Day 81 of the Journey (Shabbat) -Panama City Beach, FL

First, the good news... the carpet is completely dry now.  Looks like we came out of this unscathed.  Definitely counting our blessings! Below are some photos of the equipment that took up our living space:

The humidifier - in the doorway

One of the 2 fans

All 3 in the living room

It was extremely LOUD and the machines generated a lot of heat.  We mostly stayed in the bedroom with our newly fixed door closed where it was quiet and cool.  Hopefully the equipment will be removed tomorrow and we can get back to normal, whatever that is.

As for the rest of the day... we have been very hungry for a shul (synagogue) to go to.  We used to go almost every week for the past few decades, but haven't gone to services since we left NJ - mostly because there was nothing in the areas we were staying in, or due to my immobility.  We searched the internet for something in this area, and came up empty handed.  A few days ago, Mitch saw a sign for what sounded like a shul, just a few miles down the road.  It was kind of a hole in the wall place.  I looked up that name online, found some contact details and learned that they do indeed have services!   In general, we don't like to drive on the Sabbath (it's forbidden), but in this lifestyle, we need to make exceptions.  It gets lonely not to have a community to share the sabbath with, so we decided that if there's nowhere within walking distance, but within a reasonable driving distance, we'll drive there.  So we did today.

It was unfortunately not very much to my liking.  It is a sephardic synagogue.  For those who don't know, there are 2 main cultural streams of Judaism: sephardic and ashkenazi.  The former has roots in the Middle East, and the latter has roots in Eastern Europe.  Although beliefs are the same, the traditions and practices are somewhat different.  In this community, all of the congregants were Israeli.  Except for 1 or 2 times, they did not make much of an effort to converse in English, so I felt like a stranger in a strange land (at least the prayers are the same, although the tunes are different.  Glad I can read Hebrew, even though I can't speak it).  Still, it was nice to be with other Jews on Shabbat.  The only drawback is that services were 2 1/2 hours and I had a lot of trouble sitting and standing for any length of time.  I don't know how I'm going to handle the High Holiday services in 2 weeks.

When we returned home, we took a little nap and then went out to the pool with our magazines.  After a brief swim, dark clouds rolled in, as did the thunder, so we had to pack it up.  Spent the rest of the day reading and napping in the quiet, cool bedroom.

Tomorrow is the last day we can get anything major accomplished, as we hope to leave on Tuesday or Wednesday of this week.  I hope Mitch can finish working on wiring the antenna.  There's a lot of drilling he needs to do inside the cabinets so we don't have all these unsightly wires and cables sticking out.  I'm hoping to take the long brush and soap and try to wash the outside of the CoW.

Oh, and one last thing...  there was this huge bug inside the light fixture over the table.  From the shadow it was casting, it looked like a dragonfly.  Mitch couldn't get it because the bulbs were hot and it would have required turning the light off -- another thing we don't do on the sabbath.  He said to wait until the evening.  Well, now the thing is no longer in the light.  I have no clue where it went.  I hope it doesn't land on me in the middle of the night!  It's a big MF!