The Epistle, January 2008

Chateau La Bourbansais

Built in 1583 upon Gallo Roman ruins it was enlarged by 3 generations of parliamentary families in the 1700’s. Traditional French gardens flourish and the guided tours of the living areas of the Chateau with its period furnishings allow you to experience the ambiance of the past. Critical restorations were done in 2007. It is located about 2 hours from home.

Mandy visits with Gillian

Making her yearly pilgrimage to Dad and Mom’s, Mandy joined us for Christmas again this year. This time she brought her friend Gillian, a Montana girl currently finishing her Masters degree from the Manchester Royal College of Music in England. Following her graduation, she will study for her PHD in composition. The girls spent two weeks exploring the area with Mandy as her tour guide. They biked and walked for hours daily. Mandy is quickly becoming an old hand at this and is familiar with many of the local sights. The two of them loved mom's home cooking and ate and ate and ate.

One of the sights we returned to were the WWII D-Day invasion beaches in Normandy. I have been there a couple of times before but never felt that I got my fill. It was always a drive by, so to speak, on our way to or from Paris. I wanted to dedicate an entire day there slowly going from one beach to another and spending some time at the cemetery and museum at Omaha Beach. The girls wanted to tag along so the three of us went together. (Janice had had enough from the previous visits)

What’s new?

This past month has seen a number of significant developments for us. To start with, my friend Carl put a website together for us. This for the purpose of renting out our home here during the summer and other times we are gone. We are absolutely thrilled with the result and you can take a peek at www.my-holiday-in-brittany.co.uk He spend an enormous amount of time on it and it shows. Bear in mind that the site is specifically geared to target the British market so there are a few terms that would seem a little off to an American reader. It was also carefully designed and optimized for the Google search engine and contains little idiosyncrasies to that end, including a few deliberate misspellings and ...the name itself. Finally, it only contains photos and information on the "public" part of the house as the sauna off of the courtyard and the entire 3rd floor are inaccessible to renters since it houses our as yet unfinished master bedroom and bathroom / dressing area. A locked door at the bottom of the staircase ensures that the area remains private. If you do look at the web site, I would appreciate any critical comments you might have, as seen from fresh eyes.

We started renting our house out as a holiday home ( see what I mean?) the first year we bought it. We had minimal luck the first two years and chose to change our approach. The third year was considerably better but left a lot of room for improvement. Last year was our best year yet and we feel that we may have finally found the winning formula and look forward to a busy and profitable summer. We will want to give this a few years to make sure we are not just being lucky in the short term. If this keeps up and our costs here continue to be offset by our rentals, Janice could end up with her wish to have a tiny weenie itsy bitsy little house in Italy.

As a result of our dealing with English clients we have found it necessary to have a bank account in the UK. As you know, England has not adopted the Euro for its currency and so our clients pay us in Sterling pounds. The problem was that British law does not permit foreigners to open a bank account in the UK. We found a cumbersome work around for a while but this past month we arrived at the solution; an offshore bank account in Jersey (a British island off of France). It’s like a Swiss bank account but..... without the money. They deal in Sterling and allow us to have a checking account without the UK banking restrictions.

Finally, we made one more important improvement. Last month I wrote of our bringing a huge pile of receipts to scan and store digitally. This month we moved a step further by copying everything on our computer to an off site, internet based storage facility. I know that to some this will be old news, something you have done ages ago. If so, shame on you for not telling me about it sooner. You see everyone knows that it is important to back up their computer but recently I started thinking that even though I have a backup drive we could loose both our computer and the backup in a fire or theft. By moving all our data and pictures to an online storage site we can access the entire contents of our computer anywhere in the world. Also, since we have less than 25 Gigabytes to store, it’s free. We know that some people worry about security and data theft but we worry far more of possible data loss.

Pineapples anyone?

As bizarre as it seems, this is the second winter where we have seen salvaging occurring along the coast. Last winter a large vessel dumped a number of cargo containers at sea off the coast of England during a storm. People quickly rushed to the shore to collect sealed packages of diapers and other goods destined for UK stores. A lucky few even found BMW motorcycles still in their crates. A recent storm dumped a number of cargo containers full of pineapples and tobacco off our coast on our local beaches just a few miles up the road. Word spread like wildfire and locals quickly stocked up.

