One Mighty Fine Weekend

It's been just beautiful the past few days...and I've been a hiking fool - bet I put in 30 miles in just the past three days.  Yesterday was the best of the bunch.  Walked from auntie's all the way up to the end of Perseverance.  Tons of people.  Tons of hounds.  Everyone in good spirits. 

It's clouded over this afternoon and there is a possibility of thundershowers.  YIKES!

On Friday Laura hosted an 80th birthday bash for her dad at her condo.  It was quite fun.  Her father, Jim Calvin, is a hell of a good egg.  And a racquet club regular!

 Happy 80th Birthday to Jim Calvin!

Three generations of Calvin Clan and friends.  A fun party.

Well, I've got a bunch of pics...but am too pooped to post.  Gonna put in a load of laundry and call it a day.  Will try to post regularly this next week...but if the sun is shinin' I'm gonna be spending more time outdoors!

Later gang.

Mobility is Good

It took two days but I think I've now got a system for getting dad out of the house.  Until yesterday, he had not been outdoors for nine months - since his last doctor's appointment.  On the one hand, this is a good thing - as far as the medical stuff is concerned.  On the other hand, it's appalling for someone as attuned to the seasons as dad has been all his life - not to mention a waste of  his considerable talents as a gregarious bullshitter.  Dad likes to yak-it-up with his fellow man.

Yesterday was step one - and it ended ignominiously.  I went up to Catholic Social Services and got a wheelchair.  Actually, I think it's called a transporter  - smaller back wheels than a hospital style wheelchair.  Good for outdoor walks and very lightweight.  The ol' coot was up for it.  He got down the stairs from the porch under his own power and soaked-up some rays while sitting in the chair.  I took him for a short stroll down the street.  He was visibly thrilled.  Then we got back home and tried to get him back UP the stairs under his own power.  YIKES!.  He just couldn't do it.  I could barely keep him upright...called for help from the neighbors.  It took three of us about five minutes to get him up four stairs - twenty five inches of rise in total.  He cut his arm somehow.  He has a bruise on his chin where he hit the railing.  OOFTA!

So...Plan B today.  Went over to the medical supply place and rented a really cool ramp.  It folds up...into a large suitcase size package that only weighs about fifty pounds.  It unfolds to become an eight foot long ramp.  Fits perfectly on the stairs.  Today I whipped the ol' boy up and down the stairs without the slightest problem.  Dad, mom, Linda and I had coffee outside.  I walked him around the neighborhood.  He chatted-it-up with several of the neighbors.  He inspected our wood pile with a critical eye and gave his approval.  He was clearly delighted with being outdoors on all accounts.  I felt very pleased myself.

I've also been busy with yard work.  Mowed and trimmed auntie's and mom's yards yesterday.  Did Alison's and Dougie's place today.  All the yards look quite marvelous - by Juneau standards, at least.

And here are some pics from last week's birding expeditions.

 Short-Billed Dowitchers (I think).

 I had to crawl on my belly to get these pics...on maneuvers!

I enjoyed every minute of it!

 A Yellow-Rumped Warbler doing the warbling thing...

 I think these guys are Republicans...exploiting the labour of others...in this case a spider.

There are Oil Spills - and then there are Oil Spills.

A great weekend.  Sunday was as fine a day as I've had in many a moon.  I went over to Joan's about noon - we worked in her garden for a couple of hours.  I got to use my three  favourite tools - the hammer (for disassembling an old potting bench), a crowbar (used like my second favourite tool, the pick) to pry out a bunch of Goatsbeard roots and the shovel (to level a bit of her back yard).  Big time satisfaction.  I'm a manual labor kind a guy....

Then Joan coached me through making a great marinade for chicken drummies.  A shitpile o' butter, garlic, minced ginger, scallions, and a cup o' Thai hot sauce.  HMMMMM...

Then off to Kris and Dave Gray's for a pic-a-nic with the hosts, Marla Berg, John Greely and their son Matt..

When we got there some of us sortied to Point Louisa to check-out the progress on taking the bunker crude off of the sunken passenger ship, the Princess Kathleen, that went aground there in 1952.  Pretty impressive.  They have booms around the site and a barge VERY carefully and firmly anchored over the wreck.  There are two large buoys with anchors off both the port and starboard forward and aft quarters of the barge.  And another line firmly anchored to the shore.  Bet that puppy doesn't move a foot in any direction regardless of current or wind.

