Homeless By Choice

Monday

Ah Shit.  The stock market is still going down.  I thought that the response to the Fed announcement on quantitative easing was irrational. The news was a bright economic outlook.  Friday is always a cashout day anyway.

I got on my computer and made sure that I had trailing stop percentage sell orders in place until I lost internet connectivity.  Off to town to continue.

I had promised myself that I would not subject my new computer to rain, salt water and endless hours of pounding, but this called for action, the cost of the computer was trivial in compared to the losses in the making.  

No electricity in town.   One of the three diesel generators that power this town was being replaced.   Why is there not sufficient capacity to run on two while maintenance is done on one of them?  These things are beyond comprehension.  I bought a replacement battery for my backup phone.

I stopped by Chris’s boat.  “Got any food?” “No.” “Coffee?” “No.” Of course not.  Why did I ask?

He was charging his batteries so I plugged in my computer.  One of my two phones that was dead was hooked up to my computer the computer powered up.   Wow!  Minutes later it was fully charged.  So I have eight chargers that won’t charge this phone.  Cheap, Chinese pieces of shit, Nokia knockoffs too, apparently.

Where to for lunch?  I’ll go check on Grumpy.  Nope, the Pickled Parrot was closed.

Back to Casa Verde.  It started to rain.  I undid the bowline, leaving the stern line until I got the motor started.  One quick pull and I lurched forward and slammed to a stop with the stern rope taut.  WTF?  It’s not supposed to pull while in gear.  I hurried to town.   Yes! Electricity.  Of course, their internet was not working.   I have no idea how they manage to make the thing so unreliable.  Where is that girl that is coming?  No way to check my email.   Oh well, when it stops raining, I’ll scrounge one up somewhere.

I wish they would hurry up with that burger.  I have to get online.  Trying not to each junk food, but when it’s raining and after one and I haven’t eaten yet, well, one won’t hurt, much.

Bought a thumb drive.  Walking down the street, a cute young woman with a couple of guys.  “That’s Jim, the coolest guy ever.”  “Thanks, Melissa, but recruit me a cute girl.” “Haha, like you need help.”  Pepper Spary?  Sure, why not.  If I think about it and don’t buy it, I’ll regret.  Not that I will ever have it in reach.  If I carry it in my pocket, I will lose it in ten minutes.  “Hi Jim!” “Hola Nadia.” “Hey!” (Jesus, fucking Sombra.”  “Que paso, Mr. Jim?”  “Todo bien, Carlos.”  And so it went.  The locals up and down third avenue.

Jesus I need to epoxy that exposed wood on the boat.

Windows 8 blows.

A start panel with a bunch of apps that are only full screen.  This is not a tablet, this is a frigging computer.  Want to run a program?  Hit Windows C, Search and try to guess the name of the program.  Nice, you frigging clowns.  Want a program to start up automatically just open the file explorer if you can type it and type shell:start that will bring you to the folder into which you should create your shortcut.   Now, good luck trying to find out where the program is located.  What the hell is wrong with these idiots?

Got to visit Kirk and drill a hole for that through hull fitting for the bilge pump. Of course the battery is about to die.  I lent my battery charger, brand new $240 to somebody.  It was stolen while he was using it.  He claims I was storing it there and is not responsible for thef

Still raining.

Can I create a live boot thumb drive and recover the stuff I have at home?  Oh, it’s not at home, it’s across town.  Damn, I need a 3.0 USB external disk drive case.  “Tiena una disco caja?”  Of course not.  What was I thinking?

Writing at 2MB/sec.  Jesus.  I finally got a computer that supports USB 3 and I don’t have any peripherals other than 2.0.

I got my hamburger.  “Did I piss you off?” “Como?”  “Did you run out of meat?” “Como?” “No mas molida?  Este muy poco.”  WTF?  That’s a hamburger?

I need a break.  Cuba?  Thailand?

Shit, I have to send off money to the guy in Panama City to get my camera repaired.

Trouble in Paradise.  Here comes crazy.  Sorry you ran out of meds, you should do something about it.  But please don’t come and bitch to me about everything in your pathetic life that annoys you.  Three more weeks and you are on to Colomb?ia. Why don’t you go now and study your Spanish there?

Hola Cuba!  

Why the hell won’t my computer connect to my phone?  This bluetooth configuration screen blows.

Cuba wanted to charge his phone on my computer.  His charger won’t work on his phone.  Huh, I plugged it in and had to wiggle it then it worked on mine. Same thing as with the USB cable from my computer.  This frigging phone was $60 and I only plugged in the USB once before.

Well done. All phone batteries charged.

C’mon Chris, you have a charter, let’s clean this dump up.

We moved shit off the back deck, out of the salon, from the cabins, from the pilot house.   Hoses, clamps, pumps, electrical fittings, tools, miscellany.  I emptied a dozen overflowing ash trays.   We took a boatload of shit to the battlestar, a retired naval vessel Chris had acquired for $1.  Another trip, more shit.   I emptied drawer after drawer, folded wrinkled bits of paper, crayons, colored pencils, water colors and stuffed this collection of little Noah’s doodlings into a plastic bag.   Hundreds of keys that would never enter a lock again, candles, ancient medications, drawer after drawer of crap.

The pilot house upper deck as covered in solid black hardened mold.   Some muriatic acid turned it red.   Straight 3.5% bleach and scrubbing got it clean.  Now to get another 30 gallons of bleach.  We took five gallons of diesel off the battlestar.   Then we couldn’t start the generator because the batteries are dead.   I took my charger ashore and intended to bring a cable so I could run two in series and rehabilitate a couple of batteries that I have to run in series for my charger.   Shit, left the cable on Alejandra’s panga.

