a bed of dozes

I had a number of topics I wanted to write about today. Instead, I took a nap -- a five-hour nap. I must be rehearsing for retirement.


The photograph above is to remind me that this will be what I see each day in my back yard: starting in less than four months.


But there will be steps to take before I get there. The first one comes early tomorrow morning -- I will stop by the agency that handles my retirement pay.


If I understand the procedure correctly, a counselor will walk me through the application procedure, I will get a briefing on some of my retirement options, and I will then write out a check that will boost my retirement pay a bit. When I leave, the wheels will be in motion to ensure that I will be retired on 31 March.


This coming week, I am going to start compiling the final list of things I need to do. As an example, I have not had a physical in years. I should do that. The old chassis may require a lube job before I give up my health insurance.


I will share some of my action items -- because some of you will have a very good ideas based on your own experience.


But not today. I am heading back to bed.

jonny ward revisited

Serendipity is arriving in bushel baskets this week.


On Friday evening, I was shopping at Safeway, and tried to maneuver around two younger women who were filling their basket with some bargain or other -- bathroom deodorizers, it appeared.


Now, we need to get our story's facts in perspective. When I say "younger," I mean "younger" than your correspondent. Maybe in their 40s or so.


We exchanged pleasantries as we are wont to do with strangers in our little village. One turned to me and said: "What a delightful accent. What part of Ireland are you from?"


Mind you, this is not the first time I have been asked the question. Responded I: "The Oregon part of Ireland." They laughed, and one responded: "Well, it is sexy. Very sexy."


We will pause in our narrative for one moment. I am not certain I have ever heard that adjective used in conjunction with the manner I pronounce my vowels. But I will say that I was duly complimented.


I bid them a good day and went on my leprechaun way.


The exchange was odd because on that very day I had two hits from Ireland on my blog -- both of them coming my way with a Google search for "Jonny Ward."


I briefly introduced you to Jonny (or Jonathan, as I first knew him) in afloat in my mind last October. That is him on the right in the picture at the top of the post. He was then a cadet on the Queen Mary II. He is now third officer on the ship.


I started wondering: who had conducted the Google search? A friend in Ireland? His parents? (His father also served on the Queen Mary II.) A stranger?


The answer will never be known -- unless the searcher would be so good as to leave a comment.


Or, perhaps, I could simply murmur in my new-found sexy Irish voice -- and answer the question for meself.

mexico exterminates canadians

The National Post wants all Canadians to know it "stands on guard for thee."


Yesterday's headline almost blared: "B.C. man critical after Canadians shot in Mexico strip club."


The details were every bit as alarming. Apparently (from what one can gather from the breathless reporting), three young Canadian men, on vacation with their families, innocently wandered into a strip club in Baja. The next thing they knew, an unknown assailant shot one man (the subject of the headline) point-blank in the neck. His two friends ran, and the assailant caught one and shot him in the throat and leg. The third man is in hospital with unreported injuries.


In a throw-away line, the reporter tells us: by the way, a Mexican security guard was also shot.


But, that is all prelude for our intrepid reporter. The shooting seems to be merely a dramatic device to support the grand announcement: "Mexico is getting a reputation as a dangerous place to holiday for Canadians."


Is there a band of psychotic serial killers in Mexico searching for a maple leaf to target? From the tone of the article, Canadians must be stacking up like cord wood in Mexican resorts.


But, wait for it. There is always some interesting statistic to support the as-yet unfounded hysteria. And there it is. Not until the end of the story. "In seven years, Foreign Affairs missions in Mexico logged 172 reports of violence against Canadian travellers."


7 years? 172 reports? I suspect that the Toronto police might have some interesting statistics that would simply dwarf the "reputation for violence" label.


Is there crime in Mexico? You bet there is. The three young men hospitalized in Cabo are a perfect example. Each of the reported acts of violence is a tragedy.


But the story is just another fluff piece of hysteria that distorts reality for some nonsense agenda of the reporter -- perhaps no more pernicious than the desire to sell a story.


What offends me is the inevitable result of this style of reporting: it merely ends up feeding people's paranoia. Worse than that, it is bad writing and shoddy logic.


That, I guess, is the blessing. Any story this badly-written will not have legs.


Newspaper readers are smarter than that. Aren't they?

the winter of our content

I would be beyond remiss if I did not point out that Jiggs is 13 today.