Speaking of local happenings, this month we discovered that there is a rock quarry nearby that is exclusively contracted to the NASA space agency. One of only two such quarry’s in the world, they supply some of the unique raw materials used in the fabrication of the tiles on the bottom of the Space Shuttle. These tiles act as a heat shield during re-entry and are used on other spacecraft as well. This place never ceases to amaze me.

Kid number 4 launched!

Always an event for weary parents to say nothing of their pocketbooks is the launching of a kid. Some go easy, some go hard but go they all must. It is with great satisfaction that our youngest baby girl Cassie Anna passed her California state board exams last month and is now a licensed Cosmetologist. All finished with school and entering the world of work, she is eager for her independence. Currently, she intends to remain in California and consider her options. We are both relieved and proud of her accomplishment.Cassie turns 21 this week.

Whew! Fly, little hatchling, fly!

So how am I doing?

I wish I could take credit for the better aspects of our little blog but I am afraid that I can’t. There is not a single element of this that has not been the result of someone’s suggestion on how to make it better, easier to use or navigate, nicer looking or whatever. I do however, take full credit for implementing their ideas and following their advice. I am always looking for better ways to do what I do so if you have a suggestion, please don’t hold back.

Every month I struggle to keep my letter to you shorter as I am not trying to write a book or be so long winded that you will feel that you can't be bothered to read it. I also know that it is a little ‘off putting’ to some people that it is not a personal letter just to them, but it's a compromise I have to live with. I write about the things I would tell you about if we were sitting down and visiting with you.....or with a number of other family or friends if I were sitting down and visiting with them. The blog allows me to have a 'virtual' visit once a month with everyone that I am not near at the moment. If you are still not convinced of its merits, just consider the last time you would have had the time to write a nice long chatty letter to all your family and friends within the same month. Yikes!!!

Check this bad boy out!

18 months ago we asked our village blacksmith to make us some implements for the fireplace I built. At the time, we went into one of those ‘price is no object’ fireplace shops, found the nicest set we could never afford to buy, photographed the heck out of them then went to our blacksmith and said: “Can you make these for us? He assured us that he would forge the items in our 6 month absence while we returned to the Island for the summer.

Yea, right.

Six months later he had only completed the andirons. They were spectacular to be sure and we were sure grateful to have them but we had asked for a custom forged wood holder, fire screen and fireplace tools also. Well, 18 months later we have the second item, our fire screen. We love the work he does but at his advanced age we worry that he will kick off before he has a chance to complete the set. [Editors note: “advanced age” is a fluid and moving target. It is now officially defined as anyone older than I at any given time]

Bonaparte Beach

A mere 20 minutes away from the house lies Bonaparte beach. Interestingly, it was at this beach that from January to August 1944, 135 Royal Canadian Air force and other allied pilots were spirited from France back to England by the French resistance as well as British escape and evasion rescue teams. There are a whole slew of these kinds of historical markers everywhere around here as well as all over Normandy as they were the obvious transfer points back to England across the channel during the war.

Today, it is a source of great French pride to have participated in any effort to resist the German occupation. It is hard to find any of the elderly who do not claim to have been or have assisted in the resistance. It is funny to see how in most cases, revisionist history makes heroes out of the meek and creates enhanced memories out of pure fantasies.

Flax ponds

Many of the large Manoirs or Longeres in the Brittany area were funded by wealthy flax growers, harvesters and exporters of its linen products. For many years Brittany was renowned for the quality of the linens produced here. My bride and I found several of the old creek fed, stone lined, traditional flax ‘ponds’ just a few minutes from our village. It was here that the flax was submerged in water for days until it was broken down enough to be carded in order to separate the fibers and spin them into linen thread. From there the fine linens were woven.

Please write when you can and we will see you next month!

The Epistle December 2007

Chateau Bienassis

Built in the late 1400’s, this little gem is about an hour from our house. It remained within the family of the original owners until 2005 where the last descendants voluntarily deeded it to the state. With period furnishings and loads of interesting history, it was a great place to visit.

So, what’s new in France?

It is always a bit of a shock to arrive after being up for 36 hours on the clock from the time we got up in Seattle to the time we open our front door here. This includes flight time, delays, shuttles to and from airports, layovers between flights, the drive from Paris to home and the 9 hour time change. It was very heartwarming to arrive at our front door only to see the lights on, the hot water tank warm, the fridge turned on and a few necessities in it and----get this---- a roaring fire in the fireplace! WOW, what a welcome from our friends and neighbors Malcolm and Rebecca. We are sure treated better than we deserve.

