A view from my new office, Nov. 5th. It sure beats the white stucco wall I stared at from my last desk.If in fear or in doubt, flap your ass and get the hell out.
A grudging smear of grey begins to appear outside. Those glorious summer mornings of soft light and singing birds are over. It is an autumn dawn. Our Thanksgiving weekend is over. The emergency sirens down on the highway are quiet now, the carnage has ended for the moment. It was constant all weekend-long. There is a threat of rain and we know that, of course, it will be bucketing down on Friday, our moving day. That forecast hasn’t flickered. I am beseeching the weather gods otherwise.
The control center, Uhuh!
We walk around in here sideways, between the stacks of boxes. Jill has done a magnificent job of extricating our possessions from under beds and out of cupboards and shelves. Each box even has a printed label which notes the destination room. We inherited our daughter’s belongings. She seemed to have a fetish for suitcases. I muttered this morning that we have more of those than a train station. They’re all bloody full! I swear that this will be the last move of my life and that I may as well try to enjoy it.
In Chemainus, our neighbour community, I discovered this. For a moment I was back in Foshan, PRCDowntown full moon. Itis called the greasy lens effect.Clearer now?Dunrovin? Why someone burned a backpack has got to be a good story.
A week later. We’re still walking sideways between the stacks of boxes but they are diminishing. I, of course, am finding things to repair and adjust. We’ve both had extremely nasty colds and there is little happiness in our new camp. But it will come and the dogs are thrilled. They seem to love the space, especially in the back yard. They race about as if they’ve grasped the notion that it is all theirs. There have been spectacular moon rises and I am sitting at my monstrous new free desk looking at my spectral image in the window’s reflection. It is nearly 7am and once again there is the faintest glimmer of grey dawn over the harbour. It will slowly evolve into an overcast morning but even that view is a huge treat to me. So long as I can see the water and boats going about, my world is fine.
At the end of October, beds of these beauties still bloom as they first appeared in August.The last California PoppyAnother type of California Poppy. It is often called the ‘Fried Egg’ flower.Moving Day. This single shot says it all. We did have a fantastic moving crew from the “Take A Load Off” company. Thet certainly impressed this old grump.
The days rumble past with an endless plethora of odd jobs and eternal unpacking. There is an occasional frantic about something misplaced but then it reappears. There are also a load of handyman jobs. I’ve been horribly ill for the past three weeks and every tiny effort is massive for me. The grudging dawns continue. I enjoy being up in the inky black pre-dawn and watching the sky lighten. There is what appears to be a large beautiful Krogen yacht anchored in Dunsmuir Bay. It has been there for several days. I can see its anchor light, a tiny speck in the blackness. How I wish that was me out there. Life without a boat is terribly dry but I do have this wonderful new office, something I’ve dreamed about for years.
Today is finally the one when we are promised to learn the outcome of our Provincial Election.
Ten days after the polls closed, some ridings are within a handful of votes between the two parties, it is that close. I, for one, am happy it’s turning out like this, political arrogance cannot continue to run this wonderful province into the ground. Either the NDP or the Conservatives will be just as bad. So long as they get on with the business of government instead of throwing poo pies, we’ll be all right. At least, for once, there was an enthusiastic voter turnout. The teeter-todder of democracy was tipped with twenty-seven votes in our provincial election. Getting out to cast your ballot does make a difference. Then, on November fourth, an uncounted ballot box has been discovered!
Imagine the T-Rumping coming up south of the border.
Hallowistmas. I’m sure the Easter Bunny is lurking somewhere in there. Nothing is sacred!Our resident stinkbug.The house spider. This wee cutey was about two inches long.
And that’s it for October. I’m now sitting at my desk and making faces at the reflection in my black, black window. I went to bed too early. Time has just tripped over midnight and fallen into November. It is tweak the clocks back weekend. Wasn’t it bend them ahead time just a few weeks ago?
THIS is what time it is!A river runs through. It is always uplifting to see the annual drama of the salmon.A bouquet of morts. Salmon soon expire after they spawn. The cycle of life is done, a new one begun. Their remains enrich the streams and forest. A dubious aroma fills the damp autumn air.My two splendid wee nurses. What amazing friends!Dawn at the writer’s desk.
“Time is a created thing. To say ‘I don’t have time’ is like saying, ‘I don’t want to.’” – Lao Tzu
Your funnel’s rusty. Detail of an old steam locomotive in Nearby Duncan.
I watched part of the televised Provincial political leader’s debate. Ho hum! Frankly if those characters are the best we can do for leadership, we’re screwed. I shut off the television in despair. Cream may rise to the top, so does scum. What more is there to say? Life goes on regardless of who is in the saddle. I am not at all politically astute but I’ve been watching the game for a lifetime. I’ve learned that seldom does a candidate get elected. It is usually about someone being voted out. I have also come to believe that it is usually those who do not vote who decide our political future.
Other countries have massive violent protests for the basic right to vote freely and without intimidation or corruption. They die for that freedom. We live in such a broad comfort zone that many of us can’t even be bothered to participate in the democratic process. Today is the first chance to vote in the advanced poll. I’ll be there, if only to renew my license to bitch.
