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Just got home from taking Waldo to the doggy-daycare; he's been living his days in the car at the hospital while we were inside doing work-things; the next 2 days we have to be there all day for job training and since we can't take him in early he will spend a couple of nights. He's great in the car, doesn't chew anything but his toys, but what a crashing bore for him. Driving home was neat. We have no experience driving in the snow and this time we were out in a fairly heavy fall, 12 -18" predicted, ahead of the plows. So it was 4wd, 20mph, and still some slipping and sliding. Now I can sit and watch it come down as I type.

I will go back a bit here. We have not kept up with everyone very well and though I can't fill all the gaps I can at least start with our arrival in Maine in May of 01 - sounds kinda pioneerish.

We left Stitzel Canyon, in the Mimbres in N.M., behind and headed east as soon as we thought the weather would support the move. On arrival here Maine was fine in May. I think that may be when bug season starts, with black flys, but then it is possible that bug season in one form or another is a continual process here. I am presently on the alert for white bugs.

Almost the first thing I discovered here were the auctions. Wow! You go over onto the Gold Coast, which is along Highway 1, where the tourists hang, and everything is top-dollar, but come inland a bit and suddenly you're in the real Maine, the slightly impoverished one. At the inland auctions stuff sells for a dollar and up. None of this "the bidding only moves in $5 increments". This is what I call box-lot country. It is mainly estate sales, and everthing that either doesn't look like it will sell on its own, or will just plain fit into a cardboard container, is poured willy-nilly into boxes, and it goes really cheap. You have to get there early enough to have time to go through the boxes and see if there's something you want. Often you can't really tell what's what, it's such a mishmash, garbage bags of mixed papers, linens and glassware. But not uncommonly you see several boxes go as one lot for under $10: packrat heaven. It makes garage sales look high-priced.

I don't actually get too much box-lot stuff as it is really a clutter once you get the one thing you want out and then try to decide what to do with the rest. No, my allegiance went almost immediately to tools. I was in the process of setting up a woodworking shop; the former owner is a woodworker and he had a good space for a shop. I thought, 'why not?' I had enjoyed what little woodworking i had previously done. First thing, I went the generally acceptable, but very wrong, route of buying some new machinery. It's what you do, right? Nope! You get in touch with some guys who know more about this, like the bunch at www.oldwwmachines.com and you start inserting yourself into their dreams of 'old arn'. Pretty soon you find yourself bidding on, and loading into your truck, the strangest of beasts. You take things apart, carefully labelling nuts, bolts, etc - yeah, right! Sooner or later you actually do get something put back together, all cleaned, tarded-up, a few new parts in place. And you begin to wonder where you can find someone silly enough to want to buy your 'new' machines. It's a devolutionary process that is quite satisfying and loads of fun. Many of the links off the homepage will ultimately lead to old arn.

The summer in Maine was great. Zoe came and spent a few weeks with us, between global excursions. While we're here we might just as well talk about Zoe. She has a job again! I know, to hear me talk you'd think she was going to live off lawsuits 'til the end of time. I was just impatient. To recap: having ridden her last job, an executive jet, down in flames at LAX, Zoe had spent the next 3 years on comp, hanging out in L.A. at sushi bars and coffee shops and rehab - when not in Australia. Don't go thinking fraud here, she really did hurt her back in the crash. And now she is flying again She is the private air attendant, or something like that, for a family of some means who have their own jet and like to fly all to hell and gone and be waited on while watching the clouds roll by. I just heard from her and she's home from a trip that found her in Hawaii, Guam, Hong Kong and Thailand for the last few weeks. What I find neat about the job is that while in a place, say Bangkok, she gets all her expenses paid, is put up in a very classy hotel, eats where she likes, and goes where she likes in a rental car. Her only responsibility on the ground is to be available immediately, if the family decides to fly off impromptu, and to have the plane all supplied and fluffed and ready to go on the next scheduled takeoff. (oh, she remains 31, almost 6' tall, lovely to look at, unattached, and childless; her only real problem is that her feet itch)

Our new house here in Maine is all that we had hoped. It is bigger than anything we have ever lived in before, about 1900 ft. sq., plus double garage, basement, and several hundred sq. ft. of weatherproof and heated shop space. The house in Stitzel Canyon is 700 sq. ft., but the weather is so good there you simply end up living out of doors a lot, day and night.

There are 3 houses visible from ours, each about 150 yards away, and behind us is over 50 acres of woods that are virtually empty, and expected to remain that way given current permitting and code restrictions. We actually have about 3 1/2 acres. Most of it is lawn, the rest woods.

We have been adopted. We bought the house from a couple who has parents, hers, across the road and a brother next door. Oddly enough the house on the other side is a family from Las Cruces. The brother sold his home, but he is building a house a few hundred yards away. They have all taken us in and we are well looked after and treated. I have spent some time helping with framing the brother, Buddy's, new buildings, and the younger brother, Butch, plows us out after each snow. When spring comes we will start framing again, and I can learn some more. Never have done this kind of building before. All I know how to talk is river cobble and adobe.

