Stay in Florida

Stay in Florida

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There are many ant nests of small ants (1/4 inch long, dark brown) that seem to eat the rotten fruit under the trees and in the drainage ditches. However the soil is all sand, so their nests are slightly raised (better drainage in rain) and very soft when stepped on. Here is one that my ladder disturbed. Mostly I ignore the ant nests and they seem to rebuild fine, but I once was kneeling to get low hanging fruit. At the time I noticed the soil was really soft but didn't think anything of it at the time. Then 'Yikes!' ants were all over my leg and not at all happy (and letting me know by biting and stinging me). Now I am more careful where I kneel. There are lots of spiders and other bugs about and I got several bites of unknown origin. I get somewhat less now that I wear a cap like Anno with a 'bandana' under it covering my neck and ears (last page).
Here is a movie (20 seconds, 422K, it will probably take a couple of minutes to download) of Louis loading a tub of juice oranges into the loader. The lever to rotate the grabbing arm has been replaced (not needed as the tubs are round unlike the square bins) with one to dump the tub. The back of the loader has a box sort of attachment, open at the top that the oranges are dumped into. When the loader is full, Louis drives it to a juice trailer and pulls up next to the trailer. There is another control which lifts the box straight up about six feet and then tips the contents into the trailer for shipment to the processing plant (the side of the box flaps open when it is raised and tilted). I am not sure if I will have a chance to make a movie of that.	If your browser is not set up to show movies you will get a dialog box instead of a player and can just press cancel. If you press the pause button (left bottom) before the movie finishes you can watch the movie again without downloading it again.
Carter's parking lot gets really busy in the mornings around 8AM and in the afternoon as the crews come back. Here is a shot in the parking lot of a slightly different style of packing fruit loader (with windshield, no less) pulling a porta potty. You can also see the tail end of a van pulling a trailer with ladders. About half the crews are Hispanic and about half the crews are black. I would also guess that about half the blacks are foreign, mostly Hiatian with some from Jamaican. For some reason you rarely see the crews mix. The few white pickers (three counting myself) seem to be able to join any crew. There are also some women pickers, but they usually aren't part of my crew and seem to be less than 10% of the pickers.
We got a day off on the Sunday (Nov 10) of Veteran's Day so I went to the beach at Fort Pierce for the morning. On way there I saw this barge loaded with packing fruit getting unloaded. I was going over the bridge over the 'intercoastal'. The intercoastal is the waterway between the mainland and the series of islands which make up the barrier reef. The beach is on the Atlantic side of the island. The next picture is of the bridge I took the picture from. I had a pretty nice morning hanging out at the beach and reading and mending my clothes. However, I realized when I went to the library that all the libraries were closed for Veteran's Day. Three days with no access to the internet. Bummer!
Further, as I checked the schedule, I would probably have four days without internet access over Thanksgiving weekend. Now, the heat, humidity, sun, bugs, rain, and such don't really bother me, but with no work and no internet access, I am not so happy. So, I decided to end my fruit picking adventure early on the 17th (last day) and head back to Dallas, Texas starting on the 18th to visit with my brother and mom there. I hope to get a job driving a truck with packages and such during the holiday rush (and maybe find a chance to practice driving tractor trailers so that I can upgrade my license to Class A).
Just after I learned that I wouldn't be able to use the library for three days, I found out that the local Mensa group had moved there monthly meeting up a week to be that Sunday at 3PM. What perfect timing. I just found out I had nothing to do that afternoon. They meet once a month at a local restaurant. This month it was a Crawdaddy's. To the left of the restaruant is an open air extension of the restaurant where we met and had an early dinner. The food there was New Orleans style as was the atmosphere (music and decor).
Here is the picture of the group. The food was quite good and we had a nice time visiting. Each day I make 10 mile drive to Walmart (to get my frozen dinner and any other items (mostly food) that I need), Barbell's (to shower), and Indian River Community College (library with excellent internet access). Those three places are all within a mile of each other, so that works out nicely. The next picture of Wal-Mart is mostly just a place holder for updates on my daily routine. I have started buying a regular 24 ounce loaf of 100% whole wheat bread for my peanut butter sandwiches. There is not nearly the selection and the price is higher than in New York, but it is still only 22 cents for the bread for each sandwich. Also, I have found that bread will keep fine in my car for ten days, which is great.