Navy Chronicles: Chapter Three

As a graphic illustration of just how dangerous it was on a carrier flight deck, I’ll relate this story. Whenever we were scheduled to fly and tow some targets, we were always positioned on the very aft end of the flight deck with our tail feathers hanging over the edge. All the other planes in this particular launch cycle would be lined up in front of us, tied down and ready to start the engines. There might be ten rows of three or four planes abreast across the flight deck waiting to launch. An auxiliary starting cart was used to get each plane started. This was no more than a giant battery on wheels with a steering wheel and a seat for the driver and a long power cord to plug into the aircraft. They always started at the back of the pack and got each plane going as they moved forward. This was to keep all the whirling propellers and sucking jet engine intakes behind the cart driver. All was proceeding according to plan one day. We were the first to fire up and the cart moved forward till he had most of the planes turning and burning. For some reason or other the plane directly in front of us had stalled his engine and he called Prifly on the radio and requested the start cart to return to him and get him going again. Well the plane in front of him was doing his pre take off engine run-up where the throttle is pushed up to 30 inches manifold pressure and about 2000 rpm in order to check out the magneto operation of the engine. The cart driver had gotten the word to go back and start the plane in front of us. He turned his cart toward us and drove right through the prop arc of the plane doing the engine checkout! Sitting in the right front seat of my airplane, I had just happened to look up and out the canopy and was watching as the cart driver made his fatal turn. When he hit that 16 foot prop turning that fast, he in effect disintegrated into a cloud of blood bone and small pieces of meat. They immediately covered the windscreen of our plane and my arm that had been hanging out the side of the canopy. Whereupon my stomach revolted at what I had just witnessed and all my previous meal was deposited on the instrument panel, my lap, and the deck of the cockpit! The pilot, who had his head down checking out his flight plan, looked at me and yells, “what the hell did you do that for”? I just pointed at the remains of the cart driver and he then proceeded to help me cover the inside of our trusty steed with puke! They shut the whole flight deck down and cancelled flight ops for the rest of the day while all the mess was cleaned up and as much of the victim as possible was recovered. I spent the next two days trying to get all the puke and smell out of my plane.
Whenever we were out on one of the carriers, they were always conducting some kind of operations with some of our Allied forces ships and planes. These ops would go on for up to ten days at a time twenty four hours a day. So you would be up on the flight deck sitting in your plane waiting to be re-spotted or getting ready to go flying. There were times out there that I never once got to sleep in a bunk for the usual two week tour on board. They would assign you a bunk with the particular squadron that you were hooked up with, but half the time I wasn’t able to go below decks long enough to find out where the hell mine was! I probably spent a couple thousand hours of my tour in Italy, sleeping on the deck of various airplanes! When we weren’t flying or moving planes around, there was specified maintenance that had to be done on my plane, so I was kept constantly on the go for the total time I was out there.
Being a prop driven plane, we usually made deck runs in order to launch us into the blue. One time though we had pulled into Barcelona Spain and dropped anchor in the bay. Then some of the powers that be decided they wanted the AD-5N tow plane on the beach. They called down to the flight deck and told me to get ready to launch my bird. Oh boy, here comes my first cat shot. “Cat shot” means a steam catapult launch. They usually do this while steaming along at about thirty knots in the open ocean. This gets a lot of wind under the wings and helps mightily in sustaining flight. Well this was to be a shot from a dead stop! The “Airboss”, CAG, (Carrier Air Group commander) was going to be the driver to deliver me to the beach. He was also an A5D Vigilante pilot and all the cat crew and associated people saw his name come up quite regularly on the flight schedule driving one of those big-assed birds. It was about three times bigger than my AD-5. See where I’m going here? It, the A5D was probably the heaviest plane on board except for the “Fords”, F4D Skyrays. Anyway they took the “ready plane” off the starboard cat and loaded us up with the “bridle” to connect us to the steam cat and made us ready to depart the premises. The pilot had the engine at takeoff power and the cat officer signaled that we were off! Man, I have never before or since, gone from standing completely still to 120 mph in about three seconds! That was a literal “kick in the ass”! Just as soon as the cat fired, the CAG started screaming at me and anybody else listening to be ready to ditch!! He had realizes as soon as we started moving that we were moving way to fast for this particular plane and that the cat had been set for the much heavier A5D! As soon as we passed over the deck edge he hollers at me to look at the wing root and see if there were any wrinkles down there. I responded that there was a whole line of them all the way to the tip! So he calls Prifly on the radio to apprise them of what had just happened and then called the beach to request an immediate straight in and low approach to the active. We got it and after he had put her down oh so gently, and taxied to the ramp and shut down, we got out and looked her over. There were wrinkles in both the horizontal and vertical stabilizers, in the fuselage sides and both wings! That was the last flight for that plane as it had to be completely dismantled and sent back to Quonset Pt. For a total overhaul! After that, and on other carriers, I was able to wrangle a few rides in the various big jets. It was still a thrill, but didn’t really compare to that first ride. There was always a big adrenaline rush every time though as you wondered if the plane was going to fly or turn into a submarine as they sometimes did!

On the second day of the very first trip out to a carrier, I was forward of the Island watching the planes being launched when I saw what I thought was a guy committing suicide! Right after a plane had been launched; he ran over the leading edge of the deck and disappeared! I was just getting ready to start screaming “man overboard” when he comes miraculously back up over the edge! He had this big piece of cable in his hand. After watching a while longer, I was able to figure out that he was retrieving the bridle used to hook the planes to the cat shuttle in the deck. There was, and is, a huge steel cable safety net that caught the bridle and the guy sent to bring it back. Boy was I glad that I hadn’t had time to start screaming about a man overboard. That Flight Deck Officer probably would have thrown me overboard after the shenanigans of the night before!
There was one man overboard instance while I was aboard the USS America. A sailor will lie down and go to sleep anywhere at anytime when they are involved in one of these twenty four hour a day, seven day a week evolutions. In this instance, a mechanic had decided to crawl up the tail pipe of an F8U Corsair while it was spotted in the middle of the deck. After he had fallen asleep, the deck was re-spotted and the plane he was in was positioned at the edge of the deck with the after part of the fuselage hanging out over the water. They used to put the main landing gear right up against the little ridge that ran all around the deck. They did this to gain as much space as possible out there on the deck for maneuvering purposes. Now it comes time to start the engines for the upcoming launch. The noise finally woke up the sleeping beauty and he proceeded to back out of his hidey hole and right into space and shortly after an eighty foot drop, into the loving arms of Davy Jones locker! Unbelievablely, the starboard wing lookout on the destroyer following the carrier during launch happened to see the guy fall into the water, and they were able to put a small boat in the water and retrieve his lucky dumb ass!
So this was pretty much my life for the next few months. I’d get back to Naples from one ship and then off I’d go to another one, or to some airport in another country close to where ever these ships were to be operating, for another sojourn. It was a great job and I loved it, but better things were a-coming!
Whenever anyone would take a plane out to a Carrier, the guys who had been out there previous to your trip would come up to you and give you their “cigarette card”. This was a piece of cardboard about the size of a nowadays credit card. It allowed you to go to the ship store and buy 2 cartons of cigarettes a week. These were rationed Items at the time on board ship and also at the Navy Exchange in Naples. They cost us $1.50 a carton. On the black market in downtown Naples that same carton would sell for about $200! You see where I’m going. You couldn’t just walk down town and look for someone to buy them though. There were the State Police and various other law types looking to confiscate them themselves for their own nefarious purposes. So you had to find a middle-man who would take them off your hands for a somewhat smaller but much safer profit. It turned out that the person we would wind up selling all of ours too, was a recently deported from America hood, by the name of Luciano who owned two of the bars that we frequented. He would give us $5 a carton, no danger involved. The thing that amazed me though, was that they would open each pack and hold all the cigarettes loose in their hand. Where upon Luckys henchmen would stand on the street corner and sell those butts one at a time for $1 apiece! Now he’s making $200 dollars a carton! So back on the ship on my first trip out there, I have acquired six of these cards and I’m only going to be there for two weeks. Every time I would go up to the window to get my two cartons and get my ticket punched, I’d have on some kind of disguise so the guy who was the dispenser of cigs wouldn’t recognize me. I’d wear different colored flight deck shirts and either wear my glasses or not, sometimes I’d wear my flight deck helmet and other times just my hat. I was paranoid that I was going to get caught and tossed in the brig. It never dawned on me that the one guy who ran the place couldn’t possibly remember 5000 faces and names! All this messing around for the grand sum of $60 bucks when I got them back to Naples and sold them. So I decided that it wasn’t worth it for the money I got, if I got busted. Although $60 was a lot of money to have in your hand back in ‘59-’60.
This was the beginning of three of the best years of my then young life. I may not have realized it then, but looking back now, I wish all of my kids could have had the same experience. I hung around with a bunch of guys that looked and acted just like the characters on the TV program, “Happy Days”, you know, Ritchie, Potsy, and The Fonz. Seeing as this part of my life was taking place in the last of the fifties, I guess it is only fitting that we were unknown role models for these guys. I think the writers were following us around and storing material for twenty years later!
There were a few mishaps in the course of my flying career over there. On one occasion just after we had made our deck run for takeoff from the carrier, the engine had a terminal seizure and quit just after we had made our turn to the left after lift off. This was a good thing because now we were not in the path of that gigantic ship as our not-so-trusty AD-5 steed settled into the water a couple hundred yards ahead of it! This was another reason to keep the canopy open on takeoff and landing. By the time the “Angel”, read that, rescue helicopter arrived, I was standing on the wing of the plane with my brand new flight boots hanging around my neck. They never even got wet! You seem to do strange things when under sudden stress.
On another occasion, we had just left the island nation of Malta and were on our way back to Naples. We had just finished climbing to 10,000 feet when the pilot decided to change from the main fuel tank to one of the drop tanks hung under the wing. On goes the fuel boost pump and then he turned the selector handle. Right then our troubles started. For some reason, it wouldn’t draw the fuel, so he immediately switched back to the main tank. Now the only trouble was, it wouldn’t suck from that one either! Major problems now. That big old fan out in the front had stopped generating any wind on its own and it definitely made the sweat start in the cockpit! He then hollers at me to prepare for bail out over the intercom. I just kind of looked at him and said that I don’t want to do that! He said that if I didn’t go when he told me to, I’d be up here in this flying brick all by myself. That kind of changed my attitude real quick. He mean while had been broadcasting a Mayday signal all the while our Skyraider was making a bee line for the water. The glide ratio for the good old AD series of Mr. Douglas’ airplanes was about ½:1! That’s ½ a mile forward for each mile down. From our initial altitude of ten thousand feet, that meant we were NOT going to reach anything resembling dry ground. All this took place pretty fast and as we passed “angels 7” the pilot said to go! The procedure was to unstrap yourself and stand in the seat with one hand on the front, and one on the back of the canopy. You then pulled/threw yourself at the trailing edge of the wing and hopefully you would miss the horizontal stabilizer as you went by! Well that all went as advertised and I made the frantic grab and pulled the ripcord from it’s socket whereupon the canopy blossomed above me. Right then I was thanking my buddy Bill Tkacz, for packing that ‘chute just right! For some reason or other I noticed that the front of my flight suit was all wet, but I didn’t remember going through any rain on the way down! Shortly thereafter I notice the water was coming up to greet me pretty fast. I just had time to deploy my raft package and get hold of my nose when I hit the water and went down about six to eight feet. I immediately yanked the two strings that inflated good old Mae West, and I popped right to the surface. Again, just as advertised in all the training I had received before getting my AirCrewmans wings! As I was climbing into my raft, I noticed the pilot in his and paddling toward me using his hands, so I did the same and very soon we were joined up. He then told me that he had received a reply from the base at Malta, and that a chopper was on the way. In about forty minutes we heard a helo in the distance and we both popped an Orange smoke flare so they could locate us a little easier. Shortly, an RAF rescue helo was over head, and they promptly winched us aboard and returned us the place whence we had so recently departed!
My next to last departure from normal flight, occurred in Athens, Greece. This time we were in an SNB-5 Buno. 10115. It was one of those “pilot proficiency” flights where all we did was go round and round the airport making touch and go’s for four hours. Well, as there was nothing for me to do during this time period, I was lying on the deck between the two rows of seats in the back. All of a sudden it got real quiet and this is not a good thing when you are aviating! I woke up from a sound snooze to discover the two pilots frantically trying to start BOTH engines at once! Some how or other they had managed to get the fuel selector handle broken off while it was being turned from one tank to another! I was pumping to beat hell on the wobble pump handle trying to get some fuel to the engine. But having not gotten a tank selected fully, the engines were only getting a minimal amount of fuel, and kept revving up and then backfiring as the pilots had both of them fire-walled! By then the ground was approaching at a terrific speed and they turned their attention to putting us down in once piece hopefully. We actually slammed down with our wheels up onto the side of a big hill going uphill. There was one hell of a cloud of dirt, dust, and grapes flying thru the air as we made our unscheduled arrival in some guy’s vineyard. I had just managed to get into the front seat of the passenger cabin before we hit. The two front seats were facing to the rear so I really didn’t have to be strapped in. All I got out of the incident was one hell of a headache when my head slammed against the forward cabin divider! No harm done there though as it was, and is pretty hard.
My last departure from an in-flight aircraft came a couple months earlier than the above one and the details will be found in another document called “Medals” suffice it to say.
And so ends page 11 of a total of 24. Hope you can stand it!! Ciao.

