Happy New Year!
We had a nice New Year’s Eve with Bill and Linda aboard Sequester. It was a lovely evening and we lounged on the bow nets and then moved to the cockpit and sat at our new table. They wanted to go to the street party, so left about 11pm. We also would have liked to go (as last year’s party was so good), but Ted’s back was so bad he couldn’t even walk 100 yards, and I was so tired I couldn’t be bothered. I was asleep 10 minutes after they left.
It’s a week today since we finished the clinic. I’m still recovering from lack of sleep and we both had a relapse of the flu-like thing that is going around. Ted is resting his back most of the time and is also coughing and coughing. It sure takes us longer to recover now that we are older!
We had the second yacht race yesterday, and Sequester didn’t do as well this time. Once again, weather conditions were unusual for this area, and we had a big squall which changed the wind direction, so that the downwind leg was a beam reach and the upwind leg was a close reach on one tack. Since we start 10 minutes after the monohulls, our conditions for the race were different from theirs, as the squall came through just as we were about to round the second mark and the wind direction changed drastically and we had to tack to get around the mark. That was the race for us. We came in 8th out of 9 boats. We all got pretty wet and cold, but still had fun together.
Our major obligations are all taken care of now. Ted and I both have some small jobs to do. I’m waiting for fabric to arrive in the mail, so can take a few days off. Ted has a couple of boat projects pending, but he needs to be able to stand and walk first. A number of boats are leaving to go out-island to experience some of the more remote atolls. Another boat is sailing west to Micronesia. Two new boats are arriving today. So we say some goodbyes, but have new folks to meet. Karen
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Thursday, January 1, 2009
December 30, 2008
It’s Over!!
We finally left at 2am last night, with the clinic all cleaned up and packed away for the next time we have a visiting vet. We’re all hoping it will be at least 6 months before we have to do this again. On the other hand, if a vet came more often it wouldn’t have to be this crazy. The last visit before this one was August 2007.
We ended up doing 75 clinic hours in 6 days, with an additional day’s work of 11 hours to set up and take down. We did health exams and surgeries on I don’t know how many dogs and cats. Most surgeries were neuters but we also did a couple of hernia operations, excised a malignant tumor and set a broken leg. I was with Mia for all exams and surgeries, so had an intense course in animal care.
Mia Greenberg is an amazing woman with an enormous amount of energy and I can tell you she is an excellent vet. She is also a very skilled surgeon and it was a joy to learn from her. She has started her own non-profit organization and her dream is to someday own a catamaran and have a sailing vet clinic that roams the remote Pacific Islands. It would be FAR easier to have a permanent set-up on a boat rather than try to fly in supplies and set up in place after place. She could also travel with a skilled team of assistants and not have to train people wherever she goes, although I must admit we were a crack team by the finish and could probably travel with her. But we’ve all got at least 20 years on her and couldn’t keep the pace, so we’ll leave that for those far younger.
Mia left about 10 suitcases full of supplies with us, plus an anesthesia machine, animal traps and dart gun (to sedate feral animals for capture and treatment). We were so busy doing private pets this time that we didn’t even make a start on the ferals. She may or may not be the next vet to visit, but we will have whatever is needed.
I think I can now call myself a vet nurse. I feel competent to give anesthesia to any cat or dog. I can also sedate them with injectable medicines. By the end of the clinic I was calculating the dosages and pre-medicating all the animals. And I did the majority of the anesthesia, plus trained 2 assistants to help me. Mia left a lot of medications with us and anything we’re not sure about we can consult with her by email or phone before giving. But at least we have something to work with, and in this remote part of the world you give help whenever or however you can.
Right now I’m listening to Christmas music, as Christmas was short-changed this year. Tomorrow is New Year’s Eve, and we plan to get together with Bill and Linda, who were with us for every hour of every day, and without whom we wouldn’t have survived this. We all need to sit down, de-brief, and process the experiences of the past week. Today we’re just running on adrenaline and attending to basic functions, like making sure there is fresh water on the boat. We’re also enjoying a little sunshine and fresh air.
