Category Archives: Writing

September/October/November

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I have already related to you the mess we had with insurance over medical problems.

We came back to Colorado, and then after getting that straightened out, we saw JoAnne’s oncologist, and dates were scheduled.

As luck, or perhaps fine tuning, would have it, we had a three week hiatus in which to make another trip across country.  We wound up traveling back from Colorado to Southport.  We stopped (as usual) to visit our friends, Mike and Cindy, as Cindy is preparing for her starring role in “A Bad Year for Tomatoes” in November.  (As of this writing, she did opening night and the second night’s play.  This Friday night and Saturday should be their final curtain.)

We stopped around Tennessee and we wound up at Southport late on the evening of our arrival.

The boat was pretty much a mess.  Books and other things not nailed down flew around during the hurricane.  A solar panel pulled loose from the top and fell to the deck, ripping wires from the connectors.  Fortunately, it wasn’t much of a mess, the books were cleaned up, the batteries checked, and we stayed with our friend at her apartment for a couple of night until I could clean the interior of the boat up.

We spend the next week doing minor repairs, and prepping the boat for the winter, dumping our water tanks and removing any remaining food stuffs to the car, to return that with us to Colorado.  Why not use it there?

I repaired and tested the solar charging system.  We had a major water gusher under the sink where our Seagull Water filter system resided, and had worked itself loose, releasing pressure when turning on the pressure water system.  We move a few things to storage, removed a few winter clothes and after about a week on the ground there, set out again for Colorado.

This time, we took a few extra days, as there was no rush.  We stopped again with Mike and Cindy and spent a full day assisting in the set build for the play at the local VFW Hall in Richmond, MO.  I helped Cindy with her lines and we had a good time hanging out with them.  The day we left, we both had colds, and were kind of miserable.

So, we stopped in Kansas for the night instead of making the long, eleven hour run from Richmond back to Colorado Springs.  We spent the night got up late, traveled and arrived back here.

Over the course of the last week, we’ve been to multiple doctor’s appointments, been in and out of two hospitals and visited most of our kids.

A couple of days ago, our fourteenth grand child was born.  His name is Lincoln Alan Dale Donaldson, and he was 5lbs & 15oz.  He’s have a few breathing issues apparently though, and is still in the hospital until they can get him breathing correctly, even perhaps giving him some  red blood cells to help as he seemed slightly anemic.  Otherwise, he seemed healthy.  His mom and dad (Lana and Patrick) are quite proud!

Baby Lincoln

 

Yesterday was the beginning of JoAnne’s chemo.  She has six sessions.  They are 21 days long (scheduling, not that many days in a row!.)

The first day is a lot of chemicals, drugs to prevent nausea. etc.  The second set in the first session, will be 7 days out from the first day, and will be a short session to give her another dose of one of the chemicals.  Then it starts over again on Day 21.  This will go on for six total sessions, or about 18 weeks, interspersed with doctor’s appointments, blood work and other tests as needed.

We are hoping this particular chemotherapy doesn’t make her lose her hair like the first one did, but we’re prepared that it will, just in case.  She has some hats and scarves, like last time.  The chemicals are somewhat different this time as well, and her doctor said that people do not lose their hair “as much” with this type.

JoAnne is a tough cookie.  She fought this last time and managed to beat it back for four full years, she never really even got ill as some do, through chemo, and she worked the whole time last time.  This time, we’re completely retired and have nothing to keep us from fighting this all the way through.  She’s going to get plenty of rest in spite of herself! ha!

JoAnne, the First Mate of the Sailing Ketch, Adventure!

 

We both want to tell you folks, those who are already out there and follow us, and those thinking about it, as well as our friends who are comfortable in their homes, snuggled up by the fireplaces, drinking their hot chocolates, or martinis by the fire:

Stop living life the easy way.  Don’t pass the opportunities that come your way.  Don’t live day-to-day and Check-to-Check.

Do NOT let life pass you by while you’re “waiting for retirement”.  Don’t sit on your butts, thinking about all the things you’re going to do “When I don’t have to work again”.  Do NOT wait for “enough money” (because you will NEVER HAVE ENOUGH MONEY!) to do the “RV Thing”, “buy a boat”, “go horse back riding”, “Mountain Climbing”, “Paragliding or skydiving”.

Just don’t wait.  Do it.  Sit down and make that list of things you want to do, and then check them off, one at a time.  Save some money, go do one, pick a date, do another.

Life isn’t lived while you’re “waiting on it to catch you”.  Life is lived when you grab that bull by the horns and wrestle his big ass down into the mud and hog tie him, then jump up and win that trophy.

The day JoAnne gets her walking papers from chemo, we’re headed back to Southport without meager belongings, and we’re going to empty out the Vee Berth, put everything we don’t need in storage (winter clothing, parts, junk pieces, extra crap that we “might need one day” and all the stuff that weigh us down, collect a couple of friends as crew and we’re setting sail for the Bahamas.  Yes, it will be near the beginning of Hurricane Season.  Yes, it might be the BEST sailing time.  Yes, it will be relatively spur of the moment, pretty much “unplanned” and absolutely not the “right season”, but you know what?  It’s well past time to do it.

We made a decision awhile back that we were going to live our lives, and do the “medical stuff” around life, not live our lives around the “medical stuff”.  I’ll keep JoAnne safe, and healthy, and make sure she sees the doctors when it’t time, but we’re not sitting on our asses waiting for a “day, date, season or proper time” any longer.

To our friends Kevin and Debi – skippers of their own ships, be prepared, we’re coming for you, we need a crew! (Don’t be surprised if you get shanghaied!!!!!!!!!

 

 

Loss of a Friend – Guy Bernardin – Circumnavigator

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“I had resolved on a voyage around the world, and as the wind on the morning of April 24, 1895 was fair, at noon I weighed anchor, set sail, and filled away from Boston, where the Spray had been moored snugly all winter. The twelve o’clock whistles were blowing just as the sloop shot ahead under full sail. A short board was made up the harbor on the port tack, then coming about she stood to seaward, with her boom well off to port, and swung past the ferries with lively heels. A photographer on the outer pier of East Boston got a picture of her as she swept by, her flag at the peak throwing her folds clear. A thrilling pulse beat high in me. My step was light on deck in the crisp air. I felt there could be no turning back, and that I was engaging in an adventure the meaning of which I thoroughly understood.” – Joshua Slocum, Sailing Alone Around the World, 1900.

EDIT 21 March 2018: I have received numerous questions regarding Guy’s boat.  A boat was spotted off the coast of Honduras recently, and many believe it to be Guy’s boat.  I’m inserting the only image I apparently took of the boat, zoomed in on the aft end of the vessel.  The boat is a 40+ foot racing sloop, known to have a 7′ fin keel, and around a 60 foot mast.  The image does NOT show the new wind generator that I assisted him in installing a day or so before his departure.

To be CLEAR, his boat was found off the coast of Cape Cod, about 400-700 nm out from the area, in either September or October of 2017.  The date it was discovered is unclear.  The boat was intact and no one was aboard.  Given that he disappeared somewhere off North Carolina right after departure (in July) I venture to guess this is about right giving being set up north bound currents.

There is NO WAY the boat found in the Gulf of Mexico would have been Guy’s “Crazyhorse”.  The Gulf Stream doesn’t take boats to the south off the US Coast line, and no way it could have found it’s way into the Gulf of Mexico.  The image I saw of that upside down boat had two small keels.  Not a fin keel.  (End of Edit)

Above image of Crazy Horse, and the stylized “Horse Head” on the back of the boat.  I apologize for the quality of the image but I was taking pictures of a departing boat and only caught the back of his boat and slightly out of focus.  – RD

On the 16th of September I took a leave of absence from my marina job for six months – until April anyway.  Maybe a bit longer.  We did a quick (month long) road trip and returned last evening from the road to Colorado and back.

Our whole purpose for being on this boat is to go places.  Our boat has sat here for most of a year, December 2016 until now.  We had some bad experiences with the water, waves, wind and weather and took a break, but it’s time to go again.  For awhile I was of a mind to sell the boat and get back on land.  I don’t like JoAnne getting sick, and having experienced sea sickness myself, I don’t want her to be ill ever again.  However, we aren’t giving up quite so easily.