Navy Chronicles: Chapter Two

I think I'm going to put up four pages to make this go a little faster.

Old Sam Baker sent you out to do whatever job was deemed necessary. He was also the guy who assigned people to be plane captains and aircrew members for each a/c. These were the two coveted jobs in Naval Aviation for an enlisted man, and was what I wanted to do! After having been there for a couple of months, a vacancy came up for a P/C on one of the AD5-N’s and I got the job on a probationary basis! This was only after the Chief had read my record and found out I had been in VXE-6 and had wintered over on the ice in Antarctica, and that I already had my Aircrewman wings. Every morning after quarters, you would go to your plane and do the preflight on it, and make sure it was ready to go flying. Now, seeing as I was the junior Plane Captain on the flight line, my plane was put as far from the flight shack as it could possibly be and still be on the airfield. So off I go dragging my toolbox on wheels after me. I had almost gotten to the plane when the chief’s voice comes over the loudspeaker system and say’s, “Littlefield, report to the flight shack on the double!” Well I didn’t think too much about it and went hustling back to see what was up. When I get there, Old Sam Baker says to me, “Go preflight your airplane.” I said that’s where I was and took off again. Well this routine went on every day for about two weeks and I was getting madder and madder every time it happened. Finally one day I was really torqued and when I got to the flight shack and got my usual order, I hollered OK! At him, and slammed the door of the shack good and hard on my way out. Big mistake! The pane of glass flew out of the door and landed right on Chief Bakers desk where it immediately shattered into many little pieces, most of which landed in his lap and down the front of his shirt. I didn’t see it happen, but the next thing I knew, he had jumped over his desk, slammed open the door, and grabbed me by the back of my shirt and lifted me right up on my tippy toes. He then marched/pushed me out the back door of the hangar where upon he proceeded to read me the riot act, and to deliver a short hard shot to the gut as a reminder of just who was in charge. If you didn’t like being physically assaulted by a “higher up”, well that was tough! Back then, the Navy hadn’t yet degenerated into Admiral Zumwalts prissy little canoe club where you weren’t allowed to cuss out a subordinate. A couple of days later he took me aside and told me that he used the same sort of harassing techniques on all new P/C’s to see where the tolerance level was for putting up with different types of adversity. Seems like mine was way up there ‘because I lasted a lot longer than most guys, but when they finally spoke back, they didn’t cause a lot of broken glass to fly into his lap. He then told me that where I’d be going, I’d be on my own, and he wanted to see how I handled things.
After I had proved to Chief Baker that I could handle being a plane captain on one of Uncle Sam’s birds, he sent me on my first trip with an AD-5N aircraft. It was to be a two week stay aboard one of the Aircraft Carriers that was always in the Med. We were to take the plane out to the carrier and whenever they scheduled us, we would go up and “stream” a target for the surface ships to shoot at. This target was a nylon rip-stop sleeve about 30 feet long and about two feet in diameter. We would let out about 5000 feet of armored ¼ inch cable, and then the pilot would put the plane through some pretty weird gyrations to cause a ball of cable to form on the end. Then we would clip on a target and chuck it out a hole in the deck of the plane put there just for that purpose. Then it was back and forth for about three or four hours, while various surface ships would take turns shooting at it. They weren’t using popguns either. They were banging away with 5” 38 shells! Plus various types of anti-aircraft guns. Most of these guns were kept on target by using a radar signal to track the target. One time that I was out there flying around about half asleep, one of the ships managed to knock the target off the wire. The gun radar then proceeded to lock on to the cable and was tracking forward faster than we were flying! By the time we figured out what was going on, they had shot off ALL the cable. The next two rounds of 40mm AA went through the tail of the plane, and the next was destined for somewhere in the vicinity of we operators, just as the pilot took violent evasive maneuvers and proceeded to scream on the radio to “KNOCK IT OFF”. Just another form of saying cease fire please! Only our request was delivered with a lot more verve and gusto! (tie downs, hot bunking, sleeping in catwalk waiting for plane to come back, )
This was my first time aboard a Carrier and I had absolutely no idea of the organized and mass mayhem that I was about to descend into. As we arrived over the ship at about 6000 feet, it looked to be about as big as a postage stamp. I’m thinking to myself that there is no way in hell that this plane is going to be able to fit on that little thing! We moved into the marshal point and the pilot told me to cinch up my parachute harness and seatbelt really tight and to open the canopy on my side. You always did this in the old prop planes whenever landing, carrier or ground. As I found out over the next two weeks, we were always the last plane to land because we were able to stay up the longest with two 300 gallon drop tanks hung under the wings. Well finally it is our turn and as we got closer to the ship it grew magically in size ‘til it filled the whole of the windscreen! We came over the fantail and caught the number 3 wire, arresting cable, and we taxied up behind the last airplane. The pilot shut down the engine and jumps out and tells me to get into his seat to ride the brakes as they were about to re-spot the deck for the next launch. Little did I know that this is where I would spend almost all of my time for the next 2 weeks except when flying.
Some guy in a yellow shirt comes up to the plane and bangs on the side of it to get my attention, and hollers at me to get my butt out of the plane and get it tied down quickly. I jumped out and went into the wheel wells where there were two ammo cans located in the wing root. We stored all kinds of stuff in them when they weren’t full out bullets. I took out my usual three number six thread manila lines and proceeded to fasten my aircraft to the steel deck, just like I had every day back at good old Napoli. No sooner do I get it done, when here comes that yellow shirted guy again and proceeds to scream at me for being the dumbest SOB in the USN! He says to me, “How the hell long have you been on this ship, not to know that you don’t tie planes down with rope?” I looked at him and said, “About five minutes”. That deflated him for about 2 seconds whereupon he then explained to me just what a Hurricane tie-down was and where to procure nine of the little devils. That’s how many you installed whenever a plane was re-spotted on the deck. That is three on each of the landing gear. Just after I got it all figured out and done, I climbed back into the plane for a little rest. By the way, a Hurricane tie down consists of a 12 foot length of 3/8” chain with a hook on one end, and a nifty little device that has a hook on one end and a quick release chain restraint mechanism on the other end. The chain weighed about five pounds and the quick release about the same. So a full compliment of nine complete tie-downs weighed about 90 to a hundred pounds!
Bang, bang, bang on the side of the plane is the next sound I hear, and here is that guy with the yellow shirt again telling me to “break it down”, i.e. untie the plane again. So I did and they moved me to a different spot about three feet away, and then I went through the whole tie down procedure again. Well, this went on for the rest of the day and into the nighttime hours. Out there on the flight deck at night it is pitch black, as there are no white lights allowed. The only light is natural light supplied by the moon. This is so that when the pilots come on deck to go night flying, they have already had their eyes adapted to the low light by wearing red colored goggles in the ready room and up on to the deck where they can then remove them. So now it is time to re-spot the deck for a night time launch and they move me again! I jump out of the plane and because it is so dark I can’t see a damn thing. Into the wheel well I go again to get my trusty flashlight. Man, when I turned that thing on and was moving around untying my plane, it was like the wrath of God had descended on me! Two guys jumped on me and were wrestling with me trying to steal my flashlight. I’m thinking to myself, “Jeez, you’d think they had enough of these things for everybody out here so they don’t have to fight over them”. One of them finally got it away from me and I proceeded to scream at him and call him all the nice vile names that I had learned since joining the Navy. This got me a hand around the neck and a fast trip across the deck into the Island to a place called PRIFLY stenciled on the door. When he pushed me in the door, I could see that he had the words, Flight Deck Officer stenciled on his yellow shirt fore and aft. Well, in actuality here WAS God as far as anything concerned with the flight deck of that carrier was concerned! This man has, for all intents and purposes, the power of life and death out there in that mass of whirling propellers, screaming jet engines, and planes moving all over the place in the dark. He was the conductor of that milieu and you had best be paying attention to him or you would soon be dead! He then proceeded to ream me out for using that white light and asked me what squadron I was from so he could banish me from HIS flight deck. When I told him I was from the Naval Air Facility, Naples Italy, he looks at me as if I were a bug under the rug and says, “Oh yeah, the tow plane, how much instruction on flight deck procedures did you get before you came out here he asked”? When I told him none, he just shook his head and muttered something about them, “trying to get one of these damned kids killed out here”. He then directed one of his henchmen to give me a crash course in just what the hell was expected of me, and my aircraft while I was on board that vessel. That was when I found out about red lenses on flashlights and all that other night adaptation vision stuff.
After moving me all over the ship for the rest of the night, they found a more or less permanent home for me right behind the Island unless I was scheduled to be flying. Now I didn’t have to be moved every ten minutes and I could do some of the maintenance work on the plane I was supposed to be doing. I will have to say though, that was the best place on the flight deck to be. I would sit on top of the canopy and watch every plane being launched and recovered. It was a grand stand seat for something I never tired of watching. The only problem with my location was, when ever they would “blow the tubes” me and my plane would be covered with a fine soot, inside and out. Blowing the tubes was something the people in the engine room did to the boiler tubes to keep them from being clogged with the soot. So they just shot a charge of high-pressure air in there and blew it up on deck and then it was our problem to clean up. Usually the ship was moving directly into the wind and going like hell right after a launch whenever they pulled off this trick, so most of the stuff went right overboard.
After having been on board for a week or so, and it became necessary to get my clothes washed. It was a free service while on board ship. Everybody just put their dirty clothes in one huge bag and off to the ships laundry it went. It would reappear in your berthing compartment that day and was dumped in a huge pile. Then it was up to you to retrieve your own gear from the pile. If you had fortuitously stenciled your name on each and every piece of clothes, including socks, underwear, and handkerchiefs, you would get it all back. If no name was on a particular piece, it was fair game for whoever came across it first! I had observed a few times as we came back aboard with our plane that there were a lot of manila lines trailing off the stern of the ship and decided to go down to the hangar deck and find out what they were for. When I arrived there I found out that there was a swab, (mop) tied to most of the lines. They were dragged behind the ship for a few minutes which did an outstanding job of getting them perfectly clean! I guess if I was dragged behind something that big at 30 to 40 mph for an hour or so, I’d be clean too! I noticed this one guy pulling in a line and lo and behold there was no swab tied to the line, but rather two pair of dungarees. (pants) The guy said it did a great job of getting them clean too. So of course I decided to do a couple of pairs of mine the next time they needed cleaning which was every day. So down I go with my two pair of nastiest looking dungarees and proceed to tie them to an unused line and pitch them over the fantail. Then I went back to work for a few hours. When I went back down to retrieve my pants at noon chow time, the line I had tied them too was being used for a swab! There was a guy standing there watching me and asked if I was the one who had left the dungarees on that line. I said yes and did he know where they might be? He nodded his head yes and pointed behind me to a real small pile of denim colored rags. I picked them up and was surprised to find only the belt loops and waist band and a few inches of material hanging off of them. I looked at him and said, “What the hell happened to my pants?” He asked how long I had left them in the water, and I replied, “About four hours”. Well said he, if you leave them for more that fifteen minutes this is what you’ll get back every time! Well, that was an expensive learning curve