You’re scaring me! So tempting but I just can’t be sure which is safe.I’m sure that some readers have had enough fungal photos. They fascinate me obviously and are within my range at the moment.Crusing the fast fungus food strip.
It is moving time. The burly men will arrive in a week. We’ve busy packing boxes until the place is stacked nearly to the ceiling. Where the hell did we have it all squirrelled away? What did we use it for? Do we need it? Why are we determined to hang onto to crap we didn’t even know we had? I’ve written essays about owning “stuff” and here we are hard at it. I’ve been busy building fences for our dogs at the new home. I’ve also been hauling over ancillary possessions that can sit out in the rain. Fortunately the previous owner has graciously allowed me to do that and also given me access to the workshop to store the tools I need.
I’ve been fighting issues with chronic fatigue so I’m most grateful to have this opportunity to do important things, but at my speed. There is no way we’d have accomplished the change of nests within the tiny time window allowed before we had to be completely moved out. I watch the evening TV news and realize that a Palestinian or a Ukrainian would love to have my problems. There are millions out there who can’t even imagine a conundrum such as I have. A place to crawl under a tarp and a drink of water for their children is a high hope. And I’m pissed off that at two in the morning I can’t sleep.
A half-inch wide ball of wonder.New blooms in October.
I did go and vote today. The line of voters was long, apparently all day. It kept moving and more kept coming. What a wonderful thing to see such communal enthusiasm! It is said that change only occurs when the fear of the future is exceeded by the pain of the moment. Has the price of living here finally got our wheels turning? We’ll soon know. At these words a volley of fireworks has just broken out on the street. It’s the revolution!
You’re new in town. Nice textures!Shroomy way.A mid-fifties Studebaker coupe. So ugly it’s beautiful.Trent River, Vancouver Island. No salmon just yet. Maybe one more rain will swing the deciision.
So, it’s a Halloween election. Trick or treat?
I was impressed. Halloween fun at the Duncan Logging Museum.
“Not voting is not a protest. It is a surrender.” Keith Ellison
Blooming in the rain. Blackberry blossom in late September.A souvenir, but I drank it.Thai apple drink in a Creston restaurant. It was good.Pub special. Chicken breast in buttermilk batter on a candied dougnut with fries. Bluuurph!
I was out the door and walking across the parking lot when I realized I had no limp. Wow! First time since my knee surgery three months ago. Funny what happens when you’re distracted from your problems. Swimming some lengths in the local pool fixed that limp; it’s back. I drove home from the pool into a cloudless sunrise. On the corner an old man with a lab pup signalled which way he was going so as to keep me from waiting for nothing. A considerate citizen! He got a thumbs up from me. My morning medication routine produced a blood sugar reading which was lowest ever. Incredible! A perfect morning.
Decisions.They’re back! Sept. 21st. First day of autumn.These beauties always appear at the end of summer.Arbutus trees, a favourite of mine.He was the black toadstool of the family.
We’re deep within the rushing current and back eddies of selling and buying homes. A building inspectors is coming in a few minutes to look at our present abode, Monday repeats the process on the new one. Well, it IS 67 years old. Properly built with old growth full dimension wood, (A2x4 is actually a full 2” by 4”). Floors are built with diagonally-nailed planks. Nothing but solid lumber everywhere.
I prefer that to the new slap-dash houses which are built entirely from OSB board, stapled together in the pouring rain and then put up for sale at an unbelievably high price. When we arrived on Vancouver Island forty years ago, houses sold at an average price of $40,000. Now the number has risen to $750,000. Has our money become worth that much less? I guess there is no point in asking questions that have no clear answers. The people we’re told to trust can’t, or won’t, answer them either. I still choose to believe we live in one of the best places on the planet. We’re still free to leave. Nobody is shooting at us yet.
A fashion statement? I have little idea of which fungi are safely edible, so I don’t.Munch brunch. Before the slug came, a deer has taken a few bites. Interestingly they never eat the whole thing, choosing to take a sample of each. It must be nature’s way of leaving the fungi to survive.Another peek at the huge microscopic world of the forest floor. There is always plenty going on.Change of season in a domestic garden.
This morning the rain is hammering down. Someone must be building a house out there. Haar! The moving process goes on with one more thing and then one more thing. The tedium builds. There are a few more days until both the sale and the purchase “close” and the agreements are inscribed in stone. Then we sit and wait until moving day when “possession” occurs and we then have a few hours to move our stuff from beneath one roof to beneath another. In the meantime boxes of stuff rise. We’re moving about three blocks. It is as much work as moving across the country. Bets on which day it will rain?
There was a time when all I owned fit in my backpack. Then it got to be the back of a pickup truck and half of that was tools. We’re like crows sitting on a wire. Too busy looking for something else shiny to peck at, we’re completely unaware that fifty thousand volts are running between our toes.
From whence we come.It’s still a jungle out there.A solid union.
