No More Bull

The last Ford Taurus rolled off the line in Georgia yesterday ending a 21 year history. My last Taurus (actually a Mercury Sable) “rolled off” this past summer when I traded the 2004 Sable for a 2007 Toyota Camry Hybrid.

The price of gas had just peaked past $3.00 a gallon and I had been sniffing around hybrids since they appeared a few years ago. Had Ford come up with a reasonable hybrid – instead of the ridiculous SUB hybrid (that got almost the same gas mileage as the Sable), I might have bought one.

I owned three Taurus/Sables over a ten year period. The first, a 1996 was my favorite. Unlike the average person, I loved the oval shape and Star Trek interior. I know that the radio button drove everyone crazy, but I loved them. This was my first automatic transmission in many years, and after as few weeks of driving, I had no interest in returning to the stick. Yes, the gas mileage compared to the 1991 Mazda Protégé (4-cylinder) was striking, but in those days we weren’t too concerned about these things.

The 1996 Taurus started to nickel-and-dime me at around 100K. First the heater core (all three had the same problem), the brakes (again all three had the same defect) and then the catalytic converter. I had dumped $2500 into it in six months and it needed a thousand dollars more work to make it last another year. I used that as a down payment at bought a 2000 Taurus. By then the Ford engineers had bowed to the “complaints” of the old farts running the company and had ruined the design to a box. The novelty and forward thinking elements were all gone. But it was a comfortable and relatively safe car.

At around 100K this one started to misbehave like the last one and my extended warrantee had expired. After breaking down on a road trip to DC and having to pay $500 to have it fixed, I drove back to the dealer and got the 2004 Sable.

The Sable was a step up in terms of creature comforts and I loved some of the higher tech gizmos – my favorite was the self-dimming rear view mirror. But with each successive Taurus/Sable, the gas mileage dropped. The Sable only got 26 mpg on the highway (although it got 29 mpg when we drove to Florida in spring 2005). In the winter, the best I could hope for was 24 mpg.

I reflect on this because I think it is symptomatic of what was happening to Ford in general. Their business plan was becoming more Republican with no regard to gas mileage issues and more interest in continuing to promote large gas-guzzling behemoths like the Explorer and Expedition. I was increasingly becoming ashamed of driving a Ford product and it was clear the company had no interest in changing.

So, the death of the Taurus and what it represented are clearly symbolic of the demise of Ford Motors. They have now dropped behind Toyota and are threatened with extinction.

We’ve owned Ford products in my family since the 1930s. When my father steered away in the late 70’s to Chrysler, he regretted it. But he never bought another Ford. I’ve owned seven Ford/Mercury; most bought new. But, I’ll tell you, without a major turn around in their corporate mindset, I think I’ve bought my last.

~jeb

Maine Mystery Beast Returns

It seems the Maine Mystery Beast that was all in the news a few months ago (see my blog entry) now has its very own poster.

Figures it would show up just in time for Halloween.

~jeb

Arming Teachers

While scooting through my Bloglines collection of education sites I found several references to school violence and the recent shootings in schools around the nation. But when digging further, I discovered that a Wisconsin state lawmaker has proposed the arming of teachers as a solution to gun violence in schools. I intially thought this was some kind of a joke, but then found the interview with the lawmaker on several website including a site with a link to ABC News.

But the best review is Stephen Colbert's Colbert's Report

~jeb

Pessimism

Bill Nemitz, a regular columnist for the Portland Press Herald and the Maine Sunday Telegram had an interesting piece in today's MST regarding the "pessimism of Mainers." The column struck a note and I think Bill is on to something.

His piece deals with a Brookings Institution report that was released this week called "Charting Maine's Future" which provides a reasonably upbeat perspective of Maine's current economic picture. Coming in at this time of negativism - something always associated with the annual elections season - I found this report particularly refreshing and the Nemitz piece particularly relevant.

Nemitz based part of this column on the comments of former governor Angus King who, for the sake for full disclosure, was involved in the funding of the report. King has been reported in the media this past week as praising the report and is quoted in the Nemitz piece as saying: "That's their stock and trade, telling people how bad off they are." This is in reference to the nature of partisan politics that, as Nemitz states, "run increasingly on pure negatives."