About two Jen and Mel were ready to go snorkeling.  About time.   Definitely working on Panama time.  Off to Old Bank, we walked most of the way to Wizard Beach, then back to the marina to get my snorkel gear out of my boat.  Out to Hospital Point.  

Ahh, the masks are brand new.   Well, I have some toothpaste.  I never know when I am going to spend the night somewhere other than my house.   I scrubbed the silicone off the inside of the lenses, spit on the lenses, rinsed them in water and sent them out.   Bobbing in the waves, I took the boat for a quick spin to pull the plug and drain the water that had accumulated over the stern in the short time I was idling.  This little skiff is definitely going to see bottom some day.

I returned.  Where the hell is Mel?  I picked up Jen and went back to a tour boat that was moored at a buoy.  There she is aboard the tour boat.  Not quite the andventurer that Jen is.  Well, the water should be calmer at my house.   Mel saw a jellyfish and immediately wanted out of the water.  Jen couldn’t give a rat’s ass.  

Off to the end of the bay and up a small river toward the bat cave.  Only got stuck a couple of times.  Sunken logs everywhere.  Back to town.   Back to the house.  Jessica crawled between my legs, scared of all of the pounding that was compressing my vertebrae.

This skiff barely burns gas but it is not much of a boat.  Gotta go, it’s probably sinking right now.

This morning I grabbed a few things and stuffed them in my backpack.  The dogs knew that meant I was heading out.   No working computer at home, that’s another story.  The phones won’t take a charge either.  Two phones, five batteries, five battery chargers.  What kind of Bermuda Triangle of electronics have I entered?

New moon low tide.  I pulled the lightweight skiff out of muck.  I had pulled her close to shore to prevent her from sinking in case in rained.   Although Saturday I had improvised a bilge pump arrangement it was really sketch.  Purchasing a bilge pump, a float switch, battery connectors, a section of hose, a through hull fitting, a wire nut, some screws. a stainless steel push plate for a door,  some hose clamps and some liquid dialectric.   I bolted the switch and the pump to the plate, wired up the switch, put on the terminals and returned to hook it up to my boat.   It was rainining hard.  Mel was bailing the skiff, good thing else it would have found bottom.

In any event, it was time to secure this bilge pump, clean up the wiring, put in the through hull fitting in place, secure the wiring in a tube, effect a better installation of the battery wires, hook up the motor to charge the battery while underway and then tend to my scheduled activities, of foremost priority was getting a new foot for the outboard on my panga.

Off to town then.  |Well, partway.   Halfway between Carenero and Colon I exhausted the gas.  Soon a water taxi towed me the mile to the gas dock.   I filled up the tank and pulled repeatedly.   Soon the knot pulled right through the rubber pull handle.   I had no washer aboard.  I pumped the primer bulb repeatedly, wrapped the cord around the pull handle and pulled and pulled and pulled.  I popped the cowling and grabbed a loose cable that functioned as the choke control while trying to steady the motor with a second hand and pull with a third.   As I was doing this Victor, the attendant walked over.   During my thrashing the discharge hose was knocked into the boat and the drain plug was pulled loose by a security chain.  I was sinking.   I put the plug back in, better be sure to get another today and a spare, despite having no place to store any tools, spare hoses, hose clamps, lubricant, wrenches, screwdrivers, cable ties, wire, duct tape and other items I always carry on my panga.

|It finally started and I made it to town.  “Jim, can I talk with you for a minute?”  What now?  Need money?  Mom in the hospital?   Oh, you want me to repair your computer.   Shit, it’s not like I don’t have a huge backlog of my own stuff to take care of.

I am getting worn out.  I need a break.

“Sure, which boat?”

“Carlos’s”.

“Meetcha there.”

“Hey girls, let’s go to the beach.”  

“OK”

We met on Isla Carenero.   The boat owner, far cry from any sort of Captain, a 55 year old Uraguan, Mauricio a white haired, white bearded Argentinian Santa Claus who spent 16 years hitchhiking and sleeping under bridges, 45 year old Belgian Chris, 30 something year old Alejandra, hailing from Spain, 30 something Nadia from Argentina, 24 year old Melissa (Mel) from Thailand and 24 year old Jennifer from Belgium and I boarded the boat.  I tied my skiff behind her.

We motored slowly in the thrice sunk hull.  It never fully sank, but water rose over the tops of the counters in the galley.   Through hull fittings, bud, you have to watch this stuff.

At Starfish Beach Nadia wanted me to take her to bird Island.   Mel and Jen wanted to go.  Mauricio wanted to come. I don’t know whether he was more strongly motivated by never having seen these rocks that jut up out of the open water with near vertical cliffs and opening straight though that have been eroded by the pounding waves or the fact that I was taking every single woman with me.

Five aboard a 15 foot skiff powered by a 15 HP outboard.   Maybe a foot of freeboard.  Not a life jacket, fire extinguisher, flare, whistle, or anchor.   Bocas perfect.   Around the point and into the swells.   Boats flip over out there all the time.   It’s June, just exercise caution and don’t let the engine fail me.

Struggling uphill, speeding downhill, pointing into the swells.  Forty minutes later we made it.  Everyone aboard was enraptured.   I idled in the calmer waters leeward, they took pictures then we headed back.   Nadia, admitted that she had been scared shitless.  

We motored back.  Carlos has never put this boat under sail.  Nor can he dock it, nor tie a knot, he doesn’t even know how to wrap a cleat.  I showed the girls how to tie an overhand knot, a square knot, a bowline, a clovehitch, a sheet bend, a figure eight knot and an overhand knot, just the simplest most often useful knots.

Chris took the helm and docked the boats while Alejandra and I handled the lines.   I headed home, suspicious of the amount of gas I had.  Certainly enough to get home, questionable on making the return.