4/19/04 I should be at the boat in Lorain next week to work on it, I would like to get the Bimini top to see how it fits and take some measurments on it. Do you know if the work on the bow has been scheduled. I'm hoping to get the bottom ready for paint. And do a few other misc things. I've first got to go to NJ and Connecticut but should be there Tuesday or so. Sounds good on the help rigging, I'll probably be doing a week or so of work on the boat sometime before launching. One thing I'll probably do is make a cap for the chainplates, to eliminate that possible leak point and repair the bulkhead area in the head where they attach. I think the bulkhead is still structurally sound but that area is probably the worst looking on the whole boat. The cap will consist of a thin circular stainless plate welded to the top of the chainplate just above deck level and a rubber or silicon gasket to seal it to the deck. I'll have to find someone that can weld stainless, or somebody with that equipment that will let me do it. If you have any idea's or if somebody comes to mind on who could help me on that project I would appreciate it. I've got other old sails with this type of track slider, so I'll start on that project. I'll probably make some type of storm sails also. And I'd like to look into a roller reefed head sail too. Eventually I might remove the port settee, and replace it with some type of very comfortable reading, relaxing, reclining type of lounging chair or chairs. I'm also looking at lots more storage, shelves and cubby holes. There is a lot of unused or ill used space in the boat. Last fall you gave me three sails, 2 mains and a genoa, there should be two more head sails some where, one is supposed to be at the sailmaker, the other was supposed to be in storage. since we didin't find it in the garage, Please check around and try to find it so that the two sails are still accounted for. I set up the Bimini top and made some measurements. I will make a first attempt at a dodger to go between it and the cabin top. It won't be convenient to get around to the fore deck but should be nice to have on a rainy or cooler day. I also bought a couple quad line clutches so I can run most lines aft to the cockpit. I bought a 7 foot fiberglass dingy on the way home, it should fit on the front deck.
3/21/05 Today it is raining. It is a spring rain, so it is not bad, the flowers are starting to bloom, daffodils and crocus. I went to a birthday party last weekend at a friends house in Kansas City. I spent the weekend in the city. I went to a famous barbecue place,Arthur Bryant's BBQ, "The standard by which all are judged" to eat lunch onSunday. It was in a book that my friend got for a birthday present, 1000 places to see before you die. It had about 300 places in the USA, I have probably seen 200 of them,but this BBQ place, I had not, so I decided to have lunch there, it was very good.
I spent much of the last year sailing, I bought a 30 foot boat on ebay, in Ohio, eventually heading toward the Bahama's. Last summer I sailed the Great Lakes till the first of October. Then headed down the canals and rivers ending up in Mobile, Ala. early December, across the gulf to southern Florida and left the boat near lake Okeechobee. Lots of great memories, near disasters, funny stories and pictures.
4/2/05 I give a talk this evening on the sailing adventure to the local Yatch club, guest speaker at the spring banquet, people paying money to listen. :-) Now I just got to get them to pay me. I guess I get dinner out of it, probably not going to report that as income. Don't tell nobody, Ok
4/8/05 I give the talk at least twice more. My outdoors club in Topeka, backpacking and canoeing group, and to the local boyscouts. I have too many slides so it ran long but everybody was glued to their seats. I had to hurry up the last half :-) because the dinner cleanup crew needed to get busy so they could go home. I digital videotaped it so I'll be able to clean it up and have it on a web site or something if I decide too. Unfortunately the video of me is all black, the camera keyed on the slide screen but it recorded the voice well, that was the important part. The next couple talks I'll concentrate on the last half, so I'll have both in detail. I imagine after cleaning it up and putting them together, it could be 3 hours. That's long, but 8 months of lots of adventure with new interesting friends almost every day is a long time too. It's overcast outside today but the temp is good, I need to get some emails sent to let people know I'm still alive, haven't fallen off the edge of the earth on a sailboat or anything. Still busy, nothing that I can point a finger at, just life, my normal life, no moss grows here. I guess I've been spending a lot of time fighting a computer virus. I've got it beat down to submission but can't get it licked it keeps coming back. At least it's not a big problem like it was toward the end of last week when I didn't have time to fight it, just beat it back down, live with it and work around it. It's mushroom time so I'll be out in the woods for the next couple weeks, looking for morrels, very tasty.
4/21/05 Still working on taxes, when you don't owe them anything there are no penalties so therefore no april 15th deadline to loose much sleep over. Haven't figured out what I'm doing this weekend but I've been keeping busy, lots of outside time, and had to dig out an old video of me dancing and watch it to relearn some old steps for dance class this week. Also getting ready to give my sailing talk to the boyscouts so making some mods to it.
5/3/05 (written to friend wondering if I needed a job) I've done and can do just about anything mechanical, electrical or computer related, from working on Tractors to designing and building and testing fiberglass hiway bridges. I would say right now I'm just looking for some short term design or testing work. Just something to keep me off the streets :-) My list of previous projects stretches from designing and constructing Nasa space suit gloves to optical computerized laser fine particle measuring test equipment for dust explosion work. I love to teach, and feel that if you give me a book I can teach anything science related. Taught everything from engineering ecomony, thermodynamics, fluid mechanincs, graphics, dynamics, machine design, kinematics, EE for non EE's, circuit theory, and a few others that aren't right on the tip of my toungue. Oh yeah, started out with teaching physics and holography. I've developed a testing system that allows me to teach large lectures (200 and more students) of problem oriented type classes and get the tests back next class so the students can quickly and are actaully required to learn from their mistakes, get them corrected and move forward, instead of finding out about them 2 weeks later and never bothering to correct and learn from them. Hopefully this gives you a idea of what I'm looking for, basically something part time technical to recharge the coffers on the boat and then head back to sea.
5/4/05 Singles game for the grocery store. (this came from posts I did on a singles site) I always said we need a singles night at the grocery store, everybody goes there. Just hard to bother somebody when they are busy. I'm sure there a lots of single woman and men that would just love to talk but how do you figure out which ones. It's a much better meat Market then the bar (excuse the play on words there, or don't excuse it, just listen up). I came up with this idea a few years back when I was president of a local singles group.
What I haven't figured out is what kind of game to have that would make it OK and actually desirable to talk to other people and identify yourself as single. That's where you guys come in let's talk about this, maybe I'll start a thread on this topic, I've always thought it's a great idea. The store could offer coupons or something as an incentive, I'm sure it wouldn't be a hard sell, they would love to bring all the singles into their store. So let's hear it.
I've been told Walmart does it. that don't surprize me one bit. I think the grocery would be better. But then Wall Marts have a grocery now, so they would be a posibility and I guess you wouldn't even have to be looking for groceries, could be oil or even fishing lures too. Here's what they do, Walmart stores in Germany, red bow on cart to identify singles but no game, your still on your own to start up a conversation. I'm looking for the thing that makes people have to talk to play the game, that'll help out the shy ones. That's what I'm after here.
Aside: Bass Pro is good, love em too, and Cabello's, and Gander Mountian but just not the mass appeal I'm after here. Concerning Cabela's, In the old day's when I would head toward Yellowstone, I'd leave in the afternoon so I'd catch the Kearney, Neb store about an hour before closing, check out there bargain cave section, then head out west. I'd camp on an island in the South Platte just south of town in Julesburg, CO and then in the morning head toward the Sidney store and check out it's bargains, then off to Cheyene and the Trading post same thing. Sometime I'd head for the hot springs in Saratoga on the North Platte, spend a night there, others I'd get on with the trip and be in Yellowstone or the Wind River area by evening. Now Cabela's is everywhere it's not such a big deal, my house is filled with bargains, and the bargains just don't seem as good.
4/2/2006 I've recently bought a larger sailboat, a 38 foot Hughes, and maybe planning a trip around the world, first will be a shakedown for a couple months around the Bahamas, then after a month or so back in Florida making all the changes I've deemed necessary, up the east coast to Nova Scotia. If things are still going good, maybe a right turn and head for the Mediterranean. All this because I bought a 13 foot sailboat for $45 at a yard sale while I was in school and then came up with a dream of sailing my own boat to the Caribbean. Dreams, what would life be without them, if you stop dreaming you might as well stop breathing. I'm still looking for somebody to share some dreams and make some memories.
4/28/2006 I made it out to Oregon, I actually had a date in SF but not with a SF gal, she was from Baton Rouge, met her on line, we did the Mardi Gras thing in New Orleans, Mobile and Baton Rouge and then she was flying out to SF to a conference, I drove out there in an extreme hurry, 2 days from Mobile to SF, with a stop for lunch with an old Singles in Agriculture friend at a little Mexican restaurant north of San Antonio. Neat restaurant, Franks Bait and Taco shop, he's on my email list now. Anyway did a week running around north California and then finally south Oregon and picked up my year old ebay backup generator for the boat. Now back in Kansas, and soon Heading off on the boat to who knows where, might even do the 4 year round the world. Got friends living in my house, emptying the mail box, so I'm free to go, only need to come home if I need a new supply of different outdoor toys.
5/12/2006 I'm in LaBelle, Florida right now, I spent a little over a week in Mobile. Helping a friend with a 65 foot aluminum military PT boat. It's got three big Detroit diesels in it and then another 30 Kwatt diesel generator. The generator was giving trouble, not getting enough cooling water through the seaco ck (not misspelled, they bleep that word on here) and strainers, either sucking air through leaks or just too much restriction in the small line leading to what was originally a 15 Kwatt generator. I suggested a section of sight tube or clear line going to the engine to know if it's an air problem. Take note that's a good idea for any engine with raw water cooling, think I'll have to add that to my boat. We were going to take the boat to the Pensacola wood boat show but had trouble and had to turn around.
I also got to ride on a shakedown of a new cigarette boat they had just bought. Also all alluminum, it had two almost new 350 hp Yamaha outboards on the back, it was making some noise from one of the engines. We couldn't quite figure it out while on the water but after pulling it out and pulling the plugs it was pretty easy, one of the pistons wasn't moving, no compression when you held your finger in the plug hole and cranked it. Either a broken rod or wrist pin, lucky no holes in the side of the block, amazing it ran as well as it did. They might get luck and be able to fix it since the piston was down a 1/2 inch in the cylinder the skirts might have protected the cylinder walls enough to be able to just put in a new piston and rod. The boat still went close to 70 mph on the water with a broken engine, it'll be a good ride when fixed. Speaking of a good ride the PT boat would do about 45, it was no dog by any means, faster than designed since it had much less weight, no guns or ammo.
