This was the scene in the morning at Indigo Coffee in Hyde Park Village. I'd had a coffee earlier so the cup is hot chocolate with thick whipped cream. It is scrumptious and as chocolate as I can take. The muffin is filled with fresh blueberries and drizzled with a sugary coating. (I'm sure it's very healthy.) If you wonder if there was a choco/sugar high after this relaxing time in the Village, that would be a resounding, yes! Although it's humid, it's a pretty day without a storm cloud in sight. The perfect, lazy Saturday to sit for a while by the fountain (which is still without water because of our shortage and use restrictions) and watch a great variety of people strolling, biking and simply enjoying the setting. My favorite thing though, is watching the young 90-lb. moms navigate their huge, 6,000-lb. SUVs into tight parking spaces, and load and unload little ones without once stopping their cell phone conversations. They practically need a step ladder to just unbuckle junior from his car seat. It's a hoot.
I posted a photo of the new mansion being built by New York Yankees ballplayer Derek Jeter a couple of day ago HERE. If any of you want to see a shot I got from across the bay of the home under construction on Davis islands, I've included it here. Click and enlarge it to get a better sense of its size. I'm guessing that the homes on either side are in the range of 5-7,000 square feet. His 31,000 square feet makes theirs look like guest cottages.
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The front page of the Wednesday, November 5, 2008 issue of TBT*Tampa Bay Times, the daily that has gained a wide readership on both sides of the bay, is reproduced on the sidewalk at Hyde Park Village. The chalk art reproduction is still visible after several weeks of foot prints, weather and lots of dog paws that have crisscrossed its surface a thousand times. The artwork was created during the inaugural Chalk Walk, a public festival of drawings created in late March by about 25 individuals, families and groups. The Tampa Bay Business Committee for the Arts played host and several other companies joined together to sponsor the events for the hundreds of artists and Chalk Walkers. Some of the finished works were huge and others not so big but they all showed great imagination, design and color. Tampa's future was their theme and it was interpreted in a wide number of ways by adults and children. Tampa's skyline, mass transit systems and beautiful people were favorite elements of many of the designs. Sidewalks in front of village restaurants, shops and around the fountain of Hyde Park Village were used liberally as canvases. As the days have gone by most of the works have disappeared, but this one remains. Public chalk art by it very nature smears, smudges and literally blows away. (Think of the Florentine artists working on the touristy streets by the Ponte Vecchio.) What we need are more chalk artists, more frequently.
Hyde Park Village, a shopping area in South Tampa, is part of a neighborhood of older homes within the Hyde Park Historic District. The district is listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. I love the red British telephone box smack in the heart of the village along with the street sign for Snow Avenue framed by palm trees. I'm sure an early Tampa developer found great humor in naming this small, palm-lined lane, which runs down to the open bay, for the white-stuff.
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