Ahhh, summer

Summer has officially started. I have now been to the beach. In fact I went not once but twice in as many days. Dad and Mom and I decided to go to Popham beach for our after lunch Sabbath walk. It must have been an astronomical low tide because I have never seen the sandbar out to the island so wide. It was about 1/4 to 1/3 of a mile across. We sat on the top of the island with the wind strong in our faces and the sun shining on us for I don't know how long before we headed back.

On the way home we picked up medication for the cat (she injured her paw and it's infected) and stopped by Ally's to visit and practice some music that Dad and Ally were thinking of doing for special music one Sabbath. While we were there, or maybe when we were talking on the phone after, Ally invited me to go to the beach with her and Missy on Sunday. I accepted with pleasure.

So yesterday I packed up a beach bag and a cooler with food and the tree of up headed off to Popham. When we got there the parking lot was full and park wardens were directing cars to an alternate parking lot a mile away. That was full too. We then turned around, went back to Bath and took the road to Reid State Park.

Reid State is not as well known as Popham is, and with some reason. The sand is actually tiny pebbles that cause great discomfort when you walk on them and the beach isn't as long, the longer side is only a mile. However to make up for that there is waves. Waves like Popham only dreams of getting during a storm.

After walking down the beach at the waters edge where the sand isn't so bad and back calf deep in water we decided to play in the waves. Call it body surfing or wave jumping or whatever. It's fun.

Missy was the first one to get dunked. There had just been a huge wave and we (I, at least) hadn't figured out that big waves come in sets of two. It swept all of us down but Ally's and my head stayed out of the water. (That makes it sound like we share a head but I can't quite figure out how to fix that problem.)

By the time we were done all three of us had been soaked and were so cold that all our joints ached. We laid in the sun for half an hour trying to get warm again while we listened to music and ate cotton candy.

After we were done and went to the bath house to shower off I saw the sign that said the tide times (it was coming in) and the water temperature. For an hour we had been thigh-deep and head-deep in water that was 55 degrees! Are we crazy? Yes we are! But it was such a fun crazy that being sane can't be half so nice.

We had to leave at 3:30 because Beth and I had a dinner date. Oh, before I go on, photo credits. They aren't mine. I didn't take them and Reid really didn't look all empty. I found picture of the beaches in question online and that was the best I could do.

Dinner, right. We were planning on going to a Tai restaurant in town. We forgot to see if it would be open on Sunday. It wasn't. Neither was most of the other restaurants we have it town. This, we decided, was because of the blue laws.

When we moved here Sunday law (called blue laws for some reason I have never understood) were still in place that didn't allowed businesses to be open on Sunday. I think it was in the past eight years that that law was eliminated. I still remember that it was a big deal when we could go grocery shopping on Sunday, because before we couldn't go all weekend because of Sabbath.

Anyway, almost all of the restaurants were closed so we choice to go to an Indian restaurant. There are two in town and we kinda randomly picked. I love Indian food. I discovered it for the first time in April when the choir when to DC to sing and I stayed with an Indian family. They made the best. Food. Ever. I had Indian food before, a few years ago when Beth and Mom and I were going to England and we heard that Indian food was popular there. I liked it but it didn't go beyond that. Now? It's my new comfort food. Forget pizza, takeout Indian for movie night!

After dinner we proceeded to Pickard Theater. There we would see Miss Saigon. It is Madam Butterfly set in Vietnam. We cried through the whole second half.

It was a good day.