They're pumping the crude off the wreck - so far without incident.

This afternoon I happened to bring this up with my landlord and his sister, Jewlee, who has a friend working on the project.  The word on the street is that the project is costing the feds about $250,000 a day. I don't doubt it.   They've been at it for a couple of months.  You do the math.  An Uncle Ted legacy project. 

When observing the clean-up, one could not help but contrast the well organized and careful Pt. Louisa project with the chaos in the Gulf of Mexico.  The only thing the two situations have in common, of course, is petroleum.  The amount of oil in the Princess Kathleen is nothing - the spill in the Gulf vomits more oil in minutes than the entire amount on board the sunken princess. 

The Princess Kathleen in the prime of her life

The Princess Kathleen goes down on Pt. Louisa in 1952

Taking the oil off the Princess Kathleen in 2010

Note the diving suits drying on the deck.  Divers are really expensive.... 

Matt Greely, Marla Berg, John Greely, Dave Gray

Same 'ting. 'cept me on the left instead of Matt.

Got some more pics and news...so will post again tomorrow.

Cheers!

Busy Week

My back is a little stiff this morning - from slinging bags of potting soil, I expect.  Did a lot of yard work the past few days.  Mom's yard is now planted.  Up at auntie's, I rehabilitated a major flower bed and still have a little planting to do.  Will look damn nice I do believe...

The weather has been quite nice.  Was in the low 70's yesterday although it clouded over late in the day and then we had a fairly brief but quite intense wind storm.  And I heard the rain on the roof during the night.  It's cloudy this morning but supposed to improve during the course of the day.

I escorted mom to the doctors yesterday morning.  An exam,a blood draw and then we zipped over to the hospital for an x-ray of her lower back.  She's had very bad back pain...I'm guessing it's serious arthritis in her back and that our next stop will be the orthopod.  Don't know what the treatment, if any, might be for arthritis in the back.  Don't think back transplants are included in the orthopods bag-o' tricks.  We'll see.  The doc should call today.

I've got a few birdie pics from hiking on the dike trail; but haven't had the ambition to download them. I have high hopes for a couple of pics of a Yellow-Rumped Warbler dining on bugs caught in a spider's web. Will take some photoshop jiggery-pokery I'm sure. My old computer gets very cranky these days when I do pic stuff.  Just haven't been able to pull the trigger on a new desktop since the one I want will set-me back the cost of a month's vacation.  Still, the day is fast approaching.

In other news, I note that the financial reform bill passed the Senate last night...conference committee to follow.  Good news, I believe, although the bill did not go nearly far enough for my tastes. The bright line between commercial banking activities and the casino gambling of the investment bankers has not been reinstated.  And I would have liked to see the amendment limiting the size of the biggest banks pass. I guess I find the argument that if you're too big to fail - you're just too big - quite compelling.  Although given the herd mentality of our bonehead bankers, I reckon that a flock of mid-sized banks going bust would likely have the same affect as one or two behemoths going under.

I guess at the end of the day I am skeptical of our ability to regulate effectively over the long-haul - we might be able to prevent a recurrence of the LAST meltdown - but dealing with the NEXT collapse is much more tricky.  Financial regulators, like the pentagon, tend to prepare themselves to fight the last war.  And while the Wall Street hucksters have amply demonstrated their lack of wisdom, they have cleverness down real well.

Still, the reform bill is well worth passing.

Dougie and Alison are on their way south  this morning.  They're got a condo in Branson, MO lined-up and also plan a side-trip to Memphis.  Not my cup-o'-tea; but I'm sure they'll play lots of golf and have a good time.  The heartland..
 
Well, think I'll go see if I can persuade the ol' coot to have a bath today - one day earlier than scheduled.  The weather is supposed to be very nice tomorrow and I want to have the decks cleared for outdoor action!

Have a good weekend everybody!

Shih Tzu's Don't Float

A couple of beautiful days in Juneau.  Yesterday, Joan took the afternoon off and we went walking out by the glacier.  Pretty quiet over by the skater's cabin...figured there would be lots of terns and sandpipers; but there was nobody home.  We back-tracked to the Dredge Lake Trail and wandered around for a bit.