A funny (or not) story is that Bill and Linda never got a chance to call their children in the States on Christmas, and their children got worried and were hearing reports out of Majuro of our huge wave surge (which happened a couple of weeks ago), so called the Coast Guard and reported them missing. This morning, first thing, after being asleep only a few hours they heard banging on the hull and it was officials coming to check on their welfare! So they quickly got ashore and spent hours on the phone with their loved ones assuring them that all was okay. The good news for all you landlubbers out there is that the authorities take your concerns seriously and they will track us down!!
Happy New Year! Karen
We finally left at 2am last night, with the clinic all cleaned up and packed away for the next time we have a visiting vet. We’re all hoping it will be at least 6 months before we have to do this again. On the other hand, if a vet came more often it wouldn’t have to be this crazy. The last visit before this one was August 2007.
We ended up doing 75 clinic hours in 6 days, with an additional day’s work of 11 hours to set up and take down. We did health exams and surgeries on I don’t know how many dogs and cats. Most surgeries were neuters but we also did a couple of hernia operations, excised a malignant tumor and set a broken leg. I was with Mia for all exams and surgeries, so had an intense course in animal care.
Mia Greenberg is an amazing woman with an enormous amount of energy and I can tell you she is an excellent vet. She is also a very skilled surgeon and it was a joy to learn from her. She has started her own non-profit organization and her dream is to someday own a catamaran and have a sailing vet clinic that roams the remote Pacific Islands. It would be FAR easier to have a permanent set-up on a boat rather than try to fly in supplies and set up in place after place. She could also travel with a skilled team of assistants and not have to train people wherever she goes, although I must admit we were a crack team by the finish and could probably travel with her. But we’ve all got at least 20 years on her and couldn’t keep the pace, so we’ll leave that for those far younger.
Mia left about 10 suitcases full of supplies with us, plus an anesthesia machine, animal traps and dart gun (to sedate feral animals for capture and treatment). We were so busy doing private pets this time that we didn’t even make a start on the ferals. She may or may not be the next vet to visit, but we will have whatever is needed.
I think I can now call myself a vet nurse. I feel competent to give anesthesia to any cat or dog. I can also sedate them with injectable medicines. By the end of the clinic I was calculating the dosages and pre-medicating all the animals. And I did the majority of the anesthesia, plus trained 2 assistants to help me. Mia left a lot of medications with us and anything we’re not sure about we can consult with her by email or phone before giving. But at least we have something to work with, and in this remote part of the world you give help whenever or however you can.
Right now I’m listening to Christmas music, as Christmas was short-changed this year. Tomorrow is New Year’s Eve, and we plan to get together with Bill and Linda, who were with us for every hour of every day, and without whom we wouldn’t have survived this. We all need to sit down, de-brief, and process the experiences of the past week. Today we’re just running on adrenaline and attending to basic functions, like making sure there is fresh water on the boat. We’re also enjoying a little sunshine and fresh air.
A funny (or not) story is that Bill and Linda never got a chance to call their children in the States on Christmas, and their children got worried and were hearing reports out of Majuro of our huge wave surge (which happened a couple of weeks ago), so called the Coast Guard and reported them missing. This morning, first thing, after being asleep only a few hours they heard banging on the hull and it was officials coming to check on their welfare! So they quickly got ashore and spent hours on the phone with their loved ones assuring them that all was okay. The good news for all you landlubbers out there is that the authorities take your concerns seriously and they will track us down!!
Happy New Year! Karen
December 28, 2008
Vet Clinic
We have almost destroyed ourselves with the hours we’ve been keeping in the vet clinic. We’ve bested our record each night. We thought 7:30 pm was staying late. Huh!! Last night it was 10pm and tonight it was midnight!! Thank god tomorrow is the last night, as we are anticipating doing an all-nighter. We are all thankful that Mia gets on a plane Tuesday morning at 10am, or this could go on forever. She has a good 20 years on us older folks, and it seems she could go on and on, but we are fading fast and will be grateful for the week’s sleep after she is gone.
