I finally caught a small lull in the work action with a break in all the ships this weekend (which I’ll make up for today) so yesterday, with my parents in town, we decided to play the tourist.

Gorgeous suggested we check out the Ships of the Sea Museum since I like things nautical. And it was a good time. The most impressive thing there was all the scale ship models they had from various periods. Everything from sailing square-riggers through iron clad steamers. They had a model of the SS Savannah, the first steam powered ship to cross the Atlantic, and the NS Savannah, the first nuclear powered cargo chip ever built.

For ship buffs like me it was definitely worth the price of admission.

Then we went over to City Market so the ladies could do some shopping. Dad and I tried to entertain ourselves but found it challenging.

Since Mom really wanted to go eat at Lady & Sons, Dad and I decided we’d go get in line.

Now Paula Deen (the owner of the restaurant) is a sharp business woman and a class act all the way. Mom’s dentist had told her to be sure to check out the place. I’m guessing he heard about it on the food channel. I’ve eaten there a couple times before, when folks come to visit who specifically want to go there.

The down side of going there (and it is a big one) is that the line to get in the place is almost always all the way down the block. And in the Savannah afternoon heat standing there in the sun is no fun. But Dad and I were willing to suck it up and stand there.

Until it started raining.

The bottom line is that there are way too many great restaurants in Savannah to go through all that just to get into one. Don’t get me wrong, the food is really good at Lady & Sons. Some might even say it’s worth the wait.

So we shifted gears and went back to City Market to Belford’s and had a wonderful meal there.

But I think the highlight of the day, at least for Mom, was our stop at a place that was not at all unique to Savannah. Gorgeous found out that they’d never been to a Bass Pro Shop so we stopped of at the mall to “show them the waterfall and the fish tank.”

The ladies spent over an hour trying on clothes while Dad and I entertained ourselves looking at the boats and making cracks about how little of the clothing we could actually see. (Most of it was so well camouflaged.)

Anyway it was a good day hanging out with my folks.

But now it’s back to work.

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Anyone interested in a really cool idea of a travel blog should go check out Where is Basil?

The premise is silly – a fictitious donkey named Basil (accompanied by a Fawlty Towers DVD set – Read the explanation page for more.) is visiting different people who have signed up on The List. When Basil is visiting that person, they write about what he sees in their fair city.

They even have a cool map of all the places that he is visiting. In addition to a whole bunch of places here in the states, list includes places like

• Arncliffe, Australia
• River John, Nova Scotia, Canada
• Minsk, Belarus
• Cape Town, South Africa
• Bellingen, Belgium

Right now Basil is with Gorgeous and I in Savannah. So if you’d like to learn a few tidbits about Savannah from someone living here, check it out! I’m even throwing in lots of photos from around town!

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Gorgeous and I went to a birthday party last night for a friend of hers she met through our local Small Business Chamber. Eventually we all got talking about travel.

It turns out Gorgeous and a couple of the other guests had all lived in Australia for a while. The evening went by quickly as they each took turns telling stories of their time there.

I was fascinated because the three of them all spent time in different parts of the country and seemed to have very different experiences.

One of the guys had lived in Perth for a couple years and said he felt very isolated there because the city is so far from anywhere else.

Of course he decided isolation was a bit relative when he heard that Gorgeous had spent a year living in Broome, which they both agreed was the “back of beyond.” Gorgeous said the locals used to talk about slipping into “Broome Time.” Apparently nothing moved quickly there.

Of course that may be changing a little since she was there, what with the increase of tourism and all. Check out this web cam on the beach in Broome and decide for yourself. (Remember they are about 12 hours out of sink with us here in the states so it will be dark there during our day time.)

The third gentleman at our party was a little older and spent some time in Sydney during the 60’s. He said that when he was there then the memory of World War II was still pretty fresh and the Australians absolutely loved Americans then.

If you are in to travel then go ahead and check out Where is Basil? The blog is about the ongoing travel adventures of a fictitious donkey. The idea is there is a set of DVD’s of the old British TV show Fawlty Towers which is being mailed around to people who sign up at the blog and for the week that they have the DVD’s they describe what the Basil the donkey does while he’s there. Then they send the DVD’s off to the next person on the list an Basil heads to the next place. It is truly a global travel adventure.

I bring it up because Basil is here in Savannah and I’ll be posting some tourist type things over there for the next week or so.

I tried to explain the whole thing a while back in Adventures in Traveling. But don’t take my word for it. Check out Basil’s blog.

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I got home from work fairly late last night. I finished up with the ship and walked down the gangway sometime around 1:30 AM this morning. Not a big deal, really. All part of the job and everything went smoothly for once.

I was driving home with the tunes blaring to help keep me alert. You need to be when you are driving around town at those hours to keep a safe distance from all the cars that weave back and forth or drift out of their lanes.

It is amazing to me the difference in drivers sometimes. I use the cruise control whenever I can when I’m on the highways and the by-pass and I pretty much set it to the same speed all the time. Sometimes I’ll be one of the slowest cars out there with everyone whizzing by. Other times everyone is going 15 MPH slower than I am on the same road. My speed didn’t change. Savannah is weird that way. And last night it seemed I was in a rocket ship because everyone was going slooooowwww.

I’ll tell Gorgeous sometimes if we’re heading home a little late from something, “Watch out for that one. He’s drunk.” She doesn’t understand how I can say that with such certainty. But there was a time in my life…

Anyway, I tuned into my neighborhood sometime around the 2 AM hour and it looked like there must have been a bad accident, flashing lights everywhere. Lots of blue lights mixed in with the amber from a tow truck.

My first thought was “Oowie! That doesn’t look good.” Then I did a quick mental check to see I knew of an easy way around by an alternate route because it had been a long day, I really just wanted to get to bed. And in my experience Savannah’s Finest isn’t particularly concerned with traffic flow around accident scenes. They’ll block major roads way longer than they need to in the interest of safety.

But hey, they’re allowed. They’ve got guns.

Well I saw they let a car go around what must have been the wreck so I decided to just suck it up and wait it out. It turns out that was a good call because I’d run smack into a DUI checkpoint, not an accident. And on a Thursday night even. Go figure.

I’m a little slow on the uptake, but I figured it out when I saw a line of police officers beside the road, each one talking to a driver. So after presenting my license and proof of insurance (and saying a quiet thank you for our secretary who’d just given us our new insurance cards) I was on my way home.

As the officer was handing my documents back he yelled to his team, “We’ve got another one trying to cut through!” I wondered to myself it that was someone trying to avoid talking to the police, or someone just trying to get past a traffic tie-up.

The whole thing got me thinking how nice it is not to be concerned about an encounter with the police. They say people who often drive drunk get to be experts at spotting cop cars. It is probably because of the rush of adrenalin that hits their system when they see one, knowing what could happen.

Paul explained this principle

For the authorities do not frighten people who are doing right, but they frighten those who do wrong. So do what they say, and you will get along well.

And it is true. When our conscience is clear and we know we’ve done nothing wrong we worry a whole lot less. I was completely unafraid of talking with a representative of the Savannah-Chatham Police Force, even when it was approaching the two o’clock hour. That lack of fear hasn’t always been the case…

Given a choice, I prefer no fear. Besides my bed at home sleeps better than any accommodations Chatham County would provide at that hour!

Enjoy! And stay safe this weekend.

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