March 2025: Nashville Cats & Otter Adventures

The first part of March was a whirlwind.

It started out in The Villages, where I got to spend a few days with Marilyn–a family friend that my Papa met at a painting class some years ago.

(Thanks for putting me up for a few days, Marilyn!)

We caught up, visited some of the different clubhouses in her area (at least one of which is pretty much a museum with a ton of neat military stuff), and enjoyed some good pizza.

1 March 2025 Selfie with Marilyn at One of the Clubhouses in The Villages

From there, I headed to Tallahassee where I met up with Chris and Dan, friends of mine I hadn’t seen in 20 years.

It’s funny to me that I can say that I have friends I haven’t seen in 20 years.

20 years from now I’m going to read this and think of what a baby I still was writing this, I’m sure.

But in the meantime, it’s a novelty that I marvel at.

Anyway, it was really fun to catch up with them.

I was trying to get better at taking pictures of food and things, since I was so bad about it in January.

Chris and Dan were not only understanding about this, they introduced me to the phrase, “The camera eats first,” which I found funny and adopted (despite how incredibly silly it is) to make sure I actually take pictures of the stuff I’m blogging about.

(I hope you all appreciate how goofy I appear while trying to make these things look good enough to share them with you.)

One night they introduced me to Peruvian food at Café de Martín:

Ají de Gallina – A Peruvian Chili Dish

It’s difficult to explain what this tasted like. In short, it was comfort food.

(And it sounds like a Jedi Master, so it has that going for it, too.)

If you ever get a chance to try Ají de Gallina, I highly recommend it.

On a funnier note, if you know me at all you may know that [understatement] I’m not really a drinker [/understatement]–I’ll try just about anything, but after a sip or two I’m not usually inclined to have any more.

So, when Chris suggested that I try this “really gross” liqueur I couldn’t resist seeing what it was like.

Malört Served in a Cleveland Browns Shot Glass
(The joke was that both were equally sub-par.)

I braced myself for the worst.

And I didn’t find it as bad as it was cracked up to be.

You see, it tasted remarkably similar to albuterol sulfate, which I find not off-putting.

That said, why anyone would want to drink something that tastes like albuterol sulfate is somewhat beyond me.

Regardless, I was glad to have tried it to see what it was like.

(And to save you all the trouble, if you know what albuterol tastes like and aren’t inclined to drink it.)

Tallahassee Museum

While in town, I got to have a full tour of the Tallahassee Museum.

I met Tommy the tabby cat:

Had a deer named after me:

Frankie the Deer

Appreciated the car-part dinosaur sculptures:

And found a portal to Dagobah:

If you’re ever in Tallahassee, the museum is worth a stop.

Oh, and if you do go, please say, “Hi,” to Frankie the deer for me.

Alfred B. Maclay Gardens State Park

On a whim (and mostly for those of you following the blog–thank you for that, by the way, it gets me out more, hahaha), I decided to check out a state park while I was in Tallahassee.

I’m glad I did.

The plants were incredible.

There was an old house with some neat gardens and this very long decorative pool (or, I suppose it is technically a “pond” since I don’t think it’s there to be swam in):

Then, I had the unfortunate experience of failing to coordinate lodging for a few days between Tallahassee and my next gig in Nashville.

NOTE: For anyone wondering, I have since found a good place to stay in between for the next time.

So, I hiked it from Tallahassee to Cincinnati in one go.

Admittedly, that was a very long driving day.

It was also the first time I’d been North since the end of January, and it was COLD! 😂

It is a strange thing leaving Florida where your friends say, “Here is a grocery bag; please feel free to fill it with as many oranges from our tree as you’d like, since we have an abundance of them and fresh orange juice is amazing,” and then arriving in Northern Kentucky where it is snowing the very same day.

So, Northern Kentucky…

A local doughnut shop was doing bananas foster doughnuts, and I thought those might be worth checking out:

A peach-mango, galaxy, and couple of bananas foster doughnuts from Moonrise Doughnuts, which I will never get again because they apparently went out of business within weeks of this visit. 😅
…now I really wish I’d picked up the laptop sticker I’d been eyeing there…

Then it was on to Nashville.