But, we need to move, we need to go, we need to see things.  Life is short and if we sit here, we waste our chance to see other parts of the world.

Nothing has driven that idea home more accurately than the sad news I received a few days ago.

A few months ago an older man came to the Marina here at South Harbour Village.  His name was Guy (pronouced as Ghee) Bernardin.  He was in his 70s.  He was aboard an older boat by the name of “Crazy Horse”, a racing sloop.  The boat was in need of attention, and he’d just purchased the vessel for a non-stop race around the world.

Guy and I quickly became friends.  I helped him on several occasions with lines and moving things around for him.  He had another friend named Larry Brown who came to visit and stayed with him for a few weeks while working on Crazy Horse.  Larry and I spoke often as well, while various parts were refitted on the boat.

Sometime in June I had asked if I could interview him and write an article for the local paper.  He refused at first stating that he was leaving soon for France to go back to work on his other boat, a Spray (Slocum) replica.  I found out more of his story in that conversation – that in 1998 he had completed a three year, round-the-world tour which duplicated for the most part, Joshua Slocum’s original trip.  He explained that the boat was steel, and he was going back for some refit work.

The Interview was never to take place as my wife and I had also gone home in June to do medical appointments and other things.  Guy was ready to depart save for last minute things when we returned.

When we returned, I saw Guy infrequently, but I did chat with him on and off.  I assisted him in installing his wind generator a couple of days before his departure sometime in late July (I do not recall the date, and didn’t write it down).  I know he left and came back in with either engine or steering issues, or perhaps the weather bothered him.  I never got the chance to ask, as the following morning he was gone again and I never heard from him again.

Sometime in August (about a week or so after his departure) I wondered how he was doing.  Then I heard a rumor about a radio call for help and some people were saying they thought it might have been Guy.  I did not hear the call.  I don’t know the details of the call, who made it or why. I completely discounted the idea it was Guy.  He was, after all a seasoned traveler, sailor and knew what he was doing.  I never believed anyone actually heard the call themselves and were guessing (which they likely were).

I forgot all about it.  Until this past week.

JoAnne and I had to go back to Colorado for a few days.  A message came in from Norm at the South Harbour Village Marina while we were traveling with friends, asking if I had heard the news about a friend who had been in the Marina for awhile this past summer.  I received the sad news that he was missing and his boat had been found.

A few minutes later I had an article mentioning him and learned that his fate was not what I would have expected.

I was shocked, and to this day I am still in shock I believe. I’d written off the original rumor of the radio call because I felt it couldn’t have been Guy, it couldn’t have happened to a world cruiser, racer and a man who was very good at what he did.

Guy Bernardin went missing sometime in August we believe, somewhere off the coast of North Carolina, close to us. His life raft was aboard, the boat intact as far as I can tell from the article.  I have little information on what might have happened to him but have first hand experience on his boat.

“Crazy Horse” was a typical racing sloop, designed in a minimalist fashion, but there were narrow decks, running rigging all over the place to the cockpit, a scooped stern, easy to have fallen from there, life lines were short to the deck (no more than a foot probably) and little to grab onto.  Guy told me he had not had time to install jack lines when I questioned him the last time I spoke to him.

Guy Bernardin

We were raising the wind generator mast and he was putting in bolts and connecting the final wires.  I asked him about the jack lines, and he said that it was something he had not bought and probably wouldn’t require them for this part of the trip.  I didn’t question his wisdom on this for I knew he was experienced.  The image below was taken just a couple of days prior to installation of the wind generator.  I was shooting images of boats going through the fairway and happened to catch the stern of Crazy Horse in this one.

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Crazy Horse on RIGHT of Image above

It is now very apparent that Guy, while experienced in around the world cruising, a six-times around the Horn man, and a seasoned racer made a mistake that anyone could make.  He didn’t think anything bad would happen.

According to the article (Written in French), the boat was recovered with no one aboard.

For those who know the story of Joshua Slocum (and I hope all Sailors know it, if not, read it) Slocum traveled solo around the world, with an old wreck of a boat he rebuilt from the keel up.  A completely “new” boat from the old boat rose of the “ashes” (ok, sand actually) and he proceeded to travel the world, visiting exotic locations and becoming a very famous man in the late 1890s.

Bernardin sailed a steel boat called Spray around the world, following the footsteps of Slocum over a three year circumnavigation.

Like Slocum, Monsieur Bernardin disappeared at sea.  Unlike Slocum, Crazy Horse was found without it’s Captain. Spray was never located.  Today we can only assume the worst for Guy.  He never finished his last voyage.  At least I tend to believe he wished to complete it with success, not in the manner it ended.

So, to sailors everywhere…. do your best.  Never skimp on safety, know your limits.  Know that any little thing can kill you out there.  I’m sure you all know this, and I’m preaching to the choir, but seriously, I’m tired of losing friends like this.

Fair Winds, Guy Bernardin, where ever you are now.

 

Sail: disappearance of the navigator Guy Bernardin off the American coast

Guy aboard the Slocum Spray Replica

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http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/2017/10/05/guy-bernardin-lost-sea/#.WdxRdryap7Y.facebook

http://www.lepoint.fr/sport/voiel-disparition-du-navigateur-guy-bernardin-au-large-des-cotes-americaines-03-10-2017-2161787_26.php#

http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/2017/03/08/fifty-year-anniversary-spiritual-journey/

https://www.amazon.com/Sailing-Around-World-Retraces-Slocums/dp/1574091484

https://books.google.com/books/about/Sailing_Around_the_World.html?id=sAA6uNUnKYMC&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

The other blog

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As some of you know, I have a second blog I started in conjunction with a group I run on Facebook.

It’s called “Sailing and Cruising: Preppers”.

Rather than reiterate or copy what I wrote over there, here’s the link to the latest entry today:

https://sailingcruisingpreppers.wordpress.com/2017/09/13/hurricane-irmajose/

I would urge folks to go read it.  Agree or disagree with my opinion, it’s important to me that people learn from history, they learn from mistakes, and they learn skills before they need them.

I wrote a book called “Basic Survival and Communication in the Aftermath”.  The “Aftermath” is that thing that exists when it’s all over.  Disaster, zombie apocolypse, hurricane, asteroid strike.  You name it.  Any sort of thing that befalls some portion or all of the human race, putting them into survival mode.

Maybe people pooh pooh such things as science fiction.  The truth is that disasters DO happen. We know for instance dinosaurs once walked this planet.  Giants who ate one another, and whole trees in one sitting existed.  We have found their bones.  We have found their skulls.  We know they were….

We also believe they were eventually killed off in a rapid extinction, perhaps by as asteroid hitting the planet.  That is, of course, the belief of science today, and while not 100% certain, it definitely has a good following, even from me.

The point though, is that these mega critters had all they could eat, and lived the “good life” as critters go.  And suddenly over a few decades, simply ceased to exist.  Human beings aren’t very large.  We’re not very powerful.  We’re not all that tough as creatures go.  We do have civilization, technology, good (and bad) eating habits.  We live in a world of other humans.  We mostly get along.  We mostly don’t kill each other for lunch (though there are a few times it’s happened).

But we, like the dinosaurs, populate this planet in abundance and dependence on the planet’s resources.  The two recent hurricanes prove that we’re stronger than we look and resilient, yet, dangerously dumb at times.

Many of my prepper friends ask me about my book, mentioned above.  They ask why it’s not in a paper format, because, you know Rick, when the EMP comes Kindles and digital media will be no more!

Here is why.  It kills trees to make a book.  Books wind up in garbage cans or burned as a fire starter when the end comes.  It isn’t the BOOK that is important, it’s the KNOWLEDGE inside said book.

Reading and knowing information is all we as a race have.  Understanding things.  Knowing HOW to do things in both a technological manner and a primitive manner are what keep us alive.

That you can take a computer, get the weather from it and know where the hurricane is, where it’s headed (with in a reasonable guess anyway) and know which way to go to get out of the way is one thing.  Gazing at the sky and seeing after noon clouds building and knowing a thunderstorm is in the making is more important in the hear and now, than the hurricane five days out though.

