TubaOrNotTuba

I placed my personal safety among my most prized habits. I am unlikely to find myself anywhere where death is an ongoing option. Of course most of the places that a tourist can visit have already been taken and sanitized. The really nasty stuff has been removed from the equation. Earlier today I re-watched a video of some people exploring a former military installation. Something from the last century which involved coastal guns. And I said to myself that I have been there and at no point did I feel that my life was at risk. If I been in the area half century before I might have found myself in the middle of a battle but not anymore all we have left are the large reminders I imagine that removing a multi ton cannon was more trouble than it would be worth. Easier for the authorities to remove the dangerous bits and place some safety railings which they have done there was little chance of my dying in a spectacular way. All I could do was to go into the vault look around turn around and leave. As I think about it almost everything I have visited as a tourist fits in that category. The cool bits are gone. We just have a chance to imagine what a place was like when life was going on there. Probably for the better because some of us do not watch what we’re doing as well as we should. But it would have been interesting to hear those large cannons fired and to watch the method of the soldiers getting things ready for the next big moment. Old photos and movie clips do not give the whole story. We have some movies but because we cannot compare them in the then and now way, we have to imagine how the film people did their job. And when we as tourists visit old installations we have to remember that the people in charge of the site have already been over it carefully looking for all the things that could hurt the stupid people. There are a lot of them.

Apparently there’s something going on there. Anyhow I just watched an interview with a top name from Hollywood. Not going to say her name but it generally requires a pronunciation course for those who are going to speak with her. Going on. I also rarely see new movies. Given that I rarely go to the cinema I also rarely see new movies. There may be a correlation here. Her latest film is set in the Orkney Islands which is one of those areas they really want to know more about. The crew of her film stayed in local homes because there were no accommodation means readily available. My own skills in animal husbandry are minimal so I was interested to learn about the birth of a lamb. You have to purely shake it alive. You also have to use a piece of straw to aspirate the mucus. This is supposed to be in the movie so now I am truly interested because where else would I learn about the kind of things that would have been commonplace for my ancestors. Most families kept sheep because it provided a ready source of wool from which all good clothing comes. I can only wonder if I will ever see the film since I’m not going to make a special trip to a big city to find it in a cinema. Maybe it will come across my timeline in a few months. I give credit to people who get involved in their craft. Being an actor should go beyond just parroting lines. Her role required learning some skills that go beyond the normal run of acting. She had to deliver baby lambs. Bring them to life in the open air through a lot of shaking and removing mucus from their noses. Let us be fair this is not something you learn to do in acting school. It requires that you get advice from people in the area on skills that may no longer be common. I know that we kept sheep in this area because in the old days getting wool for clothes was a requirement. Long winters and no catalog sales. I can only imagine that my grand father would have had to deliver his baby lambs and he would have done it with the confidence that he took to his other jobs. Knocking down trees and making iron into something useful. He could probably dig a well if you had to. All jobs that I can only read about. In the situation where I would have to bring a lamb back to life I would probably fail miserably. As the actress said she also had no urge to kill little lambs because of her lack of skill. And so she managed. Believe me that is more than learning to ride a bicycle. We need people in the film industry who will show us the realities of life, especially on a farm. No green screen fakery. Put the real stuff out there so that the rest of us can imagine how life would be if we were in the same situation.

I live on an island this island is serviced by a certain number of ferry boats. At least, it was until a week or two ago. Right now two of them are tide up for repairs. Getting another boat in on short notice is not possible. And so we make do with other methods. Apparently one of the boats or ships collided with the wharf. The other one has motors that simply stopped working. I had not realized how risky it could be to take that way of getting around. I mean, when we had a major fire about a year or two ago I said to myself that would not be a good place to be then, the government was able to find a loan boat. Loan as in on loan from another company. But there is a limited possibility to borrow a big boat. I keep imagining a scenario where you load your car on the ferry and then the ferry sinks. I never used to think in those terms. I have a suspicion that maintenance is more of an issue than the companies want to let on. Should I switch to an airplane? No they also follow this guy period. We do have a bridge that we can take when the wind is not blowing too hard. All of this points Two reasons There have been fairies involved in our local transportation system for my whole life. However the idea of both boats being out of service for more than a few hours at a time was not considered to be a possibility. I am surprised to find that our whole method is based on something as easy to stop as running into the wharf. It must have been quite a collision. And I imagine that the wharf is barely bruised. It is a good thing that I do not need to get to the other side of the water anytime soon. I guess that travel is now something optional rather than always possible. I did mention a bridge but even there we can be locked in the house if the wind blows too hard and this is a windy place. Maybe I should just surround myself with nice things and leave the rest of the world to do what it does. There used to be a standing joke about how the rest of the nation was cut off from us. Less of a joke and more of a realistic statement of fact.