With the US dollar now in free fall on the world market the cost of living here has got our undivided attention. We have seen these fluctuations before but over the last 5 years it has gone from bad to much, much worse. While the majority of the big-ticket items we have are bought and paid for (Homes, cars, boat) it is inescapable that everyday items (not to mention a daughter in law school in Europe) consume a much larger share of our pitiful resources. Our purchasing power has dropped 35% in both Canada and Europe in the past 5 years due to the declining exchange rates.

I imagine that you are on the verge of tears over our predicament so I want to reassure you that we have not sought the location of the local soup kitchens….yet.

All kidding aside, gas is now $2.10 a liter ($8.40 a gallon) and everything else is 1/3 more expensive than when we started coming to Europe ….and Canada. It can’t help but make a difference. I know that this financial pendulum swings back and forth and all of our European and Canadian friends are all thinking “It’s about time you get a taste of what we have suffered, you George Bush loving Republican!” Go on, gloat if you must.

One of the things I love about being in Europe is that while we have lived here half the year for the past 3 years we are forever finding little nuggets of interesting local history. For instance, I was walking though Treguier, a little town just 4 miles (6 kilometers) up the road from our house when I stumbled upon a dedication plaque on the wall in front of city hall. It indicated that it was where the first French/ Latin /Breton dictionary was ever printed in 1482, some 525 years ago or 10 years before Christopher Columbus sailed to America. (Breton is the second official language of Brittany) This was only 30 years after Johannes Gutenberg printed the world's first book (The Gutenberg bible which we saw in Mainz, Germany) using movable type in 1450. No town in America could lay anywhere near such a claim.

Treguier Cathedral

A big change recently in French Law has some Brits we know in a real tizzy. The French government has decided that anyone who is under 65 years old and is not employed in France must buy private health insurance. Previously, anyone who was a resident here and paid a minimal public health premium was eligible for French health services. Curiously the law is being applied retroactively to anyone who has been here less than 5 years and had not applied for citizenship. It does not matter if they are retired and receive income from abroad; the French classify them as ‘inactive’. The premiums are substantial enough that our dear friends and neighbors plan to return to the UK and maybe forced to sell their home. It’s a real bummer. This new law has no effect on us of course as we are not residents and are covered by our own private health insurance from the US. (This just in: the law may be repealed)

On a lighter side, I recently found myself needing to use a public bathroom and when I entered the men’s room I immediately came upon 4 women. One was entering a stall; the other was coming out of another. A third woman was washing her hands while the last one was brushing her hair. Quickly realizing I had mistakenly entered the ladies room I turned around and left. As I opened the door I glanced up to see that the sign on the door clearly said “Men”. (OK, it said men in French). I stopped to see that these women we glaring at me as if I had done something wrong. For a moment I flashed at our experience last month in Cape Cod when we walked into a transsexual convention but I could see that these were real women, with urinals behind them on the back wall.

There were among a growing number of women here who are sick and tired of waiting in long lines to use ladies rooms while many stalls in the men’s rooms are empty. The have cast aside any inhibitions or shame and are simply turning men’s rooms into unisex facilities. Any man who so much looks at them askance faces the scowl I got: “Wanna make something of it, mister?”

Who are you?

One of the fun little features of writing this blog is that it keeps detailed records of all those who read it. No, I can’t tell if you were in your pajamas when you read this but I can tell almost everything else. I can tell obvious things like how many people read it, for how long and if they came back to it later. Less obvious are things like what cities and countries they were in and what their IP address is. (It is like your street address but specifically for your computer) Who should be receiving this blog is obvious to me as I know whom I send this out to but last month I was stumped.

I noticed that someone in Renne Brittany had read it but I don’t know anyone there…that I can recall. Also in Atlanta Georgia, I don’t know anyone there either, do I? Someone in the city of Mission, in the province of British Columbia, Canada read the blog. Huh? I even had two readers from blocked web sites. Langley Virginia? Could it be the NSA? No, because there is No Such Agency…Finally, Pays de Loire, France.

Who are you people? As long as it is not the IRS…..

Artsy Fartsy

Last spring, days before we left for the Island we finalized an agreement with a young local “Ferronier d’art” (an artistic blacksmith) to accept a commission for an exterior art piece for the entry to our home here. This is not the old village blacksmith I ‘studied’ under last winter but a recent graduate of the formal state school for the art of creating forged art. He has made many objects that have sold but this was his first substantial commissioned piece and it was a doosy.