I also got the lead keel from the boat I salvaged down there sold, still have the mast to sell, it's good condition and from a 25 foot Cal sailboat, if anybody needs one. I've also got the engineering project of designing an 80 foot tall spiral staircase on the bluff east of Mobile bay. Same guy as the boats, he's got a house on the bluffs there. He wants stairs to the beach below the bluff, think I'd hang them from the top on three cables and just use the bluff to keep them from swinging.
Have a great day, still looking for the gal that wants kids and maybe wants to sail around the world. The world is negotiable, the kids not.
6/22/06 Still in Labelle, got the varnishing done on the old sailboat today, I've been having fun down here, went kayaking on lake O for a day, met some local kayakers at a restaurant here in town one morning, introduced myself and the next thing I knew I was invited and they even had a extra kayak loaded up and all ready for me to use. I also spent a weekend camping and sea kayaking in the mangrove swamps on the west coast of Florida. I also went birding a couple times with the local audubon group, there are lots of interesting birds down here that's for sure and some of them know how to fly.
Still in Labelle, got the varnishing done on the old sailboat today, I've been having fun down here, went kayaking on lake O for a day, met some local kayakers at a restaurant here in town one morning, introduced myself and the next thing I knew I was invited and they even had a extra kayak loaded up and all ready for me to use. I also spent a weekend camping and sea kayaking in the mangrove swamps on the west coast of Florida. I also went birding a couple times with the local Audubon group, there are lots of interesting birds down here that's for sure and some of them know how to fly.
This week had an interesting thing happen, but I can't remember it.... I woke up and had lost 5 years or so, went to the hospital, they checked me over nothing obvious, a nursing teaching friend from back in Kansas put her students on it and they came up with TGA, Transient Global Amnesia, actually pretty common but nobody can remember it... LOL. If you Goggle it you get 155,000 hits. Basically you lose a period in your memory for a short period of time, normally a day or two. I knew something was wrong that morning and told my friends. I couldn't remember where I was and how I got here. I knew I had sailboats but when asked some questions I said it was the year 2001, and Clinton was President. I had something similar happen about 10 years ago, I was home alone, and remember emailing friends about losing a memory cell, one I just used, about cells dieing all the time but this time it was one I just used. I had a bunch of recent memory that I couldn't tell if it was dream or real, but I could tell you every last detail about it. I figured the memory cell that said this area was real had died. The memory was about a weekend camping trip, I deduced it was real because all the camping stuff in my living room had a smoky smell. I didn't know if it was Friday and I dreamed about camping because I was getting ready to go or if it was Monday I actually did go and it was memory. I had really bad night sleeping the night before that event, the camping trip was cold and wet and the tent leaked most of the night. If I remember right, I came home Sunday morning, went to bed and slept through the middle of the day, woke up in the late afternoon with the memory problem.
The brain is an interesting thing.
6/22/06 I just really sat down and reconstructed the 10 year ago event. figured it might help with diagnosing this one, I wrote it in a email to my sister an air force nurse and my friend the teaching nurse and her class. It went like this.
I was camping for the weekend in the late fall in eastern Kansas with a Topeka, KS backpacking group called prairie packers. We where south and east of Topeka, it had rained most of Saturday evening and early Sunday morning, the tent had leaked and water puddled on the floor, it was a miserable and cold night with not much sleep. we broke camp first thing Sunday morning we hiked out and I drove home, about a two hour trip. When I got home I unpacked the car and called a friend that lived about 15 minutes away. He was an old student of mine, but only a few years younger, Mike from Junction City, that I often had Sunday dinner with, and played thinking games similar to Risk or chess. We planned to meet in an hour or so, I was going to take a shower first. When I got out of the shower I didn't know what day or time it was. I had a memory of the camping trip but did not know if it was Saturday morning and I was getting ready to go on the trip and I had dreamed about how the weekend would turn out the night before or if it was Sunday and I had actually lived through what was in my mind. I could tell you anything about the camping trip but did not know if it was dream or reality, I only lost one piece of information, I even knew about the phone call to my friend. I went to inspect my camping equipment and it smelled smokey that told me it was not a dream and it was Sunday. I reasoned that I had just witnessed a brain cell dieing, something that probably happened all the time but normally not one that you had just so recently used. This was the brain cell that told me this area of the brain with the camping memory was memory and not dream. I called my friend again, explained the situation and that I was heading his way, and if I didn't make it by a certain time he should come look for me. I gave him the route I planned on taking and even told him the gas station I was stopping at to fill up with gas. I had no problem getting to his place, have retold this story a couple times since then and chalked it up to a first hand example of how the brain works and can forget things. It might be related to what has happened this week. That time I only lost one bit of information, not a whole day.
For somebody interested in the medical side of this my sister the air force nurse came up with this info. The Dr .I spoke with discussed 1.) Lacunar Infarct, 2.) TIA, 3.) SIADH and 4.)REND(I am not sure what kind of cerebral event this is?). I would not take a guess at which shoe fits? Global anemia seems to have patients with a history of migraines from the research I have looked at. ( that's not me, no headache problems-- Jon)
It would seem that if he is having a cold sensation he may have something going on in the brain stem region where the temp regulating system is working. The part of the brain that involves memory is known as the association areas, that is what makes us individuals. They believe that memories of things, such as what you did last summer, involve the "hippocampus" (Greek for seahorse), part of the temporal lobe on the floor of the lateral ventricle. This area seems to collect information from areas of the cortex and puts them together. People who have damage to the hippocampus cannot form new memories. If he had an infarcted area (small clot, stenosis, blockage of some sort) It would make sense that it would be in this area. He should take 325 mg of Aspirin per day. Which would be 1 tablet. Blood thinners and clot busters are the usual treatment and prevention for strokes in the absence of a hemorrhage which they ruled out when they performed the ct scan (Did they inject dye when they did the scan? I am guessing not. Dye would give a better impression of blood perfusion. Small vessel blockage would not show up on a routine scan from what I understand.
How has his diet been in the past? Iodized salt? Thiamine difienciency? (can cause issues, usually seen in alcoholics, don't know Jon to drink that much.) Mosquitoes? Tic bites? Weird rashes? (Nope none of these probably fit, mosquito, tick maybe, alchoholic nope, a couple beers on Friday and Saturday night before CW swing dancing for 5 hours straight, but not for 6 weeks now, the last 6 weeks has been a glass of red wine in the afternoon about 60% of the time-- Jon)
If you have any ideas feel free to pass them on, I'm all ears.
My sister told me my seahorse might be out of wack.
Have a great day, I will, even if stuff like this happens, it's all part of life, might as well enjoy the ride. Jon
10-28-06 Last Saturday I drove through fall, I left Charleston where the lowest temp so far was in the high 40's and the days were still often in the mid 90's to drive through the hills of TN and KY with the beautiful trees and then the next morning home in KS I woke up to ice on the water bucket outside and 22 degrees. Quite a shock, I enjoy the cool though, the heat you can't do anything about, but cool you can always dress warmer, and it makes you feel like doing things to warm up.
The boat is anchored out in Charleston harbor, at least it was when I left it there last Saturday, I'm home now, everything is OK here, I've got to get rid of some cars to make the county happy. Basically I'll clean up some of the junk that has been accumulating for the last few years, I can get rid of VW rabbits, Some aerostar vans, some chevy vans, and some lincolns and it won't hurt too much. All the british stuff and other sports cars and old pickups can stay for now.
I've been dancing a few times since getting home, basically I've been taking a vacation for the last week, going dancing again tonight, and playing cards and pot luck with the singles group tomorrow. the next day is my birthday, haven't made plans for that yet, but I'm sure we'll figure something out. Tuesday is another dance night and Wednesdays I play texas holdem poker so no moss is growing on my feet.
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11-24-06 I am going to go to Iowa, Michigan, Ohio, West Virginia, and then back to the boat in Charleston, SC.
Iowa is where a niece live with her family, the man she married was a student of mine here at college. She is the daughter of my brother that lives in Arkansas. We will have a late Thanksgiving meal there on Saturday. My brother and his wife and I think all of his kids will be there.
After that I go to Michigan to get a kayak that was stolen from me two years ago. It came up on eBay in June and I had the police go recover it for me. Then I will probably go to Canton, Ohio and visit my cousins that live there. Falling Waters, West Virginia is the US Coast Guard office where I will do the registration paperwork on the new boat.
After that I go to the boat In Charleston and will work on it for a week or so and then sail it to Florida. Then I will find a ride back to Charleston and get my car, after that who knows? That's too far in the future to predict well.
11-26-06 I am at my niece's house in Iowa. I have been playing a lot with her two little boys, Issac is 3 and Tyler is 5. I also played pool (billiards) for most of yesterday afternoon with my brother and his oldest son Fritz and Fritz's girlfriend Michele and my brother's daughter Jenny's boy friend Tracy. My brother and I went for a long walk in the woods behind the house yesterday with the two little boys. I enjoy playing with the boys. I also read books to them before bed last evening. The weather here is overcast, but not cold for this time of year, when you walk you don't really need a coat but if you stop you do. There has not been very much wind. Today Mike, Amelia's (brothers other daughter) husband and Tyler went for a walk in the woods again. Mike was a student of mine in engineering at KSU.
We had a huge meal yesterday evening, today we have been eating the leftovers, most everybody but me has gone home, I will leave later in the evening and drive to Muskeygon Michigan. to pick up my recovered stolen kayak.
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11-29-06 I'm at my cousins in Ohio, I will leave tomorrow morning and go to West Virginia. I got my kayak from the police the other day.
