Fiat 500 Cabriolet

I was walking Cheyenne and my phone rang. My wife's Sebring Convertible had stopped working and she was in Marathon where she teaches adults two days a week. We had little hope it was a jump start problem but I drove over and the car wouldn't start. I suspected the correct cause, a blown fuse, but I had no replacements even had I been able to check their status. AAA came promptly in the dark and towed the car to Stock Island.

"I have found a Fiat convertible at Carmax in Tampa," my wife announced over dinner the next evening.

"Ok," I replied cautiously because she hates wasting money on a new car. It was apparent to me that a road trip was coming up if she had decided, without any pushing from me, to make the move. So there we were, not too bright eyed, not too early on the road to Tampa seven hours away, in a car with some, perhaps minor, reliability issues.

I wasn't ready to cross the Everglades twice in two consecutive weekends but this had to be done whereas last week's trip was for fun. My wife put 80,000 miles on the 2004 Sebring since she bought it six years ago. The interior light didn't work, the roof was waterproof though the trim was shot, the heated seats didn't and the heavy trunk lid had to be held open with a special tool designed by yours truly: a stick.

The old Sebring is actually not a bad car though it has a few plastic parts that need replacing every 70,000 miles we discovered...shocks, a cam chain tensioner and so forth. The battery has had a habit of going flat so we suspected a failing electrical system. We drove and hoped for the best.

Cheyenne was not happy. The rear bench seat was uncomfortable and she was restless. We were anxious to arrive. It was not a completely happy crew under the canvas roof.

Carmax is fantastic. They don't haggle or bullshit, they let you test drive anything on the lot you fancy, they will buy your car independent of whether or not you buy another from them, and all paperwork, tags financing is in house. The entire process from test drive to shifting our crap to the Fiat took two and a half hours. Simple. Why anyone would not buy at Carmax I don't know. This is our fourth purchase from them, and as always no high powered selling or upgrading, no hassle, no bs. Lovely.

Cheyenne took a keen interest in the paperwork. I was worried the bench seat in the Fiat would make her crazy on the way home. They gave us twelve hundred bucks for the Sebring - yay!- which covered the tags and taxes for the $16,000 Fiat. Someone took a bath on that Lounge 500 which cost 25 grand brand new and which Carmax bought at auction in Delray Beach, sold it to us and made money with a nine grand discount...I wish I had business sense, but I am a wage slave by inclination.

Ever since my wife first saw the new 500 in Italy five or so years ago she has been unwavering in her desire to own one, perforce a convertible. She checked the Smart and the Mini and they didn't measure up. Her love of the 500 has been single minded. Weird too because she is no great lover of cars. But she's like my dog (in a good way) in that she knows what she wants. I drove the car home, she organized the stops, seen here on Tamiami Trail south of Naples on Sunday, food courtesy of Trader Joes.

We had hoped to get another year out of the Sebring but my wife has to travel for her teaching job and getting stranded is no fun so this change was inevitable. It's a pain in the ass having a $200 monthly bill but the car was an extraordinary deal, first purchased in December 2012 and since then driven 1116 miles. Carmax changed the oil and the thing is like brand new, just run in. My wife loves to drive with the roof down, though in the Fiat the cloth roof is more open than down. The roof slides open and closed with no latches or complicated lifting mechanisms and my wife loves the fact it can be opened or closed safely at speeds up to sixty miles an hour, perfect for Florida's squally weather, now sun, then rain and suddenly sun again.

The roof space inside is taller than the Mini and the interior is surprisingly spacious, even Cheyenne slept soundly on the dreaded rear seat. Even with the roof open. We opened only as far as would leave her in the shade but it didn't bother her at all. Driving home through the Keys at dusk with the dog snoring in the back gave us the promise of being able to take road trips in this little bumble bee. It's supposed to be good for 40mpg but holding eighty on the freeway drops that to about 29mpg...

The trunk is small but adequate, the 1.4 liter engine is reasonably peppy and you can manually shift the automatic six speed box, if you like, no clutch involved weirdly enough.

My sister still has her original Fiat 500, a twin cylinder air cooled 500 cc engine that offered 65mph on the flat if you were lucky. These cars were the workhorses of Italy equipped with trailers and roof racks they took families on vacation, husbands to work and they doubled as pick ups or SUVs of the time. Driving them took skill as first gear had no synchromesh so double de-clutching was a standard skill. The roof rolled back but the vinyl was kept in place by poppers when closed and rolled up in straps when open. The modern 500 reflects the quirks in an up to date package. I like it.

On Card Sound Road we kept it down to 55 long enough to slide the roof open and home we drove. I watched the mileage zoom up to 48mpg as I stuck to the mandated 45 speed limit (plus a couple). It's an odd position to be in, buying a car at a time like this. I am acutely conscious of the weird economy we are in, the effects of burning carbon, of a world generally in flux, resource battles, consumerism and Peak Oil. Despite all that daily life goes in and mobility is still expected of us no matter how gloomy the economic outlook. Besides I am battling a huge head cold I picked up from my infected colleagues at work and the feeling of unease you get from a fever permeates my days. Perhaps the economy is doing better than I think and my gloom just comes from my post-nasal drip.

