Christmas Letter 2012

Christmas 2012

Dear Family and Friends,

Last year at this time, we were facing the prospect of a non-white Christmas, and winter continued mostly snowless, for one of the worst ski seasons in memory. This year looks to be more promising: we have had two pretty good snowfalls already. As a neighbor said to Nan and me as we walked Scout past his house this morning following last night’s accumulation, “It’s good to see the wet.”

After the season’s first snowfall last weekend, Nan and I ventured up icy roads to the Colorado National Monument for this year’s card photo. Scout couldn’t join us because dogs are not allowed, so we dressed him up in antlers for the letter photo instead. Yes, that is a cane in Nan’s right hand. She underwent bilateral hip replacement surgery on October 26 and has been making a remarkable recovery. Osteoarthritis and thirty-five years of running had used up all her cartilage, leaving her in constant pain. She should not run anymore, but she may now look forward to a future of other activities, like swimming and cycling, free of hip pain. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to Nan’s sister Monica for her tireless, hands-on assistance in the weeks following Nan’s surgery.

The year started for us in Isla Mujeres, Mexico, where we celebrated New Year’s Eve with local friends at the island’s all-night fiesta. We have vacationed there almost a dozen times now, but this was our first winter trip. It was chilly and windy, definitely not beach weather, and we were happy to have brought our fleece jackets. We went back again in September for a week of perfect weather, lazing on the beach, finding new things to see and do, and checking out the island’s many marinas for a future sailing trip from Savannah. Our friends Mike and Erika from Aspen joined us for a day from their vacation in Playa del Carmen, and we saw all the sights from a rented golf cart.

In April, my family held a reunion of sorts in Savannah. Mom and Dad hosted sister Jane, her husband Josh, their twins Max and Ben, sister Susan, Nan and me for golf, downtown tours, Tybee Island beach time and long, memorable dinners. Missing were Susan’s husband John, their kids Kirsten and Peter, and brother Stuart and his girlfriend Mayumi. Stuart has not visited the mainland from Hawaii for at least five years, but we’re all hoping to visit him there sometime, maybe for Dad’s eightieth birthday in June.

Nan enjoyed a few quick trips home to Manitowoc this year for family time with her mother, her sister Amy, and other members of the Mullins clan. In May, she helped celebrate her mother’s eighty-ninth birthday and sister Monica’s fiftieth.

Summer in Grand Junction was the hottest on record, with many days above a hundred degrees. Even with his cool “puppy cut,” Scout refused his afternoon walks after scorching his paws on the hot asphalt. Nan and I braved the heat most weekends for bad golf at our local public courses, and I finally hit a hole in one after fifty years of trying, witnessed officially by Nan and our friends Kevin and Lesley.

After many years of writing these Christmas letters, I regret to tell you that this is the last one we will be printing and mailing. Like Newsweek magazine, we are going completely digital in the New Year. If we have your email address, we will send you an electronic version at this time next year. If not, please look for the letter on my blog at whisperingjesse.blogspot.com. In case you don’t already have them, our email addresses are johnallenlichty@gmail.com and nanlichty@hotmail.com.

Wishing you and yours a wonderful, wet holiday season and a peaceful, prosperous New Year!

Love,

The Shins at Belly Up in Aspen

Nan and I were up in Aspen last weekend to see the Shins play at the Belly Up nightclub. I have been a fan of their distinctive music since I first heard "New Slang" on the soundtrack of the 2004 movie, "Garden State", starring Zach Braff and Natalie Portman. Over the next several months, I listened to the band's first two albums, "Oh, Inverted World" and "Chutes Too Narrow" almost non-stop.

Two years later, in 2006, my sister Jane and I traveled to Chicago from an August family reunion in Milwaukee to see the Shins play at Lollapalooza in Grant Park. It was heartwarming to see tens of thousands of other fans as crazy about the band as I was, and we were all treated to new songs off their then-upcoming album, "Wincing the Night Away".

