Deep-fried deals

You hear plenty of talk about the high prices on the island, and it's not without merit. If you want to go out and spend $100 on a dinner for two, there are many restaurants around here that could easily make that happen (and probably still leave you somewhat hungry on the way out). There are no fast-food chains anywhere to be found around here -- not a single McDonald's or a Burger King or even a Taco Bell -- and many places close down by 9 p.m., which puts a crimp in late-night dining.

But there are some wonderful bargains to be found, if you keep your eyes and ears open. I had heard from my co-worker Scott about The Net Result, a seafood place just on the outskirts of downtown Vineyard Haven. He said the food was terrific and the prices were quite reasonable, which definitely piqued my curiosity. He wasn't kidding. It's a combination take-out restaurant/fish market, with one counter for meals (and sushi) and another for fresh-off-the-boat filets, clams, shrimp, etc. that you can take home and fix yourself. In between the counters is a large tank in which dozens of live lobsters are displayed for your viewing pleasure.
The Net Result is staffed by an energetic team of cooks and chefs, many of whom look like college students. But they've been well-trained: Your food arrives quickly and with ample amounts of tartar sauce and lemon on the side (they also have vinegar packets for people like me who like to sprinkle it over their fish and fries). Their crab cake sandwiches are a mere $4 each and come equipped with a fat, perfectly fried crab patty, lettuce and tomato; for most people, I suspect one would be enough to make a respectable lunch. They also offer the traditional fish and chips meal, with three pieces of haddock buried beneath a generous portion of fries; it's $10, but it's a filling meal. While I can't imagine ever having a better fish and chips meal than the ones I've had in London, The Net Result knows how to put together a delicious basket.

The seating is all outside, at picnic tables that are thoughtfully covered by umbrellas. The tables are also under surveillance -- by some little birds who eagerly await any dropped crumbs or abandoned leftovers. They're feisty, but not obnoxious. Like many a household dog, they make their presence known and then lurk on the sidelines to see who's feeling generous.

On the other end of Vineyard Haven is Sandy's Fish & Chips, which has a similar set-up and equally outstanding food. At Sandy's, there is only one lengthy counter, with one side for take-out and the other for shoppers. It must be a neighborhood staple, since the cooks and cashiers tend to greet customers by name.

The fry cook seems to know the regulars so well, she can predict their orders. One afternoon, I overheard her challenging the guy who was taking a pick-up order for a fish sandwich over the phone. "Ketchup, lettuce and onion," he had told her, but she was skeptical. "Mac's getting lettuce?" she said. "Are you sure it wasn't mayo?" Oh yeah, the cashier realized, it was supposed to be mayo. The fry cook went back to preparing the sandwich with a satisfied look on her face: "Yeah, Mac getting lettuce: I don't think so!"

Friday Getaway, Part II

My original plan had been to catch a double-feature, and I got to the Regal Nickelodeon just as "My Sister's Keeper" was starting, so I saw that one first. It was well-acted and delivered all the heartbreaks you would expect (although I understand it takes major liberties with the novel from which it was adapted), although oftentimes I found myself wishing director Nick Cassavettes had had more faith in the actors to carry the material instead of slathering so many songs on the soundtrack that were programmed to tell us which emotion we should be feeling at any given time. I had also expected it to be more of a courtroom drama, since it's about a young girl (Abigail Breslin) named Anna who sues her parents (Cameron Diaz and Jason Patric) for "medical emancipation": Basically, Anna has been used as -- to put it crudely -- spare parts for her leukemia-stricken sister, Kate, all her life. Now, when doctors want to remove one of Anna's kidneys to donate to Kate, Anna refuses, even though she loves her sister deeply. The provocative legal questions are more or less brushed aside in favor of domestic drama and a teen love story.

Anyhow, the movie got out at 2:30 and "Tyson," the next film on my list, wasn't scheduled to start until 4. Plenty of time for a late lunch. Except that the Nickelodeon is in the middle of a wildlife preserve, and there are literally no other businesses around. At all.

I started walking down the road, sure I would find some kind of cafe or sandwich shop -- nothing. To top it off, by the time I realized this, I must have already been about a mile away from the theater. And this was the time when the granite-colored sky finally decided it was time to let loose with a few raindrops, which forced me to make a quick decision. If the rain really started up, I would be drenched by the time I made it back to the theater (where there was nothing to eat except popcorn and candy); if I went on ahead, I might find some place to rest and maybe get something substantial to eat. So I went on. "Tyson" would have to wait.

Not long afterward, I caught sight of a gas station -- with a Dunkin Donuts in it, thank you, Lord -- and that, of course, was the exact moment the shower came to an abrupt halt. Dunkin's lunch menu is limited to say the least and I had ample time to read it since the woman working behind the counter was engaged in a bitter, long-winded discussion with her mother (a customer) about what constitutes proper child care and how many hours of sleep a working parent deserves and which of the cashier's friends qualify as acceptable babysitters in the mother's eyes. Both women were speaking in shrill, rather loud voices, but even though there was a manager nearby they did not quiet down and he did not intercede to suggest that maybe this was the kind of confrontation that should take place at home, not in a ersatz restaurant.

The mother finally gave up and left. I ordered a grilled cheese flatbread, which didn't seem like too much of a stretch, but from the expression on the cashier's face you would have thought I'd demanded she whip up beef Wellington. With sandwich in hand, I returned to the road, convinced I could walk a little bit further and shave a few more dollars off that cab fare.

I've made smarter moves. About 10 minutes later, while I was walking along a woodsy stretch with no houses or businesses whatsoever, the rain made an unwelcome return and it was a mite more insistent than it had been before. If this had been happening on the island, I might have summoned up the courage to stick out my thumb to one of the passing cars. Unfortunately, I was in the real world, where hitchhikers are barely one notch above swine flu carriers and panhandlers. So I picked up the pace, navigating around crushed plastic cups, used diapers, discarded gloves, a faded and ton-up copy of "What Daddies Do Best" and other random rubbish strewn along the shoulder.

The rain did stop, although I was no closer to a commercial district. Instead, I saw farms, forests and a couple of clusters of pre-fab housing communities that looked as if they'd been designed for the Stepford Wives to move into; one group of almost identical houses, all painted a watery gray and trimmed in white, was downright eerie and I wondered how many of them were sold since every driveway was empty and every yard utterly barren.

I used the Google Maps feature on my phone to check if I was going in the right direction to get back to the mall. Affirmative: Only four more miles, it told me. Now you hear "four miles" and you think, "That's not very far." And it's not, if you are in a car on a bus. On foot, it's an entirely different experience, especially when there is nowhere to stop and rest along the way. I kept trying to convince myself there would be a place just around the next bend in the road; instead, I found more of the same.

By the time I reached the rather meager-looking highway the mall was on, I calculated that I was already more than two-thirds of the way back. What cab driver is going to go out of his or her way to pick up someone who's only going to travel a mile anyhow? No point in stopping now.

