The Cantina

Well, this past weekend was the season opener for camping season and I have to tell you that there’s nothing I enjoy more than standing outside on a frigid, rainy evening with an icy cold drink in my hand. I’m kidding of course. The weather was miserable. It was cold and windy. It rained about half the time but we all made the best of it. We got our campers set up and the basics laid out. When it rained hard we all went into our campers and cleaned and organized them. When it wasn’t raining, we huddled around a big campfire and drank like vikings. We all had fun and we all got a lot of stuff done.

I mounted a 17″ monitor on the wall of my camper to use as a PC and TV. They gave me an AT&T wireless air card from work since I’m on call one week a month, and a USB TV tuner will come in handy for rainy days and the morning news. Wall mounting a tv or monitor is a must in a camper for saving space since real estate in a small camper is at a premium. I’m pretty happy with it.

Next week I’ll take the golf cart, picnic tables and some firewood up. I’ll try to remember to bring my camera along so I can take some pictures to share. The weather is supposed to be nice so prolly not much else will get done other than beer drinking and bullshitting since the boating season doesn’t officially start until mid May.

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Now I’ll be the first to admit that I’m no Ty Pennington. I’m a systems administrator Jim, not a carpenter, so for all you true craftsmen out there, please hold your laughter to a minimum. Anyway, I got to looking at the cabin door on my sailboat a few weeks ago and had a bright idea to build and install a drink holder on it. There are no drink holders installed in the CP-16 from the factory, in fact, back in 1981 when this was made, there weren’t a whole lot of options period for this model sailboat, so one can pretty much pimp them out however they want. I’ve just started really, and this post is about the cabin door. The picture to the left is the cabin door as it was originally from the factory. That is still the way it looks when I have my customized side of the door facing in.

The picture on the right shows the inside of the cabin door in it’s original configuration(at least, this is the way it was when I got it). That frame is a 1/2″ aluminum angle and I guess was designed by the factory to hold the slabs of Teak togetfher to form and brace the door. I thought the frame was ugly. All last year I thought about mounting a sailboat picture or a mirror in there or anything to dress it up a bit. While I was out working on the boat a few weeks ago it hit me. I can install a backing plate inside that frame and mount a drink holder and maybe some other stuff on there, so that’s what I did.

I had a 1×8 piece of pine out in the garage so that’s what I used. I cut two pieces to fit horizontally inside the frame and that left about 3 /12 inches left at the bottom. Perfect height for a drink holder. So I measured and cut out the top bottom and braces for it. Then I busted out the trusty 3″ hole saw to cut holes out of the top. Ooooops, no brass screws in the inventory, so I hustled up to the hardware store to grab some before they closed. You have to use brass or stainless on anything related to the boat or they’ll rust out on you. Anyway, I screwed it together and dropped it into place for a perfect fit. It looked good to me so I brought everything in, gave it a quick sand and a few coats of finish. Here’s what the cabin door looks like from inside the cabin now.

Since the cabin door is completely reversable, you can slide it into place front side out or front side in. So now I can put it with the functional side facing the cockpit when I’m sailing to keep my drinks and my GPS/Marine Radio from rolling and sliding all over the cockpit, and I can reverse it for some nifty organization for when I’m camping out inside the cabin. Since there’s still plenty of real estate near the top of the door, I may install a compass and a pouch for my cell phone. The possibilities are endless 😀

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Anybody who has ever bought some little piece of new technology and got completely frustrated with trying to figure out how to use it will apppreciate this video. Anyone who’s ever fantasized about beating the ever loving snot out of the little cocksucking engineer that invented this piece of shit and then jamming it up his ass, will thoroughly enjoy this video. Anyone who has dreamed of having a loaded rifle atop a high tower after reading though menu after menu, and page after page of worthless documentation that helps absolutely no one, will appreciate this video. Personally, I’d like to see a little honesy in advertising.

THIS SOUNDTRACK IS NOT WORK SAFE!!!!

Having said that…..Enjoy!

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I don’t know why all of the sudden I feel like writing about these memories, but I do. If they bore you, please move on. Nothing to see here. You’ll have to wait till I get pissed off about something stupid Obama or his viceroy’s do if you want the juicy stuff.

