Lunch At The Beach

To sit on a beach on November, to watch the waves roll in and admire one's tougher neighbors out taking a tan under gray skies and strong east winds; that's autumnal sport in Key West.

I had expected to line up for a while to get my swine flu vaccine at the High School but I was in and out so fast I had time left over for a leisurely lunch. Not too leisurely because we have so many people out sick there is overtime going begging. It was an enormous pleasure to sit out at a picnic table and feel the warm, muggy wind blow in my face. I was so tired I didn't bother to indulge myself in my preferred activity, reading, I just sat and stared out at the water. Key West in winter is a different season. It brings with it spells of cold dry sunshine mixed with short bursts of overcast weather, a little rain and a return to the bright cold crisp sunshine. People make fun of a cold day slightly above 60 degrees (15C), but when one is used to temperatures closer to 90 degrees, (30C) it feels cold enough. I haven't yet pulled my sweatshirt out of the closet but I know it's coming, and I know we will be flooded with people, people who apparently have jobs and are determined to enjoy a vacation in "America's Caribbean" (Key West, that is, not the real one in the US Virgin Islands). So an empty picnic table and a bespoke burrito from Badboy (porkchilicabbagejalapenocheesericeandbeans) is just the job to celebrate a spare hour:
As my work was my next stop I was wearing motorcycle boots, Kevlar lined pants and my uniform polo shirt. The nurses at the vaccination station asked if I was riding a motorcycle. "Oh no." I said,"I just feel safer overdressing." The student nurse was very sweet to me and failed entirely to jab me as hard as I deserved for being smart with them. Visitors to Key West, even as winter progresses pretend it is summer and throw their clothes away with a ferocity that tells you they are determined to enjoy their winter break:
It's never out of fashion to build a sandcastle with your Dad:
The winds have produced white lumpy conditions in the Straits of Florida that, as long as winds were out of the east, were coming ashore with a ferocity not usually seen inside the reef. When my wife and I were out cruising we used to check the ocean conditions by looking at the horizon from the comfort of our anchorage. If we could see buffalo rolling along the horizon of the open waters we determined it was probably better to stay put. Next time you are at the beach look to the horizon and if the waves roll along looking like the humps on a herd of buffalo you will know what I mean.
I wasn't planning on going sailing so I watched the waves crash on the rocks placed off the beach to preserve the sand in just these conditions. I like swimming in calm waters, body surfing seems rather gross to me.

Offshore I could see a ghost, a cruise ship lurking. It vanished into the murk and the little green pilot boat came rolling back down the channel a few minutes later. I doubt the passengers on the ship even noticed how lumpy the buffaloes were running.That other nautical saying came to mind, "I'd rather be in here wishing I was out there, than out there wishing I was in here." I took pleasure in the trees, the sand, the stillness under the canopy.
The sea oats is growing nicely along the beach. It is supposed to be for erosion control and beds of it are always fenced off on Florida beaches. Visitors aren't supposed to pick it or trample it or disturb it.
I love staring out at the turquoise waters and gray clouds. Sometimes when the clouds pile up over shallow waters, even while standing in downtown Key West, you can see a turquoise sheen reflected off the bottom of the cloud. It's reminder of how shallow and clear and close these magical waters are, even to the fleshpots of Duval.
Visitors do the damnedest things. They swim in November in rough waters:
And they seem to enjoy it. Others don't:
Me? I dropped my can in the recycling bin and packed my sandwich wrapper to drop it off in the garbage can at work. Lunch was over, time to answer a 9-1-1 call or two. It's hard to imagine but not everyone was having an easy day at the beach.

Tommy Atkins

The British War Office in the 18th century used the name "Thomas Atkins" to illustrate how to fill out pay slips. The name stuck for centuries and the term "Tommy" became the name given to the common soldier. British poet Rudyard Kipling wrote a poem for Tommy Atkins noting the double standards soldiers are held to by civilians. Kipling wrote this poem in 1892 to give you an idea that what you see today, on Veterans Day (Armistice Day as it was known to the Tommies who survived the trenches of World War One), are sentiments that have been floated around for a long time, not always to the credit of the promoters. Here is actor Roger Moore quoting the poem:

