Old Town Key West – O! The Garden Club!

O! The Garden Club!

Old Town Key West – From Our Corner

New post at the OTKW blog site:

From Our Corner

Please note that we will provide links for the remainder of this month from the G&B site, migrating to OTKW on December 1st.  if you wish to follow OTKW, please subscribe/bookmark, etc.

Thanks,

Chuck and the Pheebs. 

New Blog – Old Town Key West!

Here’s the latest – a blog about life in Old Town Key West.

Old Town Key West

Just click on the link and it will take you there!

Thanks,

Chuck.

 

Home.

I’d miscalculated the time involved.  After allowing for the +15 hour adjustment, total travel time was 24 hours door-to-door.  Pretty uneventful trip, which is the best kind in my opinion.  The plane arrived an hour early due to 130 MPH tail winds which allowed speeds of 650+ MPH.

I was carted home most graciously by our neighbor Jan (Yaan).  Upone rolling up to the house I was greeted by decorations in my honor:

Seems a good portion of the neighborhood has become accustomed to my presence.

Two banners were needed for all the salutations.

I’m not the kind of guy who “collects” friends.  Something about growing up on a dead-end street, spending summers in the north woods.  I’m not accustomed to these sorts of things.  Having said that, I watched a TED presentation on Living to 100+, and one of the key tenents of productive longevity is a solid social network of 6 or more friends.  According to the presenter, the average number of close friends in the US is down to less than 2; 6 or more are beneficial to one’s mental health.   If this is true, I am on a road to long life.

Thank you all – I really do appreciate it!

I woke up after a few hours of sleep, greeted by Key West sunshine and deep blue sky.

Backyard vegetation a sight for sore eyes.

Guam’s coconut trees were prolific  – yet there’s nothing like having your own.

Dorothy was right – there is no place like home.

 

In Transit

Today’s a travel day.  I’m writing from Tokyo’s Narita Airport, a model of efficiency in a chaotic world.

If all goes well, I should be door-to-door in 21 hours.  The problem is – I’ve a narrow transfer window at Hartsfield Airport, and if I miss it, I’ll have to spend the night in Atlanta.  The last two trips I’ve heard about from Atlanta to Key West (made by neighbors) resulted in an overnight.

I hope not – wish me luck.

From Japan,

Chuck.

True to Myself

Day in, day out I’ve asked many questions, I say
Only to find the truth, it never changes, I say
If you don’t deal with it, it keeps killing you a little by little, I say
Call me selfish if you will, my life I alone can live, I say, I say, I

Got to be true to myself, got to be true to myself 

– “True to Myself”, Ziggy Marley.

Three months. Actually, it’s more like 3 and a half; nearly 15 weeks.

This has been the longest the Pheebs and I have been apart in 25 years of marriage.

Frankly, it stinks.  I’m not doing it again, unless it’s a matter of life and death.

I’ve lived a life not unlike that of a monk for the past 15 weeks.  A spartan apartment, no television, largely cut off from friends and family save for a few minutes of contact at the beginning and end of the day.  Not much food (personal choice and it’s gone well, thank you) and little more than water to drink.

It’s given me time to think.

Conclusions?

Well…

1) I’ve not taken as good care of myself as I should have.  It’s been something put off for another day; an assumption it’s something “old” people have to do.  As I approach my 51st birthday, it may no longer be ignored.  Like a relationship, it’s something one must work at every day.  Vertebrae in my lower back shall be a reminder of this to the end of my days.

2) I’m not living on the mainland.  Ever. Again.  Island life suits me just fine.  No, not the come-into-town-over-a-weekend-and-drink-one’s-brains-out island life, but island life where everyone knows everybody, and people take care of their own.  It’s what life was like in Small Town America before the advent of McChainStores/restaurants/services/TV.

I had a vivid dream as a teenager about a place, a place with wood frame houses close together and white picket fences.  A place where people spent time on their front porches, a place where colors are bright and personalities vibrant.  Thankfully it’s on an island, an island called home.

That – and I don’t have to wear socks.  I hate socks.