Knowing how to pick up a few things in the woods, and start a fire that night to keep you warm, in the shelter you made with your own hands – it’s THOSE things you should know.  Sure, you might have a cell phone to call for rescue.  Sure, you MIGHT be able to get a chopper to come pick you up from the mountain with one.  If they battery isn’t dead, if you’re in cell service range, if the phone isn’t wet, and and and…. etc.

The fact is, sometimes, one must stop, drop and roll to put out a fire on their body, or duck and cover from a nuke attack.  Sure, those things are few and far between, but it could happen.

So can hurricanes.  Category V hurricanes.  And denuded Islands happen.  And flooded land in Texas could happen.  Earthquakes in California could happen.  Typhoons in the Pacific can happen.  And knowledge is forever in your head when your book blows away in the rain.

Final thoughts here, do yourselves a favor.  Do not be normal.  Don’t follow the masses.  Don’t believe everything you see on TV, hear on the radio or read on the Internet.  Believe instead, in yourselves.  Believe you can be better than you are, that you can do things no one else can do.  Because, friends, you can.

Read.  Learn.  Understand.  And then Teach.

Milestones

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I hesitated to post this today, but… exactly two years ago today I had a heart attack.  The following Monday (19 May 2015), I would be in cardiac surgery for open heart, aortic valve replacement “procedure”.  (Edited – I thought today was the day I had the surgery.  My wife reminded me it was Wednesday the 13th the attack occurred.  Oh well, so much for memory, right?)
I also hesitate to use the word “procedure”, but that was their term for it. It was a mind numbing, very humbling experience to have your chest cracked/sawed open in surgery and for people to be touching your inner workings, in particular your heart.  I honestly didn’t believe I was coming out of surgery alive at that point.  I’d said good bye to everyone I could, just in case.
JoAnne and I had previously set a date to leave Colorado and move aboard Adventure on 1 June 2015. On 11 May 2015 I had turned in my resignation.  On 13 May I was driving home and experienced a heart attack. Not a classic heart attack, but a sickening feeling, nausea, cold sweats and heart “palpitations”, along with trouble breathing. I pulled the truck over, knowing something was wrong (but what, I was not sure) and called JoAnne thinking I might never see her again. I knew it was my heart, but there was nothing “classic” about what happened, and nothing I could do sitting in the truck on Highway 94 outside of Colorado Springs, 40 minutes from home and ten minutes back to work (and worse, going through security to get back in.  Then, there was the issue with calling an ambulance and eventually getting my truck home…. but I digress).
The aortic valve was calcified, and deformed from birth (I knew that part and had for a couple of years, and also knew I had a “heart murmur” all my life). I also knew that some “day” I’d have to have that “procedure” but didn’t expect it for 5-10 years.
I think the stress of selling the house, quitting my job to “retire” and getting rid of all our “stuff” probably brought on the attack.  I was, after all moved out of the house and we’d already gotten a good price, signed on the dotted line, and had gotten rid of 90% of our “stuff”, bought the boat, and we were moving aboard soon.  It was a very stressful time for all of us.  The kids too, because we’d moved in with my daughter and son-in-law and their three children, into their tiny (at the time) house.
I was terrified of the surgery and honestly, it wasn’t as bad as I thought, but you can never say something like that is routine.  Many people die on that operating table for various reasons from the anesthesia to not being able to restart the heart.
But, here I am today.  Alive, and well, and very likely in better shape today than I was before the heart attack (and don’t get me wrong, I’ve never been in ‘bad shape’, never been overweight, I’ve always exercised and even exercised the day I had my heart attack).
I went on to recover in pretty much record time.  Six weeks after I left the hospital I went back in for a check up and they released me to go back to work (with a few restrictions on lifting of course) and I stopped to visit the nurses who had cared for me so well at Penrose Hospital in Colorado Springs.  One nurse hugged me and cried… she told me that it was extremely rare to see a patient return looking so well in so short a time, and most of them never saw the same patients again ever, or if they did, it was due to them returning to the hospital in even worse condition.
JoAnne and I went on to move on to the boat in July 2015.  Slightly over a full month from our originally scheduled time.  Since then, we’ve had a lot of adventures on Adventure.
Today, I racked our first batch of beer made on the boat.  It won’t be the last, and we’re starting a second batch in a couple of days. (We have an ulterior motive though, we’re entering a home brew contest through Check Six  (https://www.facebook.com/CheckSixBrewingCompany/) located in Southport, NC.  I highly recommend a stop there if you like beer.
We won’t stop living our lives because of medical issues.  We’ve been slowed slightly, but getting back up to speed has been fun.
JoAnne went through her own bad experiences with cancer prior to my heart attack.  It wasn’t a cake walk either, but she’s doing fine.
I suppose, in the end of it all, life is how you lived, and are remembered.  It’s not always about how you die.
I believe that people who want to do something with their dreams need to stop right now, evaluate just how much you want that dream to become a reality.  Think it over carefully.  Judge how difficult it would be to start that dream, or the realization of that dream and then write down a plan to make it happen.
It is very, very important you write it down.  Then read it every few days.  I’m serious.  If you have a written plan to follow, you will soon discover you can break it down into smaller, achievable chunks.  If you want to set sail into the sunset, go around the world, or visit the Bahamas, or fly to Europe on a vacation, then by golly, do it.  Don’t wait for “retirement” to happen.  Because, retirement my friends NEVER HAPPENS.  It will never come for some people, they won’t make it there.  Others will be infirm medically by the time they “arrive” at retirement.
Tomorrow is NOT the day to start. Tomorrow never comes.
Right now, this minute is the time.  Write your plan for your dreams.  One year, five years, ten years – and plot your course for how you will arrive at your dream.
Make the dreams happen.  Don’t wait for them to come to you.

Working for a Living

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I wrote a post a couple of weeks ago about life being a Journey, not a Destination.

Hope you read it.  Because it certainly is true.

I started a job here at the marina a few days ago.  Had about 8-9 work days so far, part time.  I clean the docks, check boats, power towers, take out trash, open the “store”, close the store and a few other things, like handy-man things.  I’ve repaired the golf cart ramp a couple of times, moved oyster shells, rocks, bricks, old wood, dirt, cleaned bathrooms and collected cans for some local charity.

It’s actually… FUN!

The best part?  Cleaning bird poop off the docks.

Yep, no kidding.  I get to be outside, walk around, walk past all the boats, check lines, discover problems, fix things… but the bird poop is the BEST!

It rots wood, and looks like… ummm…. crap. LOL  It’s a crappy job, but someone has to do it!

Seriously, it’s nice being outside, and not staying inside the boat all the time.  I get to meet new people all the time as well.

We are going to stay here for a few months, head down to the Bahamas and then come back after a few months.

So, I’ll invite our cruiser friends to South Harbour Village Marina to stop in and say “Howdy” over this season.  We’re looking forward to the transients like us, passing through, headed north.  A few are still headed south at this point, but some are already passing through on the way north.

I’ll see you on the docks!!!!

Fair Winds!

Hurricanes and Boats

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Simply put, hurricanes and boats don’t mix well.

Matthew is proving to be a pain in the ass for a lot of folks right now.  People in Haiti, soon Cuba and then the Bahamas.  After that, according to the models (which I want so desperately to disbelieve) Florida, and most of the East coast of the United States will be in for a bit of roughhousing as well.

Latest Tracks for Matthew

I’m far enough north that it should break up and just be a tropical storm by the time it gets to us, especially if it hangs over land for any length of time.

But for whatever reason (I can’t see the reasons) the models have pushed over to the west and it’s promising to be a beast.  I see a front coming through, and pushing out, and now there’s a dry, low pressure system in the middle of the US which may reach the coast about the same time, and that might be pulling the hurricane in somewhat.

On the other hand, there’s a mess of rain and another front west of that high.  It usually takes 3-4 days to cross the states with weather systems.  Hmmm.  MAYBE it will get to the coast in time to push some more.  I don’t know.  I’m not a forecaster, just a storm chaser that looks at the data and predicts local mesoscale conditions.  Hurricanes are big, bad, Red-Spot-on-Jupiter things to me and are as distant as that planet is from Earth for me.