If I see one more TABOR ad or one more for that Woodcock telling us that Maine is the "most highly taxed state in the Union," I'm gonna throw up. All I can say is I grew up in Brooklyn, NY and brother you do not know what taxes are. Long before there were sales taxes or rooms and meals taxes in Maine we had them in New York. And we paid them. I'm sure there were people complaining about them 50 years ago, but they didn't have an ad on the TV every five minutes. Geez, people might actually start to believe that nonsense.

All I can tell you is that a couple of years ago I attended a wedding in Plymouth MA for the son of one of my cousins. Attending the wedding were the groom's aunt and uncle who live in Westchester County, NY. These are people I remember meeting at family gatherings 40 years ago and I know them to be good Westchester Republicans - at least that's what mother used to say. Well they are very well off; he a retired VP from some multimillion dollar international company; she a socialite, and the live in one of the more high priced areas of Westchester. At the wedding, we got talking about local real estate and they were absolutely astounded at the fact that they had gone and looked at several beautiful new homes being build along the Massachusetts shore with price tags in the close to a million dollar range. They expressed their surprise that the taxes on the properties were only about $6,000 per year. According to the rich cousins, a similar property in NY would be taxed over $10,000. I guess it's all relative.

One of the more enlightening pieces of information coming from this Brookings report is the fact that the Maine population is actually growing. And our population is not growing because we are being overrun with Mexicans and migrant workers from Third World Countries. Maine's population is growing because rich retired people are coming to Maine because of our beautiful way of life. Imagine that.

Don't they know were the most highly taxes state in the nation? I guess not.

Or, perhaps they know what I know. That the Woodcocks and the Republicans and the pro-TABOR people are just a bunch of rich farts that want more money for themselves and they are trying to convince the few folks whose houses are in areas of Maine where there have been incredible increases in value of the land and are being "taxes out" that it's those "devils" in Augusta that are doing this to them and that by voting in the Pubs and TABOR all of their problems with go away. Sorry sister, TABOR ain't gonna do anything to save your house.

Nemitz best comments come at the end of the column:

King, who helped fund the Brookings report, likens Maine's funk to the advice he received during a motorcycle safety course: Focus on the road ahead and that's where you'll go. Stare too long at the roadside ditch, on the other hand, and guess where you'll end up?

"Maine looks in the ditch all the time," King said. "And lo and behold "

Oh, as lest you believe I am a Angus King fan, I'm not. I was one of the thousands of State workers who were fired when King came into office.

~jeb

ED

I wish there was some way I could capture this and post it... I was just cruising MSNBC's video selections and the story about the Congressman from Florida sending inappropriate e-mails to a 16 year old boy popped up first - but not before an advertisement for medication for erectile dysfunction.

You don't supposed they did this intentionally?

Hi Ho

~j

Fall Color

It's that time of the year when Mother Nature provides us with the most vivid colors.

The leaf peepers are arriving like the swallows at Capistrano and the Fryeburg Fair starts tomorrow.

~jeb

Where the Heck Have I Been?

We did come home from Canada. And, I had hoped that I would be blogging almost daily from the Maritimes. But life got very busy after I returned and work occupied all of my time.

I heard from an all college friend (I was almost going to say "college chum" - eeek!) who was involved with me in a loose band of "hippie types" at St. Francis College. We called ourselves "Treaty Stone" and our main claim to fame was the fact that for about six years we hosted a series of "folk festivals" on campus. They were usually on a Friday night and drew a nice size crowd who drank cheap wine and cheese and crackers while we watched and listened to each other play guitars and attempt to sound like the leading folk rockers of the time.

My own specialty was doing covers of Stephen Stills. I parted my hair down the middle and tried to perfect that slighty pre-nasal, Texas voice. It all seems rather silly now, but we had fun at the time.

Many if not most of the "musicians" continued to play and I even enjoyed a brief stint doing the bar scene in Brooklyn and at some other similar college affairs. In the early 80s I even was involved with a musical duo and we played in bars in the Mount Washington Valley of NH. That too was short lived as I moved away and basically lost interest.

