We Are The Champions!

Well, at least for this Saturday at Scotty's Bar and Grill here in Corozal. The team Dianna was playing on, (Rick, Peggy, Manny, and Dianna) beat out the other two teams for that honor.

Dianna, Showing Her Championship Form

And what an honor it is too. The winning team members each get a free Belikin and $10.00 BZD off their bar tab. That's pretty cool, I must say.

Regina Getting Ready to Shoot Some Darts

What fun. Most folks playing either are total neophytes or have very little experience shooting darts. Oh, sure, there's the odd few who are 'pro's', but the atmosphere is strictly for fun and conviviality. Nobody criticizes the poor shots, everybody laughs and has a good time.

Sporting The New Scotty's T-Shirt

Of course, the teams are all 'pick-up' teams. That is, whoever shows up, gets picked for a team. You seldom play with the same people on your team twice in a row.

Donna Getting Advice On Her Shot

 Nancy, Scott, Kristen and Shireen all make sure the food is good (A nice selection of burgers and other sadwiches and pizza too) and that the Belikin is cold. The ceiling fans are on high, and it's a nice way to spend an afternoon. It's a tough job for them, as chances are, they're playing as well.

Hard, Hot Work

Yesterday morning dawned as it frequently does here - picture perfect. We know this because almost every morning we walk the dogs into town. Depending on the season, that trek begins about 15 minutes before sunrise, or 15 minutes after sunrise.

On this particular walk, as we (Doug and myself, along with the usual gaggle of doggies) were going by the waterfront, we spied a young man diligently painting the underside of Christina's hatch cover. I thought it made a nice photo.

6:15 AM and Hard At It

After we got back from the walk, our work was getting set to begin. We've been plagued for quite a while with cloudy water. We were pretty sure our chemistry for the pool was finally under control and the water had become blue as it should, but it was cloudy. So much so, that standing in the pool, you couldn't see your feet. Not quite the effect you want.

Well, we'd had enough of that. We had decided to drain the pool, pressure wash the whole thing, and refill it to see if that made a difference.

As we drained the pool, it became obvious what the problem or culprit was. It was marl dust. This occurs during the extremes of the dry season, when the road bed marl becomes finer than talcum powder (reminiscent of Mt. St. Helens ash, for those of you who also lived through that experience).

We thought we had been pretty well free of it as the prevailing breeze pretty much always blew from east to west, directly away from our house. But, the problem is that the marl will even turn to dust in the absence of vehicles. A fine layer, to be sure, but there nonetheless. that layer, blowing around fairly constantly, always got into the pool, where it roosted in the wall and the floor of the pool. When Cody vacuumed the pool, it would be sucked up by the vacuum, only to flow right through the sand filter and be redeposited into the pool, since the filter was unable to trap such fine particles.

Along with the marl in the pool, Dianna wanted to tackle the remaining tiles that still had not been properly cleaned. We tried several things, muriatic acid (diluted, of course) and some other products. It seems that the only thing that really works is good old-fashioned elbow-grease - of course.

Here's some shots of the pool drainage and Dianna hard at work scrubbing the tile. You would not believe how hot the inside of that pool became.

Dianna Working to Clean Pool Tiles

Dianna Still Working on the Tiles

Thankfully, Doug and Twyla came over to help work on the pool. As hot as it was and as labor-intensive as the job became, the two of us would have been at it for another week.

The job would have gone faster if the main pump had sucked all the water out of the pool - as we thought it was going to do. Instead when it got down to about 3-4" of water in the pool, the pump, although sounding like it was working wasn't sucking... That sucked, big time. That meant we finished draining the pool with 5-gallon buckets, cups, hands, whatever we could find.

That process took about an hour and a half longer than we had thought the whole thing would take.

Here's a couple more shots of the pool drained and waiting for the final pressure washing.

Couple Views of the Pool Cleaning

Another View of the Pool Cleaning

Unfortunately, this is all the photos I took of the activity. It was such hot and hard work, with all of us sweating profusely (not just profusely, but gallons) that we forgot completely about photography of the pool cleaning party.

It took us till about 4:00 PM before we were satisfied that we had cleaned the pool sufficiently. Then we started filling it - a 7-hour process in it own right.

