Meandering in Manatee County

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My younger sister and her husband spent much of this past week with us.  Visiting from North Carolina, they were happy to trade bone-chilling temperatures for sunshine, warmth, and even time at the swimming pool. We focused several of our outings on Bradenton and the surrounding area.

THE BISHOP MUSEUM OF SCIENCE AND NATURE

A and P hadn’t been at The Bishop for several years.  The Mosaic Backyard Universe was a new addition.  Although this area with its tree house, science hut, and rocket ship is geared toward young children, it’s a fun area for adults to explore as well.  We sampled some of the short videos in the rocket, tried out several different types of blocks and building materials and climbed to the treehouse overlook.  

Spending time viewing the manatees was an essential for this visit. Three manatees are currently in residence being rehabilitated before being released to the wild.  These funny looking blimpy mammals are soothing to watch as they float gently around their pool, periodically surfacing for air and lettuce leaves.  

We also wandered upstairs to browse in a fascinating exhibit about early days in Florida, the contributions of the Seminole Indians, and the role of the Bradenton River in Bradenton commerce and settlement.  The museum currently has an outdoor exhibit of robotic dinosaurs, Dinoventure, which is bound to appeal to kids and even some adults.  The dino exhibit is an extra charge and will remain until mid-March. If you haven’t visited this museum in a while or ever, it’s worth going—with or without children!

BRADENTON RIVERWALK

Catching the rays on the Riverwalk beach

I confess that the Chief Penguin and I had never been on the Bradenton Riverwalk even though it’s been open for some years.  Its boardwalk is accessible across the street from The Bishop and winds along the Manatee River for more than a mile.  We walked from the museum almost to the end.  Along the way there is a fishing pier, splash pad, skate park, spot for beach volleyball, and some whimsical concrete chaises on a small sandy beach.  Before lunch there were few people out, but when we walked back afterwards, the walk was much busier.  It was a different experience with lots to see.

EATING 

For lunch, we made our first visit to Mattison’s Riverwalk Grille conveniently located set back from the river.  The restaurant is covered outside seating with heaters for cold days.  There’s a wide variety of soups, salads, burgers, and more substantial entrees on the menu.  Two of us tucked into the half sandwich of the day (tuna melt) with either a cup of mushroom soup or a salad (Caesar for me). The others tried the fish tacos, artichokes Esther-Style, and fried green tomatoes.  Our server was a friendly young man, and it was the perfect meal for the occasion.  Wine and beer are available and there is live music on certain days.  At the other end of the Riverwalk, also with outside seating, is the Pier 22 restaurant.  

PERICO PRESERVE

Section of scrub with jet trails overhead

On a lovely sunny morning, we made our way to Perico Preserve.  Those of us who live in Manatee County are fortunate to be able to choose from among 12 nature preserves, all with trails for walking and some biking. Perico Preserve was created from farmland and has been transformed to include wetlands and scrub along with blinds for better bird watching overlooking the bay.  It’s not far from Robinson Preserve and one of the trails we didn’t take connects to it.  

Unlike other local preserves, Perico does not allow any dogs, and bicycles are limited to just certain parts of the trail.  It’s a very quiet spot, only a few other people were around, and we enjoyed being in nature here.  For my sister and brother-in-law, active birders, it was a chance to see a variety of songbirds as well as ibises, egrets, and blue herons.  

Note: Header photo was taken at Perico Preserve. All photos ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved).

Tidy Tidbits: Inside Diversions

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WATCHING—COMEDY, ADVENTURE, CRIME

Don’t Look Up (Netflix)

DiCaprio stocking up for a special dinner. (thewrap.com)

Don’t Look Up is both a funny film and a sobering one.  When a comet is on the horizon that will destroy the earth, the hapless president dithers and does little.  The scientists who have plotted its course are ignored and ridiculed.  The film is both a spoof and a satire targeting politicians, egocentric celebrities, and huckster entrepreneurs hawking worthless devices.  But despite its comic moments, it is a doomsday story.  

There’s an all-star cast with Leonardo DiCaprio as the lead scientist, Meryl Streep marvelously inept as the U.S. president, and Mark Rylance almost unbelievable as the tech giant, along with Jennifer Lawrence and Cate Blanchett.  It’s definitely a change of pace from some other recent film offerings.

Around the World in 80 Days (PBS Masterpiece)

Phileas Fogg and his companions (hollywoodreporter.com)

I saw the original film of Jules Verne’s adventure tale when I was about 8 years old.  It was one of the first movies I saw in the theater and going to see it was special.  

This new version of Around the World in 80 Days has a more diverse cast with a young woman, Miss Fix, as the accompanying reporter, and a Black man playing Passepartout, Phileas Fogg’s so-called valet.  They are an oddly mismatched lot with diverging aims, but they end up depending on one another for their wellbeing as they encounter riots, marauders, and collapsed bridges.

