Cee’s Fun Foto: One More Yellow

Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge and Daily Post Weekly Photo Challenge: Nighttime

Ocean City, NJ. Night glow. iPhone pic.

You can find my other “yellow” pics here: Cee’s Fun Foto: yellow

Cee’s Fun Foto: Town with a Sense of Humor

Cee’s Fun Foto: Contrasting Colors

Ocean City, NJ is a town with a sense of humor. It invited artists to fancy up those dull green, obnoxious, electrical boxes around town. Have a look:

The Daily Post Photo Challenge: Zigzag at the Beach

The Daily Post Photo Challenge: Zigzag

Zigzag: This week, share a photo that foregoes the straightforward in favor of the twisting and winding.

Zigzag fences at Ocean City, NJ protect the new straight-row beach grass plantings.

 

Zigzag trench brings water from ocean to castle as the tide comes in.

Making licorice salt water taffy at Ocean City, NJ (zigzag)

Silent Sunday at the OC Beach

 

Ocean City, NJ beach

***
Janice Hall Heck, retired educator, blogger, wannabe photographer, and nitpicky editor of On the Horizon, a bi-monthly community newsletter for Horizons at Woods Landing, Mays Landing, NJ, is quite possibly a grammar geek.

Oh Heck! Another Writing Quirk, a regular feature on this blog, suggests ways to improve our writing by avoiding and/or eliminating troublesome bug-a-boos that cramp our writing style.

=<^;^>=

 

 

Ailsa’s Weekly Travel Theme: Close-ups at the Beach

Ailsa’s Weekly Travel Theme: Close-ups

I took my backpack and camera up on the Ocean City boardwalk on a cold, windy day in late April. Here is what I found…

Stones along the boardwalk…

 

A support piling for a retaining wall…

 

Boardwalk planks…with my toes…

***
Janice Hall Heck, retired educator, blogger, wannabe photographer, and nitpicky editor of On the Horizon, a bi-monthly community newsletter for Horizons at Woods Landing, Mays Landing, NJ, is quite possibly a grammar geek.

Oh Heck! Another Writing Quirk, a regular feature on this blog, suggests ways to improve our writing by avoiding and/or eliminating troublesome bug-a-boos that cramp our writing style.

 

 

NaBloPoMo 29. #WANAFriday. Clips and Coin (2008)

The WANAFriday prompt for this week comes from Tami Clayton.  Tami can usually be found Taking Tea in the Kasbah.

Tami Clayton

The #wanafriday blog prompt for November 29, 2013 is: Dig through your bag, couch cushions, backpack, man purse, satchel, or scan the floor of your car for the first coin you find. Look at the year printed on it and then write about what you were doing that year.

…

On my desk sits a small Pyrex dish with a collection of coins and clips.

Look. Right there on top. A shiny 2008 Oklahoma quarter. 2008. Five years ago. If my memory serves me correctly, in 2008 I was…well, I’d better check my picture files and see what I find there. They will jog my memory.

1. Family reunion in South Carolina

My brother Bill and sister-in-law Patty live near Charleston, South Carolina, and that seemed to be a good spot for our Kroey Krewe to gather for a reunion. Siblings came from New Jersey, Texas, Florida, and California.

We enjoyed visiting various Low County plantations, salt marshes, and tidal creeks and imagined ourselves in novels set in the area.

2.  Reunion with friends in Florida.

I met up with two very special friends in Florida, Kit and Ruth, from my days of working at Hong Kong International School. In just a few days together, we caught up on all the news and formed some new memories.

We had fun on an airboat looking for wildlife in the Everglades. We were not disappointed. This fearsome fellow gave us the evil eye, warning us to get out of his territory, but he soon tired and swam away.

3. Family Time in Ocean City, NJ

Of course, we had beach and boardwalk fun at Ocean City, NJ. Cuzzies from far corners of the US got a chance to meet and play. You never know who will become a mermaid or dragon at the beach. This time it was Mandy’s friend, Hakeem who became the mermaid. Sorry about that, Hakeem.

