The main attraction in Ernest Hemingway’s Key West home (now a museum) is the cats. 59 of them! About half have six or more toes (polydactyls).
The story goes that a Massachusetts boat captain sailed into Key West with a white six-toed cat named Snowball. Hemingway became enamored with the cat, so when she had kittens, Captain Dexter of Massachusetts gave one to Hemingway for his sons. They named the kitten Snow White.
Hemingways is quoted as saying, “One cat just leads to another.”
The museum staff includes many world class cat ladies (and gentlemen) who love taking care of them and even sleep over in the museum with them during hurricanes.
“Papa”
My husband on the veranda of Hemingway’s Key West home
Picking up the cats is not allowed, but you can pet them
I’m not even going to pretend to be a big Hemingway fan. I vaguely remember being forced to read “Old Man and the Sea.” I’m sure he was a great writer and all, but he did have four different wives (he divorced three of them). He also collected antique birthing and midwife chairs, which seems odd (and a bit creepy) for a man.
Birthing chair at the foot of the bed in the Hemingway’s bedroom
During the American Civil War, Key West remained under Union control despite Florida joining the Confederacy. Its strategic deep-water port and existing naval base made it a crucial Union stronghold for blockading Confederate shipping in the Gulf of Mexico. Apparently some Key West residents didn’t like that and left the island permanently. (Good riddance assholes!)
Today, there is a big and thriving LGBTQ 🏳️🌈 community here. Along with all the artists, this makes for little to no open MAGA support. I have not seen one Trump hat or shirt on anyone. It’s great. There are also no Trump lawn signs or boats flying the obnoxious flag.
There is just one seedy store on Duval street, that carries the offensive paraphernalia. And because I am a leftist Boston MASShole, I had to stop and Flip the Bird to this particular retailer.
Other than this one tacky store, the coast is clear for MAGA haters to come to Key West.
Not so much for Kansas City fans though…I’ve only seen Eagles shirts. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say Key West is rooting strongly for Philly in the Superbowl.
I’m settling into the vibe here. I know I was worried about getting bored on such a small island for a whole week, but Key West is actually a very lively town with many good restaurants and lots of live music. There’s definitely a lot of Yacht Rock here (I’ve heard multiple renditions of Steve Miller Band’s The Joker), but there’s also a lot of real talent playing in the bars.
The town feels safe, but colorful. There are some beautiful buildings and lots of cute houses, but none of the highrise condo buildings that are in virtually every other city in Florida.
Custom House
Episcopal Church
Walgreens
The roosters are real and they are everywhere. Apparently they were originally brought here by Cubans for cockfighting, but then cockfighting got banned, so the Cubans retaliated by letting the birds go free. They are now a protected species here.
Iguanas (“Key West dinosaurs”) are everywhere too, but they are not protected. They are an invasive species.
Despite my understanding that recreational weed wasn’t going to be available here, a very close hemp substitute is sold everywhere. This enhances the vibes, especially for those of us who aren’t big drinkers.
The food has been really good.
Blackened mahi mahi wrapped in banana leaf with mango salsa
And the legendary sunsets are truly spectacular.
To enhance the vibes, I’m reading Florida, short stories by Lauren Groff. They’re fantastic so far. She’s an amazing writer.
Before I left, I read The Last Train to Key West by Chanel Cleeton, historical fiction set in The Florida Keys in 1935, when the “Labor Day Hurricane” demolished Flagler’s wondrous railroad.
See? I got to the end of this post and haven’t mentioned Jimmy Buffett once.
I’ve posted many times about the great cookies and other baked goods I’ve made with recipes from Sally’s Baking Addiction.
Although she’s mostly a baker, Sally does have a few other recipes and I decided to give one of them a try: Slow Cooker Creamy Chicken & Corn Soup. It’s really more of a stew or chowder (chow-dah, if you’re from Boston 😉).
If you have a large slow cooker (aka crockpot), this recipe is easy and good. The inner part of my slow cooker is safe to use on the stovetop, so I didn’t even need a second pan to cook the bacon. For me, it was truly was a “one pot meal.” The only other tools I needed were a cutting board, knife, and potato peeler (for the sweet potatoes).
The only ingredient that was a bit hard to find in the store was a can of cream style corn. I had to go to two grocery stores to find it.
It cooks on low for 7-8 hours and smells wonderful while it’s cooking.
If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.
“In what ways specifically is the second Trump administration acting like a fascist regime?” ~ question to ChatGPT
The second Trump administration has implemented several policies and actions that critics argue exhibit characteristics commonly associated with fascist regimes:
1. Pardoning January 6 Participants: In his first week back in office, President Trump issued pardons to approximately 1,500 individuals involved in the January 6 Capitol attack. This move has been interpreted as condoning political violence and undermining democratic institutions.