I slept most of the night and woke in a coughing fit. Cheyenne and I went to Big Pine at four in the morning and I found myself pushing some shopping carts I found in some bushes. In my fevered state I wondered how the homeless among us cope with the rattling noise and awkwardness of these infernal carts. I imagined myself pushing my earthly belongings in one and I shuddered.

Everything happens for a reason the wide eyed optimists among us say with perfect sincerity. I'm buggered if I know what the reason is much of the time, especially when people die, but I know why we got the Fiat 500; my wife wanted it. Good for her. Good for me.

 

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Irredentist Stock Island

There have been noises in Key West about possibly annexing Stock Island to the city. It may be wishful thinking but I rather hope this idea will be the Nude Beach Issue of 2014, the flag that someone flew last year and that ultimately no one saluted. Stock Island got its name from the cows stored here for the use of residents in the nearby city who preferred to keep their manure out of town. The signage used here is a bit stronger in flavor than the mild, dreary no trespassing signs that uglify Old Town Key West. Shooting potential customers seems an odd way to do business to me. Making aggressive threats seems odd too but this is Stock Island. Grr...we be tough.

I wondered for a moment if these old beauties were waiting for the next boat to Havana where they recycle old cars like crazy. Because they have to.

What Stock Island lacks in physical attractions it makes up for in utility. This is the housing market that at some level, though overpriced as always, is a lot more affordable than Key West. Hotels would have no cleaning staff, restaurants would have no dish washers and and fast food chains would close.

Chickens as always continue to run free, just like Key West.

The thing is that the city annexed the north half of Stock Island years ago to make possible a city development of homes at the golf course. But adding the southern half of the island benefits no big developer as there is nothing there to sweep away and develop. Or is there?

There have been plans in the works ever since the boom years to redevelop Stock Island when the newspaper published a map of the island with a development overlay of all the parcels purchased and destined to be gentrified. No luck so far, perhaps someone has figured if they gentrify Stock Island Key West's underpaid tourist economy collapses.

For now there seems to be an uneasy coexistence on the water between the commercial fishing fleet displaced from Key West's Bight and the encroaching high end marinas and yacht clubs that are being redeveloped.

There isn't much here to attract tourists excepting a couple of nice restaurants, Hogfish and Roostica along with the Dolphin Deli and my favorite El Mocho are reason enough to visit. The boatyards, autobody shops and construction yards may be outside the zone of interest of people visiting town to drink and party but they are what keep things going.

My main reason for not wanting to annex Stock Island revolves purely around my work as doubling the size of the city would increase the emergency dispatch work load. Doubling because the the Irredentism movement also has its eyes on annexing neighboring Key Haven where the upper crust reside, imagine that property tax base.

Aside from my personal lack of enthusiasm about the idea, annexation it seems to me might be a bad idea from a sociological point of view. The city has quite a few persnickety rules that might not go down real well in communities where they are in the habit of abandoning vehicles and trailers on the streets.

The funny part is that people who live on any of the islands between Stock Island and Sugarloaf Key are in the habit of assuming they live in Key West. That's because they are served by the post office in Key West, so mail sent to Bay Point, Geiger Key, Shark Key or Big Coppitt among others is all labeled with a Key West address. But they are all residents of unincorporated Monroe County.

I love these "increased penalty" signs. They make lawmakers feel good because they are "tough on crime" and can thus bullshit the voters, a tactic that seems to work sadly, but I doubt addicts and their pushers are calculating the length of prison terms if they do their deals in Bernstein Park instead of around the corner. In my opinion the only thing that might tamp the activity down is more cops on the streets. You'll notice speeders ignore the "fines doubled if workers present" signs on the highways, but the brake lights come on as soon as they spot a marked car. But more cops cost money so it's considered more effective (ie: cheaper) to stick up a sign. At least the sign lets the rest of us be aware we are now in a high probability drug dealing zone...

Cheyenne on these walks is always blissfully unaware of my ruminations. Indeed she is unaware of the sleeping cat her presence frightened into a semblance of wakefulness.

Stock Island street scenes, some mud...

...always a boat...

...and the hope of a better life to come. Better that I suppose than wresting improvements here and now from an uncaring world.

The heart of Stock Island, the Tom Thumb.

If they did annex Stock Island, Key West would join the rest of the island chain in getting its own Tom Thumb inconvenience store. That's reason enough to call for a vote I guess.

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Truman To Catherine

One day I am going to learn to appreciate the craze for symbols of winter proudly displayed in the Southernmost City. I have a colleague at work who is heartsick all winter, waiting for cold weather to blow through town, heartsick because we haven't had a really cold blast for what? at least the past two winters...

Strolling past Don's Place, a dive of a bar filled with drinkers who mumble at each other about the weather in their former homes as they sup alcohol at seven in the morning, I wondered about the dangling plastic snowflakes. Cheyenne had her nose on something closer to the ground.

I love how Key West lives indoors and outdoors, like those of us that live in the suburbs, but where our lives thrust outdoors are mostly out of sight on our suburban streets, in the city if you throw your home open - there it is in all it's messy detail.