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12-5-06 I have met a bunch of new friends, they are all boat people, that restore and build wooden boats. The boat yard that is closest to where I anchor my boat is a club of people that have and work on wooden boats. The allow me to park my car there, and leave some stuff, like my inflatable kayak that I use as a dingy to paddle out to my boat every night. I met these people because of a welder friend that I had contacted when I first came here to buy this new boat, he has a shop around the corner from the boat yard. I stopped in to say hi the first day I was here, and he introduced me to the group, then I ended up talking and staying most of the night playing poker. At one point I was winning about $30, I finished the evening loosing about $8, that's not bad for a evening of entertainment, sometimes you win, sometimes you loose. The next evening (Friday) they had a big party fora guy that was celebrating his birthday, he also has a boat he had just finished and was putting in the water on Monday. We had all kinds of food, and for the firsttime I got to eat oysters, that were collected that morning, boiled in the shell and we opened them and ate them (called shucking.) We did this again last night. We also have a bonfire on the beach and sit around talking and drink a few beers.
Saturday and Sunday I worked on my boat and yesterday I helped the guy with the new boat launch it and then take it to his dock. I also met a couple that has a boat very similar to mine, that is anchored next to mine. They are form Florida, but are staying on land since they just had a newborn. They have a rowing dory that I wanted to try out, it rowed very nice. I will probably make one very similar to that except I will make mine it three pieces that will nest when taken apart to save space. It will make a very good, sea worthy dingy, that will haul a lot of gear and/or people and will store away in about 4 feet by 5 feet.When I first paddled out to my boat, it was just as I left it, still a mess, LOL, only difference, lots of bird shit on it. Looks like it moved about a 100 feet, drug the anchor in a storm, no big deal, it could have been if it blew a different direction and a little bit more though. I was very glad when I got back here and saw my boat still in the same place and was even more glad when I saw nothing was messed with or stolen off it.
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12-9-06 I'm working on my boat, it is anchored out, I have to kayak a 1/2 mile to shore then drive to the library to wait in line for a computer, that is slow. I have one hour to use it and much of that is spent waiting for the screens to come up. I need to write the emails before hand on my laptop, but I haven't got the power up on my boat yet, so it's dark in the evenings when I would be able and would desire to do it. Also it's been cold here, yesterday morning I set a new record for me, I kayaked in weather that was colder than freezing, I had never done that before. The boat stays about 50 degrees even when the weather drops below freezing for the night. It is well insulated above the waterline and the water temperature is still around 56 F. It gets heat from the water, the hull is not insulated below the waterline for that reason, it would keep the boat warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer. A 50 degree cabin temperature is a little cool to be typing, eventually I will have a wood stove in the boat, but that is still on my other boat in Florida. I bought the batteries for the boat the day before yesterday, I need to get them out to the boat, probably later today, then I can start to debug the electrical system, I have mainly been spending my time fixing little things and sorting out all the stuff on the boat.
A typical day for me starts with waking with the sun at 7AM, I eat a breakfast of milk and cereal, the milk is powdered I mix it in the bowl, with cold water and then add the cereal, often Raisin Bran, or Grape nuts. I then start work on the boat, which for now consists of sorting out everything into like items and finding a good place to store that on the new boat. Normally about noon after working most of the morning fixing something, painting or storing stuff away I might kayak in to my car, maybe to get a tool, or maybe to go to a friends house to his machine shop to build a part I need. I will often have lunch on shore, maybe at my friends or maybe make a sandwich and eat some fruit. I often need to go shopping to buy something to fix part of the boat or to get some food.
Last night being Friday night some people from the boat yard gathered and we made a fire, then we went into the building and played cards, I normally don't gamble, but they wanted to play poker, so I played, I normally do quite well, because the other guys normally drink too much and I don't, so that my thinking and calculating ability that is normally much better is even more improved compared to them and that gives me even more advantage. I don't mind gambling, even if I loose, when I know I loose money to friends, instead of a casino.
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12-11-06 I've been sorting through all the stuff on the boat, such as my collection of spare bolts and screws and extra parts. I need to know what I have and where it is. I'm working on my boat while it is anchored out.
The last couple days I've been putting the interior back together, since I had to tear it all up to do the welding on the boat.Today I finally got the power turned on in the boat, so tonight I will not have light by candle, and I had a hot lunch on the boat for the first time, I finally spent some time on checking out the propane stove and oven and made the small repairs that where necessary since it had not been used for 8 years. My next step is to debug the running lights and other things that makes sailing the boat legal, such as the radios. Then I need to check the navigation electronics, the GPS and radar units, depth finder and speed sensors, both wind and water and other things that make moving safer.
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12-18-06 It's Saturday lunchtime, I'm sitting at the boat yard kicked back on chair typing this letter on my laptop. My friends are a little late, I figured the best way to guarantee they show up is start doing something like this. Last night we played poker again, it's a standard Friday night thing here at boat yard. We play dealers choice and rotate the deal. It's quarter ante and when we play Texas holdem we play a little different we have everybody ante and have a $2 limit on raises and bets, we still can get quite good size pots. With other games there is no limit and $20 bets are not unheard of, I've made a few myself. The first night I lost about $30 and then we played Saturday too, I donated another $8 or so, since then I've been doing much better, and I'm now ahead about $50. That first night I was introduced to many new games, many are completely luck, lately we've been playing more games where being able to calculate or estimate the odds helps. We think we played some Omaha last night, three cards down and then like Texas holdem after that. Often when other people deal they have too many wild cards three, like 2's 4's and 8's or two cards in your hand that add to 7 or thirteen, basically then the game if it's 7 card, is going to be won or often split by having 5 aces, 5 kings sometimes wins, queens and your chances drop considerably. Not much odds calculating going on there. Then they play a game called follow the bitch, it's 7 card poker, queens are wild and the card that follows a queen face up is wild (that changes if a new queen comes up.) One other twist is the low spade in the hole of the players that haven't folded splits the pot.
Last night I folded a 3 of spades when the 2 was face up, I was guaranteed a split but had forgot that rule. I was not happy, such is life of a gambling man, $20 bucks down the tubes. Normally I'm not a gambler but I'll do it with friends, when I know if I loose a friend wins, it's entertainment. I normally think I have an advantage, if odds are involved and drinking is rampant since I don't drink as much, but it's still a GAME of CHANCE.
I'll probably be ready to head to Florida next week, I've got the batteries in the boat and the electric system is mostly figured out. I also have the propane system up so I can cook food and heat some water for baths and such. The water system is still mostly torn apart, so many 2 liter pop bottles filled with water will be my fresh water supply. I should also have the two 55 gal collapsible drums filled, but they are mostly for healing the boat over to fit under the low bridge east of Okeechobee. I have yet to see how much the boat heels with them hanging on the swung out boom.
I have a cell phone but it's never on, it's for me to call, it's a track phone thing from a company called net zero, buy minutes before hand, basically I've got a 14 months of service and 1800 minutes for $200. I also have an internet answering service, that's the number I'll give out. It's 785-370-4232, should be good forever.
You'll hear my voice saying my name and asking to please leave a message. If you do I'll get an email telling me about it with time stamp and your phone number and I can go online and listen to your message. That's free and if I remember right it's from net 10. That's pretty good for me, since email is my only real method of communication. I should be able to have very limited text based email with amateur radio on the boat at sea.
The guys here down at the boat yard are great, many nights a week we've got a bonfire on the waters edge and somebody brings some kind of fresh seafood they just caught or collected, we've had steamed oysters more times than I can remember, If I make it back here on the 30th to pick up my car we are all going out collect some and crabbing have a big feast while watching football and drinking a few, probably a few too many. The boat yard is a collection of younger guys mostly involved in wood boat construction and their friends, the next dock over is a shrimp and sea food market and ice house, many of the shrimp boats dock here and the captains often join us. A couple days I woke up thinking I might get to know one of the captains real well. It was pea soup foggy when I rowed out to my boat late the evening before. Had a little trouble finding my boat. Anyway when I was awoken at 3 in the morning to the sound of a diesel engine and a person yelling "Turn right, Turn right, sailboat dead ahead," It got my attention to say the least. I'm anchored out a little closer to the channel than I would like but when I anchored I was searching for 12 feet of water (6 foot draft and 6 foot tide) with a long stick and I was in a hurry. Since then the boat has moved about 50 feet in a strong blow but it's securely anchored and still out of the channel so I haven't been in a hurry to move it. The last couple weeks I haven't had a steering wheel, I finally got all the pieces to adapt the new one built and installed a couple days ago. The shafts, keyways and thickness where different sizes, so I now have a system of three adapters pieces but it's good and secure. Luckily the replacement wheel had a bigger hole and key and was thinner, so no modifications where necessary to it, just had to build pieces to fill up all the gaps. That was mostly done by machining with power and hand hack saw and filing. I want to get a small machining center for the boat basically an 18 inch lathe, small mill and drill press built into one machine, then I can easily make stuff like this. I'm lost without a shop at my disposal.
I got a very neat forwarded email from my friend Judy back home, Recording a once in a millennium event on film. At the time they didn't know the risk they where taking. Finding a new island, go to my good stuff page to see it. I'm trying to not spoil the surprise, every sailor needs to see this email, and everybody else would probably be interested too. http://www.jheld.mysite.com/index_2.html Thanks Judy.
Still the friends have not showed, not a big deal. Many of the boat yard people have come and gone. Last night after the card game I went home with one of the guys, he offered a hot shower and a movie and sleep on his couch. It sure was nice to take a hot shower instead of a luke warm sponge bath on a 50 degree boat. I need my wood stove, that'still on my other boat, just to take the chill off. The boat is well insulated topsides and the water is 56 degrees so 50 is as low as I've seen in the cabin.
I've been frequenting a Goodwill clearance store in north Charleston, this is where all the excess donated stuff gets sold and stuff that doesn't sell at the normal stores around town. They sell most of there stuff by the pound. I've been finding very good clothes at 79 cents a pound and yesterday I found a good pair of cowboy boots, like new, but had a slight problem with and inside heel pad, my old ones where getting where they needed new soles and heels. In the last couple weeks I've also bought a couple pair of hiking boots and a some Bass sandals. Yesterday I also found a pair of topsiders boat shoes. All these are in like new condition, a couple shirts and pants too, even got some more kids toys, glassware, candle holders and X-mas decorations for the boat. If your ever in Charleston, you should visit this place, it's on Rivers, just north of 526 on the west side of the road.
