YCOA

Times are not as tough in Key West as they appear to be elsewhere in the continental United States, yet signs of struggle are evident here too. There is a house with a for sale sign on Highway One garnished with the words "Default-Bank Owned" and the Beachside Hotel, which was to have been the centerpiece of a huge new hotel development at the entrance to Key West was sold to the Mormons and has become one more Marriott property in Key West.
This area used to be a rough and tumble marina known as Peninsular Marine on Stock Island. I don't know if the original sign writers messed up the spelling of "peninsula" but this is in fact Pensinsular Avenue and is now known as Yacht Clubs of America. And very plush it is too, especially when compared to the old pea rock working marina and boatyard that used to exist here.
The place is fresh and new and brimming with facilities, and if you don't want to use the the gym or the sauna or the pool you can just lounge in one of the many seating facilities scattered liberally around the premises.

The place was designed to a sort of country club for the boating set, so there are dry slips with ample covered storage in these sheds, which also coincidentally block the club off from any errant views of hoi-polloi out on Pensinsular Avenue:
People do keep boats in the water here and I'm pretty sure this is a liveaboard boat. Who would have thunk of people living on their boats in this place? It seemed quite humanizing to me, that bicycle on the dock!
There was no dedicated motorcycle parking but I followed some other dude's exmaple and made do nudging my Bonneville up to the motorcycle already there:Across the water to the east of the club is Boca Chica channel with it's share of anchored out boats between Stock Island and the Navy Base on Boca Chica Key visible across the water:

In the main building there is a dining room upstairs with a balcony offering spectacular views to the south across the Straits of Florida:

The outer arm of the marina has been developed too with ramadas offering the possibility of cook outs in splendid isolation at the head of the docks.

My wife and I were guests of a friend with a membership and she invited a group of us to spend Labor Day afternoon by the pool for a cook out. We didn't need to be asked twice. It was an idyllic way to spend the afternoon. The club has a rule that no children are allowed in the club on weekends which makes membership especially alluring to me, and at $100 a month my wife and I were contemplating the value of joining especially as the owner is offering deals apparently.We joked that we would be the only Democrats in the place but this would be an excellent spot for us to meet weekday afternoons, me on the way to work, and my wife leaving her place of work on the north side of Stock Island. She has eaten in the dining room and she describes the food as excellent and reasonably priced and I can just imagine how pleasant a seat in the sauna would be prior to a night in the salt mines.I was having trouble thinking my wife was serious about joining and I was wondering if I am going soft in my old age but the showers in this building are quite a bit plusher than those at work, it goes without saying:The fact that Clyde Butcher pictures decorate the walls led me to think this place has more going for it than just superb facilities and decent grub. I like Butcher's art:
I suppose most people join these places for the social aspect and I grant you I'd rather buy a beer here than on Lower Duval, but my wife is a gym fiend and we both love to swim, in the pool or in the saltwater of the almost empty marina (much to the scandalized amazement of a an established member of the club- not a good start I suppose to draw attention to ourselves when we visitors swam happily in the peace and quiet off the little beach). And therein lies the problem. This is a club that would gladly have me for a member, not least because it was built at the end of the crazy money boom and the facilities are sadly under used. The food was eaten, the staff closed up shop, it was time for me to get dressed for work:We lazed under the umbrellas and watched the comings and goings of the club members on a holiday afternoon:

And this really is a splendid place to laze around:

As one member of our party put it, it doesn't feel like Key West at all. I think that was meant as a compliment. The owner has made a rule that no children are allowed in the club on weekends, which tends to surprise people when they first hear of it, and it did us too. But it makes sense if you want to preserve the atmosphere of an oasis and it's a rule I rather like.

There was a time when this place would have been packed, but times are tough and for the first time in a long time there are boat slips to spare all over Key West, even as the city plans to build a new luxury marina on the Truman Waterfront. I am told there were five facilities operated by Yacht Clubs of America but there are now only two survivors, one on Sanibel Island and this one. There are rumors this one might be opened to the public at some point.Times have changed in America, even as our leaders tell us we are pulling out of the Great Recession of 2008. I feel privileged that we can even think of joining such a plush facility.

