Wide open spaces...

It was a beautiful hot day at the beach. I took a dip, on the hour, just too cool off... Not quite... It was freezing and windy and I had on my winter gear. But, it was sunny and the wide open space was just what I needed. Larger space if you want.

I started out the day getting an MRI (just trying to figure out some mystery back pain) and I had forgotten how LOUD and SMALL those things are! Bang, Bang, Bang - GRIND, beep, beep GRRRR... The staff is kind enough to give you ear plugs and place headphones over them. You get to choose what type of music you'd like to listen to during 45 minutes of torture. I chose the first one on the long list: hits (because I enjoy about any music and didn't really want to read the whole list.) Did you know that Rap falls under "hits"? Now, I can get into a good rap song occasionally, I'm open to it... but it is NOT relaxing and I needed relaxing... Oy Vey... Big mistake! Next time I'll read the list or just go for easy listening.

Now, claustrophobia aside, I can't lay perfectly still for 5 minutes without a muscle cramp, let alone 45 minutes. So when I got out I needed to walk somewhere wide open. I stopped at a little beach in Traverse City along Grand Traverse Bay West (a large bay off of Lake Michigan). Blue skies, turquoise water and sunshine made up for the icy cold wind. All and all it was a nice relaxing time at the beach. The snow in this area had, for the most part, disappeared... Quite a contrast to home.

The rest of the day was great. It's hard not to be in a good mood when the sun is shining like this! I got a few good shots of birds this afternoon, but decided to post this and give you a break from my bird blipping.