Navy Chronicles

This post/story is twenty four pages long and so I am going to put it up in two page increments. It covers the three and one half years I spent in Naples Italy. After this one has run it's course, there will be other ones concerned with side trips and adventures embarked on with in this same time period. As other items of interest come to mind, I will post them, interspersed with the above adventure. Enjoy if you will!


Landing on foreign soil

Well here I am, following in Charles Lindberg’s steps winging my way across the Atlantic Ocean on my way to Paris France. The only difference between my self and “Lucky Lindy” was that I was flying courtesy of the US Navy with a civilian airline, Pan-Am, instead of piloting my own aircraft. But this one I’m on is one of the most beautiful airplanes ever constructed. It is a Lockheed Super Constellation. It is a giant gleaming silver bird with four engines and the distinctive triple tail feathers that made this plane such a beautiful sight.
After about ten to twelve hours of playing non stop games of cribbage with my seat mate, we arrived at Orly Field about ten o’clock at night. After collecting our sea bag’s and our wits, we were whisked off to a hotel in down town Paris for the night. The hotel people showed us to our rooms and at that time I became aware of the Parisian’s haughty attitude and disdain for Americans. After having saved the French people’s collective asses from the domination of the Germanic tribes twice in the first half of the last Century, I have never been able to figure out why they look down their pointed Gallic noses at us! Maybe we should have left them to their own devices on both occasions. Maybe they would have preferred having to learn to speak German instead of our form of bastardized English. But I do digress.
The room we had for the night was beautiful, and while exploring the whole place, we came across an odd looking device in the bathroom. It was sitting right next to the toilet and looked like one somewhat. It had the same shape of its neighbor, but had no seat to speak of. It also was minus any sort of a tank to dispense water for flushing. Also, it had two knobs on the back of it that looked like those found on the sink. Hmmm, what is this? We looked at it for some time trying to determine just what it was and what it was used for. After standing directly over it and turning one of the knobs, and getting a forceful jet of water right in the face, we finally figured out that it must be for washing your feet if you didn’t want to take a full bath! Problem solved, that’s what it was, a foot-bath. Ingenious people these French! Well it wasn’t for another month, that I found out just what a “bidet” was and what it was really used for! Imagine my surprise! We didn’t have anything like that on good old Block Island!
Right after finishing our inspection tour, we decided that we should go out and see some of this Parisian night-life that we had heard talked about on the trip over the big pond. So out the door we go and start walking down the street looking for this “night life”. It turned out that we were in a residential district, and the good old US Navy put us out there in the sticks on purpose. Don’t put temptation in their path and just maybe they will not stray off the straight and narrow and cause any diplomatic bumps in the road. Hah! We did finally manage to find a bar and commence to get slightly inebriated. We were due to leave about 0900 the next morning so we headed back to the hotel. The only trouble now was, that we didn’t remember the way back and couldn’t ask anyone either. All the smart folks were home in bed at 2 AM. Even if there had been anyone to talk to, we’d have been out of luck! Non parlous vous Franchise.
After wandering around up and down a few dozen streets, we finally came upon our abode about three hours before we were to leave from the airport. After getting all cleaned up, we were just in time to get breakfast and get on the bus for the airfield.
We had our tickets in hand to get us to Naples Italy, so all we had to do was find the Alitalia gate and climb aboard the plane. Just finding the gate was another of the adventures I was to undertake over the next three years. Back in the fifties there were no signs in the various languages for travelers. We hadn’t as yet become the mobile society that we are now. French was the universal language back then, at least as far as travel and the diplomatic Corp was concerned. If you couldn’t read it or speak it, you were at the mercy of all the little dictators of their fiefdoms. Even finding the location of the head, (bathroom) was an excersise in futility! A few graphic hand signs and motions always seemed to do the trick though.
After an uneventful trip of a couple of hours, we arrived right on the door- step of my new home for the next three years. Il Capo Di Chino was the name of the airport there in Naples, and it was shared by the civilian airlines as well as the Italian Air Force, and the good old United States Navy. Stepping off the plane, the very first thing that caught your eye was the volcano, ‘Vesuvius’ dominating the whole landscape. It appeared to loom over the airfield as well as the whole city of Naples. It was then and still is a beautiful sight.
At the end of my first day at la aeroporto Capo Di Chino, I had been assigned a place to live for the next three years, and was all checked in with the people and places that really mattered. You know who, the chow hall, the paymaster and the chief on the flight line. The next morning bright and early I go down to the flight line and meet some of the other guys and my new boss Chief Sam Baker. This guy was about six foot three and had a face that looked like it was carved out of granite, but had been shot at with steel ball bearings, and hit too! He was from somewhere in the South and had a really easy-going demeanor until you got on the wrong side of him.
Well, I was assigned to one of the crews performing routine maintenance on all the planes that we had stationed there. We had four SNB-5’s, three R4D-8’s, one R4D-3, one R5D-6Z, one R4Y-5Z, four AD5-N’s and one HUP-2 twin rotor helo. These were just the station aircraft. In addition to them we performed all the scheduled maintenance on every R4D-3 & 4 that belonged to an embassy throughout the whole of southern Europe, the Mid East, and all of Africa. This came to a huge amount of a/c and we were busy all day long every day, as well as a night shift that worked from 1600 to mid night. This was just grunt work, but it was the main reason that I had joined Uncle Sam’s Canoe Club in the first place. To be continued.