I’ve been in two.  One hit DC a long time ago and water levels came up 8 feet up the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers.  The second was in Jamaica in the 2ooo, when it missed us by about 90 miles on the north coast of Jamaica. But… it RAINED like the ocean was pouring over us.  I’ve never seen so much rain for so long in my life.

The plan today is pretty simple.  Down comes the headsail and sheets.  I’ll remove everything off the deck and bring it below today and tomorrow.  And we will bring our tarps (we use as tents topside) below to cover things down here inside the boat.  JoAnne will pack and we will be ready to bug out sometime on Saturday morning most likely, because the predictions are showing it coming up this way Saturday night and Sunday morning.

The last of the preps will involve moving the boat out, adding lines and hoping for the best.  We’re not going to stay aboard the boat if the hurricane approaches us.  We’ll head inland and stay out of the path as much as we can.  I’m planning to take most of our clothes, our foulies, food, water, electronics, important papers, car and our mortal bodies away from here.  We went through a Nor’easter in the Bay… and that was not good, with the shallow Bay, short chop, poor JoAnne getting sick.  Staying in a Marina is not going to be much better.  And there’s little here to keep us safe, and in fact, it might be pretty unsafe to remain here.

I maybe take one of the ham rigs too, just in case.  We have terrible luck with the phones, so a ham radio might come in handy.

So, all my hoping and my “estimating” isn’t coming true.  All I can say is that the hurricane tarried a bit too long in the Southern Caribbean Sea and the weather that would have push him off is long gone now….

This sort of thing is, by the way, why I have been a “prepper” most of my life and even wrote a book about it.  I sure hope it all works right this time. 🙂

I guess that’s it for now.

If y’all believe in prayers… better get busy.  The entire coast of the US, Bahamas, Haiti and other poor people in between are all in danger’s path.

Back!

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First, I want to apologize to every one who has asked about blog entries.  We have NOT been on the boat for almost a month.

We left last month on the 12th to travel across county.  I’m sure some of you get the “security” idea.  JoAnne and I have always been “security conscious” but more so now that we live on a boat.  Having both worked in the government, and me in particular in the military, and with security for the Missile Defense Agency for many years, we tend to look over our shoulders a lot.  So, we try hard not to advertise EXACTLY where we are, where we’re headed, where we’re anchored, but we still do it to some extent.

Half the fun of doing this is changing locations and seeing new things and sharing that information with others.  Both the good and bad of it….whether it’s a bad or good experience in a marina, getting our boat damaged by someone else or rain (constant rain sometimes), we’ll share.  We won’t share the dates and times we’re leaving exactly, or exactly where we are located except with family members so they know to look for us if we “vanish”.

With that said, again, sorry for no entries lately.  I’ll make up for that though now.

We left for Colorado on the 12th headed back for doctors’ checkups.  I had a physical.  JoAnne had a “two years after chemo” checkup.

We arrived and stayed with my daughter, Kristy…. but on the way we stopped to rescue a grandson who had been abandoned by his mother, our ex-daughter-in-law and return him back to the family in Colorado.  He is safe with his Uncle Nick and his Dad is working to get a job and support the young man now.  Gage was doing well when we left him.  Hopefully someone remembers to feed and water him occasionally (he’s 16, I think he can help himself a lot now :))

On the 20th I went in and had a blood draw, and a physical.  Apparently, I’m not going to die any time soon.  My heart is doing fine, though I now have an anomaly due to the heart surgery called a Left Bundle Branch… what ever that is.  It looks weird on the ekg.

JoAnne went in for a blood draw as well, the CA-125, which is an indicator of tumor growth.  Her numbers have been low since the surgery, in the 10-16 range.  We never got a pre-surgery baseline, so no idea what it might have been before the tumor was removed.  The numbers peaked at 18.  The PA said we could do another test in a month to see if it were a glitch or a CT scan.  We instantly asked for the CT scan.  Her examination was fine.  Nothing out of the ordinary.  It was just that darned blood test that scared us.

A couple of days later she had the CT scan, and then we had to go back on Thursday to see the doctor.  We ended up sitting for over 2 HOURS waiting for him, because he was running behind.  They placed us in the conference room for an hour and a half and we were nervous by the time he walked in.  He was flanked by a nurse and the “social worker” or psychologist or whatever she was.  We BOTH almost lost it right there.  We KNEW it was going to be bad news.

But he asked JoAnne how she was.  She said she was fine.  He said “Your exam was fine, and the CT scan came back clear.  There is no sign of cancer”.  I wanted to throttle him for making us wait for 2.5 hours for that.  He could have kicked us out of the office in 2 minutes and simply said “You’re fine, no sign of cancer, go sailing”…. ack.

We had already packed so we headed home, collected our bags and packed the car.  We’d mostly said good bye to everyone but got a few more in and got on the road.

Stopped in Hays, Ks.  Then we traveled on Friday to Mike and Cindy’s home in Richmond, MO and visited over the weekend.  On Monday we went to Branson.

In Branson we saw the “Legends” show on Tuesday, and on Wednesday we went on the Branson Belle Showboat and saw a cool show on the river cruise.  The ship was HUGE…. and probably could have held Adventure inside the auditorium!  They probably had almost 1000 people in attendance and not all the seats were filled.  Both shows were very good.

We made it back here on Saturday afternoon.  Adventure was fine, our new solar charging system is working wonderfully and there was nothing out of place.  Unfortunately, JoAnne’s lavender plant didn’t do too well in the care of the marina office.  I’m trying to nurse it back to health now.  Not sure I can do it though.

So in the middle of retirement, we took a month vacation.

I did laundry yesterday, today we go grocery shopping so we can actually use our refrigeration unit haha, and I’ve got a bunch of stuff to put away.

We added one item to the inventory, a manual water maker, which is a reverse osmosis filtration system.  It is a hand pumped device.  I have yet to read all the instructions, but it will go with our ditch bag.  Hopefully we will never have a need to use it.

On the 12th I go in to see an eye surgeon.  My left eye is getting bad with cataracts.  I’m going to have to have surgery soon.  I hope it very soon so we can plan our trip to the Bahamas next.

All my best to everyone.
Fair Winds!

s/v Adventure Post-Winter Status

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Rained lot last night, lightning and thunder for a few hours on and off. Washed the boat off. Was covered in dust out on the deck, but that’s all gone now. Now, when I have time (I don’t know when that will be, lol) I’ll have to get out and wash the topsides down, and put on some wax. Boat needs it badly.
 
Some of our lines were out over the winter time and faded some. I don’t think any of them are too worse for the wear.
 