Anyway, I played music professionally from the early 80’s to the mid 90’s. My most successful run was from 1988 to 1992. I had a great band at that time and we were working all the best clubs. We had an awesome fan base in central PA and everything was just falling into place with a lot of hard work and a lot of great music. I landed a solo gig opening up for Joan Osbourne in ’92. I booked the gig prolly around June of ’92 for a play date of late September. It was supposed to be just me and my guitar for a 45 minute opening set at Club Met, which was the biggest rock club in central PA at the time, and then Joan and her band would take the stage. I was really excited about it. Joan wasn’t real famous yet, but anyone who was into music knew who she was. She wouldn’t become a household name for about another 3 years when in 1995 she released “One of us” which comes from the refrain in the song “What if God was one of us?” Anyway, Joan was on fire and was touring all over the states and I was lucky to get the gig.

Something bad happened though on August 2nd of that year. I was in a bad motorcycle crash and lost my left leg. It was a very serious crash and injury as I’m sure you can imagine. August was a big pain blur for me. Naturally, August’s play dates were cancelled and so were most of September’s but I wasn’t going to let the honor of opening for Joan get away from me.

I was in severe pain and on heavy doses of mscontin.
I was all screwed up mentally and physically and decided that I still wanted to do the gig, but I didn’t want to do it myself, so I called my friend Dave Venet and asked him if he’d do a duo with me that night, and he accepted.

My mom hated the whole idea. She moved in with me after I was released from the hospital to take care of me, so she knew first hand what a mess I was, but she reluctantly drove me to the gig anyway. So, I’m in a wheel chair in pajama pants and a t-shirt and off to the club we go. I took an extra jolt or two of the pain killers to try to put that excruciating pain somewhere other than right in front of my face and once we were there I was getting my friends to order me and sneak me Jack and cokes when Mom wasn’t looking. She was all on my ass about drinking while I was on such heavy pain medication and wasn’t happy about the entire situation.

Show time comes. Me and Dave are on stage and the lights are dim. The local radio celebrities are getting the crowd jacked up and here we go. We get introduced and the lights come up and it becomes totally quiet. Pin drop quiet. I see a bunch of my friends and people I know in the audience and they’re all looking at me with compassion and hurt, as if they are sharing my pain. I made some kind of stupid joke about….”Don’t worry folk’s. I’m ok. It was just a motorcycle crash, but look what the hospital took for the bill!”

It’s seemed to lighten the mood and Dave and I started jamming. We played some great tunes that night and the crowd was into it, not only for us but they were really stoked for Joan. When our set was over, we went back into the dressing room and I got to meet Joan and her band. They knew what had happened to me and were completely amazed that I even did the gig. They treated me with with a great amount of respect and were all just incredible people. They all signed a t-shirt and gave it to me and I still have it today and keep it with my most valued possessions.

We stuck around for a little while while they played but Mom wasn’t having any of it and we had to go. I was drugged and drunk. She was pissed and in charge.

I didn’t do the gig for like…”the show must go on” or anything like that. I was having a hard time mentally at the time about losing my leg and I had to do it for myself to try to convince myself that my life would still continue with some type of normalcy. It was weird. Anyway, it was a memorable night for me and I’ll never forget meeting Joan and her band and how awesome they were, not only as musicians, but as people. Just people.

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I started playing music at a very young age. My step dad played guitar so there was always one or two sitting around the house. I’d say it started at maybe age 5 or 6 for me. I continued to play through high school just for fun, for myself. My brothers and step brother played too. It was kind of a family thing. We lived on a farm with shitty tv reception. There wasn’t much else to do really.

By the time I hit my late teens I was good enough to play the bar circuit and that’s what I did. I played my guitar and sang for people for a long time. I played and sang for every reason a person plays and sings. To share the music. To share the emotion. To share the feeling. To be popular. To get girls. To play for money. To make a living. To play for fun. Every stage of the game was for one of those reasons.

I did pretty good. I hooked up with some great musicians. I made a record. I had a few great bands. I opened for national acts. I opened for Jonny Winter, Marshall tucker, Joan Osbourne, Lonnie Brooks and many more. I played on stage with Bo Diddley. It was a great accomplishment and a great time in my life. I used to love the thrill of the crowd and the excitement of the performance. I used to love everything about it. But then it wore off.