Also helping for a while were Lynn and Pete, who came over on their last day before heading back to Seattle.

We told everyone that we'd treat them all to burgers and beer at Scotty's, but Lynn and Pete had already made other arrangements.

So, after showers and dry clothing changes, Twyla, Doug, Dianna and I all headed to Scotty's. I think towards the end of the evening, all four of us were ready to fall asleep right there. We were all pooped out and sunburnt as well. We could all hear our beds calling our names.

Monday morning finds us refreshed and finishing the pool filling. I'm going to run a chemistry test of the pool as soon as that's done and then take it easy for the day. It may be pool time this afternoon.

About the filtering, I think I've found the solution for our problem. It's something called a slime bag. One of the options is that it will fit in plastic filter housings. I found them at Cleaner Pools.Net (http://www.cleanerpools.net).I think ganging two of them together and putting them in-between the vacuum and the skimmer will go a long way to solving our problem of the fine materials just shooting through the sand filter.

I'm not sure yet exactly how to set it up, hard-wired in before the big filter in the pump house, or make a stand for the two housings and plugging the vacuum into one end with the other end plugged in to the skimmer, and vacuuming away as usual. Further investigation is warranted.

I've also found the perfect waterfall/mosaic light. It's a waterproof 20" long LED light bar with 18 LED's in it that will mount just above the waterfall. It's 12Vdc, so as safe as can be and easy to install as well. I found it at elementalled.com (http://elementalled.com). It can even come with a dimmer to really control the mood lighting - and it's reasonably priced.

Well, that's all for now. I've got to go shut off the pool filler valve and do some testing. Makes me feel like Dr. Bunsen Honeydew... Where's my assistant, Beaker?

Cookery Competition Creating Commotion

Well, maybe not quite a commotion, and not a real competition, seeing as how the "contestants" don't even know they're in a contest.

Up until a short while ago, Butchie's Bar and Grill, part of the Marc Anthony Hotel here in Corozal, was pretty well acknowledged by the cognoscenti of such things as having the finest burgers in town. Now the gauntlet has been thrown down, or at least, the spatula has been raised.

The contender is a newcomer to Corozal, Scotty's Bar and Grill. Located in the old Crazy Canuck's location (27 G Street, N.), and run by a family from Portland, Oregon (that second "o" in Oregon is almost silent).

We met Nancy, Mark and Kristi (Scott was still up north) the other night for our first taste of their fare. I had the Big Bay Burger, a 2-patty affair with cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, in short, all the trimmings. It also came with curly fries. Definitely a full-meal-deal.

Dianna had the Little Bay Burger, a one-patty thing with onion rings. Mae and Craig were with us, but I don't remember what they had. I think one of them had the Teriyaki Chicken Sandwich.

Anyway, along with Belikins to help things along, it was an enjoyable evening.

So, which is better, Butchie's or Scotty's? Hard to say. Both have really tasty burgers. I think the Big Bay option has an edge for size and content (sauce, etc.), and, they do have the curly fries. Those were tasty, and in a nice quantity. Butchie's has straight-cut fries, so I suppose it could come down to a personal preference on that account.

The other thing that has to be considered as well, is cost. I know that's not really part of the official taste comparison guidelines, but when you're on a "fixed income" (it seems so weird to say that, I just couldn't resist) cost becomes a factor. Probably a good thing there's not a King's Food Host Buffet around. Butchie's is expensive as their prices have gone up some in recent times.

Well, back to the question. Which is better? Hard to say. They both taste good. Curly fries or straight? Whatever your preference is. Size? Some folks say size does matter... But, probably not an overriding concern in burgers. The other factors would seem to give Scotty's an edge, but I think that's still a debatable issue.

In any case, it's nice to have two places with distinctly different atmospheres here in Corozal to tempt us with their offerings. I wish them both luck and I hope they both make it through the next few years, what with the downturn and all. I know we'll all do our part to try to help them both survive.

So, is it down to cost? If that's the case, Scotty's wins. If cost is definitely a separate issue, I'd say the question calls for more deliberation. That is, probably at least a few more trips to each location to do adequate research. Especially if the Belikins are cold.