LONG DISTANCE

CRITICAL INQUIRY

I was awaken from my "power nap" by our youngest son as he was handing me the phone saying "uncle Wayne". Wayne is presently residing in Salem, Oregon and his call sort of got me a bit worried this time. You see, our aunt Vicky was admitted in a hospital somewhere in Portland as she is still awaiting operations. This was why I was a bid worried by Wayne's call.

PHONE CONVERSATION

No greetings or anything but sort of like he was just calling from the neighbor's house to invite me for a drinking session.

I took the phone and listened for a while. I can hear other people in the background and were a little too loud compared to my weariness then I answered, "hello"he goes"Tikk, can you tell me what large reefs we got back there that are good fishing spots" I got to thinking for awhile, "what da hell is Wayne up to..." and responded back to his inquiry "Esmeralda" and he yells "Esmeralda", then I heard several voices in the background as if surprised and repeated after my brother "Esmeralda". Then Wayne comes back and asked "any more reefs that you know of" and I told him "Zalandia" and just as Wayne repeated Zalandia, more yells came from the background and I had to asked Wayne just what the heck he was up to. He said they were just sitting and talking of fishing spots (located) here at home but no one among them knew their names so that was the reason of his call. "They weren't just sitting and talking, I bet (everyone a dollar) they were sitting, talking and drinking too". And for you my brother Wayne, the picture above tells a whole lot of story in itself.

Among those sitting and talking (besides looking at the camera lens), mixing up a chew or two and drinking, these are just a few of the fishermen that can sum up a great (if not good) fishing stories of the Northern Islands. And the next time you decide to give me a call, ask first how I or my pet puppy are doing. Arra so?

Summer In

DEVIN POWER

Our grandson will be turning 3 years old come July and we have yet to plan on what to do on his birthday. Well, with the strain and burdensome economic situation we are presently experiencing, maybe a small family bar-b-que to show some love on his birthday.

Anyhow, he and I were glued to his favorite television channel-2 when power abruptly shuts off, he turned to me with a "what da hell" look and said "si Lucy". I asked "what about 'si Lucy" when he said "si Lucy turned off da power" I can't help but laugh as I came to understand what he meant by "si Lucy". He was simply telling me "...C.U.C. turned off the power".

VROOM, VROOM

I told my 2nd oldest son to cut the grass down at our mom's place approximately two weeks ago today. He did just that and was later dropped off to our house by our folks later that evening. He had used my brush cutter on that day and because I had not seen him when he was dropped off, I had no idea whether he had brought it back, so the next morning, I went out to the storage to see if he had brought it back. The gas container, the brush cutter line and my pair of cutters which he had also brought with him on this particular mission, were in the storage but no brush cutter.

I called him out and asked if he had brought the brush cutter back after cutting the grass when he simply told me that he had already put it back into the storage. I just told him to go look because I just can't seem to find it except for the three other items. He looked, came back and said he had stored it back in the storage but isn't there anymore. I asked if he had loaned it to anyone else but only stated he had not.

I didn't make a great deal out of the present situation as I only thought that maybe a family member had come and borrowed the brush cutter without us knowing. Besides, we woke up very late that morning and maybe they came and took it while we slept. A few days past and my better half started saying "maybe someone came and stole it" but I just thought "why would they only steal my brush cutter and not the rest of my tools". Not long after that, I began thinking the same thought as my wife except furious over what others would do with other people's belonging. Just a final word on this matter, "I truly hope whoever took my brush cutter would truly enjoy operating it, without it kicking debris into both his eyes and blind them"-just a thoughtful curse.

ANOTHER TRIP

The boys left on a fishing trip north again. This time around, only my par (West), my brother in law John and the Master Canoe carver Tuughumaay (and 9 other crew members) went on it. The boat will off load passengers in Alamagan, Pagan and Agrigan prior to heading all the way north where a national monument has been proposed. This should be an exciting trip as it will be this voyages first trip to the last island to the north. Can't wait to hear about it from the boys.

