Prince Edward Island...Look Out Anne!

It's only a matter of time until I don a set of red pig tails and have my picture taken, I just know it. I'm on Anne's island, but not on her case, at least not yet. I just arrived last night and I haven't had any opportunity to absorb the local culture, or do any meaningful photography.

I'm staying at the Stanley Bridge Resort and Spa. It's a spa because they have a hot tub, though I haven't found it yet. I like public hot tubs because, when I'm in them, I feel like I'm a tanned carrot in a boiling pot of vegetable stranger soup. Most people in the pot are potatoes or parsnips, though once in a while a turnip will turn up. Most people look like beets when they leave. I'm always nervous when parents bring their kids into the tub, in case they have a leek or two.

I once came up with an idea for a book that would turn Prince Edward Island on its ear. Its title... Annie of Groin Fables. It would be about an aged cherry-headed prostitute living and working along the desperate docks of Wood Islands. Wood Islands is the last remaining port where a mainland ferry docks on Prince Edward Island. There are daily passages between spruce-coved Caribou, Nova Scotia and spud-laden PEI. I'd highly recommend the trip, just be on the lookout for a one woman welcome wagon called Annie.

Of course I'd never write a book about the seedy underbelly of PEI tourism...I like PEI too much and I respect the legend of Anne and Loosely Bawd Montgomery. But, my god, I could make a fortune in t-shirt sales and ice cream. Two scoops anyone?

I'm going to make it my mission to explore the oyland. They don't say island here, they say 'oy-land', not a Jewish reference because everyone knows the Japanese own this place. It's strictly a phoneticism.

I'm going to do my best to stay on the hundred mile diet while on vacation.

Vacation...from what? Since when does a leisurologist need a vacation?

I'll be eating potatoes, fish and rotation crops (barley, rye, wheat and alfalfa if I'm lucky). Last night I had fish cakes and baked beans, a reasonable hundred mile compromise given my options. I washed it down with some of PEI's Rossignol wine. I had the wine in my hotel room, after supper, since I'm too Scottish to pay $35 for a bottle in a restaurant. I drank it from a tumbler, since my spa didn't provide wine glasses in the room. Wine tastes differently when it's enjoyed from a glass...I think that I might do that more often. Wendy says that I shouldn't drink wine straight from the bottle, though it's hard to break old habits established twenty seven years ago at Agricultural College. At least it's wine now, and not rum.

Now I'm off to explore PEI! Look out Anne!!