Gifts from the sea

Next time you are out walking along the beach, as you go along take the time to look at each of the piles of seaweed and trash that are just lying there. Go over and move them around a little bit with your foot to see if there is anything interesting in there. It might be a message in a bottle from Gilligan or Mr Carosue(sp). But then again it might be something a lot more interesting and needful of your help.
That is what happened to Jamie Johnston the other day. After a couple of days of the NE wind we have had, he was out either fishing or just walking and passed by a bunch of seaweed and deitrus and thought he saw it move, all on it's own. When he went over for a closer look he could see that there was indeed someone on distress. After extricating it from a ball of monofilament gill net and other assorted junk, he held in his hands, a leather back turtle that from the size of him, was probably eight to ten years old! So after calling a friend to come and take a few pictures of him, they put him back in the water and sent him on his way to wherever he was going. Hopefully, he will manage to avoid anymore of those loose nets out there floating around in the ocean. NICE JOB JAMIE!!! Maybe the pix will show up in the paper so we can all get a look at him !TIFN

Two Tough Questions

2 TOUGH QUESTIONS

Question 1:
If you knew a woman who was pregnant, who had 8 kids already, three who
were
deaf, two who were blind, one mentally retarded, and she had syphilis,
would
you recommend that she have an abortion?
Read the next question before looking at the response for this one.

Question 2:
It is time to elect a new world leader, and only your vote counts. Here
are
the facts about the three candidates.

Candidate A.

Associates with crooked politicians, and consults with astrologist. He's
had
two mistresses. He also chain smokes and drinks 8 to 10 martinis a day.

Candidate B.

He was kicked out of office twice, sleeps until noon, used opium in
college
and drinks a quart of whiskey every evening.

Candidate C
He is a decorated war hero. He's a vegetarian, doesn't smoke, drinks an
occasional beer and never cheated on his wife. Which of these candidates
would be your choice? Decide first... no peeking, then scroll down for the
response.








Candidate A is Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Candidate B is Winston Churchill.
Candidate C is Adolph Hitler.

And, by the way, on your answer to the abortion question: If you said YES,
you just killed Beethoven.

Pretty interesting isn't it? Makes a person think before judging someone.
Wait till you see the end of this note! Keep reading...

Never be afraid to try something new.
Remember: Amateurs...built the ark.
Professionals...built the Titanic

And Finally, can you imagine working for a company that has a little more
than 500 employees and has the following statistics:
* 29 have been accused of spousal abuse
* 7 have been arrested for fraud
* 19 have been accused of writing bad checks
* 117 have directly or indirectly bankrupted at least 2 businesses
* 3 have done time for assault
* 71 cannot get a credit card due to bad credit
* 14 have been arrested on drug-related charges
* 8 have been arrested for shoplifting
* 21 are currently defendants in lawsuits
* 84 have been arrested for drunk driving in the last year...
Can you guess which organization this is?



Give up yet?
It's the 535 members of the United States Congress. The same group
that crank out hundreds of new laws each year designed to keep the rest of
us in line.

No Truer Words!!

I received the following as an e-mail this morning and just felt I had to pass it on. They are not my writings, but they do express my feelings on the whole New Orleans disaster/fiasco. So read and enjoy!
Been sitting here with my ass in a wad, wanting to speak out about the bullshit going on in New Orleans. For the people of New Orleans...

First, we would like to say, Sorry for your loss. With that said, Let's go through a few hurricane rules: (Unlike an earthquake, we know it's coming)

1. A mandatory evacuation means just that...Get the hell out. Don't blame the Government after they tell you to go. If they hadn't said anything, I can see the argument. They said get out... if you didn't, it's your fault, not theirs. (We don't want to hear it, even if you don't have a car, you can get out.)

2. If there is an emergency, stock up on water and non-perishables. If you didn't do this, it's not the Government's fault you're starving.

2a. If you run out of food and water, find a store that has some. (Remember, shoes, TV's, DVD's and CD's are not edible. Leave them alone.)

2b. If the local store has been looted of food or water, leave your neighbor's TV and stereo alone. (See 2a) They worked hard to get their stuff. Just because they were smart enough to leave during a mandatory evacuation, doesn't give you the right to take their stuff...it's theirs, not yours.

3. If someone comes in to help you, don't shoot at them and then complain no one is helping you. I'm not getting shot to help save some dumbass who didn't leave when told to do so.

4. If you are in your house that is completely under water, your belongings are probably too far gone for anyone to want them. If someone does want them, let them have them and hopefully they'll die in the filth. Just leave! (It's New Orleans, find a voodoo warrior and put a curse on them)

5. My tax money should not pay to rebuild a 2 million dollar house, a sports stadium or a floating casino. Also, my tax money shouldn't go to rebuild a city that is under sea level. You wouldn't build your house on quicksand would you? You want to live below sea-level, do your country some good and join the Navy.

6. Regardless of what the Poverty Pimps, Jessie Jackson and Al Sharpton, want you to believe, The US Government didn't create the Hurricane as a way to eradicate the black people of New Orleans; (Neither did Russia as a way to destroy America). The US Government didn't cause global warming that caused the hurricane (We've been coming out of an ice age for over a million years).

7. The government isn't responsible for giving you anything. This is the land of the free and the home of the brave, but you gotta work for what you want. McDonalds and Wal-Mart are always hiring, get a damn job and stop spooning off the people who are actually working for a living.

President Kennedy said it best..."Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country."
Thank you for allowing me to rant. George Carlin

The Best Retirement Account in the World!

I was reading another blog the other day, one that gets a lot of exposure, and had it revealed to me about a retirement plan that I want to get in on. It is the one that our Illustrious Senators and Congressmen have voted into law, strictly for themselves! If they serve for only two, or six years, or go on for forty or fifty years like Senator Byrd of Virginia( I think). They will go on receiving from the government a check equal to the amount they were receiving on the day they retired or lost an election, UNTIL THE DAY THEY DIE!!! This amounts to millions of dollars for each and every one of them! On top of that their spouses will receive about $275,000 until they pass on. I want some of this! So I'm going to run for Congressman and then quit after two years so that one of you can get in on the gravy train to!

What needs to happen in these two hallowed halls of crookedness, is for the electorate to vow NOT to vote for any incumbent the next time they come up for election. It is the only way to stop the good old boy back room dealings that go on now. And if they had ANY balls, they would institute term limits at the next session of Congress. With this crew that is in there now, virtually all lawyers, they will never do the "right thing" for the people of the US because they are to damned greedy. Breaking this chain of shame, by getting rid of these, "henchmen of the Sheriff of Nottingham", is the only way to start over with a some what clean slate.
So that's what I'm doing next year, care to join me? TIFN

This Won't Take Long, Did It?

I saw on the news tonight at six, that the moped operators of the State and BI got to that Judge Rubine early. He decided to let them keep on doing as they have for years in defiance of an existing State Law. I almost fell off my chair when I heard him say, "what's the urgency in enforcing this existing law?" I now wonder if he feels the same way about many of the other state statutes. I guess if your pockets are deep enough you can get anybody you need, bought. Wasn't it Mr. Hagopian's father that inflicted these things on us in the first place? I am not against mopeds as I own one and ride it every day in preference to my 1100 cc motorcycle. If this judge continues to let these people do just as they damned please, then it is up to the legislators of this mostly crooked state to write a law with some teeth in it that WILL make them comply with the rules. While we are on the subject of enforcement of the laws of this State, why is it that virtually NO ONE does anything about enforcing the muffler laws that pertain to the operation of full sized motorcycles? Mine has a regular muffler just as the laws prescribe, and it came from a foreign country. You look and listen to nine out of ten Harley Davidsons that come over here on the boat and they all are in defiance of those laws as they all run straight pipes that can raise the dead!Whats up with that? TIFN

Politics, It's like a Country Road

Have you ever noticed that as you drive along down a winding country road, that the road starts to become a very good analogy of what politics is all about? As in politics, it has a center, left, and right. Now as you go along that road, you can veer a little to the left or right, or you can drive right off the edge into pure hate and anarchy. Dept. of Transportation people just label their road with the names Left and Right and you should stay in your lane. In politics though, we have taken to calling OUR side of the road, "Conservative", and the OTHER guys call theirs, "Liberal". Now just as in when you are driving your car along this road, if you maintain a steady course, you usually arrive at your destination in good order. But you can by inattention or intention, veer off the road by a little or a lot. The degree of variance really does determine what is to become of you, whether as a driver or a person. Will you go 'over the edge' too the right and become a Neo-Nazi or someone of that ilk? Or will you completely lose your mind, and for some reason cross that painted double line into the LEFT lane? And have you ever noticed that those people, once they get in that lane, THINK that they are doing just fine, even though they are going in the wrong direction! I'm not to sure what name attaches to those of the "far lefty persuasion" that are driving along in the bushes on their side of the road, but whatever the name is, it should have something that Identifies them too us all, so that we can avoid them like the plague. After watching the Judge Roberts confirmation hearings, I came away again, wondering if there were really that many STUPID people living in Mass.! How can they keep electing that buffoon that sat there looking like a chimpmunk, as he rails against a MAN with more intelligence in his little finger than Teddy has in his whole body, and who makes Teddy, look like he just recently descended out of the trees? A couple of million years too late I might add. Some one else surely has to write down his questions for him to ask, because he couldn't come up with one on his own if it didn't have the word "abortion" in it. That was virtually the whole line of questioning that he brought with him to the hearing. The guy is a laughing stock to every other thinking person in this country. Teddy, Why don't you just pack it in and go back to Hyannis and finish drinking yourself into oblivion so that we all can rest more comfortbly knowing that you are no longer a member of the United States Senate! You are a DISGRACE! GO HOME!! Oh PS: Careful of those bridges around Chappaquidic,(sp) They are a bitch! TIFN

Bringing Home Billions of Buck$$$!

