Fishing and Framing

2011-03-25T10:00:00.000-07:00

Since I posted last, there hasn't been a whole bunch going on. I'm hoping I won't have to summer in Florida again this year; there is no place I'd rather spend the summer than in the southern Appalachians, and this year I might get to do just that.

My wife bought herself a new (to us) 1996 Volvo 940 turbo. It has been a good car so far and has proven to be easy to work on. The Mrs. was still in Florida, and I drove up to the NC to buy the car. I was enjoying the good gas mileage and get up and go compared to my truck for about three days when I went to have it inspected. At thisparticular inspection station you pull up to a stop sign in the front and a service tech drives it around back to commence the inspection process. The guy drove the car around the back and I went inside to read magazines and cavort with the other patrons. About five minutes later the service tech that had driven my wife's car around back comes into the office and asked me if I had ever had trouble with this Volvo starting. I told him he was probably holding his mouth wrong which got a chuckle. Turns out the in-tank fuel pump had gone out. I had it towed to a spot where I could work on it and after six hours and a $277 Bosch fuel pump the Volvo started right up.

I drove the "new" Volvo down to Florida to pick up the Mrs., my daughter and the 1976 Winnebago.
We drove both vehicles up to North Carolina for some camping and R&R without a hitch (unless you count money spent on fuel; that was a pretty huge hitch) and all was well in the vehicle world for a couple of months. We drove the Volvo back down to Florida in time to spend Christmas with my in-laws and the car was sort of surging while cruising. Not during acceleration, just when at speed. Turns out it was the oxygen sensor and after replacing that and cleaning the mass air flow sensor (MAF sensor) she's been running like a champ. This car gets 31 mpg at 60 mph over long distances. Nice little car.

As far as carpentry work goes, I've had very little, but I've enjoyed the few small projects I've done. I built some floral display cabinets for a store that needed to show fake floral stems in an upright position instead of hanging them upside down on hooks. Here's what I came up with. I painted them gloss white and they look nice for what they are. They hold a heck of a lot of floral stem inventory, considering that the metal fence is 1"x1" square. The entire storage area is 24"x79". I was happy with the results. So was the store manager.

Alright, that's all I have for now... good to see ya!

Springtime events in the Florida Panhandle...

2010-06-20T04:01:00.001-07:00

It's been an eventful few months in my life here in the panhandle of Florida. My wife has given birth to our first daughter and she's a wonder beyond imagination. What a gift. Everybody is happy and healthy. My vehicle has been a thorn in my side, however.

I was in Apalachicola, Florida (http://www.apalachicolabay.org/) headed to a friend's house when my clutch started a horrendous squealing noise. I couldn't believe it, as I had compiled a list of items that needed replacement on my truck and the clutch wasn't on it; the dealer I bought it from 4 years ago put a new one in before I bought it. (I know he did because they didn't tighten the bell housing bolts all the way and the terrible shuddering that ensued was corrected by tightening said bolts) I proceeded to Advance Auto Parts in Port St. Joe and bought a new clutch. It took my friend and I seven hours to remove the 4x4 trans axle and transmission, which entails removing the exhaust, both front and rear drive shafts, and a supporting strut under the transmission itself. Bunches of fun, I tell ya. My buddy jumped in and began removing the exhaust connections to the manifold and proceeded to break two bolts before I suggested we let them soak with Kroil (http://www.kanolabs.com/google/) a while before trying the other side. A little patience in situations like these help one maintain one's sanity. We had to remove the starboard manifold to drill out the broken studs and in doing so I noticed that the manifold gasket had started to deteriorate, which turns out to be the reason I had a tapping on that side from not enough back pressure on the valves. Yay! We got the clutch, pressure plate, throwout bearing and CLUTCH FORK, of all things, reinstalled and the transmission slid back in place and splined up nicely with relatively little effort. The little things that make my heart rejoice. As a side note, the clutch fork should be good for the life of a vehicle. It broke (and was the cause of the clutch problem) because of the shuddering resulting from the last mechanic failing to tighten bell housing bolts. That's why we double check behind ourselves. If you look at the clutch plate in the image, there's a lot of life left in the plate surface. The problem is the fact that the center bearing and spring plate are detached from their mounting surfaces. It should have been good for another four years. Oh, well, I know it's done right this time.

I felt I was able to breathe a sigh of relief at this point. I drove the truck home that night and everything operated normally. I was happy that I was going to be able to take the wife to the hospital to have a baby, you know. I was working on a roof in Apalach with the same buddy that helped me with the transmission, feeling that after three days of helping with my truck I should probably throw some work his way. We went back to his house for lunch and after it cooled off enough to get back on the roof we got in the truck and the starter did nothing. Ugh. Said buddy climbed under the truck to tap it with a hammer (which works when they're first starting to go bad) and that didn't help. As a side note, in March the starter went bad and I took it apart and replaced the brushes. I had to modify the brushes (drill the holes bigger and shave the sides a little) so I didn't expect them to last as long as a new starter, but it was a $6 fix instead of a $40 fix at the time. Ok, so the process of removing a starter and installing a new one is a matter of two nuts and two bolts. No big deal. That went as smoothly as I expected. And was on the aforementioned truck repair list.

Then the wife had our daughter. Yay! The truck made it back and forth for that monumental event for a week. The baby had a slightly elevated white blood cell count so they had to keep her and my wife seven days for observation and antibiotics, which I abhor, but that's another rant. She weighed 6 lbs 15 oz and had ten fingers, ten toes, two arms and two legs. What a beautiful gift. She likes Mama better because she has on-demand nourishment. She just hasn't realized I have tools, yet. I've decided that I want to be called Shrek. My wife isn't wild about the idea, but I think it's meant to be. I can already hear her as a nine year old: "Let me go ask Mom and Shrek..." It'll grow on my wife. The baby's name is Naomi. She already seems like a Naomi to me. It's strange what having a child does to a man; I hear gentle squeaking emanating from a paint roller and I think of my daughter. It makes me want to be more cautious, where before I was just a tad reckless sometimes. It's an interesting, involuntary evolution. I didn't think I had a soft side.

I was commuting the 65+ miles from Apalachicola to the hospital in Panama City and one evening the truck overheated in Mexico Beach. I just happened to look down at the gauges and noticed that the temperature gauge was red lined. 260 degrees plus. In doing everything else I hadn't noticed that the water pump had started to leak water, indicating that the impeller seal was going bad. I ran her out of water big time. Ouch. for a fraction of a second I debated whether or not to stop the motor, and decided I needed to, as I didn't know how long it would take for me find water. Fortunately, across the street there was a house with a long, black hose full of hot water which I promptly transferred into my five gallon jug (that I'm glad I tote around) and was able to pour hot water into the hot motor. I didn't crack the block, thank the Gods of mechanics. Water pump. Ugh. I didn't really want to deal with this bugger. I went over to Apalach by seven in the morning and by the time my buddy came out to see what I was doing, I had the fan shroud out, the fan off, belts and bracket bolts off and she was ready to come out. I got the rebuilt pump installed and bolted up and filled the system with water. I noticed a leak and saw that I'd kinked the gasket on the passenger side. Out comes the water pump AGAIN. I remedied that problem and reinstalled the whole thing, all the way through the fan. I gave the fan a spin to make sure all was well, and all was not well. The shaft coming out of the water pump was bent. The fan wobbled horribly and that is not good for anything attached to the belts that the water pump drives. Back to Port St. Joe. Had to buy the only one they had left in stock which was a more expensive brand new pump. Ugh. With the core charge on the rebuilt pump it was 32 bucks or something like that. The new pump was roughly ten dollars more with no core charge. I had to pay 96 cents to get the new one which means they cut me a five dollar break. That was pretty cool of the Advance guys. The "new" new pump went in smoothly and all the gaskets seated properly. After installing everything up to the fan I gave it a spin and it was normal.