(I visited a Buc-ee’s for the first time on my way down from Cincy to Nashville. It was an experience in middle-American opulence of the funniest kind. When I document that I’ll link it to the post here.)

Three Weeks in Suburban Nashville

I’d never been to Nashville.

It was nice.

Different.

People in Nashville actually go outside (😱), so no matter what time of the day I was taking a walk there seemed to be a lot of people around walking their dogs and/or out with their kids.

I got pancakes at a local diner pretty early on in my trip, which you can read about here:

Pancakes in Paradise

The place I was staying at had a river in the backyard, and the view was quite peaceful.

Here is what the sunset looked like (and, of course, cameras never do justice to how pretty sunsets really are):

It was probably around 70°F (21°C) most of the time, and I got outside in the neighborhood I was staying in for a lot of long walks.

Some walking highlights were the chives that looked like they came out of a Dr. Seuss book:

Whose are these chives? These are Whos’ chives. Whos have funny curlicue chives.

The tiniest snail (brick for scale):

And running into Mr. Bill while he was out mowing his lawn:

Oh, no!

Because it was Spring, I enjoyed the flowering trees, buds, and other Spring vegetation in abundance throughout the neighborhood:

Various Spring Plants in Nashville

One day when work was slow I decided to get out during the afternoon.

First of all, if you can swing it sometime, I highly recommend taking an afternoon off when most people are working.

You’ll see things you ordinarily wouldn’t.

It’s cool for a perspective change.

In my case, I enjoyed the midday sunshine and saw about 50 turtles (not all could fit in the picture below) out for an afternoon swim.

I’d never seen this many turtles all at once:

Speaking of perspective, I thought these two pictures side by side (in which the flowers are tiny and almost imperceptible in the lower-left corner in the first) offer a metaphor about how zooming out or in on something can make all the difference:

So, there you have it.

I didn’t stay in the neighborhood the whole time, ‘though.

I got out and tried a local ice cream joint where they made homemade fruit popsicles.

This kiwi one rivaled the melon ones you can get at some Korean restaurants:

I also went to Aldi and found these raspberry oranges that were blood-red inside and, in fact, tasted somewhat like raspberries:

But, I actually did spend most of my time in Nashville in the same neighborhood.

So, back to all that:

Something I like to do when I travel is check out the little libraries in the different neighborhoods I’m visiting.

If you’re not familiar with little libraries (I don’t know if people have these internationally), they are raised book boxes that people have in their front yards where you can swap a book of yours for one in the box, or drop off a book you no longer want.

I felt like I got the better end of the deal with this particular book swap:

I feel a little bad that I never ended up reading the Helen Keller one, but learning how to converse with extra-terrestrials and eject one’s self from a barrel-rolling fighter jet seemed more important…

If you have read it, you may recall that I had that blurb in my February blog post where I mentioned that lichen grows on everything down South.

My recreational basketball time lasted about an evening or two until the lawn guy took my getting-the-ball-down stick when he did the landscaping.

Flood Plans

So, something I didn’t realize signing up for this gig was that living on a river has its own…erm…uncertainties.

One night we were expecting a good amount of rain, and the owners of the home I was watching reached out to let me know that if the river overflowed too much I should reach out to the neighbors because they knew the flood plan.

I was there like, “Come again…the what?” 👀

Fortunately, I did not need to enact the flood plan, but apparently that is a thing one ought to have when living on the bank of a large river.

Here are some before-and-after pictures of what the river looked like normally versus flooded:

The following are from an area of the river down at a local park.

What the pictures don’t depict well is just how much water was there.

For one, the river bank was probably a good 15 – 20 feet high.

For another, the water entirely swallowed a set of steps leading down to where its height ordinarily was.

But, you know, it wasn’t exactly on my mind to get good angles for before-and-after shots ahead of time.

I was just glad my car didn’t end up washed out despite being up on a hilltop.

(Apparently something of that magnitude is rare but does happen approximately once every 10 years.)

Ferris Bailer’s Day Off

The last week I was in Nashville I realized I probably should get out and see the city, at least a little bit.

I decided that I’d prefer to go downtown on a weekday when it would be less busy.