Bow platform needs some varnish. I only had time to get two coats on it before we had to rapidly depart, most of it is worn off already. I’ll do a light sanding and recover that soon. I did bring my sander with me this time so I can use it to do the rails around the boat and get them sanded quickly and efficiently instead of working a foot at a time and killing my shoulders.
This morning we had drip coffee from our new coffee maker.  The only thing wrong is that it’s only an eight cup pot. Making it like I usually do, with three little scoops of coffee makes it too strong.  So, I’ll try tomorrow with 2 scoops and see how it comes out.  I wish the pot were bigger but that was what we found.  I wanted a stainless steel pot instead of glass, as I broke the last glass one in the sink before we ran off to Colorado.  This one should last longer.
After doing a quick trip around the deck in the rain this morning, everything looks good.  There’s some chaff on the stern line, and the dock master added a second line for me after the big storms moved through here a few weeks ago.  We also had a fender blow up in the strong winds, but we had some aboard so he also added one.  I’ll need to go get replacements now.  And perhaps some fender covers or something.  I saw where someone bought golf shirts to cover his on facebook.  The shirts were much cheaper than the fender covers, and it’s time to start being more frugal.  We still have one more trip across country coming up in July.
Today I’ll open the battery compartment and run checks on the electrolyte (I did voltage checks yesterday and the batteries were charged properly so I assume the electrolyte is doing ok, but I want to double check it).  The boat has been on trickle all winter and the checks I did last were six months ago.  That reminds me, time flies when you’re having fun.
When we leave Colorado it seems like we’ve been gone forever when we go back.  But when we’re on the boat time goes so quickly.  It’s been a year on the 13th of May since my heart attack.  That seems eons ago, but traveling to the boat last July seems like a few weeks ago and not months.  Staying in Colorado from December through April – four months – seemed forever because we couldn’t DO anything.  The boat was too far, and we have a car, but we didn’t get to do a lot.  We traveled a  couple of times, but not enough to make it seem like we were seeing anything new.
The trip across country took us about three weeks, stopping to visit friends and family.  But, again it seemed too short.  Now we have a lot of boat chores to do to prepare for moving, BUT, at this point, I’m going to take my time doing it.
We have to drive up to see the marina tomorrow.  We’re going to see it to verify it’s where we want to be for the summer.  Once we do that, then I’ll work on the logistics of getting our boat there, and our car there.  We want both available for the summer.  Then we have to work our storage for the car while we’re gone to the Bahamas.
I guess the Bahamas is where we’re strongly leaning to going for this fall and winter season.  JoAnne might have different ideas too, but we’ve both looked at Florida and Bahamas.
We decided to “take the day off” today because we did travel three weeks without much of a break, driving for 5-9 hours each day, stopping and visiting and going places eventually tires you out. haha  However, even taking the day “off” we’ll likely run up and do laundry today, and I’ve got some stuff to move and re-arrange in the forward compartment.  JoAnne wants to work on the aft head and empty the cabinets, go through our stuff there and throw out unused things and make space for towels and other stuff there. Mostly, I am trying to get some blog posts in because they help me remember things I’ve forgotten.
Speaking of forgotten….what was I going to say? Oh, yeah, my heart issues…. Led to certain medications.  One of the meds I take is a statin, it is called Atorvastatin.  It is also known as Lipitor.  Some of you know it’s used to block production of cholesterol.  I’ve got to take it because during the surgery last year they removed parts of my heart, the aortic valve (which was deformed) and replaced it with a tissue valve (apparently from a pig, because I crave bacon now, lol).
Taking the drug is supposed to prevent me from plaque build up in my heart, arteries and so forth but it has a side effect of making me forget things short term.  My short term memory is messed up.  Before we left the boat I had stopped taking it because I ran out and they wanted $900 bucks for the prescription which I refused to pay at the time without insurance.  We have insurance now, but it still costs me 20+ bucks for the one (and 20 for another and more for the blood pressure meds).
So… I go back for a physical in July and I’m going to chat with my doc about trying something other than this drug.  My cholesterol has NEVER been high, ever.  So I want to get something that will do it more “naturally”, like certain vitamins.
Back to the boat.  This marina did take care of our boat for the most part.  I don’t see any other damage from other boats, they made sure our oars stayed attached to the dinghy in the wind storm, and all the other things I mentioned, plus checked battery levels several times for me.
The boat probably needs a pressure wash, but I’ll hold that until next marina.  That reminds me, I need to call them and chat and let them know we’re coming up tomorrow to check the place out and get a tour.  I already have a slip assigned there, but I want to look at the channel in person and the turns I have to make coming in.  It looks tight on the charts and on the satellite view.   And getting into the slip might be a problem, but the water is about 12′ deep there so I fell good about that.  Also, floating docks.  We will never again stay at a fixed dock and in the Bahamas I’ll just plan to anchor out most of the time.  They have pretty high tides there (last time we were there, we had to climb ladders to get in and out of the boat we stayed on).
I want to say HI to some of the people who have asked for me to write more. I’ve gotten comments and/or emails saying “write more”.  The best one was from someone at my former work who said she enjoyed following us without having to do all the work herself. haha.  So, Susan, this post is for you! haha (Now, just imagine all the stuff I’m NOT talking about having to do!)
JoAnne and I want to thank everyone who visited with us across the country, especially Paul and Cathy, A’lice and Larry and Mike and Cindy who put us up for a few days while we visited.  To Stephen and Judy, thanks for inviting us to the perfectly timed pot luck at your marina in St. Augustine!
Lastly, to our Daughter Kristy and her Husban, Carlos;  Thank you for everything, for putting up with us, and letting us stay with you while mom’s back healed.  She is still not at 100% and we’re not sure if her back will ever get back to normal but without you guys we’d have had to sell the boat and move back, get jobs and be mediocre people again. haha.
Onward and upward… I’ve got things to get done so time to run.  See you next entry everyone!

Good Bye Winter – Hello Spring

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Winter can’t go away quickly enough for us.

We’re ready to go back to the boat, but it’s still chilly here and back in Norfolk.  Apparently they haven’t suffered from much cold as it’s rarely gotten below freezing according the marina where the boat is waiting for us to return.

Talked to someone on Facebook yesterday and they told me they got about an inch of snow which rapidly turned to rain and all of the snow is gone.  So, that’s a good thing.

I’m going to tell you all a story here.  Over the course of the past 7-8 years JoAnne and I have gone through a lot in getting ready to move aboard a boat.  In the past few weeks people ask us about it and we tell them some of the things that have happened.  Most are aghast or in awe of what we’ve accomplished.

I don’t think either JoAnne or I consider anything we’ve done or gone through too “heroic”.  Except JoAnne.  Cancer is nothing to sneeze about.  She went through a lot in the last two years and I want to point out to folks who have normal, every day problems like ants in the kitchen, painting needed in a room, grass cutting, snow blowing or shoveling, that there are times – and people – that try the patience of saints.

In January of 2014 JoAnne wasn’t feeling well.  We were I believe staying with my daughter at the time because our house had been up for sale.  The whole market thing wasn’t working for us, or the house.  She called off of work one day and went home four times early over the course of about a two week period.  This was not only unusual for JoAnne, it was unheard of.  My wife rarely gets sick, she almost never took a day off work, and she’s a pretty strong lady all in all.

On the fourth time I walked into the house after work and made an off handed comment, “So, what time is your doctor’s appointment tomorrow?”

To my surprise and astonishment (because she hates going to doctors) she gave me a time.  I don’t remember now if it was the very next day or a day or so later, but she’d set one up.

Our family doctor, Kendra Robison, gave JoAnne an xray and told her that there was a “mass” down low.  She ordered up a C-T scan for a couple of days later.   On the 29th of January a bunch of us family members met at Rock Bottom (our normal hang out) to have a beer and celebrate my youngest son’s birthday.  That’s when Doctor Robison called JoAnne.  We both went outside to take the call.

I could tell by JoAnne’s face that things weren’t good,  After the call she had our kids who were with us at the time come out, left spouses and grandkids inside and she told us all what was up.

She had a very large tumor, about graprefruit size, maybe larger.  They believed without a doubt it was cancerous.  A few days later she underwent surgery.  A few weeks after that she started chemo.  Lost her hair.  Went through some shots to help her immune system but put her in severe pain.  We had moved back into the house so she had a place to recover – because neither of us ever doubted she’d recover.   There was crying, praying, more crying, plenty of support from our children (all adults).

In late August 2015 we learned that she was “cancer free” at that point.  Her chemo had ended and she went home and started looking at boats – because our “five year plan” never went away.  It was suspended and we both continued to work as we could.  She went to work all the way through chemo.  She worked fewer hours, and I tried to make sure she got plenty of rest.  We still visited Rock Bottom from time to time and had  a beer, but there were times when she couldn’t go to work right away because of the immunity issues.

I took off as many days from my job as I could to help her, take her to doctors appointments and be with her.

In November 2014 JoAnne found three boats that not only met our specifications, but our budget (we’d actually increased our budget by then).  The house was nearly paid off anyway and we figured we could do this.

In December 2014 I flew to New York to look at a boat called “Duna”, a Transworld Formosa 41.  Exactly the boat we both had dreams (and occasional nightmares) about.  Beautiful lines, full keeled ketch, with most things working.  The boat really needed a lot more than a few repairs, but all-in-all the boat was intact and with a little bit of work could be put in the water and sail right away.

The issues on the boat though, we considered minor compared to our goal, and JoAnne’s recent battles.

In January 2015, one year and one day from JoAnne’s diagnoses of cancer, we closed on the boat.  In March of 2015 we put the house back on the market.  The first day we had five showings.  Over the week, we had about 25 showings.  On Sunday, seven days from the day we went on the market, we closed on our house.  We sold it to a young man in his 30s, single dad with two children.