Last week I also went to a used boat equipment store also on Rivers, just south of Montague on the east side, I bought a lot of stuff I needed for the boat and a couple books, one is the repair manual for the new diesel,I still need to find one for the little 8Hp yanmar. I bought a flare kit, shore power cord and a spare depth sensor thru hull, that's what I needed right before I launched the boat, I ended up paying real money for a bronze one, this $5 new plastic one would have been just the ticket, I'm ready for next time now.
Sometime I need to attach the picture of the place in south China that I decided I will go to,it was on the wall of the Chinese buffet I ate at (it's also on Rivers, LOL), I'll want to see if any friend of a friend might be able to tell me where it is. (it's on the bottom of the trip report1 page, I found out where it is by searching on the internet)
This week I also visited the tall ship that they are building downtown with my welder friend. The ship is the "Spirit of South Carolina", it's going to be beautiful, many of the people here at the boat yard are working on it. It will be launched on the first Saturday in March, it'll still have a year of work left before it sails though.
Still left for me to do on my boat, hook up the navigation lights, check the instruments, electric bilge pumps, hook up the radio antennas. I checked out the radar today, it works but not as good as expected, might be operator failure, since this is the first time I've messed with radar. Well that covers a lot of my life in the last week. My friend finally called they'll be here in an hour.
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1-5-07
I'm still here with my boat anchored out in Charleston, SC. I will probably leave for Florida next week. I've had a local friend and sailor that I met a couple years ago when I was on my first boat in St. Petersburg, Fl. say that he might be interested in sailing with me to Florida. It would be good to have an extra set of hands along for this maiden voyage. I still need to check how far I can heel the boat with the water drums, but I'm getting closer and closer to feeling ready to make the trip.
I checked the sails (12 of them) yesterday and this morning, a best as one can check them in the cabin when it's raining outside, LOL. I was able to get rough measurements on them so I know what I have and which bag to look to get what sail. The sail cloth and stitching all looks pretty good, all the head sails must have never been rinsed so the clips and grommets that attach them to the head stay were all very corroded. I got them cleaned up and working again, a few of the clips and more of the grommets on them will need replacing soon but not before they are used again.
Today I will go do some laundry and I will go to the sailing thrift store and look to see what they have for replacement clips and grommets. Tonight we will play cards at the boat yard, I haven't decided what tomorrow will bring as far as fun, since it's Saturday. They tell me the big football game is Monday or Tuesday so I'll probably stick around till then and find a place to watch that.
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2-5-07
I'm in LaBelle, the boat is in Stuart, about 80 miles east of here, came here to Norm and Phyllis's to watch the superbowl. I'll head back to the boat probably tomorrow and head this way. I need to do something with my two old boats, hopefully sell them.
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2-17-07
I've got my car, today I went to the Ft Myers gun show looking for an SKS but didn't find one. I'll be heading up the east coast and then back to Kansas and Arkansas to help my brother pour some concrete on his new house in the next couple weeks.
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3-6-07
Last week I danced with a PlentyOfFish online singles group in Columbus, Oh. and made a bunch of new friends. My little Subaru is going to have 250K on it real
soon. Still going strong. I picked up the finished boat documentation paperwork. Also got some eBay items picked up and some dancing with new friends. I now
have what I need to get the 1996 Nissan maxima on the road. I've been running around with my Best friend from college for the last couple days, his dad just died, They knew it was coming. I met him in Urbana, Illinois, visited with his brother and sister who were also there, then we went to his mom's in St. Louis, I've known them all since the first year in College, spent Xmas with them all. We continued our trip toward home and visited his Nephew in Colombia, Mo, and then stopped for a visit with his son (named after me) and future wife of that son, in Lawrence, KS, they are buying a house and we got a tour of that. (They will get married Sept 8th in KC, so I'll probably try to get back for that.)
I'm home in Kansas now, It was good trip, got in two days ago. A week of dancing, old friends, new friends, ebay items, exploring new towns and bargain hunting in thrift stores, what more could I want? Except maybe to meet my future wife and mother of my kids. Everything at the house is fine and still here. That's always a big relief.
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6-1-07
I'm back in Florida working on the boats, been here for a couple months, heading to Kansas and Arkansas for the 4th of July, having a family reunion, and pouring more concrete on my brothers place on Beaver lake. I couldn't find a buyer for the 38 like it was so I've been fixing it up to make it a ready to go boat instead of one needing work, maybe I'm one of the few or the only one that buys boats like that, and that's why I get such good deals, ya think...
I'm flying home, it's cheaper than driving, even my Subaru, $3 gas would cost $400, I can get plane tickets for $200, infact I sent out an update my life email, and one of my friends back home will pick me up at the airport, take me dancing and then take me home. and turn around and do it again 3 weeks later, but I found another friend that needed her daughters car driven to Florida so I'm doing that instead of flying back, so only need a oneway ticket, a little over $100. A couple other friends also offered solutions to my how do I get from the KC airport to Manhattan or Arkansas, but it's hard to beat an offer including dancing.
Speaking of that I went dancing last night, haven't done that for almost a month, down here I tend to keep my nose to grindstone. If you read this line how about right now before you forget, you send me an email to let me know somebody actually does read this stuff, it's good to know I'm not just typing to keep my fingers active.
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Travel to Florida and the Flying bike V3 Aug 01, 2007 Needed: A trip to KC Sunday or Monday, more follows. Life has been hectic the last month, I've found myself driving 800 miles in 10 hours in a brand new 08 Sonata, very nice car equal to my 87 Lincolns, and then a couple days ago driving 400 miles with a 1/2 hours notice and doing some concrete work as soon as I woke up. I've finally got a moment to write a letter, I'm in Arkansas at my brothers place again, we poured more concrete on his new house project and will make another pour Friday morning. Today I'm working on my flying bike project, version 3, no the bike will not fly per say it folds up (really disassembles easily) into a neat small package that will easily be transported as luggage on a commercial airplane. This package will be about 28x26x12 inches and also contain a folding bike trailer, the package itself (fiberglass box) we be a major component of the trailer. Version two was worked on last week at my friend Glens house, it had multiple disassembly points and folded
quite compactly but was found to be too flexible when assembled. As Edison once said, I have not failed, I have just found 10,000 ways not to do something right. When I figure out how to make folding or disassembling bike wheels the package can get much smaller. Small wheels is out of the question, they just aren't safe at high speeds, and I do see a tiny 49 cc motorcycle engine being added to this in the future with 50 mph and 100+mpg not unbelievable. Now for the travel part, my plans to get back to Florida to deliver a car, got totally turned upside down when I was told the car didn't need to go, she said I could still take it, but there's no need to waste $600 of gas to take a car to Florida and back for now reason, so I opted for other solutions, I started up my motorcycle and gave it consideration. Hadn't been on it for 10 years or so, since I last took a long trip out west camping along the coast and visiting national parks for a couple months. The problem with that would be one more vehicle in Florida, got too many there already, granted the motorcycle trip would be enjoyable and it would be easy to store and also tow home. I also was wanted here in Arkansas to help with a couple more concrete pours, and had intended stops in Mobile to pick up a sailboat mast and maybe Atlanta for single campout on the trip to Florida. After evaluating alternatives I opted for a flight from KCI to Ft Myers for a total cost of $97, hard to beat that. I drove Del's truck down here to Arkansas, Del is the guy looking after my place while I'm gone, and will drive back to Kansas Friday afternoon after we pour concrete in the morning. I fly out of KC Tuesday morning at 6AM, so I'll probably stay in KC Monday night and maybe also Sunday night too. Anybody having any ideas how I can get to KC from Manhattan, please speak up, sure I can take the airport shuttle but that's no fun, that's for normal people and all you know I'm
far from normal, LOL. The 800 mile drive was to pick up Del's daughter from the X in a little town west of McCook Neb. Del called Saturday evening and wondered if I wanted to go for a ride, I told him I was out dancing, pick me up at the bar at midnight. I drove all the way out there, that's what Del wanted was help driving and he drove half way back while I got some sleep. I'll probably call somebody about buying some used but still good barn tin I checked on a month ago at a yard sale in Lyndon, KS, if they go for my offer I'll borrow a boat trailer from my brother and pick it up on the way home. I've always got use for stuff like that around the home, and if the price is right it's a good time to buy it. The conveyor A frame support project we worked on last time I was down here worked perfectly. I need to figure out a better joint for the bottom tube of the flying bike, something that rotates in and connects and has good side to side bending and tension strength, a hinge with removable pin would work, but surely there is something out there that is more elegant than that and requires no tools. Have a great day. Jon
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9-17-07 I spent the last month and a half in Florida getting the Hughes ready to sell. Some fiberglass work, learning how to weld stainless steel, and lots of other little jobs, it's ready now. Now it's time to learn how to sell on eBay. Since I've been such a good buyer eBay sent me note that listing stuff for sale is free for me this month. So the 38 and 30 get listed, I expect the 38 to sell and not the 30. I just bought a couple sailboat shipping cradles in Ft Myers, haven't picked them up yet. A thousand pounds of structural steel and a pallet full of about 30 jackstand screw jacks and pads.
Haven't been doing any dancing, just work on the boat, learning about poker statistics, wrote a few programs to calculate things like expected winning hands for any number of players for different games. I've been playing a lot of poker lately that's what spurred that on, $5 game twice a week. I also played in a couple $25 texas holdem games and came out ahead. I've actually learned enough interesting stuff that I'm planning on writing a book about "The math and probabilities of poker." I couldn't find anything about the hand probabilities of draw poker after the draw, so I calculated it, and found out stuff that most would not expect, that warrants a book about the subject.
Welding stainless steel was pretty easy using a gas welding torch, read about it online. Basically you use a fuel rich mixture to get rid of all the oxygen, use a piece of stainless rod, I just used part of an old animal cage, keep the flame steady to keep a good shield gas, and melt everything together. It takes a lot of heat, stainless is a good conductor. I learned once more how to release hot metal quickly, didn't even have any long term blisters, just a sore spot for a day or so. It was a success, the bow rail on the Hughes is one piece again, and even looks good where I welded it. A grinder is a wonderfull tool. Then finish up with a wire wheel, a stainless wire wheel would be better.
