It was around six or so years ago that we began in ernest.  We had had the property for about 30 years but it wasn’t until then that we set about building the real house (we had been in the boatshed for a bit, tho, preparing it and the landing deck in front).

Somehow we managed to pick a spot for the house without much fuss.  Not much thinking, either……to be honest. 

There are a lot of factors to be considered when siting a building and we knew none of them at the time.  Sal likes sunshine and so we propped the idea up on that: get up high and orient south.

I like propping things on solid bedrock so we chose a huge slab ‘o rock on which to bed.  To be fair, I am also keen on a great view and so that meant choosing a spot somewhere on the west side of the little finger of land that juts out from the main body of our property.  After that, it was all luck.

Well, it turned out to be lucky but there were times when we weren’t so sure.

The incline on the rock averages about 30 degrees.  That turned out to be a relentless challenge to construction.  Even though we had to load stuff up the hill the hard way (carrying it like a mule – you have to start to build stairs and funiculars from the top), that wasn’t the first point of realization.  The first indication that we were literally over our head was in locating the precise locations for the footings that would hold the posts that would keep the house off the ground in a square, level and secure fashion.

How do you find such spots when the property slopes in all directions?

I hired a local guy. A touted expert.  He came out and, first thing, asked to borrow my long tape.  Bad sign.  Then he went about the property and waved his arms about and said, “About here, will do.  Here’s a good spot…………and, oh, I am sure this one will do……..close enough, anyway.”

I decided to get a team of real experts in to re-do it.

I delegated the chore to Sal and Emily (our daughter).  “Sorry, gals.  Gotta be done.  And I got tons to carry up the hill still.  You two – here, take this calculator, this string and the long tape measure – figure out where the posts go.  Em, use that geometry you just learned at school.  Sal, check her math and hold the string tight.  It’s just triangles.  Three dimensional triangles.  You can do it.  Now don’t screw up or the house will fall over.  See ya later!”

Working out the placement of foundation posts

You might think me mad (they did) but, honestly, Em has a calculator for a brain and Sal is a stickler for getting things right.  Even tho they had no clue where to begin (I took them to the beginning point – they worked off that), they did good.

“Sweetie!  We’re done.  I am not 100% sure that we are right, tho.  We have never done this kind of thing before.  But Em is pretty sure.  Might be off an eighth of an inch or so but no more than that.  Z’at good enough?”

“How many points did you mark?”

“Like you said, twelve.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve been thinkin………..I don’t know what I am doing either.  The plans call for 12 posts on which the house is to be situated.  That is why I asked for 12.  But, you know, we are going to have a deck all around and I have plenty of logs…..and, well, you seem to have the hang of it…………………so please lay out six more spots for posts in front say, eight feet out and square to the house.  That’ll hold up the front deck.  Same idea on the two sides.  Leave the rear.  And then double up on the support spots.  I think I’ll just add more posts.  Say thirty or so.  Why not?”

“Unh, OK.  I guess.  Hey……..is this how things are built?  I mean, like, just a-wingin’ it, kinda?  Zis how other people build cabins?”  

“Yep.  Jus’ like this.  Zactly.”

“OK.  Jus’ checkin’.”

For the record: the house was dead square and dead level.  When we put the roof on we had the last piece out by only half an inch.  Seems the last piece of roofing is the best indicator of square and level and we had somehow managed both.

And it all started with the real experts – Sal and Em.

As Sal is my editor, I asked her to provide me a statistical breakdown of my prolific output to date.  I wanted to know what topics I have covered.

“You don’t want to know!”

“Yes, I do.  Why wouldn’t I?”

“It is mostly gibberish!”

“How can you say that!?  You are my life partner, my true love and my editor, the one who will get all the royalties!  You are supposed to encourage my writing, support me, nurture my muse!”

“I’d rather nurture the garden, encourage the dogs and spend the pension.  This blog thing is killing me!  And, anyway, it’s mostly gibberish!” 

“Really?  Can you break it down?  Can I see what you mean?” 

“OK.  But it ain’t pretty.  I’ll send you the stats.”

And she did.  For the first 155 posts, the breakdown is as follows:

Adventure 1

All over the map 21 (more than one topic in blog so I have to split them up into specific categories)

Beginnings 5

Boating 3

Characters 6

Community 13

Day to Day 21

Dogs 1

Emergencies 3

Friends/Relations 3

Guest Writing 1

How To 23

Introduction 3

Musings 18

Other 11 (trips to Vancouver, etc.)