3) I like being the captain of my own ship.  I was an owner in a mid size corporation once, and I liked it.  I liked being able to chart the course.  I liked being responsible for a staff of people whose livelihood depended on my navigation skills.  I had the helm during some of the toughest times in the industry we served, and I’m very proud of the fact we made money without laying anyone off.  

4) Conversely, I’m not a large corporation guy.   Too many rules and regulations, with an emphasis on what cannot be done as opposed to exploring the art of the possible.  If it’s not something we’ve done before, the pat answer is always no.  The folks who get ahead?  Aside from the few at the top charting the course, middle managers excel by attending as many conference calls as is humanly possible.  Not my style.  Nothing much gets done on a conference call.

5) I enjoy helping people – making a difference, so to speak.  The best part of the work day were the mornings, as they were spent walking around the office just seeing how everyone was doing.  Some days this took 15 minutes, other times took half a day.  While I’m making a difference now (I believe) the linkage between action and reward is so tenuous as to be rendered insignificant.

I need to true to myself.  I’m out of balance.

I think sometimes we opt to immerse ourselves in some aspect of our lives in an effort to drown out the voice which says, “Hey! This ain’t right!”  Some people immerse themselves in work, others opt for affairs and some simply self medicate.  Each one a dead end.

So – that’s my task for the remainder of the year.  Figure out how to be true to myself.

I’m fortunate to be able to do this at the Star of the Sea with the woman I love.

 

7,500 Page Views and other Ruminations

Yet another milestone has been acheived this week – 7,500 page views.  It’s noteworthy, as it occured mere days before departure.  This has been a blog for family and friends; a way to keep interested folks abreast of life on this side of the world.

I’m shocked at the number of photos which have been taken; in three months of solo living, over 1700 photos have been saved, with perhaps about 300 deleted.  Two thousand photographs over about 100 days – that’s 20 shots a day.

I have become a better photographer for this, composing shots in my head in an effort to capture the essence of a place far beyond what a mainlander considers mainstream.

I tried to capture the essence of the place so as to give the reader a feel for what it’s like to be here – to experience this place, this Guam.

There is a rugged beauty, and it is sure to remain a part of my consciousness for the rest of my days.

I think it a place on the verge of discovering itself.  Long a military outpost, Guam is seeing a resurgence of Chamorro culture – a good thing.  At the same time, the current administration is in process of weaning itself from the federal government dole, choosing to focus its attention on Southeast Asia, Russia, and ultimately China.  With abundant natural beauty coupled with a part of the workd curious to ‘”see” the USA, Guam is well positioned to surpass Hawaii as a Pacific tourist destination a quarter century hence.

As the world’s growth engines shift southeast, Guam is at the doorstep.  I’m already hearing an increase in the Chinese language on the beach, and saw more Russians in the past week than I have all year.  This bodes well for the future of the island,

assuming pristine places remain the way they are.  I sure hope so.

This represents an end of sorts.  I’ve but one more full day left on Guam, returning Monday to the funk, color and camaraderie of Key West.  No decision has been made whether to end this blog – or – to start another one featuring a Lower Keys perspective.

In any case, the sun is setting on one of life’s chapters.  Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share the experience with you – trust you’ve enjoyed it.

Blue Water

“Wow!  It’s kind of shallow here!”

I’d recevied an email yesterday afternoon from Mike asking me if I wanted to go fishing tomorrow morning.  It’s Veteran’s day (Guam is a day early), and my client had a holiday.  I had an unplanned free day, so yes.  We went out.

We left from the Agana boat basin before dawn.  With only two public boat launches on the entire island, earlier is better.  On the way there, I witnessed a spectacular moonset – every bit at pretty as a sunset, albeit surreal.  Unfortunately my equipment was not up to the task of capturing the sublime event and I had a boat to catch.

Today’s trip was different.  Instead of heading south, we were to fish in the lee of the island as the combination of wind and waves were to be pretty choppy as the day wore on.

“So how deep is it?”  I needed to know.

“Well…about 300 feet.”  I guess when you’re used to fishing in 5,000 feet of water, 300 is shallow.

Mike sets every line as if it were to land a 500 lb marlin.  After spending a few days out on the open ocean, it makes sense.