Now all of my music is played at the 5:30 Saturday Mass at St. Mary of the Assumption here in Augusta. I think my skills have actually impoved over the years.

So, I responded with some enthusiasm when John Kiely contacted about a reunion of Treaty Stone. In all of the excitement of nostalgic replay of the past, I offered to create a website for the affair and have just starting collecting stuff for what will likely be a blogged site. This will allow for multiple users to access and update the information and unlimited resources for posting images and other files. So, stay tuned.

~jeb

Hanging Out in NB

On Wednesday we made the trip south to Houlton from PI and crossed over into New Brunswick, Canada. The weather was beautiful, albeit at bit cool. The clouds had that “wintry” appearance and the brisk northwest wind had a taste of autumn.

We took Canadian RT 2 to Fredericton and much of this road is under construction. The Canadians apparently anticipate that the Americans will be sending more business up through Maine and have the superhighways ready for all the added traffic.

Fredericton is a happening’ place with lots of new development and people plus a great historic downtown. The main attraction downtown is an 18th Century garrison which now provides places for lots of tourist activities and shopping. The Canadians are masters at tourism. Every town, no matter how small, has some historic and tourist related attraction; all the information is published in full color tourism brochures provided by the provincial government and free to tourists. The US could learn a lot about tourism from the Canadians.

One of the neatest attractions in beautiful downtown Fredericton is the Lord Beverbrook Art Gallery which contains three masterpieces by Salvatore Dali. This summer they are also boasting an exhibit of Rodin sculpture. It is absolutely amazing that a small city like Fredericton could have a treasure like this. With a population of under 50,000 the town has a nice feel and good combination of things to do and places to see.

We hit the Mactaquac Provincial Park and played golf on Thursday. A splendid 18 hole course with beautiful views of the Mactaquac dam and hydroelectric facility. The dam holds back the St. John River which flows from northern Maine to empty in the Bay of Fundy in St. John, NB. Good golf – I shot a 104.

~jeb

Hanging out in PI

I've been hanging out in Presque Isle, ME since Sunday as the first leg of my golfing vacation with my friends Bob and Kathy. Bob and I played PI Country Club yesterday in the rain. It was cool in the temperature sense but we didn't get too wet.

The course was in excellent condition and relatively empty. I shot a 105 which is good for me and didn't lose any golf balls; a rarity.

Today we played one of the most unique golf course in the world. Aroostook Valley Country Club actually straddles the Maine/New Brunswick border. That's right, the course runs through the U.S. border with Canada and there are no customs stations or guys with walkie talkies in site.

AVCC was built during Prohibition and has the club house in Canada so the locals could come over and play golf and drink legally. People still do. I shot a 106 and lost two golf balls. The course is much more challenging than PICC and very slopey...not sure if that's a word. There is a lot of slope which basically means there are lots of hills and valleys.

After our round and a couple of Alexander Keith's on the deck, we drove over to Perth, NB and had dinner at York's Dining Room. York's is also rather unique because it has a "fixed price" menu that includes everything from soup to nuts as well as an opportunity to sample one of the other items on the menu. Good food and lots of it. We always make a stop at York's when were in The County.

Tomorrow we move on to Fredericton, NB and plan to play three different courses there. See you later.

~jeb

Beta

I just switched over to Blogger beta and re-set the template. It deleted some of the customization I had on the page. We'll see how this works. Taking it for a spin...

~jeb

Mystery Beast

It must have been a slow news day today.

The buzz was regarding a strange "mystery beast" that was killed in the western Maine town of Turner. Apparently for 15 years the locals have reported seeing a strange beast and now question if this is the "monster."

The Animal Control and State Wildlife people think its a mix-breed dog. This thing looks like it has human teeth!

Here's the news report

~jeb

Fall is in the Air? Maybe

When you live in Maine, you get use to long winters and short summers. About ten days ago we were all crying about the excessive heat and humidity, the dew points, the oppressive conditions. We had forgotten momentarily where we live. We forgot that old adage about New England: "If you don't like the weather, wait a minute!"

I never really gets hot in Maine. I think the all time record in Portland was 102 and I can only remember twice in the last 30 years when it was at the century mark. We also know that August is one of the greatest months in our state because every year, just about now, the middle of the month, we get that first blast of sweet Canadian air, dry, and crisp.