The last week, I've been helping with an online search for Steve Fossett, the adventurer that set all the worlds record's and then went missing while flying in the Nevada desert. Basically I spent 30 hours or so looking at 7000 satellite images, and then also reviewing what other people had found, passing the info on to the search team on the ground and in the air in Nevada. You can see a couple pictures about that on my photo page. I was at the landing and got to meet Steve in Salina after he finished the solo round the world trip in the global flier. Many say I'm just like him, but he has more money.
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Need ride from Topeka friday. October 15, 2007
Friends in Manhattan/Topeka area:
If anybody knows of somebody that works in Topeka that wouldn't mind giving me a ride from Topeka to Manhattan when they come home from work on this Friday, I can get a ride from KC to Topeka in the morning and spend the day shopping.
I moved two boats yesterday, the 30 footer should be headed to Puerto Rico, the 38 is still up in the air, I get people asking questions about it, hopefully soon somebody does more than just ask. Today first thing I need to get the big boat off a mud flat it's been sitting on for a the last 9 months, I figured that would be a safe place for it mostly sitting high and dry. It's about a foot to high, going to have to use an anchor or two from the mast top and lean it way over again. I haven't been dancing since I got back down here to Florida, that's months. Life has just been work on boats, day in, day out. Soon it will be just work on THE boat, and I'm getting it set up so I can do that anywhere while travelling. I keep adding pictures to the web site. I'll be around Manhattan for the next 3 weeks.
http://www.jheld.mysite.com/photo_5.html and MISC PHOTOS has the new pictures.
Thanks
10/15/07 I moved two boats yesterday, the 30 footer should be headed to Puerto Rico, the 38 is still up in the air, I get people asking questions about it like on from
Israel and the head of Fiat in India and many other places, hopefully soon somebody does more than just ask. Today first thing I need to get the big
boat off a mud flat it's been sitting on for a the last 9 months, I figured that would be a safe place for it mostly sitting high and dry. It's about a foot to high, going to
have to use an anchor or two from the mast top and lean it way over again. I haven't been dancing since I got back down here to Florida, that's months. Life has
just been work on boats, day in, day out. It's great to finally be working on the big boat, I'm getting it set up so I can do that anywhere while travelling. I'm heading
home Thursday evening flying into KC. Old friend Angela will pick me up at the airport and I'll spent the night in KC. If anybody is has reason to drive from KC to
Topeka or Manhattan on Friday or Saturday morning I could use a ride. Basically need to be in St George by late Saturday afternoon for a BBQ.
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10/18/07 I'll be around Manhattan for the next 3 weeks till Nov 11th so I could use a ride to KC then. I wouldn't have any trouble spending time in KC for a day or two shopping and sight seeing. So If your headed that way please let me know.
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11/04/07 I've been working on a couple projects, went to Arkansas and helped my brother with the last walls on his new house, we only have one major pour left, the roof and then the house will be ready to start work on closing it in and making it read to move in. There also will be tons of dirt to move to cover it, you can see pictures of the progress at my other website
http://www.jonheld.mysite.com/photo3_1_1.html
I've also been helping with building the the stage set for the local High School play "Beauty and the Beast" pictures of my work can be seen toward the bottom of this page.
http://www.jheld.mysite.com/photo_4.html
It's hard to believe it's almost been a year since the pictures below were taken.
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Heading back to Florida November 07, 2007
I'm heading back to Florida on Sunday. I need to figure out how I'm getting to the KC airport Sunday afternoon. I have options but am always open for suggestions. I can get a ride to Junction city and take th bus to downtown KC and then figure out how to get to the airport from there. I can get a ride and go dancing with friends on Saturday night in Topeka and then figure out how to continue on to KC. If you know of anybody travelling from Manhattan to KC sunday that wouldn't mind a rider please let me know.
Lately I've been working on the set for the play Beauty and the Beast at the local High School. It's quite neat. You can see pics at
http://www.jheld.mysitecom/photo_4.html
I've also added another paragragh on the bottom of my life at
http://www.jheld.mysitecom/custom3.html
We finally finished the walls of my brothers house.
http://www.jonheldmysite.com/photo3_1_1.html
I've got more new pictures but they haven't been posted yet. I need to figure out how to extend that page or just start a new page but the page templates the site offers have changed and I haven't decided how I want to deal with that. The old ones have been eliminated, but I'm sure I can figure out how to reuse them and keep the look of the site consistent. Life goes on.
I think I've got somebody interested in the 38 foot boat now, he lives in the next town over from my brother in Connecticut, not sure which town and which direction yet, but he sails out of New London..
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Boat sold, need item taken to Arkansas, pay gas. Nov 20, 2007
I'm in Florida, got here no problem, just had some help from new and old friends, and also free airline tickets from giving up my seat on a flight last summer. thanks all.
I am putting out a call for help once more, no rush. My brother that's building a house just bought a concrete grinder surfacer here in Florida on Ebay but it needs to be in NW Arkansas where the house is. I picked it up last night, it is gasoline powered about the size of a garden rototiller but the handles come off and it fits in the back of my Subaru station wagon no problem. If anybody is heading from Florida to anywhere near Arkansas we would be happy to go out of our way to meet you and reduce the effect on your trip and make a large donation to your gas cost to help get this on it's way. No rush, my brother would like to have it there by February so keep this in the back of your mind. Everybody can come out ahead.
Yesterday I finally sold the 30 foot boat, so I'm only a two boat guy this morning and soon will have some money in the bank, been almost a year and a half since I've been this way, but I'm sure I'll be able to rectify the problem of having money in the bank real soon..... LOL.
I still have the 38 foot boat to sell, and finally starting to work on the steel boat to get ready to go. The guy that bought the 30 foot boat is from Peurto Rico, so now I have a good friend from there. He's been here for the last week and learning much about debugging problems on boats. We went through the boat from stem to stern fixing things along the way and making sure it's ready for the trip to his Island in Caribbean some time next spring. It will be stored on the hard for the winter at Glades Marina and new bottom paint and the hull inspected before making the trip.
I've got a couple interested in the 38 but nobody making the trip to look at it yet. Money is very tight, I expected the 38 to sell and have trouble with the 30 since there are many many more 30 footers for sale and not many 38's and most everybody that has a 30 would like a 38 and the price is definitely in the lower part of the range.
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Merry Christmas This will be the last email from me unless you respond, more about that later but first here is a Xmas thing you will enjoy.
------------------- This is a group of college guys who sing a wonderful take on the 12 Days of Christmas....you will definitely be smiling.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Fe11OlMiz8 ----------------- Now back to the last email thing. I believe many of my emails sent out end
up in the spam folder of the recipients for two reasons, my amateur radio email address, n0ryq, is considered spam by many spam checkers
and the fact that it also is addressed to many addresses. Anyway I will update my email list to only those that respond. You may have two
copies of this email, I started a new email address jheldatksuedu@gmail.com and sent this email from both that to eliminate the n0ryq problem
and n0ryq@juno.com for those that receive it ok from there. If you only received one and it's the first that you've heard from me in a long
long time your spam checker might be the problem and the new one works. I've sent out at least one email per month for along time. Maybe
if you sent me an email to the juno address your spam checker would learn that n0ryq (2nd character is a number 0) is not spam. I don't
intend to stop using that email because I've used it for years and that's where most people expect to find me. Please send me an email
and tell me how many emails you received, respond to the juno one if you got it, if not we will try to get the juno one to work, it's the easiest
for me and the one I check and use most. I also have the jheld@ksu.edu, it's automatically forwarded to the juno, I can't send from it because
KSU makes you change your password every couple months (suppose to be more hacker proof, but a stupid idea and ridiculous burden for the
thousands of users in my opinion, but nobody asks me.) I plan to keep the web sites updated, www.jheld.mysite.com and www.jonheld.mysite.com
If you don't get either of these emails, you don't need to bother to send me anything, LOL. Unless of course you got this a different way and
want to be put on the list..... I'm in Arkansas at my brothers the day when I first wrote this, we got the grinder delivered. Then I went to south
central Kansas, a funeral, unfortunately. Then last Thursday I made it to home to Manhattan. I'm getting reacquainted to cold weather, a week
ago I was swimming at 7am just to wash the sweat of me, a day of driving and I was in 20 degrees, the last couple days I've been helping my
brother cut firewood. We drag whole trees with the backhoe to the splitter then cut it to length and split and stack it. The progress on the big
boat is slow and steadily moving forward, I've got the engine room about done, still no tanks under the floors and have to paint the bilge, it's
coming along. I still want to reshape the main bilge under the engine on the boat, to eliminate water sitting on steel, since with a bilge pump
you can't pump out every last drop. This will involve pulling the main engine and pouring some concrete that will slope to the cut off bottom
of a 5 gal bucket set in the concrete to act as a sump. This after bilge pumping will leave a little water harmlessly in the bottom of a plastic
pail a long way from any steel. The only thing left in the engine room is to decide what to do with the exhaust from the two engines, I probably
want to keep it a dry exhaust, right now it's a tractor type stack complete with flapper valve coming out the back of the cockpit. That will
change but not exactly sure of the details yet. There is a 4 inch diameter fiberglass exhaust pipe headed to the back of the boat, but that's
designed for wet exhaust, I had to introduce salt water to anything inside the boat. Any ideas are welcome. The engine cooling is a closed
system keel tank, basically just like an automobile type radiator system. This trip I am without my phone, it's sitting on the front seat in
my car in Jacksonville, Florida. It didn't make the transfer when we unloaded the grinder and other stuff to Jason's car for the trip to my
brothers. After talking with the phone companies customer service, a long drawn out process, due to language barriers and the little knowledge
of what to do about the problem on both ends of the phone. It was learned that I can buy a new phone and have the old service transferred to
the new phone. This will give me a replacement phone for the next couple weeks while I'm in Kansas. It seems I should go thorough the
process of buying a new phone every time I need to add minutes to my old one, since the new phone comes with more minutes and longer
activation for less money than the cheapest minute cards. This new time will get added to minutes and service time I've got on the old
phone. I love to find financial loopholes in a system, LOL. Soon I should have a phone, I checked what's available locally, but the phone
ordered one is a better deal. Basically I need to loose my phone every 4 months buy a new one, and I can have a cell phone for about $8
a month. I should be back in Florida in early January but my travel plans are still unknown and up in the air. If you know of anybody traveling
toward Jacksonville, that has space for a rider please let me know. I could use up one of my free flights or I could drive another vehicle down
that way, one that could tow the Subaru home and carry lots of stuff, or one that I could sell down there for maybe more money than it would
be worth in Kansas. Have a Happy New Year too. Jon
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My life letter 2-10-08
Everything is fine, I'm in Florida, been here for a little over a week. I had a tough time with my cell phone for the last two months. Like most things in my life it has been an adventure. When I met Jason in Jacksonville mid December to travel back to Kansas and to deliver my brothers Ebay purchased concrete grinder, I was using my cell phone to get the last minute directions to his place. It ended with a look left, I see you thing and I set the phone on the passenger seat. That resulted in it getting left there when all my stuff was packed into Jason's car for the trip to Arkansas and Kansas. The phone had a month of service left and almost 700 minutes. I called Net10 and explained the situation with the expectation I could probably upgrade my phone handset and get access to my service while I'm in Kansas. So I did that and purchased a new phone that also came with time and minutes that would be added to my account. When it arrived it was a Track Phone, a competitor of Net10, and with a phone call to customer service I found out two things, Track phone had bought out Net10 and it was incompatible, they would have to send another phone, and another week goes by without phone service. I pleaded that since they made the mistake and I would be another week without a phone that they should at least turn the Track phone on. The finally did that after going through many levels of supervisors and much arguing on my part. Four days or so later I receive another phone in the mail, another Track phone. By that time I was due to leave in a week, I gave up on this problem. I canceled the visa payment for the new Track phone and they promptly turned it off.