My truck is running well. She runs cool, starts without a hiccup and has a strong clutch that catches the right distance off the floor. It doesn't, however, run better than it did in its earlier days. It doesn't run faster, stronger or more elaborately. The problem I have with working on vehicles is the fact that everything is NORMAL when I'm finished. Nothing is better. Just normal. That's why I'm a carpenter.

To be fair to the gods of mechanics, the power steering pump, which was on the list I mentioned towards the beginning of this post, seemed to like the temporary upheaval. The power steering has been less than brutish for a few weeks. It's been kind of weak, especially around turns at lower RPMs (where I happen to need it most). They didn't have one in stock at Advance, so I just left it hooked up to the hoses and it got banged around, knocked over, fluid leaking out of the cap... well, it LOVED the abuse. I actually have *normal* power steering. What a luxury!

That's the news... I hope everyone that happens to read this is well!

The last photo was actually taken with the truck running! (and notice that the one in this picture is a black one and the one in the above picture is a defective silver one)

Florida work

2010-04-26T10:02:00.000-07:00

I'm currently in Apalachicola, Florida working on the old homes around here. I've built an arbor, shed roof to shelter a fish cleaning station, painted a house and now am replacing rotten siding on a house built in 1843 that was moved here from Port St. Joe.

Whoever I'm working behind at the moment must have either had no idea silicone is not paintable, or had a whole bunch to use up. It's everywhere. I've been picking silicone out of cracks all morning. There is an abundance of bad carpentry all over the house, and I'll be trying to correct as much as I can and stay within the home owner's budget.

I've been slack in posting, as my wife and I have our first child on the way; it's a girl and her name will be Naomi. We're really excited, but I'm burning the candle at both ends and haven't found much time to post on here. She's due around the end of May, or the first of June. =-)

More later!

Project in Brooklyn

2009-08-04T13:30:00.001-07:00

I'll be meeting a woman who is rennovating a Brownstone townhouse in Brooklyn this evening. Should be fun. She wants some built in shelving, some painting and I don't remember what else, but it should carry me for a week or so. I'm excited, as it's been really slow. I removed some old window a/c units in Manhattan last week and installed two new ones. Took about an hour and the lady paid me better than I asked. I'm really looking forward to some viable work. I think they're not living in this upcoming Brownstone (which is very close to the apartment, by the way) and that means I can leave my tools out and not have to reload them every evening. Yay! I'll try to post some pictures of this project...

Shelf Installation in Manhattan

2009-07-23T08:57:00.000-07:00

Being alive is very expensive in NYC. I'm really looking forward to leaving this God-forsaken place. In all honesty, I realize I'm responsible for all but two of the seven parking tickets I've received here, but I still get really annoyed when I get one. For the record, the two tickets I'm not responsible for were given by mistake. I paid them anyway (actually, my Sweetheart paid the last two) just because it would be a full day to go contest them.

The day before yesterday I had a small job that I found on Craigslist that entailed finding studs, installing brackets and mounting shelves. I charge a $50 minimum, and good thing I did, because the job only took about half an hour and the ticket I got before I left for work was $45. Ok, I'm spinning my wheels here and so ready to be somewhere where parking is a right, not a privilege. (sigh) I'll write more when I'm not in a negative state of mind. My apologies.

2009-07-08T16:31:00.000-07:00

Next time I'm sure I'll regale y'all with tales of Amish parking lots in Pennsylvania...

Painting stripes in Upstate NY...

2009-07-08T16:21:00.000-07:00

Well, seeing as I try to get out of Brooklyn during the week as to avoid parking tickets, I landed in my friend Don's yard in Springfield Center, NY. The closest "real" town is Cooperstown (of Baseball Hall of Fame fame). I decided I was going to come upstate to try my hand at painting Yankee parking lots.

I managed to sell a stripe job to a fellow who shall remain nameless, because I think he might just be "connected" (in a Sicilian way). Nice guy, though, and at the moment we're waiting for everything to dry out. I found traffic marking paint for $25 a gallon, which isn't bad, considering everything else up here is out of control expensive.

Hopefully I'll paint Mr. X's lot tomorrow morning and be able to head back into NYC by early afternoon at the latest. That way I'll be able to retrieve and cash a check for a job I did last week in Brooklyn. I'll probably stay until Monday and maybe hit Pennsylvania to try my luck with Amish parking lot stripes. We'll see...

Debauchery

2009-07-05T13:17:00.000-07:00

The other day I needed to find a Wachovia in order to cash a check, so my Sweetheart and I went to Manhattan. We got caught in the rain, and decided to grab a bite and a beer and wait it out. It was a nice little place where we split a bleu cheese burger with bacon and had a pint each. Uh, oh. That got the siphon going. After we found a Wachovia and I made my transaction, we did a slow bar crawl to the place where we were going to meet one of her co-workers for more drinks. Things got a little fuzzy after that. I do remember being asked to leave the NYC mounted police stables.

Once again, yesterday turned into a similar fiasco. We went to a party near Jersey City and once again, over imbibed a bit. As we were leaving the party, we poured our remaining beers into solo cups and proceeded towards the train station to head back to Manhattan. While walking down the street of a pretty suburban neighborhood a cop pulled up and we immediately poured out beers out. That didn't help. The cop wrote us tickets anyway and, to add insult to injury, checked the box requiring us to appear in court. So, on the 20th, we have to go back to New Jersey to pay the piper. Dang.

With that behind us, we proceeded to the train station, on time, mind you, and successfully made it back to Penn Station in Manhattan. I don't remember exactly what we were bickering about, but somehow I upset the little woman and she was walking quickly up the stairs as I called out her name. Evidently a nearby cop thought things were worse than they were, and detained me for a bit until I convinced him that I was, indeed, her boyfriend. He let me go and I managed to catch up to the woman of my dreams before she got too far, which is a good thing, considering the fact that I would have been completely lost without her marvelous sense of direction. I love that woman.

Anyway, I've decided that the NYC police presence is enough to leave me inclined to moderate. Or abstain...

Work in Brooklyn, NY

2009-07-02T06:19:00.001-07:00

Being in Brooklyn a month ago made me skeptical of the possibility of being self employed in NYC. Come to find out it's the contacts one has and not one's ability. My Sweetheart sent out an e-mail to the people in her industry and the responses have been numerous!

Yesterday I patched the sheetrock under the sinks in the kitchen and bathroom of a very nice apartment here in Brooklyn. The repair under the kitchen sink was fairly straightforward except for the fact that the plumbers that made the repair requiring them to remove the section of sheetrock left the stub for the sink drain too deep in the wall and it was a bear to retighten it after I replaced the P-trap. I managed to get it, though, and that patch, for a one-coat patch turned out nicely.

