©Ian Coristine/1000IslandsPhotoArt.comMedical dept:
“Look Ma, no baby!
As we go to press, our baby girl Cassie has not given birth. Her doctor is stalling as long as her health will allow and so we wait. If we don’t have a birth to announce by next month, I will be reporting on a medical miracle.
Meanwhile, Janice and I have wiled away our leisure hours by getting our colonoscopies done. We will die, we are told, just not from anything remotely related to…. eh… ’that’.
Finally, Janice checked herself in yesterday for her dreaded Gallbladder surgery. Other than some serious post-op nausea, it all went swimmingly and I returned her home for a period of recuperation under my tender loving care and culinary treats.
Gotta go, the hot dogs are ready…..
Projects dept:
With the economic situation being what is as of late, Janice was disappointed that we were too poor to build a 3rd story onto the cabin so we could jump out of a window that was high enough to make it worthwhile. If this keeps up, the airlines will go out of business and we will have to take a cargo ship to Europe!
Be sure to 'double click' on this photo!
Our projects this month included sprucing up the BBQ area by laying flagstone and building a base for a granite counter top. Actually we have had the slab for 2 years but have only now gotten around to putting the whole thing together. The base is made of log cut outs from the cabin when we added the large view window.
The counter top was acquired when the granite people erred in measuring our kitchen and showed up with a slab that was 6 inches too short. Thinking ahead, we made them a silly offer they were in no position to refuse and we snapped up a matching counter top for our outdoor kitchen.
Next, I built platforms to put under our beds with 6 sliding drawers in each for storage in both rooms. Pretty handy when you realize we have no space for dressers. Finally we finished the last of our window trim and Buckskin covered window treatments in the bedrooms.
Not so fun dept:
This is the time of the year when the water levels in the river drop like a rock. While there are no tides to contend with, the river authorities release an enormous amount of water through the locks and dams throughout the summer months. The difference in the high water mark in June and low water mark when we leave in November is as much as two feet. (65 cm)
This means that as the water level drops, shoals and other underwater obstacles of every description become a threat when they are out of sight and out of mind the rest of the season.
I know this because I had an unexpected encounter earlier this month. I was cruising along on my way to the pharmacy (virtually all businesses here have their own docks to accommodate island residents) when I approached a shoal marker. Being a prudent kind of guy, I gave it wide berth but evidently not quite wide enough. I hit the submerged shoal at about 20 MPH (30 kph) with the effect similar to hitting a brick wall……under water.
Needless to say I came to a grinding stop, drifting in the middle of the main shipping channel. (fortunately “she who must be obeyed” was not with me) With no ocean going vessels in sight and all but out of power, I limped back to shore to the nearest marina. The good news was that the boat didn’t sink. The bad news was that I feared that I had torn out the entire out drive.
Quick! What's wrong with this picture?
Once in the marina, I was fortunate that they were equipped to be able to lift the boat right out of the water and swing it onshore to where the entire bottom could be examined. Fortunately there wasn’t a scratch on the bottom but the propeller was thrashed. Further examination determined that no additional damage was done to the shaft or gears. So, with a new propeller in place, I was on my way back into life in the 20MPH lane……
Business Dept:
For the past 3 years, the local property assessments here have been ‘frozen’. Like many areas, communities have struggled with rising property values and taxes that worry many homeowners that they will be taxed out of their homes.
Here, property assessments and property taxes are handled by two separate departments. Once the municipality knows how much assessed value it has to work with, it determines the tax rate and that determines your tax bill.
In the islands, that is often quite a bone of contention. Although clearly seasonal residences that enjoy few city services (No roads, water, cable TV, trash pick up, snow removal or municipal police services) we still pay all local taxes, including school taxes. The kicker is that because it is waterfront property (duh! It is an island) it is assessed at a higher value.
We know this because the new and improved assessments have just been released and ours doubled since the last one just 3 years ago. I can hardly wait to see our next tax bill….. Ironically, even with a very healthy 6 figure drop in our property value in California due to the thriving economy, our property taxes there will remain the same due to a much slower rise in taxes than anywhere else we live.
Fun dept:
Every year over 30,000 scuba divers from all over the world come to what has been dubbed ‘Canada’s Caribbean’, the Thousand Islands. Largely because of the zebra muscles, this is some of the clearest freshwater diving in the world.
Looking out from one side of Honey Bee
There are numerous shipwrecks to explore; including some you can snorkel to. Just last month one of the largest, oldest and best-preserved wrecks was discovered in Lake Ontario; the HMS Ontario, a 228-year-old British warship that sank during the American Revolution. I have to hurry up and save my allowance to pay for my airplane so that I can go scuba diving next!
Looking out from another side of the Island
Speaking of having fun, a friend of ours was commenting recently on our prolific use of home exchanges. He was saying that we are not in either France, California or at the Bee as much as 2 months out of the year. Sure we like to exchange some, I thought, but lets not exaggerate.
This is what we have to put up with every day :)
Then, we counted the weeks and he was closer to the truth than I realized. In the past 12 calendar months we have exchanged homes from Cape Cod to Spain, from England to the Netherlands and places in between a total of 9 weeks. Is this a great gig, or what?
Enough already dept:
Last month I wrote about the last of our pursuits in following the long saga of our family tree. We were done, I said.
Or so I thought.
No sooner had I put it to rest when I got an email from our daughter Mandy in the Netherlands. She sent me a copy of a document that her boyfriend Markus had found online while doing a little personal research on Mandy’s family. (Probably trying to confirm which side of the prison bars I was on.)
It seemed that he found a lengthy document containing names of people that I had never heard of but was clearly laid out in a ‘family tree’ style. Buried in this lengthy document were the names of all our immediate family including my children with many personal details about each. Since the authors email address was available, I wrote him and pointedly asked, “Who are you and what are you doing with all of my family’s information?
I got an immediate reply from a ‘long lost relative’ who I have never actually meet, but who turned out to be my fathers cousin. He explained that he had spent many years researching my grandmother’s side of the family (my fathers mother) and had some 1600 relatives on that branch of the tree meticulously cataloged going back to the 1600’s. YIKES!!
I never knew he or the results of his research efforts existed, but this has added a whole new dimension to our body of knowledge. Thank you, Cuz!
