{"id":13340,"date":"2016-07-01T16:37:19","date_gmt":"2016-07-01T16:37:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/?p=13340"},"modified":"2016-07-01T16:37:19","modified_gmt":"2016-07-01T16:37:19","slug":"why-marlow-loves-key-west","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/why-marlow-loves-key-west\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Marlow Loves Key West"},"content":{"rendered":"

Life and Island Times July 1 2016 \u2013 Why Marlow Loves Key West<\/p>\n

For many years during his current coral island sojourn, Marlow wrote down every day the reasons why he was thankful to live in Key West. By the 2012 holiday season he compiled from the thousands of random thoughts a \u201cbest of list.\u201d In view of his and W\u2019s imminent departure, he thinks it should be shared once again.<\/p>\n

4. Sandals & shorts 24\/7\/365
\n10. Answering tourist questions like “Will the sun set tomorrow like it did today?” with a smile and not a snark or a smirk
\n13. The “Ah ha!” look that our mainland visitors display when they finally get it why we like this place
\n14. Loud F\/A18s from the Naval Air Station five miles distant as the crow flies
\n16. Poetry on bar bathroom walls
\n18. Watching men dressed as 250 pound, 6′ 7″ tall women promote on Duval Street sidewalks the nightly drag show out front of the 801 Bourbon Street Bar
\n21. People copulating on public streets and in bar and restaurant restrooms
\n30. The running Cardinal of Key West
\n38. Amazing music you hear at local bars
\n42. Waving at someone the next day after chatting with them the night before at a wine or cigar bar
\n44. Tubing down Duval Street atop storm sewer back ups
\n46. Defaced street signs that read “pee Limit 25”
\n69. Finding a misplaced, two-week overdue bill from a mainland company and calling them to forgive the interest and penalties due to poor mail ship delivery service to our disconnected Caribbean location
\n70. Hot Russian waitresses and the Israeli green card exotic dancers and entertainers
\n125. Telling your “how I came to live here in paradise” story to a stranger in the time it takes you to pour them a sip of wine
\n151. Rainbows and waterspouts
\n155. The mosaic of Key West\u2019s One Human Family
\n244. Good looking, painted females who, without being asked, tell you that the “curtains match the carpet”
\n268. Uplifting affirmations on public bathroom walls
\n269. Correcting bathroom wall graffiti grammar, meter and rhyming errors
\n270. Correcting my corrections when sober
\n272. Solar flares make us a bit crazier than normal
\n371. Standing at the corner of Duval and Green Streets facing south at 4 AM to watch the bars sweep out the last of their customers; for a few brief minutes it becomes an unforgettable, neon-lit, festival pageant of silly walks and Gumby body jive
\n400. Stepping outside, opening one\u2019s eyes wide, breathing deeply and getting an instant attitude adjustment
\n453. Watching the daily 10 AM cruise ship tourist tsunami crest atop the sidewalks of lower Duval to hear the faint announcement in one\u2019s head, “Attention WalMart shoppers . . .”
\n522. Southernmost Santas
\n555. Visiting and resident writers – celebrity, wannabes and clandestine – seeking a version 2.0 prolonged enhancement of their content and craft
\n640. Ambience of favorite haunts twelve hours after a visitor hurricane evacuation order takes effect
\n671. Doing laundry at the White Street M&M Laundromat early in the morning, sipping a cafe con leche and enjoying the to and fro of the local Hispanics and their playful banter
\n751. Monday mornings spent in phone teleconferences with mainland clients while ensconced under a “Coffee is God” sign in a zen garden while Kermit, the Key West Lime Pie tycoon, hawks his wares somewhere out just beyond eyesight on Caroline St\u2019s sidewalk
\n788. Childlike sensation that it was Christmas In April when a new graffiti in the Green Parrott men\u2019s room was found
\n903. A \u201cwe\u2019re not in Kansas anymore\u201d moment: overhearing Partridge Family\u2019s song I Think I Love You emanating from a local gym
\n1001. Received wisdom: do not eat the last “all-breeds” hotdog at the Chart Room
\n1030. Brief cognitive dissonance moment: hearing James Brown\u2019s It’s a man’s world wafting out of the Bourbon Street Bar
\n1255. The ceiling at Captain Tony\u2019s Saloon
\n1282. After being here over four years, I believe there is no more intelligent and entertaining life anywhere else in the universe
