In keeping with the theme of the last blog, we followed the scheduled maintenance required for our wood stove yesterday.  Kinda.  You see, we skipped last year so, in reality, we were a year late.  Or were we?

Common wisdom states that you clean your woodstove every year.  If you don’t, your house will catch on fire and you will die.  Horribly.  Painfully.  Worse, you will lose all your possessions and your premiums will go up.  Apparently, that is a fact.  And there will be no sympathy from the more regulated for such wanton irresponsibility.  So, we have complied like the good woodsfolk we aspire to be despite the fact of our not having house insurance or being that attached to possessions.  Life, on the other hand, is more precious so we did as we were told.  Until last year.

Did I mention the free radical gene in my DNA?

Here’s what came up: every time I cleaned out the chimney, it was virtually clean.  Over twelve feet of flue, admittedly with only one 45 degree bend, yielded but a cup, maybe two, of soot.  ‘Surely, I thought, this obsession with cleaning flues is some weird kind of safety propaganda along the lines of Reefer Madness, bicycle helmets, seat belts and the need for security cameras at all times and all places.  The benign looking woodstove can’t be the demon lurking as publicized’.  Or can it?

Last year I took a chance.  “Hey, Sal, let’s not clean the chimney this year.  Waddya say?  Let’s risk it.  Take a chance.  Roll the dice.  Let’s introduce a little danger into our lives, ya know?”

“We just came back from chicken busing through El Salvador and that scared the bejeesus out of us, isn’t that enough thrills for awhile?”

“Well, you make a good point.  But I think it is in my favour.  What the hell is a house fire after chicken busing through an armed camp of rebels in a poverty stricken, drug infested banana republic?  Now that you mention it, why not plan on vacationing in Afghanistan this next winter?”

“Nix on Afghanistan – this winter, anyway (Sal likes to keep her options open)-  but I will admit that we never seem to get any soot from the obligatory annual dismantling of everything woodstove.  I am OK with skipping a year.  Do you think it is safe?”

So, we skipped and all went well.  Mostly.  The stove wasn’t drawing as well near the end of last years burning season but close examination suggested that the baffle was the culprit.  It was disintegrating.  This year we would clean it all up, put in a new baffle and ‘do the right thing’.  And yesterday we did it.

Here’s the result of the experiment:  This time there was a five gallon bucket of black collected.  Not much in the way of creosote but a lot more loose ash, soot, cinder and black crud.  Not enough of anything to make for a chimney fire but enough to make an impression.  In one year we got two cups of crap, in two years we got almost five gallons.

That’s surprising.  Doesn’t fit with my sense of logic.  Why didn’t I just get 4 or five cups?  Never mind.  We can go two years without worry and so we will.  I think.  Somehow wood soot grows in some odd exponential way so we likely won’t push the two year envelope but it will still add an element of adventure.

Oooooh, this off the grid lifestyle is just one long thrill-ride, isn’t it?

The weather turned yesterday.  Just like the next-to-last blog prophesized.  Sheesh.  We were just a sweater short of putting on the fire yesterday.  And today.

We try NOT to burn wood til October.  No reason, really.  Miserly wood hoarding, I guess.  Just seems like the right thing to do.  But, really?  NOT putting on the fire until some certain arbitrarily chosen date is one of those weird habitual things old people do, “Nah, never put on the fire til October.  Never mind the snow.  Put on a parka if yer cold, ya wuss!”

I have a friend who always hangs up his golf clubs on October 1st.  Regardless of the weather.  “Why?”, I asked.  “It is October first.  I always hang ém up on October 1st.  Always will.”

I never understood that.  Still don’t.

Generally speaking, I balk at such habits.  At least I say I do.  ‘Feels like living unconsciously, ya know?’  Habit, ritual, routine, scheduled maintenance…it all sucks the life out of life, I think.  It definitely shortens the golf season.  Still, I am doing it, too.  More and more.