I’m sure none of us would have signed on for this gig if we had known how intense it would be, but we have learned an enormous amount, and for myself, I could be an anesthesiologist when this is all over. I trained an assistant today, so I can take a break now and then (good when you are doing 15 hour days). I can also give injections to dogs and cats. One of the local surgeons even came in tonight to help out and can now do surgery on animals! Mia is an excellent surgeon so we are learning from the best. We have a well-oiled team, so she doesn’t even have to tell us what to do. By the time she asks for something it is already done!!! She wants us to follow her to the other Pacific islands, but we are all thinking we will avoid any island she is on (only kidding!). Karen
We have almost destroyed ourselves with the hours we’ve been keeping in the vet clinic. We’ve bested our record each night. We thought 7:30 pm was staying late. Huh!! Last night it was 10pm and tonight it was midnight!! Thank god tomorrow is the last night, as we are anticipating doing an all-nighter. We are all thankful that Mia gets on a plane Tuesday morning at 10am, or this could go on forever. She has a good 20 years on us older folks, and it seems she could go on and on, but we are fading fast and will be grateful for the week’s sleep after she is gone.
I’m sure none of us would have signed on for this gig if we had known how intense it would be, but we have learned an enormous amount, and for myself, I could be an anesthesiologist when this is all over. I trained an assistant today, so I can take a break now and then (good when you are doing 15 hour days). I can also give injections to dogs and cats. One of the local surgeons even came in tonight to help out and can now do surgery on animals! Mia is an excellent surgeon so we are learning from the best. We have a well-oiled team, so she doesn’t even have to tell us what to do. By the time she asks for something it is already done!!! She wants us to follow her to the other Pacific islands, but we are all thinking we will avoid any island she is on (only kidding!). Karen
Christmas Day 2008
Merry Christmas!!
I can’t begin to tell you how busy this week has been. I may have mentioned that I was in charge of organizing volunteers for the Vet Clinic this week. Well, it turns out that we are super involved in running the clinic and are there all day everyday and today (Christmas) is our only day off and we are working Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday. We spent this morning doing laundry, as it is our only day off. We got to sleep in a little extra too!
The clinic is supposed to run until 4:30 in the afternoon, but we haven’t left before 7:30 each night. Then we collapse into bed and start again the next morning. This feels an awful lot like work! We were scheduled to end the clinic on Friday, but Mia (the volunteer vet) got bumped from the plane in Hawaii last Saturday, so arrived a day late and they gave her extra time here. But her 7 pieces of luggage with all her medical supplies didn’t arrive until yesterday afternoon, so we were running on what little was left from previous clinics, plus a few drugs the hospital gave us. We now have a functioning surgery and an organized work area. For a while I didn’t think it was going to happen and the whole thing was going to fall down around us, but now it looks promising.
She is spaying and neutering dogs and cats and doing health checks and immunizations. I am her assistant, and am with her for all exams and surgeries. I’m injecting animals and will be intubating next week, and yesterday spent a half hour giving mouth to mouth to a cat!! (That was before our proper supplies arrived, so hopefully won’t have to do that again!) The cat is fine, by the way, and her owner very grateful to have her back.
Ted’s back has been in horrible shape and he has been hobbling around for the last week and a half. He can only be upright for an hour or two before the spasms get so bad he has to lie down. He is on multiple drugs, has gotten lots of advice from the cruising fleet, and it turns out Mia’s husband is a chiropractor and he brought his table, so yesterday he worked on Ted while we were working on animals.
This is not really the Christmas we had planned, but it is turning out all right. Yesterday morning I was very pessimistic, but now I’m optimistic that we will have a successful clinic. I’ll probably need to sleep for a week when it is over. One of the cruising couples in the fleet, Bill and Linda on Creola, have been a MAJOR help with all of this. They have been there all day every day and will continue to be with us until the end. We couldn’t have done it without them. We just met them when they arrived here and we are bonding with them through this experience. We were all disappointed to miss the Christmas Eve cruisers’ get-together last night, as the clinic went on and on, but we made our own party afterwards and made up a funny Christmas carol having to do with dog’s balls and anesthesia and sang it to the fleet as we dinghied home. So we are finally in the Christmas spirit and will have a nice pot-luck this afternoon with everyone.