Rants 9

Relationship 3 (David and Sally)

Visitors 5 (Mostly Chinese students)

Wildlife 2

Wwoofers 3

It would seem that ‘All Over the Map’ is a category all by itself.  That and ‘Day to Day’ doesn’t bode well for a strong book theme, except, of course, for the Big Book of Gibberish or something.  By the time ‘Musings’ is added to the list, I am convinced: it is all gibberish and I am writing about nothing.

Hmmmmm…………..maybe ‘Nothing’ can be a theme?  Sienfeld did it!

‘How To’ and ‘Community’ seem to follow along the promised theme of living off the grid but clearly they have come second to gibberish.  I am going to have to switch tacks. I’d start by teaching more from the How To section but mostly I still don’t know much about How.…To….   I am still learning myself.

I could, I suppose, put more emphasis on ‘Community’ but don’t forget, I still have to live here.  I have already decided to do an unabridged Tell-All on all of the characters in the area and their unique contributions to their unique definitions of community.  Some day.  After I have found a new place to live (and maybe a new identity).  Can’t risk that right now.  You understand.

I am surprised at my courage in including even the six Characters so far.

And, according to my statistician, I have only done two Wildlife pieces.  Gawd!  It feels like a lot more!

We have another ‘chore’ day looming.  Tuesday.  Been awhile, it has.  So long, in fact, that we had one and half days chores lined up.  As fast as we are (and we are very fast, efficient, organized and dedicated to the challenge each and every time), we had more to do than we could possibly get done on the next-scheduled chore day.  So, we made a mini-day, a half-day, an ‘exception’ and went to the neighbouring island to get a few of the easier tasks handled.

Like picking up manure for the gardens.  And a couple of chainsaw files.  And wine.  You know – the kind of chore that is so incredibly simple that one should be able to blitz in and bounce out in seconds if not a minute or two?

I just doesn’t happen that way….

I go into a store that has no customers to get a chainsaw file.  By the time I find them (only three left so I get ’em all) and get to the counter, the cashier has wandered off, Sally has come into browse and two others have come in through the front door.  One of the clerks passes.  “Hey, Dave, haven’t seen you in the local rag lately.  You get blacklisted, too?”

“Blacklisted!?  Me?  I don’t think so.  Well, now that you mention it, it wouldn’t be the first time.  Had a little row with some Deputy Ministers a while back.  Got kicked off the Little League circuit a couple of times for yelling too much. But nothing I am aware of up here.  Unless you are countin’ book club but that’s women only ………..mind you, I’m pretty sure I’m on the black list at the local MP’s office…………Geez, I dunno.  All Sal’s friends finally organize against me?  Which list are you talkin’?”

“Rumour has it that the local paper has banned any controversial letters-to-the-editor!”

“But all letters to the editor are controversial!  That is the point of them!”

“Yeah.  But it seems that is not a universally accepted point.  Least not with the local publisher.  It’s now controversial if we can have controversy or not.  Editor, it seems, is fed up with it.  We call that the Stephen Harper syndrome.” 

“Hell, I only read the paper for the letters.  Those writers are nuts!  They are funny, tho.  I loved reading about how someone was so fed up stepping in someone else’s dog’s feces that he opined that someone – not named, of course – would likely shoot the beast.  Or the guy whose letters covered ten or so topics in two or three paragraphs.  What a bunch of whackos!  Great fun!” 

“Yeah, well, you know……………a guy can get a bit riled steppin’ in the same dog crap, ya know………..anyway, it was you I was thinkin’ about.  Haven’t seen any letters from you and now I am not seeing any letters from anyone and, well, I am not writin’ any myself (gotta lay low for awhile). But I don’t think this is a good thing, do you?  How you gonna get that stuff off your chest otherwise?”

“You make a good point.  The Harper syndrome has stifled expression. That is for sure.  But I had no idea that it trickled down to the local paper.  You sure?”

“Nah.  Just rumour so far.  But that is the next best kind of news, don’t you think?

It is a good twenty or so minutes after I arrive that I leave with three chainsaw files and two Roger’s chocolates (Sal only browses hardware stores that also carry chocolate).  We still have five more small, simple chores to perform all within a half mile of where we are.  All single purchases.  All from people we know.