I reached the mall and made it to the trolley at 4:40, which gave me 20 minutes to shop before departure back to Woods Hole. I needed an external hard drive and some recordable CDs for my computer and I knew these items would carry a much heftier price tag on the island than they would in Falmouth. So I once again ventured into WalMart -- wishing I could wear a bag over my head -- and found the items (admittedly at very reasonable prices). I boarded the trolley and started another bumpy ride back to the Steamship Authority. My legs were throbbing a bit, although my two-and-a-half-hour walk had saved me nearly $30 and had certainly warmed my legs up for the full week's worth of walking I will be doing at the Toronto International Film Festival in September.

How far exactly had I gone? I consulted Google Maps again and found that, with one accidental detour thrown in, I had plodded along for close to eight miles. That's almost as far as Martha's Vineyard is from the mainland. Thank goodness I do not have the power to walk on water -- although it would save me ferry fare.

Friday Getaway, Part One

To celebrate the end of my third full week on the island, I left it. I decided I would go over to Falmouth (on the mythical "mainland") to do some shopping and see some movies. Imagine finding actual sales on items I need, or theaters that play something other than "The Hangover," "Year One," and "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen." And it was all just a ferry ride away.

Ah, but the things in life that sound so simple often turn out to be trickier than you expect, and that was certainly the case with my little Friday getaway.

The complications began even before I got on the boat in Oak Bluffs. Because I didn't know how long I'd be gone, I knew I should find a 24-hour parking space, just to be one the safe side. The nearest one turned out to be almost a mile away from the Steamship Authority office, where you buy the ferry tickets and go on board. I'd left early to catch the 10:45 ferry, but finding the parking space took much longer than I would have expected and by the time I parked, it was 10:35. So you can picture how quickly I had to hustle down the sidewalk. I bought my ticket ($7.50 for one-way) and was the very last passenger admitted. The ticket-taker at the gate had to radio down to the ferry crew: "Last passenger. Running. Green striped shirt. Blue hat." They were waiting as I hurried down the slanted wooden planks of the passageway and onto the boarding ramp. I was out of breath as I handed my ticket stub to the guard. "You don't have to hurry anymore," the woman assured me. "You made it."

But you never really leave the island if you bring along your iPod: Only minutes after I walked to an upper deck to get some coffee, the voice of Carly Simon, one of the Vineyard's most notable residents, was purring in my earbuds, singing about "anticipa-a-tion." Soon afterward, "He Lives in You" from "The Lion King" turned up in the shuffle mix, which made me think of taking my niece Rachael to the Wharton Center in East Lansing to see the show three months ago as a birthday present. It was hard not to feel a little sad at the memory, since it made me realize once again how far away everyone is now.

The Vineyard Fast Ferries, as they are known, are anything but floating cattle cars. They're actually extremely comfortable, well-equipped and spacious boats, with hundreds of chairs, dozens of restaurant-style booths, outdoor seating (for those who can stand the strong breeze) and a cafeteria that serves everything from tea and beer to clam chowder and hot dogs at fairly reasonable prices. They're equipped with wi-fi, so you can spend the 45-minute voyage surfing the Web while you're riding the waves. There are also large flat-screen TVs everywhere, although on this particular day they all seemed to be tuned to CNN, which had temporarily become the MJN (Michael Jackson Network) and was providing such gripping content as searing interviews with Michael Jackson impersonators -- this is what now constitutes "news" in America -- and tear-stained testimonials to Jackson's brilliance from Liza Minnelli and Regis Philbin. No wonder most people were finding other ways to occupy their time.

When we arrived at Woods Hole, I disembarked and found the "Whoosh" Trolley, which carries passengers north to Falmouth. My plan was to ride to the end of the line, Falmouth Mall, do some shopping, and then take a cab to the Regal Nickelodeon Theaters in North Falmouth; according to an online mapping site, it was a short ride.

I had no problem catching the trolley. Enjoying the ride was another matter. The Whoosh looks sweetly quaint when you get on board, like a conveyance of 100 years ago, with brass poles, green and gold paint and bench-like wooden seats. With no padding or cushioning whatsoever on those seats, however, you are guaranteed to feel every bump and pothole on the way to your destination. I was reminded of the similarly cute-looking train that takes you around the Detroit Zoo; it has flat wooden seats as well, and if you ride for more than a few minutes you begin to feel as if you're being paddled. I was grateful my Whoosh trip whooshed by in about 15 minutes, before bruises and blisters had time to form.

The Falmouth Mall turned out to be a mall in name only. It's essentially a supermarket, a WalMart, an exercise studio, a hardware store, a tobacconist's shop and not much else, so my hopes of a real shopping trip quickly came crashing down around me. I haven't shopped at WalMart since I read Barbara Ehrenreich's expose "Nickel and Dimed" several years ago, in which she went undercover as a WalMart worker to show how callously the company treats its employees. I was so disgusted by her revelations that I cut up and threw away my Sam's Club card, which had gotten a lot of exercise in earlier years.

But it's not only WalMart where you get "nickel and dimed," as I found out when I went to the supermarket to use a cash machine. I inserted my card, punched in my PIN and then received a cherry little message that the bank providing the machine would charge me $2.75 for this transaction. I immediately hit "cancel" and collected my card. Unfortunately, I did need cash; equally unfortunately, that was the only bank machine I saw in my vicinity.

So I swallowed my high ideals, gritted my teeth and strolled into WalMart, where I bought two pens for $2 with my debit card, which then allowed me to take an additional $60 back in cash. Forgive me, Ms. Ehrenreich -- and that wasn't even the worst thing I did that day.

Looking at the clock, I realized I'd better find a taxi to the theater if I wanted to catch a double-feature (I was planning to see "Tyson," because I've heard it's terrific, and "My Sister's Keeper," because I like Cameron Diaz and Abigail Breslin and I hadn't seen a good tearjerker in ages). Getting the cab was a snap, and the driver turned out to be a delightful woman in her 50s who was eager to discuss all the movies she had wanted to see (and missed) in theaters during the last six months: "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," "The Reader" and "that one with the comeback guy," which I correctly guessed was Mickey Rourke's "The Wrestler." She also wanted details on "The Hangover" and "Up," and I assured her she'd probably have a great time at both.

Although the conversation was lively enough, I still found it peculiar that it seemed to be taking much longer to get to the theater than my trusty little downloaded map seemed to indicate. There was a reason for that. The site that provided me with the information had screwed up the address of the theater. It was not just around the corner, it was a good six miles away, and by the time we pulled into the parking lot of the Nickelodeon, the fare was up to -- cringe -- $23.

But what can you do in such a situation? as the British say, "In for a penny, in for a pound." Or, in this particular case, about 15 pounds or thereabouts.

More to follow...

Michael's legacy

I was listening to the early albums by the Jackson 5 last night, and I was struck by the genuine emotion in the pre-teen Michael Jackson's voice. You get the sense he really believed the songs he was singing, that he was truly committed to the sentiments in the lyrics. There's a semi-obscure ballad from that period called "Maybe Tomorrow" that I found particularly fascinating, in which Michael reflects,"You are the song that I sing, you are the four seasons of my life. But maybe tomorrow, you'll change your mind, girl. Maybe tomorrow, you'll come back to my arms, girl."