These big Penn reels are tremendous instruments; if ever I were to follow in Hemingway’s footsteps and spend time on the sea, they’d be the first things I’d buy – after a boat, of course.

The weather perfect, vistas magnificent.

Mike took us up into the water north of Guam.  Rota could be seen in the distance – but not in this shot.

This end of the island is the exclusive domain of the US Air Force.  The beaches are truly the finest on the island – perhaps because no one uses them.

The first half of our fishing sojourn was a goose egg.  Nothing – not even a hit.

There’s an ocean current which passes close to the northern tip of Guam which churns up the sea much the same way the Gulf stream does.  There were times we looked at walls of water half again as tall as the boat.  No – no photos, as one needs every extremity to stabilize one’s position.

On the way back, fortune smiled on us.  We were able to land a pair of wahoo and a pair of mahi-mahi.  They’re both great eating fish, and the last mahi was closer to four feet in length than three.

I haven’t been feeling all that well lately, so I asked to call it a day at lunchtime.  Mike complied with some reluctance – I could tell he was going to head back out for more upon dropping me off.

I’m happy, though, as I was able to capture something I wanted to share:

Blue water.  The colors of the photo are not retouched (it has been rotated a bit to compensate for the boat’s tendency to roll), the water is actually this blue – and clear as spring water.  To land a mahi-mahi in this is to fight with a neon blue metallic beast – colors more brilliant than a mainlander could ever imagine.  No – no fish photos.  To photograph a mahi-mahi after its separation from blue water is to attempt to explain Technicolor or Kodachrome armed with a palette of black and white.

I now understand the pull of blue water.  I suspect it will hold sway over me for some time to come.

Beating Planned Obsolescence

Being a man of my word, we are about to embark upon our grand experiment in beating planned obsolescence.  Behold:

A restored 1965 Volkwagen Beetle.   This is an original black plate California car.  Why is that important?

Well, “black plate” refers to vehicles licensed in the state of California prior to 1971.  CA plates stay with the car its entire life; it’s a way to validate the car never saw snow or salted roads.  Makes the body solid, even after 46 years.

This one is the product of a 6 month amateur restoration, with a rebuilt motor, new master cylinder and wheel cylinders, new window rubber, fresh paint and,

A new interior.  While not fond of the black carpeting, it will do for a while.

What’s important to me? Floor pans have been replaced, and the car is nearly plastic free.

A gas gauge and a speedo – what more does one need?

The color is not a stock color, but it’s very period – and – very Pheebish.

As a matter of fact, mint green and white is about as Pheebish as it gets.

I like that it’s been painted in good old fashioned single stage enamel.  No nasty clearcoat to dry up and flake off in Florida sun, and pretty easy to color match when some drunk-assed idiot tourist whaps it at 2:00 AM.  Don’t laugh – it’s happened to us twice.  With a couple hundred bucks and a paint code, I can repair it in a week.

And it’s straight and shiny!  The Pheebs loves shiny!

It will get some tweaking (as do all my things-with-motors) but the tweaking will be minor.  Biggest short-term change will be a nice set of wide whitewalls, as this car will be the bee’s knees with a set of wide whites.

What did we pay for this little cutie?  Well – about the same amount as an eight year old Ford Focus with 100,000 miles on the odometer. The next big trick will be getting it home from Los Angeles, but we’ve done this a few times.  Hopefully we’ll have it in time for Christmas, as it’s the Pheebs’ big present…for the next five years, minimum.

Wish us luck!

Planned Obsolescence

I have an allergy.

I’m allergic to depreciation.  We own but one car, a 1996 Geo Tracker.  We bought said car as a ‘learner’ car for the girls; when we quit the mainland and moved to Key West, we sold everything save two cars – a magnificent 1995 Buick Roadmaster Estate Wagon, and the crusty-yet trusty Geo.

I have a couple of secrets I’d like to share with you, and the aforementioned car serves to illustrate them:

Secret #1 – The purchase of a new car is quite possibly the most asinine thing one may do with one’s money, save for perhaps gambling and snorting cocaine.  The estimated rate of depreciation on an average new car is over $500 a month – that’s money which goes away and never comes back. $17 a day spend just to have a car sitting in the drive – you’ve not insured it, no gas in the tank.  Tack on another $250 a month for insurance and fuel – now you’re at $750 a month.