Merry Christmas to all!!
PS from Ted; The back is significantly improving the last 2 days, not a minute too soon!!
I can’t begin to tell you how busy this week has been. I may have mentioned that I was in charge of organizing volunteers for the Vet Clinic this week. Well, it turns out that we are super involved in running the clinic and are there all day everyday and today (Christmas) is our only day off and we are working Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday. We spent this morning doing laundry, as it is our only day off. We got to sleep in a little extra too!
The clinic is supposed to run until 4:30 in the afternoon, but we haven’t left before 7:30 each night. Then we collapse into bed and start again the next morning. This feels an awful lot like work! We were scheduled to end the clinic on Friday, but Mia (the volunteer vet) got bumped from the plane in Hawaii last Saturday, so arrived a day late and they gave her extra time here. But her 7 pieces of luggage with all her medical supplies didn’t arrive until yesterday afternoon, so we were running on what little was left from previous clinics, plus a few drugs the hospital gave us. We now have a functioning surgery and an organized work area. For a while I didn’t think it was going to happen and the whole thing was going to fall down around us, but now it looks promising.
She is spaying and neutering dogs and cats and doing health checks and immunizations. I am her assistant, and am with her for all exams and surgeries. I’m injecting animals and will be intubating next week, and yesterday spent a half hour giving mouth to mouth to a cat!! (That was before our proper supplies arrived, so hopefully won’t have to do that again!) The cat is fine, by the way, and her owner very grateful to have her back.
Ted’s back has been in horrible shape and he has been hobbling around for the last week and a half. He can only be upright for an hour or two before the spasms get so bad he has to lie down. He is on multiple drugs, has gotten lots of advice from the cruising fleet, and it turns out Mia’s husband is a chiropractor and he brought his table, so yesterday he worked on Ted while we were working on animals.
This is not really the Christmas we had planned, but it is turning out all right. Yesterday morning I was very pessimistic, but now I’m optimistic that we will have a successful clinic. I’ll probably need to sleep for a week when it is over. One of the cruising couples in the fleet, Bill and Linda on Creola, have been a MAJOR help with all of this. They have been there all day every day and will continue to be with us until the end. We couldn’t have done it without them. We just met them when they arrived here and we are bonding with them through this experience. We were all disappointed to miss the Christmas Eve cruisers’ get-together last night, as the clinic went on and on, but we made our own party afterwards and made up a funny Christmas carol having to do with dog’s balls and anesthesia and sang it to the fleet as we dinghied home. So we are finally in the Christmas spirit and will have a nice pot-luck this afternoon with everyone.
Merry Christmas to all!!
PS from Ted; The back is significantly improving the last 2 days, not a minute too soon!!
December 2008
Rain and thoughts in Majuro
This morning I put up a tent on the side deck of Sequester. This was done in an effort to continue providing electricity on board in the face of today’s challenge. Since we returned to Majuro I have refurbished the wind generator, and it works great......when there is wind. The solar panels are more than adequate for our needs.....when there is sunlight. But once more the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone is confounding our renewable energy systems. For the last few days it's been light wind and heavy cloud, and now, when I need to boost the charging with the little gasoline generator, it's steadily raining. Cheap little generators don't much like rain, so I made a tent for it, and it seems happy out there puttering along, feeding the computer and the batteries.
I haven't sent an update email out since we got back here, and sent our voting ballots back to Florida. I'm quite sure you all know how relieved and pleased we are with the results of that election. There's a gigantic challenge before us now, but at least there's someone in line to seriously address it rather than issue bumper sticker slogans and threats. Let's all pay attention, and help wherever we can. And on that subject; I just got an email from a friend who was one of our favorite Worldteach volunteers last year. We think very much alike about the state of the world, and he asked for my response to some of his friends since he returned to the States. He's been told he's now their most depressing friend. That's what you get for describing reality, I said. Review how it went for Nicolas Copernicus. But you don't have to be depressed by it. You can take it as a challenge rather than a death sentence. I was tempted to expand on that with a motorcycle racing analogy, because that was my sport, and how I defined myself, while I was learning how to use my mind. I didn't write it then, but now it's raining and I don't have anything to do but think and type, so I'll tell a story. If you hate technical sports allegories, skip on down the page!
