TCC for 11/11/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/11/08

Lake Temp. 50.25 F.
Ghetto temp. 41.5 F.
Island tmp. 40 F. Yesterday's L/H: 41/46 F.

Current conditions: Mild wind from the South, a few mph or so, crisp night, full moon, when clouds aren't obstructing the light of the moon walking about without a flashlight is no problem.

11/18/08


10/24/08


10/6/08


For much of the day on the Lake there wasn't much in the way of wind, an occasional breeze here and there every once in a while. With almost no boat traffic (perhaps a total of 3 boats) the Lake was very quiet. The sort of calm day that even in these colder months it is relaxing to be on the Lake. Come late afternoon the wind began to pickup from the North North West, nothing too strong but enough to have an edge. For the most part the day was mostly cloudy, come late afternoon the sky began to clear a bit, the Caretaker was hoping it would clear entirely by nightfall for the full moon, that however has not happened, at least not yet.

The Caretaker went for a brief walk around the Island in the moonlight, kicked up dried leaves just to hear the sound. The vibrancy of Autumn's glow has long since passed and there isn't much left of the copper (when what leaves are left on the trees have turned to dark red and/or varying shades of brown), soon all of this season's leaves will be taking their final rest, and then all that will remain of Autumn until Winter is the time of stone. For much of the mountain sides here on the Lake the time of stone has long since begun, but down at the shore there is still a bit of copper, so too on a number of the Islands. Some people find Autumn's stone to be rather stark, the Caretaker does not, he enjoys it. When all of the leaves of the deciduous trees have fallen, limbs now bare reveal much of the bed rock that lies hidden beneath the cover of foliage from mid Spring through mid Autumn. It is now, during Autumn stone, before Winter's snow, rocks of gray are revealed. The topography from shore to mountain top can easily be seen, easily enjoyed.

In this way, if it never snows the Caretaker would not be too upset, but in many other ways, if it doesn't snow this Winter, the Caretaker will be rather bummed. At around Noon the Caretaker was returning from the mainland, at Lake level there were a few sprinkles here and there, but up at the top halves of the mountains it appeared to be snow, nothing heavy, nothing that accumulated, but certainly some flurries, perhaps frozen mist. Is there such a thing as frozen mist? Hm, the Caretaker will have to look into that, tomorrow.

--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/10/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/10/08

Lake Temp. 50 F.
Ghetto temp. 43.5 F.
Island tmp. 38 F. Yesterday's L/H: 46/60 F. (Yesterday's temps. are suspect.)

Current conditions: South wind, 5 to 8 mph, winds aloft from West to East, mix of moon and clouds, clouds numerous but not dense, passing before the moon rapidly. Day started cloud covered then became progressively sunny, wind from the West shore, a bit blustery.

11/10/08


9/16/08


10/15/08


The Caretaker was in town for the latter half of the day, being a little pressed for time he grabbed some lunch from the market, and since he was thirsty he purchased a "soft drink". While in the middle of his lunch he decided to read the label of contents on the bottle, it was as follows:

Treated water, High fructose corn syrup, Pear juice concentrate, Citric acid, Phosphoric acid, Potassium citrate, Sodium Hexametaphosphate (to protect flavor), Natural flavor, Potassium Benzoate (preserves freshness), Gum arabic, Potassium sorbate, (preserves freshness), Xantham gum, Glycerol ester of wood rosin, Calcium disodium edta (to protect flavor) Red 40, Blue 1.

After reading this the Caretaker almost threw-up. There seems to be an awful lot of substances in this beverage to preserve freshness and protect flavor, the Caretaker is wondering if there is anything in this drink to protect humans? This chemical cocktail is labeled as a "Juice Drink" and is sold by a rather well known orange juice company. The flavor of this "juice drink"? Strawberry Melon. Wait, there's no mention of strawberry or melon in the above ingredients, the only juice is pear and it's from concentrate.

So, on average, it seems, that in the United States one's choice of drink is either something containing alcohol, or something containing more synthetic chemicals than a Dupont factory. The Caretaker's estimation is that more often than not one has a better shot at getting a "health" drink from a bar than anywhere else "soft drinks" are sold. Back when there was such a thing as a soda jerk, soft drinks were indeed "soft", but now a days, they seem to all be rather hard with chemicals, at least certainly those produced by the mainstream industrial food complex.