Finally the macrame trail of paper work is complete. I’m now sitting at my desk in someone else’s home. My house is now around the corner and down the street. It is still almost a month until we can make the move. Hurry up and wait. Somewhere in that time there is an election but there is no-one I want to vote for. But I will, if only to renew my bitching license.
Both deals are now fully completed. “SOLD” stickers are on the For Sale signs out on the street. Let the packing begin. What’ve we been keeping these for? Stuff!
Truffle hounds. Hey, what’s a truffle?Ever get the feeling that you’re being watched?
Home is where the heart is…even if you can’t remember which box you packed it in.
It is a beautiful September morning. I’ve been on the phone for a very long time working on my insurance claim for a replacement drone. It seems the people who sort-of interact with you turn ying to yang and then back again. Long pregnant pauses precluded more new instructions about how to upload flight data went on forever. First I needed a special cable to connect my cell phone to the drone remote control, then I did not. It went on and on. All’s well that ends. But…I’m not sure it has. Two weeks later, my replacement drone is supposed to arrive today; but now it has been delayed. But what’s more persistent than an old man with no place to go?
Making beaver cookies. This will upset the tree huggers! Developer beavers!The intrepid explorer.Fire Moon. Passing through the Kootenays last month under a smokey sky. (Not a bad photo for a hand-held cell phone)
Losing that drone skewed my entire prairie trip. I wanted to teach myself to fly it well and record some good drone footage. Nothing was life or death but someday it might be and I want my flying camera ready to rock. Hopefully I’ll be entirely on cue. Of all the airplanes and other machinery I’ve operated I have never needed a mobile phone or a QR Code or an Asian accent to make things work. I am missing something in all this AI gobbledy goop. ( By this computer’s AI, AI is not a spelling error, gobbledy is) Perhaps I should return to Drumheller AB and find a job as a dinosaur. “Alive! Living and breathing just as it came out of the swamp: Phredophartaus!”
Old growth in the forest.
Home again I find our local world immersed in a provincial election circus. This has become a two-pony race. The incumbent NDP party seems determined to run a shit-slinging barrage against the provincial Conservative party. They respond in kind. In my opinion, if a political entity starts muck-raking against a political opponent it has dismissed itself. If you cannot build a platform based on your positive aspirations and what you intend to do for your constituents, then go to hell. It demonstrates a lack of integrity. You have nothing of value to offer anyone! The conservatives emailed me today to ask who I was voting for. I replied that it was none of their damned business and now they were down a vote for Rustad. BUGGA!
Here today, gone tomorrow.Oregon Grape. This has been a fantastic year for these berries, but like this year’s blackberry crop, most are unpicked. I hope they’ll be winter food for the birds.
Our home selling and buying endeavours are a confusing muddle. I’d much prefer to haul my wee trailer over the horizon and not look back. All this manoeuvring for much more room than you need to live. The rest is to store, or display, all the stuff you don’t really need. I presently have rented a 20′ shipping container to re-move a load of stuff. I’m OK, I have stuff. The storage yard bulges with folk’s belongings that are rotting into the ground. There are RVs there which have not turned a wheel in years. I wonder at the devilish simplicity of that industry. No sales force, no financing, no warranty, low maintenance, and if a client walks away, you now own their stuff. It is a perfect capitalist storm.
Ram Rough. No air bags but I’ll bet it’s almost paid for! Note the original wheels and daily driver license plates.My shamrock plant at night time.Same plant in the morning. It happens every day.Snot funny. More autumn fungus.Stone Face. There is a phantom carver who goes about etching selected rocks. They’re subtle until eventually they jump out at you.
Meanwhile the tedium of buying and selling a house goes on. Each day another potential buyer wants to see our house near mid-day. The remains of the day become collateral damage. We fuss about cleaning the joint yet again until it is tiddly spotless then bugger off out to waste some time in the midst of another beautiful day. It’s tedious. We now know half the houses for sale on Southern Vancouver Island. The quotient price is near a million. Few vendors do much to enhance the “curb appeal” of their property. Take it or leave it. My instinct screams to move back onto a boat despite all the dark logistics of that lifestyle. What a strange culture. We constantly struggle with an obsession of becoming rather than cultivating the wonderful art of being. Dogs have it all worked out. We just have to pay attention.
None of these here. Yet! This was happening in Manitoba last month. Perfect for the crops.THEO. A new friend on the trail. He was giving me some bark therapy, What a beauty! He is a corgi/chihuahua cross and about the size of the latter.Artificial Intelligence replacing the human unit one treat at a time.
Today is our most precious possession. It is our only sure possession.
I got up early to catch the ferry. With the wait in the terminal it took half a day to get across to mainland Canada. I spent the actual two hour crossing in my own dark, cool, comfy bed in my trailer. I have my own bathroom so there was no need to go to the upper decks for anything. What they don’t know won’t hurt them or me. The drive eastward was hell. With clear blue sky above It was hot and smoggy. The traffic was horrific as I drove through the murk. There is random construction. The roads were clogged both ways. Nearly everyone is a road warrior and recent gruesome fatalities on this highway slowed no-one.