A friend had told me about Hattie B’s, home of the original Nashville hot chicken sandwich.

I was also informed that said original home had a chicken so hot that it would melt your face off.

Naturally, I had to check that out.

So, the last Wednesday in March I drove downtown, parked in a metered space that was limited to 2 hours and was in front of a different Hattie B’s, and walked to the original location from there.

Here’s what it looked like from the outside:

Here’s what it looked like from the inside:

And here was my view after a large group of businessmen asked me if I’d be willing to sit somewhere else since they had a bunch of international people visiting for the day and would like to all sit together if possible:

This was the sandwich, and it was worth every bit of the pain.

The Hottest Chicken Sandwich at Hattie B’s
It was, indeed, insanity. 10/10 recommend.

Partially it was worth the pain just to say I’d had it.

Partially it was worth it because most of the businessmen at my erstwhile table were discussing how they weren’t brave enough to order this one.

Mind you, I didn’t tell them I was eating the hottest sandwich, but I did get a good laugh about it to myself while overhearing them discuss it.

But now I’d like to bring your attention back to my car at the 2-hour parking meter.

…to get to my car exactly on the minute of when the meter was about to be up.

In case you’re wondering, running on a full stomach of incredibly-spicy chicken is, in a word, no bueno.

I then went to the Nashville library, which is the first library I’ve ever been to with its own parking garage.

In this case, parking was free for the first 90 minutes and I didn’t have to run anywhere.

That was nice.

The next (and final) stop was to see the Parthenon.

Yes, there is a full-sized replica of the Parthenon in Nashville.

I had multiple friends tell me about this one, so I figured I should prioritize it.

Parking was free (and I didn’t see a time limit), and I used the parking money I saved to buy an Italian ice to try to curb some of the spicy that had now coated the top of my stomach during all the running.

(It didn’t help, but it was still nice on such a hot day.)

There was also a pond and some gardens there, so it was a picturesque place to walk around.

A Tree Eating the Side of an Artificial Pond in Nashville, TN

Despite planning the trip on a weekday to avoid crowds, I overlooked the fact that it was Spring Break week. So there were a lot of people around anyway.

Nonetheless, it was a good time and I went home satisfied at having gotten out a bit and learned enough to have a pretty good idea of what to expect if I ever get to be a tourist in Nashville again.

Other Stuff Worth Sharing

A Laugh

As I may have mentioned before, I spent a lot of time in the neighborhood of the house I was watching.

One day I saw a bit of sidewalk art that gave me a chuckle.

It’s an old joke, but I couldn’t help sharing it with you all here–with apologies to whoever did the art–it’s not intended as a laugh at anyone’s expense, per se, just that it struck me as particularly funny in this context:

The Fruits of the Spirit:
Love, Joy, Mercedes, Patience, Kindness, Goodness…

A Recipe

Kerm introduced me to this lovely concoction near the end of the month:

To make this, you layer fresh parmesan cheese on parchment paper.

Then you slice onions thinly and pat them dry.

Brush the onions with olive oil, and sprinkle on some salt and pepper to taste (a little garlic powder can be nice, too).

Bake at 425°F (218°C) until golden brown.

NOTE: You can add other thinly-sliced vegetables to this; zucchini is a good one to go with the onions.

A Sunset

The park near where I was staying had some pretty great sunsets. Here’s one of them:

A Doughnut Shop Recommendation

At the very end of this trip, I had a friend recommend Five Daughters Bakery as a must-stop place in Nashville.

Their 100-layer doughnuts really are fantastic.

I recommend the Vanilla Cream one.

Photo of the Month

When I first got to Nashville, I went to buy groceries and this guy was out on one of the main streets nearby.

So, this was one of my first impressions of the town.

Sign Reads: “JESUS ❤️ YOU / RAPTURE SOON / HEAVEN BOUND? / ESCAPE WRATH / ASK ME HOW“

March Stats

Animals Pet

23 dogs, 2 cats, 1 ferret

Books Finished

None

Library Cards Collected

2

Distance Traveled (Miles)

1,574

Miles Walked

116.5

Song of the Month

WARNING: This song contains brief, strong language.