So, it came as no real surprise when I ended up closing the windows last night after a particularly wild thunderstorm. I had missed the storm in July when the trees were blown down, but this one was up there in severity including strong winds, small hail and, as the weathermen like to say, frequent lightning. It was very concentrated and lasted only about 30 minutes. But the temperature dropped about 10 degrees in that short period and never recovered. It was a right bit nippy last night!

But, it was perfect sleeping weather and I woke late and refreshed.

Ah, Maine!

Here's a little picture of the fuschia on my porch after the thunderstorm, as well as the rainbow that followed.

~ j

Coffee Break No More

I was saddened to read an obituary in today’s Maine Sunday Telegram about the passing of Margery Eliscu. I am actually surprised the newspaper didn’t have a featured story about Marge, but perhaps they are working on that now.

Marge wrote a weekly column in the MST which I must admit to enjoying on many occasions. Like me, Marge was born in New York City and, according to the obituary, grew up out on “the Island” – Long Island, NY for those of you not from the area. Also like me, Marge fell in love with Maine and came with her husband Larry to live here permanently in 1970, which interestingly is the year I first came to Maine and fell in love.

For 20 odd years, Marge penned the Coffee Break column which was a short personal reflection of her times and activities. In it, we regularly heard stories about Larry, their children, grandchildren, and particularly her daughter, “Kathy-the-nurse.” Her column had an Erma Bombeck quality, but it was always with a Maine flavor and I looked forward to reading her entry each week where she would sometimes rant about something; but always in good style and with lots of humor. In some ways, Marge wrote the first Maine blog, as her commentary had the same tone often found in blogs – but without all of the techno stuff. She was a writer ahead of her time.

I suspected something was not right when after a short hiatus early this year, her returning column referred to some medical issues which in typical form she dismissed in importance.

Then in July, the column disappeared completely and only a short note was found indicating the column would be gone “until further notice” or with some other ominous wording. I kept watch each Sunday following, hoping for the return. So, I guess I was not really surprised by the obituary today.

It looks like Marge Eliscu lived a long, full and happy life right to the end and was surrounded by her many friends and family. There are a couple of references in the obituary suggesting how Marge would like to be remembered:

“In her last days, her daughter Kathy (the nurse) asked if she had any wishes. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘that everyone should be happy and well.’

“In Marge’s memory, it is requested that everyone who reads this hug their loved ones and laugh together!”

Consider it done, Marge.

~jeb

Brooklyn in Maine

There is a "Brooklyn" in Maine, but it's spelled Brooklin. Located downeast near Blue Hill, it's a lovely area. I think I've passed through it once; quite remote.

But the picture in last Friday's Kennebec Journal was the other Brooklyn, the real Brooklyn, the place of my birth. Why it was included in a story about "housing starts" and a title "Big ticket durable goods orders rise" is beyond me. But the picture was interesting nonetheless.

This picture of Grand Army Plaza is not far from where I grew up in Clinton Hill. Not included in the picture, but just to the right of this scene is the main branch of the Brooklyn Public Library where I spent may hours in my youth. In fact, we often took the Vanderbilt Ave bus (Route B69?) up Vanderbilt to GAP and then crossed in this very cross walk pictured. It is also right next to Prospect Park, the greatest urban park in the world (sorry Central Park enthusiasts).

The building shown in the picture being build is on an open lot which I remember being there as far back as the early 1960's. It's hard to believe that it has remained open all this time. But then again, this section of Brooklyn has seem more deterioration than building growth - until perhaps the last 10-15 years. Glad to see the neighborhood is growing in a positive direction.

~jeb

Congratulations Tiger

Congratulations, Tiger Woods - 2006 Champion of the British Open

Freedback

Bloglines is looking for some feedback (codeword: "freedback") on their service and have asked folks to blog their comments. So this entry is in response to that request.

Bloglines is great.

