WESTPORT, THE CHALLENGE.

On our visit to Westport, we ambled along the harbor, talking to fishermen and taking a lot of pictures.


This place has a huge number of fishing boats and the overcast provided irresistible reflections in the water. I was impressed at how clean the water was, very little floating crap and only two greasy oil stains near the commercial floats, both by older boats. I compare that to my old diving days when to dive inside the breakwater was a dirty affair.


We walked around the commercial docks where crab traps were stored for crab season, I expect.


The traps get pretty grungy and studded with crustaceans.


Suddenly, we heard a ruckus at the end of the pier. Gulls were squawking and flying and diving and calling, making a noisy complaint.


As we got closer, the problem seemed to be centered around this boat. For minutes of watching the gulls, we finally determined the cause.


Sea lions in the water were grabbing the offal. Competition. The docent at the museum told us the sea lions are something new to the area. They've moved north for better food. According to her, there is no food for them in San Francisco and they've left the areas in the south. Most likely climate change and depleted ocean areas are to blame. The locals have put up an electric net to keep them out, but apparently they can thwart the net.


We heard them barking and found a colony of about ten lions inside the breakwater.


On one end was this huge lion, set a bit away from the others. I'm thinking maybe he is the bull for this harem.

But, he/she just preened and batted his/her eyelashes. I think maybe this lion is a female. I'm guilty as a lot of others who assign human characteristics to animals.


A young sea lion tried to get up on the float and got warned away.

Then the young lion tried to enter a space next to these two obvious bulls on the other end of the float. No dice. I'm sure the one is a bull because of the mustache.


The lion tried to get these two to move over. They had no intention of sharing their sunny spot.


It got a bit rancorous.


And finally, he'd met the requirements of the challenge in some way and the old bulls on the end turned their backs to him or her and let him up on the float.


One of the old bulls has a tattoo and we wondered what kind of trouble he got into, or what kind of tracking was going on? Since I don't know squat about sea lions, I may have it all wrong. But, it was a fascinating half hour watching them play their games, whatever they meant.


We left the marina headed for a cool one at Westport Brewing Company. The license on this rusted old Dodge says Evergreen State. But, coastal vehicles run to rust unless they get expensive paint jobs along the way.


This is kind of a warning, ...please don't park in front of my house... which is right next door to the brewery.


It's a friendly little place. He has a 3 barrel system and produces 14 different beers. They had a good dark ale, but I didn't care for their stout. They have pot luck on Friday night, but we didn't go back.


There we met a beautiful woman who shaves her head and wears 35 bracelets.


She invited me to count them. They are all different. She says, " it is my signature. I never go without them." It was a grand, fun day.

PRIORITY LIST.

I have a priority list and blogging isn’t on it. But, I did read my email this morning and saw that 80,000 africanized honey bees attacked a woman in Palm Desert where we were just parked in February. The woman survived, but the bees they removed were being donated to farmers?  No explanation of that statement. It left me wondering. Maybe somebody else can explain how and why they would donate these killer bees to farmers?
I have advertised for someone with Western Driver cords to help me get my pictures out of my backup storage drive. (Jim and I believe my cords evaporated into thin air out of the motor home.)
My friend John Hofstetter, with a powerful magnifying lens found the model number. WD5000N1U-00. Other than that, no luck. But, I have two more people from my computer group who are trying to help me.
I’m trying to find a mobile home for my son to live in while he rebuilds my place in Oregon that flooded last year.
Making sense of new phone service offers is challenging. I’m amazed at the varying services out there. International Cellular can actually provide me service while I’m in Turkey. But, AT&T with more towers than we have ants, can’t get me steady service in Murphys? I don’t get it.
And, my taxes await. I get that, but don’t like it.
I cruise through my photos now and then and this album represents a really fun time we had in Port Arthur, Texas: You can click the album for a slide show.

2013-2-22-Catfishin’WithMarkConner

I hope I did this right.

EASTER FUN

This morning I looked for items the family left behind after a full weekend of Easter fun. Ken left his tennis shoes. Doug left a Care Package of chicken alfredo he wanted to take home. And Virginia left her shopping bags that she had previously left in my car when I returned to Murphys weeks ago.

The kids colored a glob of eggs. Ken colored one egg with a rock band symbol and told the boys aged 10 and 13 whoever found that egg on Easter morning and could name the band, he would pay $5. The boys got on the internet, figured out the band, Blue Oyster Cult, and conspired among themselves that they’d share the 5 bucks and that way, no matter who found the egg, they’d both be winners. Smart kids.

Even though they are too old for the bunny, the fun is in the egg hunt. With 23 hidden eggs, it took them two hours to find them. The hardest was finding a purple egg hidden among the bouquet of lilacs, invisible among the flowers. And, one brownish egg hidden in the woodpile next to the stove.
We who hide the eggs take pleasure in providing a challenge. I took great pictures of the whole scramble.

Cedric loves to bake and he made a wonderful woven Easter bread. We all enjoyed card games, the food and sweets. Ken and Virginia are training for a 65 mile ride, so they got out twice on the bikes. Easter morning they road 45 miles with hills before the rain set in. Ah, well, we have to count our blessings. We had good weather between storms. The lightening show was fantastic. We skyped family members who couldn’t come. All fun.