I like to be alone now. I spent so many years in the spotlight that I hate the spotlight now. I hate being recognized. I’ve gone the complete opposite. I moved to the mountains. I don’t keep in contact with anyone. I hate when someone recognizes me. I haven’t been in a bar in over 2 years. I seldom talk about those days and I’m not sure why I’m talking about it now. I had fun back then. More fun than most can imagine. But I’ve been there and done that and now, I just enjoy the memory.

My guitars sit in their cases. Untouched, abandoned and forgotten. I never play them anymore. I don’t want to pour my heart and soul out on a stage anymore. The little piece of myself that I have left I want to keep to myself. It’s weird.

Anyway, I enjoy every memory I have of that time in my life and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. I’ve just sort of moved on. Not ahead or behind. Just….moved on.

The pic is of a gig I did with Bo Didley at Gullifty’s in New Cumberland back in the early 90’s. That’s Bo up front, Ski playing drums and me in the back playing guitar. What a night!

Filed Under: Entertainment, General 3 Comments »

Amazing isn’t it. If you add up all of the money that Obama has spent in the 50 days that he’s been in office on stimulus, bailouts, spending bills, and other democratic policies that he recklessly signs as they cross his desk, you’ll find that he’s spending our tax dollars at one billion dollars an hour. These are my tax dollars and your tax dollars. No, that’s not right. These aren’t even dollars yet. These are your children’s and grand children’s tax dollars.

That’s impressive. That’s change. Sheeple wanted change. You got change. Everything but change in your pocket.

His policies have decimated my stock portfolio and your 401k plan. Your retirement nest egg is history folks. You are being led into an existence now where you will have to rely on the government to take care of you for everything, but the government is putting itself into trillions of dollars of debt at an alarming rate. So when the time comes that you need to be taken care of, it’ll be ching way, screw you, sorry we’re broke. It’s called socialism. The next step is communism. I find it ironic that the namesake of a democratic society can be the ones who propel us into socialism. Don’t you?

Everyone thought they bottomed out in November when the market crashed. But then Obama came along and with his lack of understanding of the free market, cut my already 50% losses in half again, just since his inauguration. But that has nothing to or little to do with the spending of a billion dollars an hour.

While Obama campaigned against earmark spending and says he’s against it, he just signed a bill with 9000 of them. My god. This is insane. Every democrat that voted for this asshole owes me and the rest of America an apology. I want it now… or no… Maybe I’ll wait, because it’s not over yet. No.. no, it’s just begun.

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I spent the better part of my adult life riding Harleys and hanging out with a bunch of misfits. I honestly wouldn’t have it any other way. I have a thousand stories, all of them are true. Most are beyond a normal person’s comprehension or ability to even imagine people doing the shit we did, but sometimes it’s the simple things and the little things in life that make it all worth while, and that’s what this post is about. One of the simple things. One night.

It involves Dave “Crusty” Conrad. I wrote about him in an earlier post about riding in New Hampshire during bike week. Dave and I had another memorable ride once. It’s going to be hard to describe because where we went and what we did means nothing. Where we left from, where we went to, and what we did while we were there means nothing.

I have hand full of friends that I trust on the road. You get that way when you spend your life on a bike. You ride with hundreds of people, but only a few that you really, really trust….on the road. You ride thousands of miles and with every single mile you get to know someone. You get to know how they react to things. Like deer jumping out, an oncoming driver, a crosswind, a plastic bag blowing across the street.

Real bikers ride side by side, elbow to elbow, handlebar to handlebar and they ride fast cause it ain’t no fun if you ain’t leanin. You get to know your true friends well on the road if you spend enough time with them and push the limits with them. Trust me. I’m telling you the truth.

Dave and I were just bar hopping one night. I can’t tell you the year, the month or the day. It didn’t matter back then. We were just out on another night like so many other nights. But this night, we went for a good long run. We went from Dauphin up to Halifax, then to E-ville, bar hopping all along the way. All mountain roads. Winding twisting mountain roads. It was cool on the way there but nothing special. Just another night of bar hopping on the Harleys. The ride home was amazing.

Everything was just right when we left the Washington Hotel. The temperature was probably about 75 degrees, no wind and the moon was full and bright. We were both in a good mood and we had a great night of partying with old friends and new. The mood was cool. We were happy. We were both young and free and living a dream. We fired up the hogs, an impressive sound, even though we heard it every day and night of our lives, and pulled out. There’s a stop light right there so we saddled up side by side and waited for the green. It wasn’t a race mind you. We were just sizing up and positioning for the ride home. The next twenty miles would be some of the best miles I ever rode.