I had decided to take a newer Chevy van to Florida that I had bought cheaply at an auction to resell and make money on, thinking that the Mexican field workers in Florida would like such a vehicle since it had seat for 8 and would easily hold another seat for three in that back. It is is in excellent shape, it was previously owned by the State Police, so maintenance would have been excellent. I loaded it with a few tools, some stuff that needed to head to Florida, items that might be needed to tow my Subaru from Jacksonville to Labelle, a new battery and some food and drove it first to my brothers in Arkansas. I had on intended to immediately continue toward Mobile, Al to pick up a sailboat mast I had stored there from a salvage operation a few years back but decided to spend a little over a week there helping with concrete forms for the new house he is building. Pictures of the latest work is now on my website.
http://www.jonheld.mysite.com/photo.html
The weather was cold, often below freezing, but the work needed to get done. When the weather called for snow and rain I decided it was time to move on in a southerly direction. I left his place around noon and ended up driving long into the evening arriving at the marina where I had purchased the 38 foot boat and done the salvage recovery of the 26 footer that was abandoned and left in the swamps from hurricane Katrina. While leaving Rogers, Arkansas I stopped at the Harbor Freight store, one of my favorite stores and bought all the extra stuff needed to carry the mast and tow my car. At my brothers we had build a couple 2x4 frames to hold the mast. In the morning I got ready load the mast there were 3 on the trailer, one was broken, not mine and of the other two I decide which one I needed to load up. One was much larger than would be expected on a 26 foot boat so I choose the other. When Cliff arrived, he's the dock manager there, I asked him which one was mine, turns out it was the larger one. Looks more like a mast from a 34 foot boat or so. Anyway, loading went quite well with the help of the support of a pickup truck that had a portable engine lift in the bed. I could lift one end up and set it on that and then lift the other end up and rotate to be over my van. I tied it down and continued on my trip heading to Jacksonville. I wanted to arrive before dark because the mast stuck out more than 10 feet behind the van and was only marked with a red flag. I assume there is probably some kind of law stating a light should be on it and I had no desire to talk to the police about it. I came into the west side of Jacksonville just as it got completely dark. Less than hour to go I pushed on, but since I was directed by phone the last few miles to Jason's place last time, it was not committed to memory well and it was not written down. I did have his address, so I stopped and asked for directions and they let me use the phone to call him. The car was fine, I was afraid somebody may have needed the tow bar that was strapped to the roof rack so I brought enough to make another tow bar but it's not needed. I spent the night there and hitched up the car in the morning. The only problem was putting the ball on the van's new tow hitch we had built at my brother's in Arkansas. I bought a new ball at Harbor Freight but couldn't find it. I had decided I must have left it at the store on the checkout stand since I had picked up two to see which fit best and then went back to pay for all the items that at that time were already bagged and ready to go. I did have a ball on a receiver type hitch was in the back of the van but was not having any luck with the tools I had of getting it loose. I had a pipe wrench, C-clamps, vice grips, water pump pliers, hammers and tires irons, but nothing was working. Even parking the car on it to hold the receiver hitch and using the pipe wrench and hammer did nothing. The lock washer on the 1 inch bolt was doing it's job quite well. Finally after C-clamping and vice gripping it to the vans hitch and beating on the pipe wrench I got it to budge. I installed it hooked up and wire tied the new safety chain and went on my way. I decided it was daylight and the vans lights were high enough and easy to see around the small Subaru so didn't worry about lights. Quite a rig, 38 foot mast on top and car in tow.
I made it to Labelle, no problem. Surprisingly I got about 18 miles per gallon with the van, a lot of the was due to slower speeds, I was often 5 mph under the limit. The gas tank is somewhat around 30 gals, I never did put in over $80 a tankful, travel by car for a single person now needs to be evaluated closely. I had no choice this time since I needed to pick up this mast, but in the future flying might be the choice.
The boats survived no problem except once again somebody decided they needed my Stearn's inflatable Kayak more than I. It was stolen off the dock where I keep the 38 footer. My dingy, and inflatable zodiac type boat also there where not touched. I am sure it was stolen because the paddle was also taken. We will see if once again it turns up on Ebay and I get it back. Unfortunately if was not the old one, (previously stolen and recovered) it was a newer replacement. So If I do get it back, probably the serial numbers will get removed from this one too. Unfortunately that's life in the modern world. We could choose to spend all our time keeping everything we own in a safe and never ever use it, or we can choose to take a risk and enjoy life.
Lately I've been working on the 38, I put it on Ebay again since I got an email stating it was only a $1 to list it. I've got about 5 people interested but nobody is jumping on a airplane to come look at it at this time. There are not many sailboats selling these days. People that want them, they just don't have any money. I might have to wheel and deal some creative financing plan for somebody. I've fixed up the cabin top hand rails and am now working on varnishing all the exterior woodwork. Each of these projects adds value to the boat, most people do not want a project boat, so hopefully after I get all this done I can sell it as a ready to go completed turn key thing for more money. Maybe the sale will involve delivery to someplace exotic and I can get paid for that too. I can at least hope, can't I?
Today is laundry day, I've been winning at poker lately. I played in the games at the bar just for fun and in the 3 or 4 times I've played I got enough points to allow me to play in the tournament they have. Prizes are $300, $200, and $100 but it's probably not worth going back to Manhattan for a chance to win that. The local games are $5 buy in, with all the local friends and family every Monday and Friday nights. Basically it's just and excuse to get together and have some laughs. We play dealers choice and play quite a variety of games, ever hear of crazy pineapple, basically it's Omaha with a discard before and after the flop, so you end up with 2 cards you have to play and 3 out of a standard Texas hold-em type common cards. There are lots of other similar but unique poker games we play. I've worked up probability programs on the computer for some of the poker games using basic programming.
I also went round and round with Paypal for most of a week. I still need to continue that fight. Paypal is Ebay's credit card payment system to help sellers get paid easily. They have a policy to protect sellers that items can only be shipped to the address that the bank uses that issues the credit card. Sellers can choose to ignore this and give up the protection offered and ship to where ever the buyer wants the item. But it's my argument, that for a buyer in good standing (high Ebay feedback) and a small priced item there should be some way to get around this rule. I recently bought 6 books totaling $12 and had to have them shipped to Kansas. They are sailing books that I would want in Florida. Even though I have purchased $9000 through Paypal, there was no way to have these items shipped to Florida. Even though I called numerous times and argued up and down, left and right, I couldn't speak to anybody that had the power to change a policy or make a reasonable decision. All I could get is customer service people and there immediate supervisors. There was no way to talk to anybody higher up. I was promised three time that I would get a call or an email form such a person, but two weeks later still no call or email has arrived. When I call they go through a process to make sure I am who I am, like answering my mother maiden name. If after going through all that and I say I need this in Florida I should be able to get it shipped to Florida. I have already had numerous Ebay items shipped to this address in Florida. It should be able to get it shipped to Timbuktu if I call up and say that's where I want it shipped.
That's all for now, hope everybody else is having a good time.
Jon Held
====================
kids ATV for sale, Life is good , Mar 05, 2008
Life has been good, I've been working on the 38 Hughes, basically it hasn't sold as a fixer upper so I'm doing the fixer up routine. I should get more money for it that way but boats aren't selling well right now. I do have a couple of guys that are interested in it though. I'm almost done, there always more that can be done, but I've got all the woodwork varnished and working on some interior paint today.
I've got a few other projects to side track me, a few for Carolina, the lady that owns the place where I am keeping the boats and a few on the Subaru, need to work on brakes for it. Had to put a new water pump on it, actually found a new one on ebay for $7 and $9 shipping.
Carolina has a brand new kids ATV for sale for $500 or best offer, you can see pictures at my website. I've ridden it, it's like new.
http://www.jheld.mysite.com/photo_4.html
Might be able to arrange shipping next time I come home or go someplace else.