Living off the grid requires a kind of discipline and discipline requires routine.  I watch and maintain the stockpile of food, the water system, gas, fuel and electrical sytems.  I change the oil on engines, chop and stack wood, put away tools, sharpen some of them…..that kind of thing.  Batteries alone are more demanding than were my two children!  And none of this is in my nature.  I am more of a free radical.  I think life should be more of an arcade game than a card game, if you know what I mean?

The point: if you are not careful, you can live remote in the wilderness by recipe.  Sounds kinda counterintuitive, doesn’t it?

Anyway, I have noticed that I am doing more and more that is the same and samer.  For instance, I never got up in the morning at the same time.  I could rise at 7:00 or nine.  Even later sometimes.  Rarely ever earlier.  Just depends.  But it used to depend on what time I went to sleep and I have noticed that I am going to sleep every night between 10:30 and 10:45.  That’s a routine.  I’d break it if I could.  But I can’t.  Eyes close.  Done.

Worse, I am actually rising at around 7:30 more often than not.  My world is getting stable.  What the hell!?

Of course, some things impose their routine on me.  Bowels, for instance.  They have had their way with me for as long as I can remember.  Stomach, too.  Hard to ignore one’s gastro intestinal tract.  The point: body parts impose routine, too.  And, as you get older, weaker body parts impose more and more health related routines.  And, collectively, the whole of the body demands hygenic routines.  Always has.  The way I see it, we homo sapiens are basically a routine trying to happen. All the time. “Tubes rule, dude!”

It is amazing I have any free time for my real self at all!

So, I try to resist it.  Trying to have a life, as they say.  For the sake of balance in my universe, I try to counter the tendency to routine.  Why?  Because there is a very powerful force pushing us all into routine and it is not just nature doing it.  The enemy is us!  Jobs.  Christmas.  Easter.  Birthdays.  Bus schedules.  Regular dental care.  The list is endless.  Haven’t you noticed?  It’s all a conspiracy, I say.  Regimentation.  Goose stepping.  And most people go along with that.

I try not to.

But I am losing the battle.  The reason:  I don’t have enough free time to deal with it all.  That’s why!

Ironically, Sal has always been much more comfortable with routine in her life.  Til lately, anyway.  Now she seems to be balking, too.  Nowadays the only behaviour of hers I can count on is her breaking at 5:00 for a glass of wine and yet dinner, for instance, is getting harder and harder to come by.  Unless, of course, I make it.  Which is OK.  So long as it doesn’t become a routine.

She’ll play with the dogs, go to book club and whinge about missing yoga but, generally speaking, she is rebelling at all the thngs she used to do without thinking about it, too.

Like, I am doing the dishes all the $#%$#@ time now.     

Where is the routine (for her) when you need one, eh?

You can see where this is going…..right?

Well, I don’t.  I have no idea.  Does this mean that between the requirements of the bed (and, by ‘bed’ I mean ‘sleeping’), the woodshed, the workshop, the bathroom, the kitchen and the dogs, my life is over?  Have I been subtly conscripted into a regular system of sorts?  Have I lost my free will or is it simply a function of time management with too little time?

What exactly the hell is going on?

Had an appointment in town.  Car would not start.  Did the usual things (I carry tools and a spare battery with jumpers at all times) and concluded, “She’s broke!”  We caught a ride with a neighbour and I made my appointment.  Sal was left to deal with the car.  She did.  Tow truck went to get it.  It will be towed in and fixed.  A few days, I guess.  Boat access only until then.

It is a good car.  But all things break.

I kinda feel it is my job to figure all this stuff out and have contingency plans in place  when a major component of the ‘independence facade’ breaks down.  And I don’t really have one for a vehicle ‘down’.  One tends to rely on the kindness of neighbours and strangers instead when such times happen.  And – for the record – both neighbours and strangers rose graciously to the occasion this time.  We are very grateful.

And we have risen and driven graciously for others in the past, too.  It is a system.  But it is not an ‘independent’ system.  Not in the least.  And, of course, it is not a long term system.  We really must do better.

