20 hours on Martha's Vineyard

We left for Martha's Vineyard in the rain. The biggest problem with getting here is getting here. There's no decent way of doing it from Philadelphia without chartering a private plane. Here are the choices:

Fly to Boston and then change planes and fly here. That can be done all on JetBlue (which we're doing next week) or on American and something called Cape Air, which flies 9-seat twin engine prop planes back and forth all day and charges a bloody fortune ($200-300 for a 25 minute flight).

Drive to Washington or New York and take a direct flight. There used to be one out of Newark, which was how we always came, but they stopped that 10 years ago, so we'd have to go to JFK, a 2 1/2 hour drive.

Go to North Jersey and take a boat. This takes about 5 hours and is a good way to do it if you want to be completely hammered by the time you arrive. Great party in good weather and pukefest in bad.

Finally, you can go to Quonset, Rhode Island and take a 90 minute ferry ride. You can drive there, which we did last year, take Amtrak to Providence, or fly to Providence. This time we flew. Driving is the cheapest way, flying is next best.

It's an ordeal of sorts no matter what, but pretty much the moment we arrived here the weather turned beautiful and so far has remained so. My older daughter and her boyfriend had arrived the previous day and were just chillin. I say that from time to time but it looks weird when I type it.

We hung out at the house for a while and I swam in the pool for a few laps. Then we went into Edgartown, one of the 3 big towns on the island, and the one with the most nice stores and restaurants. We made an obligatory stop at the Black Dog shop, and I actually bought something, a bike jersey that is guaranteed to make me the envy of everyone I pass. And nobody will pass me because they will be transfixed by its coolness. I don't know. I don't have an overabundance of bike jerseys and this was a nice one.

We strolled around and eventually were lured into a skin care shop by a smooth-talking, handsome gay Israeli guy, who softened our hands and made all us smell really good. He showed us his (gorgeous) boyfriend and offered to be Facebook friends. We bought some scrub to reward his excellent salesmanship.

Eventually we had dinner at a good, if overpriced, restaurant and toddled home. It was almost midnight by the time we got back, in part because I took a wrong turn. It was a very nice afternoon and evening.