The Shins didn't put out another album for several years after that. Band leader James Mercer, partnering with Danger Mouse as Broken Bells, released an excellent self-titled album in 2010, and I assumed that the Shins were no more. But then earlier this year, I saw that the Shins would be the musical guests on the March 11 broadcast of Saturday Night Live. I tuned in and was surprised to see James Mercer surrounded by an all-new band. The distinctive sound was still there, though, and I was impressed enough by the songs they performed to get their new album, "Port of Morrow".

The band line-up in the poster outside Belly Up looked the same as the one from SNL, but when the band took the stage, guitarist/vocalist Jessica Dobson was not with the band. There was very little patter between songs, and no explanations were offered. My impression was that James Mercer is the Shins regardless of who is playing with him, and this was made evident by the line-up that night playing a wide variety of Shins songs from the entire repertoire rather than simply focusing on songs off the new album. It was a show to promote the Shins, not just "Port of Morrow".

The music that night is a blur for me now, just a continuous stream of songs I know by heart, punctuated by favorites "New Slang", "Sleeping Lessons", and the final encore song, "One by One All Day", which I found myself singing for days afterward.

Go see the Shins if you ever get a chance. As Zach Braff's character Andrew says to Natalie Portman's Sam as he slips the headphones over her head, "You gotta hear this one song. It'll change your life, I swear."

Failure is not an option

Where I work, we have a postcard on the wall of the conference room that was sent to us from the Kennedy Space Center by an employee's husband a few years ago. It shows the Apollo 13 mission patch next to the mission motto, "Failure is not an option." The postcard hangs as a reminder that our work is important, that we must not fail. But more often, when I look at it, as I do frequently during long meetings, I think of the Apollo 13 astronauts, James Lovell, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise, and how close we came to losing them back in April 1970 after an explosion aboard their spacecraft.

When the motto was decided on, the people at NASA must have been thinking specifically of the importance of the mission's success as only the third manned trip to the moon. They could not have foreseen that the motto would take on an entirely different meaning: Failure to bring the astronauts home alive is not an option.

The tremendous effort and ingenuity that went into saving the astronauts' lives are an inspiration to me every day that virtually anything is possible if we set our minds to it.

Now it's back to work...

John's Chili Recipe

Back in the early 1980s, I found a chili recipe in the "Good Morning!" section of the Milwaukee Sentinel newspaper that was so easy to follow that even I, a cooking-challenged bachelor at the time, could not screw it up. Over the years, I have modified it, adding some ingredients, like jalapeno peppers, and leaving out others, like the twelve-ounce can of American beer called for in the original recipe, until I think my chili is pretty darn good and plenty hot:

Ingredients:

1 standard size package of lean ground beef (or a finely cubed sirloin steak if you like Texas style)
1 large white or yellow onion
1 large green pepper
12 fresh jalapeno peppers (or fewer if you don't like your chili too hot)
4 plum tomatoes
1 15-oz. can of Hunt’s Tomato Sauce
2 8-oz. cans of Mexican pre-cooked pinto beans (or equivalent reconstituted dry pinto beans)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon garlic flakes (or chopped fresh garlic)
1 tablespoon cumin
1 tablespoon paprika
½ 4.5-oz. container of chili powder (McCormick or other)

Directions:

1.  Finely dice the onion, green pepper and jalapeno peppers. Be sure to remove the seeds and insides of the peppers. Use a spoon with the jalapeno peppers to avoid acid burns!
2.   In a large stew pot on medium heat, pour in the olive oil and sprinkle in the garlic. Sautee for a few minutes.
3.   Turn heat up to medium high. Add in the ground beef and then use a wooden spoon to chop it up finely and mix it in with the olive oil and garlic. Add salt and pepper if desired.
4.   When the ground beef begins to brown, add in the onions. Sautee until the onions start to become clear and the ground beef is completely browned.
5.   Turn the heat back down to medium. Add in the green pepper and jalapeno peppers. Mix thoroughly. Cover pot and let simmer while next contents are prepared.
6.   Dice the tomatoes. Drain and rinse the canned pinto beans.
7.   Stir the pot thoroughly and add in the tomatoes.
8.   Stir thoroughly and add in the tomato sauce.
9.   Stir thoroughly and add in the pinto beans.
10. Stir thoroughly and then cover for 10-15 minutes.
11. Slowly blend in cumin, paprika and chili powder.
12. Turn heat to simmer and let chili simmer for at least one hour, stirring occasionally.
13. Turn off heat and serve, or let chili cool to room temperature and then refrigerate for later.

