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musings of mark since 2001

Yet another late March day with snow coming down, lightly near the cove and heavy at higher elevations. Not unheard of to have snow this late in the season, but sure would be nice to get it over with. Not getting that cold at sea level over night, just enough to keep us in winter and glad to be indoors today.

Gathered up my income tax info for the year and got that started yesterday, will finish off with the tax software to be picked up on Monday; getting a leaky toilet operational today for a friend. One toilet down but there’s still another to go at the chicken ranch, the fellow that was supposed to show up didn’t so the owner is staying elsewhere again. Kind of a lazy day otherwise, there are things to do but nothing is too pressing and with mostly grey the colour of the day a good one for an afternoon siesta.

Didn’t get the siesta in though, was waiting on the parts for the toilet to come back and when they finally showed up it was too late in the afternoon and with work tomorrow might as well power through it and go to sleep at the normal 9 or 10 o’clock tonight. Had another secret place to stretch out at night given to me, it’s kind of cozy scrunched up in the Mazda Motel though and easy to stay warm so maybe some other time will take advantage of it.

Looks like I was a little premature hoping for winter to be over, snowed heavily just before lunch and again late this afternoon with the weather forecasters predicting cooler temps all the way into next week.

Meanwhile things are afoot with the ferry system as they roll out a new way to get by with fewer employees, (turnstiles likely the next step), and gather a little extra data on the users as well. As usual, most of the people are all for it in the name of convenience with little regard for the people that have actually had to work within the corporation for their livelihood. There’s at least one other person on the island besides me who also knows a bit about how easy it is and more importantly, how prevalent information theft and abuse really is, but one’s own convenience is the flavour of the day on the rest of the forum thread.

The schedule on the next house sitting gig has moved up a couple of days due to airline ticket availability, and the local dog trainer, Pam, will be keeping much her regular schedule so there will be a couple days a week for my most boisterous charge to be somewhere else for a break, that will be nice.

Describing my present lifestyle not as being homeless, but as being homefree is getting a much better reaction. When someone asks where you live, and almost everyone does eventually, saying that you are homeless evokes all sorts of reactions and none of them positive. Describing yourself as homeless negates pretty much any chance to put a positive light on the situation, there is just too much of a bad meme from the media about the word homeless.

However, the same smile on my face and positive attitude when answering that I’m homefree evokes a positive response almost every time. Some people get it right away, seeing an interesting way to live and wondering how they would do themselves in the same situation. Others seem bemused that anyone can ever think of not having a permanent home, but in my entire lifetime there hasn’t been a place that hasn’t been moved away from so it’s fairly easy to keep a positive attitude that there’s always a place for me. Essentially it doesn’t matter where I am, life has always been more about here and now than any future. The here and now at present is Bowen Island so I guess if really pressed to answer, the whole island is my home. And what a home it is, clean water and air every day with a night teeming of stars, if only the whole world could have it this good that would be a wonderful thing.

Quiet little morning around the Cove today with a minimum of people getting on the ferry because of the Easter holiday, and slept in to almost 8 o’clock. Just a coffee this morning, can’t afford more than a few times a month to eat breakfast as the cafes around here cater to a mostly well-to-do crowd and can command premium prices for the barest of commodities.

Glad to have the rechargeable razor now, heat has been turned off in the ferry washroom for the season and much easier shaving dry than wet. One of those odd weather mornings, clouds scudding across the sky have it warm in the sunshine for a little while, then the rain comes along and a few minutes ago a little hailstorm. It’s back to sunshine quickly and the chill goes away, could be worse, elsewhere on the island yesterday it was snowing while Old Man Winter had one (hopefully!) last kick at the can.

In the end the clouds went away for good and the first tourists are showing up already. The taco shop owner was on hand doing a little painting and sprucing up for a target opening date five weeks earlier than the traditional Victoria Day (May 24th) holiday. Not sure herself that there will be enough business to justify it, but the gift shop owner is already making sales in the sunshine. One thing for sure needing sprucing up is all the left over lumber from the dock repairs, have checked with the owner and most certainly he wants the lumber from himself and have stopped someone already from carting off a truckload.

Back to the part time job in the morning for a couple days, instead of long weekends the schedule gives me two regular weekends, twice a week. Borrowed a Best of Steve Martin DVD to watch tonight and sitting outside the Snug Cafe beforehand doing a little surfing on the intertubes and catching up on the gossip. Should be a nice cool night, and quietly still hopefully, it gets real noisy when it rains or the wind brings down the pine cones from the trees above. Starting to notice a few little dents in the roof because of them too, probably should change over to another parking lot without so many of those types of trees above.

After somewhat of a rainy night, Easter morning is all sunshine and lollipops in Snug Cove. There are some threatening dark clouds to the east but they are for now moving away instead of towards the pier so soaking up lots of vitamin D. Didn’t get much of a breakfast, ordered and paid for some scrambled eggs, hash browns and dry toast without butter easily enough while the order was written and placed up for the cook, gave my name and sat down to read the paper a bit. The “ferry rush” was over and lots of choices where to sit and settled in for a nice little, albeit expensive, breakfast.

At the time, mine was the only order hanging above the cooks prep area and was served up quickly, perhaps too quickly as the toast was soaking in butter. Not the first time it’s happened and usually just go with it and squeeze some oil out before biting in, but this was Easter Sunday breakfast and it would be nice to have it right, so asked for a replacement. I waited, and waited, and waited some more while the eggs turned cold and wondered if my toast would ever arrive. About ten minutes later with great apologies from the waitress I had some toast to go with the now cold eggs, and to make them edible again asked to have them heated up in the microwave. And there they sat and so did I waiting, and waiting again some more and eventually just gave up on breakfast being served and left a little poorer and hungrier than going in.

Headed down to The Pier and the kayak shop has already started their season with a couple intrepid adventures standing by for instructions from the owner, along with the gift shop owner continuing her preparations for the summer tourists. The dock repairs are coming along nicely, after the fingers were done last fall the main deck is near completion with about one more load of timbers to go. Shoring up where the old path meets the dock is still not done, a separate project on it’s own due to the complexity of timing for low tides to make concrete forms and pour. I moved a defunct refrigerator display placed in front during construction, to around the corner for the gift shop so won’t be long now until the colorful display she creates will greet travellers coming off the ferry.

Really good wi-fi around the kayak shop, have got myself plugged into his power supply for the afternoon so there’s a good charge for watching a movie tonight. Those dark clouds keep reappearing and the temperature drops a lot in the shade, not full on spring but you can feel it and see the buds just beginning to make their appearance.