Plan Your Day

You should never end the business day without constructing a detailed written plan for the events that you want to accomplish tomorrow. The plan rarely gets accomplished because of changing conditions and emerging priorities, but you are far more productive when you have a road map to follow.
~
It's not enough to list the things that you want to accomplish. You have to estimate the time of the work effort involved. That gives you a realistic notion of what you can handle and prevents you from getting into an overwhelmed frame of mind.

Peep of the Week - Week 37

What goes up must come down.
~
That's why you shouldn't shit on people as you are moving up, because you are going to have to deal with them when you come back down.
~
Know what I mean??? Payback is a bitch.

Announcing....
Nanepashemet Peeps of the Week for the 37th Week of 2008

John Sununu
Dennis Fai
Chris Crawford
David Letterman
Kathy DiGiovanni
Lauren Rathbone

The law of Karma is powerful. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Trap Trash Talk

Chris Crawford points out to me that he got his traps from Billy Oliver Boats in Cohasset for $40 ea. including lines and buoys and further points out that $40 is a better deal than the $90 price that I had.

~

Thanks Chris.   You can be my new financial advisor with your keen insight.  

~

The good part about Cohasset as well, is that I can avoid the delivery charges from Maine, which would be another significant savings.... at least $400 minimum.  I can take a detour from the Cape Cod Coast Guard job and pick them up in my  Ford F150.

Season Shift

Summer has passed. This is the first morning that I have paid attention to clothes on the basis of warmth.
~
Lots of travel today. Heading to pick up some ground rods at a distributor then bring them to the Coast Guard job that we are builidng on Cape Cod.
~
Then up to apple country in Stow, MA to work on a building permit.
~
Finally back to Marblehead to pick up a signed site lease.
~
I vastly prefer this type of travel compared to the airline jaunts that I used to take on behalf of General Dynamics. In many ways, this work is more real, and more meaningful than those big corporate missions. There is an artificiality of that existence that is hard to explain. Maybe it's because you are so far away from the actual point of production... the more you have to explain things by Powerpoint presentations, the more phonies you seem to encounter.
~
I know that I must sound high powered, but I'm really just as mediocre as you are.

tuna lips said...

I have scented a decay in the air mysef. At first I thunk it were the possum we stewed last night at Shoo Fly's youngest, Loralean, but the wrotten stench of marsupial stuck between the teeths I got left in my head is nothin' like the sweet wind of crab apples falling to the soil and the last crops turning ripe, like my missus, ready to be plucked.


I found mysef touchin' mysef whilst looking at them 82 year young boobies on that Clorox gal, dancin' like a ballayrina.

Trap Due Diligence

Mark Vona told me today that $90/ lobster trap, complete with rope and buoy is a good price. He says that he could get me some used commercial traps for $20, but I would have to add all of the gear, and they would be pretty beat up. Joanne is pretty enthusiastic about it. Looks like Hamilton Marine will be getting an order soon.
~

Dancing Again

Once again, I bravely confront the critics of my manhood as I embrace another season of "Dancing With the Stars".
~
Bring it on. I can take it.

Lobster Calc

Pulling the traps with Chris Crawford and Tyler Gill was really fun.  They had seven keeper lobsters in the seven traps we pulled, as well as a cod which I took home and filleted.  Naturally I was inspired to get my own traps, register for a recreational 10 trap permit and get my own lobster fishery next year.

~

The cost of 10 traps, gloves, pants, line, buoys, claw pliers, etc. from Hamilton Marine Supply in Maine will run about $1,500 delivered.  If I averaged seven lobsters a week, for the 16 +/- weeks of the season, the cost per keeper lobster is running about $8 a crustacean.   But then again, the equipment will last longer than one year, so the amortized cost reasonably gets down to about $4.00 each.

~

This doesn't include the cost of the boat and gas, but you figure that I would be using that recreationally anyway.

~

Mike says that Mark Vona can get us a deal on used traps which would lower the cost as well.

~

The justification can't be all financial.  Time on the water is magic time, and this is a great excuse to get out there more often.   I think I might give it a try.

No Pressure

Patriots v. Dolphins are playing on my 42" HDTV at 1:00PM today, but Crawford and Gill want me to help them pull their remaining lobster traps.
~
I know that the Patriots are counting on me to watch the game, so the traps will have to be pulled this morning. I can't let those guys down as they strive to make their record 3-0.
~
Plus Joanne just asked me to bake some bread... to go with the chicken soup and chili that she is making for gametime. More stress.
~
Once again.... a lesser man might wilt under so much pressure, but I'll be getting it done in stride with time to spare. Plus, maybe we'll have a lobster or two to go with the gametime menu.

Fish Story

Brown was a no show, so were the fish. Even with Pat Piscatelli on the WhaleEye, we came up short. So we headed into the Boston Yacht Club to console ourselves over some Dark and Stormies.
~
My "Friend Who Doesn't Want His Name Mentioned in the Blog" was on the porch with his wife Nancy, daughter Abby and Paul and Debbie Lynch. Pisc entered into some spirited conversation with Abby over the wisdom of Tuna Lips, and I was impressed with her praise of Sarah Palin. Abby always did have her head on straight.
~
So even though we didn't catch fish... again... it was a great afternoon.
~
I love to fish.

Fair Warning to Fish

The WhaleEye departs from Salem Harbor at 1:00 PM this afternoon. There will be no National Football League Defensive Pro Bowlers aboard, but we will have that "Mountain of a Man", Bobby Brown. Seems like an equal trade.
~
By 4:00 PM, as we sit on the Boston Yacht Club porch sipping our Dark and Stormies, many a fine Bluefish will have met the sting of our treble hooks.

Patriots Defense

So Adalius and Vince must be talking smack, because now Tedy Bruschi, Richard Seymour, and Ty Warren want Ryan to take them out to Stellwagen next Tues. Wilfork and Thomas seem to have fired them up.
~
That's a lot of defensive firepower stacked up against a worthy pelagic opponent.
~
I hope they don't think that you bag a Bluefin every time you go out, but with Ryan's luck, they probably will hook up.

Business Daze

Another great day for Nanepashemet Telecom. Pretty sure that we won a new guyed tower construction job with a Federal Agency and we're in the middle of a nice Coast Guard installation on the Cape. And we'll be going back to Maine again shortly.
~
Plus plenty of site acquisition action in Metro West.
~
But the best part of the wireless telecom industry is that it is immune to the present economic downturn. The last thing people let lapse is their cell phone bill.