Un-announced

Da Electric Company
Didn't someone say "...come June, power outages will be a thing of the past" or was that meant to be the other months of June in the distant future? Not that my name is Francisco to be Frank or Tikko but quite frankly, I'm sure we all share the same frustrations over the many power outages we are now experiencing EVERYDAY. First came the scheduled outages followed by the unscheduled ones and the next thing we know, frequent outages that are burning up our appliances that we can't afford to have fix back into operation because we spent more on paying utility bills from the same electric provider that's responsible to the damages in the first place. Hafa Adai masusesedi? Essor salappi!!!!

Stimulated Situation
It was reported that the Chalan Kanoa branch of the U.S. Postal service was swarmed with a lot of people checking their mail boxes for their "Stimulus Checks" a few days ago. The Postal parking was filled with cars all the way to the Round House on the south. There must have been one hell of a traffic situation down there on that day. Let's blame and thank Uncle Sam for creating such a chaos. Ready? One, Two, Three-all together now. THANK YOU UNCLE SAM. Anyhow, it was one heck of a relieve to be able to par up a bit with bills. Thanks for stimulating me too.

Gas! Gas! Gas!
Had you been in the military, you'd be scrambling with your chemical suit as every second counts or your ass is grass. In our particular situation, we are exercising burning less fuel for more time-time your vehicle will take you until the engine chokes to death for the lack of fuel and decides to make you walk, hitch a ride (which is against local law) or find some other means to get to refuel.

Back in the 70's, we were lining up at the few gas pumps on island to fuel up our vehicles and whatever container(s) we may bring along with us. My late uncle owned a Willey's back then. He would hook up his military type trailer, stack it with his G.I. fuel gallons and any other container that will hold liquid (which include empty plastic Clorox containers) and get in a long and slow tedious line on a scheduled day to buy fuel. Because I was the mucus one back then, I was told to walk back home and get lunch as once you take your vehicle out of the line, you end up at the end to start over again which was something you don't want to do as most times, fuel supply runs out and that was before it was limited to something like 10 or 20 gallons per vehicle. I come back with lunch and my uncle was still lining up not anywhere close to the pump yet.

Present gag
As if the price of fuel is not high enough, some idiot decided to play some stupid rumor that the gas price was to climb past 5 bucks per gallon starting around 2:00 p.m. on that given day. I was driving past the San Vicente Mobil station when I first came across an unusual long line to the pumps only thinking "Stimulus". I came up past the Kagman Mobil where there's another unusual long line of cars probably waiting to gas up. The same thought came to me again "Stimulus".

Around 4:00 p.m. as I was heading back up the same road from Kagman, cars were still lined up at the Mobil station but the board still read "4.62" per gallon. This just kept me wondering why people were really lining up at the fuel pumps. This got me thinking on my way up to Capitol Hill as I was heading to pick up my better half from work. The gas gauge on our vehicle was registering a quarter tank. Should I go and fill up?

The first thing that came out from my better half was "has the gas price gone up already". I just asked her back "is it suppose to go up". Not taking any chances, we headed down town to the nearest ATM and on our way down, Shell Marianas located in (local) Puerto Rico still indicates the same price for unleaded. We got some money out from the bank and headed to the middle road Mobil station to fuel up.

Hyped Old Lady
Surprisingly, there were only a few vehicles lined up at the gas station by the time we got there. I went inside to pay for the gas and found myself in line behind an Oriental couple and an elderly Chamorro woman. The elderly's turn to pay her purchase and as she approached the cashier's counter she asked "is the price of gas really going up" only to be responded by the Philippine national lady cashier "I don't know ma'am-we don't get da memo yet" and I interrupted from behind the elderly "can I give you a memo to bring down the price of gas to a dollar" as they both laughed followed by a comment by the elderly "ai ya sina mohon no laihu".

The Gas Attendant
I found our nephew working the pump on my car as he conversed with my better half who was still in the car. I asked him if their station was busy earlier and he responded "you should have been here this afternoon uncle. There were more cars and more people here than during the grand opening". We gathered from him that people were also arguing as to who came first in line to get gas. Oh well, All is well...I think.

4 extra credit
A hooker was approached by two "nit-wits" as one asked, "how old are you" and she responded "terry dollah". The other nit-wit asked "what's your telephone numbah" and was responded back "too, ay,ay-ay, ay, lie, lie". Followed by another question "and what can you do" she responded "wrong time, shode time, airy time".