Jon Held
====================
April 5, 08 Bananas and diesel
I've just been working away on the boats, I've got the 38 ready to sell, a couple people looking and always somebody saying I've got a friend looking for one,
but nobody with the money yet. I'm finally ready to start work on the big boat, I've got to replace the head gasket on the Subaru first though, that'll take a
couple days. I met a couple the other day that are from the Netherlands (Holland, where my big boat was built.) I recognized the flag as not from here
and thought it might be dutch, so I looked it up in the book. They cruised by Norm's place when I was here checking on the house since Norm and Family
are in Iowa for the week. I went out to the dock with the binoculars but nothing but the boat name on the stern. They where headed to the bridge but the bridge
never blue the horn to open so I figured they where stopping at the city dock. I went down to meet them, and did. We've become good friends. They've been
sailing for the better part of 6 years. I took them some citrus from the trees around here. The night before last I spent on there boat and taught them how to
play poker, even gave them a brand new deck of plastic playing cards and they came over last night for the normal scheduled poker game. They did great till
they had a good hand and Mike came up with 4 of a kind. I've been on a losing streak for the last 5 games or so, but last night I at least broke even. This
morning they all got up early while slept in and went flying with Mike, he has an old tail dragger airplane. I'm sure they are enjoying it. Last night they both got
to feed owls too. We are showing them a good time they will not soon forget. They enjoyed the poker, said it was the most fun they've had for $5 in a long
time, and lots of great conversation, that's the whole reason for the game anyway.
They will leave the boat in Glades marina and fly back to Holland next week to work for a year or more. They will probably come back to play poker again on
Monday, Actually I'll go over to Glades and pick them up. I'm sure we will see each other in the future or at least stay in contact. Their website is http://www.syjoho.nl/
I spent most of last week working on the old diesel that came out of the salvage boat in Mobile. I got it running fine. Even the starter motor worked, that was a
huge surprise considering it had been stored outside for the last two years and before that had been under salt water twice a day for 6 months. The alternator
was toast, couldn't even get it apart but everything else with a little cleaning, actually a lot of cleaning, some TLC and elbow grease, was salvageable or
easily repairable. The little bag of new spare parts, fuel pump and injector, also got wet but cleaned up. The old fuel pump and fuel filter housing was the real
casualties of the salt water, it corroded the pot metal casings. That's when I remembered the bag of parts and got luck because there was a pump in it. I
also remembered I had a service manual, damaged but use-able, but couldn't remember what safe place I had stored it. I found one online a downloaded
PDF file, then after I got the engine running I found the paper one in a plastic bag in the back of the van. I needed the manual to put the injector pump back
together correctly, for some reason the engine wouldn't work when it was incorrect? That fixed, the injectors worked, I put it back together and the engine
started. It runs great. Now I just need to find somebody that needs it.
The Subaru blew a head gasket, it still runs, just low power, a couple weeks ago it needed a water pump, I found both parts on eBay, brand new, the water pump
was $6 with $7 shipping and the head gaskets where $4 with $10 shipping, They were listed a valve cover gaskets but the picture showed a head gasket. I
asked to make sure the picture was what was being sold. They arrived yesterday. So now it's time to pull it apart and make sure that's the problem.
The 38 foot boat is really looking good, There isn't much else I can do to it other then gold plate it, I just need to find somebody that has money and wants it. The
money is the kicker these days. Speaking of money, the land just west of me in Kansas sold on an auction last Tuesday, it was internet biding for a week and
then a final sit down session in Manhattan on Tuesday. It was 356 acres in 5 smaller acreages or all together whichever brought more. I didn't like the fine
print there was a think called a buyers premium of 10% in addition to the 3% auctioneer and broker commission. A buyers premium means the selling price
is 10% more than what is bid, you bid $50K the selling price is $55K. That is dirty pool in my book, hiding that in the fine print. You're always wondering if the
other person you are bidding against really knows that? Anyway I was interested, before the sit down auction the 70 acres next to mine was $70k, that
was too much for me but a fair price. The entire property sold for $1.23m. I was flabbergasted when I read that, I first read it as 123k rut that didn't make any
sense since it should have been more if the 5 units sold separate, then I counted all the zero's. I expect I have a development with many houses coming in next
to me and my taxes going up. Luckily I had the appraisers out to reevaluate my place last fall. hopefully that gives me a couple years grace. Also there is a hill
between me and the property so the view shouldn't be affected and the view toward the lake is the other way. My value should also go way up if I sell
sometime in the future, never expected $4k per acre, that's unheard of in Kansas, at least I never heard of it. Somebody's got money, actually two did. It
might be a wealthy wanna be farmer, but I don't expect it. I'm trying to find out who the new owner is and find out for sure of the intentions.
That's it for live on the boat in Florida. Been swimming a couple times a week, eating bananas of the tree, and still lots of oranges, tangerines, and grapefruits
every day. Didn't expect bananas though, small but good. Even transplanted a couple of them to Norm's river bank. Been helping Carolina a lot around the
house, basically paying my rent for use of her garage and dock. I'll be back in Kansas in a couple weeks for a short time.
Later. Jon
==================== Jul 19, 2008
It's been a long time and a lot of water has gone under, luckily none of my boats has. I've still got the 38, it's completely ready to sell, but almost nothing
is selling with the economy like it is. I'll put it on eBay but really don't expect anything, I certainly can't afford to give it away, I would think that sailboats
would pick up here pretty quick with fuel like it is and something big enough to live on and go places has to be an attraction. Time will tell. I'm in Florida, I
was back in Kansas for a while and will head that direction again, I've got a friend that will finally move into the place and take care of it. I'll probably be
back there mid to late August for most of a month. I've finally got both boats sealed up where they don't take any water during a rain, still work to do on the
45, but it mostly painting the bilge and then installing the tanks there. I still want to do something with the bilge under the engine since it can't be
accessed in an emergency and that bothers me some. I'd like to put some concrete down there and have a bucket cast into it that will have the bilge
pump. That will keep salt water away from the steel and also provide another layer to slow leaks if the steel was compromised and the bucket should easily
keep the concrete "dry" and make the bilge be easily pumped down to an insignificant level with the always little bit of left over water not causing a problem.
I've been working on wire brushing and painting all the little rusty spots on the cabin top, I'm just putting quick spray can paint on them, something to easily
get them covered while they are still dry and clean, later I'll come back with a suitable top coat. I still will probably do an anti-slip deck coating on the 38 foot
boat, that will make it look a little better and hopefully sell easier.
I've got some small welding to do on the 45 in the engine compartment, I want to try my 125VAC welder I bought in Charleston, but unfortunately I took it
home to Kansas, so I'll experiment with it bake home and see how well it will weld a 3/8 bolt stud to the steel plating. I've got a couple places I want to
mount some stuff with studs like that. First place is some clear plastic deck drains made from thick Plexiglas threaded to accept a PVC 1 2/2 inch plastic
pipe fitting. The old steel pipes welded in on both sides have rusted through. When removing them I noticed how nice it would be to have a small window in
that area of the engine room to let some natural light in. I figured I could make the window, only 4 inches square with the pipe fitting in the middle and remove
the rust problem area all at the same time. Right now the rough oval shaped hole is plugged with a foam noodle with a PVC pipe down the center and it
drains into a funnel made from a cut off 2 liter pop bottle. It works but is not as permanent as desired,even if I think that it's a solution that could survive a
ocean crossing and not cause a problem. I still enjoy the solution of problems like this using ordinary found items in unlikely ways. The window is something
similar, and will look much more professional when completed, held in by the fore mentioned studs and having finished edges. I needed a pipe thread die to
cut the threads in the 1/2 inch thick Plexiglas and was able to make it from a short nipple of pipe with 4 ground slots in the edge to give cutting edges.
I was going through the interior or the 45 footer looking for a tool or supplies to fix something and I opened my sextant box and found that salt water had gotten
into it during the first crossing with the 30 foot boat. There where scattered drops of moisture here and there nothing major, the sextant is a Davis Master
model, a very good professional plastic sextant. The salt water can't hurt the frame but there are metal fittings on it (some adjustment screws and such) and
the salt water also corroded the silvering on the index mirror. That's the mirror that moves and reflects the sun or star image to the half silvered horizon
mirror. The mirror will be easy to replace, just requiring some glass cutting on a scrap of mirror, then probably paint the edge to slow a repeat similar type
damage. I don't think I have a glass cutter here. No silvering is not really a problem, the front surface of the glass does just fine for reflecting the sun but is
probably needed (or at least very desirable) for a star shot. Also the sextant can be used to figure distance off by measuring an angle between two known
coast objects, the mirror surface would help there.
I did a noon sun shot for the first time yesterday and even with no horizon, I used an imaginary line a couple feet above a guard rail on the road found to be
properly placed by sighting along the top surface of a suitably placed carpenters level. Anyway even with those problems I found my latitude within
a mile and half and Longitude 6 miles. Not up to GPS standards but very suitable for navigation, where you normally just have to get within sight of
something recognizable. Basically the Latitude is what you work with and can get reasonably accurate and you then sail east or west till you reach your
destination. Standard navigation practice before GPS and other modern electronic way finding. The main reason I needed to play with the sextant is
that the paperwork packed with the sextant, original manual and some paperwork on using a sextant with the necessary tables I photocopied many
years ago had become mildewed. I cleaned it up and scanned it into the computer so I have it in a more secure place. The I dried the paperwork and
placed it in a sealed plastic zip lock bag. I also have a back up simpler plastic Davis MK3 sextant that also works and has less moving parts.
It's little things like that keep me busy. Last week the major push was the teak wooden mast surround to make the tapered sealing boot on the 38 boat, that
was the last deck leak on that boat. I am amazed how much water came in around the base of the mast, but never watched it in a rainstorm, I imagine
some water must have drained of the boom stored mainsail cover but then also the mast has quite a large surface to intercept wind blown rain. With each one
solved it makes me one step closer to pushing off and getting on with the trip with fewer chances for things to go wrong. The main thing keeping me land
based is 2 big sailboats when only one is needed.
This morning being Saturday, I got up early and went to the flea market, after that I didn't really find any yard sales and made the daily stop to the library for
an Internet, eBay and email check. I bought a clock radio for a dollar at the flea market. I wanted to continue to listen to the radio the other day and realized I
didn't have one in the shop here where I keep the boat, so now I can sit here in the shop typing this and listen to country music. I also have a clock and alarm
if I need one too, a dollar well spent. Last night we had a short poker game, one of the guys, Tim, got unbelievable hands, 4 of a kind, a straight flush, full
house, etc and this was all in less than an hour. I was not getting anything and dropped out most of the time but Mike was not as lucky and had good hands
but not when matched against great ones. I was quite happy to finish only 20 cents down for the evening. Cheap entertainment.