Our village goes dark at 11 PM when all the streetlights are turned off. (Don’t ask!) When I say dark, I mean go in your bedroom closet, close the door and shut your eyes tight ….kind of dark. So, we asked him to forge us an entry light and found a design that we felt would be in character with our village and the fact that our home is within the town square. This would look ridiculous anywhere else but here, but here is where it has to work. The design so impressed a friend in the village that he gave us the antique hand blown magnum that had been in his family for 50 years. It serves as the shield for the bulb contained within. It turned out much nicer than we had ever hoped for. Now when friends come over for the evening they are safe for the last 50 feet (15 meters) up to our door or the first 50 feet when they leave. After that, they are on their own.

Tip: If you are new to the blog, you can super size any picture by double clicking on it

You packed WHAT?

We have all heard the expression “They took everything but the kitchen sink”. Well, as I wrote last fall, upon our return to France this time we not only brought a kitchen sink but our Master bathroom one as well…and a faucet for good measure. This is for a little renovation we will work on this winter. Yes there are plenty of sinks available here but frankly we didn’t like the styles.

European styles are usually the rage in many things and are sometimes more sophisticated than what we have available at home. Oddly, many of the sinks here look like they are out of a tract home in the 50’s. The really nice American styled sinks are available at specialty shops but at prices that are prohibitive to us poor Americans. This not only because of the dollar exchange, but simply because so many things are breathtakingly expensive here to start with. I know it sounds like an inordinate amount of trouble to go to but we have come to see just how easy it really is. It is no more trouble than taking a suitcase to the airport and handing it in then having it handed back to you in Paris and putting it in the rental car to drive home. Bingo!

Savings? About the cost of the flight here for one of us. The food disposer and Reverse Osmosis water treatment system will follow next year.

This is not to say that getting something here is always trouble free. To explain, I must digress for a moment. In America you are permitted to deduct the ‘cost’ of your home on your taxes when you sell it. While we have no such plans to sell, at some point all homes are sold, so we (or our beneficiaries) will want to be ready to take full advantage of this tax break. Normally this is simple as people can prove how much they paid for their home. As we physically built our own, it is a little trickier. The cost of the property itself (the land) is documented with the county but we also have to provide receipts for everything we claim as a deduction towards the cost of building or renovating the house itself. Everything.

So, over the years we have accumulated enough receipts to fill a suitcase. After the recent fires in California, we thought it prudent to digitize this information by taking the time to scan them and have an off site copy available. A good project for Janice this winter, we thought. To that end, I packed them all in my roll-on to take with us. Because of their ultimate value, I was going to take them on board the aircraft as ‘carry on’, never leaving them out of my physical presence. We all know that checked suitcases have been known to get lost.

As we boarded the aircraft we were seated near the front so we were among the last to get on. The problem was that the overhead bins were now full so the crew wanted to take our roll-ons from us to put them in the cargo hold as checked luggage. This was not optional and these are testy days to get ‘in-your-face’ with an aircrew. Against my better judgment, I relented. With all of the straight-faced assurances they could muster they promised us that the bag would follow us to Paris. You guessed it: it didn’t.

It was the only bag that did not arrive and panic set in. There were well over $150,000 (100,000 Euros) worth of receipts in there and would cause untold havoc in providing acceptable replacement documentation, if available. Early on we were told that the bag had been located and would arrive within a few days. Since my shaving kit was the only other item in the bag, I decided to take on the ‘Mr. Hollywood’ look for a few days but then I quickly started to look like ‘Mr. Dumpster Diver’. Thankfully a knock on the door announced the arrival of my shaving kit…..and our receipts.

The ‘Le Guindy’ Aqueduct

Four miles (6 kilometers) from the house is the ’Le Guindy’ aqueduct, named after the river that flows under it. Built in 1610 it provided drinking water to Treguier where our local Cathedral is located.

Enough! We are off to explore
so we will see you next month.

The Epistle November 2007

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? NO!!!

It's SUPER Grandpa!!!!

Impressing one’s grandchildren isn’t like it used to be. Time was when reading a bedtime story or taking them to the park would suffice but today’s grandchildren have expectations that are hard to keep up with. While recently spending time with our favorite little ones, the family came up with the bright idea to string 1700 mini lights on their 40-foot (13 meter) Pine tree at the entrance to their property for Christmas. After all, they figured, their dad owned a crane with a sixty-foot boom (20 meters) and an industrial safety harness so all they needed was to hang ‘someone’ from the end and have him string the lights.