When I moved into the bathroom, however, it was a different story. The wall behind the vanity sink was tile which the plumbers broke through with a hammer. Not the nicest hole. I couldn't realistically bring in my tile saw because it is a wetsaw, and it would have soaked the apartment down below. I called the landlord and told her that to repair the damage would be a fairly extensive project, entailing removing the newly installed vanity, chipping the tile out to the nearest stud on either side (which in this case would be a four foot span for some reason) , sheetrocking the larger hole and replacing the tile which means I'd be descending five floors to make the cuts on the wetsaw. She asked me what the alternative would be and I told her that I could silicone a piece of sheetrock over the hole and stub the plumbing through. A surface patch. To my chagrin that's what she had me do. I really don't like to band-aid stuff like that, but it is, after all, under a sink in a cabinet.

When I gave the landlord a bill, it was evidently not to NYC standards, (100$ for three hours is fine by me) and she said "That's just crazy talk!" She told me that no one would even show up for less than $150 and that she'd make it worth my while. I'm curiously anticipating the check. I'd be happy with what I told her was due me. We'll see!

That's life in the big city so far this go 'round!

Life since my last post... (long time ago...)

2009-06-30T07:06:00.000-07:00

I've gotten away from writing much anymore and I've been told that I need to keep at it. I guess people want me to keep developing my vernacular and vocabulary... Ok, Folks, I'll try to be more consistant.

Not too awful much has happened since I posted last. Since the economy has deteriorated, I've been basically subsisting. I didn't rent a shelter in Apalachicola this past winter; my dog and I, more or less, just camped out of my truck. I had an invitation to park behind a friend's house, and it was very secluded considering that it was downtown.

Fortunately I have friends that had smaller projects for me to work on. I think they were, in all actuality, throwing me a proverbial bone. Thanks, y'all! I replaced some siding on a house, applied Ospho to a metal roof to stabilize the rust and then painted it with a tarnished copper-toned roof sealer. I then scraped a popcorn ceiling in a different friend's garage (to make it smooth) and painted the ceiling and walls with primer and two top-coats of high gloss oil based paint. That way, when it's raining and my buddy needs to process wild game in there, he can just hose down the walls. I then prepped the concrete floor of the garage and applied a 2-part tinted epoxy to seal and shine the surface. Turned out really nice.

When those jobs were completed, I decided to head up to Brooklyn, NY to be with my sweetheart, who I've known for around four years. Over Christmas, she came down to Apalach to be with her family, and I've always tried to make it a point to be able to see her when she's in town. We ended up having a really nice connection over our four day visit (staying up until 4am talking about anything and everything) and I decided that come hell or high water I was going to persue her to the ends of the earth. I was devastated that she planned to join the peace corps and I resigned myself to waiting for her for the 27 month sojurn. I think she's changed her mind for the time being, and we plan on doing a nat'l walkabout for several months come September. I'm really excited.

Anyway, I stayed in Brooklyn for a month with almost no work at all, and after harvesting 6 parking tickets, totaling $450 more or less, from my windshield, I decided that I should go where I could work. I went back to Asheville, NC, where my parents live, and over the course of another month I skim-coated raw cinderblock walls with topping cement, painted the soffit, fascia and trim on a garage and house, and cased and installed a steel door on the same cinderblock structure on which I applied the topping cement. Fun, fun!!

When I finished those projects in NC, paid my parking tickets and performed routine maintenance on my truck, I hopped in at 5pm last Saturday, and made good time on I-81 north. I drove all night on a steady diet of 1 energy drink every four hours, and arrived back in Brooklyn at 7am Sunday morning. I suprised my girlfriend because neither one of us thought I'd make it up here until 9 at the earliest. I think it was a pleasant suprise! =-)

I'm currently driving a 1986 full size Chevrolet Custom Deluxe 4x4 with the 305 small block v-8. I was shocked to see that she gets almost 18 mpg after a tune up! My last mid-80's 4x4 pickup had the 351 windsor big block v-8 and I was tickled in Kansas, with a tail wind, to get 12!! It's all relative!

Well, that's the news for now, and I'll try to keep y'all "posted" (snicker)...

Getting Warmer...

2008-05-01T12:01:00.000-07:00

The weather here in Apalachicola is really beautiful; 78 degrees and sunny. The evenings are down into the high 50's to low 60's and dry. I'm loving it. I know these are temporary conditions and it does no good to wish for this weather year round, but I do.

I look forward to the next month or so when I'll head up to the mountains to escape the infernal heat and humididty of Florida. I've found some really beautiful places to camp.

I found out what happened to my blogger account; evidently when they switched to Google I received a verification e-mail on a defunct e-mail address I use to funnel spam. Yesterday I tried to log in twice and the second time they told me I haven't verified my e-mail address. I then verified it by responding and voila! Here I am. Hopefully something funny or noteworthy will happen before too long because it's kinda silly to sit and type about nothing.

Later--

Finally allowed back on Blogger...

2008-04-30T10:56:00.001-07:00

I haven't been able to post for quite some time as I either forgot my password (not likely, seeing as I use it for everything) or was vacant too long. Let's see if I can keep it up...

Post thanksgiving update...

2006-11-29T11:21:00.000-08:00

Well, we made it through Thanksgiving without any serious altercations. THAT's suprising. I grew up in an incredibly altercation-oriented family. This was one of the biggest family gatherings I've been to in a long while. One of my Dad's sisters was there with 3 of her children and her husband. Her kids had, I think, six kids. One of my aunt's sons wasn't able to make it. Four of my five siblings were there and no telling how many kids they have. It's like trying to count 75 bait fish in a live well in six foot seas. They just keep moving around too much. When I'm counting cattle I just count their feet and devide by four. That doesn't work with nieces and nephews. I know I'm leaving someone out, but all in all, there were over 30 of us, I think.

This weather lately has been very warm. I actually had to buy ice for my cooler. I like to not have to do that. The fact that the dog likes to lie on it when we're riding probably warms it up, too.

My truck has been giving me moderate fits. A couple of days before Thanksgiving it died on the way to town. I finally tracked the problem to the distributer cap. The points were corroded and I scraped them off and went on my way. Since I've bought a new one. Today on my way up to my folks house the top radiator hose blew out. Killed the engine with water and split in a place too far from the end to just cut it off and jam it back on. Dang. It just so happened that I was in the middle of a terribly congested intersection when this happened. As I'm pushing my truck backward the way I'd come, some guy stopped and asked if I was having trouble and in my irritated state I retorted: "No trouble, I just like to see if I can get away with pushing my truck backward into oncoming traffic." He gave me a lift to the autoparts store anyway.

Talk to y'all later! Think SNOW!

Crazy Pre-Thanksgiving...

2006-11-22T15:38:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm in North Carolina now and things are already out of control. I've been at my folks house all afternoon and there are only ten of us here so far. It's already pretty dang loud. Tomorrow there will be thirty-five or so of us here. THAT sounds fun. Fortunately I'm camping about 30 miles south in the Pisgah nat'l forest and it's really quiet this time of the year. There are only a couple of the many campsites occupied and one of them's me. I'm really glad to have a place to go home to. It's after dark right now and it's still pretty, uh, what's the word, riotous.