There are a couple bunches of Bananas and a pineapple getting ready to be picked, I tried to microwave a green one the day before yesterday and was
surprised to learn that a green cooked banana could easily pass for a baked potato. I've developed an interesting recipe with canned beans and corn, left
overs from the chip dip I make. Anyway, equal amounts of corn and beans both drained (1 can each), (I used red beans this time) a good dollop of peanut
butter ( 1 Tbs), some hot sauce (about a 1/2 teaspoon) and also a 1/2 teaspoon of Lizano salsa. Microwave till hot and stir. An interesting Caribbean or such flavor.
I know your saying what the heck is Lizano, It's an interesting salsa I found at a thrift food shop in Topeka last winter from Costa Rica. It was quite a find, I
bought three large bottles (probably 50 cents apiece) gave away one to a food loving friend in Manhattan and have looked for it in stored ever since. My
supply is getting low, it's made from vegetables and spices, the ingredient list is water, sugar, salt, vegetables (onions, carrot, chili pepper,
cucumber,cauliflower), molasses, spices. I experimented with this dish and found I can make a suitable substitute for Lizano with dill pickle juice, brown
sugar, black pepper, and hot sauce, probably 1 tsp, 1 tsp, 1/8 tsp, and 10 drops. So now you can play with this recipe at home. I'm sure your all rushing
to the kitchen right now, LOL.
Also on the food subject, I've been making lots of Mexican flat breads lately with both white and corn flour and mixtures. Basically just flour and water is all
that's needed, I've experimented with adding a little mayonnaise to make it release from the cooker easier, any type of oil or grease will do, that's what I
had easily available at the time.
When I got back, My inflatable dingy had been left on the dock, I noticed there were ants there so I figured I would clean them out, they had chewed huge
holes in the boat, so I need to find some Hypalon and hypalon glue and make some repairs to that item.
I know there are plenty of other things I've done since I last wrote, but to be honest I can't even remember how long ago that was. I have to go back and
check my old sent emails to do that, it's time to clean them up and store them for permanent safe keeping anyway.
=========
8/28/2008 1:45 PM
>>> I looks like I will be in Corpus Christie, TX with my old 38 foot boat the last week of Sept. A lady there is buying it for her husbands birthday, a surprise present. He has looked at boats and identified mine as
one to get but has not contacted me and doesn't know about this. I will get $5000, non refundable, week after next and take the boat there and wait for the birthday. If the husband decides he doesn't want it, I keep the boat and the money. If he does want it I get $17,000 more. I've been talking to a contractor in Iraq that was planning on buying the boat on time, store the boat in a yard, $1-2000 a month, then he gets it after it's paid for. He pays storage and he was planning on flying me to Little Rock in three weeks where he lives, to talk about the deal and meet in person. He is coming home on R&R. If the Texas people don't want it we will store the boat someplace down there and sell it on time to the other guy and get even more money. I would like to find crew to help me get the boat to TX and then need to figure out a way to get to Ark, or KS after that.
====================
11-9-08
I'm at my brothers in Arkansas, I've been here for the last 6 weeks. We've been working on the new house he is building. I volunteered to help him thinking it would be a couple weeks of work, maybe a month.
After I tied 25,000 wire ties (15 seconds each is fast), helped place probably 15 tons of reinforcing steel, that what I was tieing, and 6 weeks of work later we poured the concrete for the roof. It's a 2 story earth sheltered (mostly underground) house the day before yesterday. The work has been 7 days a week and 8+ hours a day, week after week. For those not in the know, a wire tie is a 6 inch piece of wire that you wrap around two rebars to hold them in place and then twist it tight. Anything like this that has numbers in the many thousands means lots of repetitive work. After getting the rebar tied in, then I worked on building walkways around the outside, mostly I could install the stuff as fast as he could cut it and get it to me, so I did nearly 80% of the installation, wire ties, rebar, lumber, bolts and screws, while my brother was busy keeping me supplied with the stuff to install. The important thing is that the house now has value instead of being an unfinished pile of concrete. Sort of like when I got my steel boat to float. Now my
brother can seal the place up and do the interior work, rain or shine, warm weather or cold. During the construction the afternoons were often warm and the work was in the sun and therefore I was often sweaty. Since the house is right on Beaver lake, I got in the habit of going for a swim when the work was done. The water was rather cool but very refreshing. It would reinvigorate the body and soul. Even though the weather continued to cool, we still went for the swim, even on days when the temperature dropped below freezing at night, we still went for a swim after work. The temperature of the water was near 60 degrees, maybe a little below that today and the swims became shorter, but it still felt very good. The day of the pour the air temperature was in the 50's but I still went for a swim and it still felt good. Even better to get out and dry off quickly. I have said "if the shock of entering the cold water doesn't kill you it's good for your heart." Not working for the last couple days, I have not felt like swimming and haven't. Nov 7th is late enough in the season for the last swim in NW Arkansas waters. When I last wrote, I was in Florida with my boats, and was waiting for a down payment check to arrive on the surprize birthday present sale of the 38, so that I could deliver it to Galveston in time for the birthday. I was scheduled to arrive right about the time that the hurricane got there. The check never came, so it was time for plan B, which was to meet a new friend in the Little Rock area that was considering buying the boat over the next year in a time sale. Over the next month the details were worked out, money is now coming in monthly so that boat is finally in the process of being sold. I've had a heck of a time getting this letter sent. My laptop died about a month ago, I bought a USB hard drive converter, that let me get to my old files. My brother gave me his old laptop, it's a windows 95 vintage device with no USB port, so I couldn't read my old files from that. I typed the letter in the old laptop and then went through all kinds of contortions trying to get it onto the desktop to sent it. It would have been easy if we could have found the cable to connect the old laptops modem to the phone, no luck. Next was try the floppy, I could format a floppy in the old laptop, but it would not read it in the desktop. My brothers new laptop came with a USB floppy, it wouldn't read it but if I formated a floppy in it the old laptop could read the files, but as soon as you wrote a file to it, then it showwed up as unformated on the USB drive that it worked fine in and just formatted it a couple minutes ago. Aren't computers fun? Finally when we tried an old diskette, deleted a file from it to make room, add this letter to it, the USB drive read it. Once, afraid to try it a second time. I'm heading home to Kansas in the next day or two and will be working on my house. I learned about a month ago that the house had been broken into and stuff had been stolen. I know my saddle and all of my brass musical instruments have been taken, I suspect much more but it will be years before I really know the extent of the loss. One instrument
was a trumpet with a solid sterling silver bell. The work at home will start with storing most of my stuff in a semi trailer and then fix the house up to be able to rent it out to a friend that will take care of the place while I'm traveling. In the evenings my brother and his wife go to bed early, his wife gets up early to go to work, 3 AM comes real early. I stay up later and try to sleep later till the sun rises. I often watch public TV in the evening. I saw one show in particular that everybody should watch if they get a chance. It's called "HEAT" and I think it was on Frontline, is available to view online on the public TV website. We as a world are producing far too much carbon dioxide, burning much the carbon that has been stored in fossil fuels for millennia and pumping it into the atmosphere in the last century. This process is continuing to accelerate with no signs of slowing down. The excess C02 in the atmosphere is trapping the suns warmth and is also entering the ocean waters, killing the sea life. The temperature increase is melting the polar ice caps and glaciers, the sea level is rising. We, the USA, are much to blame, but China is now producing more C02 then we are and India is not far behind. It is predicted that in 30 years the sea level will rise enough so that most of Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama will be underwater. After watching the show, I believe they are right and this should be what the politicians should be working on and worried about, the economy is small potatoes compared to this problem. Often things that are supposed to be "Green" when looked at with this problem in mind are not very "Green." For example, ethanol production and it's use as an auto fuel substitute is really not, the energy needed for the fertilizer production to grow the crops to produce the ethanol is actually worse than burning fossil fuels in our cars. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/heat/ Basically each coal fired power plant in this country burns two unit train loads of coal a day, and those trains are very, very, long and contain many thousands of tons of coal. Near 80% of the rail traffic through Chicago is coal trains taking coal from Wyoming to the east coast. 40% of the glaciers on Mt Everest have melted since 1922. When the glaciars are gone, the people below the mountains will have almost no water supply. The average household in the USA consumes 9 tons of coal a year, to produce it's power, and all the other things that it consumes. World War 3 (in my opinion, the end of civilization as we know it) will
most likely be caused by the effects of this problem causing people lives to change so much that they will fight others to get what they no longer have and need. It's not a pretty picture. We did just find water on Mars, maybe there is hope for survival of some human life. This is your wake up call. Please try to educate yourself on the subject and then help to wake up the rest of the world, before it's too late. 10 years from now may be too late. I have also seen many other public TV shows on Nature, learning about whales, white wolves, sharks, elephants and tonight monkeys that use medicinal plants, think, scheme, communicate, and even lie for personal gain. This most people believe is only practiced by humans, no longer can we think that. There also was a show a couple weeks ago on breeding dogs from wolves in a very short period of time, with selective breeding, they selected for tameness, it was done in a couple decades instead of thousands of years. The experiments were done in the Soviet Union in the 50's to produce better wolf fur bearing animals. This is a major step in making evolution more believable and proving that when the conditions are right it can happen very quickly. A couple days ago the show was about electronic devices that read and decode our brain and allow people to control a computer with only thoughts. Paraplegics will be able to regain motion and control. A monkey was shown operating a mechanical arm to feed itself that was connected
to it's motor control center of it's brain. This will allow people with paralyzing neck injuries to regain muscle control. If we can survive as a race we will have much to live for. I did also get to see a pitcher hit a home run in the World Series, I think they said that was his first ever home run, none in little league all the way to the majors. And that pitchers have only hit 17 home runs since the start of professional baseball. An email last week corncern Steve Fossett, said his next plans were to go to the bottom of the ocean the Marinas Trench with submarine plane, it's built and they are trying to find somebody else daring enough to pilot it. That all for now, I/m now thinking I might fly down to Florida for a quick check on the boats sometime soon. Jon
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