But first: remove Honda 50 carbs (3) and manifold. Take back to workshop. Disassemble. Clean. Fuss. Lose critical bolt. Got lost in the jungle somewhere even a magnet couldn’t find. So, I find another one in my pile and make it work. Reassemble. Will replace the whole shebang tomorrow when the day is cooler. Chances of it working? 100%. Working as it should? No idea. Totally up in the air. A crapshoot.
Update: carbs cleaned and reassembled on motor. Motor starts and runs like charm. OMG, we are pleased! “We?” Yes. We. Sal and I took them off and Sal and I put them back on. I cleaned them but it was a two-person chore for us. So much easier having two pairs of hands.
We will likely bring the other, smaller outboard up tonight for additional repair efforts. New impeller. And we will definitely bring up the two big 250 gallon tanks for fire-station installation within the next few days. ‘Bring up’ means hauled up on the high-line. While I putz about with engines, Sal is gardening and keeping house and home together. The weather is pleasant – a bit hot – but pleasant enough. We are all ‘shopped and stocked’ up. We’ll be kickin’ off August with a list of chores still to do and a bunch o’ visitors scheduled in every once in awhile. We’re busy.
And my guess is that the politicians will be busy, too. The campaigning has started already and Harper’s visit to the Gov.Gen to announce his intentions is really just a formality at the best of times. And these are not the best of times. The sooner the better, I say.
The CONS will claim fiscal management again. But they can’t manage squat.
What exactly does this recession look like to you? It certainly does not have the characteristics of normal recessions. It is not responding to normal economic policy. The market is flat. Precious metals are flat. Oil is flat. The loon is swooning and interest rates are lower than Harper’s awareness of life in the Canada he leads.
I am not so sure it really is a recession, anyway. It may be the first steps in an unusual, unprecedented international depression. Think about it……the real difference between the two to economists is duration. A recession is short, a depression long. But we have had a recession for over a year already, maybe longer, if you judge by other criteria than what the bank of Canada looks at. Look at consumer levels. People aren’t buying as much. There is almost a palpable, unspoken, feeling of gentle resistance…..isn’t there? I have mentioned this before but the more I look, the more it feels like ‘consumerism’ – as a mindset – is flattening. NO?
Of course, it will be almost impossible to see such a subtle social change right away. People will still buy stuff. They will even buy silly crap they don’t need. The buy-more-stuff consciousness we’ve had since the ’80’s isn’t about to go ‘off’ like a light. But it does seem to be dimming. I guess that is what I am saying: mad consumerism is waning, I think.
Interest rates are so low, big-ticket items should be flying out of showrooms. They are not. Only houses are still flying high, everything else is flat. Well, except food and the ‘stuffs’ of life. We can wade a long time in that shallow pool but methinks we are heading for the deep end.
Jus’ sayin’……………..
Our Off the Grid Home 
Thirty-nine new trade agreements and still running a trade deficit! It seems giving away the farm doesn’t make traders buy the cow when they can get the milk for next to nothing.
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Giving away the farm means losing money and that describes ‘deficit’. We are our own worst enemies. We just give it away (but the pols likely get a generous under-the-table slice to do it). The real joke is that a population the size of a large city in China thinks itself a nation with all the attendant powers. We are NOT. We are small fry and we get stepped on all the time. We have to live amongst the giants but we could at least be good to our own. Canadians should NOT have to give it all away and then buy it back at world prices….we should apply 100-mile-diet principles to or own economy.
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Seems to me that the Conservatives have been doing a fairly good job, compared to the government we had under the Liberals (memory is so short). I shudder to think what would happen if the NDP got in.
How’s the Liberal govt. in BC doin’ for you? Here in Alberta we’re just waiting for the NDP to screw up.
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You and I likely do not see eye to eye on politics but you’d be surprised to hear me describe myself as a conservative. I think I am. But I do not attribute conservative principles to a party just because it calls itself Conservative. Anyone can choose a name. Do I really think Liberals are liberal or the NDP are new? To me, those are just names. Branding. So, in light of that, do I think the current Cons are conservative? No, I don’t. They don’t conserve. They don’t respect human rights. They don’t respect the military. Or education, health, truth, or even democracy. BUT most people only care about their wallet anyway so let us judge them on that. The dollar is around 70 cents and that is considered ‘good for business’ (hard on citizens, tho) and yet business is tanking. We are in a deep recession and heading deeper. I don’t see business genius in that. And, anyway, when your team members are cheaters (Duffy et al) then the team cheats. If your team members are incompetents, then the team is incompetent.
The only true conservatives are the Greens. They want to conserve. They want traditional values. They are the good guys. Sadly, they are wet-behind-the-ears but still, if you are voting by values, you have to vote Green. If you are trying to be more practical, how can you vote for a team that is losing? The LIBS in BC are exactly like the Cons in Ottawa. That is why CC and Harper are practically an ‘item’. The Libs in BC are really just the old Socred party in a branding change. NOTHING liberal or even smart about them.
Just so we don’t start flaming, know this: after Elizabeth May, Preston Manning was the best politician to come along in a long time. Reform really spoke to R-E-F-O-R-M. They didn’t achieve it because of the rightwing nutbars they attracted but, if you look at the Reform platform of yesteryear it was very progressive and yet conservative.
I am no fan of Notley. Met her when she was young and a horrible person. Maybe she is better now. But let us not judge by the names or the brands these people ‘sport’. Means nothing.
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You are hitting all the correct notes. It is interesting to watch Donald Trump( life long liberal if one’s political stripe can be judged by one’s actions) expose the latent hypocrisy in the American political system. Trump is a propagandist and provocateur as he ladles out his sorta partly true quips. Trump said, “I watch the speeches of these people(politicians), and they say the sun will rise, the moon will set, all sorts of wonderful things will happen, and people are saying, ‘What is going on? I just want a job.” The average person continues to do penance for the state of the economy. What did Joe Lunch Bucket do except keep his nose to the grindstone? He sure as hell wasn’t working to make Deutsche Bank the largest holder of derivatives in the world which is now facing imminent derivatives melt-down again.
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Joe was lied to. Always has been lied to. Always will be lied to. Joe has to stop listening to the lies and start thinking for himself. He has to see what he sees, feel what he feels, know what he knows and believe in people not government, not corporations, not media and not ‘experts’. Joe has gotta grow up and start seeking the truth about a lot of things – including himself. “I jus’ wanna job is also stupid.” Joe has to want to grow as a person, learn about the world in which he lives and care about the world he passes on to his kids. Joe has to get past himself and his TV and F-150 and get on with the real job at hand – making a better world. He is overdue.
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