During the course of our wandering we came upon a large pothole of indeterminate depth that was completely covered with spruce pollen and other assorted pond scum.  Joan and I were walking around the perimeter of the pothole when Maddie the Shih Tzu decided that the shortest distance between her and us was a straight line - right across the water!  A serious mistake.  Upon reflection, I am convinced that she did not recognize the bright green pond as a water hazzard - she thought it was solid ground.  This is an animal bred for companionship - she's much more comfortable in the palace as opposed to walking in the great outdoors.

You can well imagine, then, Maddie's surprise when her first step resulted in a ker-splash.  Frantic dog paddling.  Looked like she would be OK; but then started running out of gas.  Started doing circles half on her side - like a dying goldfish in extremis.

Fortunately, there was a dead branch on the ground long enough to drag her to shore. One mighty chagrined hound...
 

Maddie the Shih Tzu will NOT be trying-out for the Olympic swim team...

I walked the dike trail a couple of times this weekend.  Lots of waders.
 

Pectoral Sandpipers forage on the wetlands.

Joan hosted supper on Saturday.  She has a new rotisserie device for her grill.  An excellent BBQ pork loin...

I did some yard work this weekend too.  Fertilized both mom's and auntie's lawns.  Bought some annuals for both locations. God I love spring!

In other news, Amanda flew south on Sunday morning.  A quick stop to see her mom in Olympia and then on to Portland to see Leah.  Wheels-up for Cali later this week.  I sure enjoyed her company.  She intends to return to Juneau next fall to seek full-time employment.

Well, time to get moving.

Beer Now - Pop Tarts Later

Last night I finished one of the most engrossing books I have read in a very long time.  The book is The World is Flat - A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century by Thomas L. Friedman.  In a nutshell, it is the story of globalization from the breaching of the Berlin Wall in 1989 until early 2005.  And nothing has happened in the past five years that contradicts his central arguments - indeed, quite the contrary.

The title of the book is clever way of describing how various technological innovations and business practices have affected the developed and much of the developing world in the post Cold War era.  The first part of the book identifies ten "flatteners" that have driven globalization.  The first is the end of the Cold War.  Other "flatteners" are the development of the internet, outsourcing, supply-chaining, and digital telecommunications.

The central point of the book is that the "flat" world has allowed new players - particularly China and India - to participate in the world economy in ways previously unimaginable.   Mr. Friedman argues that barring catastrophe either natural or man made this process will continue and even accelerate.  And if you think low wages in the developing world are the beginning and end of the story, think again. 

Mr. Friedman further posits that if the United States doesn't address a number of fundamental structural issues - a largely second-rate public primary and secondary educational system being at the top of the list - then we will not only find ourselves in relative economic decline compared to the likes of China and India; but will likely experience a real decline in living standards.

This could all be deadly dull, of course, but it is not.  Every point is illustrated by personal experience or the experiences of an international cast of journalists, business people and others intimately familiar with the economic upheaval of the past several decades.  The stories of how particular companies have used the emerging technologies to gain a competitive edge are interesting and frequently amusing.

For example, the discussion of the development of world-wide supply chains uses Wal-Mart as the poster child.  Purchase an item at Wal-Mart, and a factory in coastal China (or somewhere else) is immediately directed to build another one.  Pretty amazing; but also pretty obvious.  However the same system provides the company with other less obvious competitive advantages.

During hurricanes, Wal-Mart officials told me, Wal-Mart knows that people eat more things like Pop-Tarts - easy-to-store, nonperishable items - and that their stores also sell a lot of kids' games that don't require electricity, and can substitute for TV.  It also knows that when hurricanes are coming, people tend to drink more beer.  So the minute Wal-Mart's meteorologists tell headquarters a hurricane is bearing down on Florida, its supply chain automatically adjusts to a hurricane mix in the Florida stores - more beer early, more Pop-Tarts later.

Regarding the likelihood that America will rise to the challenges posed by globalization, the author is ultimately agnostic.  It's not that we don't have the ABILITY to address these issues; it's a question of whether or not we have the WILL.

...
Lucky for us, we were the only economy standing after World War II, and we had no serious competition for forty years.  That gave us a huge head of steam but also a huge sense of entitlement and complacency - not to mention a certain  tendency in recent years to extol consumption over hard work, investment, and long-term thinking.  When we got hit with 9/11 it was a once-in-a-generation opportunity to summon the nation to sacrifice, to address some of its pressing fiscal, energy, science, and education shortfalls - all the things we had let slide.  But our president did not summon us to sacrifice.  He summoned us to go shopping.