Adolescents with diabetes, cholesterol problems, circulatory disease, etc., etc. Gee, is it any wonder?

The industrial food complex is poisoning us--the FDA knows, and doesn't care.

--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/9/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/9/08

Lake Temp. 51.5 F.
Ghetto temp. ? F.
Island tmp. 46 F. Yesterday's L/H: 54/58 F.

Current conditions: South wind, about 5 mph, cloud covered night sky, faint light from the moon--diffused. Mostly a cloud filled sky from the afternoon on, a few sprinkles here and there every once in a while.

11/9/08


10/10/08


8/28/08


The Caretaker was off Island last night and didn't get back to the Island until mid-afternoon. Not much to report on other than that the temperature has started to drop again, there is talk of a possibility of snow these next few days, the Caretaker is not holding his breath on this prediction, at least for not here on the Lake.

--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/8/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/8/08

Lake Temp. 52.25 F.
Ghetto temp. 58 F.
Island tmp. 56 F. Yesterday's L/H: 53.75/58 F.

Current conditions: Rain off and on, warm, damp, humid, day, gray with clouds and mist and fog.

11/8/08


9/20/08


9/15/08


This day would not exactly be classified as an exciting day, at least not for most people. Back in October, near the end of the month, the Caretaker was in town with S. having lunch. After lunch they went to The Black Bass to see if H. was in, it turns out he was away, but K. was minding the shop so it was a pleasant surprise. What was also a pleasant surprise was that H. had recently acquired a manual typewriter, the Caretaker quickly seized upon it. After determining what was wrong he asked for a price, accepted it and dashed to the ATM machine. This "new" typewriter is going to be a great addition to his collection of manual typewriters, that is after he has the needed repairs done. If you didn't already think the Caretaker was a bit odd you can add this to the list: he likes to use manual typewriters. In fact, it is his second favorite way to write, his first is by hand, his least favorite is the computer. He would write everything by hand except that no one would be able to read it, there are times when even he can't make out what it is he wrote, so, when he corresponds to people he usually uses one of his typewriters to write to them. Unfortunately he has fallen out of the practice of corresponding to people for quite some time now, however, with this new addition to his typewriter collection he has been motivated to break out his typewriters and begin writing again, thus this is an exciting day for the Caretaker. So, what does this mean? For those of you who are unlucky enough to have shared your address with the Caretaker you will probably be getting a letter in the mail sometime between now and the next six months (give or take). As per usual you can expect the normal cockamamie diatribes.

That pretty much sums up the day for the Caretaker, so, instead of carrying on about the joys and pleasures of the manual typewriter he will instead share a story from back in October. (A quick side note, if the Caretaker could figure out a way to connect one of his manual typewriters to his computer instead of using the keyboard he would find his blog much more enjoyable. Odd yes? Anyway...)

It was the week before closing, a Wednesday, the 22nd of October to be exact. The wind was from out of the Narrows all day, it started mild and became progressively windy. At one point the Caretaker went out with his "Beaufort-O-meter" which showed sustained winds of 30+ mph with gusts exceeding 60 mph (his Beaufort-O-meter pins at just above 60 mph so it could very well have been a gust to 70 mph or more). At this point the Caretaker figured that the boat on the North boathouse dock would probably be having some problems with hitting into the dock, and upon going out to the boat sure enough it was. The wind had caused the boat to slip the mooring anchor, so the Caretaker got onto the boat and retied it to the cleat. Even after resetting the anchor line at the cleat the boat was not doing too well, the Caretaker knew that he should just move the boat to the lee of the Island but being lazy he instead tried setting and anchor for the bow. His throw of the anchor from the boat as it bounces up and down on the waves did not exactly go far, heavy anchor into a strong wind usually never goes far, but being lazy he tried working with it anyway. After getting the second anchor set the Caretaker hopped out of the boat and stood on the dock to observe the how effective this second anchor would be at keeping the boat away from the dock. It didn't take long for the boat to slip both anchors. This did not surprise the Caretaker, so he overcame is ever present inclination to laziness and brought in the second anchor, untied the boat and began to motor it around to the South side of the South dock were it would be protected from the wind and the waves. The wind was blowing so strong that before the Caretaker put the engine in the gear the wind and waves had pushed it completely away from the dock and the boathouse putting the boat in the channel without having to do anything other than stand there and watch. Not wanting to leave his direction to the chance of the wind, the Caretaker put the boat in gear and began motoring his way towards the South dock. It didn't take long for the Caretaker to realize a potentially serious oversight, he turned his head to look and sure enough he was dragging the stern anchor. The fool forgot to pull up the first anchor.

