Knock Knock

Knock, knock…”anyone still here?”

I know…I seem to have wandered off the edge of the earth into some dark hole…swallowed up in cyber space…the bits and bytes no longer flowing.

Truth is…it took me a few years to figure this out, but my little consultancy gets busy late in the year. Seems any budget surpluses cause folks to think…”let’s get that consultant in here”…so (not complaining) I “hop to” and hit the road when they call!

From Mississippi to California, Texas to Pennsylvania…driving and flying I make my rounds.

As I said…I am not complaining (I would rather spread this out over the year)…”but gotta go” when they call!

I specialize in two areas…so I have variety and constantly meeting new people and challenges…both I thoroughly enjoy.

Opppsss…gotta go, phones ringing and the computer is “binging” …”you have mail”.

American Greatness!

American greatness is still here...we are just confused by the debate. However, the core essentials are still here...hearty people, democracy, and opportunity.

 Nothing has changed...just confused...listen to the debates on the channels and listen to them all, liberal to conservative, read the blogs, talk to your friends... the basics are still here...just confused as we are increasingly polarized into "no move camps"!

Where is the voice of reason and reality? Where is that voice that transcends politics and agendas and strikes to the heart of the issues? This...disregarding personal agendas and speaks only to the core issues...and with realistic solutions?

We are still the nation that ALL want to come to...that should tell you something...and we CAN prevail!

Alligator Cove

The drought continues, the rains still just a memory, and the lake, our lake continues, to recede! We are now down over four feet!

The “dribbles” coming out of our sprinkler system alerted me to a potential problem! I went down to the dock and looked at the water pickup off the end of our dock…and sure enough it was sitting on top of the water…not good for the pump!

 I turned it off!

Today we ran the pickup line further out into the lake…another twenty feet!  The channel in our cove is usually about twelve feet in the middle (now down to eight feet!) so that “should “take care of the problem (until the lake is dry…”can that happen?”).

Now the point!

When we put the sprinkler system in the water was up four feet and the neighborhood alligator was “patrolling” the cove. Needless to say the installers were “wary!” They “watchfully” installed the pickup line off the dock.

Today they carefully “waded” out and made the necessary adjustment, a 90 ° elbow to a twenty foot extension to another 90° up to the inlet screen…cleaned out some of the valves and we were up and running.

Oh…and no alligator in site!

We are back to watering...until??

Alligator Season:

I’ve been working in Louisiana for the last ten days and was anxious to get home. Up at 0500 I was in the elevator heading down to check out by 0545.

Riding down with me was a fellow hauling a large cooler. Creating conversation I said…”looks like your heading out early also?” He replied…”have to get out early to beat the heat.”

Checking out the woman looked over at the group, including my elevator companion, and said they were headed out for alligators…”today is the first day of the alligator season.” Alligator season runs from the first Wednesday in September and runs for 30 days. During that time 30,000 to 35,000 are harvested.

She also added that a film crew from Swamp People had recently held auditions at the hotel for this seasons alligator hunters.

My companion in the elevator would not be one of them as he was too corporate looking, clean cut and average looking. Most of those profiled on Swamp People are more colorful in appearance and speech.

Heading west out of Houma and across the swamps, the mist and ground fog clinging to the trees and floating on the swamp, I thought what a primordial scene…not changed since dawn of time and neither have the alligators!

The "End of the Road"

I’ve often wondered what lay at the “end of the road”. Today I found one road that indeed ended in the marshes, the gentle wave of the Gulf of Mexico lapping at the shores…Cocodrie, Louisiana.  Cocodrie is at the end of Hwy 56, south of Houma Louisiana and is at the “end of the road”. 

Shimmering in the heat of the afternoon sun, flat waters and no breeze, Cocodrie is an assemblage of fish camps, shrimp docks and boat launches. Unless you’re curious like me you probably wouldn’t go there…even if lost you would probably turn around before you ran out of road.

On the way down I passed many, if not most houses, trailers and businesses that had been “shored up”…that’s what the advertising signs offered. One in particular caught my attention as it was firmly elevated, with its two garage door at least twelve feet above the ground…no water was going to get in there…and no cars!

Finally arriving I found a great marina / restaurant called (imagine this) Coco Marine. Seated I asked the young lady what does this restaurant at the end of the road do best?

Without hesitation she replied “Wine Shrimp”. And that is I asked? Smiling she replied…”grilled shrimp in a skillet with a spicy wine and cheese sauce poured over it and baked and garlic toast for “sopping” up the gravy”.  

 Wow that sounded good (may send my blood sugar out into the Gulf) but the day was early and I could exercise it off, so I agreed to try the wine shrimp…and was it good, no GREAT! After a chilled glass of wine and the sumptuous (and rich) dish I waddled out (maybe I’ll exercise later…much later!), very contented and marveling at what you can find at the end of a road.

Drougth!!

Over the last few years drought has plagued much of Texas.  All Texas lakes have suffered, their levels decreasing annually…all that is except Lake Livingston, our home lake.

Lake Livingston is a man-made lake that is part of the Trinity River watershed. Fortunately rains to the north have kept our lake at or near it defined level of 131 feet…until now. As the large high pressure system settled over Texas and blocked the moisture laden Gulf of Mexico air from providing our summer thunderstorms.

The rains have stopped, the temperatures have soared into the 100’s and the water use and evaporation have sapped the lakes…even our Lake Livingston. Slowly at first then at an ever increasing rate the water along our bulkhead began to recede…now we even have a small (but growing) beach.

The 100 degree day continue, the rains are but a distant memory and the forecast is grim…no change for the foreseeable future…maybe until November!

TEXAS WEATHER

The scorching Texas sun has finally set.  The ceiling fan in the kitchen squeals and whines in a futile attempt to cool.  The screen door to the back porch creaks and groans as the old dog wanders in and, tongue hanging out, flops on the floor under the table. No one moves, only the sound of the ceiling fan and the windmill in the yard, barely turning in the hot evening air, breaks the silence.

Fast forward sixty years…same hot Texas sun but ceiling fans purr quietly as they circulate the cool air conditioned air around the room, but the discussion on weather goes on, from the morning coffee down at the local café in Onalasaka (yes there is an Onalalaka)  to the concrete corridors of Houston.

Much is written about the weather…

 “Climate is what we expect, weather is what we get.”  Mark Twain

 On February 9, 1870, President Ulysses S. Grant signed a joint resolution of Congress authorizing the Secretary of War to establish a national weather service. The resolution required the Secretary of War... “To provide for taking meteorological observations at the military stations in the interior of the continent and at other points in the States and Territories”.

So the records are still being made and broken, season come and go…and the weather cycle goes on.

Though the air conditioning makes life more comfortable I can still hear the opening and closing of a screen door, the creaking and groaning of a windmill…life move on.