We moved back in with our daughter again and began our final transition from working, to moving to our boat and becoming cruisers.

In May we were ready to leave.  We both put in our resignations.  Mine went in on Monday the 11th of May.  JoAnne’s last day of work was supposed to be that week on Friday.

On Wednesday I was driving home and felt ill.  Long story short, I’d had a heart attack but didn’t know it.  We went to the doctor that evening, they sent us to the hospital, the hospital admitted me to the cardiac care ward and refused to let me move around or walk without someone being with me.

My aortic valve was damaged, and was malformed.  A “bicuspid” instead of a normal three leaf tricuspid valve.  I had to have a new hear valve put in.  On Monday morning the following week, I was wheeled into surgery and given anaesthesia, and surgery was performed.  I honestly thought that our whole life together was over.

JoAnne’s strength and fortitude was the only thing making me strong.  I was terrified of someone “touching my heart” – and not in good ways.  Being cut open, having your heart literally stopped and being placed on a heart-lung machine and having electrical equipment doing that work for you is very scary.  I’ve always considered myself a strong, nearly fearless person.

Not that day.  As I was to sign the release forms, I nearly chickened out.  But I knew JoAnne was counting on me and I knew I’d counted on her being there.  It was the least I could do.  I signed.  They operated and I’m writing this today.

Now – there’s plenty more to this story, but I’m not going to write it all. That’s for a book someday.

Jump forward to October 18, 2015.  We’re in our boat.  We’ve travelled from the Hudson River all the way down to Pocquoson River on the East Coast and we’re anchored out up a creek there.  The phone rings.  It’s a marina we’ve left messages for, as they were recommended to do some work.  Our backstays aren’t as they should be and it’s causing some issues with the sails.  They call me at 10Am and say “If you can get here this evening, we can look at your boat tomorrow.”

Against our better judgement and without knowing exactly what the weather was going to be, we left.  And we were caught in 19knot winds without being able to raise sails, in short chop caused by constant winds, with no place to run but south under engine power.  The rest of that story has already been written on the blog. Read it here:  (Norfolk, the Hard Way)

We didn’t “get seen” the next day.  In fact, Friday that week we were hit by a power boat.  Almost $12,000.

On the day the mast was going back up in December 2015, JoAnne fell from a fixed dock onto a boat she was trying to board after we were invited over for a drink.  She fractured two vertebrae.  We’re in Colorado as most of you know, while she heals.

She’s supposed to be out of her back brace in a few days.  One more appointment before we head back to the boat at the end of March to have her chemo port removed (we hope) and then back to Adventure.

Summer is coming.  We want to be back on the boat this spring to find a place to land for a few months of summer while we do needed repairs and refit, and then next fall, we’re off for the Bahamas – finally.

So you see folks, adversity happens.  But one must pick up their marbles, collect them all, along with their thoughts and persevere if one is to make it anywhere.  Whether you’re time to make it down the Island Chain of the Caribbean, the East Coast of the US, or you’re just trying to get through day-to-day at work until your time to go sailing comes up, you can never, EVER give up.

You can’t let life, naysayers or negativity get you down.  You have to keep plugging along.

This is the way we live life.  NOTHING is handed to you on a silver platter and if it is you’re the one who is missing out on life.  If you don’t step up, grab that brass ring on the Merry Go Round you will never, ever accomplish anything more than letting life run past you.

Life is not something you get through.  Life is something you must live to the fullest no matter what stands in your way, no matter the adversity, no matter the bumps and bruises you suffer along the way.

Grab life and give it a whirl!

 

 

The trip across country

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JoAnne and I have travelled several times across country in the last 38 years. But this time we’re doing it to get to our last, new home. The ship.

As of today, starting in Colorado Springs and ending in a place called Reynoldsburg OH, we’ve travelled 1611.3 miles. That includes some side trips to Hermann, MO, a trip to Liberty, MO and some side trips around Cincinnati, OH.

We picked up some salmon over in Liberty at the Sprouts, and brought it to the Sause family for dinner one night, a side trip to a winery in Hermann to add some bottles to our collection for the boat and we had to travel back and forth in Cincy to meet up with Ryan, go to dinner, find out hotel (a couple of different times) and so forth. So the mileage isn’t all straight travel.

Tomorrow we meet up with Bob, our friend from WAYYYYY back in the White House days and his wife for dinner.

On Monday evening we hope to be in Woodbridge, VA to meet with another friend of the family, Phil at his place.

We are hoping to leave Wednesday and likely be in Stony Point NY around Thursday or Friday (taking our time, pulling a trailer, and then finding a hotel in the area… the latter being mostly likely the most difficult thing we have to accomplish, other than paying for the boat storage, painting and maintenance).

I did create a new photo storage area… if I can remember where it is, so we’ll post some images.

We have NOT taken any photos with friends. Most of them we aren’t going to post images of. Some, like me are rather reluctant to place images up, and for the protection of my friends I won’t do that 🙂 — There’s a good reason for this, which I will not explain on this blog, but suffice it to say the lot of us have had government jobs, held positions we would rather not go into details about or don’t want to have our faces all over the Internet.

Fortunately for those of you reading the blog, I’m one of those free spirits who simply doesn’t care all that much and my “enemies” know how to find me anyway 🙂

LOL

Ok, back to the regularly scheduled blogging.

Tomorrow we get to see Bob for dinner. We have not, to the best of my recollection seen him in 25 years, and JoAnne seems to think it was when we travelled from DC in 1989 moving to Colorado. That means that every time we move to a new home, we get to see Bob I think. Perhaps he and his wife will come see us on the boat next time? We shall see 🙂

The good old Ford F150 is hanging in there with 206467 miles as of tonight. The trailer is handling the trip well. I’m not so sure about my guitar which keeps getting shoved into the truck bed under the shell. It’s pretty hot so, I’m hoping it’s doing ok. I tuned it a couple of days ago and it was off a bit, but was holding it’s notes pretty decently.

Ryan – my friend Ryan whom I had never met until a couple of days ago, is an awesome young man. (I say that because I’m turning 58 in a few days and he’s significantly younger than me), He is, like we are, beer aficionados. While JoAnne and I like to make beer, Ryan likes to buy various types of beers, taste test them, and even post some reviews of various beers.

Before we left, he basically loaded us up with several bottles of various types of beers that he recommended to us. I’m currently enjoying a Bell’s Oberon, from Comstock Michigan. It’s a wheat ale, rather fruity, a little hoppy and a little spicy. Very good stuff!

JoAnne happened to run into a six pack of Root Beer…. ok, well, not really Root Beer. It’s “Not your father’s root beer” – a hard root beer, 5.9% alcohol by volume. I am NOT a fan of Root Beer, however, I tasted it and it was… very wonderful. I can see me making a hard root beet float with it, lol.

The weather, with the exception of a few night time thunderstorms through the travelling has been pretty hot. We’ve had a couple of 100 degree F days. We did have quite a storm come through in Kansas on the way to Missouri, but nothing too bad.

Let me see, what else. Wifi has been a bit of a pain in the behind a few times. We couldn’t get it on our phones more than once and even had to reset our phones a couple of times due to lack of data connections. T-Mobile said they weren’t sure what was happening, but helped me fix things. The idea of our phones is to be able to use them as a hot spot when nothing else is available.

We can’t stay in hotels forever – and we’re hoping to be to the boat by this coming weekend if not sooner.

I’ll write more in a few days.

John Titor: Time Traveler from 2036

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Some folks know me as the Rick Donaldson from the Anomalies Network, back in the days when we had forums there.  I was the forum administrator and my friend, Olav Phillips was the site owner, archivist and all-around good guy who owned the equipment.

In late 1999 myself and some other members of the Anomalies Network frequented the Art Bell Post-to-Post forums and encountered an enigma called John Titor.  Several of us became interested in his story.  He sent information Art Bell and several of us interacted with the guy in those days, including Darby, myself, Phil F., and Pamela Moore.  With the exception of myself and Olav, I believe most folks were using aliases of some sort or another, though I have spoken to Phil, Pam and I believe Darby on the telephone myself.  We all exist.