OMYGAWD!  There is so little time!

KISS was the title of the-day-before-yesterday’s post.  I got 300 more hits than I usually do.  The highest look-up words for that day – according to Google – were Time Magazine Cover.  Reason: Time featured a woman breast-feeding her three year old son on the cover. The lesson is clear.  My blog titles have to be more lurid to get readers.

“But, Dave, what happens when your new readers discover that there are no nudie shots and the context is about seniors living off the grid chopping wood?”

“Well, first off, I am not above stripping down myself and posing in only logging boots with a chainsaw covering my nether parts.  Give ’em what they came for, eh?”

“That might not do it in the long run, Dave, though I admit that I will pass that particular image along to more than a few friends, myself!”

“Yeah, I figure to put the odd nuanced word in to the titles, too, from now on.  You know, like Living Dirty, In and Out or maybe Au Naturel Living with Animals or Tying Things up With Ropes in Sheds.  That will get me a few whackos, I am sure.  If that doesn’t work, I can go extreme with Squirrel Love or Coming With Tools or Sado-masochism With a Chainsaw!“. 

“Well, you certainly have the credentials for that last title!”

“Its how the corporations sell their messages.  They call it ‘branding’.  I can do that.  I’ll probably have to rename the blog, tho. Seniors Doing It in the Woods, perhaps or Getting Off (the grid)”.  It’s image, isn’t it?

“Why not just try writing better?”

“Nah, that won’t work”.

Decided to paint a paddle today.  Goofy, eh?  When I have had enough with the lifting and carrying and general ‘work’ stuff, I usually read or write something.  Maybe drink some wine a bit earlier, ya know?  But, once in awhile, I go paint a paddle.

Ya never know when you are going to need a paddle.

It’s an art form.  ‘Folk art’, kinda.  Actually, it is not really art at all.  It is paint therapy.  Art really should be original.  Mine isn’t.  Mine is decor, really.

People have been painting paddles and ‘junk’ for years.  It’s considered cottagy.  It is almost de rigeur to funk up the place, if you know what I mean.  So, we do that. I paint paddles.  It’s colourful, fun in a ‘kindergarten’ kinda way and it tends to make me feel better.  You see, I need a little cheering up.

My useless, idiotic, corrupt imbecile of an MP is John Duncan, probably the simplest, greediest, most nauseating sycophant to ever walk the floor of parliament and, yes, you guessed it – he recently outdid even his usual cretinous behaviour.  His limousine driver, it seems, got paid $22,000 last year.  That was not his pay.  His unionized public service pay, I am guessing is in the $60K range with government benefits.  No, the $22,000 was overtime.  That’s right, John Duncan’s limousine driver made more in overtime than most people out here make all year!  (and Parliament is only in session in Canada approximately -140 days of the 365!!!). 

He’s our area’s MP.

He is also a member of the “Restaurant Caucus” a group of MPs who have interests in the restaurant industry.  And, it seems, that is part of the reason his driver had so much overtime – waiting for him while he dined! (That poor driver must have virtually slept in the car waiting for John.  How long are his meals, anyway?)

Duncan’s riding was also influenced by the malicious, fraudulent robocalls initiated by “Pierre Poutine”.  And he won.  Of course.

Finally, Duncan helped draft the Conservative Party’s Northern policy on oil and gas.  That’s right.  He is in on the leaking edge of the Enbridge scheme to pump oil to the coast.

You can see why I need a little cheering up.  We are already up a pretty stinky creek and I am afraid to be caught without a paddle.  In fact, since we are all in this mess together, I may just go into the business!

(Warning: paddles are not effective in heavy crude). 

Back at the Q-hut.  Tís the season.  Finally.  Trying to put it all together to become the first major industrial power in the area.  Which should be easy.  The only other employer is the one-teacher school and the one person, part-time post office.

Well, OK, ol’ Sal can really crank out the bakin’ when she gets into it.  But that is sporadic at best (and my neighbours eat all the profits).

All we really have to do is make a few boxes or benches or something and we should be eligible for an economic development grant, a no-interest forgivable loan and maybe a cultural heritage grant (the Q-hut is pretty old).   Of course so are all the participants so we may even apply for a senior’s activity grant……….hmmmmm?