Out of knowledge comes strength. Not sure of the origins of that model. Perhaps it was something I over heard. Or found in a book. Or over heard while going through a book. It doesn’t really matter much. Lately the world is coming alive to the idea of AI. Which from what I have learned is a fancy way of saying that with enough data and the right analysis tools you increase your net worth. Still waiting to find an application. Lately we have been considering the idea of getting a dish for the roof of the van. Something to allow us access to data while away from home. Here is the point of the exercise. We want to make a decision that will not leave us filled with buyer’s remorse. And if we can get a tool such as AI to analyze our possibilities we might choose the right solution. Things like which dish to buy or which data service to subscribe. Too much information for a tiny human brain. However the whole idea of letting an app analyze our needs and spit back  a response seems worthwhile. Yes I know that garbage in gives garbage out but I can do a pre-analysis. I can look at what we have already done and what is available to us in our local market. I know how much we can afford and whether or not we are willing to make the plunge. We will. Perhaps not today or tomorrow but soon. I think that came from a movie I saw once. Anyhow we have been studying the solutions that are currently available to mount a dish on a van. All of them require some DIY. At least we do not want to use the dish while moving which reduces the engineering skills we would need. It could be that something as simple as a junk of PVC pipe and the trailer hitch would give us a solution. We probably have the winter to draw up a solution to a problem that isn’t really there. And we will. We have the time. And the idea of being cut off from the world because we left the house is too much to pay period. At least we have YouTube. There are others that are trying to solve the same problem. And if we can consolidate all of those answers we will have a personal version of AI to get us over the bump.

My first tour in uniform happened when I was still quite young, able to show my age using the digits of my fingers. The polite ones of course. I had done like so many others before me enrolled in the local scout movement. Without really understanding the implications. The idea of clothing with insignia and badges and the ability to progress through my merit seemed very alluring. I was able to count my age using my fingers an I had little understanding of what was really involved here. This was the gateway drug to the military hand signs and special language. Our town was large enough to have a specialty store just for things that a Boy Scout might need. Better caps and better jerseys and camping gear. Owning my own cutlery which had been stamped out of metal and nested together seemed like a real treasure. And realistically that knife and fork and spoon were designed to last forever. As long as you didn’t lose them in the woods. I imagine that if you searched around the homes of my friends you would still find a last spoon, or fork. Depending on the meal. What we learned was that you did not need silver to eat called slap. In fact as long as it resembled a sandwich. I do not believe that my own children ever had such treasures in their kit but anything is possible. We do not learn all life skills from our care parents. I think that the little scouting store is gone although I do not know what took its place. Perhaps the decline in enrolment in the movement was enough to make people look for better quality tools. Contrary to popular belief you need more than a pocket knife to get through life. Also you do not measure a man by the quality of his tools. We just did not know any better. I keep wondering what I would buy now. Something involving rare metals probably. Plastic is not good for the environment. But in retrospect we learned the camping did not require a whole knapsack full of gear. We were not actually out there long enough and most camping was done in some kind of large military surplus canvas structure. Leftovers from bygone war. I think as for my uniform I would love to believe that it is folded away carefully in a drawer but that would too much to hope for.

There is an old joke about a town being so small that they roll up the sidewalks at night. I have never personally seen that happen. However in many places where I have lived they do remove the rails. Now, think about that for a moment. Laying rails is a big job and it serves a big purpose. Trains were a great way to travel. That someone will come along and steal all that iron strikes me as odd. After all even though the rails were not being used there was still potential. We do not remove old roadways or canals or air strips. Not even paths through the woods. But there is this vision of a future where rails go away. I have walked the rails and I am aware of the danger when there are still trains in use. This does not seem to be the condition. This is more where someone is retaking what was expropriated from them. Apparently in this province we have lost all but a few 100 meters of rail. In sections of neighbouring provinces all rail trails are common sight. If these paths were put to better use it might be a good idea but I think that all too often those responsible are terribly short sighted. If we still had rails lying around as people say we could put small trains in place that would do excellent work add moving passengers from point A to point B. They will not find the budgets to re-lay rail.

Back in my heyday I was a practicing percussionist. What others might call a drummer with a better set of lyrics. My favourite venue was a large theatre. Built before the automobile and in use after the second fire from the time of the First World War. A wonderful  Venue with seating for 700. A full stage and an orchestra pit. That was my corner of the realm from 68 to 72. The theatre dated back to be for amplified sound. If you did not play loudly you did not get heard. And as a drummer I had the tools to handle that task. Show after show over a period of years. I believe that I became better with time but there are no recordings to let others know that over a number of years I honed my craft and although there are no recordings to show my skill set, I think I held up my part of the task. What was wonderful for the rest of us in the band was behind the stage. In the rear of that oversized asbestos fire curtain. Elevators and stairwells and access to the inner workings of a theatre. I have not been back there in many decades but the hall is still in operation. What I can say, as a drummer, is that I had stick control. In fact I can only remember once when I broke a drumstick. Due to playing as loudly as I possibly could to fit in with the triumphant and of a performance. I wonder how many others of that band of minstrels are still out there remembering their moment in the limelight. I went on to do other things musically but those several years involved with musical theatre hold a special place. From where I sat on the throne we were really good. The singers and dancers perhaps not a show score With all your pencil markings and then return it to the firm in New York at the end of the run is something that few people ever get a chance to try. As for the drum set I figure it is still in place in the back corners of a high school. Too expensive to ever throw away. As for the performances I still remember most of the lyrics because when you sit through enough rehearsals you do learn the lyrics.