John Titor, however, I’m not so sure about.

Eventually in late 2000 I think it was he “left”, not only taking with him his “pickup truck” and time machine, but leaving us questioning ourselves, science and whether or not he was real.

I’ve personally always been of the opinion he was a hoaxer, with some backing to set up the story.  I have questioned some of his science, and in fact, personally ripped apart a few things that came out much later from the “Titor Foundation” (or whatever they called themselves later) and in light of Darby’s discovery of Larry Haber (a Florida Lawyer who may have perpetrated or been a party to this hoax) I had written off Titor as not factual.  Some of the data I obtained later about the “Time Machine” included a lot of data about the amount of power it used, etc.

As a trained communications guy I noted some of the measurements of power use on the “manual” provided to us was somewhat sketchy.  Many of the units were “Coulombs” which is what caught my eye.  We measure power in Watts and electrical current in Amperes, and the “pressure” in Voltage.  A coulomb is a unit of measurement that takes into account a number of electrons in a storage unit such as a capacitor, and from that is derived amperes.

For instance, 1 C = 6.25 X 10^18 power electrons.  1C = 1A * 1S, or 6.25 X 10^18 power electrons moving one Amp of current in One Second.

It is never used to explain how much power is used, because mathematically it’s not directly related to an amount of current, because you need “time”, you need “voltages”, you need current flow, a completed circuit with a load (resistance) and so forth.  So, the short answer was the manual was a hoax.

Now, as to why I am writing this article today.

John Titor stated in a conversation on the Internet 15 (now plus) years ago and basically stated today (according to some interpretations of course) that today, 12 March 2015 nukes would begin falling on the USA.

Here is the exact communication, blue is the question, the bold below is his response:

You have said you will not participate in helping anyone avoid ‘death by probability’. Yet many things you have said could have caused an individual to do or not do something that will now result dying, or escaping death.


It would help if you could give an example. If you are referring to the conflict and war in your future, I’m not sure I’m specific enough to help any individuals avoid anything. Suggesting there is a war coming is a bit different than saying avoid Washington DC at 3:45 AM on March 12, 2015.

Now, if I recall (and I’m not sure I do precisely now) that was a question posed by Pamela Moore, one of our investigators at Anomalies Network, to John.  His response was somewhat cryptic and hence the reason for me stating “interpretation” above.  He did not specifically state that we would be nuked today, just mentioned that date and his way of saying this was “to avoid DC” would be different that saying a “war was coming”.  Subtle but strange.

Over the many ensuing years I’ve seen people call folks like me “Basement Dwelling Titortards” (among other things, which I laugh at) for those things aren’t true.  But what I find funniest of all is that people without an open mind, or perhaps it is imagination must deride those who investigate such things with an open mind.

Is Titor a true being?  Yes, SOMEONE posed as him.  Is his name really “John Titor”, no most likely not.  Was he a Time Traveler, almost without a doubt, he was not a time traveler.  Did I ever personally “believe in him”?  No, though I did question some of my beliefs at some point because… honestly, what is NOT possible?  In my mind, nothing.

America is going through tough times.  Our best and brightest are long retired, and those coming behind our generation are brain washed, indoctrinated people who some how believe that “Socialism” is the way to go, that “big Business” is evil, that the Russians are our friends.  Are these opinions?  No, they are facts.  The Russians aren’t out friends, never have been, Big Business isn’t evil for all the gyrations people go through to blame them for everything, and Socialism is the driving force trying to call out Capitalism in the first place.

America has not changed so much since I was a child that imagination is a bad thing to have, and our old Cold War Bogey Men never truly went away or went “straight”.  But it has changed significantly over the past 60 years…

Lenin said:

Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted. –Vladimir Lenin

You tell me, honestly, be intellectually honest with yourselves now, how long has the Left/Socialists/Progressives “owned” our children and now our grandchildren.  The “seed” has been planted and is growing.  Robert Heinlein is turning over in his grave, as are the ghosts of Rod Serling, Huxley, and Bradbury, all of whom tried desperately to warn us all through Science Fiction.

Now, in your current state of intellectual honesty – what do you do about it?  Do you believe in “Titor” or our own American structure as it SHOULD have been, not has been fundamentally restructured to be today?

John Titor was a hoax, a well-built, well-considered hoax who has a lack of scientific background (which he used to advantage to disarm “disbelievers”) but he was a hoax none-the-less.  Lenin was no hoax, nor was Communism, the Soviet Union or the rise in greatness of the United States since it’s inception to the 1970s.  Since the 1970s our “Greatness” has been denigrated both from within and without, even until today with our own President himself stating “America isn’t Great” and we’re not “exceptional”.

America IS a great nation.  We’re not the Roman Empire (or the later, Holy Roman Empire).  We’re America, formed by a dispossessed people, men and women forced to live here in some cases (Blacks, Irish, Scots, Chinese, all slaves or indentured servants) and yet we strived for Freedom from an oppressive government, a Monarchy and won the day in the end.

Today, there are those who point not to the good of America, but to the bad (such as slavery) and call it “evil” (and evil it was, but it wasn’t the main cause taken up by most Americans).

Today, on the Internet hoaxes, conspiracy theories and hatred abound.  Various religions are hated more than others.  Christianity, something upon which America was founded, is treated as evil, while Islam, considered by many to be the most dangerous “War Plan” ever in existence is brought up as the “Religion of Peace”.  Lest anyone think this is a religious tirade against Islam, consider the source of the stories of Islam and the seven Crusades.  No, the Christians didn’t start those wars.  They finished them.  Yes, they went after Islam to force it back to whence it came, back to the oppressive Middle East.

Back to John Titor once more.  He was a “sign of hope” in 1999.  People wanted to believe in something imaginative, something “to be”, predicable, and for some perhaps even something to which to look forward.  But Titor was not all he promised, he wasn’t even a Time Traveler, just one more hoaxer coming through the pipes on his way to wherever waste moves when it’s done being used and becomes waste.  Titor will go down in history as a hoax.  Mark my words on that. But there was one plus coming from his story, however “made up” it was.

He wasn’t a star in which to believe.  He did, however, do one thing for many with starved imaginations.  He awakened that imagination in many and perhaps gave folks hope that somehow there was hope for a failing world.

Unfortunately, today, the world is still failing – and much, much worse, we’re failing our children with our over use of technology, cell phones, tablets, computers, taking away their imaginations, and letting them “Google” everything and BELIEVE in what they find.  We leave them in Public Schools to be further indoctrinated with “Common Core” educations where they “learn a test” rather than learn to think.  We stifle them by prosecuting them for pointing a finger and saying “BANG!” instead of knowing they will undoubtedly grow up like so many of us who looked up to the military and to our Great Country.

With that I leave you with this thought.  Do you want the government to control every aspect of your lives, to give you what they think you need, to offer you more while giving less and taking more from you?  Or do you want your children to IMAGINE, to LIVE through their imaginations?

If the your answer is the latter, then America is doomed.

If your answer is of the former, then introduce your children to READING.  History, Science Fiction, FICTION… anything except “Googling”.

For the Sake of the Children….

New Book: Basic Survival and Communications Skills

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I wrote a book.  Just thought you’d all like to know.  It’s called:

Basic Survival and Communications Skills in the Aftermath

The current Amazon link is at Amazon

The publication date was 30 November 2014, so it released on Sunday (yesterday as I write this).  The book was written specifically for the Kindle in mind, but will eventually be released to other eReaders in the next few months.

Here’s the description:

Nuclear war looms, an errant asteroid is headed for Earth, Yellowstone is showing signs of an impending explosion. Will be survivors. Are you going to be one of them? If so, how are you going to survive and contact your friends and loved ones?

The world has no set time of destruction and it might never come, or next Thursday while you’re on your way home from work might be the very day the killing blow comes. Will you be prepared?

Join the author in an imaginative exploration of several scenarios of “What Might Happen” and practical ideas on mitigation of the “Aftermath”. Survival isn’t always about stocking food and water in a mountain hideaway, collecting the best knives, guns and most ammo. Discover the important information you’ve been missing! This book was written specifically for the Kindle devices in mind.