A clever homebuilt expedition vehicle from Nevada. I had to stop. SWB, 4×4, diesel, someone smart fitted a trailer to the flat deck to make this beauty. Don’t laugh, she’s paid for!
So, finally I made it to Hope. Now all fuelled and grocery-ed up I’m parked in the bushes beneath the Hope slide. Odds are, all those car- sized boulders perched thousands of feet above me will stay put for one more night. If not, well it is meant to be and it probably won’t hurt a bit. I am just off the highway but well hidden. The flies are bitey friendly and it’s toasty warm (31C) but once it cools down I’ll go to bed in hope of an early start. My little truck clearly does not like dragging the trailer up long steep grades on a summer afternoon. Even the front fenders were too hot to touch.
Faces in the rocks above at the Hope Slide
My early start shuffles past eight o’clock. Rain spattered sweetly on the roof through the night. Now thunder rumbles and echoes between the towering cliffs above me. The purpose of this frivolous trip is to visit a dear old aunt in Manitoba. I am doing this on the generous means of my dear wife. I have to remind myself that I am to meander, there are no deadlines and I need to restore my soul which has suffered after two dreary years of death, illness, surgery and poverty. Just be, old man, just be and remember, how you once travelled with a backpack and your thumb. Best years ever. As for Jill, getting me the hell out of her face must be a reward on its own.
Forest fire smoke has proven to be a constant all the way across the prairies.
Yesterday’s inferno has passed for the moment. There were spatters of rain through the night and at the break of day it was gloriously chilly. I ( had hoped to drone the Hope Slide but the wind was gusting and there were squalls of rain, neither are good for the drone, especially at the hands of a rookie. I headed east and groaned up one long, steep grade after another. The engine wanted to overheat on each one and I stopped more than once to cool things down. The worst was the zigzag crawl up to Anarchist Summit from Osoyoos. All the day long the temperature was as hot as yesterday and thunder rumbled overhead. Finally, nearing Greenwood the truck began to steer oddly and once in town I discovered a nearly flat rear tire. I changed it myself as thunder-rain spat down. A lady stopped, but not to offer help. Her dog was missing. Gabby the collie had run off. I hope that girl is home safe and healthy.
The grind up from Osoyoos called Anarchist Hill. “Oh Lord, your hill is sooo big, and so is this damned trailer!”
Now in Grand Forks, I am parked in a large feral field beside a fleet of logging trucks. A young boy is riding his tiny motorbike, with training wheels, round and round in a cloud of dust. A friend tries to follow on a small electric John Deere tractor. I’ve been told that I can stay here by the folks at KAL Tire. I wheeled in there with my sick tire just before closing time and wholly expected to be told I’d need a new one. They could have, I wouldn’t have known. It was simply a bad valve stem. They refused to charge me. It follows that I inspected the other three tires and they need the same treatment. I’ll go back in there asking about the problem with being nice to a pain in the ass. Of course the answer is: they come back! I have a friend here whom I’ve known for fifty years. A visit is due. I already like this town and mucho kudos to the tire shop boys.
A smokey moon over Grand forks.
The next night finds me parked in a gravel pit beyond Yahk, which is not at all romantic as it sounds. My poor little truck staggered up the numerous long steep grades. If it were a mule it would be on its knees with tongue over shoulder. It is frustrating when you cannot go over 50kph whenever and wherever you’d like just like all the folks passing you at 140 kph. I just don’t want to cook my motor. There was a car and then a motor-home burned to a crisp along the roadside. I got the warning. Haste makes waste. In days past, even at my trundling speed it might have taken two weeks instead of two hours. From the top of the passes you can see valleys and mountains stretching into apparent infinity. The smoke adds a mystic touch to the scenes. It is still hard to grasp how big our single province is. There are all those others beyond. The grand thing was being able to smell the fragrance of the sub-alpine forest at the summits, those indelible aromas of balsam and spruce and buck brush that waft out into the summer air. There must be an air freshener called ‘Alpine.’ What memories those aromas bring!
You just never know what you’ll find. This delightful fusion of odd bits is in the lovely bakery in Greenwood.This one too! A twang for your coffee.
In the morning it turns out I’ve backed into a spot on the edge of an impromptu fire-fighting depot. A helicopter comes and goes and I remember my heli-days so long ago. One whiff of jet exhaust and the clap of rotors brings so many recollections. That was me? In a single life?
Still a thrill for me. Helicopters have always amazed me and later ones are an incredible blend of technologies.
The day wears on. Leaving Cranbrook, a lovely spotted fawn suddenly appears in front and there’s no chance to stop. There is the expected sickening crunch and I bound out to have a look. The fawn has disappeared and truck in not damaged. It is not my fault but I feel sick for the rest of the day. I wonder what happening to this once great white hunter.