And, rembember, when we ‘outliers’ get to the vehicle, we have already left home in a boat and are carrying stuff.  You ‘meet’ your car already one third of the way into the trip.  It is NOT in your garage, it is in a forest on a different island sometimes in the snow and sometimes in the dark.  I dunno….somehow that is a different kind of vulnerability to vehicular (or even wardrobe) malfunction, ya know?

But, what to do?  A second car was the go-to plan when living in the city even tho the city provided an inneffective but relatively cheap alternative in transit.  I mean, you could not rely on public transit and have a life but you could get to work.  Which, when you think about it, serves the state and commerce well but makes the ridership drones and cattle. 

Still, any camel in the desert will do, eh?

But we don’t have public transit.  Not having a public is the main reason, I guess.  So, one needs a vehicle.  And one needs a specific kind of vehicle, too.  One that will go off-road, carry a lot of stuff and people and NOT break down.  It is an odd contradiction in thinking but, despite not driving more than 200 kms a month, my vehicle has to be top-notch and large and ideally I should have two of them.

Think: two multi-thousand dollar investments to ensure the ability to go twenty miles two to three times a month carrying heavy loads.  NOT logical.  But real.

The overall plan to live in paradise is a great one.  One I promote to anyone listening.  Or reading.  And I would not alter that boosterism in the least as a result of some of the compromises one has to make.  Yes, you have bigger challenges shopping.  Yes, you live more physically.  Yes to this and to that.  And to more.  Much more.  But the reward of a wonderful life is worth it. No question.

But this car thing is a bigger hurdle than most.  Believe it or not, we are even more dependent on it than one might be in the city.  Less use.  But always more critical.  And it is always a surprise.  Usually a very inconvenient surprise.

I really have to work on this one.

I was thinking of adding a motorcycle to the stable.  And that might do the job.  But crashing a motorcycle is an inevitable part of using one and after 65 crashing loses some of it’s cachet.  A cheap but mechanically sound piece of crap that will stand in for a week now and then might be the answer – especially if it is in the same category as the primary vehicle for ICBC insurance purposes.  I may look out for another 1996 Pathfinder.  Thank God the market values them cheaply.  Some sort of community-owned vehicle sounds good but is not really practical.  It involves people.  You understand.

One thing is for sure –  having only one vehicle that you rely on out here is an Achilles heel.  I am just thankful it has been ten years of NOT having to really think about it.  But now I do.

‘We’re roof ready.  Rafters, plywood, strapping, collar ties, nailers – we’re ready to sheath and clad!  We’re ready to insulate and finish!  This is a good thing ’cause summer is officially over.  That means we have to think of ‘finishing up’ before the weather turns.  Lock ér up, crew, gotta get ér done!’

Sal is my crew.

She thinks I am hers.

Actually that is all just construction talk, anyway.  Builder-guys say stuff like that.  “Get ‘er done”, “roof-ready”, “weather turns”.  Truth is there is plenty of time.  And we work slow anyway.  It gets done when it gets done.  And, even though we do have winter weather, we can work in it.  It’s just cool.  It is not Fort McMurray.  We are more Palm Springs than Yellowknife.  Nothing to complain about.

Plus, the whole structure is only 12 x 16.  It ain’t BC Place we are a’buildin’ out here.

As described earlier, we have built this thing like a bunker.  It has the material content of a place twice the size.  Really.  I could have made this workshop 24 x 16, used much the same amount of material and it would still be better built than the stuff of the leaky condo era.  Only a shipping container or a concrete building is stronger.  I think we could withstand a hit from a 747 and last longer than the world trade towers did.

Mind you, no governments were involved. 

Anyway, this is an end-of-summer update.  End-of-summer is not marked by dates or length of sunny days out here, it is marked by boat traffic and, like many ‘attractive areas,’ the decline in tourist traffic.  Our tourists come by pleasure boat and kayak.  I guess whale watching boats are a third way but they come and go and hardly stop moving in the process so they are a class unto themselves.  Laser-bursts of tourists.  But all forms are basically over.  Traffic is light these days and almost all local.  By the end of the month we will know everyone who goes by and we will know them simply by the sound of their motor.  Local knowledge is knowing the sound of a Yamaha 30 on a twenty foot boat and a Honda 50 on a 17 foot boat.