Moods Of Rest Beach

I got to Key West through a rain storm. I was standing on the shoulder of Highway One at Bay Point putting on my waterproof layers when two Harley riders pulled up. "Haven't got rained on since we left Tennessee" they muttered looking at the huge black cloud up ahead. I was too tangled in plastic waterproofing to reach for my camera but I advised them I had a dental appointment and had to press on. They turned back with the idea of stopping and waiting at Sugarloaf Lodge a mile north. The rain cleared by Big Coppitt and at Mile Marker Nine the road was dry again. I made a beeline for Rest Beach to undress and dry out my waterproofs before I repacked them in the saddlebag.
.
Rest Beach is a hang out
but in September the worst beach month in Key West, I found an empty table. To the left there was a lonely man and bicycle waiting for Godot and to the right there were more men and machines probably waiting for the same unlikelihood:

Homelessness is a surfeit of time and an absence of money which is a dire combination, no matter what their critics tell us. I did my best imitation of a residentially challenged person by spreading my belongings out around the picnic table to dry. Summer storms in the keys are intense though happily short lived:
My tooth cleaning appointment (free to me with my municipal health insurance plan) was at 2:40 so I had twenty minutes to burn while I waited for the waterproofs to soak up the sun and banish mildew-forming moisture. I turned seaward with my camera.

Rest Beach is a pretty little spot to hang out and watch the horizon, but the ever excellent J Wills Burke in his book "The Streets of Key West" tells us it wasn't always so. Apparently it used to be used as a slaughtering place for cattle shipped down from Lee County. They were corralled in the Martello tower nearby, where the garden club is headquartered, (see this essay for details of the tower: http://conchscooter.blogspot.com/2009/01/ghostly-west-martello.html ) and led out to the beach to slaughter. The beach became the city dump and was known as Bottle Beach according to Burke. The Federal Government targeted the beach for beautification by the Works Progress Administration during the first Great Depression and there we have it, a pleasant place to stop and contemplate the cruise ships coming and going behind the White Street Pier:
It was time to go, the clock on the Bonneville said so, as did the first large, cold, wet, raindrop from overhead. I bundled my stuff up and left the protective sea oats to bend in the increasing wind. My dental hygienist gave me a clean bill of health with the promise of no imminent cavities. By the time I was out the rain had passed and the world was crisp and fresh for a few moments before September's heat closed in again.

Public Option Please

I got a notice from the home insurance company that covers a rental home my wife and I own. They said that they were canceling the policy because we now had a swimming pool on the property. I called and told them no renter had asked me to pay to put a pool at the house and what were they talking about? They hummed and hawed and sort of, kind of admitted perhaps their agent had checked the wrong home. They will check again they said. I couldn't even blame the government for this stupidity, this is a private insurance company hard at work showing us how well the private sector operates. Here's another, more grievous example from the Huffington Post. Remember: I don't for one minute believe that that Big Pharma is spending a million and a half dollars a day lobbying Congress against the public option because it is in the best interests of We The People. Nor should you. Of course one has to wonder what tort reform will do in cases like these. Texas has reformed tort laws to no visible effect on the cost of medical insurance.

.

The South Carolina Supreme Court has ordered an insurance company to pay $10 million for wrongly revoking the insurance policy of a 17-year-old college student after he tested positive for HIV. The court called the 2002 decision by the insurance company "reprehensible."

That appears to be the most an insurance company has ever been ordered to pay in a case involving the practice known as rescission, in which insurance companies retroactively cancel coverage for policyholders based on alleged misstatements - sometimes right after diagnoses of life-threatening diseases.

The ruling emerges from a conservative Southern state with one of the most pro-business climates in the country. And it comes as progressive Democrats on Capitol Hill are pressing for health care reforms, such as a public insurance option, that reflect wariness about the private insurance industry's motives.

The Supreme Court on Monday upheld a lower court's verdict against Fortis Insurance, now known as Assurant. The trial jury had awarded the former college student, Jerome Mitchell, $15 million in punitive damages; the Supreme Court reduced that amount by $5 million.

Mitchell learned that he had HIV when, while heading to college, he donated blood. Fortis then rescinded his coverage, citing what turned out to be an erroneous note from a nurse in his medical records that indicated that he might have been diagnosed prior to his obtaining his insurance policy.

Before the cancellation of the policy, an underwriter working for Fortis wrote to a committee considering whether or not to rescind his policy: "Technically, we do not have the results of the HIV tests. This is the only entry in the medical records regarding HIV status. Is it sufficient?" The underwriter's concerns were ignored and the rescission went forward.




Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/17/insurance-company-must-pa_n_289841.html

Night Walk

It's rainy season in Key West still, and there is something quite refreshing about taking a lunch time walk after the latest storm: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.