On the way up here I stopped by to see my friend in Franklin, NC, and I'll swing by there on my way back. He loaned me a chair (as I forgot mine). We played Texas Hold-'Em at the restaurant where my friend works and I did fairly well. We played 'till about 4 am and it was heck driving up here the next day hung over and dog tired.

The first two days I camped I woke up to a fine dusting of snow which was such a welcome change from the dog days of Apalachicola. I've got an excellent supply of red oak, white oak and hickory to burn. The temp's cold enough at night to freeze a layer on the dog's water by 9pm. I LOVE it.

By the way, my cell phone wouldn't work as soon as I got out of my area code and the people at Trac-fone couldn't fix it remotely. They'll be sending me a new one which I'm not excited about reprogramming. I hope to have it back by the monday after Thanksgiving.

That's all for now!!

Tornado in Apalachicola...

2006-10-30T08:53:00.000-08:00

I've not been posting lately as I have a commute that leaves me computerless. (leave before dawn and back after dark) Today I'm taking the day off to help clean up the mess tornado "Syphillis" left in her wake. I named the tornado myself.

Friday evening I was on my way back from Carrabelle under very dark and ominous skies. By the time I got to the Apalachicola bridge, visibility was next to zero and the wind was shrieking at 40 knots, according to the NOAA weather I was listening to on the VHS radio in my truck. It was pretty frightening to me as I thought it was going to flip my truck. Every one else had pulled over, but I thought if my truck was going over I'd like to not have to walk so far to town, so I kept going. I was very glad to get off the bridge and begin spreading the word of my bravery and driving skill, but the wind was let out of my sails when I coasted into town and saw the devastation caused by the tornado.

The streets in this community are laid out in a NE and SW direction and SE and NW for the perpendicular roads. As tornadoes generally travel in a north-easterly direction, this one traveled 26 blocks from the outskirts of town (at the IGA grocery store) straight up Ave. G (towards the NE) all the way to the apalachicola river. No deaths were reported, but there were several tales of wonder and miracles. The two story houseboat I built is fine; 20 feet away a metal building built to withstand hurricanes was totally destroyed. The people were INSIDE the metal building when a 16 foot outboard powered boat crashed through the structure. Aside from 40 stitches to the man of the house, no injuries were caused. WOW.

I guess I need to go get some more gas for my saw and get back to it.

Previously owned truck...

2006-09-19T07:35:00.000-07:00

Well, I finally bought a truck. Again. It's an 87 Dodge Dakota with 106,000 miles on it and not a drop of rust anywhere. All of you that have lived in Fla. know how bad rust can be down here. I guess it was kept in a garage. It's not so nice that I'll worry about scratching it, but it's one of the nicest vehicles I've bought. It was cheap, too!

I've probably got five or six license plates floating around this community and I couldn't find any of them. I have a hard time believing that the DMV isn't making a bloody fortune off of those chincy (sp?) pieces of metal... they charged me 45 bucks for the plate itself! That's highway robbery (so to speak)!

The weather has taken a turn for the worse. It's back up in the mid-90's and muggy, muggy, muggy. It's hard to get dehydrated here because one inhales about half a gallon of water daily. It almost looks as though we'll get by without being blasted by a hurricane this year. Knock on wood. Now if I can just get to the mountains before the tsunami hits. I suppose everyone heard about the earthquake in the gulf around Tampa latitude that registered 6.2 on the Richter scale. THAT's scary. I've had a sense of foreboding for some reason and I think I've figured out why. I'm as finely tuned in to the rhythms of the planet as are elephants and horses. Maybe more so.
I am kidding.

'Till next time...!

Finally some relief!!

2006-09-08T07:59:00.000-07:00

Wow, the past two days have been such a relief I don't know where to start. I'll start with the morning I woke up and it wasn't 82 degrees. The bank clocks were both at 69 degrees. That was wonderful!! Yesterday the temperature never got over 87. I never thought I'd consider that cool, but it was.

I'm now building a replica turn of the century door for the city hall building. I think these guys are wanting to "antique it". That could be fun.

Did I mention how nice and cool the weather's been? Hmmm, I guess I'll wrap this up and wait for MORE non-complaining blog fodder.

Uh, oh...

2006-08-18T12:28:00.000-07:00

Ok, I need someone to talk me out of buying a 1950 Dodge Coronet with 285,000 miles on it. It's actually in decent shape inside and out...(it looks beautiful when you drive by it at 30 mph) been painted once and has some of the wide white wall tires on it. I don't need a project car right now, but if I had a vehicle to drive every day I'd sure as heck buy it. Those straight -6 motors are very straightforward and this one runs decent already. If anyone's in the market for an old Dodge, this one's only three grand... I could really see someone named DH driving it.

More Torrid Heat...

2006-08-10T11:32:00.000-07:00

Recently I'm only able to be outside from daybreak to about 11:30. Siesta at noon, then back out around 3:30 (it's still hot but getting cooler). This makes for extremely slow progress on the porch roof I'm building. Today at 10:00 a.m. it was 86 degrees. In the shade. Right now (2:30) it's about 98 degrees. That's cooler than yesterday (it was well above 100). Everyone seems to be a tad bit irritable.

I know I'm a tad bit irritable, which doesn't help me deal with a "friend" who was going to sell me the Bronco I was talking about. I acquired insurance and a temporary tag for it and rode up to Sumatra to get it. I only drove it about a half a mile up the road and back and gave him $1050 for the truck. He and his wife left for appointments with the kids and left me to clean it out a little bit. I then set out to drive it the 8 miles up to the Sumatra grocery for some fuel to drive it back down to Apalach, and about halfway there this shudder became apparent in the steering. I slowed down and said shudder became more violent. I didn't think I had enough fuel to turn around and go back to Mike's house, so I crept the rest of the way to the store. When I finally got there, the front left hub was too hot to touch. I put some fuel in it and waited about an hour before the wheel was cool enough to touch. When I realized the jack (Mike swore was there) was absent, I decided to cool the wheel and hub down with water and start back to his house. The cool down treatment worked, and at my new reduced speed I made it almost back to his house before the shuddering was anything significant.

Mike and his wife were gone, so I left a note saying that the title was in the truck and I can't afford to spend over a grand on a truck that I can't drive. (I've driven $500 vehicles for years and they all ran fine with a little TLC; this truck is beyond that point) Mike is giving me the runaround about getting my money back to me. He said "maybe sometime this week", and in the meantime I have insurance and a tag on nothing. He has a hard time with the fact that I don't want a check, even after I pointed out that I gave them cash.

I'm very perturbed and realize that there's no record of this transaction so he's got me by the short and curlies. Damn.

Ok, I'm done complaining for now.

Tune in next week when Prentice says: "Dang! I got a splinter!"

Wow, what a heat wave...

2006-07-29T09:44:00.000-07:00

It's been incredibly hot here the past few days. I've been building a set of steps on the Apalachicola city hall in this infernal heat. They were quite large; 12 feet high to the landing and 5 and a half feet wide. I finally finished them Thursday and was very glad to do so. I'll post a picture as soon as I get my film developed. Yesterday (Friday) the temp was 97, which isn't really all that hot, but when you add in the 95% humidity it's torrid. Makes for great chafing, though.