Like I said earler. Everything was right. There was new blacktop for twenty miles, and it was beautiful summer night air and there was a full moon. There was a strong long-time friendship between us and there was a few hours of just having a damn fine time with the evening. Most of all there was trust. I knew how Crusty rode and he knew how I rode. I liked the yellow and he liked the white. (For those of you who don’t understand that, it refers to the color of the lines on the road and the side of the lane that you prefer to ride when riding a motorcycle….side by side).

Crusty and I hit the throttle and off we went, me on the left and him on the right. We both had the right amount of beer in us. Everything was just right. We rode from E-town to halifax, about 20 miles of beautiful winding freshly blacktopped mountain road at an average of about 20 to 30 mph over the speed limit, handlebar to handlebar, side by side. There were so many times that night that our bikes threw sparks from steel hitting road that I couldn’t even keep count. Kickstands, frames, exaust pipes and rubber blasting down and testing….gouging the highway. It was beautiful. It was as if our bikes were one. One bike, two riders. It was that tight. But there were two bikes and two riders that night. It was a ballet. A symphony. It was a beautiful thing. I’ll remember it as long as I live. It was one truly one of the highlights of my life. I trusted Crusty with my life. He trusted me with his. We rode way too fast for way too long and everything went right. Handlebar to handlebar, elbow to elbow, side by side. It was a beautiful night.

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I just received great news in the mailbox. Camping season is normally from April 15th to October 15th every year but since April 15th falls on a Wednesday, the campground owner is allowing us to move our campers in on Friday, April 10th. I’ve updated the camping season countdown clock on the right side of this page to reflect this.

I have much to do and a great weekend forecast to get started. It’s supposed to be in the 60s tomorrow and Sunday. Let’s see….

I have to apply a few more coats of urethane to my sailboat mast and booms, clean my camper. I need to plug it in and get a good charge on the emergency battery. I need to fix a tire on my golf cart since it’s my main mode of land transportation up there. I’ll need to drain the antifreeze out of the water system in the camper and flush it all out with fresh water. Better fill the water tank too because they won’t turn on the campground water till prolly the beginning of May. I have work to do on both of my boats. Cleaning and some minor repairs. I have to mount my transom ladder on the sailboat….

Man this is great. I hibernate and do as little as possible in the winter. I hate winter. This marks the beginning of 2009 fun for me. A few weeks of hard work and I’ll be ready to party all summer. Woo Hoo!

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Thanks Kimmer. I’ve been obsessed with this ever since you sent me that article. (Read my earlier post on the subject if you don’t know what I’m talking about).

I almost hate what I’m about to write because it’s going to sound so……Democratic. But I think it’s common sense. Illegal immigration is a huge problem in the good ‘ol US of A. I could sit here and type all the reasons and costs of why it’s such a big problem, but why do that when the government already did. You can read the staggering numbers right at this study on the Center for Immigration Studies website. For more information, go to the root domain right here and follow some of the links.

You’ll learn some amazing numbers and some really stupid ideas on how to fix the problem. Like building a big fence. Like assimilation and granting citizenship. Perhaps you’ll read long enough to read about political asylum.

All bad ideas if you ask me. All are reactive measures that don’t even look in the direction of the real problem, let alone address it. The real problem is that the mexican people that are desperatly trying to enter this country are trying to escape the horror of extreme poverty, disease and starvation. You don’t see Mexico’s elite scaling a fence or hiding in the back of a manure truck trying to get here. You don’t see Mexico’s businessmen and Mexican doctors running through the Arizona desert. You see Mexico’s poorest, most destitute people trying to save themselves and their families from a lifetime of misery.

Stick with me here for a minute. Say you have an asshole neighbor. Say that asshole neighbor has a dog chained up out back. Day after day and week after week you see this dog tied up out in the back yard of your asshole neighbor’s house. The asshole never gives him any fresh water. Maybe once or twice a week you actually see food in the dog’s dish. There’s no shelter. No box or doghouse to get in out of the rain and snow and wind. Just a poor shivering, starving dog trapped in a life of misery with an uncaring asshole in charge of his destiny, chained to a tree in the asshole neighbor’s back yard.