2. Withdrawal from International Agreements: The administration withdrew from the World Health Organization and the Paris Climate Agreement, actions that signal a retreat from global cooperation and a preference for unilateral decision-making.
3. National Emergency on Migration: Declaring a national emergency on migration, the administration sought to cancel birthright citizenship and suspended refugee admissions, reflecting nativist and exclusionary policies.
4. Attacks on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Initiatives: The administration has aggressively targeted DEI programs, rescinding long-standing anti-discrimination executive orders and mandating investigations into DEI practices in the private sector. Critics argue that this undermines civil rights protections and could lead to systemic discrimination.
5. Anti-Transgender Policies: An executive order was issued recognizing only “two sexes, male and female,” affecting policies related to passports and access to single-sex spaces. This move has been condemned by advocacy groups as discriminatory and regressive.
6. Consolidation of Power and Suppression of Dissent: The administration enacted executive orders targeting undocumented immigrants, canceling federal diversity programs, and removing anti-corruption inspectors. A significant purge of senior officials and attempts to control government spending have been perceived as efforts to consolidate power and suppress dissent.
7. Dehumanizing Rhetoric: The administration’s rhetoric has increasingly dehumanized political opponents and marginalized groups, with President Trump referring to adversaries as “vermin” and employing language reminiscent of authoritarian regimes.
These actions have led to widespread concern among scholars, political analysts, and human rights organizations, who argue that the administration is exhibiting traits characteristic of fascist regimes, including authoritarianism, suppression of dissent, and the erosion of democratic norms.
I have a couple of updates for you on the college class of 1987 (high school class of 1983). Most of us were born in 1965, so we are turning 60 thisyear. One of my best friends from college turned 60 yesterday. She broke the ice. Now the rest of us will follow…if we’re lucky. Making it to 60 is not a given. We’ve lost people—mostly to cancer, but sudden massive heart attacks have taken down a few of the men.
I appear to be the only grandparent in my college class of about 500, which is wild. A few people still have kids in high school, so I guess we tended to have kids late, but still…it’s a vivid illustration that the birthrate actually has cratered in this country.
Another observation is that people truly do age differently. Some people look 40 at 60, and some look 80. Money seems to be a factor, but not the only one. Most people are still working, but they’re either talking about retirement or saying they will never be able to retire. “Work ‘til I die” is some people’s retirement plan.
There is both a lot of concern—and a fair bit of bragging—about adult children in their 20s. “You’re only as happy as your least happy child” seems to be true. (But if you’re posting an effusive happy birthday message, with multiple pictures, for a 27-year old who doesn’t even use Facebook, you may need to let go a bit.)
Our parents, if we still have them, are very old now. I know of only one other classmate with two living parents like me. More of our mothers are still alive than our fathers.
For the first and oldest official GenXers, the Eighties was our decade. Nobody has quite so many formative memories of those years as we do. Do not challenge us to an 80s trivia quiz, because we will win. And we will also look back on it all with slightly rose-colored glasses. We’ll forget the bad stuff and laugh about that time we ate pot brownies at school and Mr. Ullman’s physics class finally made sense.
I’ve been digitizing old photos over the past few weeks. I have a ton of them. There’s no way I could save all of them in the event of a fire. I wouldn’t even want to. There are too many.
Walt Whitman’s lines “I am large, I contain multitudes” keep popping into my head. I’ve gone through so many phases in my nearly 60 years. I contain multitudes. We all do.
One theme I’m finding is that we (like everyone) mostly took photos on vacations and holidays. And there’s one vacation destination in Massachusetts that everyone knows: Cape Cod. It’s known simply as “the Cape.” (There’s another popular cape in Massachusetts, but that one gets referred to by its full name: Cape Ann.)
Cape Cod is where the Kennedys summered and it’s just one of those places that everyone in Massachusetts has memories of. If you didn’t have a friend with a house “down the Cape,” then you probably rented one or stayed in a Cape hotel at least a few times in your life.
My earliest memories of the Cape include barfing after eating scallops at Thompson’s Clam Bar, having my grandmother tell me that they thought I’d drowned when I went missing at the beach one day, and waiting for the sun to come out.
I’ve been lucky to visits “The Islands” many times too. (If you’re from Massachusetts, you know that The Islands are Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket.) But the Cape is where my earliest vacation memories happened.
I’m realizing that the places where our memories were made—where our lives have played out—are quite meaningful. They’re the settings for our stories.
The Cape, August 1970At the beach on Cape Cod, 1970, with my Italian grandmother in a bathing suit (a rare occurrence). I don’t remember how I hurt my knee, but I do remember wearing that huge bandage.
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