Acting fast, he threw the boat into full reverse, well, may be not "full" reverse but he didn't mess around for he was aware of the possibility of something very bad happening. With the boat in reverse the Caretaker left the helm to go bring in the anchor, driving backwards into the wind the waves were crashing over the transom filling the boat with water. Thankfully the boat is double hulled so most of the water that washed over soon emptied out the back of the boat. Ignoring the cold and wet the Caretaker begin to raise the anchor by hand, as he brought up the wet rope it was at this time that he had wished he had brought some gloves. As the anchor was coming up it was getting harder and harder to draw, the Caretaker was concerned that by dragging the anchor he had done one of two things: he caught the phone line which would have been bad, or he caught the power line which would have been really bad.

Both the phone line and the power line to the Island come over from Clay Island, both lines lie on the floor of the Lake, however they do not come over side by side. If you catch one chances are you did not catch the other. So the Caretaker pulled up the rope until he got to the chain, at his point he was a touch hesitant to continue drawing in the anchor. He knew it was caught, and he also knew what both the phone line and the power line looked like, they are very different but at this point in time he could not tell what it was that the anchor was hung up on because it was still too deep in the dark water to see. At this point the Caretaker realized he would have like to have brought out is insulated gloves, not that he has any for this sort of thing but he did realize that at a time like this such items would be nice to have. He then deduced that if the anchor was caught up on the power line and it had become electrified he would have probably been electrocuted by now so he figured he'd keep bringing up the anchor. Sure enough it wasn't the power line, it was the phone line, unfortunately with the drifting of the boat due to the wind, the phone line had become taught and the Caretaker could not get the anchor out from under the line, that is without damaging it. So he dropped the anchor, returned to the helm, reset the boat and then quickly drew in the anchor again, this time he was able to get the anchor out from under the phone line. Relieved he brought the boat around to the South dock and tied it off.

Both the phone line and the power line have slack in them to help prevent them from getting ripped out by say the ice or an absent minded Caretaker so he wasn't too worried about having broken the phone line but he certainly didn't waste anytime checking. At the house phone the Caretaker picked up the handset half expecting there to be silence, thankfully the dial tone was there with its usual bit of low level buzz.

Thus concludes the Caretakers tale of how he nearly took out the phone line. Once again proving that he is not just a mediocre hero but also an international man of shenanigans.

--The Caretaker

TCC for 11/7/08

The Caretaker's Concern 11/7/08

Lake Temp. 52 F.
Ghetto temp. 58 F.
Island tmp. 56 F. Yesterday's L/H: 52/54 F.

Current conditions: Little to no wind, cloud covered night sky, warmish and humid. The day was mostly cloudy and foggy, some wind and some sun, but not much.

11/7/08


10/17/08


8/7/08



The Caretaker has been keeping himself rather busy with a number of things these past few days, most of which are not worth bothering about, however, the one thing that might be of interest regards his photography. For those of you who happen to enjoy looking at the photos that the Caretaker posts on this blog, you may want to take the time to check into his new site on Redbubble.com. This was made mention of in a post a few days ago, but there wasn't much in the way of details. As convenient as this blog is for disseminating text, photos, etc. the format for the photography is rather small, which is quite a shame. So, to address this the Caretaker has spent these last few days posting a large number of his photos on RedBubble.com. They are up there for sale as photo-cards, but by no means is anyone expected to purchase them, what is important is that it provides a venue for the photos to be seen in a larger format than that which is available here on blogspot. For those of you who have been regular readers of the blog since it was started you will probably be interested in checking out the Caretaker's RedBubble site because there are a number of photos that have never been posted to this blog (they were taken before the blog was started). So, should you happen to be interested in perusing some of the Caretaker's work in a larger format please cut and paste the following address into your browser:

http://jeffreydmoore.redbubble.com/

Or, you can use the link at the top of this web page, on the left hand side, it is marked by the text: "Photo-cards 4 Sale" the link is just below, it reads: "The Best in the World Click Here". Ha, ha.

