PIRATES OFF THE PORT BOW !

My Tess surprised me with a pre-Valentine's Day vacation to Catalina to get away from the cold New York weather. So we got out the boat, gathered our provisions, and set out for a nice relaxing trip.

But only two days later, in the middle of the night, we were shanghaied by PIRATES !😭

And a scurvy bunch they were.

When we reached New Orleans, they locked me up and if it weren't for this helpful dog, I'd still be there.

Then I had to rescue my Tess from this auction (She's the comely redhead in the big hat, of course)
and escape. We tried to ask this guy Jack for directions but he was a bit tipsy and no help at all.

We made it to a mansion but it was haunted, although these three spirited fellows kindly pointed us in the direction of some much needed sustenance.

 My Tess is from Louisiana and I've worked there several times so we knew where the best food was and after a couple of Po-boys (I had the popcorn shrimp, she had the fried chicken) and a couple of o orders of beignets and bread pudding ( with cafe au lait for me, hot chocolate for her) we had the strength to continue on to our original destination.

 (Tess says the Mickey shaped beignets are "blasphemous". 😆 This is the closest I can get to the laughing emoticon. I miss it already.)😞

On our way out, we saw that the pirates were looking for us,

So we left the boat behind and hopped a train to Neverland.😃

(Silly, I know. But we've had a tumultuous year and this was our first real breather and we enjoyed ourselves immensely. We felt like a couple of kids playing hooky from reality and now it's back to the real world. Isn't that what the place was created for? I hope you all get the chance to ameliorate your everyday lives now and then because if you aren't having any fun, what's the point ? 😩)