So I understand now that there are about 1 million people who have lost their homes and or business down along the south coast. I guess after Monday, that number will probably go to triple the present one. I also read/heard that the federal govt. has committed $60 billion to those people alone. That doesn't include what ever money has come to them by way of private charities. That is all well and good and I don't begrudge one thin dime to them. But! Where is the money going to come from to pay out that 60 bil? Already there is talk that the prescription medicine handout from Medicare may be coming under attack. But that is another blog. I have a suggestion as to where it might come from. How about if the first thing we do is to kick the UN out of the US? Send it to france where they can support and administer it in their typically incompetent manner. That would get us a few billion. Next we really should withdraw from NATO and close all our bases in Europe and let those folks fend for themselves for a change. We have been holding their hands and wiping their asses for them long enough. They OPENLY hate us now, and make no bones about it. SO let them hold each other in a firm embrace while keeping a close eye on all the Islamofacists in their midsts that are about to bring down the life style and ideals they have lived with for decades. The mullahs are working over time to finish them off. By closing all those European bases we could keep another $150 billion for our own people. "Foreign Aid". There is a sad chapter in American history. It started out all well and good but over the years has been corrupted to the point that we now give "billions and billions", so Carl Sagan would have said, to countries that openly oppose us and our ideals and actively engage in acts that are a direct threat to our countries safety and well being. The number to put in here is beyond my understanding, but have read somewhere that is close to a Trillion with a "T" bucks! It is time for the Congress of these United States to take a good long unbiased look at all the money that we give away to these countries. Just stop it outright! Then go over each countries past use of the aid, and whether it was used against us in some way. If each applicant does not measure up, or live up, to a strict new set of rules, then they either don't get it to start with, or it gets summarily pulled if they are found to be playing hanky-panky with the money. It is time to stop trying to buy peoples good will with dollar bills. They take it all the while laughing up their sleeves at us. PROVE too us that you are worthy of Aid, and MAYBE some will be forthcoming. For a while! TIFN

New Town Hall

There was a Town Council meeting last evening and one of the topics was about the new building that is now under construction! Before the first bucket of cement has been poured, it came to light during the meeting that this building is already destined to join the other town building fiasco's. It seems as though the structure, before any bid request have gone out, is going to exceed the 1.7 million budgeted by a nice round 10%! What the hell is going on in the town hall? Is there ANYBODY there that has a clue about doing this sort of project and getting it right? Remember the Library, the School, and now the new Town Hall? There has to be someone in charge of these projects who knows his ass from a hole in the ground! It would behoove the Council to hire a Town Public Works director and do it now, if one can be found. Another thing that amazes me is that in this era of skyrocketing energy costs, that there has been NO attempt to do anything to mitigate those costs! There are lots of things that could be done. There are items that can be incorporated into the foundation that would warm the foundation from within, and radiate that heat into the interior space as well as upwards to the floor above. Electrical dump loads fed by a number of solar cells on the roof would do that job. Water circulated through pipes in the foundation and fed by solar water heating panels is another option. According to the August National Geographic magazine, there are still plenty of grants out there for new construction municipal buildings if the cities and towns are willing to go after them. Another option, and I know this will bring the anti-WECS lobby out in full force and throat, is the use of some sort of windpower. In that same issue of the NG magazine there was a study someone did that put forth the proposition that if every house in Americe had a 1 kilowatt wind generator attached, the oil imports to this country would diminish to virtually nothing. Denmark gets 75% of it's power from offshore WECS and more are planned, as it is for most of the other Scandinavian countries.
So getting back to the new town hall, I can't help wonder why there has been absolutely no attempt to do anything in this vein. Somewhere in the not to distant future as I've said before, our children and grandchildren are to reap the results of what we should have sown! A big NOTHING! Everyone seems to think that reducing energy consumption is passe and no big deal. Well after getting your last bill from BIPCO, that should have put a huge hole in your complacency blanket! But I will tell you one thing for sure, my electric bill was a couple hundred dollars less than most of yours because of that "ugly", "noisy", "monstrosity" in my front yard! Somewhere in your future you are going to have to reconcile the need to have electricty to make all your appliances run with your "need" to see the water, or the shore or the dips and swales in the country side. Maybe after all the people who got the WECS ordinance gutted, leave the Island because there is not enough juice to go around, we can return to some sort of rational thought when it comes to renewable energy of all kinds. Get and read that copy of the National Geographic and it just might give you a different mindset. TIFN BTW, turn off those uneeded lights in the evening and then go watch your meter turn a lot slower!

Will It Ever End?

There is a letter in the paper this week from a Dr.R M Wood in which he attempts to save us from ourselves again,as have countless others before him. How REALLY interested in us is he? He starts his letter like this. "Parting words for the Medical Center. My summer visits to Block Island have come to an end".That certainly sounds to me as if he has NO intentions of coming here again except maybe in the winter. So of course on the way out the door he takes a few "artfully created" parting shots at the people who live and work here. Apparently he feels that no one should be paid anything more than the minimum wage to do any job, be it menial or one that takes a great deal of skill. Where does he get the idea of a 'severence package'? There is none as far as a couple of the board members know. Just another unsubstantiated stab in the back. "This present system provides several, (1) "highly paid" administrator(s), (actually less than other people in the town who do similar work),with full benefit packages to do these tasks". His words. Oh yes he mentions free housing for the administrator, but "artfully neglects" to mention that housing is free to one physician, as has been the case for fifty ears or more and was part of the lure to get and hold a doctor. No problem there. The other, gets a $22k subsidy over and above salary to help pay for their housing.
Does anyone recall what has been going on in the town finance office since all or most of the billing and collection was "outsourced". Of course it is ALWAYS smarter and more cost efficient to pay someone else to do the job even when qualified people are already on board and able to do the job.
I was glad to hear that the only difference between a doctor and a hair stylist, is a Nurse and a different supply list. Maybe I'll go to the Beachcomber next time I get sick and see what happens.
I wonder if Dr. Wood has any clue as to why the Med Ctr was set up as it was in the very beginning? There must have been some very good and compelling reasons. Look into that please sir before you advocate ripping apart, what has served the people of this town, and thousands of visitors for a very long time.
Now, all this advice on how to conduct the day to day business of the Med Ctr. which sees between twenty and fifty people a day, (conservative est. I think) is freely given by a Doctor who's practice is for the most part limited to incontinence in the fair sex, and who sees approx. eight patients a day, or so I am told by an, "un-named but realiable" source.So I personally would not put much stock in all the allegations and or fixes advocated by this particular person. Go to the meetings and find out, "What's going on up there" and why.

Unlawful? Underhanded? Unethical? Which?

Hi All, Here is a little scenario I want to put forth. What if a person decided on their own hook, and in their own home, to "call" a "meeting" of the "board" that oversees the process of the job held by this person? Oh yes, and be sure NOT to invite to the same "meeting", two of the members of said entity who will not acquiesce(SP) to your requests/demands without due diligence? Well this happened a couple days ago and the Board in question is one that we are all familiar with. I was not, and am not privy to what was said there, or what if anything was decided on, to be voted on at a later meeting. Everyone who did not have a clue, had a lot to say about what went on at these previous, OPEN meetings. Now it appears that 7/9 ths of this board has taken it upon themselves to hold some sort of a clandestine meeting without the knowledge of the rest! What does this sound like to you. I understand they were discussing staffing issues, and solutions to same. Having an invited guest as a speaker to tell them how to do their job was another highlight of the evening. I don't know if all members were "sworn to secrecey" or what, but if I had been one of the members invited, when I found out that a select few were intentionally un-invited, I would have left the room and urged the rest of my fellow mwmbers to do the same! This is just plain Bull****!! I thought the days of backroom politics were to become extinct in my generation, but it apparently has flourished here on this little piece of rock. I would encourage the Town Council to abolish the whole damn board and start anew with a new set of people. Ethicality here in this board, has leaked right out through the floorboards and into the bilges with the rest of a few things called honor and accountability. PISSED again, I say, TIFN

More Junk

Well, I have to eat some 'crow' this morning. It seems as if there really are some responsible boaters out there. There are a group of young guys who come over here quite often on their jet skis and park them on the earlier mentioned beach. I gusee they were a little upset with the way things looked, so they took it upon themselves to get hold of a bunch of trash bags and tools and proceeded to rake up the beach and pick bags of junk out of the base of the breakwater. Then they hauled all the bags to the dock and went to get the Harbormaster to back his truck onto the dock whereupon they loaded it all on board and drove it to the dumpster. I was flabbergasted and very impressed with what they had done. As they passed me by, I thanked them most vociferously on behalf of all the people who live here. Guess I should have waited a day or two before I unloaded on the boaters. It is never good to paint everyone with the same brush. Thanks again guys! TIFN