Happy viewing. By the way, for those who are interested, the Caretaker is also working on a calendar, he is currently waiting for the proof to arrive, should it be up to snuff the Caretaker will certainly make it available to those who happen to be interested. His previous attempt at a calendar with another on-line printer came out, decidedly lousy.

Given the Caretaker's extremely slow internet connection he has had to make use of the local Library's computers to upload his photography, to do so from his computer on dial-up takes at least a half hour or more per image, which is obviously far too slow, the phone line would be tied up for over a week, all day and night. So, after finishing uploading at the library the Caretaker walked down to the market to pickup some things for dinner. The weather was quite warm, it felt much more like early Autumn. Town was a buzz with people out for dinner, nothing like it is during the busy season, but for this time of year there seemed to be more than the normal amount of activity going on. Then again, since the Caretaker is rarely in town on the weekends at this time of year it may very well be just the usual crowds for a Friday night.

In route to the market the Caretaker remembered to call K. to see if his packaged had arrived, and it did, which made the Caretaker happy, however, he also learned of an injury sustained by a family member of K.'s which made the Caretaker sad, hopefully all will go well with that. After the market the Caretaker hopped into the tin boat and motored over to Huddle Bay to dock at the public dock there so he could retrieve his package. It was a dark night on the Lake, there wasn't much in the way of wind, the flat water made for a nice ride.

So the Caretaker returned to the Island with his package, dropped his things and immediately opened the box, pulled out the down filled housecoat, tried it on to see that it fit properly, found that it did and then put it on a hanger to air out. The Caretaker was mildly concerned that the housecoat would not fit, it seems that housecoats are only made for women. It turns out that a woman's extra-large housecoat fits him perfectly. It is a shame that they are not marketing down filled housecoats to men, well, it is also a shame that not too many women are into wearing them. The way the Caretaker sees it, the problem of being cold is not a matter of a lack of heat, our bodies generate plenty, when healthy, 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, give or take a few points, rather the problem is a lack of insulation. So in an effort to reduce the amount of fossil fuel he consumes for heat this Winter the Caretaker is going to increase the amount of insulation he keeps about himself during the waking hours spent in the Ghetto. He will also be increasing the amount of insulation he keeps upon himself while asleep. His hope is that he will be able to maintain a comfortable existence in the Ghetto at no more than 50 degrees Fahrenheit, if he can go lower than that he will do so.

All this talk about alternative fuels to save the environment, the Caretaker knows a thing or two about alternative fuels, but he is by no means an expert, and he is certainly in no position to produce his own, however, he does know that the quickest way to "save" the environment is to reduce the amount of energy consumed regardless of where it comes from. If everyone turned down their thermostats in the Winter and put on an extra layer we would reduce our Nation's carbon foot print immensely. Or, better yet, turn down the thermostat, don't put on an extra layer, burn more calories and lose some weight--talk about a super simple weight loss program.

Lower your thermostat,
Shrink your heating bill,
Shrink your waistline,
Lower your carbon footprint.

Not exactly a smooth slogan that rolls off the tongue, but it will have to do for the time being. Now it's your turn to raise a crowd and march through the streets chanting it. Go on parade against excessive consumerism. Don't be a consumer; be a consume-less. Save it for your children, and their children, and their children and so on. As far as the Caretaker sees it we have two options when it comes to what the future generations will say about us:

"Those jerks, they used everything up and now we're left without a planet."

Or,

"Thankfully they used less so we could prosper, and in turn we shall use less so those who follow may prosper."

And so let us work to share prosperity with the world, let us all consume-less.

--The Caretaker