The really big news is that we have jobs! I, both of us, retired 5 years ago thinking we would never go back onto a hosptial floor. I know, we did just that for 3 month stretches in '98 & '99, but it was time-limited, very close to Pat's kids in the Bay Area and a familiar setting. This time we are in a Catholic hosptial, very unfamiliar ground and a very suspicious set of beliefs. We have, however, found it quite nice. The people are great. They talk about some pretty weird stuff, like what they did with their church group, but nothing gets shoved down your throat. I suppose it's the state of federal law that causes them to actually go out of their way to insist they do not want to convert you to their beliefs, etc. They give lip service, and much more, I think, to a multi-cultural approach that allows for any and all beliefs that support basic human respect and dignity.

Our former job, the County Hospital in Oakland, was real cowboys and indians compared to here. Here you are not expected to be in several knockdown-dragout fights a week with patients, to screen the parking lot for shooters before you approach your car in the parking lot at the end of your shift, or to be ready to rush pell-mell into the ambulance delivery area to assist the police or save paramedics. This is a very refreshing place! Most of the patients here are voluntary, and they don't try to hurt you or threaten to kill you once they get out. The staff seems better, more motivated, more honest here. One thing is they can be fired. In Civil Service almost nobody can be fired.

Pat is working, or will be as we are both still orienting, on an adult acute psych unit, and I have opted for a career change and gone into a chemical dependency unit. I am not real comfortable with the 12 step emphasis on GOD, but iI will find a way to work it out. A lot of atheist users have before me. I understand the basic idea of having to surrender it all up, but I just don't like the god that is presently popular in this culture and haven't found any others who really grabbed me.

So, a few days, or maybe a couple of weeks, later and we are still hard at it in the hospital. I am still an orientee, but they have begun calling me on an emergency basis to come in and help out. I turned down 12 hour shifts for both last night, Friday, and tonight. The nursing shortage appears to continue in full swing. I agreed to do 12 hours a week and am doing close to, or over, 30, and I don't really care for it. But it is so damned hard to say no; the nurses who will be working short are suddenly known to you, and you realize the conditions they face and how much they need the help. My bank balance loves it and my body says "NO!". The night shifts I worked without a twinge a few years ago seem a bit harder now, and suddenly they are 12, rather than 8, hours. I have to admit, though, that it is sort of fun to be doing something I know so well how to do again. The Art of Psych Nursing - oh, well.

Went down to the Trolley Museum near Kennebunk today. Had to turn over a planer to its new owner and the museum was close to a midpoint for us both, and a volunteer there had offered us a tour. A really neat place. Hundreds of acres, I imagine, of old trolley and railway cars. They are simply all over the place waiting to be rebuilt; many years of work are sitting there. It is a working museum with over a mile of tracks, and in the summer when they are open you can ride them. Most of the workers are volunteers, but there are the old guys who still know how to operate and fix this stuff, and it is a mad dash to get this knowledge passed on to the younger guys. Here is their link if you are interested.

February 17th and I haven't updated this lately. Not a lot has changed. The mild winter continues, and we are even getting some days in the 40's now with thawing. I think what comes next may be the most exciting part of the years; it is known locally as 'mud season.' Waldo has really taken to the snow in a big way. He loves to play in it; a favorite game is 'plow face.' Probably a lot of fun until you find a rock.

I have been working more than I have wanted. The money is nice and the hospital gets so desperate. Did 3 night shifts this last week, 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., and they wanted me to catch a fourth. Having trouble believing I am doing this part time at moments. Pat is starting to get more shifts. One of the night nurses on her unit is out with ca. of the brain and pancreas, so Pat will be orienting to nights, rather than her preferred evenings. We both continue to like the hospital and the people we work with.

Our airline tickets to the coast are reserved. We fly into S.F. on 15 May and spend 2 weeks and come home to Maine. With any luck Gillian will actually have the baby while we are there. I will take the rental car and head for L.A. to see Ara during that period.

Zoe took the job with the rich family and is now their personal air attendant. She will start at $52k/yr. and be based out of Oahu. But there will be lots of travel and staying in hotels in Australia and France and things like that that the rest of us probably wouldn't want to do.

I have been buying more old tools, as you can see from the growing list on the homepage. I will very soon have to prove myself once again by building something. About 2 or 3 times a week I do get in some shop time, but working nights is leaving me a bit drained and I feel like I am often too tired to go out there and be focused enough to use things that whirl very fast and cut without remorse. Soon, though.

We are more than ready for the winter to end. I look forward to getting on the lawn tractor and spending hours going round and round in circles cutting grass while complaining vigorously.