In 1976 I had a few years of racing experience behind me, and I had trained myself to react both analytically and emotionally to a crisis. Having found virtually every possible way to fall off, I was finally pretty good at keeping the rubber side down, as the jargon of the track expressed it. The incident I'm thinking of happened in the second lap of a national roadrace at Road Atlanta. I was leading, and pushing things a bit to open some distance between myself and the pack, and at the apex of turn 3 I fed it a little too much power a little too soon. Dave Stanton later described what he saw. Dave was probably a better rider than I was, with lots of experience, so I take him at his word. He said he NEVER saw anyone get a bike that far out of shape and stay on it. He figures at one point the rear wheel was in front. From the time I lost all traction until I made the turn exit, on line at full throttle, the elapsed time was about a half a second. In that half second, bookmakers wouldn't have bet very high on my success. But I was trained to react, and to assess, in exactly that circumstance. If you shut down the power at such a time, the rear tire gains traction instantly, and stops moving sideways. But the rest of the bike has momentum, and keeps going that way. It turns into a 100 horsepower catapult, and the rider is left wondering how high he (or she) is going to get before gravity wins over momentum. Return to Earth really hurts. So, shutting the throttle is not the best option. On the other hand, opening the throttle is how this got started, and left alone, the spinning rear wheel will pass the designated front wheel, gyroscopic stability will get all confused, and you're going to fall down. In turn 3 at Atlanta, that would be at about 80 miles per hour, it's going to hurt, it's going to break your bike, and you're not going to win the race. So you can't really just leave it opened up. Moderation is called for, and adjustment to changing conditions. As I backed off the power a bit, the front wheel could outrun the back again. As the bike assumed proper orientation, I needed to power up again to use CONTROLLED wheelspin to steer out of the turn, and to keep from being run over by a hard charging (and probably slightly disconcerted) second place rider. It all came together perfectly. No road rash for me, no broken bike, Just a big adrenalin rush and on to the next turn.
Now, how does this apply to a crashing economy, failing energy supply, and climate change? First, we, the people of the planet, have a gargantuan trove of knowledge at our command, having recorded the failure of quite a few economic models, having transited several varieties of energy source, and having faced continuous, (if considerably slower) environmental change since our species first began to alter where we live. There is a very good chance that we have the ability to ride this out. But here comes the second part, and the major point of the tale. I wasn't about to stop actively riding the bike until I couldn't reach it any more. And until we as a species fall down and can't get up again, we need to be actively looking for a level of moderation that will allow us to exist at an acceptable quality of life. That may involve giving up the 300 horsepower car, the heated pool, maybe even the air conditioning. Take note that Ben Franklin never had any of those things, and he seems to have had quite a good time living. There was a time I couldn't imagine never again feeling the joy of piloting a high powered motorcycle along a twisting strip of pavement. My last race was at Daytona in 1983. After that I could no longer justify the use of resources for so small a return. It was not my right to use those resources just because I could pay the asking price for them. The market had failed. They were underpriced. Every year since then has proved my assessment more correct. I don't burn much gas any more, just about a liter a day for the little generator and the little outboard motor. I'm looking for ways to reduce that. I'm using a lot less physical resources, but trust me, life is still very good. Don't give up just because you have to change.
So much for applied ancient history. Now for the news. We got back from the outer atolls vowing to alter our lifestyles enough that we could take a day every week or two and sail the 4 miles out to Enemanet. Away from town, and the pollution and noise, we could pick up a mooring and swim and laze and regenerate our souls. Well, not from Thanksgiving to New Years Eve.
