On the Beach

Sunday was a windy but sunny and warm day in Nags Head so Uncle Jack and Mrs. U.J. grabbed the Sony and went forth to visit some of their favorite beachwalking haunts.  Some of the results are presented herewith.

This cottage just north of Surfside Drive in South Nags Head was knocked slightly askew by a storm this winter.  Worth Hare movers of Elizabeth City plucked it off the beach and moved it back a bit and it looks like it will get a new set of pilings where it now sits. This strategic retreat might give it a few more years of  life. Who knows.

The former location next door to another house that is now the sole remaining occupant of this section of the public beach. A massive sandbag wall has helped it survive for the past several years.

. The Worth Hare company has probably moved more houses on the Outer Banks than all the other housemovers put together.  It's a fascinating process to watch, especially when that rabbit really hunkers down and pulls..

Battered Seagull Drive has been prepared to receive a gravel surface which will enable owners and renters to reach the houses on the left this summer.  A dozen or so houses on the right are condemned and awaiting demolition or removal which will probably occur sometime around the time hell freezes over if  previous experience with such structures is our guide.

The new gravel street will not be the first "fix" for Seagull Drive.  Shortly after Hurricane Isabel, using FEMA funds,  the town built a new "temporary" street (shown here on the left) as well as a huge berm of trucked-in sand to protect it.  The whole works washed away in a relatively short time suggesting that "temporary" is the operative word for structures on the ocean front.  The cottages on the right are the condemned buildings shown in the previous picture.

No sandbags or bulldozers needed here.  The expansive beach in front of the "historic" cottages of Nags Head demonstrates the virtue of  "retreat" as a way of coping with erosion.  The older cottages in this picture have been moved back several times (often by Worth Hare) on their lots which were platted from the water to the Beach Road.  Unfortunately most of South Nags Head was chopped up into smaller lots in such a way that retreat is seldom possible, hence the large number of cottages that are "trapped" at the ocean front.

The iconic Buchanan cottage, largest and grandest of all the houses in the historic district of Nags Head, is on the market for $3 million.  It was built in 1934 and only recently moved back to what will possibly be its final resting place close to the Beach Road.  President Franklin D. Roosevelt once lunched here while in town to attend a performance of the "Lost Colony".  Google "Buchanan Cottage" for further information and pictures of the interior.

Fun in the Sun

Uncle Jack and Mrs. U.J. are enjoying a tranquil week in Nags Head along with several thousand motorcycle enthusiasts.  He has turned his new hearing aid way down so the noise is not as bad as it could have been.  Between the bikes on the Bypass and the bulldozers on the beach maybe "tranquil" is not exactly the right word to describe the Outer Banks right now but they are having a good time anyway. All too soon they will have to return to the peace and quiet of  Baltimore (which is marred only by the occasional gunshot and police siren) so they are enjoying  their stay at the beach as much as they can under the circumstances

. Construction of the new Jennette's pier is proceeding apace.  The pier house looks like it will be a formidable structure in its own right.  It is beginning to remind Uncle Jack of the grand West Pier at Brighton on the south coast of  England, pictures of which he has provided below.  After seeing the fate of the Brighton pier he can't help wondering if the new Jennette's pier might not be the wisest use of public funds given Mother Nature's implacable tendency to obliterate man-made structures placed too close to the sea no matter what they are made of. Time will tell as it did in Brighton.

Brighton West Pier just after it opened in 1899.  Victorian hubris at its zenith.

This is what was left when Uncle Jack and Mrs. U.J. visited Brighton a few years ago.  It cost more to remove the wreckage than it did to build it in the first place.

There's not much sand sculpture to be found in April but this would stand out at any time of the year. This is probably the only kind of building at the seashore that makes any sense.

A modern day Sisyphus at work in the shadow of the troubled Comfort Inn South which has survived another winter on the edge of catastrophe. It's a happy time for the 'dozer operators who are working from dawn to dusk to stave off the inevitable---at top dollar.

Your better class of bikers dine at Sam and Omie's.  The rest are at Hooters.