The qualifications were pretty straightforward. What was needed was someone big, dumb, heavily insured, with a short life expectancy and completely expendable. Not finding a volunteer it was decided to put the

matter to a secret vote and I was unanimously elected.

Risking life and limb for my grandchildren’s entertainment,

I was hoisted up, up and away!!! As an added measure of security I was given my 3 year old granddaughters fairy wings to wear.

After hanging for almost two hours at the whim and mercy of my favorite son in law, the job was done.

TA-DA!!!

The kids are excited about the fact that the tree will have grown taller next year…..

More on our visit later.

Letter from the editor

For some time now the Epistle has gone from a folksy, back of the envelope family and friends newsletter to an intercontinental full featured publication. Complete with color photos, insightful witty reportage and sharp intellectual editorial, we are proud of the fact that we have not accepted one cent from advertisers. (Mind you that would change in a New York minute with the first offer!) We are much like the pre-approved credit card offers you get in the mail, once you are on our list, we maintain a strict no cancellation policy.

Always on the hunt for new ways to better serve our readers, I hired a European software programmer (Ok, so it was my buddy Malcolm next door in France who volunteered) to help me set up a translation feature for The Epistle. Now by simply clicking on the appropriate flag in the upper right hand corner of this page you can read The Epistle in any one of 8 languages as translated by ‘Babel fish’.

Yes, the translation is pathetic and seems like it was done by a 3-legged midget from Bangladesh. It is a work in progress and as the saying goes “it’s better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick”. A mere novelty if you are an English reader, it gives our French, German and Italian friends a chance to get a glimmer of what we are writing about as they look at the pretty pictures.

Cape Cod

As I mentioned last month, our first week away from the Island was spent on the seaside in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. A mere 90 minutes from Boston, we picked up our baby girl Cassie and made our way to a stunning home that we had arranged as home exchange on the cape. The owners will be in Brittany in May after we leave so it worked out rather well.

Unbeknown to us at the time, the home has been featured in “Cape Cod Homes and Gardens” magazine and the owner, an award winning interior designer, was fully deserving of the honor. Cassie was awestruck when she saw the house and her room and we all felt that we had really scored. Much of the week consisted of laying about, taking naps and long walks on the beach, generally being useless lazy slugs.

A little American humor.....

We did make our way over to “P” town as the locals refer to it (AKA as Provincetown). Long known as a Mecca for its largely artsy fartsy and substantially homosexual community, our timing seemed perfect. We arrived in the middle of a transsexual convention of some kind with dozens of six foot, 200-pound beefy guys in pretty strapless dresses, high heels, coiffed long hair and jewelry strolling (or should I say “trolling”) the streets. Travel ensures that there is never a dull moment.

'Fairy' nice men

It was wonderful spending time with our youngest, prior to flying home to California.

Daughter number three

Second youngest in the rat pack of five is daughter number three, our 22-year-old Mandy. Currently studying European Law at Maastricht University in the Netherlands, Mandy is having the time of her life. She first went to Germany as an exchange student for a year after being awarded the ‘Congress Bundestag’ scholarship as one of only two students from each state per year. As required by the program, she returned home for a year to graduate from high school before following her dream of returning to Deutschland (Germany).

After completing the academic requirements to continue her studies there, she was accepted to the University of Bonn. Despite her linguistic skill level she still found the study in German to be daunting and chose to transfer to the English Law program at Maastricht. In spite of the fact that she has been living away from mom and dad for some time, thanks to the Skype computer telephone program, we speak almost daily.

It has been fun lately with her e-mailing me some of the legal briefs she has been working on. Clearly out of my element, I have been of little use beyond pointing out a few spelling mistakes. Don’t you just hate it when you reach the point when your kids are smarter than you?

Naturally, our being in Europe part of the year allows us to connect and has even allowed her to tag along on some of our travels on the continent. A resourceful puss, she has finagled ways to sneak in a trip or two back to California, a visit to Honey Bee Island and Washington DC. This as well as take advantage of opportunities to take short trips with friends around Europe.

Never far behind is her ‘beau’, Markus. This man in her life, is studying aeronautics nearby in Aachen. Clearly more than a boyfriend but careful not to be fiancee, he and Mandy have been an item for 3 years. I say ‘careful’ because together, they have been meticulously calculating in staying within the boundaries that permit Mandy to continue to receive parental financial support for her education (being single). They have done the math and determined that the R.O.I. (return on investment) is higher for them if daddy writes the checks while she is in school instead of ‘Mr. Wonderful’. All attempted bribes and other inducements to elope have failed to budge my wanna-be son in law.