The boats have been pouring into the Marshalls from the South Pacific cruising grounds and from Hawaii, looking for a safe layover from the southern cyclone season. I've been prodded into running a twice daily SSB radio schedule, keeping up with boats on the way, and boats visiting the outer atolls of Tuvalu, Kiribati and the Marshalls. It's work, and restricts scheduling for other things some, but everyone, including myself, wants to help the whole community with better communications. It adds to our comfort in the yachting community, and increasingly it makes it easier for us to help the populations of those remote atolls. Yacht club programs we've recently put in place include supplying outrigger canoe builders with rope and sail material, and supplying outer atoll villagers with fishing line and hooks. It's a work in progress finding the most effective ways to distribute the gifts equitably, but it's working pretty well so far. Major positives, besides simple philanthropy, are the very warm welcome visiting yachts receive at most atolls now, easier access for us to learn the skills the atoll dwellers have, and even the occasional waiver of local government visiting fees. Island visiting fees were introduced about a decade ago, when some yachts passed through showing no respect for either the customs or personal property of the local population, leaving a pretty low opinion of western boats among the chiefs. We'd like to turn that around, at least to portray reality. I DON'T want to discourage the villagers from assessing each visitor on their own merits. As a group, we're just like the human race as a whole; some of us aren't worth the bullet it would take to shoot us. Most of us are pretty good company.
It's kind of remarkable that Karen and I have come to be so involved in yacht club activities and the community. The name of our boat, "Sequester" means a place apart from other people, a place to meditate alone. (As a verb, think of a sequestered jury, removed from the influence of the general populace.) Maybe we did enough of that in the early times at sea to learn the value of balancing that with group effort.
In any case, Karen has always seen herself as an organizer, very goal oriented (like her mother!), and she's just about overbooked herself between being the Mieco Beach Yacht Club membership director, working with the club board on funding and staffing the new programs, and working for a living in her "spare" time. There's nobody in Majuro doing business as a canvas worker, sewing upholstry and awnings. Karen and two of the other yachties have and use heavy duty sewing machines, and they get pressed into service to do work not only for the yachties, but for the local businesses as well. Karen's been making cushions for one of the excursion boats, a sun shade cover for another, and together we're refurbishing all the balcony chairs for the main hotel here. No shortage of work to do. Sometimes we get a little riled at the low wages, until we consider that we're making 4 to 5 times what an average Marshallese worker gets. We heard recently how the Marshallese pay scale works.
They have a minimum wage here of $2.50 an hour, but apprentices can be paid half that. The interesting thing is that the way a worker gets to move from apprentice to qualified worker is on the approval of the employer. There are hundreds of people who in a dozen years have never gotten good enough at their job to make that step, yet the employer is so soft hearted as to allow them to stay on as apprentices. They weld, do machine work, run heavy equipment, type, file, clean, and take home $45 a week after taxes. Unemployment is about 30%, so it's pretty damn nice of PII to let them stay on, isn't it? Before I close this rambling missive, I do want to describe Karen's latest time devouring project. The yacht club commodore has arranged for a Hawaiian veterinarian to fly in for the week of Christmas to do health checks, owner education, and pet neutering. The only vets here now are the Taiwanese animal husbandry guys who advise on raising pigs. Karen and Chris (from S/V Windswept, you may recall the story about the mast!) have scheduled a dozen helpers a day for 4 days to catch, transport, and tend animals while they are anesthetized, undergo surgery, and are recovered and returned home. We're also cooking enough vegetarian meals daily to feed the vet, her family, and the work crew. The action starts tomorrow, and we'll be up to our armpits in cats, dogs and soyburgers until after Christmas. Wish us luck, and have a great holiday. Ted
This morning I put up a tent on the side deck of Sequester. This was done in an effort to continue providing electricity on board in the face of today’s challenge. Since we returned to Majuro I have refurbished the wind generator, and it works great......when there is wind. The solar panels are more than adequate for our needs.....when there is sunlight. But once more the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone is confounding our renewable energy systems. For the last few days it's been light wind and heavy cloud, and now, when I need to boost the charging with the little gasoline generator, it's steadily raining. Cheap little generators don't much like rain, so I made a tent for it, and it seems happy out there puttering along, feeding the computer and the batteries.