\n1301. Mad(e) in Key West is not a misspelling
\n1418. While no one can give me a good reason to convince me that I am not in Mexico right now, yet why can\u2019t I find a good burrito
\n1464. Helping a neighbor encrypt her laptop\u2019s WIFI so her Skype-sexing sessions with another neighbor overseas would cease being publically available
\n1500. Observing yoga on the beach
\n1505. Escape tunnels are impractical
\n1573. Thankful that the Cold War was cold
\n1600. Chicks with tight buns — okay, some of them are not chicks
\n1627. Spring breaker hangover rush at two PM to local bodegas for native cures like a double buchi
\n1799. Cold toilet seat season does not exist here
\n1812. Impromptu collages atop bar bathroom floors could be considered modern art
\n1841. From my perch on the front porch of Vino\u2019s, watching visiting drunk hetero males hitting on the 801 Bourbon Street Bar transvestites & being convulsed by the conclusion that their chances of getting a piece of ass is about as likely as their riding a unicorn
\n1881. The mildly perverted or slightly insane need not apply for Conch Republic citizenship
\n1889. The day I gave away my windshield ice scraper and driveway snow shovel collections
\n1911. Michael McCloud\u2019s Conch Republic national anthem
\n1914. It is the perfect spot to observe the (choose one: global warming, world financial collapse, American electoral college, European and Chinese real estate implosion, war of terrorism) apocalypse
\n1915. Tropic Cinema
\n1918. The Cat Man act at Mallory Square
\n1929. Randomly sifting through moving boxes of stuff I have not touched in decades and trying to figure out where it came from
\n1955. The revolution started without me – I did not get the memo
\n2011. Late night bar closing parades on upper Duval Street are like dress rehearsals for Michael Jackson\u2019s Thriller music video
\n2013. Air conditioning
\n2112. Given the dysfunctional mainland world, this is the new Camp Normal
\n2189. Stories of our grandchildren explaining to their Catholic elementary school classes in northern Indiana the suggestively named treats they ate and saw served at our island\u2019s dessert-only Better than Sex restaurant
\n2244. My eyesight loss rate arrested\/slowed
\n2393. Occupy Key West \u2013 WTFO? We were here first
\n2423. Halloween costumes may be worn year round
\n2447. The expression “What up, my bitches?” is considered acceptable in many island social circles
\n2472. Cocktails: key lime pie martinis at the White Tarpon; Courvoisier and a stogie at Berlin’s; mojitos at La Te Da
\n2489. The fifty yard advanced warning of a working woman’s arrival on your block of Duval by her bathing in a perfume that has bits of Amazon panther organs in it; absolutely guaranteed to turn heads to catch a glimpse of what is coming
\n2500. The non-celebration ICW the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” We never had a DADT, so its repeal didn’t mean crap
\n2573. US 1’s 17 mile stretch (MM 107 \u2013 124) – proof of black holes for transportation purposes between worlds & dimensions
\n2874. Duncan Donuts is back in town after a four year long absence.<\/p>\n

\"1-070116-LIT\"
\nThe \u201cladies\u201d of the Bourbon St Bar<\/p>\n

\"2-070116-LIT\"
\nDuval Street late night
\n\"3-070116-LIT\"
\nTwo Southernmost Santas
\n\"4-070116-LIT\"
\nMallory Square bathroom wall over the sink, where a mirror would normally have hung
\n\"5-070116-LIT\"
\n\"6-070116-LIT\"<\/p>\n

Various photos from 2008 through 2010 of the colorful waters along the lower Florida Keys<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2011\/2016 From My Isle Seat<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Life and Island Times July 1 2016 \u2013 Why Marlow Loves Key West For many years during his current coral island sojourn, Marlow wrote down every day the reasons why he was thankful to live in Key West. By the 2012 holiday season he compiled from the thousands of random thoughts a \u201cbest of list.\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-island-times"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13340","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13340"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13340\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13348,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13340\/revisions\/13348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}