I'm buying a nice redneck vehicle. It's a 4x4 bronco painted camouflage with nice mud stompin' tires. My last truck had the 351 cubic inch carbureted windsor motor and got 12 miles to the gallon. This one has the 302 cubic inch fuel injected motor and I expect over 15 mpg. I'll be happy with that. I'll be able to tow heavy loads and go where most vehicles can't. That's what I look for in a truck. The only thing I don't like about the bronco is that it's an automatic. Oh, yeah, my other truck was an 83 and this one is an 88. I'm really coming up in the world.

My plans after I finish rebuilding the windows on the house I'm working on will be to drive north to Franklin, NC to deliver a tent, AC unit, Boom box, 3 CD's and a side grinder to a friend who moved up there from here. I'll then look for a place to camp and stripe parking lots where it's not so dang hot.

On a different note, my parents and two sisters and their families are down here on the panhandle for a vacation. I'll probably ride over Wednesday to see them. I'm looking forward to it. I'll post some pictures of that auspicious occasion, too.

I hope this post makes it; the last two times I tried they didn't show up on my blog. I don't know what's up with that. I can only hope this one works.

Y'all take care!

High speed chase!!

2006-07-21T10:57:00.000-07:00

Wow, y'all. Today was one of the few days that we Apachicolanders got to experience the thrilling excitement of big city (for example L.A.) life. We watched a high speed chase zig-zag all across town. I don't think they left a street out. (the north-south streets go from ave. A to ave. M; the east-west streets go from 1st street to 25th street) Everyone who was awake got to see it. It was kind of like a Keystone Cops comedy, or maybe Benny Hill. I'm not sure the cops had any cause to believe that they would ever have to deal with this; they never were in control of the situation. If they wanted to stop these guys all they had to do was stake out the two roads leading out of town. (98 east and 98 west) There is no other way out of town unless you're running by boat. (that worked for us, but that's another story) But, the cops had a chance to get over 35 mph and blow the cobwebs off their cars, and the parade of civillians following the chase (despite the vehement objections of the cops) showcased cars who's licence plate stickers expired as early as 1972. THIS WAS THE BEST DAY SINCE THE CIRCUS!

WHEW!

Seafood galore...

2006-07-17T10:11:00.000-07:00

I love living near the coast and having access to inexpensive fresh seafood.

Today for lunch I had Shrimp flavored ramen noodles sprinkled liberally with REAL imitation crab meat. Beat that! I'm sure the shrimp flavor packet in the ramen noodles was made with local shrimp.

Lots of water falling from the sky today. Got rained out on the siding job. I'm really not that heartbroken.

I'm opening my friend's coffee shop in the mornings while she's out of town. Real smart to give me, the king of excess, the keys to a coffee shop and all the coffee I can drink between six and eight a.m.. I've almost quit vibrating. My handwriting looks like it was written by a person with Parkinsons suffering DT's.

A practical joke too good to pass up...

2006-07-14T04:54:00.000-07:00

During my down time I generally hang out at a friend's shop where we all tinker, drink beer and swap lies. There are always several projects going on at once whether they be lucrative or not.

This guy Jeramy (who shall remain nameless) is a goldsmith and keeps a crock-pot full of wax around he uses to obtain molds of various creatures and objects that he will eventually cast in gold. He decided to melt the wax to mold something and two seconds after he plugged the unit in there were complications. First, a geyser of steam erupted and Jeramy (who shall remain nameless) started yelling "Oh, God! Holy cow!!" Naturally I (being the curious type) ran over to see what was happening. I thought it was some sort of cool chemical reaction. Well, this nameless guy ran the opposite direction to the window that lets a cool breeze blow through the entire length of the warehouse. That was a really bad move, as the problem was a horrible, concentrated rotten fish stench.

Evidently as a rookie shrimper he'd found some cool fish (juvenile sheeps-head) that he wanted to cast and he'd put about 10 of them, the size of a half dollar each, into this wax and in the course of standard debauchery forgot all about them. The crock-pot then got unplugged to seal the fish in wax to rot.

I don't have the words in my vocabulary to explain how vile and foul the atmosphere in the warehouse was for about 30 minutes. We all thanked God for the breeze. I have been working on commercial fishing boats off and on for quite a while, and I have never in my life smelled a more unpleasant, thoroughly invasive stench.

This whole wax-pot thing is a prank waiting to happen. We thought about selling it in a yard sale for a dime or so, but then they'd know where they got it. I thought about taking it down to the thrift store and donating it, but all the ladies there are so nice I couldn't stand the thought of them plugging it in to determine if it works or not in the store. I guess I'm just going to wipe it down with bleach to take the surface stench away and keep it 'till April. This makes Walter Mathau's "dead fish behind the truck seat" gag in 'Grumpy old Men' seem tame.

(insert evil laugh here)

Oops, getting fat...

2006-07-05T13:27:00.000-07:00

Well, since I've been in this house with all the modern amenities I've seemed to expand in girth. Where I used to ride a bike or walk for at least half a mile to feed myself, I now only have to walk the short distance to the refrigerator. I've been considering moving the fridge across town, but I don't have an extension cord that long. I still bike or walk wherever I go, but cooking breakfast, lunch and supper at home and having immediate access to leftovers whenever I want (and a microwave) is still packing the insulation on me. I'd do well in a cooler climate.

Sigh.

Feast or Famine...

2006-06-29T06:16:00.000-07:00

Around Apalachicola it tends to be either feast or famine for a self employed carpenter. I think the pendulum has swung towards feast for me lately. I've been slowly rebuilding my friend's house, but she doesn't have the funds for full time labor. Recently I painted the lines on the parking lot at the local Ace Hardware, and as a result I think I sold Gulf State Bank lines on their lot, too. In addition to that "easy" money, I sold the city a set of steps (they'll pay well) and a door for an historic restoration on the City Hall building. I'm just tickled.

If I get these projects finished before August I'll be able to escape the infernal heat and travel north for a while. My last camping trip to the Pisgah Nat'l Forest was so relaxing and beautiful I think I'll try it again. I know my dog is miserable in this heat; I'm just glad I'm not quite as furry as he is.

Besides the sultry weather and looming thunderstorms there's not much to comment on. Life goes on!

Rainy afternoon and parking lot stripes...

2006-06-26T09:22:00.000-07:00

Lately, it seems, we have been getting afternoon thundershowers reminiscent of the showers we got around here when I was a child visiting St. George Island. Every afternoon around 3:00pm the thunderheads would build and drench the place for about an hour. One could almost set one's clock by them. The weather's been behaving similarly for the past couple of weeks. I like it. It's made for cooler mornings, less dust and generally greener flora.