May even get a grant to hire the grant-writer!

Oh, I am only kidding!  None of us out here have the patience for that sort of thing.  Not much, anyway.  We’ll just do what we do and let the woodchips fall where they may.  Right now there is enough satisfaction in just ‘doin’ it and seeing it get done.

Man, have we gone simple, or what?!  And I mean simple as in uncomplicated, not stupid.  We are simplifying, we are.  Like Thoreau said, “As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler; solitude will not be solitude, poverty will not be poverty, nor weakness weakness.”

“Wow, Dave!  A bit pensive aren’t you?  Gonna wax philosophical again?”

Nah.  I’ll spare you.  I was tempted, tho.  Been watching F-18 fighter jets fly overhead the last few days.  Been wondering why.  Guess there is a reason.  Not a good one, I am sure, but a reason-of-sorts.  I guess.  Whatever it is, it is complicated.  I am also sure of that.  And we don’t do complicated out here.  Not anymore.  Jus’ keepin’ it simple for as long as we can. 

And our heads down!

The W’fers came back yesterday.  For one day.  And it was good.

They had left us almost a week ago to expand their local experience by w’fing with a couple of neighbours for a few days each.  We share w’fers.  And the w’fers get a variety of experiences as a result.  But they needed to get back our way by weeks-end and then on to their next w’fing gig birthing calves in Alberta.  They came back to us because we were enroute, we needed their help with the log jam and, Sal’s cooking is worth traveling for.

And so, early Monday morning they returned, we got to work and, by the end of the day, we had pulled and stacked 42 lengths of log.  Pretty good work day!

We have 44 lengths of log but the winch packed it in!  Had to to leave two at the bottom.  Here I am up to my ankles in winches and the one I am employing fails!  What are the odds? (they are pretty good, actually, since a winch NOT working is unlikely to break).

Anyway, it is a 5 ton winch being worked by a miserable little 1/3 hp electrical motor.  The winch hauls a line that carries a log that Sal blocks-and-taykles up in the air so the log section is only between 200 and 400 pounds.  It then runs on a rolling block on the highline up a gradient of about 35 degrees for about 100 feet.  This may be hard work but the winch is the strongest link in the process.

Or so I thought.

As the day wore on, the bearing/bushing in the main shaft of the winch must have been wearing itself to dust.  I didn’t notice.  Not til it was too late.  Because the motor is too little for the job, I would attach a handle to the winch and assist the motor with my own body and energy.  I found myself winching harder and harder and harder as the day wore on.  I kept saying to myself, “Dave, you are getting old!  Good thing the w’fers are here to take the log from you when it gets up the hill.  This winching thing is hard!”

No wonder.  The bearing had packed it and I was bare-metal winching!

It is truly sad when you don’t know if it is because you are too old that it is too hard or if it is really just too hard!  Turns out, it was really too hard.  All I can say is Atlas could not have hauled that last log up without breathing hard.  I was breathing really, really hard.

I will take the winch apart and put in a new bearing.  Then I will upgrade to a larger motor.  Over the next decade I will get older and the job will seem harder every year.  Every year, I will suspect the bearing is failing again.  I will be wrong every time.  It will be me.  But this year?  This year, it was the bearing!

Winch - Before Disaster Struck

shafted

PS – after writing this, I went out and dismantled the winch.  Had to hammer the spool off the shaft.  When it was open for inspection, I saw the problem…..the shaft had been worn away and it was no longer round.  It had an oblong profile with a big bend in it.  It is amazing it turned at all!

When I write a blog entry, I am basically just trying to tell the ‘everyday’ story of our living remote and off-the-grid.  It is not supposed to be an adventure story.  It is supposed to be a daily journal.  Like a mini, personal daily news report.

Of course, I want readers to like it and so I endeavour to write it with a bit of interest or a bit of humour or even a bit of real news now and then.  If anything happens.  And sometimes it does.  Adventure happens.  But it is all done on an ‘As-It-Happens’ almost-daily basis really, and some of ‘what happens’ is just inside my head……like today’s post, actually.  Just thinkin’.

The main idea is not to convey a story in any one blog but, over time perhaps, a story might evolve from the aggregate.  You know?  A story about two older folks moving off the grid?  That was the plan, anyway.