It's a song suffused in a strange kind of hopeful anxiety: Yes, my love is gone, but there's always a chance that if I just keep telling her how much she means to me, she'll be back.

"Maybe Tomorrow" was recorded when Michael was around 12 years old, so it's doubtful that he was pouring a lot of first-hand experience into those words. Yet, near the end, when he builds up the intensity and pleads for a second chance, he's so on-the-mark he was obviously tapping into something that was close to his heart.

That was Michael Jackson in the first 25 or so years of his life, the performer who sought self-expression through his craft, who found the release for his pent-up emotions in music and dance. Look back at the first Jackson 5 records and marvel at how this child effortlessly delivers number after number, whether it's a tender moment like "I'll Be There" or a dance floor workout like "How Funky is Your Chicken?" It's pure talent and bonafide energy.

And I think that's what Jackson lost somewhere along the way, after he'd made "Off the Wall" and "Thriller" and become the most celebrated artist on the planet.

At a certain point, it was no longer about delivering the goods, musically and performance-wise; it was about topping what he'd done before, going another step further, breaking some new record, selling more product than anyone else. Any artist that follows that course is not heading for greater glory: He or she is stepping onto the downward spiral. No actor wins the Oscar year after year, no novelist always gets the Pulitzer Prize, no painter will ever be all the rage forever. Tastes change, styles evolve, and what was once startling and innovative quickly becomes mainstream and unexciting.

I was a big fan of Michael Jackson as a child and kept following him through "Thriller," but after that? I got a press pass to see the Jacksons' "Victory" tour in Detroit at the Pontiac Silverdome in 1984 and, even in a venue that had no business hosting concerts (the sound bounced around the stadium so violently that my sister and I were often turning to each other to ask, "What song do you think this is?"), Michael Jackson had no problem captivating the crowd with his combination of slick choreography and polished professionalism. At the same time, the performance was so calculated and precisely timed there was no spontaneity, no real joy in it. Behind the razzle-dazzle was nothing, except commercialism. You couldn't buy a poster of all the Jacksons together, for instance; you had to buy an individual poster of each of them. (And much as I wanted to proudly hang Tito in the living room, I held on to my wallet.)

To a generation that wasn't around to bear witness to the Jackson 5, or "Off the Wall" or the mania that surrounded "Thriller," Michael Jackson is primarily a punchline to sleazy jokes. They may know his songs, but they know a whole lot more about his bizarre behavior, bogus marriages, the obsession with maintaining some vestige of youthfulness through increasingly eerie plastic surgeries and the way he steadily changed himself from a black man to a chalk-colored androgyne with a freakishly tiny beak of a nose.

One of my friends posted the following on Facebook: "In his first 25 years, he gave us some great music, which we've still got. In his last 25 years, he gave us little but bizarre TV clips of him wearing a surgical mask and acting inappropriate with kids. I'd call it a wash."

Unfortunately, that's just about right. Comparing Jackson's music of the late 1980s and 1990s to "Thriller" and "Off the Wall" is like putting Kraft Slices alongside brie. The songs became background music for elephantine music videos that cost almost as much as feature films and became progressively more laughable as Jackson kept "refining" his looks and indulging in tributes to himself that would have made even the vainest diva blush. Everything seemed geared toward keeping him in the spotlight. When his music was no longer selling, Jackson sold himself, spilling out teary confessional tales of a traumatic childhood and betrayals by backstabbers. He might have found more solace if he'd told these things to a good psychiatrist instead of Oprah Winfrey and a network TV audience.

He got the attention he craved. But he no longer had anything to say or anything new to offer. To the under-25 set, Michael Jackson is a carnival freak who dangled his baby off a hotel balcony, walled himself up in a private playground and had a peculiar attraction to little boys. To understand why anyone cared about him in the first place, you have to turn back the clock a quarter of a century, back to a time when perhaps the singer really did believe in his song, at least enough to make the audience believe that he believed in it.

Farrah's legacy

What sad news about Farrah Fawcett, who died of cancer earlier today. She will always be remembered for her appearances on "Charlie's Angels" and for her legendary swimsuit poster, of course. But Fawcett should also be celebrated for the courage and fortitude she displayed when she decided to establish herself as a serious actress in the early 1980s, half a decade after her days as the world's best-known sex symbol.

Often hailed as an "overnight success," Fawcett was anything but. She had arrived in Hollywood at the dawn of the 1970s and toiled in bit parts in movies and TV shows and did many a commercial in the years before she took the world by storm as Jill Munroe, the most outgoing and vivacious of the Angels, in 1976. While "Charlie's Angels" and that classic poster made her a household name, they didn't assure her any sort of staying power. Nor were producers pushing aside Jane Fonda, Jill Clayburgh and Meryl Streep in their rush to give Fawcett (then known as Fawcett-Majors) world-class movie roles. When she wasn't filming an "Angels" episode, she could be found doing guest shots on husband Lee Majors' series "The Six-Million Dollar Man" or playing for ABC on "Battle of the Network Stars." Suffice to say Fonda, Clayburgh and Streep probably weren't losing any sleep over that kind of competition.

In the spring of 1977, then-Fawcett-Majors shocked fans by announcing that she would not be returning for the second season of "Angels." Critics quickly divided into two camps: those who thought the series would expire quickly without her, and those who thought she was committing professional suicide.

"Angels" not only survived, it thrived: When Cheryl Ladd was brought in (as Jill's kid sister, Kris), ratings actually went up. Meanwhile, Fawcett-Majors found herself in a precarious place. Hoping to make her mark in movies, she signed on for a trio of projects -- "Somebody Killed Her Husband," a comic mystery with Jeff Bridges; "Sunburn," a caper comedy with Charles Grodin and Art Carney; and "Saturn 3," a sci-fi thriller with Kirk Douglas -- none of which brought in much at the box office. To settle legal battles with the "Angels" producers, Fawcett-Majors was forced to make multiple guest appearances on the show in the third and fourth seasons, which must have felt like salt in the wound.

By 1980, her career was in dire straits, but rather than fade away Fawcett turned her circumstances around. She had separated from Majors, who had reportedly tried to call the shots in both her personal and professional life, in 1979; they would divorce in 1982. Pushing her aside her glossy/fluffy image, Fawcett sought out serious, often disturbing material, such as the doomed wife in the well-reviewed TV mini-series "Murder in Texas." She then made the leap to off-Broadway, replacing Susan Sarandon in the hair-raising assault drama "Extremities," in which she played a woman who turns the tables on a would-be rapist and insists on exacting revenge. She would later reprise the role in the film version of the play.

"The Burning Bed," a harrowing made-for-TV drama about an abused wife who kills her husband in self-defense, cemented Fawcett's comeback, drawing a huge audience and netting her an Emmy nomination. Although she would occasionally dabble in film, Fawcett found her strongest showcases on television, playing opposite Colleen Dewhurst in "Between Two Women" and winning another Emmy nomination in 1989 as a troubled woman who shoots her own children in "Small Sacrifices."