It has been a lean year for fauna.  Only a few eagles hung out near the house and none of them roosted in our big, dead, looming eagle-tree.  Not this year.  Even the ravens had a lesser presence and we think they only fledged one young ún this year.  Some years they have had four!

Prawns were all but obliterated this year, too.  Gone.  We told DFO (Dept. of Fisheries) but they didn’t care.  They opened the area to the commercial fishery despite our sample fishery directly reporting massive absence to them.  “Oh, well, don’t worry.  If the commerical guys don’t find prawns, they will just move on.” That was the official line from the DFO office.  The commercial guys came, complained about the poor catch but vacuumed up everything they could to justify having traveled and left the area devastated.

I wonder what we pay the staff at DFO for, actually?  Anyone have the faintest idea?

Still, we had a good year for dolphins and Orcas.  Not many sea lions.  Fewer seals.  And we had no mink or otter sightings whatsoever.  But that could be us.  Even tho we still marvel at the little critters, the operative word is little (and sneaky) and we are getting kinda used to it all now.  Don’t see ’em.  We’ve been here almost a decade.  One tends not to notice so much anymore, ya know?  Well, it’s theory, anyway.

I guess what I am trying say is that the seasons and the circumstances are changing and this may be just another minor, seasonal-type change or it could be a harbinger of something bigger.  I dunno.  But I do notice the changes.  The odd thing is that I do not notice the calendar hardly at all.  Rarely have a clue as to the day of the week.  Never seem to know the date.  I let the boat traffic tell me what I need to know.

However, I think I am definitely not on any Need-to-Know hierarchy.  Which is a good thing ’cause it means I don’t really need to know anything.  And I can do that.  Rather well, if I do say so.

“Oops!  Sorry.  I measured wrong.  This board is too short.  Won’t fit.  But I checked it.  It was my fault.  Better cut another”.

“OK.”

“Oops!  This board is too short, too.  But I checked my measurement.  I was right this time.  You must have cut wrong!”

“Really?  OK?  Give it to me again.”

And that is how ordering building materials becomes a crap-shoot.  If I measure everything up and add 10%, then I am doing what professional builders do.  Mind you, I really should add 20% because pros also know how to measure everything up.  I don’t.  But when you cut three boards to get one correct one, that suggests ordering somewhere around 300% extra and no amount of measuring is going to be useful in that case.  Gross and profligate incompetence simply adds up.

“Well, I am building a roof 20 by 24 so that is 480 square feet.  Better give me at least 800 square feet.”

The building supply guy just looks at me strangely.

“I make mistakes.”  He looks at me more.  Squinting.   “I make a lot of mistakes.”

He is dumbfounded.

“I work with my wife.”

“Oh, now I get it!  Women, eh?”

I really want to leave it at that but I know it will come back to bite me.  Somehow.  His wife probably goes to yoga or bookclub with my wife.  It just has to be that way.

“Well, it is not really all her fault.  Not really.  She measures and I cut.  Her measuring is pretty bad but where she might get it right, I screw up the cut.  Together, we’re hopeless”.

“You realize I have to tell this to the other guys who work here?”

“Yeah.  I know.”

“Sorry.”

“Me, too.  But think of it this way: I get two sheds.  One I planned for, the other smaller one from the off-cuts.  I call it building Matryoshka style”.

“Huh?!”

Short rant.  Not much, really.  Just hasta get said.

Government senator and Harper appointee Pamela (Pam) Wallin ‘misunderstood’ the admittedly lax and ineffectively enforced rules on government expense spending to the tune of approximately $180,000.  In other words, she cheated the public on her expenses.  She cheated the country for which she was supposedly representing.  She cheated the government, the people and she tried to cheat the auditors.  She spent, she lied, she obstructed and she obfuscated.  And she did this on top of the staggering salary she gets for merely showing up now and then to do virtually nothing ‘cept what she is told to do by the Prime Minister and his inner political circle.