I have a lot of respect for these two who are clearly going to go far.

SLO goes upscale

It is always interesting coming home every six months and seeing the gradual changes that have occurred in our hometown. Something that was under construction six months ago is now open, some shops have relocated and some have gone by the way of the buggy whip.

This time was different. We have never seen so many new seriously upscale businesses spring up in such a short while. SLO (San Luis Obispo) now has a plethora of classy high-end clothing shops, outrageous lingerie stores, home accessory shops, specialty restaurants, wine bars, cigar aficionado bars and even shops that specialize in a single item like olive oil with dozens upon dozens of varieties from the world over.

We now have a shop that sells what are locally know as ‘Freedom fries’ but some still remember as ‘French fries’ with Belgian beer. It is hard to think that this is a big deal except that they offer a large selection of exotic spices and sauces to go with the fries, making it quite a unique treat. This being a college town, it is wildly popular.

Once a week there is an evening farmers market. The name is misleading because besides limiting the main streets to pedestrian’s only traffic, it is more like a Mardi Gras street fair. It is a virtual party where it seems that the whole city attends. There are bands and musicians galore, various street performers like magicians or fire-eaters and even the religious lunatic fringe ‘whack jobs’ carrying signs proclaiming that ‘The end is near!!’ For those familiar with the area, it is fast becoming another beautiful Santa Barbara.

Seattle

The last half of this past month was spent with our daughter Amy’s family in Seattle. The grandkids are all growing like weeds of course and are doing very well. Amy is 6 months pregnant with rascal # 5 so there is never a dull moment at the Lindor’s.

It was great to see our #1 son Wesley there also before his planned move back to Sandpoint Idaho. A free spirit, he has not decided exactly what will await him there.

The original plan was for our visit to provide an opportunity to help my favorite son in law insulate his 5000 sq ft business warehouse (460 sq meters) but he pre empted the plan to insulate and finish a tool storage room from where he can work on his large machinery in an adjacent garage. Vance’s business is buying large used machinery from commercial auctions like Boeing aircraft and reselling them on the open market. Having a shop to make minor repairs and adjustments to the equipment is critical.

Meanwhile Janice made herself indispensable by relieving Amy of many household tasks and by sewing 3-year-old Mary Ann Elisabeth and 6-year-old Maddie’s Christmas church play dresses from scratch.

This month in review

Earlier this month the big news was all about the fires in California. We got an up close and personal look because we actually flew over them coming in to Los Angeles from the East Coast. At the peek there were 900,000 people evacuated from their homes as 15 separate fires raged over a 750 square mile area (1942 square kilometers) and destroyed over 2000 homes. That is like 900 times the population of our village in France. Many kindly wrote, concerned that we were in harms way. Fortunately we were not as the fires were several hours away further south.

Southern California endures fires every year due to the desert climate that ensures plenty of dry grasses and brush to act as fuel. This year’s was particularly bad and was not helped by the fact that two of the larger fires were arson.

Another milestone in our world is that a few days ago we celebrated my 3rd anniversary of my managing to stay out of prison. In other words, I have been out 1/10 th of the time I was in. By my reckoning, that is 2 years and eleven months longer than most of the other ‘guests’ of the system as the recidivism rate is horrendous. The secret to my success? Clean living and pure thoughts…….. This retirement gig is all that it is cracked up to be!

We also spent a week doing our by-yearly maintenance on our home. Clearly not trying to make any improvements per se, we are nevertheless trying to keep it up both for our renters as well for ourselves when we finally decide to return. Too poor (read that as “cheap”) to hire it out, it allows us a hand’s on approach to keeping tabs on our renters and the condition of our home. We have been fortunate in having our neighbor and friend Holly as our property manager during our absence. She is a dear with us but all business with our renters.

This was our last shot at predictable decent warm sunny weather until we return to the Bee in June.

Welcome “home”

Three times a year we get warm welcomes from friends and family for finally coming back “home”. It’s all relative of course, as in each case friends feel that wherever we just came from was just being away on a long trip but now we are ‘back’. Meanwhile, we just left friends who feel that where we are going is just being away on a big long trip but that we will be back home when we are done. We are flattered that each would think of us being home when we are with them but we feel very much at home wherever we are, for the time we are there.

California

What's not to love?