Ten years after the industry had written her off as a has-been, Fawcett was an established actress with solid credentials. In retrospect, it's fascinating to see how many of her projects centered around characters who were fighting back (as in "Extremities" or "The Burning Bed"), fighting for justice (she played the title role in "Nazi Hunter: The Beate Klarsfeld Story") or simply fighting for respect (in "Between Two Women," she plays a wife who is repeatedly snubbed and mocked by haughty mother-in-law Dewhurst, yet she's ultimately the one who takes charge when the mother-in-law faces a medical crisis). That kind of drive and determination must have struck a chord with Fawcett, who had weathered so much bad publicity and ridicule in the years after "Angels." She kept trying until she silenced the skeptics and put herself exactly where she wanted to be.

She may have lost her battle with cancer, but in my eyes Farrah Fawcett will always define what it means to be a survivor.

A different angle on the island

One of my This Week on Martha's Vineyard co-workers, Zach Dionne, also has been blogging about the island experience and I'm sure you will enjoy his perspective on the wonders and the weirdness around us. Check him out here. He's been here three weeks longer than I have and he has two other jobs besides the newspaper, so he's quite immersed in the scene while I still feel like I'm slowly adjusting to it. One of his workplaces is Mediterranean, where I will be dining this evening; the other is The Book Den East, which is a great place for used and out-of-print titles. I went in there one afternoon and emerged 30 minutes later and about $30 poorer. Had I stayed longer, I could easily have destroyed my summer budget. I suspect if I worked there, I would wind up doing the same thing my fellow employees and I used to do at the long-defunct Repeat the Beat in Royal Oak: trade in our paychecks for store credit. (I am happy to report I did manage to get some of my money back, albeit 14 years later; I traded in a large batch of old Repeat the Beat promo CDs at a used-CD store in Kalamazoo and collected nearly $300 for my trip.)

I scream, you scream, we all scream for... lobster ice cream?

"That's the most disgusting thing I've ever seen," moaned a mother, as she steered her children away from the ice cream counter at Ben & Bill's Chocolate Emporium in Oak Bluffs. The young man behind the counter had a different opinion. "It's actually my second-favorite flavor," he said. "The trick is to let it melt in your mouth because it has pieces of butter in it."

Not to mention little chunks of lobster. Yes, there is a lobster ice cream.

It's not terribly surprising when you consider you can get lobster gazpacho or lobster quesadillas at area restaurants, and lobster rolls are everywhere you turn. This is also an island of ice cream addicts, as evidenced by the traffic at Mad Martha's, Vineyard Scoops and Ben & Bill's.

But I wonder how many customers are daring enough to try a dessert that looks like innocuous vanilla with a few peculiar red streaks running through it? The signage on the counter flatly states, "Yes! There is (sic) REAL lobster pieces in the ice cream." How often do you see a come-on like that? I was too curious to pass up the opportunity.

As the employee said, it turns out to be heavy with butter. That's the first flavor you taste: rich, salted, frosty butter. Then come the little chunks of lobster, which -- no big shock -- taste exactly like frozen lobster. If someone took your lobster dinner, threw away the shell, pureed it all together and put it in the deep freeze for a few hours, the result would probably taste similar to lobster ice cream.

It's odd and a little disorienting, although it's perfectly edible (and, with apologies to that miffed mom, there are a lot more disgusting menu items out there) and, I suppose, it could grow on you over time. It must have some sort of local following because the clerk said Ben & Bill's has had it "forever" and that it's experiencing a little extra notoriety right now because it was recently written up in one of the local papers.

One scoop was enough to satisfy me since it leaves behind a dry, salty aftertaste that reminds you that what you're eating isn't actually sweet. But it's definitely a unique taste experience, and one that could not come from anywhere except Martha's Vineyard.

Three days of rain

If there is one thing that everyone around here can agree on, it's that the weather has been unusually lousy lately. The skies have been overcast, the wind has been coming in in fierce gusts and rain (or some sort of misty, mystical demi-rain that seems to be native to this island) keeps drenching us. It's extremely tiresome to deal with, especially since the high winds have ripped branches down from the trees and, apparently, even pulled sailboats out of the water. It has also shut down part of the ferry service to the island (which, I am told, is a common occurrence) and it is said that many of the people who have made it over from the dock in Woods Hole have arrived with their stomachs tumbling like clothes dryers.

I had hoped to take the ferry back to the mainland to do a little shopping and maybe see a movie or two, but Sunday was awful, Monday was worse and today looks highly unpromising. It's times like these when you really are reminded that you're in a remote location. I often feel cut off from the rest of the world in a pleasant sort of way -- the usual rush-rush pace of life is not something you feel here at all -- although it can also be a bit frustrating, too. Jumping off and back onto the island is not inexpensive, for one thing. It's $15 round-trip on the Woods Hole Ferry for a single passenger; if you feel the need to take your car with you, it's $150 round-trip.

If you don't take your own transportation, you will be relying on trolleys, shuttles, buses, trains and cabs. If you want to go to a major city, like Providence or Boston, you will need a combination of them to get you where you want to be and, if you can't make it back to Woods Hole in time to catch the last ferry, you can add an extra $100 or so to your trip because you'll have to stay in a hotel and wait for the 6 a.m. boat.

I had an invitation to a Monday night screening of the Cameron Diaz/Abigail Breslin movie "My Sister's Keeper" in Providence. I've never been to Providence, so it sounded like fun -- until I started planning how to get there. Watch the cost add up:

• First: I have to catch the Vineyard Fast Ferry to Quonset Point in North Kingston, Rhode Island. That will be $69 round-trip.


• Then, a choice: I can either call a cab to take me into the heart of downtown Providence ("That would be $55" for a one-way fare, according to the cab company rep I contacted, or $110 round-trip), or I can jump on a Rhode Island Public Transit bus ($3.50 round-trip), which will take me the same distance -- in approximately three and a half hours.

The screening was to start at 7 p.m., so let's guess it would be around 9 p.m. by the time I would get out. But the last ferry back to the Vineyard from Quonset left at 4 p.m., so I'll have to stay overnight. A visit to Priceline reveals that hotels within a five-mile radius of the theater would run between $90 and $200. If that option doesn't appeal to me, I can see if I can find a cab willing to drive me the approximately 70 miles from Providence to Woods Hole. But even then, I will miss the 9:45 p.m. ferry and have to stay over in Woods Hole, where the cheapest hotel rate is $118.

So my jaunt to Providence would have cost me at least $200, any way I figured it. And that's before you add in meals. As you might guess, I stayed home (even though the film got a very favorable review in The Hollywood Reporter). I spent Monday night running around Oak Bluffs with my co-workers Zach, Anna, Scott and Jessica, and I didn't even spend $20, which is quite impressive considering we stopped at Back Door Donuts to pick up some freshly baked treats from the MV Gourmet Cafe and Bakery. They've got a clever set-up. After the bakery closes, the staff goes to work baking tomorrow's goodies. But for those who can't wait until sunrise for something sweet, the bakers have taken out the top screen from their screened-in back door and they happily sell you some of the items they've just made. The bakery is celebrated for its sprawling apple fritters, which are too large to fit on most dinner plates (I got one last week and it was like eating a small continent). Order them at your own risk: They are certainly wonderful, but they will leave you with incredibly sticky fingers and a sugar rush that lasts for hours. The bakery has a limit of six apple fritters per customer; if anyone on this planet tried to eat six of those creations in one sitting, he or she would need a swimming pool full of coffee to wash it all down.