But, of course, I am very, very closely involved in the story.  This blog is subjective in the extreme.  I write it and it is about me.  I mention others now and then but it is still a mention of others from my perspective.  It’s me (and Sal, the editor). And my view is pretty narrow.  I know that.

I am definitely ‘in the off-the-grid box’ right now perspective-wise and it is hard to step outside of it to look back in.  We usually rely on visitors to give us some perspective on what we are doing. “You guys are nuts!”  But they, too, come from a narrow perspective and so it is not always so illuminating.  “When are coming to your senses and moving back to the city?”

That’s why the Shelter Homes Publishing company’s recent book on Tiny Homes – Simple Shelter by Lloyd Kahn – was so interesting.  By looking at that book, we managed to glean some ‘outside’ perspective on our own endeavours and, to be frank, I liked what I saw.  Seems we are not alone in this housing/living  experiment.  You know?  The one we didn’t know we were a part of?

Of course, we are not alone living off-the-grid.  Quite a few books are starting to show up on that.  But Tiny Homes is a bit more than just off-the-grid living.  It is about ‘out-of-the-ordinary’ living as well.  Mr Kahn writes about different lifestyles from off-the-grid homes (professionally built and home-built) to houseboats to treehouses to earth-and-mud, cob, etc.  Suburban homes to homes-on-wheels, sailboats and even kits are also included.  Often the featured home is not so extraordinary except, perhaps, in it’s remote location or even who built it or under what circumstances.  Difference shows up all over the place.

The company has put out more than this book and I am sure they have included even crazier ideas in other editions like converting shipping containers and the like.  This latest edition even features homes built from pallets.

It is all very interesting.

What I liked especially was that Sal and I had experienced many of the alternative lifestyles featured.  We have lived on three boats.  We have ‘motorhomed’ all over the place.  And, of course, we have built our own cabin off-the-grid.  Add that to living in the cul-de-sac, staying in apartments and occupying Shaugnessy mansions and we, all of a sudden, had a larger context for us and for the current iteration about what our home is.

It may not be about the house, after all!

We seem to be lifestyle experimenters as much as anything.  If this house and this way of living is to be taken in the larger context of our lives to date, we may just be in a phase.  Kinda.  Like the chapters of the book. This may just be temporary.  We may move on in a few years!?

Who knows?  Certainly not me!  One thing, tho, is undeniable: I have lived in over thirty different places in my life and that doesn’t include ‘temporary’ vacation places or living for months at a time in ‘modes of travel’.  Sal has been my partner for over half of them.  There is a gypsy streak showing up here.

So, the aggregate story may not be the one I expected (older couple exits urban centre for rural outback and discovers a different life living on a remote island off-the-grid).  It may be about something else.

I dunno yet.

On the other hand, none of the other places (possible exception: the last two sailboats) felt so comfortable that I would not have contemplated moving on until circumstances prompted it.  I liked living aboard.  It was good.

This place, however, feels like the largest exception to that seemingly habitual ‘change’ streak in our characters.  Of all the places we have lived – including the boats – this one feels most like home.  This one may be it.

We’ll see.

Woofer’s left a few days ago.  May come back.  Son got home after circling the globe and having a great time doing it.  Daughter calls from HK all the time.  Logs are slowly coming up the hill.  I have come to terms with my chainsaw.  All is right in my world.

‘Cept the boat thing…………………sheesh!  I am having trouble making decisions on that.  I am not so sure why.  Maybe it is an age thing.  Maybe it is a financial thing.  But I think it is a lack-of-passion thing.  Ambivalence.  I get ‘excited’ about a boat now and then but it seems to elude my grasp one way or the other.

Maybe it is rejection I am suffering from?  (Nah.  I am used to that.)

Boats are supposed to turn you on, create a buzz, make you want ém.  They are seductive by design and in their very nature.  They don’t call boats ‘she’ for nothing. We guys fall hard when we fall and many fall many times.  I am barely tilting these days. I dunno what has happened to me.

Where have all my marine hormones gone?

A neighbour friend of mine who is a marine maestro with fibreglass and is very knowlegeable about my particular boat has offered to help me ‘make it better’.  We can rebuild it.  I may just do that.  Fix it instead of replace it.  Trouble is, not a great deal of passion is generated by that option, either.

I was lookin’ for the buzz, ya know?

