Our parking spot at Barry’s sits in the shade of several very large Live Oak trees, each of which is heavily adorned with Spanish Moss. Spanish Moss is a simple but dramatic air plant that can be found almost anywhere in the southeast, hanging from trees, but less in urban and suburban areas where the Live Oaks have been cut down.

Thus, Spanish Moss is one of my indicators of finding a bit of “old Florida”. The state parks are loaded with it, reflecting the state’s interest in maintaining its parks as close as possible to the way they appeared when Europeans first arrived. If a restaurant is shaded by Live Oaks and Spanish Moss it’s a lot more likely to be a remainder of old Florida than one that surrounded by concrete and asphalt. Those old Florida places are usually pretty interesting.

But I’m going to start feeling mossy myself if we stay much longer. Not counting our visit to VT, we’ve been in Florida for about seven weeks, three of which have been in the Tampa area. Our thinking is that we will complete our remaining business this week and head out by Friday.

Maintenance note: the Olevia LCD TV died suddenly. It just won’t go on anymore. After some diagnosis with technical experts, the conclusion is: warranty replacement. We’ll get a new one tomorrow and see if it holds up better. I’ve done some searching on the Internet about LCD TV failures and they seem to happen to all brands, so I’m not ready to point the finger at Olevia for this yet. They didn’t give me any flack about replacing it, and if the second one lasts, I’ll be satisfied.