We are about halfway through the series and enjoying it.  David Tennant with his serious mien and upright, almost stiff bearing, makes the perfect Phileas.  There are 8 episodes in all.

The Commander (Amazon Prime)

Commander Clare Blake (hollywoodsoapbox.com)

This British crime drama is older (set in early 2000’s) and the technical quality is not that great, but it is diverting and suspenseful entertainment.  The series was developed by Lynda La Plante, author of crime novels and creator of Prime Suspect. Each case unfolds over two episodes and there are four seasons in all.

Amanda Burton plays Clare Blake, a high-ranking female commander in London overseeing a group of detectives.  The cases, usually involving murder, are gruesome and challenging. As a woman, Clare faces disrespect and outright hostility from some of the male officers on her team.  She makes some foolish errors of judgement in the early cases but learns from them and becomes smarter. 

Fans of Downton Abbey will be surprised to see a younger Hugh Bonneville as James Lampton, convicted for murder, and just released from prison.  

READING—WOMEN’S RIGHTS

Leaving Coy’s Hill by Katherine A. Sherbrooke

Lucy Stone (bostonathenaeum.org)

When the first history of the 19th century women’s rights movement was written by some of the principals, Lucy Stone got short shrift.  Consequently, for some time her contributions were overlooked.  Thirty years after her death, her daughter wrote a biography and recently, several others have been published.

Katherine Sherbrooke’s novel, Leaving Coy’s Hill, employs the device of Stone looking back over her life and telling her story to a much younger colleague.  Lucy Stone grew up on a farm in Massachusetts, the daughter of a staunch abolitionist father.  Early on, she vowed never to wed and to devote herself to the anti-slavery cause.  Working as a teacher, she saved enough money to go to college at Oberlin, one of the few institutions open to women.  After college, she began traveling around the states giving speeches against slavery.  It was hard life of little pay, spare accommodations, and no companions.  But Stone was a gifted orator and driven to succeed.  

Fortuitously, she became friends with Elizabeth Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. Although their approaches differed, the three championed women’s rights—the right to vote and changes to the laws governing marriage and property.  Stanton was already married with many children when she became active, Anthony never married, and ultimately, Lucy Stone did.  

Sherbrooke’s novel details Stone’s career successes and imagines the conflicts and challenges she faced in her marriage to Henry Blackwell, brother of doctors Elizabeth and Emily.  

Lucy attempts to balance love and a child with demanding career objectives, still an issue today.  I thoroughly enjoyed this historical novel, and it fleshed out for me additional aspects of the women’s rights movement.  Recommended!  (~JWFarrington)

Tidy Tidbits: Feeding the Mind

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LIFELONG LEARNING ONLINE

This season we again subscribed to the two Sarasota Institute of Lifetime Learning (SILL) series, Music Mondays, and Global Affairs.  We have in person tickets, but also the ability to watch the presentations online after the event.  So far, we have not felt comfortable going physically and sitting in a church sanctuary for an hour and a half midst a large crowd. It takes more discipline to set a time in the daily schedule to watch, but I’m happy to report that we have now viewed two programs. Both were excellent.  

Music Monday showcased two cellists, husband and wife Emilio and Cara Colon, who reside in Indiana, but are the founders of and forces behind the International Chamber Orchestra of Puerto Rico.  Emilio is from Puerto Rico. Together, the Colons strive to offer musical experiences and opportunities to students on that island in a variety of ways including an annual chamber music festival.   A charming pair, they played solo pieces as well as a couple duets.  The streaming version of this event was a high-quality production with great sound. 

The Global Issues program, Pandemics from “What If” to “What Now?” featured Dr. John Sinnott, Chairman of Internal Medicine at the University of South Florida.  He presented remotely. It was the best discussion of pandemics through the ages and the particularities of Covid-19 and how it’s transmitted in the body I’ve seen, heard, or read!  A scientifically based, well-articulated lecture with graphs and charts.  Dr. Sinnott has a You Tube channel, and there you will find several different programs including this brief intro.

MAINE ON THE PAGE

The Northern Reach by W. S. Winslow

(wswinslow.com)

The Northern Reach is a very accomplished first novel set in Maine.  Author Winslow spent a career in communications and marketing and has Maine roots.  Like Elizabeth Strout, she mines her deep familiarity with that state and its people in a series of interconnected chapters.  They are almost standalone short stories, but each one features one subset of a generation of one of four different families.  Ranging from 1904 to the 1920’s to the 1940’s and up to 2017, marriages, deaths, divorces, and disagreements mark these lives.  One family, the Baineses, are quite well off; the others fall between middle class and downright poor.  Overall, it’s a society built on tradition and loyalty to family but made messy with greed, envy, and competition.  

The writing is vivid and the details telling.  My only quibble is that with each chapter set in a different timeframe and with a different set of individuals, recalling the interrelationships between various generations can be tricky. 