I haven't been down Wong Song Alley in a while, but a quick peek off Truman Avenue showed not only that the peculiar name plate is up and looking good (tourists steal them) but the alley itself which pops out on Virginia Street was cleaner than I have seen it before and looking terribly respectable. No longer is it the jungly, mysterious darkness it once was.

I see places like this all across town. In a city as expensive as this you'd think every structure would be up and running and exploited. Not so. "No Dumping" the sign says. But the place is a dump, I say!

Our walk led us from Truman Avenue to Catherine Street, home of the Cuban Restaurant icon El Siboney. Not quite open for business yet, a slower starter than Don's Place.

Like I said there are a lot of homes in need of tender loving care, and cash. So if they get bought out of the family and refurbished they are gentrified which is disruptive to the social fabric, but if they are left to crumble what are they? Is there a middle path? Beats me.

Cheyenne doesn't pose difficult questions to herself. She enjoys the freedom of retirement and chasing smells. She even ignores the...

...warning signs. This one appeared to be a bluff as nothing appeared in response to our pause in front of the protected property.

I was struck by the line of big green trash cans stretching to the horizon. Cheyenne was struck by something else. I photographed, she sniffed.

And all was well with our world.

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Algae and Armageddon

I read recently a hopeful article about turning algae into gasoline. More accurately the article spoke of farming algae with high fat content to turn them into the equivalent of crude oil which could then be refined into all the familiar and unfamiliar products we see coming out of oil refineries. As presented the article suggested that algae farming harvesting and refining on a mass scale is just around the corner and the suggestion was that Peak Oil is on the verge of being banished from the minds of the few people who are conscious of it. That notion set me to wondering.

I mean, if we are supposed to be worried about climate change which scientists assure us is real and most likely caused by human actions, namely burning hydro carbons, then prolonging the era of Happy Motoring as KUNSTLER rather provocatively describes our modern suburban lifestyle seems like madness. Yet environmentalists say the algae plan is brilliant.

Then I hear from the climate change scoffers whose idea of a sensible debate about this little understood but much derided phenomenon is to mock Al Gore, of all the threats to Republican hegemony he is the smallest I think, and yet...har har hearty har har the coldest winter storm in 200 years is proof positive climate change isn't happening. Actually it is happening precisely as predicted. Violent weather increased frequency and devastated crops are all part of the plan. Yet the joke is on Al Gore. People are weird.

Mind you that silver food truck in the picture above is the number one rated best restaurant in Key west! according to Trip Advisor. If you can find it when it's open that is. So the w e ask, should be believe everything we read on the internet? Hardly.

Besides let's be honest, if climate change is real and our burgeoning population is stripping the planet of resources it means the next few generations are going to be in some pretty deep trouble one way and another and who wants to think about that? I certainly don't, but I don't have children so if the Keys flood in thirty or fifty years I'll be dead, cremated and forgotten anyway. Yet I have this nagging feeling I should care, I should do something, but I don,t know what. And if people who do have children think the best response to climate change is to mock Al. Gore, well what can I do?

As for algae for fuel count me in. I wish it were possible but I have my doubts, perhaps if the oil companies see the possibility as real they will buy up the algae rights and all will be well for a few decades more motoring for those as can afford it. Right now any way we're burning corn for fuel while people starve and even Americans go hungry in their millions...so I reserve the right to think that our priorities are skewed.

I remember when I first came to this country there was a program initiated by Democrats and supported by Republicans which gave away food products that were surplus to the farmer's requirements, purchased by the government and given to the poor. Naturally such munificence today is impossible to imagine, that when the Federal Reserve is printing a trillion dollars a year to buy government debt and support the banks and at the same time congress cuts food stamps by 80 billion dollars a year to deprive the poor of food. Whatever works, right? I wonder what happened to the world while us baby boomers were growing old.

I love internal combustion, it defines my generation and even though I don't much like driving cars nearly as much as I like riding motorcycles I don't look forward to the end of affordable fuel. So I like the idea of fuel from algae as an alternative to a return to horses and carts. But at what price.

It is a funny world when my dog lives better than half the people on the planet but I am unable to unravel the dilemma of what to do about it. I live in Key West partly I suppose because I want to seek refuge "south of reality" but Key West isn't really far enough for that.

There's a new hotel popping up on Caroline Street and that will be 96 more rooms to fill. I doubt they are worrying about fuel from algae as they build, and apparently tourism is here to stay so that is a good thing in a city that lives and dies by the money generated.

There are moments when I wish that I could come back in a hundred years and finally get to see the flying cars they promised us decades ago, powered by algae in a world where climate change was proved to be a myth on a planet happily hosting twelve billion people in peace and harmony. As it is every generation has expected to be the last, the inevitable human attribute of pride, determined that the world cannot continue without us, a world without baby boomers would be no world at all we believe in the secret place in our hearts. That to me sounds sillier by far than climate change denial. Bring it on, someone will stick around to keep the planet spinning for those next on the stage. Let them burn algae when the time comes.

Key West on Dwellable

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