4. Dining Out at Home

 Back at home, we dined at the local Atlantic County Community College’s Academy of Culinary Arts with our neighborhood friends from time to time. The students in the culinary program cooked, served, and chatted with us over delicious multi-course buffet dinners at the school sponsored restaurant, Careme’s. We go to Careme’s several times a year and always enjoy the exceptional food, the restaurant atmosphere, and the congenial students.

The students at the culinary school gather in the student-run restaurant, Careme’s, for cheers from the dining room guests.

5. Trips to Florida.

On one of many annual trips to Florida to visit family and friends, Ken and I couldn’t pass up this photo op near Port St. Lucie on the east coast. Other times we visited North For Myers to visit Ken’s sister.

All in all, I remember 2008 as being a happy year, with good times shared with good friends and family.

Look here for another WANAFriday Writer and her coin year:

Ellen V. Gregory, My 1988

What was your best year?

 

Jersey Shore Towns Reopen and Welcome Visitors

The terrible devastation ($38 billion in damages) of many New Jersey shore towns caused by Hurricane Sandy (October, 2012) required enormous clean-up and reconstruction projects in a relatively short period of time. Now, seven months later, these resilient NJ shore towns welcome tourists back to the beaches, ocean, boardwalks, and their communities.

President Obama visited the New Jersey shore on May 28, 2013 to check on the rebuilding progress. He walked with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie on the Asbury Park boardwalk and spoke to the crowds gathered there to see him. School children lined the route of President Obama’s motorcade. President Obama noted the enormous work that had been completed, but he acknowledged that repair work needed to continue before recovery would be complete.

New York Daily News photo

USA Today photo

The next post reviews the hurricane situation, showing how one community, Margate, NJ, prepares to meet the challenge of revitalizing storm damaged homes still in need of repair.

N is for Nora’s Ark: In Times of Trouble People Help People (Hurricane Sandy)

Hurricane Sandy makes an abrupt left turn and heads directly to New Jersey coast.

Ocean City, NJ is my favorite beach town and I have written about it before:

O is for Ocean City, NJ 2012/04/18

Saturday Silliness – Basset Hound Doo Dah Parade  2012/08/04

Always the bridesmaid, never the bride

Bike MS-Video-City-to-Shore Success 2012/09/30

Bikers walk their bikes to the staging area after completing the race

Bike MS City-to-Shore 2012/09/30

Breanna enthusiastically marches around the area carrying a sign with the positive news that a cure for MS is in sight. Children can learn the value and positive benefits of volunteering at an early age.

Relay for Life (Cancer) 2012/06/25

Relay for Life opening parade

P is for Parade, Pies, Paint–Doo Dah Parade, 2013 2013/04/18

I. Will. Not. Go. One. More. Step. And. You. Can’t. Make. Me.

O is for Ocean City, NJ: Pizza, Saltwater Taffy, Frozen Custard, Caramel Popcorn  2013/04/17

Eating ice cream on the Ocean City Boardwalk with my grandchildren and their cousins.

A Cat, A Crab, and a Sunny Day 2013/05/09

Photo credit: David Nahan, Ocean City Sentinel

The Last Meow

Good idea. Time for the beach. Let’s go!

Meow for now.  =<^;^>=

A Cat, A Crab, and a Sunny Day (Blog Every Day in May Challenge)

Day 9. Prompt: A moment in your day

It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood! I walk outside for my moment, and I want to sing the song made famous by Mr. Rogers. You can listen to it here.  It brings back lots of memories.

This kind of day I call, “The Cat’s Meow.” It couldn’t be more perfect. Here’s one of my little friends soaking up the sun.

After weeks of cool and rainy weather, we are excited to have this perfectly lovely sunny day.

