…And In The Pastels Bind Them

After a week full of irritatingly zoomed and cropped sock shots, it’s time for a full confession. I didn’t do all that just because I felt like doing something different, or even mostly because of it. No, truth is, all that nonsense was a necessity because of Puddintopia Blogging Rule #4: Thou Shalt Not Broadcast When Out Of Town.

See, for the last week, the whole Pud’n clan was not just out town, but kinda waaaay outta town. In Florida, as a matter of fact. A sunny, stormy place where an airplane deposited us last Tuesday, which we quickly realized was made of atmosphere so thick and humid you could spread it on toast, and heat so oppressive I found myself welcoming the nigh-daily 3-4 PM downpour.

We spent 3 days at Universal living the Jurassic/Minion/Hogwarts high life. After that, the only sensible thing to do was to spend an equivalent number of days at Cocoa Beach/Cape Canaveral, cooling off in the surf and/or playing a very loose interpretation of Marco Polo (with a striking resemblance to no-rules playground basketball) in the rental house pool.

It was an extremely enviable week, I’m not ashamed to say, and all the kids made a point to tell us how much they enjoyed it…without being put up to it, even. Even better, we didn’t have any appointments, any practices, or any social engagements of any kind. It was all pretty fantastic, and I’d do it again in a second.

That said, I could do it again with maybe half the human presence in the Harry Potter parts of Universal. Holy patronus, that place was crowded.

Anyway, without further ado, here are the full shots of last week’s socks.

We start with tiny footprints for full-sized dinosaurs.

Poor Cookie the Teddy Bear spent the flight to MCO tucked into my carry-on, under the seat in front of me. He did make a point, though, to tell me that he really liked my T-Rex print Jurassic Park socks. Clearly, he’s got good taste.

This one was hard not to give away, so I had to make sure I only got the smallest fraction of the Hogwarts logo.

Best part about this shot is that I took it during one of the aforementioned daily downpours, as we rode the Hogwart’s Express to Hogmeade, dry and comfy. I highly recommend the experience, especially during a drenching rain.

Kudos to WordPress user SoL for nailing the call on this one. The accompanying haiku very clearly reference Minions, and they nailed it.

I couldn’t very well go to Universal without Minions socks, and even more obviously couldn’t pass up the opportunity to photograph said stocking in front on an actual “Minion Crossing” sign. My kids were horrified that I sat on a still downpour-wet bench and shed my shoes to get this shot. But then, horrifying my teens in public is kind of a calling at this point in my life.

Side note: 15 year-old’s concerned with coolness are likely to badmouth Minions in advance of the Minions 3D experience at Universal. They will also grin and potentially even laugh unreservedly during said ride, if they they believe they are not being watched.

This picture? Yeah, not of any kind of mythical being. They were actually flamingos. I’m pretty sure those are still real.

Also? This is a view I’m not sure I’d ever get tired of, flamingo socks or not. You should have seen the sunrise from here. Which, you know, I didn’t actual ever see with my own eyes, because I’m soooo not a sunrise kinda person. But the Puddinette got some sweet shots.

Odds are good, of course, that she was only awake at that point because I was snoring. And she acts like snores never did anything good for her.

After talking sweet about Slimer and green finger puppets, I kind of seriously want socks for both…but these are not either.

They’re alligators. If you thought I was going to central Florida without sporting a pair of ‘gators, well, you don’t know me very well at all.

And, finally, we have yesterday’s pair, which might be my favorite because I’ll always be a huge space nerd. As an added bonus, I was chuffed to be able to show them in full view, scheduled to post as we were winging our way back to the ole home front.

I took this yesterday evening after dinner at Rusty’s Seafood and Oyster Bar in Port Canaveral, which checked all the boxes for a Florida waterside restaurant:

• On the water
• Kind of a hole in the wall
• Amazingly fresh fish
• Damn good clam chowder
• Gator bites
• Smoked fish dip

Sadly, I couldn’t convince any of my kids to try to the oysters, so I guess we’ll have to test those out next time.

At any rate, we’re “home again, home again, jiggity-jig”, and tomorrow the real world  sadly intrudes again, possibly with a vengeance. But that’s okay, because we had an amazing week together as a family, and scored both pictures and memories that I’ll not soon forget.

And believe it or not, most of those don’t even focus on socks.