Cape Cod Yearly Bucket List

My annual Cape Cod trip (aka giant family reunion right on the beach) is coming up and every year I put together a bucket list of things I want to do (including fitting everything in my suitcase). 

Here are some choice items:

• Get breakfast at the cafe across the street

• Get dinner with Moby Dick’s (a restaurant local to Cape Cod. Every year on the day we arrive my family and I grab dinner at Moby Dick’s and sit around catching up until the wait staff tries to politely communicate that it’s time for them to close)

• Grill (and eat) hot dogs. I love hot dogs. I freakin love hot dogs. I love hot dogs. Anyway, I don’t eat them very often. Once or twice throughout the year. I have more in this weekend than I do the rest of the year put together.

• Play canjam 

• I used to write down swim in the ocean but now they advise (very strongly advise) no swimming because there are sharks in the water. And they are quite large. I haven’t seen any great whites (though I believe some have been spotted) but one of my cousins traced a huge basking shark with his drone and we got to track his progress. 

• Swim in the pool. The hotel we stay at is very nice and comes with access to a pool and health spa. That means a lovely pool with geysers and waterfalls. That also means a hot tub, a sauna, a steam room and a small gym. Plus showers and bathrooms so I can take a shower there instead of my hotel room (which I often do but I’m not sure why).

• Go in the hot tub

• Have a smoothie. Oh yeah the health club also comes with a smoothie bar. This comes with alcoholic indulgences but your girl is sober so I’m just going to get a virgin pina colada and kick back in the hot tub.

• Play werewolf. Every year it gets harder and harder to find people to play werewolf as people get older. I get maybe it appeals to the younger demographic not to mention games tend to start really late and go really long. Also games can get intense. My cousin’s ex girlfriend once made me cry. People take social deduction games  seriously. And no one likes to be clocked as a bad liar.

• Participate in a sing along. There are Cape Cod classics. ‘“Friends in Low Place”, “Beer for My Horses” “You Never Even Called Me By My Name” Most of them revolve around drinking. Which yes happens a good amount at Cape Cod. People are always making runs to the liquid store and starting the day with Bloody Marys. In the past its been difficult but the longer I’ve been sober the easier it gets. Plus I drink nonalcoholic beer and nonalcoholic wine and mocktails and I use Bloody Mary mix to make my own cocktails.

• Enjoy lobster dinner. Every year we push all the tables on the beach together to make an extra long table and we have a lobster dinner. Do I eat lobsters? No. I just mooch off everyone's clambakes which include sausage, potatoes and corn. 

• Stay  up past one. It used to be that every time I went to Cape Cod I used to stay up to at least midnight. I was always put to bed “early” as a kid so for most of my teenage years when I shared rooms with my cousins I’d stay up far longer than my parents. Now I’m kind of boring. I get tired early and when I get tired I have to take my medicine and that makes me even more tired. But there is always one night when everyone’s in the mood for games or singing or the weathers so nice you can lie on the beach and look at the stars. So give me at least one of those nights.

• Enjoy a virgin bloody mary

• Have a crafting day with my aunt. This is a new one but my aunt (mother’s sister, hi Aunt Dorothy) reached out and asked if she could have a crafting day with Justin and I (the weather is supposed to be miserable). I’m not going to paint but I have a book of  brainteasers I’m eager to break out plus when I’m at Cape Cod I try to write two poems a day because its a really sentimental place (it reminds me of my grandparents who both passed in my teens. I have mentioned to Justin that when he proposes I would like it to be there). 

• Have oatmeal with my cousin. My cousin, Erica, has inspired me with all she has managed to do in her life. She was a professional wrestler, she wrote a self help book, she established a supportive gym and she beat breast cancer (i lost  my aunt to breast cancer). I’m so happy she is still in my life even if I only get to see her once a year.

• Learn a new game. There is a pretty cool puzzle  and game store (Puzzle Me This) in Provincetown so many of us have new games and we all play the best ones (I still love Throw Throw the Burrito). I always tried to get the smallest game so I can fit it in my suitcase.

• Flaunt my swimsuit. Last year I got a swimsuit that looks really good on me. It draws attention to my (large) chest away from my waist. And yes I need that.

• Go to Puzzle Me This and the Shell Shop. The Shell Shop is a beautiful little store that has shells of all types and sizes as well as jewelry. I have gotten nice earrings there (not that I need them anymore but if I ever get them pierced again I’ll have turtle earrings waiting for me).