Sea Dog

14 hours ago, Ozark_Kid said:

Wednesday was the anniversary of my official diagnosis. Time sure does fly!  Physically things have changed a lot.  I am not going list those changes.  I think the one thing that has changed for the better is my love of life and those around me!  I give thanks for each new day!  So much love shown to me and my family.  An example of how we have been blessed, remember me telling about our new neighbor, on her own, came over and shoveled the snow off our driveway?  Well, yesterday she surprised us with a great homemade strawberry pie!  We are still having people bringing us meals each week to help ease the burden off Sharon and to bring a smile to our face.  And what I love the most is so often I still hear someone add their name to the long list from around the world of those that are thinking and praying for us.  So special!

John you are a true inspiration to all of us! We are blessed to have you in our lives. Your love of life is a great teaching to us all. I am in awe of you.

22 minutes ago, George C said:

Too bad you didn’t get a chance to sail MSC when then allowed you to upgrade the premium drink package to a package that included everything they had at the bar including XO cognacs and 20 plus year old scotch’s , cost was 18 a day extra per person and it cost me a few hangovers, killed many bottles of Johnny Walker Blue , this was about 5 years ago . They also allowed doubles 😁😁😁

So I take it they don't do that now? That would be a great deal and I would take advantage of that.

2 minutes ago, ReneeFLL said:

The Sip Lounge

Wow Louie XIII has really gone up in price. Even Remy's XO is very expensive. I got Louie on Explorer for $125 for a one ounce pour.

Happy National Pet Day!

our 3 knucklehead's 

Charlie and Lizzy

Kylar.

We love our kids.

4 minutes ago, h20skibum said:

A Ricky update.  I took him to the vet this week for a blood test.  He wasn’t happy they had to stick him 3 times to get blood.  Everything looks good so far. His blood count is up.  Still looks a little funny with short leg hairs

Great news. I’m glad he is feeling better.

15 minutes ago, Arzeena said:

😱 OMG $1400!!!!!

I will check off and on before our sailing but I knew it would be more expensive than the Double Tree but not that much.

9 minutes ago, Arzeena said:

We have stayed at the Westin in Long Beach. Long long time ago. There was a bus/shuttle across the road that took you to other places. I also remember walking everywhere.
 

And have also stayed at Crown Plaza in San Pedro. It was OK hotel for a night. Quite walkable to restaurants across. Would have picked the DT but read that it is a bit remote and would need a car. I don't know if it has been developed more now. We were there in 2016.

Would love to but after seeing the price tag at over $1400 for two nights I think we will need to stay at the Double Tree at $485 for two nights.

6 minutes ago, Ocean Boy said:

I'd love to tour the QM. Back when Iowa was still in service I got to spend a day aboard with a friend who was a corpsman on the ship. I got to see and crawl through some of the coolest places. I'll never forget that day.

Yes I am torn between which one to tour. Maybe Iowa first as I’ve have never been on a Navy warship. Maybe tour the QM on our next visit.

7 hours ago, taznremmy said:

I’m sitting on a plane to FLL and board the Celebrity Equinox to Lisbon.  Hope we cruise together before too long.  Take care, this too will pass. Hugs.

Have a great time on Equinox!

6 hours ago, NHProud said:

My husband visited Long Beach on business quite a few times before we moved to Santa Clarita in 2006 . I would go with him often . We cruised out of San Pedro in 2023 and believe me or not you are going to be bored staying in San Pedro . The Tiki bar Dave referenced is within walking distance of the Long Beach Westin which @Jimbo has also mentioned.  Laguna Beach is very nice and with a rental car should not be a problem. We stayed at the Ritz Carlton .  
 

This October , we are staying one night at the Crowne Plaza . Last year , we stayed at the Doubletree. It’s because , we’ve been there , done that.  I’m sure , you have your itinerary planned and know what you want to do. 

 

 

This being our first time cruising out of LA I’m sure we will learn a lot. Nervous about renting a car and driving in LA especially if we go to some Tiki Bars. I’ll look at Westin and maybe we will change our reservations. We figured one day we would take a tour of the Queen Mary or tour the USS Iowa.

2 hours ago, h20skibum said:

Those scheduling people at Southwest have been busy trying to annoy me.  
 

Yesterday, they made two changes to our flight to San Francisco.  The first change, they moved our departure time up by about 10 minutes.  I thought, ok, I can live with that.  Then, about 2 hours later, they send this.  
 

 

New times, new plane, new flight!  So now, instead of a change in Chicago, we have one in Denver.  And that new departure time got moved to 5am, which would mean getting up at 2am to be ready for a drive to the airport.  Not happening, so we booked a hotel at the airport.  
 

Now, I wake up this morning to see that our flights to and from Myrtle Beach this summer were changed. Differences of 10 minutes to 1.5 hours.  Can’t wait to see if they change again later today. 
 

I am fairly confident they will change our flights to and from our Utopia cruise. 
 

Maybe they are reshuffling the fleet to find planes that haven’t had parts fall off. 

Boy that’s frustrating. I would hate those times.

19 minutes ago, Ocean Boy said:

I do make quarterly payments. Let's just say my estimates were "slightly" off last year. Very untypical of me.🙄😑😢🤧

I feel your pain. We are paying more this year because of Linda’s freelance legal work. 

24 minutes ago, George C said:

I lived and worked in that area in late 1970’s . Might need to visit haven’t showed that area of Brooklyn to my wife.