Then one day the dog gets so thin from the abuse and starvation that he slips out of his collar and breaks free. First thing he does is go to the trash cans and knocks them over to get something to eat because he’s starving. Let’s say you’re a nice person and actually put out a bowl of food and water for him and he sneaks up to your porch to get it. The asshole neighbor sees this, beats the dog and chains him back up to the tree, but since he’s an asshole, he doesn’t change anything. He still starves the dog and putting water out for him is a pain in his ass so he only does it once a week.

All the dog can think about is the glorious day that he broke free and got someting to eat and some fresh water. So now the dog thinks about breaking free all the time, and he does.

Does this make that dog a bad dog or is that just a good dog in a bad situation with natural survival instincts?

I think the answer to the illegal immigration problem lies in working with the Mexican government to put an end to their extreme poverty problem. I think if we spent half of the time, effort and money we spend now on the unsuccessful illegal immigration tactics that we currently employ and put that energy towards creating an environment where these desperately desperate people had some food, education, medical care and career opportunity that they wouldn’t be so quick to slip the chain, jump the fence and run to the neighbor’s house for food and water.

I think the solution lies in helping them out where they are so they don’t want to leave.

It’s time for a true story. I lived in Dauphin for about 12 years of my life. Every day when I’d drive home I’d pass this house that had a cute little Chow chained to a tree out front. The dog rarely had a bowl of water. It was always upside down and bone dry. For months I drove by and saw the dog getting thinner and thinner. I could see his ribs from the moving car. Still no water. That was the dog’s existence. No matter what time of the day or night I went by, he was there. Chained to the tree. No food, no water.

Finally late one night I stopped and unhooked him and put him in my truck and took him home. That’s right. I dog napped him. I fed him and gave him all the water he could drink. The next day I took him to the vet and got him shots and worm medicine that he badly needed. I took him back home and kept him for about three weeks until he started looking nice and healthy again. He was a nice dog. I thought about keeping him, but I couldn’t. I am a lot of things but I’m not a thief. Here’s what I did.

I taped a note to his collar and took him back one night and chained him back up to his tree. The note read something like this.

“I took your dog. He was in dire need of food, water and a vet. The rest of his medicine is in his doghouse. If I see him being neglected again I’m going to kick the shit out of you and then turn you into the authorities for neglect and abuse”.

Believe it or not it worked. They put an unspillable water dish out there. Half the time I’d drive by, he wasn’t there. I imagine he was in the house or somewhere. At least he was getting some kind of attention. He never lost weight or looked neglected after that either. I think they must have got the note.  The moral of the story?  I saw one of God’s creatures desperately in need and I took action at my own time and cost.  I brought him back to a stable level of health and then put him back where I found him with some insightful instructions and menacing consequences if those instructions weren’t followed, and I saved a life.  The same philosophy could easily be applied with the immigration problem.

Anyway, I’m glad I could share that story with you. That was back in the mid 80’s and I’m sure the statute of limitations has expired on the dog napping and threat charges that I could have gotten arrested for, but the meat and moral of the story remains the same.

The answer to the problem lies with creating a suitable environment where they are, so that there is no reason to escape. It’s common sense really. The only Canadians we see breaching our borders are rich ones who want to retire in Florida. Think about it.

Filed Under: General, Politics 1 Comment »

Motivation is at an all time low. I woke up this morning and watched as flurries of snow put a light dusting on everything outside. There’s a cold front coming in from the north so as the day goes on, the colder it gets. I don’t want to go outside. I hate the cold. My house needs cleaned in the worst way but I don’t feel like cleaning it. I’ll reluctantly put some laundry in later, just because I need some clean clothes for work next week. My desk is a wreck. The windows need washed and there’s a thick coating of dust on the piano. All the ash trays are full and every table and flat surface in the house has a bunch of shit stacked on it that needs thrown out or put away.

There’s nothing on tv but paid programming and I think that I’ve seen everything there is to see on the internet. There are prolly about 30 little projects around here that need done but I don’t feel like doing any of them. I think I need an optical rectumy. That’s where they snip that nerve that runs from your asshole to your eyeballs that gives you a shitty outlook.

Ok, screw it. Enough whining. I’m gonna grab a broom. I can pretty much guarantee though that it’s not going to be a white tornado in here. Prolly more like a mild drizzle but I have to start somewhere.

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