But, getting pictures up in my blog is a challenge that get’s worse with everything I try. Maybe next week.

AN EAGLE SCOUT

Everyone speaks well of the Boy Scouts.  One in four boys  joins the Boy Scouts. Of every hundred who join, thirty drop out. But even those who drop out claim they learn something enjoyable or valuable from scouts.

Only four percent of scouts per year go on to attain the highest ranking in scouting,  Eagle Scout. I am proud to present my grandson, as one of those honored few.
An Eagle Scout must earn 21 meritorious service badges to attain Eagle ranking. The skills are demanding, and challenging.
An Eagle earns badges from a surprising array of  personal services such as Orienteering, Camping, Lifesaving, Swimming, Public  Speaking, Canoeing, Swimming, Environmental Studies, Art, Emergency Preparedness, Soil and Water Conservation, Community, National and World Citizenship.  He pledges to conduct himself  with honesty, clean living, useful citizenship and honest work.
Scouting is changing, the challenges are different, but the total development from boyhood to manhood depends
upon physical, mental, and moral growth expressed in the Scout Oath.  Add to that the many activities and interests clamoring for young people’s attention, computers, gaming,  the demands of school and sports, band and music, discovering girls and driving. Preparing for college and jobs. It isn’t surprising that so many drop out and so few tread the road to complete the course from Cub Scout to Eagle. The Eagle Scout badge stands for strength of character. The Eagle Scout badge is a symbol of what a boy has done, but, more important, it represents what the boy
will be in the future as he grows to manhood.
An Eagle Scout is a marked man, he has earned the right to call himself a quality citizen. He pledges not to exploit his fellow man, but dedicate his skills and abilities to the common good. I can’t say strongly enough how proud our collective family is of this young man. And, he has stellar company among some famous Eagles Scouts:
Thirty-three astronauts, President Gerald Ford, Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, Pulitzer Prize winning authors, Wallace Stegner and Harrison Salisberg. Five members of the House of Representatives, Three Senators, Two Governors. Journalist Walter Cronkite, film maker Steven Spielberg, Generals, Heroic Soldiers, Great Sportsmen…the list goes on and on. Scouting gives us faith in the future of this country.

QUILTING SURPRISE

Opening the mail these days, I find more advertising than personal news. But, then, surprise! My adopted daughter, Karen, was published in Quilters Newsletter, a magazine I wrote a beginning writers piece for in 1976.  It didn’t pay much, in fact, it may have paid nothing, but the thrill was indescribable.

Here is Karen’s story that she sent me:

My husband retired from the U.S. Air Force in 2001 after serving for 20 years. To show my appreciation, I decided I would make him a quilted wavy U.S. flag wall hanging. I decided to use curved piecing to make it. He was thrilled with this idea. We went to my fabric stash to pick out the fabric. I cut out all the curved pieces using one template shape. Then the challenge began.
I tried to sew them together on the sewing machine and got so frustrated I gave up. I told him I was sorry; I tried but it was way too difficult for me. Years went by and as I made other quilts he would ask, “What about my flag quilt?” I’ve never been one to give up easily, so I thought, let me try one more time.
Guess what? I did it! I was so proud to have challenged myself, I decided to enter the quilt in the local county fair without him knowing. I talked him into going to the fair to see how my other quilts did. When he saw a red, white and blue quilt, he asked, “Isn’t that like the quilt you’re supposed to make for me?” When he saw the name and quilt label, he turned to me and gave me the happiest smile and biggest hug. I told him it didn’t win a ribbon. He said, “It won Best of Show to me!”  I’ll never forget the look of excitement on his face.Please challenge yourself and be patient. Just think, eight years later, you too can have a finished quilt for someone you love.

Karen is a great quilt artist. She’s a multitasker with, home and family, work, pets and many challenging projects.  She is proud of her quilt, but I’m proudest of all to be surprised by her accomplishments via a prestigious National Magazine. What a thrill!   Smooch!

BUDDING PHOTOGRAPHER

Grandson, Theo, was requesting a monopoly game, a game I dislike.  He settled for a “camera assignment.” I asked him to choose from three colors, blue, red and yellow and go outside and take pictures of (he chose red), red items  on his short street.

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He is nine years old and did very well. I always learn something from my Grandson’s. He had read a library book  called Zoom, in which a photo is reversed from close up to far away, showing for example  a roosters comb, then the rooster, then the barn where the rooster lived, people looking in the barn, the magazine the picture of the barn etc. was on, a person reading the magazine, the chair he was sitting in and so on. Hmmm. Intriguing and challenging.
So he took this photo:
which is part of his:

slip on Croc.
Later in the day we visited my sister’s grandson, Jeff and great grandson, CJ.

And, I forgot my camera and had to steal this photo from facebook.
We did manage games after dinner. We settled on  Bananagrams and Quiddler instead, both  fast moving and can reasonably be played by all ages. But, now I know I have to try a “zoom” assignment.