LOB Lessons – 2
2. When the wind starts gusting to 40 knots (75 km/hr), charge the batteries on your laptop, iPad and iPhone.
LOB Lessons – 1
I have started to realize that I can glean meaningful – to me – metaphorical lessons from living out beyond. I think I’ll impart this great wisdom in short little posts, just for you.
1. Cut your kindling before you need it.
Whatever can it mean?
Unexpected visitors in the storm
We’ve just gone through quite a big storm. Since yesterday morning it has been raining, raining, raining. Then the wind whipped up, hitting something like 55 km per hour.
The power flickered last night but didn’t go out. Nice.
This morning it’s gloomy, gloomy, gloomy. The forecast contains a continuing rain warning. Alas, January on the coast. The good news is that it’s a “pineapple express” with warm temperatures. Nice.
It’s a bit of a pain taking poor Kepler out into the elements to do his business, and yet it’s still cozy in the cabin and consulting work can continue.
This morning we saw an exciting sight down at the waterfront: pure white swan-looking birds. We’re guessing snow geese?
Snow geese visiting during the storm Photo: John McLachlan
They seem to be gone already and are perhaps just finding tasty morsels here and there. Perhaps they were taking refuge from the storm. Or, is this a regular stop on their annual voyage?
Will have to investigate this crucial issue. But for now, back to work.
Consulting from Hornby Island
My, oh, my: today is New Year’s Day, 2012. It has certainly been a long time since I’ve posted.
Why? A combination of poor excuses and a robust year of “management consulting.” This was certainly not expected; hoped for, yes, but not expected.
One of our basic concepts of living out beyond included the whole notion that with technology a person could stay connected in a way not previously possible. The future economic outlook for places such as Hornby Island could be rosier through such a piece of infrastructure. (As well, many corporations are moving in the direction of remotely-located employees for both cost saving objectives as well as higher engagement.)
Indeed, it turned out that way for me.
Working from Hornby Island. Photo: Darren Bond
In April, as I recall, an old colleague from TELUS made contact with me. He had seen my profile in the social media portal, LinkedIn. It’s used extensively by professionals and consultants looking to expand their network of contacts. He had been doing some consulting work for a credit union in the lower mainland; they had asked if he could facilitate some strategy development for them. It wasn’t really his area of expertise but asked if it was something I could take on, since that was what I did at TELUS. Timing-wise it was perfect for me. He set up a call with the chief technology officer there, we chatted, and I got the gig.
It was an intense couple of months to fulfill the contract. Then, they asked if I could stay on for another five months to help execute the plan. Then, they asked if I could stay on for a couple of months to transition the knowledge to someone. So, here I am starting my last month. The contacts are great and I have picked up another contract with a consortium of large credit unions across the country. It should be another busy year on the work front, but hopefully a little less than last year.
What have I learned?
Travelling on the BC Ferries. Photo: Darren Bond
As expected, in the initial weeks and months, a fair amount of face-to-face time was required to meet and work with the various people on the project team and to let them get used to me. Progressively, more meetings could be held via audio conferences and they were very productive. So, I became a frequent BC Ferries traveller and acquired a corporate rate at a hotel. It wasn’t so much fun being away from Hornby that often – kind of defeats the purpose of being here – but was hopefully a worthwhile investment of time that may be rewarded with ongoing work that can truly be done remotely.
Eating in restaurants. Photo: Darren Bond
As time rolls by, I will need to continue to weigh the benefits (money) of consulting with the desire for a different kind of lifestyle here. However, it’s great to know that the option is there.
Once the new house is complete this year, and the finances have settled down, it will be time to take our walk to “decision rock” (an outcropping along the path towards Ford Cove that we take Kepler to during long walks) to map out the next steps in this journey.
Late summer afternoon at Helliwell Park. Photo: Darren Bond
Video of where we live – Hornby Island
We came across this video by someone who recently visited Hornby Island. I think he captured it very beautifully and elegantly.
130 Seconds of Hornby Island B.C from Grant Baldwin Videography on Vimeo.
Strong Wind Warning in Effect
We often dump on the weather prediction people for getting it wrong. In a spirit of openness, I have been tracking what the marine weather forecasters on the coast of British Columbia have been saying for the region of water that we are located in.
Here’s my experience. In most cases, when there is a fairly brisk breeze and waves of a couple of feet outside my window, there is no wind warning in effect but when there is barely a breeze and the water is rippled or completely calm, I will often see a “Strong Wind Warning in Effect.”
The following screen shot and the accompanying photo were taken within seconds of each other. One shows the Strong Wind Warning in Effect” and the other shows the actual conditions. You decide!
PS – in case you want to point out that their warning may have meant that a wind was coming, it didn’t.
Being on Hornby Island in 1962 to 1966
By John McLachlan
My dad, George, used to shoot in 8mm and then Super 8mm for years including our first trips to Hornby Island.