Uncaring and Uncouth Boaters

Did anyone notice that this weekend just past brought as many or more people to the Island than on the 4th of July? The traffic downtown as the boats came in and unloaded, was the worst that I can remember. We still DO NOT need traffic lights, as the local boys in blue did a real good job of keeping things moving and within five to ten minutes , traffic was all eased up again. Not so for the people "thronging" up and down the sidewalks but mostly in the street!
Looking at all the people in the streets, you might also have noticed all the small boats lined up along the east breakwater. I'm not sure what it is that lures those sized boats to the Island. Maybe it is the free use of the sand and anchorages they encounter over there. Apparently all during the weekend, they buy their beer, booze and food at Ballards and tote it back to their boats to consume. A better bet is that they bring it all with them. But what really gripes my ass is that they don't have the common decency to take it all home with them when they leave! Nope, it is much easier to stuff it in a garbage bag and leave it all in a pile at the north end of the east dock. I went down there this morning after having the pile of trash pointed out to me and I was really pissed that that they couldn't walk another 200 feet and put it in a dumpster. These people in their boats that go for upwards of $50-60 thousand care so little about this place that they feel no compunction about leaving their disgusting crap on the dock and all over the beach to! They even bring their dogs and let them use the dock and beaches as their own personal outhouses. If it was just them and their ilk using the area, I'd say let it happen, they have to walk in it! But there are a lot of other people who frequent the area. So after a lot of discussion amongst a bunch of us there at the dock, we came to the conclusion that there were no town employees who job discription included picking up this stuff. The herring gulls had done an admirable job of spreading it all over hells half acre, so one Captain of Interstates ferries, three or four guys who work for the local Parasail company and myself proceeded to clean up the mess, and it WAS a mess. It is also NOT in the job description of the Harbormaster or the people who rent the few charter spots to be janitors, although throughout the summer, they do this job and keep the docks in relatively sightly condition. Assuredly there is no money in the Harbors Dept for such a person as all the money gets hijacked into the town general fund and spent where ever the TM feels it should go! SO,,, maybe it is time for the town to get off it's collective ass and do something about that area. If a former proposal I had made had been acted on years ago about docks out there and rent charged, it probably would have been all paid off by now. There used to be docks out there back in the 30's and 40's. It is way past time that some sort of order be established out there in the wild wild east. TIFN

MOI? Socialist Scum?

This post is directed to the person who answered a post on The Block Island Blog, and identified him/herself only as Anonymous 6/27/05 4:49 pm.

With regard to the problem of the Old Harbor Dock, if the town could manage to put together three or four consecutive Councils committed to fixing the dock, it would have been done by now. Capital improvement money has been set aside for ten or twelve years in a row, but for some reason or other, plus changing attitudes and vacillating political wills, the Councils, and Town manager always find other ways to spend the money except for where it was designated to go. Institute the Port Authority and then keep the money there, and all reconstruction and improvement would be done! The way things are being done now, we are just shoveling 'you know what' against the tide!

About my feelings concerning the ferry companies. I think I well realize the fact the ferries are our lifeline to the rest of the world, for all of us. I don't believe I said anything about kicking them out. You must be the same person who is always trying to put words in my mouth. But, WE should have a lot more say in just how many people/cars etc. are being dumped here every day. NOT ONE of the ferry companies gives a good rats ass what the effect is to the Island or it's people. Their ONLY concern, as in every operating business is the bottom line.

I feel SO put upon, and put down, that you think my family, all of us, couldn't "MAKE" it out here without owning the LPG business or using the ferry to accommadate our business. We have managed to survive out here, one way or the other, for about three hundred years, without the 'help' of folks like you. What has been your contribution to the Island? Where are you from, and what do you do? You seem to be lacking in the cojones department if you are a guy. If a woman, I wouldn't know how to denigrate you without coming across as a mysoginistic ass. This business started out very small, and over the last thirty years of catering to everyones whims, we have managed to grow it right along side every other aspect of the local and national economy.
Does your business pay the ferry company $360 every time a truck with your goods in it comes to the Island? Four or five trucks a week in the summer time. That doesn't sound TO exorbitant does it? Do you have an insurance bill that tops $18,000 dollars a year JUST for liability? Do you have four trucks that cost about $75,000 ea to buy, and thousands more to insure and maintain each year. Do you spend about a month of 8/10 hour days, filling out paper work and forms in order to comply with all the rules and regulations promulgated by, the EPA, EPCRA, DOT, SARA, DOT-HAZMAT, DOE, OSHA,and about seven or eight more all to do with Homeland Security? As well as all the RI State ones? Well, Do You?

A philosopher/economist once said a long time ago that,"The only thing wrong with Socialism is Socialism, and the only thing wrong with Capitalism is the Capitalist!" So I and my children will continue to try and hold up our end of the equation and it has NOTHING to do with Socialism! I spent twenty years of my life trying, in some small way, to maintain the level of freedom that we enjoy in this country, and I resent to the highest order of magnitude, your claim that I might EVER have harbored any thoughts of Socialism! So spew your gutless invective somewhere else. I mean in another Country. Try up North, they are pretty well screwed-up, up there also! And too you I say, STUFF IT!!! But feel free to post a comeback here in this venue though! Oh Yeah, put your name up to, Oh Cojonesless one. TIFN Everett

Second Step Complete!

Well the "_Supreme_? Court" just took the second step in the gradual stripping away of rights guaranteed to us by the Constitution. The Fifth Amendment is now on it's way out the door. Every local crooked politician and Administrator will be holding open their pockets just waiting for the also crooked developers to stuff them full of cash! I can't believe that those nine people who are supposedly so 'learned' can give away what was earned at such a cost, so blithely. I had always thought that their job was to interpert what was "ACTUALLY WRITTEN DOWN" on that piece of paper? Not, what these 'oh so far Left leaning' nine THOUGHT the original framers MIGHT have been thinking! They cannot know that! Even though in their own minds it has become apparent that they believe they are clairvoyant.
The first step was and is the introduction of the McCain-Fiengold act that is still in the process of wending it's way through the halls of Congress. When it gets through, say good bye to this medium as an uncensored right to express your thoughts, as well as the daily papers. Well, actually the New York Times and the Washington Post wouldn't be such a great loss. Maybe some other at the least "objective" papers could take up the slack!
And while we are here, I think that during the next round of Senatorial elections, it would do the country as a whole a great service, to unseat the currently entrenched, petulant, do nothing, and whiney,occupants of the "worlds most exclusive boys club", and replace them with people who truly have the values and needs of the people of this country foremost in their minds. Immigration, Social Security, and a host of other problems that never get resolved because "the Boy's" are busy playing one up manship,CYA, and making your opponent out to be an incompetent ass! On that last count, almost all of the present crop of idiots qualify with a 4.0 GPA! TIFN

They're Back!!

Well here it is not even summer yet, and already the blood pressure starts to rise whenever I get in the car to go somewhere. What's the reason you may want to know? Well it is "THOSE PEOPLE" who can't for the sake of their own lives, figure out which side of the road to walk on, or in some cases ride a bike on! Now a lot of these folks are high priced exec's and people who can do complicated calculations in the business world. So I have finally come to a conclusion that was told to me quite a few years ago by an old BI resident. It goes like this. "Apparently, every car that comes to the dock in Pt Judith, is handed a 1, 2, or 3 quart Mason jar, according to the size of the head. Directly after being handed said container, the driver of the car removes his brain and puts it in the jar, and then puts it under the front seat of the car. There it remains for the entire time of the owners sojurn on the Island!" I HEARTLY CONCUR!! TIFN Everett

Busy Days of Summer

I have tried to get back to this blogging business a few times recently, but there is just too much going on these days. So I would inform all that posts will be few and far between for most of the summer or until I finally run out of things to work on around the house and grounds. Hah! That won't happen anytime soon! Hope every one has a good summer and check us out once in a while to see if anything has happened. In the mean time, go to Block Island Blog to keep up with another point of view. See you now aqnd again! TIFN Everett

Slow getting back in the saddle!

Hi all, I realize I have been remiss with this thing for a long time. Man that Extra Corporeal Lithotripsy put me right on my knees for a long time. It felt like I had been in a fight in a dark alley with a bunch of muggers, ALL delivering kidney punches!! It has been just like having a bad case of mononucleosis(sp), which I have had before. I was making a continual circuit from the couch, to the chair, to the bed, to the floor! No place felt good. Anyway it all seems to be on the wane and hopefully I'll be able to come up with a viable comment in a few days.
I did have a short conversation with Peter Wood the other day and he asked me where I ever got the idea that he changed or left out parts of letters to the Ed. when he owned the paper. He told me in no uncertain terms that I was completely in the wrong there. If so, let this serve as an apology. If not,????????????. TIFN Everett

So, You want to have a Colonoscopy Eh?

