Happy Holidays from the Sunny South

We got back to Jamaica without incident only to find that the lane into our place had deteriorated from merely bad to absolutely horrible. After consulting with our partners we went ahead with some significant repairs.

The lane is now considered better by our drivers than the road leading up to it, so we declared victory. It was soon Thanksgiving, and we shared a wonderful dinner with the Laughlins.

It is absurd how fast things grow down here, and we found to our surprise that our view of the ocean was partially blocked! You can see our video of "The Return of the View" at :

https://tinyurl.com/ReturnOfTheView

Of course, there are always things that go wrong. We noticed a bad smell behind the Spiegel's house and soon determined that there was a blockage in the sewer line running down the hill. After some fruitless attempts to clear it, we called in the plumber. He was also unable to clear it, and out came the picks and shovels. What we found amazed us all - the line was flattened for about eight feet, including the part that went right under one of the Spiegel's column.

Moving the column was out of the question, so instead we moved the pipe.

Our resident family of streamer tail hummingbirds has grown. Here is one of two juvenile males that entertain us with their dogfights over rights to the feeder.

Bob Hollenback arrived, followed a few days later by the construction crew that are building his house.

In what seems to be a tradition, they all brought their broken tools for Tom to repair.

No problem, a couple of hours later they were all shipshape and ready for work.

Of course, Bob needed lots of building materials, and that means lots of trucks. Two at once makes for somewhat of a traffic jam!

Progress on the house has been amazing, with the masons putting up somewhere around one hundred blocks a day.

The kids came over for a visit, but as you can see our original group have grown up, and we now have another generation of little ones,

Most evenings we have a happy hour down on our porch to watch the sunset and talk about the days progress. 

So now we wish you all Happy Holidays, and send our love from Jamaica, Mon.

Heading South

Well, folks, it’s that time again. We’re heading back to Jamaica on Tuesday. You can reach us down there at 1-876-857-6171 or by E-mail at tad1@cornell.edu and bad3@cornell.edu. If you decide to escape from the cold, come down and visit us! We always like to have visitors from the frozen North!

The months since we got back from Jamaica have sped by.  Tom decided that his pyro shed was too small and dove into the project to add a 12' x 16'  storeroom onto the shed. In the last few weeks of July, he also went into a frantic spell of building some competition entries for the annual PGI convention.

Last fall we decided that our existing camper was too small and we bought a used 24' motor home. We have most things working on it - the main unsolved problem is getting the onboard generator working, but since we usually have external power that is not an urgent issue.

Our annual trip out West to the PGI convention was much more comfortable and we had a great time. The trip started out with a visit to one of the finest collections of automatic musical instruments at the Sanfilippo mansion in Illinois.

The visit also featured a concert by the Harp Twins, identical twins who play a very eclectic selection of music on classical and Irish harps.

The PGI convention was fun as usual, and Tom's efforts were rewarded with wins in two of the three competitions he entered.

After the convention, we spent a few weeks touring around the dinosaur sites and museums. 

When we got back to Ithaca Barbara resumed her work with the Museum of the Earth and preparing for the Tompkins County Quilters Guild biennial quilt show.

And fitted in amongst all of these activities we finally finished a project which has been underway for forty years! Yes, the wreck of a barber chair we were given forty years ago is now restored.  

So that's a very abbreviated account of what we've been up to! Come on down and visit us in Jamaica and we'll fill you in in much more depth over a Red Stripe!

A Feast for the Eyes

When we first arrived last November Binghi and I set ourselves a goal of finishing the porch floor on the North side of the house. Last week we finished, and so now as you come down onto the porch almost everything you see is tiled. Truly a feast for the eyes!

Here's the approach to the house.

The work we've done over the last couple of months are the panels on either side of the walkway. Binghi did all of the panels on the left side and Tom did all of the ones on the right.

Here are detailed photos of Binghi's panels.

 

And now Tom's panels. Tom did the right side so he could dangle his legs off the porch while installing the tile. Much easier on the knees!

 Now we have to set ourselves a new goal for the remaining month!

Cats, Kids, Puzzles, and Tails

Life here at Whimsey Hall South has been a bit quieter now that the excitement of holidays and construction are behind us. The cats - Stripey and Bootsie - have also settled in and become best buddies.

Bootsie has even learned to stand on his back legs - if there is food!

JC (aka Barbara) went up to the Kendal Basic School to visit with the kids and donate some books.

Charlie Mayer and his daughter Lily came down for their usual winter break. Paco's grandson JT came that day and he and Lily enjoyed playing games.

Tina sent a puzzle down with Jake. It was a National Geographic puzzle, and many of the pieces contained only text. To figure out where they went required using our magnifiers to try and read the tiny text in the box picture and match up the text. Sometimes a piece would have the name of a city, and we would use the internet to figure out where it was.

The completed puzzle. It had quite a bit of interesting information on bird migrations.

And speaking of birds, we have been visited quite a bit by a Streamer Tailed Hummingbird. He is wonderful to watch and his tail feathers make a very unique trilling noise when he flys.

Sometimes he looks like he's dancing!

He comes by a lot just at sunset to tank up for the night, so we have to decide whether to watch him or watch the sunset.