About ten years ago, I made some small QuickTime videos of some of this early footage. The video quality is unfortunately, not very good (especially in the 1962 video) and the narration is non-existent or really corny, but it gives a little glimpse of things back then.
Enjoy.
1962
1963-1965
1966
Ticked off – small time!
One expected – and yet not expected – element of living out beyond is the ever-present danger of exposure to creatures.
The city has its bedbugs; the country has its ticks. I blame the deer.
Our neighbours were mentioning how they had already pulled out about five of the little monsters from their dog since January. Quite a bit higher than normal. Given that the weather has been cooler on average for the past few months, this was to be expected even though by now the tick season should be over.
So, we had a mild notion that Kepler – our miniature Schnauzer – would at some point come into contact with them. However, given his longer hair it wasn’t quite clear how they would be detected. And we haven’t been good about implementing a foolproof methodology of daily inspection.
A couple of days ago I was simply patting him, and while running my hand down his back, I felt a little “bump.” Looking a little closer, I noticed an orangy thing sticking out from under his hair. It did appear to be pressing into his skin and I immediately thought of a tick. However, I wasn’t sure because I somehow expected a tick to be black or brown, not orange.
I called John over for his inexpert corroboration. He called the neighbour and they said to bring him over for inspection and cure, if necessary.
And so it happened. Sharon confirmed that it was indeed a tick and went into action. She applied vaseline and left it for ten minutes. I think this suffocates them. Then she used her finger nails to extricate it with a counter-clockwise motion. Her diagnosis was that it had probably only been there for a few hours because it wasn’t engorged with blood. Good.
Hopefully he wasn’t infected with Lyme Disease or some other dastardly affliction.
Device for pulling out ticks Photo: Darren Bond
Yesterday I was in Comox and stopped in at the animal hospital. They gave me a little plastic contraption to pull out ticks. They said that the counter clockwise motion wasn’t necessary; straight out would be fine. Kepler was also groomed yesterday while in town. I think we’ll keep him more closely cut than normal now that he’s a country dog and has to “live out beyond,” too.
Hopefully the weather will now warm up and we can rest more easily – but not too easily – about the dreaded wildlife.
Back to the future with a view to the past
In preparing the site we’ll be building on, we’ve had to take many trees down both for the house site itself but also to garner a little view to Lambert Channel and Denman and Vancouver Islands to the West. We are not on the waterfront, but just across a lane from waterfront properties.
The good news is, the waterfront property in front of us is my family’s who have owned it since 1965 and is the house we’re living in until our’s is finished. Back then, it was an open field with just a few tall firs and some smaller cedars, firs, maples and arbutus near the shore.
Over the last 45 years, did things ever change. The photo below is different angle but you get the idea.
My parent’s built a small cabin in 1966 with a view looking west. We could see most of the beach and then out to the water and islands in the distance. Slowly—or not so slowly—trees started to grow and the view over the years gradually disappeared until one time in the mid 1990s there was no view at all.
Dan Hamilton at work
Various attempts have been made to fight back the brush, but it’s costly and/or a lot of work to deal with all the mess that ensues. Carrying branches to the beach to burn or sawing up the fallen trees takes a lot of time. In most cases this was done largely by my dad, George.
I think he may love the trees that block the view so much partly because he knows the work and expense in removing them and it’s usually been him dealing with it so maybe, just maybe, he’d rather just leave them standing than deal with them. Can’t really blame him.
All these years have passed and it was time to clear so that the million-dollar view and the taxes paid for it, really was a million-dollar view and not to one of a tree farm.
Enter Dan Hamilton and his crew from Whiskey Jack Tree Service. Dan is a faller but also an arborist so he knows about trees and their health. We’ve learned a lot about the health of trees and what causes problems as well as marvelling at the tree climbing and falling.
The view, I’m happy to say, has come back. I feel like a six year old kid again standing on the deck of the cabin looking at the spectacular vista. With just a couple more trees to go, they will be finished on the waterfront lot and will then complete the house site work.
We’re looking forward and back today.
You can see a more complete set of images from this whole process on Flickr.
Hunters or Farmers
I’m bucking the trend (as well as the trees) when it comes to where I call home. At least that’s how it feels when I read posts on the Net about people who have a “location independent lifestyle.”
It’s perhaps somewhat a little trendy to be moving about the world with no place to call home, living here for a month or two and then somewhere else and then somewhere else. This is not travel in the traditional sense, but a deeper desire to spend time in various places.
More power to them. To each his own.
For me, moving and building on Hornby Island makes me feel like I’m going in the opposite direction. I’m choosing to make my physical world smaller, not bigger. I feel like I’m going back in time to how most people lived for thousands of years, since humans started becoming farmers instead of hunters (or nomads).