Throughout the book, Mr. Friedman asks various folks when they first recognized that the world was "flat".  Some interesting replies.  If Mr. Friedman asked me, I know exactly what I'd say.  "I had just got back from a long walk through Cambridge, MA and was talking with Mr. Dieter Ortmann, Global Head Quality Management, Novartis Pharma AG..."

I highly recommend the book!

Medical Day

I'm standing by for medical maneuvers today.  Amanda called yesterday morning with the news that the Painted Turtle folks were demanding proof that she had chicken pox as a kiddo.  They will no longer accept her signed statement as sufficient.  So...she has a call into our primary care doc to see if he's willing to sign a document stating she's had the pox.  I doubt it, since he would simply have to take her word for it.  More likely we'll be headed to the clinic or the hospital today for a blood draw.  The Hole-in-the-Wall camps take this sort of thing VERY seriously - understandable since virtually all of the campers have compromised immune systems.  If a kid gets a cold while at camp, kiddo is sent home.  If a staff person gets a cold, it's quarantine.

In other medical news, got a call from sister at 12:45 AM this morning.  Mom has had a very bad back for a long time...and it's been getting progressively worse of late.  Mom couldn't get out of bed last night...the pain was excruciating.  She said she thought she better go to the ER.  I said I'd be right over...  But before I could get my teeth brushed she called back...had managed to get up using dad's walker and thought she'd be OK 'til morning.  Talked to her this morning and she now thinks she can hold-on until we see her regular doc next Thursday.

OOPS!  'Manda just called.  Need to hit the road.  Breakfast and then a blood draw.

Later gang. 

Quality Time with 'Manda

A change of plans for 'Manda.  She has elected to spend a few more days in Juneau before heading south this next Sunday.  Wonderful!  I got to hang-out with her yesterday - lunch at the Sandpiper (excellent Reuben on great fresh bread).  Then a nice walk at the shrine followed by various and sundry errands.  She is in good spirits and looking forward to the summer in Cali.  I had a delightful time in her company - can't hardly imagine a better way to spend a day.

Yesterday was Joan Kasson's birthday.  I coaxed her out to Zephyr for wine and appetizers.  Dougie subsequently joined us.  An excellent French burgundy...  Good company and good wine...another winning combination!

Sadly, today is much less pleasant.  Raining and blowing and I just finished paying the monthly bills.  Time to go have a workout...guaranteed to improve my disposition.

TallyHo!

So Many Birds...So Few Pictures...

A birdy weekend with lots of sun.  I took over 100 pictures; but the number of blogworthy shots totals three.  Not a great percentage...

On Saturday Alison and I went out to Fish Creek.  Our big find was the Black-Bellied Plover.  Couldn't get close enough for good pics however.  Still, a delightful afternoon. 

Saturday evening was firepit night at Rickely/Elgee manor.  And hoisin marinated leg of lamb.  Good and good for you.

On Sunday morning we went out on the Airport Dike Trail.  LOTS of action...but again, largely at a distance.  The waders have arrived.  Lots of sandpipers in various flavors.  Also, the warblers are back - and as elusive as ever.  Lots of Yellow-Rumped warblers on the trail and I chased a Yellow Warbler around a tree for a few minutes in an ultimately futile attempt to get the definitive Yellow Warbler shot.  We saw a small raptor - but I am uncertain as to the species - a Merlin, Sharp-Shinned Hawk, or immature Peregrine Falcon are all possibilities.

There were tons of waterfowl too including a Trumpeter Swan, Canadian Geese, Northern Shovelers, and the omnipresent Mallards.

Long-Billed Dowitchers forage on the wetlands.

Pectoral Sandpipers soak-up the sun.

Western Sandpipers do a fly-by.

Last evening Amanda and I joined Cathy and David Bohna and Kira Kiel for supper at the Island Pub.  Amanda ups-stakes tomorrow morning for the Great Northwest and then Cali for the summer.  She has enjoyed her stay - last night she said she was not sure she was ready to leave. It's been a ton of fun having her around.  Her current plans call for a return to Southeast Alaska next fall with the goal of full-time employment. Plan subject to change, of course.

Pub-grub and good company!

Well, another busy day today.  Mom indicated she's ready for a bedding plant sortie.  And this afternoon I plan to thatch and rake a couple of yards.  God I love spring!

Later gang!

