I extended my trip to SQLSaturday South Florida for a couple days vacation. If I’m going to drive 3-1/2 hours may as well make the most of it.

• Stayed at the Sheraton Suites Plantation for two nights, fairly close to Nova. Nice hotel, parking was a bit of a mess due to a lot of construction right behind the hotel, should be fixed by next year. Would stay there again.
• Stayed two nights at Margaritaville Hollywood Beach. Second time there, my daughters love the pool and the slide. Fantastic lobby area. Arrived to see a Lamborghini and a McLaren parked on the side (both far out of my reach!). It’s a good hotel for pre-teen/early teen as its all gated and they can wander without much risk. The boardwalk (which is brick and concrete) is a nice stroll and we rented a side by side bike for a while.
• Tried Potatopia for lunch. Think Chipotle but instead of rice you pick some kind of potato (baked, sweet, tater tot, curly fry, etc) and they do have gravy if you like poutine. It’s all ordered from one of three iPads up front and that mostly works. The UI was good, but maybe not quite great. The concept overall? I don’t think it has the Chipotle magic, but I can see it doing ok. The inside design was ok, but writing this I was thinking it was more fast foody, a little like inside a food truck, but I think Im just comparing it to Chipotle!
• Also tried a new nitrogen ice cream place, Frostbite Nitrogen Ice Cream. Great decor, great ice cream. Only downside was because its a small shop the line to order/pay/pickup loops on itself when busy. The ice cream is really good, they pour the mixture in a KitchenAid mixture and freeze it with the liquid nitrogen so that it freezes quickly and very very smooth.
• Related to that, they also tried Dragons Breath. Frozen cocoa or fruit puffs, you put one in your mouth and you blow out vapor like a dragon. Hard to capture the hilarity at watching my youngest daughter try it and her sister laughing, then doubling the humor as oldest daughter tries it and watches herself while recording a selfie video. The ice cream was better, but this was worth the five bucks.
• Returned to Viva Brazil. It’s a $30 buffet where you get the meat at a window, all cooked on a rotisserie like you would see in most churrascarias. Decent, seems authentic, free parking, outside and the area is not great, inside is comfortable.
• Tried Grand Lux Cafe. Part of the Cheesecake Factory empire, it feels a lot like Cheesecake Factory, at least the one we went to, minus the killer selection of cheesecakes. For all that the food was good.
• For reading, I finished Command a Kings Ship by Alexander Kent as well as Facts and Fears by James Clapper, plus started on The Rational Optimist by Matt Ridley.
• I also read in interesting article in Fine Homebuilding about doing projects on budget every time (its behind a pay well, but has a free trial). My summary is that they just keep driving out uncertainty before they do the work, then they work the plan. Easy to say, but hard to do. Think about how many times we do projects where we don’t surface details until we get to implementation (it happened to me this week!)