My favorite chapter, Smoke Signals in the Aftertime, is about Alice Culligan’s death and the aftermath.  She was ready to die and let go.  She does die, but she remains cognizant of the world around her.  She hears her children discussing her, and not always in pleasant terms, and learns that events she thought she’d kept secret were well known to them.  (~JWFarrington)

“The minutes ticked on, and Alice listened as her children shared stories and swapped reminiscences so that, one finger at a time, they let her go, and as they did, the smoky fetters loosened and untangled themselves.  Alice lingered just long enough to gather up all the things she should have known, blended with it, became it, wafting, whisper, wisp, gone.”

COUNTRY VETS ON THE SCREEN

If you’re looking for something to watch to take your mind off Covid or whatever, this series set in a simpler time is mostly feel-good fare.

All Creatures Great and Small (Season 2, PBS)

James, Helen, Tristan (themes.co.uk)

Years ago, I read several of veterinarian James Herriot’s books and then watched the first TV production of All Creatures Great and Small.  It was enjoyable, homey, and low key.  Initially, I thought watching an updated version of it would be just so-so.  To my surprise and delight, I enjoyed the latest iteration a lot and was then thoroughly captivated by Season 2.  

James is charming and unsophisticated, Tristan is devil-may-care, and his older brother Siegfried, whose practice they have joined, is nothing if not definite.  He has strong opinions and tries to micro-manage his colleagues.  In this version, Mrs. Hall, the housekeeper is a key character with a bigger role, while farmer’s daughter Helen, aka James’ squeeze, is a woman of determination and dedication.  Season 2 contains seven episodes and is good escapism.

Note: Header drawing of an open head sprouting flowers is from feedingtampabay.org

Tidy Tidbits: Motherhood on Page & Screen

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READING

Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell

O’Farrell (irishtimes.com)

In Hamnet, O’Farrell has created the world of William Shakespeare’s son, Hamnet, at the time of the bubonic plague.  While 11-year-old Hamnet is present in the early chapters, he haunts the remainder of the novel after his death.  In many ways, the novel is a story of motherhood, marriage, and grief with a focus on the mother.  Agnes, Hamnet’s mother, is a creature of the woods, a skilled herbalist, yet unconventional and socially inept.  She chafes under her mother-in-law’s strictures, misses her husband whom she sent to London to get him away from his abusive father, and mightily grieves for her son, seeking and seeing him everywhere.  

The descriptions of the environs are so graphic one can easily picture town life in Stratford and life on the farm where Agnes grew up.  O’Farrell lists, annotates, categorizes, and catalogs the implements of home life and the branches, leaves and blossoms in the wood; at times, the writing is staccato-like.  It’s a beautifully written book about a horrible pandemic—timely and richly deserving of its several literary awards.  Highly recommended! (~JWFarrington)

WATCHING

The Lost Daughter (Netflix)

Colman as Leda (polygon.com)

I am not familiar with the novel by Elena Ferrante that inspired The Lost Daughter, but I’m a big admirer of Oliva Colman and would see her in almost anything.  Here, she is a comparative literature professor on a beach vacation in Greece.  Leda is alone and prepared to work, but she becomes fixated on watching a young mother, Nina, and Elena, her little girl, romp and play on the shore.  Leda exchanges brief pleasantries with Nina and her aunt and interacts with Lyle, the apartment caretaker, and Will, an engaging college student.  In flashbacks, she begins reflecting on her own experiences decades ago as an ambitious academic with two young daughters and a busy husband.  As she said to Nina earlier, “motherhood is a crushing responsibility.”

When Nina’s daughter goes missing, the extended family and friends fan out to search for her.  Leda finds Elena with her doll.  What happens afterward is puzzling and strange with an even stranger, more mystifying ending.  I wondered whether Leda was truly unbalanced and what state we find her in in the last scene.  

It’s a slowly paced film with sparse dialogue, yet the camera lingers on the physical:  limbs, breasts, and bodies. Colman is superb as 48-year old Leda while Jessie Buckley is marvelous as Leda, the young mother. The depiction of motherhood is both joyous and wrenching with greater emphasis on the demands of being a mother.  Painful to watch at points, this may be film fare for a more selective audience. (~JWFarrington)

DINING 

Whitney’s

Located on the northern end of Longboat Key, Whitney’s is a former gas station turned into a casual restaurant.  Seating includes tables on the gravel outside as well as booths and tables inside.  Open for lunch and dinner on a first come, first-served basis, it’s a welcome addition to the LBK dining options. 

A friend and I ate at a small round table outside.  Our waitress was friendly in the nicest way, and we enjoyed shrimp Louie and the mixed greens salad with tiny cubes of manchego and a choice of dressing and protein.  I opted for the salad with champagne vinaigrette and grilled shrimp.  Both dishes were excellent.  Whitney’s also serves burgers, fish tacos, crab cakes, tuna tartare, and other fish entrees.  Wine and beer are also available.  Several days a week there is live music, so you might want to plan accordingly.  

Note: Header drawing of a harried mother is from Time Magazine (time.com).