I finally sold the Ace Hardware on some parking lot stripes after trying for the past year. The owner said that he definately wanted it done, but he just wasn't ready yet. I've been pestering him relentlessly and finally Saturday he gave me the go ahead. Sunday morning at 7:00 I was down there sweeping lines and pulling the weeds out of the cracks. By 9:30 am I was within 6 lines of being through when my 4" roller fell apart. (yeah, I know, they're only 2 bucks; you would think I would keep a spare or two...) The ironic thing is that Ace doesn't open 'till 1:00pm on Sunday and I couldn't get a roller frame. Dang. They close at 5:00pm so I went back at 4:30 and bought another frame. It had already rained for the scheduled 3pm hour, so I thought I was safe. By the time the parking lot cleared the thunderheads started building again but I thought they were heading around us. I finished the last six lines and guarded them until 6:15 (they weren't dry yet, but the traffic had ceased) and got on my bike and headed back to the house. It's a two mile pedal and about two thirds of the way there it started POURING. (cry)

I fully expected to have to buy a bucket of asphalt sealer and seal a section of the lot and repaint it, but by some miracle the lines were fine! So I got paid, the guy has two more lots he wants striped and everyone's happy.

The End.

The End.

Silly Dog...

2006-06-22T13:18:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I wonder if my dog, Chester, is all there.

I was reading in the kitchen last night waiting for the roast in the slow oven to reach rare when I noticed Chester chasing flies. I've seen this behavior in him before, but never really watched the entire drama play out. (if you're wondering why I have numerous flies in the kitchen it's because the place is intolerably hot without the windows open [I'm too much of a miser to a/c the whole house] and the screen frames tend to not fit the openings; I'm guessing the homeowner scavenged them)

When I sat down to read I was vaguely aware of at least 4 flies. Chester was acutely aware of them. He would stalk them, one at a time, until he was in a position to be the center of the fly's attention and then snap it out of the air. He then would proceed to carefully dispatch it with his little front teeth, sniff it on the floor and make sure it was dead before devouring it with seemingly great gusto.

At this point I was chuckling and Chester went on to stalk the next victim. The mighty fly hunter. By the time he had caught and eaten all of the flies I was rolling. This was one of the funniest things I'd seen in a long time. When he was finished he looked at me with a sort of "what's so funny" look. I guess to him this is serious business. He made dang sure there were no more flies in the house before settling down to snooze. I guess he's unable to snooze with flies around, or mayhaps they are just plain delicious. We may never know.

For lack of anything more exciting to post this is what y'all get.

P.S.

It's been consistantly in the mid-90's for the past four days. I'm not loving it. Ouch.

Beautiful morning and an old house...

2006-06-06T06:14:00.000-07:00

When I woke up this morning it was clear, dry and cool. We haven't had a 65 degree morning in a long time and I'm loving it. (so is my dog)

I'm about to go to work and face the can-o-worms I opened up on my friends house. If you pushed on the south wall with one finger you could move it in and out about 3", so I tore down the siding and have been replacing studs, sills and the siding. It's already much better, but it's been so dang hot I'm usually only good for half a day. Today should be a good one. Hopefully I'll be able to finish the rest of the south wall and then I'll work on the front.

Guess I need to go to work, now.

Ciao!

Speeding ticket...

2006-06-03T10:36:00.000-07:00

To preface this post I'll start by saying that I haven't had a ticket in a long, LONG time. I'm usually the slowest guy on the road. It's not a race.

My friend from Tamara's cafe Floridita asked me to bartend for a wedding she was catering. I said ok, and we left Apalachicola at 5:30, giving us plenty of time to get to Port St. Joe to set up by 7:30. The last thing I said to this woman before we left is "Don't haul ass; I don't know where we're going and I don't want you to lose me." I think that spurred her on to greater speed. When I saw the state trooper (notice the lower case letters) I looked down at the speedometer and trying to keep up I was doing 85 mph in a 60 and she was still pulling away from me. She pulled over immediately and so did I. I considered continuing on, but I didn't want it to turn in to an "attempting to alude" ticket. Turns out it's the same state trooper that took me to jail for sleeping in my truck drunk. (which I took to jury trial and was adjudicated 'not guilty") When he came up to the window I said "Hi, Scotty, how's it going?" (He sat through my entire trial and he knows who I am) He said "where are you going in such a hurry, Mr. Tompkins?" I explained to him that I was following the boss lady to a catering gig and had asked her not to haul ass. Scotty said "you know I have to write y'all a ticket right?" I said "Be gentle". He laughed and then asked me for my driver's licence. I explained to him that he took it away from me a year ago last october and I never got it back. He didn't write me a ticket for not having it on me. (nice guy) He went up to the pace car and got Speedy's licence and insurance info and proceeded to write out two tickets. He's such a nice guy he nocked it down from 83 mph to 66 mph in a 60. If he'd have written it out for the speed we were doing it would have been two hundred something dollars. Instead it's $77.50. The boss lady's going to pay the ticket that I got, but I still get points on my licence. I had a spotless driving record. Dang.

Anyway, I did see a girl I went to highschool with, and the parents of a fellow my brother graduated with. Small world.

Sanity saving lullabies

2006-05-17T06:30:00.000-07:00

Everyone who has been around one or more infants for any length of time knows that at times they aren't so cute. Be it cholic or cholera, there are times when they just won't stop crying despite all efforts by one or both parents. In order to salvage a shred of sanity in the unfortunate tending parent someone came up with the sanity saving lullaby.

As an example, when my siblings and I were infants, my Grandmother (who has been called eccentric by more astute people than myself) would sing us this particularly menacing lullaby:

Old black sheepie, where's your lamb?
Way down yonder in the valley--

The buzzards and the butterflies
are picking out it's eyes--
and the poor little thing cries
Mammy--

(sing sweetly and endlessly until child grows up with a sense of humor like
Steven King or goes to sleep)

I was listening to NPR sunday night to a show that was talking about this wonderful stress relieving lullaby technique. One particular lullaby that was sung caught my ear. I don't know if it was sung to me as a child or not, but it seemed somehow familliar. Here it is:

This is the day
that we give away
little babies.

They come free
in a half pound of tea...
if you know any ladies
that want any babies
just send them around to me.

When they take off the lid
out comes the kid
with a written guarantee.

This is the day
that we give away
little babies.

I don't know if I have the words exactly right, but I've been singing it to myself all week and thought I should share this with some of you parents out there.

NPR on Sunday nights can be a riot.

Moving Day

2006-05-08T06:40:00.000-07:00

I'll start with the standard "sorry for not posting lately, blah blah blah....".

I've recently moved into a 3 bedroom 2 bath house on the south side of 98. Thats the good side of the tracks. I've had the electricity and the water turned on. (I could almost hear the gasps as I typed that) The phone is next, but not absolutely necessary.

The house is partially gutted (the apartment on the back) and I'll be working on that while living in the main house. I'll logically move into the apartment when it's finished and work on restoring the main section. It's a structurally sound place, so it will be mostly cosmetics and asthetics I'll be working on. I'll work on the place at a reduced rate for 40 hours a month to cover rent and the owner will send me a check on the first of every month. There is no time limit, as the owner lives part time in Colorado and the rest of the time in L.A. ("Lower Alabama" to those of you not residing in the southeast). I believe he inherited the place and it's been sitting vacant for a few years. I think everyone's happy. I know I am.

I still have several projects I'm working on so money won't be a problem. I'm just happy to have climate control because it's already becoming sweltering down here. 90's in the day and 90% humididy. Ouch.