For almost fifty years I’ve been working with and around radios and communications.  I started repairing shortwave radios at the ripe old age of Ten.  Since then I made it a career and life style (I’m a ham radio operator and was a military radio communications technician in the USAF).  Even my wife is a ham radio operator.

I wrote this book because, as a prepper and survivalist we’ve always worked to stay in contact with our children and family members.  While not the best at writing letters (sad for a writer, I know) we have always tried to figure out ways to contact our kids if there are emergencies.  We’ve always tried to keep one or another method open to us.

Over the years I’ve taught electronics and radio theory to civilians and military alike and have combined the skills I have in bringing this book to the general public as a way to help folks who aren’t really “radio savvy” or new at survival and preparedness skills (also called, “Prepping”).

The book is the culmination of many years of writing on blogs, forums and answering questions to students, military and civilians.  This book is not an in-depth study of one and only one thing however, it is more of a general purpose, basic/beginner’s book to get you started thinking on the path of how to communicate in emergencies.

Of course the book is colored with “End of the World” scenarios and situations but it should get you thinking.

If you’re reading this, you’re probably a sailor or a close friend and possibly feel you’re already an expert at survival.  But I am dead certain that even experts will gather information from this manual that you’ve not considered in the past.  Remember, it is not a rehash of other books.

I urge you all to pick up a copy from Kindle.  The price is $4.99 US and that’s about the price of a couple of beers.  I don’t expect to make millions of dollars, that’s not why the book was written.  But, it will certainly help the cruising kitty if a few folks buy it.  (Hey, at 35% royalties, I’m not making a killing here!)

Keep your eyes open for when I can release it to other readers besides Kindle.  There will be follow ups to this book with more in-depth and detailed answers about radio systems, licensing (for when aliens aren’t invading because we all know we don’t want to break the law!) and I will most likely work on a ham radio specific companion book at a later date.

Fair Winds!

Rick

Continuing Studies

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Something I’ve learned over the years is that I learn better when someone shows me how to do something.  As a teacher I discovered that students had all sorts of learning idiosyncrasies and most of them learned either by reading, listening or seeing demonstrations.  I endeavored to  do all three for students in my electronics courses.  Some simply refused to learn and just ‘wanted the answers’.

Those students who just wanted the answers were the kind who simply wanted to “be done” with college and really weren’t planning on doing anything with their lives after getting finished with their degrees.  One day during a class, after a test, we were going over the test answers after I’d graded the tests and recorded the results in my record keeping.  That particular week we were studying how semiconductors functioned, very specifically we were discussing diodes and P-N junctions.  A diode is an electronic device which passes current in only one direction and blocks current flow in the other direction.  They are used as rectifiers to convert alternating current into direct current.  The concept is actually one of the simplest things you learn in electronics next to resistance, and Ohm’s Law.

One student had asked me questions all week, and I had explained several times verbally how a diode works, showing circuits with current flow, an oscilloscope (which shows the sine waves and the subsequently converted wave forms of half-wave rectification).  Just before the test, this student asked for a review of specific points.  We reviewed with the whole class.  The student expressed confidence that “I’ve got this” and I passed out the test material – basic 30 question tests with 25 multiple “guess” questions and five “essay questions” – asking students to, in their own words, explain some basic concept they had learned this week.

I generally studied my own materials while awaiting students to finish but something told me to look for the “visual feedback” you get from student’s faces and actions.

The confidence of the previously mentioned student began to falter; I could see him struggling with the test so I quietly began walking the room as I often did to get a glance over their shoulders to make sure no one was cheating (something that was very rare in my classrooms I discovered, but did occasionally occur).  The confusion of this student was apparent when he hit the question we had discussed just before the test.  I had actually covered almost every thing on the test before passing it out and I was shocked that as I scanned quickly and walk on that this person was completely lost.

What was *I* doing wrong, I asked myself.  How could I have explained this over and over in the space of a week and given these students essential information needed to understand the material AND pass the test and yet this student was going to fail this test.

Now, the quarter before this one, I had a similar problem with another student who has passed but was barely keeping his grades up in each of his courses.  Was there something happening here I wasn’t getting?

After grading his test – he passed by one question – we begin going over the test.

At that point I realized that the majority of the students in the classroom has gotten 100% on their tests.  To me, that was a measure of 1) How well I presented the lesson and 2) how well the students grasped the concepts.  All but a couple of people, and one in particular were doing very well.  Instead of chalking this up to “poor learning” or “poor teaching” I thought I’d turn this around on the students.

I asked, “Ok, some of you had issues with this concept (which I explained quickly) and I’d like to get an idea where you’re not understanding this.  Would anyone like to share with the class and me what sort of problem this is causing?”

It was enough to get the student in question to say, “Well, I don’t know the answer.”

“What do you mean, ‘I don’t know the answer’?” I queried.

“Well, it’s like this….” and this student regurgitated the exact process of how a diode works, not only from the beginning of the chemistry portion (where you dope different sections of silicone with boron or arsenic to make P or N junctions – but explained electron movement and hole-theory to the class in precise and professional terms).  I was shocked.  He could explain exactly what it was he’d learned.  I applauded him on his knowledge… then he said, “I just don’t know THE ANSWER!”

I prompted once again for an explanation of the “answer”….

So he said, “Ok, its like this.  If I am working in a radio shop for instance and someone gives me a radio to work on, if a diode goes OUT in the radio… what is the answer?  What symptoms does that diode show me that tells me it’s broken?”

The light came on for me.

What the student wanted wasn’t all the theory behind how electronic components functioned; he wanted a set of RULES that told him how to easily fix or repair something.

A communications gap the size of Texas was what we were having.

Today – twenty plus years later I can see this attitude in everyone around me.  No one wants to study a subject and understand it inside and out, they want a pat answers to a series of questions that allow them to move on to something else!  Email messages that contain more than three lines are rarely read.  Even this article will have 2 readers out of 100 who read the entirety of the article because, frankly, it’s “too long” for the limited attention span of most people.

Over the past five years of preparing for our voyage my wife and I have read a multitude of books.  I read, almost exclusively, technical texts containing scientific discussions of how to anchor and keep a vessel safe to operations of diesel engines, to repairs of water makers – among other things.  These books contain math, charts, explanations that put my verbosity to shame.  But I have come to the conclusion that there are those who will never venture offshore because they won’t read anything; worse they WILL venture offshore – without reading anything.

In my estimation today’s electronic communications technology–which has essentially made radio almost obsolete, has taken the fun out of learning, it has forced people who are in the midst of information overload in their everyday lives to skip over anything they deem “extraneous”.  I’ve found that this sometimes even affects me and I tend to ignore long emails, or skip reading attachments when I should probably at LEAST glance at them.

As a skipper of a vessel one must be aware of all that is going on, stand above panic and think through every detail of what one must do to make things work, keep the ship going and to keep the vessel and crew alive.  Fortunately, it’s not flying planes or space ships.  You’re not traveling at high speeds or falling from space (or high in the sky) if things fail on a boat.  However, shorelines get in the way, and winds and blow you into the weather shore, lines break, sails tear, engines get dirty fuel, anchors can get jammed in coral or rock, anchors can drag and winds can blow when you’re not expecting them because you ignored this morning’s weather report; or over slept and didn’t listen to it.

There are NO “pat answers” in anything in life.  There are jobs all over the country that require thinking processes and regardless of how mindless a job becomes (I picture someone installing lug nuts over and over and over and over in a car factory, but even there robots have taken over…) there is some thinking required.

You can make a list of answers for your students so when they are troubleshooting a robot, computer or a space station they can simply check off and when they have one left over that’s “the answer”

I suspect my former student never made it “to the big time” with his degree.  He grabbed some job somewhere that required little thinking on his part.

All to often today in conversations I have with random people I see his “lack of thinking processes”.  They can regurgitate what they hear on television, from a show, or their favorite movie, and can even repeat things they learned in high school or college courses.  But they can’t take two or more related (or even unrelated) concepts and combine those in a logical and reasonable fashion to come up with answers to their questions.

Is there an answer for this problem?  I’m sure there’s a list someplace that can help us “fix” the problem, right?