The arguments for a new car are equally as idiotic.  “I want peace of mind – that it won’t leave me stranded, and that it has a warranty.” Horsepucky. Modern cars a stupidly bulletproof, and damned near every idiot I see driving down the road has a cell phone plastered on their ear – if one does get hit by the lighting bolt of mechanical failure, relief is but a phone call and a short wait away.  If todays driver’s had to endure the trials and travails if their motorist ancestors, hell…they’d never leave the driveway.

No – it’s possible to drive an older car some time and distance without issue.  Exhibit “A”:

A 1972 Opel 1900.  Paid $900 for it off a back lot in Southern California.  Used it as a daily driver for several years, then sold it in 2006 for $2500.  Did it break from time to time?  Yes.  Was it worth it?  Well, considering it was sold for more than the initial puchase price, maintenance and repairs…Yes again.  I drove a car for the cost of insurance and gas for 40,000 miles.  Closest comparison is my wife’s last car, which we leased for about the same amount of time.  Total cost of lease?  $9,000.  That’s easy math – driving Maggie the Opel was $9,000 cheaper.

Exhibit “B”:

Shortly after Alicia was born, I bought the Pheebs a 1956 Chrysler.  The one in the photo is a ’55 – a later acquisition.  I paid $700 for the car; I had to spend several months whipping it into shape, including a paint job.  It became the Pheebs’ daily driver for the next four years, and it  never left her stranded – ever.  I sold it for more than we had in it – yet another free car.

So – buying an older car is the hot ticket, right?  Well..not so much these days, which brings us to the next point.

Secret #2 – Modern (as in post 1970 cars) are designed to die.  Yes, that’s right – they are designed to fail after a given period of time.  It’s in their DNA.

Want proof?  Easy.  Go to Ebay, and type in Ford Galaxie.  See how many are available for sale.  At the time of this posting, 59 were listed on Ebay.  They stopped making them in 1970, I believe.

Now type in Ford Granada, followed by Ford Fairmont.  Add those numbers together.  The total at time of writing?  Three.

Ford Escorts?  Absolutely none of the first generation Escorts, built from 1981-1990.

 

How is this possible?  Well, as near as I can tell, around 1970 the automakers really started to use large amounts of plastic everywhere in the vehicle.  This plastic begins to break down 15-20 years out, causing all sorts of issues. Where plastic in the car is a significant problem is in electrical componentry; its degradation causes failure.  The gorgeous Estate Wagon at the top of the post was pristine, yet the plastic bits started failing all at once – load leveling system, harmonic balancer rubber, memory seat electronics, and then the last straw – an optically triggered electronic ignition system which cost $1500 to replace. Near the end, I was epoxying trim tabs and resetting trim moldings every other month.

To add insult to injury, the manufacturer stopped carrying repair parts after about ten years.  A $30,000 car new, it was impossible to maintain after the supply of parts ran out 15 years later.  It was, in effect, a disposable car – as are all modern cars.

The Geo’s DNA is in process of breaking down.  Plastic bits are as fragile as eggshells, and the stock of repair parts are dwindling.  Time for it to go.

The replacement?

Well, I learned something from my Dad.  He bought a car in 1973 – a car which he still has today…A 1929 Model A.  There’s virtually no plastic in a Model A (save for a Bakelite steering wheel and shift knob) and the aftermarket industry is strong enough that if one has a rebuildable engine block, one may build a complete car out of spare parts!  And no – after 38 years of ownership, the car has never stranded him, even when he took it to the top of Pike’s Peak.

So – how does one beat the depreciation and planned obsolescence bugs?

With a bug!  Early VW’s (pre 1967) had very little plastic, and since millions were made, it’s possible to build a bug with spare parts.  Full pan off resotrations are available for about $10,000, or the cost of a well-used car.

So – we look forward to whipping planned obsolescence into submission shortly by avoiding bad DNA and buying a car which, maintained properly, should last as long as Pop’s Model A.