I never thought I would see that age in print. Jiggs is a big golden retriever. I thought I would be lucky to have 10 years with him. Any reader of this blog knows that I have had concerns that his end was near every day for the past year. But he never ceases to surprise me.


Some things are different. His favorite spot in the world is on an Oregon beach. But his back legs are so weak, he cannot navigate through the sand. Or so I thought. During our snow storm this past month, he dashed around like a puppy. Only the onset of the ice defeated him.


I consider this last year to be a gift from God. I have enjoyed each day with Jiggs. I have consciously chosen not to accept a year's worth of invitations merely to spend more time with him.


Right now, he is asleep next to my computer table -- ready to jump up just in case I need to go for a walk.


Happy birthday, pal.

it is always then; it is never now

1 January. New calendar.


There is something about tossing out an old calendar. It is more than mere symbolism. It is a kinetic act showing that time really has passed -- and it will never be here again.


That is the philosophical side of time. But time passing can have relational aspects, as well.


One of the first blogs I discovered in my quest to determine if Mexico should be my next home was "Eddie Willer's" Adventures Of A Third World Shopkeeper. Most blogs about Mexico are uniformly upbeat and sunny -- describing Mexico in the same glowing terms that a friend describes his spinster sister. You know there must be something else going on, but the family simply does not talk about it.


"Eddie" talked about it. He left Britain because its political system was sapping his individual creativity. He turned that same jeweler's eye of libertarianism on Mexico.


I did not always agree with his observations, but they were always interesting. Case in point: Privatization of buses in his hometown of Tampico resulted in scheduling chaos. Even as the champion of the free market, he suggested that regulation may be better than the ensuing anarchy.


His blog announced: "Eddie now lives as a peaceable merchant with his wife and baby daughter. After all, life as a third-world shopkeeper has to be better than as a first-world wage slave."


Unfortunately, for those of us who were his fans, "Eddie" decided that being a third-world shopkeeper was not the uplifting opportunity it originally promised. He has posted his last post, and will be moving to Canada with his family at the end of January.


I, for one, will miss his pithy observations -- all based on a slightly eccentric view of human kind.


The fact that "Eddie Willers" now chooses an alternate course is not a surprise. At the end of Atlas Shrugged, Eddie's fate is not disclosed -- he is merely stranded in the desert. But, there is hope. From the pen of Herself, we learn: "He is much too able and too honest ever to adjust himself to collectivism."


If his chosen pseudonym even has an iota of accuracy, Canada will prove to be an adventure, but not the ultimate home for our "Eddie."


As he heads north, and I head south, I wish each of you a very happy and blessed new year.

paradise recalled

I am feeling a bit off today. Just a head cold, I suspect. But enough that I am not up to drafting a long commentary.


Instead, I thought I would share with you one of those exquisite moments that seem to occur spontaneously in Mexico.


While walking through a poorer neighborhood in Melaque, I chanced upon a cul-de-sac that could only be described as eccentrically charming. It had a fountain. A few aging buildings. And a cluster of these flowers. The orange against the lime wall caused me to pause. And to savor.


As I sit here chilled, that moment is passed. Even though the fountain and the buildings await someone else's moment.

Oh, if life were made of moments,
Even now and then a bad one-!
But, if life were only moments,
Then you'd never know you had one.

mystery solved

Last month in name the mystery tree and my so-called saturday , I posted pictures of a tree on the route Jiggs and I traverse through the Archives Park. Even though several people had seen similar trees, none of us knew its origin or its name.


I finally decided to follow up on as clue that my cousin's son, Cory, provided to me. I wrote to Jill Martini, the Horticulture Manager of the Oregon Garden. She solved the mystery. Here is her response:

From your description it sounds like you are talking about a Clerodendrum trichotomum, common name: Harlequin Glorybower Tree or Peanut Butter Bush referring to its fragrance.

Thank you for your inquiry. Please come visit the garden soon.

Now there is a moniker. Harlequin Glorybower Tree -- and well-suited to the colorful fruit it produces. As for, Peanut Butter Bush -- sounds a bit programmatic to me.


The US Forest Service has an in interesting fact sheet on the tree. What you will not learn is that the tree is originally from eastern Asia -- principally, Japan. But it also appears that it would grow as a specimen tree in Mexico.


Special thanks to Cory and Ms. Martini for putting this 2008 mystery to rest. Like Miss Marple, we can all go home now, put up our feet, and have a nice cuppa.