Where the streets have no name

I keep hearing warnings that the traffic gets horribly congested in July and August, when the vacationers pour in. That's very believable. The roads here are not built to accommodate many vehicles -- I've yet to find anything wider than two lanes -- and they're not designed for convenience. In some places, it seems almost as if they were afterthoughts or necessary evils. The streets that run through many of the neighborhoods are one way and so narrow that you almost hold your breath anxiously if there are parked cars on the side. There's simply no room to spare.

At the same time, you would be hard-pressed to find drivers who are more courteous or considerate, sometimes to a fault. Instead of "driving defensively," as so many of us have been taught to do, the Vineyarders drive deferentially. They are happy to share the road (even though there's little road to share). They rarely keep two hands on the wheel because they need to have one hand free to wave to fellow drivers to signal that you're welcome to make that turn or to signal to pedestrians that it's perfectly OK to cross in front of them. "Who's in a hurry? Not me!" they seem to say. Or "I know I've got the right of way, but you go ahead. Please turn left in front of me whenever you feel like it."

There are almost no traffic lights on the island (I've found exactly one: on the bascule bridge connecting Oak Bluffs and Tisbury, and it's been green every time I crossed) and the speed limits range between 20 and 45 mph; most places are in the 30-35 mph range. The roads can be quite sinuous and curvy, with sharp turns and, particularly outside of business areas, hidden driveways. So getting around can be challenging. You have to keep a sharp eye out for the speed limit signs, which change regularly and, frustratingly, are sometimes semi-obscured by leafy tree branches.

But you can look all you like -- even borrow Superman's X-ray vision, if you like -- and you oftentimes will not find street signs. They just don't exist. Trying to use MapQuest to get around the island is almost futile because it will tell you to turn at a particular street and, unless you know exactly where it should be, the odds are excellent you won't find it. I have begun to think that when U2 wrote "Where the Streets Have No Name" they might have had Martha's Vineyard in mind.

The situation becomes even more complicated after dark because streetlights are nearly as rare as traffic lights. If the sun goes down and you're not near a town, you might want to think twice before starting off on a long walk or even a bike ride, unless you have been blessed with the eyes of a cat or an owl. There are areas that are really pitch-black, unless a car comes along. I have talked to people who've had to use their cell phones as makeshift flashlights to see what's in front of them. Yes, the lack of lights does mean that island residents get a rather spectacular view of the stars on a regular basis -- the Milky Way really glitters above us here -- but I've also heard from drivers who were scared out of their skin by the sight of a cyclist or a hitchhiker suddenly popping up out of the darkness.

There's another thing you should know: Hitchhiking here is perfectly acceptable, even commonplace. If there are laws against it, no one seems to be particularly keen to enforce them. Hardly a day passes when you don't see someone (often a teenager or someone of college age) sticking out his or her thumb to a passing driver. And yes, people happily stop and offer rides. It's all completely foreign to me, since I grew up watching movies like "Diary of a Teenage Hitchhiker," in which rides with strangers inevitably led to danger. On Martha's Vineyard, however, they're more likely to lead to Vineyard Haven, Edgartown, Oak Bluffs or the nearest bus stop. The word is that even sometime Vineyard resident James Taylor has been known to offer help to hitchhikers, so who am I to criticize?

A day of deliveries, an evening of ushering

In addition to writing for This Week on Martha's Vineyard, my co-workers and I also get to deliver the paper each Thursday. We've been paired up to cover a particular area of the island and drop off copies to the businesses that distribute it. In my case, I work with Scott to blanket downtown Vineyard Haven, which, thankfully, is not that large. Basically, it's a main street and a few spots down by the dock where the ferries come in.

There was a certain amount of suspense Thursday because the sky kept darkening and the wind would swoop in, bringing with it the threat of rain; considering we make our deliveries by hand, that would literally put a damper on things. The barista at a coffeehouse I stopped in assured me that the forecast said the rain would hold off until evening and, thankfully, she was right. Even though the overcast skies never disappeared, there was no precipatation until long after we'd finished our chores. As you can see from the photo above, readers seemed to be eagerly awaiting the issue; personally, I think my extensive list of seasonal fundraisers was a big selling point.

Thursday evening was spent at the Vineyard Playhouse, where I had volunteered to usher for the final preview of "Fly," a play by Ricardo Khan and Trey Ellis. It's a superbly performed drama based on the experiences of the Tuskegee Airmen, the African-American fighter pilots who overturned a lot of misconceptions when they went into battle in Europe in World War II. The script addresses not only the racism they faced from their white instructors on a remote base in Alabama ("This ain't 'The Wizard of Oz,'" one officer snarls at an aspiring pilot. "There ain't never been and ain't never gonna be no flying monkey.") but also the tensions between the men themselves, who came from all over America and had their own stereotypical ideas to overcome about other regions and other lifestyles. A self-assured, strutting Chicagoan in a zoot suit dismisses one of his fellow candidates as "country" until he finds out the man is actually from Harlem and trained on an airfield on Long Island that Charles Lindbergh once frequented. A flyer who comes from the West Indies and speaks with a strong accent is nicknamed "Coconut." Eventually, of course, such differences and discriminatory attitudes had to be put aside as these men prepared to work together in combat.

The Playhouse is an intimate, 120-seat venue, but director Khan and choreographer Hope Clarke use the limited space to maximum advantage, making us feel the claustrophobia the men must have experienced in those stuffy living quarters and classrooms and in those cramped planes. One of the show's many inspired touches is the use of a tap-dancing griot (a West African poet/storyteller/historian) who occasionally serves as a chorus to voice the men's unspoken feelings and anxieties, but more often enhances the mood of the moment by using his fast-moving feet to simulate the sound of an airplane engine coming to life, a stopwatch ticking away, a train chugging down the tracks, a nervous heartbeat, etc. It's the opening show of the Playhouse's summer season and I suspect it will turn into a word-of-mouth hit.

Ushering was generally a breeze (I only had to "relocate" one slightly confused gentlemen who had settled into the wrong seat -- the seat reserved for me, actually -- and needed to be directed to the other side of the house) and the Playhouse staff could not have been more cordial and helpful. One of my duties was to make the coffee that was served prior to the performance and everyone seemed to like the way I made it, which was a relief since, as many of my friends and family can attest, that is not always the case.

Menemsha: A place for seafood and sunsets

On Wednesday, my newly arrived co-worker Anna -- just in from Ohio State University -- and I traveled to Menemsha for the afternoon. Menemsha is primarily a fishing community located on the western side of Martha's Vineyard -- in the Up-Island region -- and if you don't like the smell of fresh seafood, I would advise you to keep your distance. Lobsters, clams, shrimp, scallops, crab: They are all here and all in abundance. Your nose will tell you that as soon as you start walking around.