Give My Regards to Broadway

Hmmmm.  Raining this morning.  I had gardening plans...but looks like they may need to wait for a day or two.  Yesterday I finished weeding at auntie's.  Today I was going to mow and then hit the yard with moss killer.   Oh well...

Amanda got back from Sitka last evening.  She had a good time and now it's nose to the grindstone for the remainder of her stay.  Yesterday the first boat of the season arrived and her services will be needed at Annie Kails for the next week.

Last evening I was on the way home from the Club when I heard a most amusing tune on NPR.  The song is called "Bet Against the American Dream" done in classic show-tune style.  It also serves as a primer on Wall Street Finance for the majority of us who have had a difficult time sorting through the lingo of CDOs and Credit Default Swaps.  Here we go:

Step one! 
We write a check for ten million dollars, hand the check to a Wall Street Bank,
and ask them to make us a CDO.

Step Two! 
They create the CDO using risky stuff!
Very Risky Stuff!  EXTREMELY risky stuff!

Step Three!
Other investors commit hundreds of millions of dollars to the CDO.

Step Four!
We bet against the CDO using a Credit Default Swap!

Step Five!
The housing market crashes, the CDO's value drops to zero,
Our bet pays off, and we make hundreds of millions of dollars.

And before you can say Step Six
We're Rich!

We're gonna bet against the American Dream
We're gonna be on the winning team!
Purchase risky debt on a massive scale
Then place a bet that the debt will fail!

Hundreds of millions for Magnetar
The economy collapsin' like a dying star
No one will know 'til it's on NPR
And who cares?

It's time to hit the town!
This sucker could go down!
The housing market's losing steam!
And all we gotta do, to make our dream come true
Is bet against the American Dream!

Take a listen:  http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2010/04/americandream.html

Get Well Kurt

Got a call from my ol' work buddy, Jerry Fuller, yesterday.  He will be retiring from State service on June 1st.  That makes two for that day - Eric will be bidding adieu to the life of a wage-slave the same day.  Congratulations boys.  Tick-tock.

Jerry also had some ominous news.  Our mutual friend, Kurt West, was admitted to Bartlett Regional Hospital on Saturday with a coronary problem of yet-to-be-determined origin.  I tracked Kurt down by phone in the cardiac care unit.  He sounded pretty chipper and hoped to be heading home in a couple of hours.  Sounds like a pretty scary weekend - his heart rate got so slow on several occasions that he blacked-out.  Not good.  We don't have a heart specialist in Juneau - time to cash-in some frequent flyer miles for a trip to Pill Hill in Seattle I would think...

Yesterday was dry with intermittent sun.  I went bird hunting.  Alison mentioned that she had spotted some Red-Winged Blackbirds over by the Juneau Pioneers Home a week or so ago.  I went over to check it out.  Yep.  There they were - but couldn't get close enough for any pics.  I did manage to get my shoes and pants soaked wading around on the wetlands however.  So...back home for a change of clothes and then out to the Mendenhall River Trail.

As soon as I got out of the car at Brotherhood Bridge I spotted a raptor of some sort flying low over the meadows.  Hmmmm.  Didn't look familiar.  I marched out into the weeds and managed to get a couple of really blurry pics.  I have since concluded that I was probably looking at a Northern Harrier. If anyone would like to see my blurry pics - let me know and I will send them to you via email.  They are not blogworthy.

I walked down the river trail to Montana Creek.  Just before reaching the creek I stumbled across a Hairy Woodpecker dining on a downed tree.  He was fairly cooperative as a photo subject although it was pretty dark in the woods. 

Hairy Woodpecker on the Mendenhall River Trail

In other news, I spoke to 'Manda a couple of times yesterday.  She's in Sitka and it sounds like she's having a pretty good time although her "interview" with the folks who operate the student activities program for Mt. Edgecumbe High School was pretty much a bust.  They're not even sure if they'll fill the position Amanda was interested in...  On the other hand, there are several residential treatment programs in Sitka that might be interested in her and she met a teacher who immediately suggested that she would make a good nanny for his family.  Go figure...  Amanda's flying back to Juneau this evening.

Also, my dear friend Jane Ellis has been sending me listings for real estate in Portland.  She is afraid I am about to miss the boat.  The market has definitely improved in the Portland area.  And I think there is a 50/50 chance the fed will begin raising interest rates before the year is out.  Not sure what I can do about it however...

Well, it's dry again today although there is a chance of showers the next few days.  Think I'll go finish weeding at auntie's.