Further good news is that our local crustacean clairvoyant, hermit crab Mr. Martin Z. Mollusk, saw his shadow on the beach, Thursday, May 2. This means that summer will arrive one week early in that slightly wonky beach town, Ocean City, NJ.

Illustration credit: eaglestaleonline.com

Don’t laugh. This is a big deal. The Ocean City Sentinel did a half-page, six-column, six-captioned-photo article on this annual event. (The newsroom was a little slow last week.)

The Ocean City High School Band came out and played “Pomp and Circumstance,” while a whole host of critters and creatures (Shelly the Mermaid, Dr. Ernest Frankestein, Mr. Trash Buster, Mama Llama, Nurse Perfect, and others) paraded down the beach to the shadow-checking ceremony. You can peek at the whole crabby ceremony here.

Photo credit: David Nahan, Ocean City Sentinel

Listen, when you live in a small, coastal town in Southern New Jersey, you do anything you can to lighten things up after a dreary winter. And why predict the weather in the coldest part of the winter like that Pennsylvania Puxtapuny groundhog guy (or whatever his name is).  By the way,  the word “winter” is not in the Ocean City Chamber of Commerce vocabulary bank. They say that summer unofficially arrives on January 1. But what do they know? I think they are just in denial.

This Martin Z. Mollusk shadow-checking ceremony is all serious business. Dr. Frankenstein took great care to determine Martin’s fitness for beach duty and declared that Martin was healthy and free of illegal sea-roids.

Photo credit. nbc40.net

Now, seriously, don’t you want to visit Ocean City, NJ and take part in these shenanigans history-making events?

And don’t forget. In early August every year, you can participate in the Miss Crustacean Hermit Crab Pageant. Rumor has it that a representative of the Krabdashian family attended the bash last year. A big feature of this annual pageant is the Hermit Crab King of Klutz Race.  Better make your reservations now for this event.  Well, I bet it will even rival the Miss American Pageant when it returns home to Atlantic City this September.

Photo credit: Travel Times Magazine

The Last Meow

Oh, so what’s the big deal over there on the beach?
A hermit crab that predicts an early summer?
Give me a break. I coulda told ya that.
I have supernatural powers, too, ya know.

Meow for now.  =(^;^)=

P is for Parade, Pies, Paint–Ocean City Doo Dah Parade, 2013

Day 14 in the A to Z Challenge: P-Day

Parade, Pies, and Paint

I missed the Ocean City Doo Dah Parade this year because we were painting in our church in Margate, NJ, getting reading for volunteer groups coming to help repair Superstorm Sandy damage.

Ocean City had damage, too, like many other coastal towns, but volunteers have helped here, too, and life is returning to normal. To prove that, The 2013 Doo Dah Parade went on as scheduled. Here is a video clip of all the silliness that went on. The shaving cream pies were a big hit.

See my post from 2012 for pictures of a Doo Dah Parade.  Saturday Silliness: Basset Hound Doo Dah Parade 2012/08/04.

Here are more Ocean City stories from 2012.

Enjoy.

The Last Meow

By the way, don’t ever dress up us kitties like this. It is beneath our dignity. Save it for the dogs. They don’t have enough sense to care!

Hey. WooHoo. Lookee. I can see the weekend from here. WooHoo, WooHoo.

Meow for now. =<^y^>=

MS Video-2012 City to Shore-Success

Check out this video made by Kathy Gilbert of Team Deloitte of the MS Bike-City to Shore ride in southern New Jersey. Over 7000 bikers participated with more than 1000 volunteers providing support (drinks, food, encouragement) at the rest stops and final destination, Ocean City, NJ. Almost $5,000.000 has been raised to support MS research.

With efforts like these, MS will become a thing of the past. Thanks to all who participated: bikers, volunteers, organizers, donors. vendors. Every bit counts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ANxw0R7F2k&feature=youtu.be

You can find more videos from other MS rides all around the country on YouTube.