As you might expect, Menemsha has a couple of markets that sell these delicacies practically right off the boat. Larsen's Fish Market, which is the most celebrated of the bunch, sells the raw fish on one side of the store and has a little kitchen on the other side where they will cook your catch of the day. But there's no seating inside (with the lines Larsen's attracts, there's no room for tables or booths) and there's no traditional seating outside, either; if you want to eat on the spot, you have to sit on one of the crates or boxes that are set up just outside the store.

The situation is similar at Menemsha Fish Market, which has a sizable tank of live lobsters, as well as the omnipresent lobster rolls. Anna had not yet sampled a lobster roll, so she tried one and said it was delicious. I selected one of their stuffed clams, an actual clam shell (about the size of an average hand) that's been filled with a buttery mixture of minced clams and shrimp and baked. The salesperson also offered a sample of their lobster bisque, which was rich and silky smooth, exactly the sort of soup you'd like to have on a chilly December night. The Fish Market also has a lobster gazpacho on the menu, although they were out of it at the time of our visit; I definitely want to try it when I go back. After Anna and I got our food, the clerk mentioned there was seating out back, and he was technically correct: There were a few benches down by the docks, which was what seems to pass for "seating" in a Menemsha bistro.

Menemsha's other major attraction is a rather rocky beach, which is renowned for its magnificent sunsets. Let me quote this posting from the MV Obsession blog:

"It’s the sunsets... that draw many people to Menemsha. They are spectacular and it is by far the best place on Martha’s Vineyard to experience them. People come with chairs, blankets, wine, food and loved ones… or just a camera. Applause sometimes rings out as the sun disappears behind the cliffs of Aquinnah."

Anna and I could not stick around for the sunset, unfortunately. But we did spend some time on the beach, which did indeed look like a perfect place for sunbathing, particularly if you stay on the sand and don't walk out into the water, which was chilly enough to numb your toes in a matter of minutes. Near the waves, you will find rocks of all shapes and colors, some of them so exquisitely smooth and shiny you would think they had just come out of someone's rock tumbler.

Clinging to the boulders that extend out into the water is a thick, lush growth of kelp that sways gently in the current like leaves on a tree wave in the breeze. The color is an almost unearthly shade of green that looks artificial at first glance, almost like some sort of submerged Astroturf or plastic plants that have been dumped in the sea. But there's nothing phony about it, or about anything else in Menemsha, a place that is exactly what it looks like, nothing more and nothing less.

Bulgaria's answer to Tom Cruise

Every so often as a journalist, you wind up walking right by a great little story. So it was this afternoon when I was in Oak Bluffs, taking some photos for a restaurant profile. I was on my way to the eatery when I happened to see a young man behind the bar at Sand Bar flipping bottles through the air, a la Tom Cruise in "Cocktail." When that terrible movie came out 20 years ago, my roommate Susan was a bartender and she wanted to kill the people who'd made the film 1) because she was furious that she paid full-price to see such a lousy piece of cheese; and 2) because she was constantly badgered by patrons to "do that stuff they do in 'Cocktail,'" namely juggling bottles and glasses for the customers' entertainment. "Do they know how much alcohol that wastes?" Susan would ask. "And then people complain the drinks are so expensive!"

Nash, the bartender I saw today, says he doesn't generally juggle the bottles in the bar for that very reason. He prefers to use the prop bottles he has on hand. You've got to give the man some credit: His act certainly would get your attention.

Nash -- "That's my American name," he explained to me -- is one of the many foreign students who have come to Martha's Vineyard to work during the summer. You see them everywhere and they literally hail from all over the world. Nash comes form Bulgaria, and it's the 24-year-old's second summer on the island. He explained that he took second place in a drink-mixing contest in Bulgaria last year "and first place in the Absolut competition," he added. He's already a seasoned world traveler, but he seems quite pleased to have found a place at Sand Bar, a funky, very casual restaurant-bar located on the water.

"They hired me here for these special skills," he said. "They want me here all the time. I work 24/7. I work seven days a week. This is my place."

That would seem to put a crimp in the sun-and-fun department, although Nash disagreed. "I don't start until 1 (p.m.), so I can go to the beach in the morning," he told me.

He'll undoubtedly be showing off his skills Thursday night when Sand Bar hosts what he calls "an all-Bulgarian party: Bulgarian servers, Bulgarian bartender, Bulgarian DJ."

I've never been one for party-crashing, but I might make an exception in this case.

After getting Nash's story -- and the photos for my restaurant profile -- I met up with my co-workers Jessica and Scott in Vineyard Haven. Initially, we were all in the mood for something sweet, maybe a dessert of some kind. Our options were severely limited: The cupcake place Jessica wanted to check out had already closed. In this "pre-season" period (the "season," I am told, begins the July 4 weekend) many businesses seem to lock their doors before sundown; some are closed weekdays altogether.

We stopped in an ice cream parlor and looked at several dozen flavors before deciding we weren't in the mood. So we went across the street to Zephrus Seafood and Grill, which is adjacent to Mansion House Inn and Spa. We looked over the Zephrus menu and suddenly decided what we really wanted was dinner. Jessica had a bowl of mussels, Scott had a burger and I tried Zephrus' version of lobster macaroni and cheese. I had not noticed on the menu that it was supposed to be a lunch special, not a dinner entree, but the server said the cook was happy to make it for me. Unlike the dish served at Sidecar Cafe, Zephrus uses penne pasta. At Sidecar, the lobster is blended into the white cheese sauce; at Zephrus, generous chunks of lobster meat are scattered on top of the pasta, so it looks as if the chef prepared the macaroni and cheese, sprinkled the lobster on top of it and then (as they do at Sidecar) covered the combination with toasted bread crumbs. Although I'm sure it would have made a great lunch, the portion I was served was more than enough for a hearty dinner.

Afterward, we decided we did want a little something sweet after all, so we split a cookie plate, which included three offbeat items: an oat cookie with a little dab of blackberry jelly in the center; a soft and rather large sort of gingersnap; and some fat little chocolate cookies that had a hidden surprise inside: a zesty kiss of chili powder that burst through the sweetness in a most tantalizing way.

All that you can't leave behind

I thought I had done a reasonably good job packing for a three-month trip. I brought along most of the essentials: my computer, several pairs of jeans, my camera, notebooks, enough toiletries to stock a bathroom, shoes for all occasions. But I confess that somewhere along the way during my extremely drawn-out moving process I must have bugged out, or something. I keep finding items I meant to put in storage. (Placemats? Who brings placemats with them on a trip like this? Oh, that's right -- I do, apparently.) On the other hand, I've realized I left behind things I intended to bring.

For instance, I have hanging in my closet nine pairs of white (and off-white) pants. How many people even own nine pairs of white pants? Who knew I did? (Not I!) But there they are, waiting to be worn. And, just in case Michael Phelps is around and I feel the need to impress him, I brought six bathing suits in an assortment of colors and patterns. There may be another one hanging around, waiting to be discovered: The yellow one I bought on Mackinac Island 13 years ago has yet to surface, but I sense its presence.

These strange circumstances came to my attention yesterday when I was talking to the house manager at the Vineyard Playhouse about job possibilities and she asked if I could usher at Thursday's show. "Do you have a white shirt and black pants?" she asked. Immediately, I replied that I did and went to the closet to confirm it. The black pants were right at hand (and if she'd needed me to wear white pants...) and the white shirt was -- hmmm. It had to be in there somewhere. Who would travel without a white dress shirt?

