The city has quieted down for the most part by two in the morning, but I'm sure a good few of them are lying awake wondering where the thunder and lightning has gone:
It's a time of day I can stand on the street and fiddle with exposure settings and see what looks most interesting on the street. A Honda Metropolitan 50cc scooter, in my view one of the best values in reliable useful transportation, an economical clean four stroke with lots of storage and a very low seat height. My wife became a confident scooter rider with her yellow Metropolitan before Hurricane Wilma drowned it for her:
I gave this house six seconds open shutter, transforming it into daylight almost:
Outdoor dust catchers. Why Laurel and Hardy? Who knows...
Jeep Wranglers and their ilk are popular in Key West, I think because they speak of carefree vacation time. To me their 14 mile per gallon fuel consumption would give my high mileage habits a headache. Their wide un-aerodynamic, old fashioned mud guards make a good place for rain drops to settle:
This is the Kingdom Hall of the Jehovah's Witnesses on White Street even though all the lamps make it look like a the gulag at two in the morning. Approach at your peril.
Sometimes I am amazed when I speculate how these funky little houses have survived and even flourished in the climate of mad rebuilding that swept America in the modernizing 1960s.
And I am forced to wonder if the residents ever do sit out and watch the world go by from these chairs. Probably in another couple of months it will be pleasant enough to do just that:
I must have spent ten minutes trying to get this one to come out crisp and clear, but I couldn't park the camera anywhere where I could get the reflection and i couldn't hold the squeeze box still enough to eliminate the fuzzy picture entirely.
I ride past this motel-like complex quite frequently, on Catherine Street near White. I like the covered walkway facing the street.
Two men were standing in the street arguing about some drama, the details of which escaped me. I wished them a good morning as I drew near, and they pulled apart, shocked into silence. The silence continued as I splashed on by, leaving a cone of no sound behind me the way a ship leaves a wake in the ocean. Then, when they judged I was out of earshot they started up again, whispering passionately about some human frailty or another.
The irony is that I couldn't get a crisp shot of them, but this palm tree cooperated entirely with my camera and allowed itself to be photographed entirely clearly:
As I drew close to my destination I came across a reminder of the passions of electoral politics. I don't suppose Craig Cates was thinking about it when he chose his colors but yellow on green makes for a very visible sign in the middle of the night.
His opponent, incumbent Mayor Morgan McPherson chose red which makes quite a splash in daytime. But I work night shift and because I live in the county I am a bystander in city elections.
There was only one motorcycle in the police lot when I got back to work, which gave me a clear shot. Chief Lee is also a big fan of recycling; he's a fifth generation Conch so I like to think he's keen to preserve his town while keeping it clean, which suits me just fine.
I gave this house six seconds open shutter, transforming it into daylight almost:
Outdoor dust catchers. Why Laurel and Hardy? Who knows...
Jeep Wranglers and their ilk are popular in Key West, I think because they speak of carefree vacation time. To me their 14 mile per gallon fuel consumption would give my high mileage habits a headache. Their wide un-aerodynamic, old fashioned mud guards make a good place for rain drops to settle:
This is the Kingdom Hall of the Jehovah's Witnesses on White Street even though all the lamps make it look like a the gulag at two in the morning. Approach at your peril.
Sometimes I am amazed when I speculate how these funky little houses have survived and even flourished in the climate of mad rebuilding that swept America in the modernizing 1960s.
And I am forced to wonder if the residents ever do sit out and watch the world go by from these chairs. Probably in another couple of months it will be pleasant enough to do just that:
I must have spent ten minutes trying to get this one to come out crisp and clear, but I couldn't park the camera anywhere where I could get the reflection and i couldn't hold the squeeze box still enough to eliminate the fuzzy picture entirely.
I ride past this motel-like complex quite frequently, on Catherine Street near White. I like the covered walkway facing the street.
Two men were standing in the street arguing about some drama, the details of which escaped me. I wished them a good morning as I drew near, and they pulled apart, shocked into silence. The silence continued as I splashed on by, leaving a cone of no sound behind me the way a ship leaves a wake in the ocean. Then, when they judged I was out of earshot they started up again, whispering passionately about some human frailty or another.
The irony is that I couldn't get a crisp shot of them, but this palm tree cooperated entirely with my camera and allowed itself to be photographed entirely clearly:As I drew close to my destination I came across a reminder of the passions of electoral politics. I don't suppose Craig Cates was thinking about it when he chose his colors but yellow on green makes for a very visible sign in the middle of the night.
His opponent, incumbent Mayor Morgan McPherson chose red which makes quite a splash in daytime. But I work night shift and because I live in the county I am a bystander in city elections.
There was only one motorcycle in the police lot when I got back to work, which gave me a clear shot. Chief Lee is also a big fan of recycling; he's a fifth generation Conch so I like to think he's keen to preserve his town while keeping it clean, which suits me just fine.
5 comments:
Dear Conch:
There is nothing like the darkness of night to put things in their clearest perspective. It is in the night that most of my plots and romances are hatched. Youl blog today begins with a scooter, and ends with a Harley. Are we to believe this is your idea of evolution?
Please explain. Use the back of this little box if you need more room.
Fondest regards,
Jack • reep • Toad
The weird thing about intenral combustion evolution is how little things have changed. I saw an original 1907 Ferrari at the museum in Italy this summer and as I stood there and looked at it, it occurred to me i could pretty well figure how to drive the thing 100 years later. the controls were intelligible more or less. Human evolution is equally difficult to discern on my bad days when most of my neighbors shrug off darwinian theory as less reliable than Noah's Ark.
Mr Conchscooter:
speaking OLD technology (before "r"IEPE's time I'm sure) model "T" fords only had around 5HP which is close to the power of the Metropolitan (Jazz in Canada). I never could figure out the "retard/Advance" lever on the steering column. I think you are tuning it as you go.
No Bonnie tonight ?
bob
bobskoot: wet coast scootin
Dear Conch and Bobskoot:
I am amazed at Bobscoot's note. As I read Conch's reply to mine, I thought, "What was that spark advance and retard business all about?"
It is amazing at how many men these days know nothing about engines. I was at ther Strasbourg Train Museum recently, when they backed a 4-6-0 locomotive up to the platform. It was dripping boiling water and hissing steam. I watched a guy pose his son in front of the steam box to take a picture. I was thinking he could title it, "The Last Day Little Billy Had Skin."
Fondest regards,
JR/TW
In the bad old days the spark plug produiced a spark at a set time and as the engine speeded up the spark had to appear sooner and sooner to keep up with the increased revolutions. So as you accelerated you advanced the spark with a lever that looked like a choke. Then some bright spark (haw haw) figured that if you put a weight on a spring it would whirl out as centrifugal force took over and if you adapted this scientific principle to spark production you could cause the spark to arrive earlier automatically.Hence automatic spark advance which became so common advancing and retarding the spark fell out of common usage.
Phew! Is my manhood intact?
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