My Doctor here on the Island, Dr. Peter Baute finally convinced me that I should venture to the mainland and have a colonoscopy performed. He had mentioned because of my advanced age 66, and never having had it done before, it would serve me well to know just what was going on up there in the "hinterlands". An appointment was made with a local gastroentroligist(sp). That in and of itself was quite a feat, because I made the appointment in December for the 14th of April. So you can see right off the bat, I had a nice long lead time to get myself all worked into a dither about the upcoming event. Over the intervening four months, the forthcoming event had come up on numerous occassions with a varied list of people who were only to glad to give a ten to fifteen minute discourse on the whole subject. Without fail, everyone who had had the deed done, had all come to the same conclusion, "It was no big deal"! So over time my fears were somewhat allayed and on the morning of the 13th, my wife and I went to the boat for the trip over. There were three or four previous receipients of the procedure there and one of the last comments from one of them was,"Don't forget to ask for the warm blanket when they are all through"! What was that all about I says to myself as I drive onto the boat.
Skip ahead to 7pm of the same day when it is time to imbibe one of the two bottles of a concoction called, Fleet's Phospho-soda Bowel prep. It comes in an innoccuous 1 1/2 bottle and is a clear liquid. In the instructions it tell you to mix the bottle with a half can of ginger ale or sprite and to drink it down in continuous gulp. 'Nuff said, down it goes and then I decided to read the rest of the instructions. They mentioned something about it taking from 30 minutes to six hours for it to take effect. Well their timing was about twenty nine minutes off, for while I'm reading this thing strange and ominious rumblings are emanating from inside of me! I barely had time to drop the paper and make a mad dash for the bathroom while fumbling desperately with a suddenly re-calcitrant belt buckle! Ah, safe arrival, deposition of "product" as predicted, and on to the couch! Well that little sojourn lasted about ten minutes and it was on to repeat the previouly documented trip to the bathroom for the rest of the night. About half way thru the night I got a little smarter and switched to a pair of sweatpants. Now as I sat there awaiting my next lurch to the head, I read some more of the instructions. It said to drink 'copious' amounts of water to replace all that I would be losing. See, this nasty stuff pulls ALL the water from all the sourrounding area, tissues, organs, muscles, hell it even sucked the water right out of a glass I was holding in my hand without waiting for me to drink it! It then goes right into the bowel to assist in the reaming out of that organ by using the 'deluge and hot flush' method! By the time things began to calm down, at four AM, it was time for the second dose! Now I'm telling you, it was a struggle to get this dose down. There was a hell of a fight between the up and down and the in and out factions of my gut, but with a lot of will power and lots of deep breaths it stayed down and immediately started on it's journey to the end of the road so to speak. Well about thirty minutes into this process, I begin to have feelings in my 'right, lower, posterior, quadrant' that no one had mentioned to me as being a consequence of drinking this stuff! Over the next three hours, the pain back there became so intense that I could barely make my way down to the car. My wife then drove us to the South County Hospital where I was admitted to the ER in a state of total and excruciating pain. Well after a few questions etc., it was determined that I was in the process of trying to eject a kidney stone from the right kidney. It seems that all this unusual amount of water rushing thru the old kidney had dislodged a local resident who had been lurking there for some time waiting for the right time to wreak havoc on me! After a few shots of some mysterious, but absolutely welcome "juice" was injected into me along with what was to be 9 big bags of IV solution, a Urologist came along and told me after talking to the colon guy, that if they could control the pain over night with some stuff called "oxycontin", they would proceed to do the colonoscopy the following afternoon. The urology guy then mentioned that they would take care of the "stones" three days hence. So eighteen hours go by during which time I am taking these oxycontin tablets every twelve hours on the dot and it does a wonderful job of keeping the pain at bay. I can see why it has become the drug of choice for so many regular abusers of the stuff. I was in LA LA Land for three days and didn't much care about anything! On to the Colonoscopy lab where as advertised and predicted by all other receipents before me, it went well with no problems, and I received my warm blanket at the end of the procedure,which was a blessing as it was freezing assed cold in there! Especially when only covered with one of those,"my ass is hanging out in the back" Johnnies? they called them?
Well that was much ado about not too much I thought, as I came home on the boat for a couple of days before the next impending disaster. Now over the ensuing three days I was not at all hungry, 'by-product of the oxycontin maybe?', and ate very little. Before I know it, it is the day before the impending, "Extracorporeal Shock Wave Lithotripsy" treatment. That name alone should scare the shit out of you! Only in my case it didn't!! It seems that one of the detriments to taking oxycontin for an extended period is to lock up all that previously ingested forage into a solid block of nitrogenous waste matter! But, according to this piece of paper I received with instructions for the Lithotripsy, I must have an empty bowel upon presentation of my self for the treatment! Guess what? Eighteen hours before the event you must subject yourself again to the injestion of ANOTHER of those little "soda bottles" of diarrheal death! After another fight between in and out, it stayed there and went to work. This time with completely different results!Man, what is going on? Last time I couldn't get to the head fast enough! This time as I lingered close to the door, ready to "run", nothing happens! Upwards of seven hours later as a severe pain has developed in the lower nether regions and I think I am going to have to go the ER again, this time for exploration of the same orfice for a different reason, the gates of relief clanged open with one hell of an explosion! The rattling of the door to the head alerted all in the other rooms as to the status of the situation, as well as my cries and sighs of contentment! All was well again in the nether realms. Off we go to the OR this time for the treatment. In the mean time I had had to stop taking the oxycontin for some time before the upcoming event, so as the day progressed the pain threshold got lower and lower till it became non-existant and began building at a rapid rate in the other direction. One of the questions the nurses would ask every time before giving you a shot was, "on a scale of one to ten, one being the lowest and ten being the highest, what is the level you feel you are at right now?"
Now a small discourse in anatomy. The kidney has a little tube about eight inches long that runs from the kidney down to the bladder where it emptis into. The INSIDE diameter of this little tube is about the same as the lead in a mechanical lead pencil. You know, so small that it is hard to pick up, and you almost can't see? Anyway this is the area that kidney stones try to traverse as they attempt to exit the body. Now this little tube for some reason is just innundated and infused, and saturated, and completely engulfed in millions of nerve endings! Getting the picture? Well I have had quite a few ladies who have been affected with stones relate to me that it was worse trying to pass a stone than to have a baby!And so a little more of a graphic illustration may help in picturing and feeling the pain of this all. Think of that little tube as a garden hose of about three quarters of an inch in diameter. Now think of that stone as being the size of a softball and you can feel it start to hurt already no? Now back to the nurse and her questions about pain level. When she asked me what the level now was I replied that it was at the top of her scale and it felt like I was about to have a baby and that the little bastard was covered with razor blades to boot! For some reason this cracked her up and she said this was the best level inidicator she had ever heard. I'm ever the wise ass, even when I think I'm dying. Off I go to the CT scan room to get a picture of the offending stone. After getting on the table and run through the machine a few times the guy says to relax and he'd take me back to the OR poste haste. As I'm lying there I hear this guy say to someone in the little alcove with him," Holy shit Ed look at the size of this sucker, there are two of them, one about 13 mm and one about 8mm!" If you want to know how big that is think of about a 9/16" to a 5/8" nut! Now think of that in relation to the lead pencil. Carry it to the garden hose analogy and it is like trying to drive a Mack Truck through that damn hose. NOW, you might begin to suspect what it feels like to push one of these babies out. Of course something that big won't physically go thru, so it has to be broken up into sand sized grains. This is what the Lithotripsy was for and it worked very well. The only problem will be sweeping all those little grains down the super highway one at a time over a six to seven week period. Not a project I look forward to with much anticipation.
So intrepid future colonoscopy people, when you go to see that doctor for the first time,be sure and mention to him if you are in possession of any of those little calcium or uric acid stones. It just might save you from the torture I underwent for a few days that felt like months!! TIFN Everett

Daisies

The wife, you know, the 'other' person who wants to rule the Island, and I went out for a Sunday afternoon ride yesterday, and one of us remarked on how more and more of the lots and edges of developed property were cleaned of brush and junk. Well that thought sent me on a little "deja vu all over again" visit to the past. When I was in grade school and high school, the self appointed grassfire lighter, bug burner and noxious weed eliminator, would head to the west side, (the Worst side)over too about Wardens Pond. There abouts, he would accidentally drop his match that he had just lit his cigarette with and also the cig. Damned if it didn't start a little grass fire! Well he would just move a few feet down the road and try again. No sense having that fire licking up his leg and denuding him of leg hair. After going thru the same routine four or five times, he would have a sheet of fast moving flame about about a hundred yards long and tongues of bright orange licking up to about thirty or forty feet in the air. Well pretty soon the siren would go off and all hands in the fire department including all male members of the school, 6th grade and above would report for duty to the fire barn which was where Aldo's is now located. There we would be equipped with a straw broom and a bucket to carry water in. We would then be loaded into trucks and delivered to a site down wind of the impending flames and up wind of a house that might be in peril. Our job was to fill the bucket with water from various sources, wells and cisterns mostly, stick the broom it in to get it, the broom good and wet, and then go get between the flames and the house and defend said edifice from those greedy,hot, devouring little tongues of flame. Most people kept the grass trimmed very short around the perimeter of the house just fore this reason. They used various forms of accoutrement's. Some times it was a scythe and sickle, and in some places a newfangled thing called a lawn mower! Damnedest thing you ever saw! It did nothing useful, but turned perfectly good blades of grass that would have done a fine job filling the haystack, into useless little pieces of grass that the cows wouldn't even eat! But I digress FAR afield. Most folks owned a varied lot of grass eating animals and they did an unusually good job of keeping things trimmed very short. So mostly all we had to defend against were the flying pieces of grass and straw that would find their way to the rooftops, This was a good place for all we nimble youngsters to be positioned so that we didn't accidentally get eaten by those voracious flames.
Daisies you say? What's with the title of "Daisies"? Well some of the good things that happened because of these unexpected fires, was that a lot of the not so good weeds were toasted and that no underbrush was allowed to accumulate. It also did a wonderful job of keeping the stone walls clear of brush. Now early in March, wherever you looked you would see blackened fields all over the Island. In a few places you could even see faint blushes of green trying to break out of their places of hiding. Give these fields a few weeks of rain and some warm weather, and by the time the Graduation exercises at the school rolled around, there were just ab-so-lute-ly millions of daisies of all kinds and colors proliferating in every square inch of Block Island's fields!! It was an awe inspiring sight. The kids at the school would go out with cars and trucks, and scissors and knives, and come back in a few hours with enough daisies to completely cover the wall behind the stage where the Graduation exercises were to take place that night! A grid of thin boards covered with chicken wire was erected against the back wall and the flowers were tucked in the openings by the more artistic of the female members of the school populace. Some times they even spelled out words or even pictures. IT WAS FANTASTIC! It was as close to the Rose Parade as we would ever get to here on BI. And it was "woe" of the highest order if you were afflicted by the pollen distributed throughout the room! There was always a full compliment of June Bugs winging their way busily around the room, to also add too the evenings entertainment. The ladies DID NOT like them landing in their hair. It was always a fun thing to watch them trying to remove them from the hair nest. Some tried to be oh so discreet about it, and others just yanked, hauled,screamed a lot. Sure was funny to us little guys. Damn, they were only June Bugs! But as the farming died out, along with the fishing, and people moved away from the Island, the fields were slowly given over to the assortment of "trees", shad, bayberry etc. That now infest the Island.
So as I ride around the Island on a sunny Sunday afternoon, in my minds eye I can still see those fields loaded with the daisies, and the possibility that in the near future, some semblance of those fields might again re-appear for all to enjoy as much as my generation did! SO THERE! No politics! TIFN Everett

Mr Smith's Letter- Rebuttal- NOT Forthcoming!