Answer: The person who made room in his luggage for half a dozen bathing suits and placemats.

So when I went into Oak Bluffs this morning for an interview, I had to make a quick detour into a clothing store to find a white shirt, even though I would guess I own at least as many white shirts as I do bathing suits. But when they are in a storage space almost 1000 miles away, they don't do me much good.

Anyhow, when I was in Vineyard Haven today I made a fascinating discovery at the Waterside Market, a cozy eatery located midway down Main Street. I haven't really eaten breakfast at any of the local restaurants yet: I tend to save my appetite for lunch or dinner. But I saw a corned beef hash special on their menu board and decided I'd give it a try. To be honest, I wasn't expecting anything out of the ordinary. But this was not the corned beef hash I am used to at all.

The Waterside cooks shave corned beef into little bite-size pieces and mix them into raw hash browns, then fry the mixture together and serve it with eggs. The result has much more of a pronounced corned beef taste than your typical hash, which usually involves corned beef and potatoes being mashed together into a chunky spread before going on to the griddle. This is another one of those ideas I'm definitely going to try out at home later.

Speaking of homes, some people have asked for a picture of the house where I am staying. Here it is. Isn't it stunning? It was just completed last year. My portion of the house is in the upstairs area where the windows are open. It's located in between Vineyard Haven and Oak Bluffs in a beautiful woodsy setting.

There's a lagoon across the street (that's what it's called anyhow). I only found this out when I was telling someone where I lived and he said, "Oh, you're by the lagoon." I said, "I am?" And yes, I am.

Crab-less Katama

Only a few miles away from the swanky streets of downtown Edgartown is the sprawling beach at Katama, which could easily be mistaken for Southern California. Unlike many of the other beaches on the island, Katama is wide and spacious and, when you look out into the distance beyond the waves, you do not see the mainland. Katama is not on Nantucket Sound or Vineyard Sound: It's actually on the Atlantic Ocean. Gazing out into the distance, you see nothing except ocean and sky.

The waves here produce foam that looks like liquid rock candy mixed with cappuccino froth: dense and crystal-white and sparkling. Above the sand you'll see thick fields of tall grasses and those ever-present wildflowers that seem to spring up wherever they can. Signs warn of the dangerously strong current, and they're not kidding. If you step just a few feet out into the water, you'll begin to feel the pull of the current around your ankles. This would not be a place for beginning swimmers to try their luck. I wasn't tempted to dive in, either; after walking through the surf, my toes were already tingling from the water's chill. One brave soul did take the plunge for a few minutes while I was taking pictures (if you look carefully, you will see his silhouette in the picture at the top). He told me the water "wasn't too bad, really," but I decided to stay on the sand anyway.

The general consensus seems to be that Katama takes its name from a Wampanoag word that means "crab-fishing place," although there wasn't a crab to be found on Katama this particular afternoon. There weren't even dried-up, sun-bleached crab claws or pieces of shells, which are a common sight on other beaches. If this is a truly some sort of hotspot for catching crustaceans, you'd never guess it.

What a perfect place this would be for a little late-evening star-spotting, though. The sky over Katama is glorious enough in the sunshine, as the many shades of blue blend together overheard and wispy clouds loiter lazily above the water. At night, it must be a dazzling sight.

Almost forgot

Here is the Edgartown lighthouse itself. I was so moved by the Children's Memorial, I almost forgot to share the photo with you.

I cover the waterfront

The weather was mostly overcast and rainy Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and the extended forecast promised more of the same for Saturday. So when I awakened this morning to a blast of sunshine in my window, I wondered for a moment if I was still dreaming. Thankfully not, and even better, the sun decided to stay all day, which made this a perfect day to visit the beaches and check out the coastline.

There was a Chamber of Commerce-sponsored event going on today called the Lighthouse Challenge, in which participants were dared to visit all five of the island's lighthouses over the course of one day. It wouldn't be impossible to do: The one at Gay Head is a bit out of the way and the one at Cape Poge is actually on Chappaquiddick, but the other three are all within a few miles of each other. I saw the one at Gay Head on Monday and I was curious what the others were like. But I did not want to pay the $99 fee to join the Challenge, so I decided to make my own trip around. I would have failed the Challenge: I only saw two of the four I needed to see. Even so, it was a gorgeous day and I wasn't in any hurry to get anywhere.

The lighthouse at Edgartown looks almost like a sculpture from a distance. It's rather on the puny side as lighthouses go. It's easily accessible from a sandy path that runs through a field of wildflowers and out onto a rocky footbridge that leads you out onto the little island where the lighthouse is located. The lighthouse is surrounded by a Children's Memorial, dedicated to all the babies whose lives ended shortly after they began. It's a project by Rick Herrington and the Martha's Vineyard Historical Society that was dedicated eight years ago. Many of the bricks in the platform around the lighthouse bear the names of children; in some cases, the babies did not live long enough to be officially named and the brick simply says something like "Baby T Honor." Fragments of shells are scattered around the area, rattling slightly in the winds coming off Edgartown Harbor. It's striking because it would be so easy to miss. I might not have noticed it myself if it hadn't been for the explanation in a display case near the lighthouse.

Visitors are welcome to tour the Edgartown lighthouse for a $5 admission fee, but I didn't go in because it looked like it wasn't much more than a spiral staircase leading up to an observation deck. The real scenery of note was down on the ground.

In contrast, you can't even get close to the West Chop Lighthouse, which is located on the outskirts of Vineyard Haven. Locked wooden gates and stern warning signs greet passersby. It's under the supervision of the Coast Guard (and Homeland Security, according to the signage) and they're not playing host to anybody, apparently. But that's in keeping with the atmosphere of the West Chop area, which is awash in expensive homes, private drives, private fishing docks, private beaches and that sort of thing. It's jaw-droppingly gorgeous and at the same time very "look but don't touch -- in fact, don't even look for very long, if you don't mind."

To wrap up the day, I had planned to seek out the lighthouse in Oak Bluffs just before sundown. I ran into two obstacles. One, I couldn't find the lighthouse, even though I drove up and down the coast. Two, when I finally thought I would settle for getting out of the car and getting some nice sunset shots on the beach, I realized I had left my camera at home -- I had been downloading some pictures and I'd forgotten to put it back in my bag. So I had to settle for snapping a few shots with the cell phone camera. Yes, even in a low-resolution format, the sunsets here are pretty ravishing. The one this evening looked as if the clouds were trying to mimic the wavy waters beneath them.

Will the real lobster roll please stand up?

Remember that lobster roll I showed you last Friday? Please forget it. It's nothing but a fake, according to the good people at Grace Church in Vineyard Haven, which serves up hundreds of lobster rolls every Friday evening (almost 600 last Friday, according to their sales chart on the wall).

"Some people make them with lettuce and stuff like that," one of the hosts told me. He made a sour face. "These are the real thing." One of his co-workers seconded that sentiment: "These are the best lobster rolls you'll find on the island," she said, proudly.