Finally at the Frank Slide, just into Alberta, I stop and get out the drone. This is where an entire half-mountain crumbled and buried the town of Frank. Itis horrific. I’d promised myself to make this my first good drone footage, so first a test scan. Out a hundred metres, up fifty then I press a wrong button. The drone lands instead of returning home. The last image I receive is a bleary view between rocks. I activate the “Find My Drone” and go hobbling down between the treacherous rocks with my cane. I slip and fall, loose my glasses, manage to retrieve them from a narrow crevice. By the time I clamber over to where I think my drone is, my controller has a message that says a rotor was jammed so the drone has shut off its power to prevent overheating. No more homing signal. Then came the return clamber, empty handed and feeling like a very stupid old man.
The Frank Slide. There is an entire little town, and its inhabitants, buried beneath that crumbled mountain.I don’t know the story but it looked to me like part of a building sticking out of the massive lumps of rubble. Can you see my drone?It is a place that leaves one completey humbled.The limestone rocks are house-sized and smaller. Jagged, sharp, loose and dangerous it is no place for an old man with a walking stick.
Fortunately I’ve bought some insurance for just such an event but I do not feel any better. I was not employing my own advice about caution and certainly feel the diminished rookie.
Drive on old man, drive. Eastbound was a spectacular show of wondrous clouds, rainbursts, lightening, brilliant ladders of light between the clouds onto the foothills. They were all juxtaposed over columns of massive whirling windmills. I could not photograph any of it. The rocketing traffic made stopping too dangerous. Tonight I am parked on the side of the road at the former townsite of Whiskey Gap. It was a smuggler’s town in the 1930s. Now there are only cows bellowing from the ridge at the top of the coulee. A few miles back was a signboard noting the location of Aetna. But it’s not on the map either. This will be the norm I think.
In Fort McLeod. There’s a definite flavour of the old west.In the Silver Grill. A Chinese menu with margaritas.We’ve got your back!DRAW! Downtown Fort McLeod on a Sunday evening. “Git his boots.”
And so I progress into the prairies. I will meander along the southern roads and explore the beauty of this vast and windy land. It’s a long way from the sea.
” A ship is safe in the harbour, but that’s not what ships are built for.”
It’s gone. No doubt about. My first wee drone is buried in the jungle just above the beach. I know about where it is but I’ve looked for hours. Unless I know exactly where it is, there’s no hope. My bush-ape eyes are really good at seeing things in the wild but this little devil is about the size and colour of a fallen arbutus leaf. I could be three feet away and I not see the damned thing. There are millions of those leaves, the bushes and underbrush are thick and for all I know my little flying machine is stuck up in a tree. Damn me! I knew better.
The virgin drone pilot “He sat on the edge of the field looking like an old man who had lost his drone.” A drone’s eye view of the nut holding the controls.My home as seen from my drone. WOW! I live here!
I’m taking my expensive lessons and am turning them into something more valuable: what not to do! It is a bad habit I learned as a farm boy from a poor family. In an effort to save money I habitually go to what appears the cheapest route. Over a while, I end up spending far more than simply buying something good in the first place. It is said that to buy good clean fresh oats you must pay a fair price. Ones that have been through a horse cost slightly less. I thought I’d beaten the system by buying a slightly used virgin drone. Ha! The price of that is gone. There has been a lot of frustration and I have no drone. This behaviour is what keeps poor people poor. Buy one decent car every twenty years, or buy inferior ones before the last one is paid off. A quote I never seem to listen to is “If you can’t pay for it once, how will you pay for it twice.” Uhuh!
“I’ve got it up!” First flight of the new drone.Drone School. I actually bought a copy of ‘Drones for Dummies’ The foam was my innovation to protect the control sticks and the screen.Someone else’s toy. Prices start over $160,000 An Audi R8With a V10 engine in the back seat there’s only room for two people. OK! No roof racks please.
I’ve since learned that the first one I’ve bought has a wee habit of zooming off on its own, especially in the hands of a rookie. So, I’ve been wandering around with a look in my eye like an old man who’s lost his drone. Thazme! I’ve now gone and bought a brand new one for a tremendously good sale price, too good to resist. It is a DJI Mini 3. This manufacturer seems to hold a lion’s share of the drone market. When I first turned on the controller a screen appeared entirely in Chinese. My heart sank. I did not know what to press next. I’ve persevered and now bought the manufacturers insurance in event of damage or “flyaway” loss. I’m progressing slowly and have to admit that I’m a bit frightened of screwing it up again. But, there is an excellent manual written in proper English and there are several online video tutorials which actually show you good things to know. This wee flying computer has amazing capabilities. Samples of video footage taken by this product are stunning and I am actually a bit excited.
Teamwork.
Now get this. I’ve just watched a video that shows how to use the “Find my drone” feature. If I loose this expensive new puppy there is a mode which allows me to track down the lost bird by tracking it with an onboard GPS map and compass. There is also a button to push which activates an audio alarm in the drone. This klutz can’t ask for more. No it doesn’t work if underwater.
I’m determined to beat this flying brain. It may be artificial intelligence but it is smarter than my genuine stupidity. I am humbled but I am learning to trust its capabilities. In the meantime, I’ve posted my latest photo of a flower on my page on Fine Arts America. With over 700 images posted I am quite capable of posting my own descriptions. This time it wrote one for me in thirty seconds and was very articulate. Death of the writer approaches.