That maybe one of the most fascinating parts of this big adventure but there are some noticeable differences. In California, people are more open to a transient lifestyle and are easier going regarding our coming and going. In The Thousand Islands, there is much more of a temporary mindset in the ongoing friendships as everyone there ‘lives’ somewhere else and either owns a cottage or a yacht and spends the summers there but then moves on when the fall comes. In our village in France there is a much greater expectation in people staying put permanently. Our leaving seems more disruptive to the ebb and flow of relationships but we do our best to transition as smoothly as we can and make a real effort to keep in touch on a frequent basis during our lengthy absences.

We have been asked if we find it hard to ‘spilt ourselves up’ 3 ways like this. Actually we don’t see it as a 3 way split but as an extraordinarily enriching experience that we would not want to miss for the world. It’s either that or a case of schizophrenia of the worse kind. We enjoy 3 times as many friends and varied experiences than we would otherwise and we are very grateful for the opportunity. Meanwhile we await the day when daughter #3 finishes law school so that we can finally return “home”…… for at least a few months of the year.

Enough! We have a plane to catch in a few hours. Next stop: Paris

The Epistle October 2007

Project update

As I write this we have pulled the plug and are transitioning from the Bee to France. We have just arrived in Cape Cod on the Massachusetts coast outside of Boston to do a one-week house exchange for a little R&R before heading west (California) to go east (France). Our daughter Cassie will join us in the morning, flying in from California for a little one on one dad and mom face time.

Cape Cod is a wonderful place to visit and holds many great memories of my youth when we would come tent camp a mile (1 ½ kilometers) from here with my family and spend weeks at the beach. The accommodations we have now are a bit of an upgrade as we are staying in a 3200 square foot home near the beach built by an interior designer. See it at

http://www.homeforexchange.com/property_detailed_view.php?propId=18520

By and large, we managed to complete what we set out to do this summer, pretty much finishing our bedrooms as planned this past month. There are always finishing touches to do, like a little trim here and there but when we think of where we started from, ha!…piece of cake.

Before

After

Before

After (before carpet, paint, trim..)

Gone are the days when we arrived and dreaded opening the front door to face a staggering mess, hideous living conditions and a mountain of work ahead of us. There are projects left that we want to do but it is by choice and at a pace that we set.

This past month Janice and I took a little time off to travel to Glenns Falls near Lake George (upstate N.Y) to attend a hot air festival. [Now, now, lets rise above partisanship and petty politics… there is no calling for thinking that this had to do with Democrat’s! This was a hot air balloon festival!!] We got to see over 90 hot air balloons rise at dawn and watch balloons at sunset with fireworks going off as a backdrop. Very cool.

Again this year we were invited to my aunt and uncle’s cabin North of Ottawa to celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving. We unemployed never pass up a free meal so we were glad to oblige.

As the month progressed, we said our goodbyes to the river and to our friends here. In the final weeks before leaving we began our ritual of firming up our plans for next years projects. It is one thing to show up and resume building but it is another to decide to do something that someone else has to be ready to go when we are. For instance, when we show up next June we want to immediately have carpeting installed in our bedrooms. But we know there is lead-time involved and if we don’t get the rooms measured and have the carpet ordered before we leave, there would be a six-week delay when we would arrive. Ditto for some custom furniture we commissioned and some special order over sized windows and screens for the porch.

The Secret Pilot

One of the few ways that Janice and I differ is that she is so enthused about future projects that she likes to tell everyone in sight about them in their earliest stages of development. I generally like to talk about them when they are a done deal, a 'fait acompli'. People tend to not tell you it was a 'dumb' idea after the fact, especially if things turned out well. I had a neighbor stop by while I was getting ready to install my staircase and he looked downright worried when I explained how I intended to proceed. He had that "the whole damn place will collapse!" look. Now that it is done and the upstairs floor is more solid than it has ever been, I expect he will say " I told him it was going to work all along".

Recently we had friends over who noticed an area in the river adjacent to the island that was staked out and completely “de-weeded”. Mildly curious, they asked what we were planning to do. I was about to give them some blather about 'going green' and 'cleaning out the river' when Janice blurted out “Oh, that’s where Michael wants to dock his airplane”. So much for pillow talk and little marital confidences. The cat was out of the bag.

