Starbucks

Left a tile at Birch Park in the usual spot and another at a nearby Starbucks on a stack of chairs in the restroom. Each has their own little story.

Tiling Birch Park

Took a long and much-needed walk at Birch Park in Fort Lauderdale today. I like to go there and walk off the stress of the week. Today, I had about 10 miles of stress to work off, so I was there a good long while. When you go around the track, there's a tree on the right between the start and the parking lot where the playground is. It's a twisty tree with incredible roots that are above ground. You can't miss it. I left a tile right around the roots. It's in a Ziploc. Hopefully the weather won't do it in, or the raccoons won't carry it off. The tile, pictured above, portrays Stevie.

Stevie loved to watch ants in the park. For his birthday his mom bought him an ant farm so he could watch ants right in his room. That afternoon Stevie took his ant farm to the park and set every last one free. Go Stevie.

Today I saw one raccoon, one iguana and lots of empty champagne bottles from the people who were viewing the Christmas boat parade. My friend Jane found a leaf that looked like the Grinch. Maybe she could make some money on eBay.

Frogs and Toads and Tiles

I dropped a few more tiles in secret hiding places at The Frog & Toad Pub on Powerline Road in Fort Lauderdale over the weekend. The place is so cool. The house wine is really good here, and the crowd and servers friendly. I wondered why it was named that and then I looked online and found that "frog and toad" is Cockney rhyming slang for "road." I know a guy from England who always used to use those rhymes, like he would say "apples and pears" for "stairs." ... I left two tiles at The Frog and Toad - one in a magazine rack, another in a basket. It's the kind of place you wouldn't mind dropping in just often enough to say, I'll have the usual. The tiles were (as pictured above) "Joan Queen of Stress" (who worried about meeting deadlines, the suspicious mole on her right ankle and those monstrous 18-wheelers she feared would swerve into her lane and smash her to smithereens) and "Meek Margaret" (they called her Meek Margaret but had no idea what she'd done to that man in Reno who made fun of her eyebrows). I've painted 19 tiles so far, though I still have three of those left to hide and they're going out this weekend. Will post right after they're out there. Of course, there are still hundreds more 8x8 blank slates in my closet.

More snow

Dropped by Christmas by the Sea event in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea where there was lots of snow, merry people, Christmas songs and loads of decorations and lights. Checked out a homey little spot called the Village Pump and left this tile in the bathroom sink. It's a painting of someone who's had one too many of those Starbucks coffees and should really switch to decaf. But she looks pretty festive in her holiday sweater despite being completely wired on caffeine. Hopefully she got lucky that night and found herself a happy home. I think it would be ultimately cool if one day, five years from now, I walk into somebody's house or business and see one of my tiles. I think I wouldn't say that I painted it. I'd just smile inside.