Other than that, Chester's fine, I might be taking over payments on a 26' sailboat, and It's going to rain today so I'm taking the day off to finish moving. And now you know the rest of the story.

Good Day. (I stole that from Paul Harvey)

Boat News...

2006-03-08T05:44:00.000-08:00

Well, even though I feel like I don' t have much to say, I'll say it anyway. I figure maybe y'all can at the least know what I'm up to.

I'm still trying to work on the 51' speed boat (Frankly Scarlett), and wishing the fiberglass was finished. I've been having a hard time staying motivated to go to work. I don't do fiberglass. That's what I've been having to do anyway. I told the guy I'm working for that when I'm doing glasswork and digging ditches I charge $190.00/hr. He laughed. The carpentry that I can do is finished, and when the boat is back in the water I can proceed with the stern deck and cabin sole. So, I've been making enough apperances to keep alive, and not much more. I guess the only reason I don't like glass and epoxy resin would be the lack of running water in the crackerbox in which I live. I probably wouldn't have a problem with it otherwise. One can't go to bed covered in fiberglass (I suppose you could... but YIKES!) so I have to wait 'till dark and hose off with my landlord's hose. Then there's the epoxy resin. Talk about destroying clothes and shoes!! That's why I'm a carpenter! Oh, well. The boat should be in the water here pretty soon.

Now y'all know why I haven't been posting more frequently. It's the standard "if you don't have anything nice to say..." routine. Hopefully the next time I write I'll have pictures of the woodwork I'm (supposed to be) doing. I do have a wonderful stack of mahogany that measures (+ or -) 3" thick, 14' long and 22" wide. I'm really looking forward to milling and beginning.

That's the news!

Visit from Ma and Pa

2006-02-23T14:25:00.000-08:00

I had a wonderful monday, as my Mom and Dad went out of their way to swing by Apalachicola for a brief visit. It was really good to see them. First we rode around town to see the over priced real estate. This little town is really proud of its land. Then we went to the Dr. John Gorrie museum. This was the man who held the first patent for mechanical refrigeration in 1851. Not many people are aware where the ability to manufacture ice originated, but it was right here in lil' ol' Apalach. We then went to Boss Oyster for raw oyster appetizers and then Tamara's Cafe Floridita for the entree. It was marvelous to see them. Thanks, Mom and Dad!!

Scanned snail pics

2006-02-10T11:35:00.000-08:00

Hey Y'all. Here are some of the pictures I promised . The first few are from some work I did for a friend in Sumatra, Fla and then some random travel pics. For some reason the pictures I took of the motor vessel Frankly Scarlett didn't turn out. I don't know why. I'll try again.

Posts for front porch. For some reason I never did walk back around the house and take a finished shot. (yes, I did finish it!)

Post setting day on the rear deck. That's my friend "Mike with the kids". That's his best effort at appearing photogenic.

Partway through the framing. Great weather to be outside doing simple construction.

Finished Deck. I'm not sure I'm real tickled with the underpinning Mike put around it. Grrrr.

View of pumphouse framing , pump and water softener system.

Back quarter view of the pump house. Note the river in the background. It's only 22 miles down river to Apalachicola. By road it's 37.

Another view of the finished pump house.

My wonderful 30 mile commute to and from Sumatra, Fla. More often than not I would be the only car on the road the whole way. Lots of deer to hit at night, though.

Good Ol' Chester in his favorite riding position. We're in the N.C. mountains. He can ride like that for hours on end. It's hilarious when he hits bugs. When he does, he looks at me like I did it.

Andrew and cousin Chester in Ralpharetta.

Me and my friend Linda from Venezuela. She's the one on the left. With the Antlers.

Bama Jane Fighting Chair, Chain and Dogs.

Me and Bama Jane at her house in Fla.

still playing carpenter...

2006-01-28T13:10:00.000-08:00

My apologies for not posting lately... I know it gets old checking a blog and finding no new posts.

I'm back to working on a boat built circa 1956 that set a world speed record in 1963. It's a 51 foot Garwood sportfisher. It was the last boat he built and has high collectible value.

I'm the last guy in the line of people in this restoration. The hull's been reglassed and I'm doing the finish work. Currently I'm installing the rub-rails and will move to the decks and then the cabin when we splash her.

If anyone's curious, her name is Frankly Scarlett.

I'll post more pictures as soon as I use up the rest of this roll of film I'm working on.

Yes, I still use snail pics.

Back soon!

Pit Bull Attack

2006-01-20T13:10:00.000-08:00

Those of you who know my dog, Chester, are aware of what a great dog he is. He's one of the most docile dogs I've met, and he's so well behaved most people like him more than me. When I'm working around town and will be in and out, I generally leave him at home for the day to "guard the house" (that's his job).

About a month ago, I left poor Chester in the house as I do sometimes, and my landlord (the very ingenuitive captain of the grouper boat 'Offshore') came over to retrieve something out of the back bedroom. That room is his storage unit. Anyway, the front door to the cracker box that I live in is kind of quirky, and you have to jiggle the handle or it won't latch. Unfortunately for Chester, the landlord forgot this and didn't latch the door properly. Chester decided to go for a walk. While doing this, he ran into some neighbor dogs who are allowed to run freely. They're pit bull terriers. Two of them. Fortunately for Chester they're still young. I'm guessing them to be a year or a year and a half of age. They tore my dog's right ham up pretty bad; nothing to see but a dozen or so puncture wounds, but they mangled his muscle horribly. There were a few puncture wounds on his face and shoulders, and they nipped off the end of his, well, let's just suffice it to say it hurt him to urinate. He couldn't walk at all; the landlord saw him crawling by his house to go home. When he first saw Chester he didn't recognize him through the blood and the mud, but when he realized what he was seeing he took him to the vet. After a ten day course of antibiotics and pain medication the exterior wounds were closed and healing nicely. Still, after a month, he favors the leg tremendously.

Now that he's healing up it's kind of funny to watch him walk. His name came from Chester on "Gunsmoke" because he was found as an eight or so month old puppy limping around town on a mostly healed left front broken leg and as a result it's considerably shorter than his right one. So now with his permanent front limp and the newly acquired back right limp it's actually kind of comical to watch him romp and play. (he told me it's ok to laugh, now) Bless his heart! And for the record, he's going to be fine.

By the way, in case anyone's wondering, he's a chow mix. I think he's chow, shepherd and heyena.