Hi All, In the last previous post I said that I was going to have a rebuttal to each of Mr. Smiths points in his letter. I do have one for each, but after talking witha couple of people involved with the West Side plan, it seems that most all of the salient points have been addressed to all those concerneds(sp,use?) satisfaction. So in the best interests of the project going forward without any more setbacks or delays, I am going to drop persuing this whole line of inquiry. Now some of you are going to say that I am chickening out and that may be. BUT! I don't want to be the one that keeps all these twenty families from getting a home!
I only have one other thing to say, and that is that Mr.Smith does not have the intrests of the lower, lower-middleclass people of the Island as his first or even second priority! Enough said!! TIFN Everett

MR. SMITH'S LETTER

Rebuttal to follow in a day or so....

P.O. Box 984
Block Island RI 02807
401/466-5995



February 22, 2005

Gerald Pierce
Block Island Economic Development
PO Box 619
Block Island RI 02807

Dear Gerry:

I am writing to make suggestions about the West Side Road project. My original concerns focused on the environmental impact. Since learning more about the project, I now have grave concerns about the impact on affordable housing, the impact on the owner-residents, and the impact on the community’s affordable housing needs in the future.

This is one of the three largest single building developments in the Island’s entire history. This project involves the town’s resources and public funding. Many of our decisions will be irrevocable. We have to get it right and come up with a plant that a wide consensus of the community supports. My interest, since I first heard about the project, has been to make it one that truly meets our needs, serves the needs of the future owners of the units, and respects the natural environment that each of us here is fortunate to experience.

In that spirit, I make the following suggestions:

1. This site has a steep ravine that the proposed plan seems to make no allowances for. It would be unwise - and incompatible with the values of Block Island – to alter, remove, or flatten the natural contours of the land.

2. This can be done by clustering some of the units and combining four to eight of them into single buildings. This will provide variety in the neighborhood and allow more open space – for recreation, gardening, and a sense of living in sync with the natural environment.

3. With such topography and for other reasons, it is not wise or necessary that every house have a basement.

4. Combining some of the units in one or two buildings allows for some occupants to save on heating costs. It will save on installation of sewer, water, and utilities, making the units more affordable. It will increase the size of yards for owners who want and need them. It will increase the number of residents with great views. As currently planned, the project has 70 percent or more of the homeowners looking at other houses from their windows, not at the Island’s natural beauty. Imaginative siting of the units can take care of this and save money as well.

5. Having all units of identical sizes is not in the interests of the future occupants nor does it help meet the housing needs of the Island to the maximum extent possible. A person living alone may not need two bedrooms, a second floor, and a basement for many years into the future, if ever. Yet to live in the proposed neighborhood, middle-income buyers would have no choice but to buy a two-bedroom unit. It is true that the basements and second floors would be unfinished, but the owners would have heating costs for that unused space. Their mortgage payments would reflect the additional construction costs. And what of buyers who expand their families and need three or four bedrooms? There is no place for them to move. And what of middle-aged couples with children who want to downsize when the children leave home? They will either have to stay in the same two-bedroom residence where they are or move off the Island.

6. By the same token, the lot sizes should not be uniform, but varied according to the unit sizes, to the topography of the land, and to wise planning. Some residents will want a traditional yard, but others will prefer a small plot because they will save on the purchase price and save the time and expense on yard maintenance. If everyone’s lot size is the same, no one’s needs will be met. If every lot size is the same, it is impossible to build within the contours of the land.

7. Clustering and combining some units will open up a significant amount of communal space. This will give young children space to play without having to cross West Side Road to the playground or to be driven elsewhere. It may also allow enough open space so that middle-school children and young teens to play ball or other games in their own neighborhood. It will allow all the children to grow up surrounded by the natural environment, as Island kids have for decades. If we make our single largest housing neighborhood one where this is not possible, we may lose the distinctive Island ethic of appreciation for the natural surroundings. The idea of same-sized lots for everyone is a suburban model, not an Island model. Knowledgeable planners have said that individual front lawns are the most wasted and unused space in America. On an island we obviously have limited space.

8. It’s important that affordable housing have opportunities for owners to downsize or upgrade. But the project as planned does not allow for that. That means that there will be a minimal amount of mobility in the neighborhood. There will be little turnover. Occupants will be locked in, and when we need to locate middle-income school teachers, medical workers, hospitality employees, or town employees in the future, the West Side Road project will have provided us no vacancies at all.

9. One of our most pressing affordable-housing needs is units for new school teachers, police officers, and health center employees who are single or childless and need housing for a couple of years until they decide whether they like living and working here. There are no units for those persons in the current plan.

10. In fact, as I understand the current qualification requirements, the newcomers would not even qualify for the ownership units. That means that we cannot use this new development of 20 affordable ownership units as a recruiting tool for the positions that we need to fill shortly.

11. Our second most pressing need is rental units for short-term employees who come to the Island. There are no units for these persons in the current plan. Substituting three to six rental units of varying sizes, in place of some ownership units, would meet this need and allow prospective buyers to become part of the neighborhood while they wait for an ownership residence to come on the market. It would allow flexibility for owners whose family situations change because of divorce or death or other factors. Management of rental units may be a challenge, but there are creative solutions: One would be to have the owner of one unit act as a rental manager (and thereby offset monthly mortgage payments). Another would be to combine rental management of the Searles Ball and West Side Road developments. A third would be to contract rental management to the Block Island Housing Board. Still a fourth is to contract it to the Women’s Development Corp.

12. The steep grade of the roads in the proposed plan may not meet town specifications. At any rate, it raises risks. And it raises construction and maintenance costs. It would be a shame if the homeowners association of this new neighborhood is saddled immediately with large expenses because of a road washout.

13. It is hard to see that emergency equipment can pass through the inclines currently proposed. Reconfiguring the units will eliminate this risk. The fire department should be asked to take a close look at the road configuration and provide a written report on whether it allows for necessary emergency access. That report should discuss whether the alternative cul-de-sac plan is an acceptable alternative.

14. The road in the current plan does not seem to allow adequate setbacks from the pond and wetlands, as required by town specification. They may not meet state Department of Environmental Management specifications.

15. The proposed plan contemplates an addition of 40 automobiles. The Island’s fragile environment can hardly accommodate that. The plan seems to send a message that two automobiles for each residence is the expected norm. The neighborhood would be enhanced for the residents, especially the children, if accommodations for some motor vehicles are in a cluster lot, much like the Searles Ball housing and the Old Harbor Meadow complex. Not every unit needs to have auto parking right next to it. By clustering some of the cars, there will be less wear and tear on the land, less uncontrolled run-off of oils and other auto discharges into the fragile wetland by West Side Road. And the neighborhood will be improved aesthetically.

16. And yet, the proposed plan seems to have no accommodations for visitor parking. By clustering some of the residents’ parking, that space could be used for owner-occupants and for some visitor parking. This might make the right-of-way to the Greenway trail accessible to more people. Why not provide space for one automobile adjoining some units and create a small cluster lot for other automobiles. The plan could also designate additional space for additional parking if it becomes necessary in the future?

17. A vast amount of the proposed plan is devoted to automobiles, either coming and going to the residences or parked. In fact, there is almost as much space devoted to motor vehicles as to human beings. This is an inefficient use of the acreage, and incompatible with the values of the community.

18. In the current unclustered proposals, most if not all of the units will not have adequate setbacks to allow an owner easily to expand the footprint or otherwise personalize the house. He or she would need to get zoning approval for a modest expansion. This would require moderate-income property owners probably to hire lawyers, engineers, and designers for a modest expansion. Clustering the units eliminates the need for setback variances in the future.



When I met with you and Mary Jane in January, she said that there would be no paving and no central air conditioning; I trust that this remains part of the plan.

Under the Community Development Block Grant interim financing grant, the project managers, before money is spent, must conduct an environmental review, with public comments. This provides the opportunity for us to consider these suggestions – and suggestions from others – and come up with a plan that a wide consensus of Islanders can support. We will then be able to have the plan presented to the Planning Board and Zoning Board with widespread support for it in the community.

The state agencies responsible for funding this project have told me that all of these modifications to the proposal can be considered at this point in the process and that the project plans can be altered accordingly. I plan to present these suggestions to the Planning Board. It would speed the process if we could reach an agreement before the project goes before the Planning Board.

Time is of the essence, for two reasons. The community needs the affordable housing right away. And all of us want to have an Island-based non-profit organization develop this project and fulfill the town’s needs rather than to risk leaving affordable-housing development to commercial developers who may use provisions of state law to bring to the community a bogus “affordable housing” venture.

Yours truly,



Robert Ellis Smith
Member, New Shoreham Town Council

Cc: Mary Jane Balser

Multiplying Blogs

Better beware when you turn on your computer because the Island blogs are multiplying like rabbits! Here is another one. http://www.adriansisle.blogspot.com . Some one with an undecipherable email address sent me this one last night. Well at least he/she is not in my address book so it might well have come from Osama himself! Anyway it is another view although a little hardline!TIFN OK I'm to stupid to make the link work, but if you type the address into the Gogle search block it comes up and then you can
bookmark it!DUH!a