the boat and started pushing it with the back wash of the rotor. The other helecopter dropped a couple of people out with jet ski type vehicles. With all of the spray from the rotors of the helicopters it was hard to see exactly what was going on and we forgot to bring our binoculars. But we tried to watch the activity to figure out what was going on. The boat got "pushed" back out and then down the coast til we could no longer see it... maybe 6 miles or so. I have no idea what it was all about but speculating and watching was sort of fun. As a family we came up with all sorts of ideas from training sessions to deterring illegal imigrants to getting the boat with criminals on it out of range of any innocent people on the beaches. Who knows?! but it was interesting and had us all exclaiming "you don't see that every day".

The girls wanted to go out and get some sun (as all good parents do, we reminded them to use sunscreen) and Corwin wanted to finish a book he started yesterday. Bruce has been missing his guitar so we decided to go to a music store nearby so he could go pick for a while. It is always fun for me to watch the admiration of other musicians as he plays. We were at the store for a couple of hours as Bruce and some of the other guitarists shared stories and techniques. He was invited to sit in with a band tomorrow night at a club down the beach. We are still trying to decide if this is something we want to do. While it would be fun, there is always the environment issues of being in a bar setting. The 2 older kids are allowed to be there but Emmy would have to leave by 9:30 (of course that would mean we all would leave) but do we really want her in that environment at all?

It is a difficult thing. On one hand, Jesus hung out in exactly this sort of setting in his time on earth, ministering to the neediest of people and if Bruce and I were here by ourselves, it would be less of an issue. Bruce has such a heart for other musicians that do not know the Lord. And how can you be a light in their world if you never enter it? But with the kids, we just don't know. Corwin and Amber are both over 18 and are allowed in the club after 9:30 but Emmy is not. They would all enjoy watching their dad play guitar. It's the Blues and Bruce can play the blues! And it's not like they are not aware that there are folks who drink and one's who drink to excess. But do we want to potentially expose them to a level of worldliness that they have not been exposed to before? Maybe if we knew what the club looked like and the normal clientel, it would make the decision easier. Maybe tomorrow morning we should go check out the place. Certainly we will be praying about this.

Whether we should take the kids or not may be a moot point. The girls are both very sun burned! They did not use a high enough level sunblock. They look a little bit like lobsters. You know, that color, when you see it on someone else you say, "oooh...that's gotta hurt!". So we'll see how they are feeling tomorrow. Actually, going to Kennedy may be an issue as well. I think I know what my parents must have felt like when I fell asleep on a raft in a pool here in Florida when I was 11. Some memories are best left un remembered!

We all went swimming in the ocean this evening and it was really awesome. There were some cow nosed rays that were playing around us in the surf. They were within a few feet of us and seemingly curious about us. We also saw a sea turtle (about 10 feet away) and that was cool too. But when we started seeing jelly fish, we decided that it was time to go. I didn't want to play with them.

All in all, a pretty interesting day here in Florida. I am actually starting to feel relaxed.
Oh, and we had eggplant parmesean for dinner and Corwin made another batch of brownies.
Going to bed early tonight!