The seasons progress.July
While watching a video taken in a Mexican dance hall I noted one lady twirling about in the arms of her partner. As they danced her mobile phone rested on his shoulder while she texted someone with an ubiquitous thumb. Really! I can’t help but wonder what happens when she’s making love! “ Honey look, they’re having a sale!”
No! We have not abolished slavery! Our world spirals on. Black hole or toilet bowel we have to stay away from the edge.
I call it a Gravel Cosmos. I don’t know what this amazing flower is really named but it amazes me. It is rooted in bone-dry, baking hot gravel. It sits beneath the blazing oven of a white stucco wall. Begs a question or two about life don’t you think?
drone the male of the honey-bee; someone who lives on the labour of others, like the drone-bee; a lazy, idle fellow; a deep-humming sound; a bass-pipe of a bagpipe; a pedal bass; the burden of a song; a monotonous speaker or speech; an aircraft piloted by remotecontrol; to emit a monotonous humming sound; to talk at length in a monotonous or expressionless way; to say in such a tone. – Chambers Dictionary
Phew!
I ain’t no drone. I am a worker bee.
When I was a wee boy, very, very long ago there was one toy I coveted above all else. It was a little tin helicopter modelled after a Sikorsky S55. The real thing was a state-of-the-art heavy lift rotary wing aircraft. We had not yet begun to fit helicopters with turbine engines. This beast sported a massive radial pistion engine which thundered in the agony of overwork. By today’s standards, it was a club of a
thing barely able to lift much more than its own loaded weight, but it was what the world had. Anyway my toy appeared in both the Sears and Eaton’s Christmas catalogues. My heart burned.
The object of my intense desire was a small tin machine with a turning rotor on top. There was a long cable trailing out of its belly which ran to a small gearbox with a crank handle. If one spun the crank hard enough, the rotor would turn and the flying machine would rise into the air. To me, it was utter magic. I vaguely recall visiting someone at Christmas time and the boy of that house had just received one. All the toy did was fly the little bit that the driving/retaining cable allowed but it was my wildest fantasy. Imagination did the rest. I’m sure it would have soon broken, especially as I had a penchant for taking those tin toys apart. Metal tabs, gears, springs and adjoining bits never went back together properly. “Made in Hong Kong”, we’d sneer way back then. Ha! If only we knew!
The roundabout. If in fear or in doubt…put it in L for lurch and drive right over the bugger. Note the tire marks. In Europe these expedite traffic flow for millions of drivers daily. They seem to confuse many of us.Summertime by the lazy river.
Almost seventy years later I have something unimaginably better. It is humbling me. To enhance my photo and video efforts I’ve finally acquired a small drone. There were too many wonderful exploration and travel videos for me to resist. Of course, everyone sells the best and the information soon becomes confusing. Transportation Departments rightly have a set of laws about the size, type, and purpose of drones. There are licenses and certificates, just like manned aircraft. These can be avoided by staying beneath a weight restriction of 250 grams. Many birds weigh more than that but then most bullets weigh less than that. These toys need to be operated responsibly. Who me?
I do have an old and very dusty pilot’s license, long unused, so I understand what not to do. Stay the hell away from any sort of airfield ( 3 miles) stay away from people or crowds, respect other’s privacy and always bear in mind what invasive, noisy and annoying wee machines these are. I have actually waved a shotgun myself at one that once hovered persistently over my boat.
As for operating one of these machines skilfully, well I’m a pilot. Right? Flying a helicopter can be described as rubbing your tummy and patting your head at the same time. Flying any aircraft correctly is decribed as ” Using your superior judgement to avoid situations which require superior skill.” That’s while you are inside the thing! Add a remote dimension from a varying distance outside. Drones are an amazing amalgamation of computer intelligence and miniature electronics all compressed into a package about the size of a small box of candy and…..are quite affordable. They are smarter than I am and I do question my own value in the modern world. Well, others have mastered the necessary skills, so will I. So far I’ve pruned a large maple tree and crashed into the middle of a blackberry patch. I have retrieved the drone, cleaned off the green smears and recharged the battery. There will be another dawn patrol.
Just go for it.
It is the morning of yet another hot day. The dogs are already hunkered down. They know. Outside a murder of crows sing in their dry rasping voices in a chorus of foreboding. In the distance one mourning dove coos out supplications of calmness and I am instantly transported south to the desert where they thrive. I am always filled with longing for that land when I hear them. I have met folks here who hate their sound. I love it. But then while folks gasp about the heat there are thousands of these same people who pay big money in winter to go south for this very climate. A week ago these same characters were bitching about how cool the weather has been.
I’ll take it as it comes. What choice is there? I live in dread of the smell of smoke and choking orange skies. Maybe we should lock everyone out of our woodlands when the forests become so explosively volatile. I wouldn’t want some geek with his drone starting any trouble.
Summer angles in the skylightAperfect moment at high tide.Again please
So…. I’ve booked a techno man to come and sort me and my drone out. At least then I can blame him. But I can’t now. I took the drone to the beach in the early morning light and cool calm air. I hovered it steadily and took a photo. Then I zoomed it up to a hundred feet and resumed hovering. That is when it took a dive into the trees behind me. Thwack! Finding a needle in a haystack has nothing on looking for drone burrowed into the forest. Smile damnit!