Sunken Harbor Club even though I have not been to it yet has a great reputation. Its bar manager Garret Richard has written a very popular book on Tiki cocktails called Tropical Standards. He is like a chemist for cocktails. It’s small and takes reservations but looks fabulous.

1 minute ago, George C said:

I see there is one in NYC with a interesting name Otto’s shrunken head 

The best one in NY is the Sunken Harbor Club in Brooklyn.

22 minutes ago, Tree_skier said:

Could this one possibly meet the criteria.  

 

https://www.secretisland.shannonscorner.com

 

I'd love to meet there if the schedule could cooperate.   🤪

Yes that’s one my list to visit too while we are there along with the Bamboo Club, both in Long Beach. Love to meet up. We will be there Wednesday October 16th and Thursday October 17th. I can give you my cell. Email me at gpsteele7 at g mail dot com.

1 hour ago, Tree_skier said:

You'll have to explain to me what a tiki bar is vs. a regular bar.

A tiki bar is a restaurant and bar that is Polynesian in theme. They have lavish tropical decors and serve exotic and very potent cocktails. The first one in the US was in Hollywood was started by a man Ernest Raymor Gantt named the Beachcomber. After that another man Victor Burgeron came along and started the Trader Vic’s franchise and was  the inventor of the Mai Tai. Sadly most of those restaurants are gone in LA but the original Tiki Ti and the Tonga Room are still going strong. The Royal Hawaiian Laguna Beach is another very famous one along with Strongwater in Anaheim as well as Disney’s Trader Sams Enchanted Tiki Bar.

Probably more information you ever wanted to know but you did ask.😉

Mahalo my friend. 

43 minutes ago, Tree_skier said:

On a cruising note, for those who might be cruising out of LA, I have discovered an amazing restaurant in Ensenada.

Glad you are still here.

Thanks for the recommendation. The food pics look amazing. We will be on Navigator out of San Pedro this October. We ended up booking a Royal excursion in Ensenada called "Ensenada Taste of Mexico and Margarita Madness." So imagine we will get quite full but we would like to cruise out of LA again.

My biggest frustration is that we are coming into LA two days early because I am a huge Tiki fan and wanted to visit some Tiki bars. Unfortunately where we are staying at the Double Tree in San Pedro nothing is close to there except one in Long Beach. All the others are over an hour away. I don't really want to rent a car because drinking Tiki drinks and driving in an unfamiliar town do not mix. We have some friends that live there but they way live way up north. I wish LA was smaller, oh well. We will at least have the Bamboo Room on Navigator.

5 minutes ago, bobmacliberty said:

 

Looks like her last activity was on March 16 and her last post was in February.  Hopefully everything is OK and she's just busy.

She posts some memes over on FB but haven’t seen her around here in a long time. Same with @Tree_skier .

In my case.

2 hours ago, Ourusualbeach said:

Surprisingly enough, I have found the filet in Giovanni's better than chops and both better than the MDR

I agree that marinated filet at Giovanni’s is awesome. I would also add the filet at the Coco Cay Beach Club is really good too.

RIP Sweet Bella. A life well lived with the family she loved the best. I know she has crossed the rainbow bridge and is free of pain. Peace be with John and Laura as they always hold her deep in their heart.

5 minutes ago, HBE4 said:

 

 

Thank you both for the question and answer.  This whole time I was thinking knocking down the ceiling seems pretty extreme, not to mention messy & labor intensive. 

 

I was having a nitwit moment. I blame the earthquake & solar eclipse.

My friend who does drywall and did our basement told me that while knockdown takes more time to smooth things out it less messy than a popcorn. 

@Ocean Boy Just now saw your post. Does my post post above help explain?

3 hours ago, Ocean Boy said:

What is knockdown?

Badically a smoother version than popcorn. They stray then use a throw to smooth the texture out.

Just now, Coralc said:

I don't think anyone intentionally installs popcorn ceilings anymore. 😉 We took ours out here ourselves. Most difficult DIY job ever! The other house still has some. Hopefully, we can pay someone to remove them. Also my mom's "leaf art" . For some reason she thought it would be a neat idea to modge podge a bunch of fall leaves on the wall. They will have to be sanded off. 🙄

I looked into removing ours. Looked like a nightmare job. I think most homes being built now are knockdowns. Our home was built in 1997 before knockdowns were popular.

13 minutes ago, Husky1987 said:

The nice thing about living in Seattle is we pretty much live with an eclipse October through April.

 

Drywall is up!!!

 

 

 

ETA:  First pic is living room.  One thing I always hated is that there was no lighting.  So we had them put in six can lights.  We also had them take out an arch that separated the entry (where I took the pic from) and the living room.  And there was a gas fireplace that was in the corner by the window that we never used...we had them take that out as well.

Looks good. Are you going to do popcorn or knockdown? I wish I knew about knockdown when we built ours. I hate popcorn so when we finished the basement did a knockdown and it looks so much better.

Not very cool looking here as we have only 89% totality. Looks better watching the tv coverage.

8 minutes ago, FromSea2ShiningSea said:

Tomorrow, 4/9/2024, we board the Celebrity Millennium for our cruise.  We have been busy the last 4 days with private group tours that were planned, organized and set up by a fellow passenger.  Everything has been amazing so far.  
 

I will try to get caught up from where I left off with Day 11- 4/5.

Have a great cruise and please let us know what you think of Millennium.