Running in the Keys

So far, my running route has been to go around the Old Town of Key West. This puts me in direct contention with mobs of tourists sometimes, as well as in the path of cars, trucks, bicycles, motor scooters, rickshaws, etc and past the Southernmost point of the continental U.S. Its fun to wake up in the morning and see the busiest areas getting ready for another day. I’m staying in the middle of the map, at the intersection of Virginia and Margeret. The route is a little longer than 3 miles.

Bull has printed out a spreadsheet itinerary that has kept me running as well. The list of places I have eaten at so far includes the great Cuban restaurant El Siboney (had a pork sandwich, tostones and 2 fried eggs,) Kyushu Sushi (excellent sushi with extra treats from the chef), the Conch Farm (conch fritters with mustard sauce, a dozen oysters), and the Upper Crust Key West (right next to American Apparel, just like in Harvard Square.)

Yesterday I chilled out by myself at the beach and then wandered into the Key West Garden Club. It was originally a Civil War era fort built by the Union. An entry way was crafted into a 150 year old tree trunk and it leads to a shaded room where many, many orchids are hanging in the humid air. Orchids have been placed on trees throughout as well. It was awesome to see so many in a natural, outdoor environment. I thought of my orchid Mothra, home alone in the basement. Its the last days of Sculpture Key West, and I got to see some neat art in the Garden Club as well.

Each night I follow Bull around to his bar haunts. Yesterday we had drinks with his neighbors at Louie’s Backyard while the sun set, then moved on to Sloppy Joe’s. Today we took the motor scooters out and saw a tropical matinee of “Adventureland,” then cruised over to Florida’s oldest bar, the Green Parrot. This evening we saw the very talented Raven Cooper play at the Bottle Cap. This woman was singing in Spanish and English and tearing it up. Bull reached his T&T limit so we made power moves to Dion’s gas station, for the best fried chicken on the island.

The fried chicken needed to cook another ten minutes and Bull was impatient. He kept yelling at the cook, “We could use some FUCKING FRIED CHICKEN over here!” Over and over. I began to get a little anxious. The man at the cash register was not amused and threatened to call the cops. Some customers got scared and left. One customer, a red-eyed drunk older gentleman, churlishly told me how fifteen minutes was too long to cook fried chicken; how a former cook only fried it for twelve minutes, and yeah maybe that was illegal, but it was delicious.

There are a lot of old hippies down here. Bull and I briefly spectated a hundred person bocce ball tournament this afternoon and just about everyone was drinking, pony-tailed and named Ron. At an ocean-side bar, caught up in the moment (and a dozen oysters) I even requested a Jimmy Buffet song from two acoustic guitarists, a man and woman. The song I requested was “Volcano,” but they cleverly twisted the lyrics into, “I don’t know where I’m a gonna go when the hurricane blow.” They got a woman from the bar to join in on tambourine; I talked to her later and she is the manager at Chris Schlesinger’s gym.

Its a crazy world and we are one human family.

The Sculpture Key West brochure describes the above statue, “Between Space,” by Jamey Grimes with the following paragraph: Jamey Grimes’ work uses a utilitarian material commonly found in political or real estate signs to express a love of natural forms and experiences. He seeks to juxtapose the synthetic manmade material with the biomorphic or cloudlike forms. Light becomes extremely important as these pieces move from the gallery to the outdoors.