Vaccination

Edward Jenner crashed on his future wife one day when his aircraft ran out of lift and forced him to land in her father's front yard. In 1788 flying was a novelty and hot air balloons were a miracle. The fearsome killer at the time however, was not flying wrecks but smallpox. One in three of those who contracted the disease died and many, many people lived their lives scarred and pitted by the pustules the disease formed on the skin. The fact that today one is hard put to come across an obvious survivor of smallpox, at least in our comfortable first world, is a tribute to Edward Jenner.The trouble with vaccines is that people have short memories. I attribute this generation's contempt for government regulation to a lack of institutional memory to remind people why government instituted regulations in the first place. We have social security disability and old age pensions today because people starved without them, literally, in the 1930s. US banks used to be tightly regulated because bank failure was commonplace and so the federal government created the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to protect the savings of working people. Vaccination programs were a public health response to sweeping waves of disease that killed and crippled.Dr Walter Reed, an army surgeon figured out yellow fever was mosquito-borne and his discoveries permitted the Panama Canal to reach completion.His work also paved the way for huge public health works to make modern cities safe. New Orleans, Rome, Key West, were all cities subject to outbreaks of deadly yellow fever, until respective governments removed the breeding grounds of mosquitoes. Today dengue fever has made a reappearance in Key West and the advice remains the same as in Dr Reed's day: get rid of stagnant fresh water to eliminate mosquito habitat, and because people aren't used to dealing with deadly disease the advice falls on deaf ears. I contracted dengue when I was on assignment in El Salvador twenty years ago. Salvadorans died, I got a horrible fever, and I discovered why they used to call it "breakbone fever," such was the pain. Dengue is also transmitted by mosquitoes and El Salvador wracked by civil war was in no position to carry out public works programs.

Louis Pasteur in France followed up vaccination work with discoveries in the field of anthrax and rabies and saved a child's life with an experimental vaccine. In 19th century France, and elsewhere, stray dogs were a feared threat as one bite from a rabid animal promised a horrible, writhing, foaming death. Rabies was terrifying and Pasteur's inoculation made him the object of adoration.

These are just a few of the giants, the most well known giants in the field of public medicine in the past couple of centuries. Their work is how we as a species figured out how to eradicate ghastly diseases. I well remember young kids coughing their chests out with "whooping" cough, a hacking chest condition so severe it sounded like the victims were literally going to split their young bodies apart from coughing. I remember spending an eternity in a dark isolated room with measles, I remember eating a sugar lump to prevent polio. Nowadays it seems no one remembers any of it. Yesterday I went to get my free swine flu vaccine, thinking grateful thoughts about Jenner, Pasteur and Reed among others, grateful we still have some sort of public health department in the US, and at home my wife tells me most of her students aren't vaccinated because parents fear the vaccine. Most of my colleagues refused the free vaccine- and half of the twelve of us are sick, coughing and hacking. One has swine flu and is in isolation at home "sounding like death." Hyperbole I know but swine flu is horrid and why would anyone refuse a vaccine? Because it's a government plot they say, because vaccine causes autism, because people are uneducated, ungrateful and deserve what they get. God, if you exist, please give me strength.

Pierce Lane

Ironic I thought to myself as I cycled by on Simonton Street. The pool chemical store to the left, the Sugar Apple all natural store to the right.I was in the neighborhood to photograph Pierce Lane, a slip of a street that runs alongside the industrial powerhouse here which is Key West Chemical Supply:

The north side of Pierce Lane is dominated by Key West Chemical's warehouse:And looming above the warehouse the downtown cell phone tower that gives the whole place an even more industrial look. The only other such tower serving Key West is on Stock Island, though there are plans being discussed about putting another one in on North Roosevelt Boulevard:On the other side of the lane the pool chemical company was ventilating the store room with a big fan. A reminder that even in November it is necessary to throw the doors open on an overcast 80 degree afternoon (27C) to keep the chemical laden air moving:

As though a reminder were needed these are new homes built on Pierce Lane tell us that Key West has a high tolerance for "mixed use zoning." There simply isn't enough land to do otherwise and these new homes need protection apparently:

But there is still plenty of old stock buildings in the darker recesses at the back of the lane:

And, as though to compensate there is also the back of the brand new hotel which actually faces onto Truman Avenue. It is built in the modern style, sort of industrial chic warehouse with firm colors and a touch of metal in the decorations. I quite like it even though it is unusual for Key West:

Complete with parking under the building. Very convenient. The scooter is riding towards Duval on Truman Avenue on the other side of the hotel:

This is a last look back at Pierce Lane towards Simonton Street:

After all my efforts cycling around town to photograph lanes and Peary Court I felt I deserved refreshment before I went to rest at the Tropic for a matinée movie. I stopped off at my new favorite place for a quite lunch, on the 1200 block of Simonton. Badboy Burrito was as good as ever:

A stool in the window and a Gaucho Ernesto, jalapeno, beef rice and beans with a bottle of water (I forgot to bring my own flask, mea culpa!) for ten dollars set me straight. Excellent food, including the fresh salsa and blue chips on the banana leaf on the plate, it's safe to say Key West finally has a superb burrito shop to call it's own.

Peak Oil Peaking?