But eventually she got caught (by the CBC mostly) and so the government put the hammer down!  “Pay up what you owe us or we will dock your pay!” 

“Dock your pay!?”  

Guys go to jail for smoking marijuana (Well, they did.  I have a friend who did four years in Northern Saskatchewan for that).  Guys go to war for their country and then get stiffed for medical benefits and such.  Somebody shouts rape and some guy is ruined – even before the trial!  The RCMP taser and shoot people who pose no real risk to anyone.  None of that is fair.  None of that is just.  None of that is right.

But this has nothing right about it.  NOTHING.  Everything about this story is wrong and it just gets wronger and wronger.

Maybe a better way to put it is this: a guy steals a few loaves of bread over a few years and sleeps under a bridge in between times and they put that poor jerk in jail (maybe a taser or two).  The elite steal and get away with it 99% of the time.  When they get caught, nothing happens.   Pamela Wallin will get her pay docked!??????? 

If you ignore for a minute the original sin (theft by any other name) and you ignore the lies and resistance (hiring lawyers to fight the auditors’ findings) and you ignore the uselessness of the function in the first place and the other $120-something in expenses they allowed along with her overly generous salary, you simply cannot ignore that her behaviour was not befitting that of an exalted senator.  She violated the public trust.  She was – in no way – acting on behalf of the people.  The woman cheated her employer (and we are her employer!) – plain and simple.  She’s a crook.

She should be fired.  Canned.  Booted out.  Escorted from the building.  Of course she should pay back what she filched but first she should be sent packing.  Like, right now!  And she should make restitution in some other way than being paid by the people to pay back the people!

What bloody nonsense!  And the senate themselves are proposing this ‘way-to-pay-back’ as a solution!  Is there any question about the need for the senate?  Well, at least the unelected, pork-barrel style senate that we currently have…..

I don’t think so.  They really have to go.

And it ain’t just Pam.

Sal’s sister, M, is here for a few days.  She’s good.  Funny, too.  She is a lot like Sal and, consequently, up for anything.  And with a smile to boot.  Climb a mountain, work on the roof of the shed, cook, clean, play with the dogs…..M is in like a dirty shirt on all things.  With gusto.   Some kind of family gene, I guess.  They all seem to have it.  Fatigue is not part of the equation until five seconds before they conk out.  Then they sleep like babies til the next day when they crank it up, go like a train with a great attitude and move mountains in the process.  I wish I could bottle this stuff.

Mind you, there are quirks.  Plenty of quirks.  And, interestingly, they each have their own unique set of quirks.  M is a garage-saler.  Every Saturday she and her ‘group’ go to local garage sales and ‘collect’.  ‘Course, after awhile, they are practically knee deep in extra junk but then they – what else!? – hold a garage sale!  To M, there is an obvious logic to all that.

I can’t list Sal’s quirks.  I am sure you understand.

I guess if I had to boil it all down, it is the family attitude.  Life is attitude and attitude is everything.  They have great attitudes and therefore have great lives.  It is a delight to see.  It is even better to be the recipient of all that great attitude.  When M comes, she brings scotch and salmon and a willingness to help on projects.  And she fits right in.  Doesn’t get any better than that.  Plus she and her sister gab all the time.  I like that.  Don’t ask me why.  A quirk of my own, I guess.  But I like it that they get along so well.  It’s good.

M might be our last guest this season.  Nice to end on a high note.  Might get a couple of Wférs.  Might not.  And, if the Wférs come, we will share them with neighbours.  And, anyway, Wférs are guests but they are not the same kinda guests as we have had throughout this summer.  Usually in their early 20’s and from foreign countries, Wférs aren’t friends or family (altho some have turned out like that!), they are guest-workers.  They help chop wood and that sort of thing.  They, too, are good as a rule but they are not like friends and family.  I am sure you understand.  M is our last real guest.