See! I could make it hover controlably enough for me to take a photo. Then it was gone.
It is July 1st. The weather is perfect. The temperature is just right. My wee doggies are sleeping peacefully after our morning walk. The second half of the year begins.
Canada. It’s a big place. Go see it. It’s yours!
I’ve promised myself not to go on about recovering from my surgery. It is a tough grind with constant pain. Soon it will be down to the level before they rebuilt my knee and I’ll be able to feel it was all worthwhile. I can say that I am fully impressed with all the medical folks I’ve met. They have taken great care of me, promptly and compassionately. To constantly do what they do, all day, every day amazes me. Frankly, when I hear the incessant howling about our medical system I am angry. If you truly believe there is something better out there, go find it. Maybe a few days in Gaza, or the Sudan, or almost anywhere else is just what you need to change your perspective. Oh Lordy, we are SO spoiled!
My girls, my joys. What friends! they’ve really helped my recovery.
We live in one of the best places on the planet in consideration of political climate, geographic climate and economics. Most of our concerns are about pinpricks in our comfort zone and which we are too damned complacent to deal with ourselves. And the nicest thing about living in West Coast Canada is that if you are truly unhappy here, your are free to leave. There is no emigration quota. Good bye.
Meanwhile this old sack of spare parts is hobbling along toward a recovery as fast as I can. They’ve rebuilt me here and there through the years and the future is up to me. As is often said, “ If I’d known I’d live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.”
Zzzzzzzzzz. Monday afternoon siesta.
And so it goes. There will probably be fireworks in the harbour after nightfall. That will upset the dogs in town including our two girls but it will pass. The sun will rise in the morning and our lives advance. Happy Canada Day.
Old spare parts hisself. All rebuilt and ready for the next adventure. Photo by Jill
The old handle. It’s something I whittled out over dark and stormy nights in my boats. the ball bearing in the beak makes a good impression when necessary. The physiotherapist told me, in a room full of people, that I was using it wrong. WRONG!Bummer! You should see the other guy! This is the back side of the new improved knee. Dead sexy! Photo by Jill, what she has endured to care for me is beyond any degree of love. Thank you!!!This is what the knee feels like. Believe it or not, this was the main battery ground wire in my trailer. It severely overheated and it is a miracle that the trailer did not burn down. This cable was 2″ from the propane line. The cable was too light a guage and poorly fastened. I should have checked it months ago. Lucky guy! ASSUME NOTHING.
Way back while working on the tugs I regularly sailed with an engineer I soon named “Clickety-Clack.” Lord he stank! He was a good engineer, even enthusiastic, but his personal hygiene was not a priority. There was a reason. As a boy, he was heading for a local fishing hole on his bike when the home-made pipe bomb in his pocket exploded. That he lived is amazing. Missing an arm, a leg and a few other body parts, he healed and soldiered on through life with a cheery optimism. The noise of his prosthetics could be heard over the incessant white din inside the tug. Showering with only one arm and leg would have had to have been a huge challenge, especially at sea.
“Clickety-Clack.” Now that noise is me. I am hobbling along behind one of those lightweight tubular contraptions called a “walker.” The Brits call them “Zimmers.” And so I remember a former shipmate. My knee replacement surgery is already a week past. I came home a day later and have lain through long hours, night and day for the last week in a narcotic haze and a welter of pain. I finally clattered out today simply to stand beneath open sky. It was glorious!
In position. Libby, the light of my life. How i have been smitten by this wee dog.
Jill loaded me into her car today and hauled me off to a favourite pub in Crofton. It was a perfect day, the weather was flawless. It felt especially so after being housebound for a full week. That’s just not my style. It is summer solstice and I’ll be out there. I’ve shed that damned walker for a home-made cane and I intend to able to hoof over the hill sooner than anyone expected. SPRISE!
Everyone’s answer was: LIFE.
Most communities like to describe their hospital as the worst ever. There is one on Vancouver Island, which in repeated experiences, has proven to be such a place, but it is certainly NOT Duncan. The building is old and a new one is under construction but the present hospital crew are wonderful. YES I said that, the old grump hisself. ALL, to the last person, convey a sense that they truly care. The worst thing was a sandwich. The day before surgery wore on, and it was well into the evening before I could ask for food. I was brought a limp sandwich made from two slices of white bread which clung to a thick grey smear of protein-like substance. It was labelled ”Beef Sandwich.” Yum! I took a breath and swallowed it down, thinking of all those folks in Gazza. Burp, fart, all’s well that ends. I was hungry. Isn’t it amazing? How do we go into a shit-brindle brown monster building wholly staffed with total strangers and those who deliberately render us unconcious then cut up our bodies to reconstruct them? Trust? When you are in pain and fear, the risks you’ll assume are beyond reason.
Vultures circled outside the surgery window.