What is it about the Fall? I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving with friends and the rest of the world seems determined to pile on the bad news. North and South Korea trade shots at sea, New York State seems ready to follow California into a State of Bankruptcy and an official at the International Energy Agency tells the British Guardian newspaper we are running out of affordable, easily mined oil faster than our leaders want us to know... Commentators are now asking if we already for $6 a gallon gas in the US. Short answer to that is No! as embarrassing as that is to admit- we are too poor just now. This is what the Guardian was reporting yesterday in London in reference to the IEA report out today, bearing in mind the world currently uses around 82 million barrels per day as best as they can tell us:

Terry Macalister guardian.co.uk, Monday 9 November 2009 21.30 GMT Article history

The world is much closer to running out of oil than official estimates admit, according to a whistleblower at the International Energy Agency who claims it has been deliberately underplaying a looming shortage for fear of triggering panic buying.

The senior official claims the US has played an influential role in encouraging the watchdog to underplay the rate of decline from existing oil fields while overplaying the chances of finding new reserves.

The allegations raise serious questions about the accuracy of the organisation's latest World Energy Outlook on oil demand and supply to be published tomorrow – which is used by the British and many other governments to help guide their wider energy and climate change policies.


'There's suspicion the IEA has been influenced by the US. In particular they question the prediction in the last World Economic Outlook, believed to be repeated again this year, that oil production can be raised from its current level of 83m barrels a day to 105m barrels. External critics have frequently argued that this cannot be substantiated by firm evidence and say the world has already passed its peak in oil production.

Now the "peak oil" theory is gaining support at the heart of the global energy establishment. "The IEA in 2005 was predicting oil supplies could rise as high as 120m barrels a day by 2030 although it was forced to reduce this gradually to 116m and then 105m last year," said the IEA source, who was unwilling to be identified for fear of reprisals inside the industry. "The 120m figure always was nonsense but even today's number is much higher than can be justified and the IEA knows this.

"Many inside the organisation believe that maintaining oil supplies at even 90m to 95m barrels a day would be impossible but there are fears that panic could spread on the financial markets if the figures were brought down further. And the Americans fear the end of oil supremacy because it would threaten their power over access to oil resources," he added.

A second senior IEA source, who has now left but was also unwilling to give his name, said a key rule at the organisation was that it was "imperative not to anger the Americans" but the fact was that there was not as much oil in the world as had been admitted. "We have [already] entered the 'peak oil' zone. I think that the situation is really bad," he added.

The IEA acknowledges the importance of its own figures, boasting on its website: "The IEA governments and industry from all across the globe have come to rely on the World Energy Outlook to provide a consistent basis on which they can formulate policies and design business plans."

Words And Actions

We are told our economy is starting to rise, phoenix-like from the ashes of the Great Recession of 2008, and soon things will be back to normal. Which must be hugely encouraging to the 17% of Americans listed in the ranks of the unemployed, partially employed and needing more work, known in brief as U6. U3, the official unemployment rate is above 10% and that seems bad enough, but to be told all will be well soon, seems soothing rather than realistic. And slowly, slowly the prospect of health care for all makes it's way through the well insured ranks of Congress. Choosing not to have insurance will be an option finally, so Americans will be permitted to choose bankruptcy over insurance when they get ill. I wonder how many will choose to opt out of the medical coverage that will be offered when our languid Senators have finished ruminating on the issue.

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The thing is, if you look at what people say in the Florida Keys and what they do, you see no connection at all. Take the School Board for instance, where the majority have long championed the notion of reduced administrative costs and higher pay for teachers. Guess what? When they get an opportunity to put their money where their mouths are, they balk! My wife, a teacher, has been hoping to see the Board hold the line on costs and hold the line on raises, but it is with some dismay that we observe nothing of the sort.

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The new superintendent has announced he wants to hire a friend for $125,000 a year and that friend will help him run the district. That sort of blatant nepotism got a big thumbs up in Sunday's editorial in the Citizen newspaper which boggled my mind additionally. Then Superintendent Burke plans to hire not one, but three replacements for the ousted whistle blower Kathy Reitzel. Instead of paying her around $80,000, her three planned replacements will cost the district closer to a quarter of a million. And remember she it was who brought the recent financial scandal to light. She got fired along with the credit card manager while Deputy Superintendent Mike Henriquez got demoted and side lined and vast new founts of cash will be spent to replace people who were in the district before the new superintendent and his friends blew into town.

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Meanwhile the irrepressibly optimistic Leon Fowler, head of the teacher's union is pressing for a 2% raise for teachers. The board majority of Dick, Pribamsky and Mathewson have reneged on their earlier principled stand in favor of reducing administrative costs and supporting teachers and are now flailing around spending money on administration like drunken sailors and telling teachers to walk the plank. Weird but true.

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I've told my wife I don't think pay raises are a sensible notion at this juncture and when I mentioned it to Leon Fowler he shrugged, after all he does represent the teachers and has an obligation to do his best. I wasn't offended when the Teamsters failed to get raises for those of us employed by the city (though some of my colleagues were, unaccountably, as I don't see them at union meetings). However it does seem odd that a new superintendent, hired to sort out the district temporarily needs to find work for his buddies from Up North at our expense while our principled school board bends over promptly while turning their backs on their own oft-stated principles. Should we be surprised? They don't seem to think so.