Saturday morning about a zillion cormorants like these flew north past James street in South Nags Head.  Ten minutes later another flock of similar size flew south past the same spot.  Does anyone understand cormorant behavior?
  

Mea Culpa Redux

Uncle Jack discovered this morning that more than a month has flown by since he last blogged.  An apology to his faithful core (corps, corpse?) of  readers is long overdue once again.  He still doesn't have anything particularly interesting to say but he did want to let you know that as he closes in on his 80th birthday in June he is in good health and enjoying life to the hilt. He and Mrs. U.J. have gone to numerous concerts and plays during the past month and he can tell you he has enjoyed them more than ever since he got his new hearing aid. He still doesn't understand how a little gadget you can stick in your ear could cost as much as a 52 inch, flat-screen, high definition you-know-what but it did.  Unfortunately after wearing it for a month he has discovered he can't get along without it so he will just have to get over the outrageous cost which, of course, is not covered by his medical insurance.
     Quite a while ago they planned to spend next week in Nags Head only to learn recently that their visit will coincide with "Bike Week" which will surely put some mileage on his new hearing aid.  He heard a rumor that now that Myrtle Beach has put out the unwelcome sign to bikers there may be as many as 35,000 of them descending, unmuffled, on the Outer Banks for an entire week instead of just a weekend. Time to buy some stock in Hooters, for whom the recession would seem to be over.
      The Orioles are off to a great start----one win to 8 losses--- but when you have a 52 inch flat-screen you-know-what to watch them on it's still fun.  Sort of.

 Watergate, as seen from Kennedy Center where UJ and Mrs. UJ recently saw a terrific play by Terrence McNally called "Lisbon Traviata".  It was here that the Republicans began their long slide into the mucky political swamp in which they now find themselves. "Rove, Rove, Rove Your Boat" has supplanted "We'll Take the High Road" as the Grand Old Party's theme song.

Spring has sprung in Charm City.  Two days of 90 degree weather last week caused an explosion among the cherry trees, dogwoods, tulips, etc. The 6.5 feet of snow that fell a couple of months ago has disappeared, leaving a fresh crop of monster potholes in its wake.

The oldest railroad station in the U.S., now a B. & O. museum in Ellicott City, a charming old mill town just a few miles up the Patapsco River from Baltimore.

Almost all the buildings in Ellicott City are made of thick granite so they have been almost impossible to tear down.  They are now occupied by a thriving collection of antique shops, restaurants and other tourist-friendly businesses. Some of these structures date back to the 18th century. Charming town.even though traffic on the main street is horrendous.

This passenger car dates back to the days when the B & O's trains were pulled by mules.  Many of the great Baltimore fortunes derive from the folks who owned stock in those days and hung on to it.

Best job in Baltimore?

     Thursday was a gorgeous spring day in Charm City---perfect for a stroll through the Inner Harbor followed by lunch at the American Visionary Art Museum's amazing restaurant.  (Which included a hard-earned bottle of superb Victory Pilsner from Downingtown, Pa.) While wandering around the harbor Uncle Jack came upon two city employees hard at work removing trash from the waters adjacent to the walkways.  (Other larger and more mechanized trash removers operate in the open harbor).  Their combined efforts are needed year-round to keep the picturesque harbor from completely filling up with detritus inasmuch as it receives the outflow from several polluted rivers which empty into it 24 hours a day. Even with all the city's pollution control efforts the harbor gets extremely ripe during the summer months and has been known to give off exceedingly unpleasant odors.  Not so yesterday when working conditions on the water were idyllic as the picture suggests.
     If you haven't done it already, take a minute to get acquainted with the Humble Farmer's website.  He will put you on his mailing list if you like and let you know when he has posted a new set of rants.  Funny man and serious, too. Click on the link. http://www.thehumblefarmer.com/ThisWeek.html

