Air boat rides on Lake Okeechobee

Welcome back to Miz Judi’s Kitchen! I hope all are doing well today. Thank you for coming back to visit with us once again.

I would like to share a story with you today about Lake Okeechobee. I have always heard how big and pretty it was, but had never seen it.

When we moved down here from north Florida, Dub and I had talked about riding down to see it one afternoon. It was only about an hour from where we’d moved to, and one Sunday we were just setting around and I asked Dub, “Why don’t we take the kids and go see it?” He said yea,’ let’s do! You know they have airboat rides and the kids would probably enjoy it!

So I got the kids ready, and off we went to see the great Lake of Okeechobee! I was so excited that I was going to finally get to see it, because honestly I love to fish, and they say there’s some big ones in that lake.

Here we go, talking all the way down there about the air boat rides, and other things we could do when we get there.

When we got there they had a sign up… Air Boat Rides! Well, the price was on the sign, and I don’t remember how much it was, but I don’t think l it was all that much. WAS IT DUB?

So Dub took us down to the lakefront, and stopped the car. He declared, “There it is, ya’ see it?” We all said yea, we see it, isn’t it pretty? As soon as we got yea we see it out of our mouths, that man put the car in drive, and headed back out.

Ole’ Dub had pointed that car north and headed right back home! I said what are you doing, and him and his funny self said, “You seen the lake, didn’t ya’?”

To this day he won’t admit it, but what happened is Mr. Tight Wad saw the price of the air boat rides, and wasn’t going to spend the money.

He’s like that all the time. I always tell him he needs to shake the cobwebs off his wallet, cause he sure don’t like opening it up very much!

Well, I can’t say I’ve never seen Lake Okeechobee, because he did keep his word… and took us to see it!

I have to say though, that during the time we took this half day adventure, times were tough. We’d just made the move down, of course Dub is from the Central Florida area, but after the move, money was tight. I really tell this to aggravate Dub more than anything else, as those airboat rides would literally back then, have taken grocery money out of our pocket.

It’s good ammunition to keep hold of though ladies, as I can still make him feel bad about that little trip, but what is it our menfolk like to say about us? “That’s what we’re here for!” (aggravating them) With that being their actual thoughts of us, the “fairer sex,” I say…why disappoint ‘em?

Now I would like to just share a few things with you today.

Putting away some food and medicine

As you know we have talked about putting up some extra food with you. I don’t know if you have thought about it or not, but you may want to put up some extra medicines also.

We’ve put up aspirins, tylenol, ibupropren, cold and flu medicines, and things like that. Just stop and look at your own needs, and what you think you might need, if you were to get in a bind and couldn’t get to a store.

A lot of time you can catch it on sale, like a buy one get one free. Or you can look in the newspaper and get a coupon for it. Just keep it rotated…use the oldest first, then it all stays within date.

I do know this winter it was a lot of help to us. A simple example of why we try to keep some on hand is convenience! You already know when you feel bad you don’t feel like going to the store. All we had to do was take it out of the cabinet. Our oldest medicines are kept there, and we were ready to go! Now I’ll just replace it, and be ready once again! I do hope this will help you all out…it works for us!

Here is a little tip for you this morning. You guys may have already been aware of this, but I’ll share it with you just in case you hadn’t.

You know how when you open Brown sugar and it gets hard on you? Try dumping it into a zip lock bag, put a slice of bread in with it, then close the bag for about an hour or two. See if it doesn’t soften back up for you.

So till next time, keep a smile on your face and one in your heart!

May God Bless each and every one of you!

Deb