Progress is slow on the studio, of course.  But there is progress.  That is good.    Weather is lovely.  All the locals hammering and sawing and up for their projects.  Dinner parties (potluck) every week at the very least.  Dogs are happy.  Trips to town minimized.

Tís a good time of the year.

A reader:  “Are you OK?  It’s been six days since you last blogged!”

Answer:  “Really?  That long?  Not much to say, I guess.  But thanks for the prompt.”

Which is not entirely true.  I always have something to say. But right now all that I would have to say is ranting.  And people don’t like that.  Even I don’t.

Rant #29:  Syria worries me.  But Harper worries me more.  Harper may commit Canada to a war in Syria.  And Harper may do that without even having a conversation about it in parliament.   Stephen (the) King may just rule us into a massive tar baby.  He is proroguing parliament again and consulting only back room boys.  Another horror novel.  Great!

Yeah, I know...’for evil to be done, good people only have to do nothing’.  From the Holocaust to Rwanda.  From our aboriginals to Wiebo Ludwig, we Canucks have a pretty good track record of doing nothing.  Canada is often evil in it’s absentia.

But sometimes, taking time for second thoughts is a good idea.  This may be one of those times.  I think it is.

And this rant is about exactly that.  This is mostly about reacting to unproven political claims.  And, worse, there seems to be an impatience to getting involved without waiting to have those claims substantiated by neutral UN investigators who are in the process of doing that job!  It just smells.  It stinks, really. Canada, the Johnny-come-lately of politics, is hot to trot!

Methinks something is in it for Harper.

And that is why I haven’t written.  That little rant above has little to do with living off the grid.

But this does:

We have guests of course.  Our current guest is an old friend.  Haven’t seen him for years.  We barely recognized each other at the ferry pick-up.  Two old guys staring at one another to be sure if the person was who we thought they were.

He’s a committed city guy.  Invested heavily there.  In every way.  But, as he is getting on too, starting to weary of the grind.  Wondering what comes next.  Looking around to see what others have done.  That was the main reason for this visit.  It is a reconnoiter for the soul.  His.  Friendship counts, of course, but more importantly, we had embarked on a bigger leap in retirement than most and were worth a visit for that reason alone.

His eyes bugged out!

Mind you, everyone’s eyes are bugged out the first day.  It is all so ‘different’ from urban living, the conversation often turns to what similarities there are.  “Sheesh, this is hardly wilderness living, is it?  I mean, you have a freezer, dry wall, milk for your tea and OMYGAWD! You even have a large flat screen to watch movies!  Holy!  I kinda expected bears and outhouses, ya know?”

“We got bears.”

Eyes bugging out, looking around the property quickly, “Where?  Where?”

“They come down in late fall to the local orchards.  Some of our neighbours have bears in the garden every year.”

“Do they come here?”

“No.  We don’t have an orchard.”

“Wow!  Geez, I really like the rocks, too.  Weird, eh?  And I really like your site.  Perched on big granite.  Cool.  Would it be safe in an earthquake?  And the view!  Geez, I really like the view.  Boats.  Eagles.  That’s pretty neat.  How long could you live out here without having to go to the store?”

And so it goes for awhile.  I enjoy it.  I like to describe our life out here.  I like to show people.  It’s always fun.  But I have to watch what I say.  I am a bit of a preacher by nature.  And now that I have discovered nature, I find myself preaching.  “Yeah.  You should consider chucking it all in and buying a splitting maul and moving out here.”

“Ohhhhhhhhhh……I dunno about that….ya know…..no Starbucks.  My life is back there, ya know?  I like my work.  And Peggy likes her routines, you know.  She’s got her life there, too.  And she doesn’t like bears.  Or the water.  I don’t think this is the kind of place for her.  She likes to shop.  We aren’t like you guys.  I don’t think we could do it.”

I used to argue that we are indeed like each other and that they could, in fact, do it but that was not the real discussion.  Not really.  Mostly they were here for perspective gathering.  We were visited to dispell the notion of going feral rather than to confirm it.  People come to see us and feel good but they feel even better going back home.  That is the role we play.  That is the way it is.