Death and Taxes

     Uncle Jack is working on his taxes this week so he is not in a very good mood.  He has already done enough preliminary number crunching to know approximately how much he is going to have to fork over to the IRS and the Maryland treasury and it is just as depressing this time as it was last year.  He knows that paying taxes is a duty of all citizens in a democracy but he can't help thinking that his taxes, which seem so burdensome to him, will not be enough to keep the government behemoth fed for even a nanosecond. His check, with which he could have gone out to Best Buy and bought something nice to stimulate the economy, will vanish into the government money pit, never to be seen again.  Eventually it might help to cover a tiny part of the annual subsidy payment to a corporate farm in Iowa or some such but he will never know.
     At the local level he has discovered that his real estate tax on his diminutive condo in Baltimore is more than twice as high as the combined city and county tax on his house in Nags Head which is worth twice as much as the condo.  He is not sure exactly where all his Baltimore tax money goes but he suspects that endlessly repairing broken 200-year-old water mains eats up a lot of it along with filling potholes in the 200-year-old streets.  Removing 6.5 feet of snow from said streets this winter must have drained the treasury at least as much as the usual  graft and corruption which is as much a part of the local political scene as it is in most other big cities.
      Uncle Jack was delighted to receive a number of cheery comments this week from readers who had patiently waited for him to return from his self-imposed hiatus from blogging.  One comment on his "Aorta" blog was particularly heartwarming, to wit:  "You'll be dead within a year.  Your BP will spike at some point brought on by stress or surprise and then you'll take a dirt nap".  Uncle Jack had been ruefully contemplating the possibility that he might have to live out his final days in a nursing home or on life support in an intensive care facility somewhere but now, thanks to "Anonymous" he can look forward to a quick and dirty demise.
P.S.  If anybody knows "Anonymous" try to get him or her some help, ASAP.
  
 

Aorta be ashamed of myself.

      Uncle Jack's "hit counter" indicates that there are still a few steadfast readers out there looking in vain every day for some sign that he is still on the planet.  He apologizes for being so dilatory but as he grows older he feels less inclined to sit at his computer and pontificate when he could be reclining in his barcalounger sipping tea and reading a good book like the one he is enjoying at the moment.  It's called "Wits and Sages" and it was published in 1986 by the Johns Hopkins Press.  It's a fascinating study of a dozen or so of  America's most popular and influential newspaper columnists (e.g. Russell Baker, David Broder, Erma Bombeck, Ellen Goodman, George Will, Mike Royko) all of whom were interviewed at length by the author.  What makes the book even more special is that it was written by Uncle Jack's neighbor, Neil Grauer, who lives down at the end of the hall.  One of these days he is going to get up the courage to invite Mr. Grauer to dinner so he can drop a hint to keep Uncle Jack in mind if he ever decides to do another book about newspaper columnists.
      Uncle Jack mentioned back in January that he had an MRI on his heart to follow up on an echocardiogram that gave some indication that his aorta was somewhat dilated.  He finally got the scoop from his new cardiologist this week about what the MRI showed and he can tell you there is good news and bad news.  The bad news is that the MRI confirmed that Uncle Jack's aorta is indeed dilated but the good news is that it isn't a serious problem as long as his blood pressure stays normal.  The best news of all, though, is that if Uncle Jack's aorta does pop he will die almost instantly which is not a bad way to go if you ask him.  Now all he has to worry about is whether his prostate cancer metastasizes before his aorta gives out.
      The last few weeks have been somewhat trying on the medical front.  In rapid succession he had to cope with a sinus infection, an ear infection and an abscessed molar, all of which may have been products of the same bug.  Dr. Ausband neatly plucked the aching tooth from his lower right jaw, leaving a cavernous void which Uncle Jack has been compulsively exploring with his tongue ever since.  He looks forward to many hours of  this new and relatively inexpensive form of entertainment.
      He is scheduled to pick up his new hearing aid on Monday next.  Stay tuned.
    
    

Keeping an Eye on Dare County

While waiting for Uncle Jack to get off his butt and write another blog entry his readers (if he still has any) would do well to acquaint themselves with Ray Midgett's current blog, Eye on Dare.  It is entertaining as well as informative and should be must reading for anybody who has an interest in the present and future of  Dare County.  Check it out while Uncle Jack takes another nap.

http://eyeondare.blogspot.com/2010/02/time-to-get-to-work.html