But maybe this is one of those things that just needs to be rationalized philosophically.  You know, if you can’t get what you want, make up a good reason for the disappointment?  Rationalization:  anesthetic for the soul.  So, maybe I wasn’t meant to get one just now?  Or maybe this is a good lesson for me?  Or, how about: the right boat just hasn’t come along yet?  Whatever……….

“Plenty of boats in the sea?”

I admit to recalling the old rock and roll lyrics:  If you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with!  (Crosby Stills and Nash).

Maybe I am already happy?

I suppose I could use: this is a great opportunity to learn good fibreglassing from my neighbour…..?  But, really, I have already learned that fibreglassing is a horrible chore.  Why would I want to get good at that?  I am already planning on getting him started and then going to make him tea or get him a sandwich or something. Fibreglassing?  Yuck.

I am not quite being completely honest with you.  I still do have some passion for boats.  I really do.  But it has changed in some hard-to-determine way.  Now the passion seems to be for the theory rather than the actual physical boat. I look longingly at long boats.  I swoon over schooners.  Aluminum is alluring.  I wanna shower with a power cat!.  But, it is not the same as actually wanting to own one.  Not really.  I think – maybe – I am just lookin’.  Flirting, as it were.  No intention of following through………?

It must be an age thing.

Still looking for a boat.  Deal fell through.  The seller decided to gift the boat to their kids instead.  Close, but no.  Such is life.  Weird.  Feeling the loss of something you never had nor ever even saw………?  So, once again on to the Craigslist Wars.  Sheesh!

The seemingly unattainable goal: 16 – 18 feet centre console powercat or welded aluminum with a 4-stroke for a reasonable price……………..or, better put: a low price.

Bit of excitement yesterday.  Seems a fishfarm float broke free and was heading down current.  My neighbour called, “Hey, Dave, there’s a fishfarm assembly floating free out in the channel.  That’s not right.  Shouldn’t I do something?”

“Yeah.  Go save it.  Tie it up wherever you can.  I’ll call Marine Harvest.  If it is not theirs, they’ll know whose it is!  You should be entitled to a salvage fee or something.”

They have an automatic phone tree.  Press one, etc.  No one in.  No answer.  Phone three times.  Get a guy.  “Assembly posing threat to navigation.  Might wish to secure that thing.  Neighbour has it in tow.”

They come out in a huge and beautiful aluminum water taxi-type vessel and pick us up and we take them to where it is temporarily lashed up.  We crack jokes, get along, help each other  Tie it up better.  They take us home.

“By the way, we’re leaving the channel.  Too much algae bloom.  Takin’ all the floats out.  Forever.  You might like that….?”

I didn’t answer right away.  I was too busy dancing and high-fiving.  “Wahoo!  This is great news.  I mean, you guys have been good community contributors and every staff person has been polite, considerate and the very spokesmodel of public relations but…..sorry…………..we believe Alex Morton and…………well, we think fish farms should be self-contained.  So this is great news!  Fabulous.  I kinda like you guys and all but, Damn!  Glad you are leaving.  Really glad.”

“Well, you know, there are two sides to this………….

I interrupted.  “Yeah.  And you represent the dark side of the Force, don’t you Luke?” He laughed and the politics of fish farming ended right there.

The truth is (as I believe it) fish farms, as they are currently run and where they are currently placed, are detrimental to wild salmon.  Extremely so.  And, given the corruption and incompetence of the Federal Dept. of Fisheries, these two actors combine to decimate natural salmon stocks.

Frankly, the DFO should be taken out and shot and the fish farms relocated to their then empty offices in Ottawa. Wouldn’t even notice the change, really.  Fish and DFO have the same IQ, don’t feel pain and both tend to stink up the place.

But that doesn’t mean that Mike and Jamie and Sarah and Mary Ellen are bad people.  They are simply workers who may have imbibed the Kool-Aid a bit too much.  But still people.  And, to a person, they have tried to be ‘nice’ to the community.  They helped us put down the float at the end of the road.  They are offering some of their old equipment to us.  They respond politely and quickly to any complaints (usually noise) and they are generally good people to deal with.  I have liked every one of the individuals I have met.

But I am glad they are leaving.  And I am not alone. Too bad.  It would be much better to have them here but self-contained.  Why is that so hard?