Change of Pace

2006-01-17T12:09:00.000-08:00

After the last fishing trip I'm happy to report I'll be a carpenter for a while again. I'm building a pump house for my friend "Mike with the kids". Rosemoon knows who he is. (By the way, rm, he's been married twice since y'all saw him last and has six, count 'em, SIX kids now) That will be guaranteed $, and that helps pay bills.
It's a beautiful drive up hwy. 65 to Sumatra, and the road has been freshly paved. Nice 30 mile commute. The piece of property I'm working on is right on the Apalachicola river just north of Fort Gadsden. It's really peaceful until the fighter jets from Tyndall AFB decide to dog-fight over the forest. I'm always amazed at the wildlife I see in that neck of the woods. Today I saw a rather large russian boar (they're solid black) visiting my friend's hogs, and several white tail does.
Needless to say, the next couple of posts should be rather safe and mundane (unless while preparing the boat for the next trip something out of the ordinary happens).
The weather is really awesome right now; gusts up to 35 mph and thunderstormy. Not exactly winter weather. I'm hoping for long johns soon.
C-Y'all later

Testament to murphy's law

2006-01-13T13:12:00.000-08:00

Well, last Saturday my illustrious captain and I left for what was to be the first of my serious training excercises. It was a beautiful day and left no indication as to the fiasco that was about to ensue.
The capt. said we didn't need fuel; he topped off the tanks when we came back in the last time. I should probably as a preface say that this boat is not a foul weather boat. She has low freeboard (distance from the water to the rail) and a wet exhaust (the exhaust pipe is at water level). This is a particularly fast boat as far as offshore commercial grouper boats go; she'll do 20mph+ and cruises comfortably at 18, burning a minimal amount of fuel as 18mph only requires 2000 rpm's. So with this cauldron of energy between us and the water we made it to the bait hole in a remarkable 2 and a half hours. That's normally a 6 hour ride or so. We fished for bait 'till dark and went hunting for grouper. The first wreck we hit was a decent rally of nice sized grouper. We had 10 on deck for me to process on the way to the next bottom feature. On the next stop we caught nothing. On the next stop we caught nothing. (I would continue like this, but y'all probably get the idea) Finally about 10 pm the captain cooked supper and we quit fishing. The next morning was a series of stops similar to the night before. Skipper decided we should head in shore and fish shallow (30 fathoms) , as the other boats in the fleet had already pounded what we were trying to fish. We did go in and began to catch white snapper, scamp, trigger fish and beeliners. Not real high dollar fish, but quantity will pay, too. Now the fun starts.
Wednesday morning we woke up and the bilge was full of water. Guess who had to climb down into the bilge and replace the bilge pump while wading in two feet of oily, diesel fuely fish gutty water? I'll give you two guesses (and it wasn't the captain). NICE. So I got the bilge pumped out (don't worry all you greenpeace people; The oil and fuel float on top of water and the float switch shuts down before the oil gets to the pump) and we're running along to the first hole of the day. The motor quit. Just like that. The captain said "Wow, usually they'll sputter first!" I was thrilled. Turned out not to be such a bad thing after all; the water level in the racor filter (filters water out of the fuel) was up and when the filter gets clogged the motor stops. we had two extra filters on board, so we replaced it and started running again. At this point I'm kind of relieved; there's always a couple of things that go wrong on a boat and I was glad to get them out of the way. I was just thinking this when the temperature alarm started shrieking. Sigh. I figured it was something plugging the raw water intake under the boat and all you have to do is turn off the valve, remove the hose, open the valve and poke a stick or something through to dislodge whatever is clogging the hole. Not the case. The hole wasn't clogged. The only other cause for the overheating would be a bad impeller. That was the case. So we pulled the cover, pulled the impeller and it looked fine. Not a problem; this means the key that holds the impeller to the shaft has sheared. We looked and looked, but there wasn't a key on that boat. We tried to make one out of several different materials, but none would hold. On to plan L. I was guessing we were dead in the water, but the captain had other ideas. As I was preparing lunch he bypassed the raw water impeller entirely, put a 2800 gallon per hour lift pump in line on the hose and jammed it straight into the motor. It actually worked. I was elated. I figured since we were limping along with an improvised and compromised cooling system that the capt. would just count our losses and head back to the dock. Not the case. He wanted to keep fishing. So we did. More small trash fish that bring about $1.50/ lb. Those small buggers really tear up your hands. Ouch. We hit probably 5 or six wrecks and made a fairly decent haul before the racor filter got too full again. Not good. Usually It takes 3 or 4 days before it fills up that full. It's just habit to bleed off the water at the bottom of the filter once a day. 'Tis not good at all. I install our LAST racor filter, prime it up and we go. 10 minutes later it happened again. We're out of racor filters and I think we're really dead in the water this time. Close to 50 miles out. That's not far by commercial fishing standards, but too far for me to swim. We sit and read, eat, I have a couple of beers and then the captain tries it again. The motor started for just a second, where it wouldn't do that a while ago. This gave me my one good idea of the trip. On the premise that the fuel tanks are full of water (which they are) I suggest that we pump all of the fuel from the starboard tank over into the port tank. We dry and blow out the fouled racor filter the best we can and leave it to dry overnight wrapped in newspaper, and we'll let the tank settle out overnight. I guess I didn't mention the fact that we were in five and six foot seas for the past four days and that's why the water got in the tanks. Part of the reason it's not a foul weather boat. Thursday morning we wake up and the motor started. The capt. wanted to keep fishing!!! I said "You must WANT me to try and mutiny!" I told the captain that I was going home. When he asked how I was going to do that, I informed him that he was taking me. He got the idea. That was a good thing, as we rode all the way north to the cut between St. George Island and Little St. George, and died right in the middle of the channel. None of our fleet was coming in 'till friday, so we were resigned to drop anchor in the middle of Sike's cut. Not a particularly good place to camp out, but we were within sight of people, buildings, land and trees. Besides, If we were blocking the main entrance to Apalachicola bay, no one could slip by us and say they didn't see us. (dang, that captain's smart!) So, we spent the night camped out in the middle of the cut (I don't think very many people have done that lately) and woke up refreshed and out of beer. Next morning, the first boat we saw were good friends that towed us back to the dock. We unloaded our fish, pumped the fouled fuel out, refilled the tanks with fresh and now here I am, telling all you young men to GO TO COLLEGE!!!

Sunsets like summer

2006-01-04T10:29:00.000-08:00

Wow, this unusually warm weather is facillitating some beautiful sunsets. We normally only see this in the summer.

Night Fishing

2006-01-03T13:49:00.000-08:00

Night fishing is the way to go lately... the grouper are really chewing after dark. We get very little sleep (2 to 4 hours) and just keep on fishing. This is a 36 pound gag grouper that brought somewhere in the neighborhood of $100. Ka-ching!

foggy new year

2006-01-02T08:07:00.000-08:00

Well, this has been interesting weather; It's 70 degrees and we have a pea-soup fog. Grouper season opened yesterday, and the breezy, foggy conditions have prevented us from leaving the dock. The guys that got out will make the big bucks and after about 4 or 5 boats unload the price will plummet from $3.50 to about $2.75. We missed it. Oh, well.

The holidays were relatively uneventful this year. For Christmas I feasted with friends on a big deer ham. The new year came in quietly for me. Friends wanted to go to the big bars on the Island, but I couldn't think of a worse Idea. The Franklin county cops LOVE new year's eve. Instead I spent a quiet evening over at my friend Sandra's house and we watched the new year roll in with a really heavy fog. The temperature at midnight was around 72 degrees. Very strange for January 1.

Hope everyone had the best holiday season ever!!

Ciao!

Grooming for captain

2005-12-29T07:33:00.000-08:00

Ok, well this is the second time I've tried this, and perhaps this time it will work.
Life is comfortable here in Apalachicola, Florida, and the weather is marvelous. It looks like the captain I work for is going to begin training me to run my own off shore grouper boat. Kinda makes me nervous, but change is good. The only bad thing will be the stress. Captains take all the poop for bad trips. Oh, well, y'all wish me luck!

T'ill next time!