They are certainly worth waiting all week to get your hands on: It's a fresh-baked bun (sort of similar to a hot dog bun, but slightly more spacious and with more of a curve to it) that's overflowing with shredded lobster. There may have been a touch of mayonnaise mixed in to hold the meat together, but if there was, I couldn't tell. No celery. No lettuce. No shallots. None of the other "inauthentic" fillers used to pad out lobster rolls at other places.
The sale starts at 4:30 p.m. every Friday during the summer, and I was glad I showed up early: Within 15 minutes, there was a quickly growing line of hungry people.

Just down the street from the church is a bed and breakfast known as The 1720 House. It's an attractive building in its own right, but what really caught my attention as I was walking past was the driveway. At first glance, it looked like chopped-up tree bark scattered all over the place. Who'd use something like that on a driveway, I wondered? Well, not the people at The 1720 House anyway. Upon closer inspection, I realized the driveway was actually covered with ground-up shells, which, considering the property's close proximity to the beach, would surely be easier to come by than gravel.

By the way, the weather here has been so gloomy that islanders seem to feel a compulsion to apologize for it. "It's never like this, really!" one man assured me. Another told me this was "not like June at all." It's not as if I was planning to blame the natives for the seemingly inescapable gray clouds and frequent bursts of rain, although it's reassuring to hear that this is merely a fluke. A little sunshine would definitely be welcome sometime soon.

Here's something that happens to me regularly when I am out of town: I am stopped on the street by other out-of-towners who seem to think I'm either a local or Mr. Information. It's occurred several times in London (and boy, are the tourists surprised when they hear my very American accent!), in New York, in Los Angeles, in Toronto. So why shouldn't it happen here? And today it did. An apparently thirsty gentlemen asked me where he could find a good wine store in Vineyard Haven. Aha! A trick question! "Vineyard Haven is a dry town," I explained. "You'll have to go to Oak Bluffs or Edgartown. But both of them have several liquor stores." He nodded and went on his way and I felt really proud of myself for a few seconds for being able to give accurate instructions. If anyone needs to know where to find alcohol on the island, please track me down and I'll set you straight.

The second time around

Twice in one week is probably too much. But I was in Oak Bluffs this evening and I couldn't resist the Lobster Macaroni and Cheese at Sidecar Cafe. Happily, it was every bit as delicious this time around. Even better, I had my camera with me this time so I can show you what it looks like. If only I could make this photo Scratch-N-Sniff, but technology defeats me. Sidecar is a wonderful little place with very friendly service and delightful little bonuses, like the free white bean spread, olive plate and crostinis that came with the meal.

Was the meal the highlight of the day? Perhaps so. I awoke this morning to the unwelcome sound of pounding rain outside my window. The weather has been overcast and grim the past couple days, so much so that I've overheard salespeople and managers complaining that it's starting to cut into their business because everyone is staying home. Initially, the extended forecast promised a sunny weekend, but now it looks like the threat of rain will be hanging around (thunderstorms are predicted for tomorrow morning).

During a break in the rain, I ventured out to West Tisbury to visit a store called Citrine, which is one of the places being spotlighted in a piece I'm doing on exotic fashions. I didn't choose the story; it was an assignment, and I vowed to make the best of it, even though it was not something I would have picked for myself. Citrine turned out to be a little eye-popper of a place, with an impressive array of scarves and beads in any color you could dare to imagine. The helpful young woman on duty there gave me plenty of information and I managed to get back to my computer and file my story before my noon deadline, so that was a plus.

Later in the afternoon, I dropped by the Vineyard Playhouse in Vineyard Haven when I noticed the doors were open. Although their first production, "Fly," doesn't open for another week, some of the Playhouse people were busy getting items ready for a tag sale that will be taking place on Saturday. They're selling off many of their props and stock items that they don't have room to store anymore, and several of them looked quite nice. I think I now have plans for Saturday morning, in fact.

To wrap up a mostly mundane day, I dropped by Stop-And-Shop, one of the island's grocery stores. Months before I came here, a knowledgeable friend had warned me, "Wait until the first time you go grocery shopping..." and she was accurate: Prices on some of the items are, well, let's just say a bit startling. You have to remind yourself that you are not in a place where trucks can deliver day or night. Almost everything is brought over on a boat and the lucky consumer gets to bear a portion of the transportation costs. So laundry detergent that would have cost me no more than $5 in Portage goes for almost $7.50 here (ouch!) and a bottle of Absolut that would have been about $20 at most Michigan party stores is closer to $24 here. But there are still some bargains to be had, as I found tonight when I got 20 yogurts for only $10. I also noticed a box of Celestial Seasons tea cost just about the same at Stop-And-Shop as it would have at D&W in my old neighborhood.

There are also other surprise savings outside of the supermarket. Several of my co-workers and I went to the Capawock Theatre in Vineyard Haven Tuesday night to see "The Hangover" and paid a whopping $5 apiece for our tickets. No, it was not "twilight bargain" time: The Capawock regularly shows movies Mondays through Thursdays for this price. Apparently, the theater had been shuttered for many years until 2006, when the Hall family, which owns the property, re-opened the doors. I don't know how they fare on a regular basis, but the Tuesday night "Hangover" was sold out (the theater has about 300 seats by my guesstimate) and this evening's show of "Up" seemed to be bringing in a healthy crowd as well. The family also owns what I guess is meant to be called the Strand Theatre in Oak Bluffs, although the missing letters on its signage make it the Sand Theatre; it's apparently only open in the summer.

Words to live by

That's right: Take your stupid sandy feet home and clog your own drain! We don't cotton to such shenanigans at Oak Bluffs beach!
This sign is in one of the bathrooms outside the Steamship Authority office in Oak Bluffs. I don't like to think of myself as the sort of person who goes around snapping pictures in public restrooms, but I could not resist getting a shot of this memorable message.
I spent a fair amount of time in Oak Bluffs today, looking at clothes for an article I'm doing on exotic fashions. Oak Bluffs has several shops that specialize in unusual attire from around the world, such as Glimpse of Tibet and Third World Trading Company.
But the real "news" came when I stopped to chat with a guy outside an Irish-themed bar not far from the beach. In the midst of our conversation, we were joined by an elderly couple who happened to be passing by and shared what the wife said was "inside information" about the rumored visit of the Obama family to Martha's Vineyard in August. She had talked to a friend who knows a family with whom the Obamas are friendly, and this contact assured her that the Obamas are not going to be coming. It seems the Secret Service checked out the island and decided it would be extremely difficult to secure, so they've advised against a visit.
This would be a heavy blow to the many merchants around the area who have prominently placed Obama-themed T-shirts, books and artwork in their storefront windows. But they may not have to weather the disappointment at all; it turns out the Obamas are not vacationing here -- unless they are.
"They still might show up," the woman said because there's always the chance they'll work out some sort of arrangements with security after all. So basically, nothing is set in stone, although she added that there has been so much speculation about the visit that it's apparently made Obama's people very nervous (and the island businesses very excited).
A little word of advice to the Obamas, in case they do decide to drop by: Please don't wash your feet in the bathroom sinks. Sand clogs drains, you know.