For those who don't know what Bloglines is (are?), basically it is a RSS aggregator that allows you to track and read various feeds. When Bloglines was first introduced, the primary source of RSS feeds were blogs. Now, many websites are providing RSS feeds including news services, weather and sports sites. So, Bloglines now becomes even more valuable since you can track lots of information on one page quick and easy. Also, because the application is web-based, you can use any browser, from any computer, to check your "lines." A great advantage. And, of course you may organize your feeds into catagories and even share them with others.

I've used several aggregators before Bloglines, but stopped looking once I found this service.

And, did I mention it was free?

~jeb

The Clean-Up

It didn't take long. The trucks and chainsaws have been rumbling and buzzing all day.

~j

No Wicked Witch - But Ding Dong Anyway

I need to get the song correct:

Dorothy:
"It really was no miracle, what happened was just this....
The wind began to switch,
the house to pitch.
And suddenly the hinges started to unhitch.
Just then the Witch,
to satisfy an itch,
went flying on her broomstick thumbin' for a hitch.

Munchkins:
And oh, what happened then was rich.
The house began to pitch,
the kitchen took a slitch.
It landed on the Wicked Witch in the middle of a ditch.
Which was not a healthy sit-
uation for the Wicked Witch..."

More pictures on the KJ Newpaper site. The E/PRO building and the Capital Buffet are all within 200 yards of my house.

Also in that article is a quote from my next door neighbors who were here with the winds flew (their's is one of the porches you see in my photos below). Here's the quote:

Laurette McGuire, of Old Winthrop Road in Augusta, said she lost four large poplar trees in her yard as the wind and rain kicked up very quickly -- almost out of nowhere, she said.

" 'Oh my Lord,' I told my husband," McGuire said. "It looked like a tornado, so I told him, 'Let's hit the decks,' you know? The trees were just lying down like dominoes on the ground. And, of course, there I was trying to rescue my plants on my deck. My husband said, 'Get in here, you ding dong.' So I did."

More pictures coming of the cleanup....vroom, vroom.

~j

A Mighty Wind

I wasn't home when the "House began to pitch, the roof to hitch..." And there were no dead witches anywhere to be found. But these trees didn't make it.

Hot Fun in Summertime - Not!

Those who know me know I am not a fan of hot sticky atmospheric conditions. The primary reason for moving from NYC to Maine nearly 30 years ago was to find someplace that was cold most of the time. Until this past decade, Maine fit the bill.

Thanks to Mr. Bush and his conservative cronies, the consequences of Global Warming are becoming quite evident.

Last winter was one of the mildest on record with limited snow and temps never going below zero farenheit here in Augusta. This had been preceeded by the wettest year (2005) on record and followed by the wettest spring (2006) on record. Flooding caused havoc in the southern part of the state and the months of May, June and now July are recording excessive amounts of rain.

The ocean temps off of Portland - which by the way are reported every evening on the local weather - are running in the low to mid 60's, That is totally unheard of in these parts of the world. In a "regular" winter, the ocean temperature off Portland gets down to the very low 30s. Sometimes it even crosses over to below 32.

In the "good old days" the locals tell us the bays would always freeze and that you could often walk across Portland harbor to South Portland. Mind you, that was a very long time ago.

But seriously, I can remember many summers in the 1970s and 80s when you really could not go into the ocean off the coast of Maine until late July when the temps got into the high 50s. By comparison, the ocean temps in Florida are in the 70s in the winter and much higher in the summer. Maine is simply not a place where you spend a lot of time swimming in the ocean except in the southern most reaches of the state, and even then always for brief periods of time.

Being a bit of a weather buff (I believe all true Mainers are), I've made it my business to follow the various statistics. My family in NYC loves to kid me about this by asking if the tide is coming or going; something I almost always know. So, I predicted that this summer in Maine was going to be hot and damp. So far I have been correct. And, the predictions for this weekend are HHH. Ugh!

While Maine is the nation's Vacationland - at least according to our license plates - there is not much escape from the summer heat unless you own a camp on a lake or a place near the ocean. In central Maine, there are limited swimming pools and public beaches. The nearest is in Jefferson about 20 miles away and usually crowded beyond belief when it gets this hot.

So, crank up the A/C - thank God I have A/C - and look forward to the fall. Thankfully, it should be here in a few weeks.

~jeb