If you were a Sesame Street kid, you might remember a funny skit where Ernie and Bert go fishing. Bert gets frustrated because he can see lots of fish, but none of them are biting. Ernie, however, is confident that he can catch fish with his special method. He calls them with a loud, “Here fishy, fishy, fishy, fishy.” And as he calls them, the boat fills up, to Bert’s disbelief.
Kim and I were recently on a cruise to celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary. We had a ton of fun: snorkeling in Belize, ziplining in Honduras, and visiting some Mayan ruins in Mexico. So you’d think I’d write about those adventures, but probably the funniest thing that we keep talking about from the cruise happened on the first day. We were getting settled in our room and walked out onto the balcony to look out at the ocean. It is really mesmerizing and makes you feel really small just staring out at an endless expanse of water.
For some reason, whenever I’m staring at the water, I’m always diligently looking for sea life. I don’t know why. I just want a whale, some giant fish, or dolphins to come swim alongside the boat. And as we were enjoying this first view of the ocean, from another balcony came a little voice. At first we couldn’t hear it, but then it got clearer. It was a little girl shouting at the top of her lungs, “Great White Shark! Great White Shark!” She’d take a breath and then shout it again, “Great White Shark! Great White Shark!” All I could think of was Ernie in that old Sesame Street skit calling, “Here fishy.” I won’t lie, it would be kind of fun to see a big shark come crashing in through the water. Might stop me from getting in and swimming for a bit, but it would be fun to see.
Fortunately, her calls were to no avail, there were no sharks while we were snorkeling! For the rest of the cruise, Kim and I kept repeating, “Great White Shark!” every time we sat down to relax and look out at the ocean. We did end up seeing a sea turtle near one of our docks, and on the last day I did see some flying fish, which was pretty cool and much safer than a giant shark!
And I will tell you, it was quite a shock to be sweating under the tropical sun one day and then to return to these cold temps here in Florida! I don’t know about you, but I’m a little disappointed that we didn’t get any of the snow that North Florida got this week. Admittedly, it wouldn’t be great for most of our plants, but it would be kind of fun to see snow in our backyard. It does look like tonight is going to be one of our colder nights of the season, so be sure to protect your sensitive plants and use our recent Teaching Thursday to be sure you cover them correctly.
And once this cold weather breaks, we’ll be headed for perfect Florida weather. Warm 70s during the day, cool 50s at night. That couldn’t be more perfect for getting your gardens back into shape for spring. As we roll into February, we’ll have lots of fun happening at Kerby’s. On Feb 1, we’ll have Yoga in the Garden and Spellbound Sourdough at the nursery. And then on February 8th, we’ll have our annual Valentine’s Day Flower Arrangement Make and Take; you can get tickets here. On the 15th we’ll have our official kickoff to the spring season with our Spring Veggie Gardening Seminar. There is so much fun to be had, we can’t wait to see you and enjoy this beautiful season in Florida with you.
P.S. We are operating with modified hours this week due to the weather:
Thursday and Friday, January 23 and 24, 10 am – 4 pm
We will note additional updates, if any, for the weekend on our website and social media (Instagram and Facebook).