My wife and I returned from our vacation to Massachusetts and Maine on Saturday. We were glad to get home to our cats and Frankie was certainly excited that we were back. He has been ‘talking” a lot more than usual since we returned. The first thing I did was take Frankie for a walk.

Needless to say, he was happy about it.

My wife wanted to drive to the beach to see how the cleanup efforts were going after getting hit by two hurricanes. Things were far worse that I thought. We drove down some of the streets in Madeira Beach, and it was unbelievable. Almost every home had a large pile of trash in front of it.

We continued south until we reached our favorite beach, Pass-a-Grill. During the storm, a lot of sand was carried onto the streets. Most of it was cleared off the streets, but there were still several large piles in front of businesses. And then there was this pile and a similar pile nearby.

We also saw signs like this at the paths that lead to the beach.

Whatever was on the beach, it wasn’t your run-of-the-mill dangerous.

On the way home we saw this pile of garbage.

It was on some kind of park across the street from a condo development. I’m sure the people who live there are happy to see this every day. They must be trucking garbage here with the intent of moving it later. I would be surprised if this is gone before Christmas.

When we got home Frankie was more than willing to help us unpack.