The surgeon, named Nimrod Levy, (REALLY) worked his magic fingers on my old bones and I’ll soon be leaping over the outhouse once again. My pal Nim phoned three times to follow up his surgery! Yes, three! He is a great guy with an actual personality. It’s restored a bit of faith for me. After my major heart rebuild, there were never any calls. Ever. Enough said.
PerriwinkleWater Shortage
I now sit in my living room now with my leg jacked up and inside an ice machine. It’s on the summer solstice afternoon looking out through the dirty swirls on the glass door. I’d just bloody cleaned that into crystal sparkles two weeks ago. Funny how that goes.
Les Pommes FeralSwamp gloryHow’d this character cross the road? I carried it. It was huge!
“ there is no better surgeon than one with many scars.” Spanish Proverb
Dark blue sails. A perfect tack into a perfect wind on gentle seas. Sitting on the beach, this old sailor’s heart aches.
I was leaving today. That was the plan. An important appointment out of the way, my birthday past, the open road beckoned and I would be gone, trailer and all. There is a dear old aunt in Manitoba whom deserves a visit and that shining idea has kept me going with something to look forward to. The borderlands of the Canadian Prairies are beautiful this time of year. Then the phone rang.
Finally, much to my surprise a date has been set for a knee replacement; June 20th. I was told “Perhaps in August” so yeehaw, there goes my summer. Maybe by sometime in August I’ll be out and about. I am not complaining, there are times when I want to take an axe to this throbbing horror so the notion of finally being rid of that incessant ten-pound toothache has great appeal. I know there is an ordeal of pain during the recovery that awaits me but all I see beyond that bridge is bluebirds and rainbows. UHUH! Ordeal or adventure; that attitude adjustment is entirely up to me.
Pipe birds. “Look at the pecker on that one!” The birds are sitting on wooden pipes four feet in diameter. They run for miles and supply water to the local pulp mill.
Meanwhile there’s a urine yeller peecup truck sitting in my garage. I’ve been thinking that I should take the rear brakes apart and have a look. I have not yet since buying it last fall. Thinking of towing a trailer almost half-way across Canader…. and being the former aircraft mechanic obsessed with preventive maintenance! Uhuh again. Then came a brake squeal and a clunking in one rear wheel. After beating the brake drums off I discovered a wonderland of black muck and rusted everything. Clearly the previous owner had regularly launched boats into the ocean. The brakes had been working wonderfully. How, I cannot explain. There is now black brake soot all over the garage floor and the knees of my coveralls. It’s all part of the familiar but with a knackered-up undercarriage and a lame hand everything takes longer than in the good old days. I clearly understand why old farts can be a bit cranky.
My liuttle shop of horrors; or is it a Taliban training center? Fortunately, nothing goes on forever. My strata neighbours loath me and my redneck ways. But, they don’t mind calling me to fix something for them! Almost all of them are nice people.
Then there’s the business of jobs like this and working with eye glasses. There is a challenge that comes when you’re humped over like a three-legged dog trying to fornicate with a greasy football. Your glasses, or goggles or spectacles, as you will, keep wanting to leap off your sweaty face. You grab them with one mucky paw and stuff them back into position but of course everything’s a blur now with goop on the lenses. Then the phone rings and you get an itch and then you have an urge to pee. The romance of it all, sweaty testicles. I meant spectacles, spectacles! After injuring my left hand in a motorcycle crash. My existence and survival have depended on that paw all my life. Now it is painful, weak and unreliable. All my days I’ve been life support for that hand and now it needs to retire.
The job is done, the brakes work well. Then a tree swerved in front of me.
No seriously, it’s all good. Then the handle for the engine hood release fell apart. It’s fixed. I checked online and a new electric Hummer is $131000. Plus tax! Think I’ll keep what I’ve got.
My wrench-bending days are coming to an end but I can appreciate other folk’s passions. I don’t know what make this car was once but it is NOT electric.
Just think, I was going to look for a copy of “ Do It Yourself Knee Replacement For Dummies” I’ve already got a meat saw and a hammer and chisel. It is truly wonderful what modern medicine can achieve. I’ve talked to folks who’ve had this procedure and they all describe it as worthwhile. So I take a breath and jump. I look forward to being able to walk confidently and explore beyond the end of the road. Head Bashed-In Wheelchair Jump.
Imagine the stories still held within this wee wooden rowboat. Feel the spring as wooden oars pull her forward and hear the gurgle of the passing sea water. Think of the loving hands that shaped her lines. There is nothing made in plastic to match it.To get anywhere, all those wee legs have to work together. That’s a political lesson!Got bugs. There were several of these nests one day. I can’t find a name for these pin-prick sized gangsters but I’ll bet they have a nasty bite.Warm and fuzzy. Peace and serenity, a harmless wee pup. This mini daschund ( smaller than pictured) chased a black bear away a few days ago. Libby is 100% dog, in all ways.Berry blooms in the rain. There is a deep slurping sound in the woods today.Roses yet to bloom.Remember that a weed is just a flower someone else doesn’t like.
“The only disability in life is a bad attitude.” Scott Hamilton