For those who have wondered what I will do with my time when we finish our construction projects, what follows could give you a hint. Flying is an unfulfilled passion of mine that has been brewing for decades. I could have started much sooner of course but other choices and priorities took precedence. While not imminent, the time is coming quickly. I never really talked about it but when we bought the property in 2000 it was one of the immediate draws for me when I could see that I could easily dock an amphibious airplane at the island. This is different from a floatplane in that it can land either on a conventional runway or on water with the floats on in both cases.

The kids all remember how for years I kept pictures of a helicopter I wanted in my workshop and at work. I finally came to grips with the prohibitive costs and found a compromise I could live with. It would be unfair to say that Janice shares my enthusiasm to the same extent as I do but she is willing to give it a go and I believe she will warm to the whole experience because this is a perfect area for low level slow flying with endless eye candy in all directions. This became all the more evident when we got our hands on a locally published book of photographs taken by Ian Coristine from his amphibious. They are without a doubt the most stunning photos of the area we have ever seen. Take a peek at:

http://www.1000islandsphotoart.com/Albums/tabid/55/Default.aspx Go to any link but be sure to see the one for ‘neighborhoods’. When you do, you will see the indescribable beauty that we experience here for half the year.

We first met Ian at a book signing he was doing. More recently I called to bend his ear on the subject of my plans and to begin the steep learning curve on the do’s and don’ts of having an amphibious at an island. Being a fellow islander himself, he is well versed on the subject and began to set me straight on a number of hair-brained schemes I had.

On another occasion, we had an amusing experience when we had invited other friends over with Ian for a BBQ. They had not met previously so as they talked they quickly realized that they had a common interest in photography. Initially, they figured he was just a nice guy, who like them, took pictures. As the conversation progressed, they started to connect the dots and realized just who Ian was. (He is a well know figure in the Thousand Islands or what you would call a ‘big dog’ in the area). Finally it clicked and they stuttered and stammered “You’re HIM?” with all the excitement of 14-year-old girls taken backstage to meet Mick Jagger at a Rolling Stones concert.

As I mentioned, this is not something I am going to be doing right away. Per prior agreement with “she who must be obeyed” as Wayne would say, next summer will see the completion of our household projects and the construction of the dock for the airplane as well as a deck that will become the assembly area for the aircraft. Oh, did I forget to mention that I would assemble it myself?

I know this is not everyone’s cup of tea but the fact is that I have never been able to get into typical traditional male hobbies. I would rather go to the dentist than fish, be bedridden than golf or watch paint dry than to watch any sports game on TV. My suggestion that the sport franchises buy all the players their own balls so they don’t have to fight over just one has never gone over real big with any of the guys I know.

Listen! …….do you hear that? ......No?

That’s the problem. I hear a drummer few others do.

I was destined to fly.

Fat boy.

Recently I was reading an article on diets. Like many people my age it is a subject that has commanded more of my attention as of late. I am told that people over 25 typically gain about a pound a year and at 57 I can testify that I have followed that schedule to a “T”.

I know myself well enough to know that I am never going to go on some crash diet. I know that they don’t work long term and I am not interested in a yo-yo weight gain / loss /gain type diet. What caught my attention was the fact that at a pound a year it meant that my weight gain was as little as 11 calories a day ----the equivalent of a potato chip! So, I figured that theoretically at least, cutting back on two potato chips a day would allow me to reverse the process at the same rate and loose about a pound a year.

Ok, I know that’s silly. Not the least because it would be impossible to know when that last chip was the “extra” one. Besides, this is not just about chips ----although it is a basic food group--- it’s about making small choices I can live with, like reducing the frequency of calorie intensive food choices and substituting bulky foods that make you feel full but have zero calories. For me, it’s not about cutting back on portions or to ‘eat less’.

The bottom line is that at the rate I was going I figured that by the year 4978, I would weigh over six thousand pounds. Fortunately, I have followed in my daughter Mandy’s footsteps and gone the slow but sure route. I started this on the day I left Europe and in 16 weeks I have lost 3 pounds, determined to return to being the mean lean loving machine my bride married 23 years ago.

What’s an E-pistol?

I have heard it all. "E-pistol", "E-piss-el", "Epastile" and "Apostle" among others. Unless you are a heathen or were raised by Hari Krishna you must know that an Epistle is a letter or a formal communication.

How my little monthly newsletter to family and friends took on the name “The Epistle” was as a result of my long-winded, passionately forceful, error free proclamations [especially regarding all things political, economic or cultural J]. I figured that if I was as infallible in these matters as the Pope is in his, I might as well write with the same divine authority.

THE EPISTLE

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