And we have come to accept that.  We are simply one of the boundaries from which one bounces back toward the middle.

We’ve been here almost ten years.  Feels like one.  Maybe two.  It’s probably because it is all still so new and we still have so much to do.  So much to learn.  It is also because, as we get older, time seems to go by a lot faster.  The days seem to be a blur.  Whatever the reason, it does not feel stale yet – no boredom, no itch to scratch.  I am strangely satisfied.

That is weird.

‘Course, this summer was and still is a whirlwind.  Sal figures we have had something like 13 uncommitted days to ourselves since May.  The rest were booked with guests or restocking trips or the odd appointment in town.  Maybe there is no itch because we have been too busy to notice one.  But I don’t think so.  I think we are happy.  Maybe even content.

I’ll get back to you on that.

I can say that on each of those thirteen days and not just a few of the busy ones we have remarked to each other, “Well, it just doesn’t get any better, does it?”

So why have I been thinking of RVs again?

Because, I have.  I can’t deny it.  There may not be an itch to scratch but there is the hint of one……….it is the hint of a future itch that might need scratching by the time winter comes.  Maybe.  I dunno.  Just sayin’.   Thinkin’ of south.  Arizona.  Trade in our dogs for little blue poodles and get us some Tilley hats.  You know?

Seriously.  This is good.  And we are happy.  And that will not likely change for some time.  But the original plan – such as it was – had us going south once in awhile and last year we did not.  I think this year we will.  There is something about going south for the winter that is not in itself so great as it is the coming back in the spring that seems so good.  Almost like leaving makes the heart grow fonder.  I do know that south never feels so good as north does when I come home.

God, some people are weird, aren’t they?

My neighbour got conned.  By me.  And I am not proud of it.  Well, I wasn’t until yesterday.  Now I am.

R had a hard approach to his site.  Water access only is a term that can mean ‘easy access’ to the beach or very hard access to a cliff face.  He had a pretty difficult approach (somewhere in between beach and cliff face) and it was getting tiresome for him and his wife to say the least.  I had a chance to get some ramp and dock materials at salvage prices and I bought them to improve my own access.  “Hey, neighbour!?  Why don’t you buy some of this junk with me and rig up a ramp and dock.  Should be able to put that puppy together for about $500.  Piece o’ cake.”

“Five hundred?  Ya think?  But, geez, I dunno…..lots of work….kinda hard….geez…..”

“Oh, don’t be a wuss.  Just say yes and get on with it!”

And so he did.  But my neighbour does not do things by half.  In fact, he does things better than an engineer, fabricator, industrial designer and a gang of slaves combined.  Over the last year, he planned, machined, fabricated, assembled and constructed  major improvements to the purchase and put them on the beach awaiting the hand of God to lift it all in place.  The new components were impressive.  But, until the installation was done, they were also useless.

And God was slow in coming.

“You and your %$#@! $500!!!  I am into this now for $5,000 and it is still sitting on the beach!”

I didn’t actually hear that.  He was talking into the air as I had made myself scarce for the last few months.  I couldn’t hear the actual cursing but a fist shaking in the air in my direction was communicative enough.  I stayed away.  I was tempted to sneak over and yell, ‘Piece ‘o cake‘ in his direction (I have a twisted sense of humour) but I think he is armed.  I definitely felt he was dangerous.  Discretion is definitely the better part of valour in this situation.

God, it seems, is a barge.  And the barge eventually came.  It lifted and it put in to place my neighbour’s magnificent $5,000 new and improved ramp and dock yesterday (my mis-estimate-of-cost excuse?  My wife claims I tend to add or delete zeros when I do math in my head.  She may be right).

It was a delight to see it installed (and with not just some small relief for me).  Everything came together like the work of the swiss watchmaker my neighbour is at heart.

“Hey Dave, why don’t you and Sal come over tonight and celebrate the completion of the dock?”

“See!?  I told ya!  Piece ó cake!  We’ll be there!!”