I haven't sent an update email out since we got back here, and sent our voting ballots back to Florida. I'm quite sure you all know how relieved and pleased we are with the results of that election. There's a gigantic challenge before us now, but at least there's someone in line to seriously address it rather than issue bumper sticker slogans and threats. Let's all pay attention, and help wherever we can. And on that subject; I just got an email from a friend who was one of our favorite Worldteach volunteers last year. We think very much alike about the state of the world, and he asked for my response to some of his friends since he returned to the States. He's been told he's now their most depressing friend. That's what you get for describing reality, I said. Review how it went for Nicolas Copernicus. But you don't have to be depressed by it. You can take it as a challenge rather than a death sentence. I was tempted to expand on that with a motorcycle racing analogy, because that was my sport, and how I defined myself, while I was learning how to use my mind. I didn't write it then, but now it's raining and I don't have anything to do but think and type, so I'll tell a story. If you hate technical sports allegories, skip on down the page!
In 1976 I had a few years of racing experience behind me, and I had trained myself to react both analytically and emotionally to a crisis. Having found virtually every possible way to fall off, I was finally pretty good at keeping the rubber side down, as the jargon of the track expressed it. The incident I'm thinking of happened in the second lap of a national roadrace at Road Atlanta. I was leading, and pushing things a bit to open some distance between myself and the pack, and at the apex of turn 3 I fed it a little too much power a little too soon. Dave Stanton later described what he saw. Dave was probably a better rider than I was, with lots of experience, so I take him at his word. He said he NEVER saw anyone get a bike that far out of shape and stay on it. He figures at one point the rear wheel was in front. From the time I lost all traction until I made the turn exit, on line at full throttle, the elapsed time was about a half a second. In that half second, bookmakers wouldn't have bet very high on my success. But I was trained to react, and to assess, in exactly that circumstance. If you shut down the power at such a time, the rear tire gains traction instantly, and stops moving sideways. But the rest of the bike has momentum, and keeps going that way. It turns into a 100 horsepower catapult, and the rider is left wondering how high he (or she) is going to get before gravity wins over momentum. Return to Earth really hurts. So, shutting the throttle is not the best option. On the other hand, opening the throttle is how this got started, and left alone, the spinning rear wheel will pass the designated front wheel, gyroscopic stability will get all confused, and you're going to fall down. In turn 3 at Atlanta, that would be at about 80 miles per hour, it's going to hurt, it's going to break your bike, and you're not going to win the race. So you can't really just leave it opened up. Moderation is called for, and adjustment to changing conditions. As I backed off the power a bit, the front wheel could outrun the back again. As the bike assumed proper orientation, I needed to power up again to use CONTROLLED wheelspin to steer out of the turn, and to keep from being run over by a hard charging (and probably slightly disconcerted) second place rider. It all came together perfectly. No road rash for me, no broken bike, Just a big adrenalin rush and on to the next turn.
Now, how does this apply to a crashing economy, failing energy supply, and climate change? First, we, the people of the planet, have a gargantuan trove of knowledge at our command, having recorded the failure of quite a few economic models, having transited several varieties of energy source, and having faced continuous, (if considerably slower) environmental change since our species first began to alter where we live. There is a very good chance that we have the ability to ride this out. But here comes the second part, and the major point of the tale. I wasn't about to stop actively riding the bike until I couldn't reach it any more. And until we as a species fall down and can't get up again, we need to be actively looking for a level of moderation that will allow us to exist at an acceptable quality of life. That may involve giving up the 300 horsepower car, the heated pool, maybe even the air conditioning. Take note that Ben Franklin never had any of those things, and he seems to have had quite a good time living. There was a time I couldn't imagine never again feeling the joy of piloting a high powered motorcycle along a twisting strip of pavement. My last race was at Daytona in 1983. After that I could no longer justify the use of resources for so small a return. It was not my right to use those resources just because I could pay the asking price for them. The market had failed. They were underpriced. Every year since then has proved my assessment more correct. I don't burn much gas any more, just about a liter a day for the little generator and the little outboard motor. I'm looking for ways to reduce that. I'm using a lot less physical resources, but trust me, life is still very good. Don't give up just because you have to change.
