Dave Barry Appears At The Tattered Cover Bookstore!

It must be Florida Week at the Tattered Cover Bookstore.  Friday night Miami Herald columnist and author Carl Hiaasen appeared at the Tattered Cover in Aspen Grove, and then last night humorist and writer Dave Barry appeared at the Tattered Cover Bookstore on Colfax Avenue here in Denver.  Barry was his usual funny self, and told humorous stories from his new book Best State Ever:  A Florida Man Defends His Homeland.  After telling tales of many strange events that have gone on in his state, he needed to add that that are many great things about Florida, such as the weather - except for hurricane season, which lasts roughly from June until the following June.  Barry said that hurricanes are definitely not funny, and that he went through Hurricane Andrew.  I myself was also in Florida during Hurricane Andrew.  My mother and I would sit in front of the television set in her condo in Stuart, Florida each night watching the news to see if the damn thing was going to hit us.  It wound up hitting South Miami and leveling the place.  My brother-in-law's brother Willie's house was completely flattened, as was the rest of the neighborhood, and he and his family spent the next two years living in a trailer parked in their driveway while the house was rebuilt.  In any case, Barry says one funny story did come out of Hurricane Andrew.  The house where he lived had a patio enclosed by a screen, to keep the mosquitoes from carrying off the lawn furniture, and each morning he would let his two dogs, Ernest and Zippy,  into the yard.  First he would open up the kitchen door, and then the screen door on the patio. After Hurricane Andrew, the patio's screens and contents blew away, except for the screen door.  The morning after the hurricane, he let the dogs out of the kitchen door as usual, but both dogs stopped in front of the screen door, even though there was nothing stopping them from just going around it into the yard, waiting for Barry to open it up for them.  His dogs, as well as most dogs in his opinion, are not very smart.  After speaking, Barry signed copies of his book and posed for pictures.  He was kind enough inscribe my book and also pose for the above photo.  Thanks Dave!