So much for applied ancient history. Now for the news. We got back from the outer atolls vowing to alter our lifestyles enough that we could take a day every week or two and sail the 4 miles out to Enemanet. Away from town, and the pollution and noise, we could pick up a mooring and swim and laze and regenerate our souls. Well, not from Thanksgiving to New Years Eve.
The boats have been pouring into the Marshalls from the South Pacific cruising grounds and from Hawaii, looking for a safe layover from the southern cyclone season. I've been prodded into running a twice daily SSB radio schedule, keeping up with boats on the way, and boats visiting the outer atolls of Tuvalu, Kiribati and the Marshalls. It's work, and restricts scheduling for other things some, but everyone, including myself, wants to help the whole community with better communications. It adds to our comfort in the yachting community, and increasingly it makes it easier for us to help the populations of those remote atolls. Yacht club programs we've recently put in place include supplying outrigger canoe builders with rope and sail material, and supplying outer atoll villagers with fishing line and hooks. It's a work in progress finding the most effective ways to distribute the gifts equitably, but it's working pretty well so far. Major positives, besides simple philanthropy, are the very warm welcome visiting yachts receive at most atolls now, easier access for us to learn the skills the atoll dwellers have, and even the occasional waiver of local government visiting fees. Island visiting fees were introduced about a decade ago, when some yachts passed through showing no respect for either the customs or personal property of the local population, leaving a pretty low opinion of western boats among the chiefs. We'd like to turn that around, at least to portray reality. I DON'T want to discourage the villagers from assessing each visitor on their own merits. As a group, we're just like the human race as a whole; some of us aren't worth the bullet it would take to shoot us. Most of us are pretty good company.
It's kind of remarkable that Karen and I have come to be so involved in yacht club activities and the community. The name of our boat, "Sequester" means a place apart from other people, a place to meditate alone. (As a verb, think of a sequestered jury, removed from the influence of the general populace.) Maybe we did enough of that in the early times at sea to learn the value of balancing that with group effort.
In any case, Karen has always seen herself as an organizer, very goal oriented (like her mother!), and she's just about overbooked herself between being the Mieco Beach Yacht Club membership director, working with the club board on funding and staffing the new programs, and working for a living in her "spare" time. There's nobody in Majuro doing business as a canvas worker, sewing upholstry and awnings. Karen and two of the other yachties have and use heavy duty sewing machines, and they get pressed into service to do work not only for the yachties, but for the local businesses as well. Karen's been making cushions for one of the excursion boats, a sun shade cover for another, and together we're refurbishing all the balcony chairs for the main hotel here. No shortage of work to do. Sometimes we get a little riled at the low wages, until we consider that we're making 4 to 5 times what an average Marshallese worker gets. We heard recently how the Marshallese pay scale works.
They have a minimum wage here of $2.50 an hour, but apprentices can be paid half that. The interesting thing is that the way a worker gets to move from apprentice to qualified worker is on the approval of the employer. There are hundreds of people who in a dozen years have never gotten good enough at their job to make that step, yet the employer is so soft hearted as to allow them to stay on as apprentices. They weld, do machine work, run heavy equipment, type, file, clean, and take home $45 a week after taxes. Unemployment is about 30%, so it's pretty damn nice of PII to let them stay on, isn't it? Before I close this rambling missive, I do want to describe Karen's latest time devouring project. The yacht club commodore has arranged for a Hawaiian veterinarian to fly in for the week of Christmas to do health checks, owner education, and pet neutering. The only vets here now are the Taiwanese animal husbandry guys who advise on raising pigs. Karen and Chris (from S/V Windswept, you may recall the story about the mast!) have scheduled a dozen helpers a day for 4 days to catch, transport, and tend animals while they are anesthetized, undergo surgery, and are recovered and returned home. We're also cooking enough vegetarian meals daily to feed the vet, her family, and the work crew. The action starts tomorrow, and we'll be up to our armpits in cats, dogs and soyburgers until after Christmas. Wish us luck, and have a great holiday. Ted
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