The beans absorb the flavors and the peppers mellow a little over time, so the chili is best served a day or so after preparation. It microwaves well and is really good served with flour tortillas, shredded cheese and sour cream. Enjoy!

Savannah: long list, little accomplished

Saturday, November 24: It's the fourth day of my trip out to Savannah and I'm not overly happy with what I've been able to get accomplished on my long list of boat projects. Of course, the list is overly ambitious and would realistically take a few weeks to complete, not the five days I have had available. And I don't want to leave any projects half-done. So when I stare at the Aries windvane bolted to the stern of the boat and try to figure out what it will take to remove it, the clock inside my head goes tick-tick-tick and I realize it will take more time than I have on this trip, especially if I try to remove the lag bolts secured through the hull. That would involve emptying out both lazarettes and squeezing down in there with a headlamp and some beefy wrenches. Instead, I work backward toward the windvane, removing the steering drum that was attached to the wheel and the numerous blocks that guided the lines between the windvane and the wheel. It's not much, but it's something.

Before I undertook anything related to the windvane removal, I tried to repair a disconnected cockpit scupper using the part I had ordered from Defender Marine Outfitters. I lucked out with guessing the correctly sized plastic elbow fitting for the 1.5-inch scupper drain, but I still couldn't get it to fit. Either the thread spacing is wrong or the drain threads are stripped, which would explain why the previous fitting was only glued in place. I expect that I will end up gluing the new one in place, but I'll wait on that until I'm ready to use up an entire tube of 3M 5200 marine adhesive on this and other applications, since the whole tube will start to set up as soon as it is exposed to air.

My greatest success has been with constructing teak frames for the cockpit cut-outs. I spent a good part of yesterday afternoon using a mitre saw to cut L-shaped molding pieces to fit, and then some time this morning gluing the pieces together. I will need to fasten some small screws as well, but the glue should hold for that process.

The molding was part of an order I placed through the West Marine website a couple of weeks ago. West Marine offers free shipping to their stores for in-person pickup, which worked even better for me than drop shipping to my folks' house. While I was at the store on Abercorn Street, I noticed that the Garmin GPSMAP 740s Chartplotter/Sounder was on sale for $400 below list price. I had to think about it for two days, but I couldn't pass up a deal like that on a necessary piece of equipment and went back to buy the last one in stock, along with an external antenna. The installation looks tricky, so I'll wait and have Thunderbolt Marine do it when I return in the spring.

Tomorrow, I'll see if the teak frames fit, take some measurements for some other projects, see if the engine will start and stay cool, and then prepare the boat to be left alone for another winter.

Redundant Sailboat Systems

Sailors know the importance of having spare parts on board in the event of equipment failures that can be readily fixed. With more complex equipment, such as GPS units, sailors will typically have two or more units on board. This redundancy is largely driven by the need for safety. If you are far out to sea, depending for your navigation needs on your one-and-only handheld Garmin GPS, and it fails, then you are lost--or at least considerably less certain of exactly where you are.

It is with a sense for the importance of redundancy that I approach my sailboat's many systems. I have two VHF radios, three GPS units, two emergency beacons, and multiples of other equipment, including auto-pilots. My boat, a 1980 Valiant 40 that I purchased in May 2010, came with an Aries windvane and a Raymarine electronic auto-pilot. The windvane was bolted to the stern, but the Raymarine unit was still in its box--it had never been installed. As part of an extensive refit, the Raymarine unit was installed, and the Aries windvane was removed for hull work and then reinstalled. During the delivery trips (it took two) to get the boat to its current location in Savannah, Georgia, back in September and October 2011, the Raymarine auto-pilot proved itself to be invaluable, almost like having an extra crew member. The Aries windvane proved itself to be stuck. It is supposed to be hinged so that its trim rudder can be kicked up out of the water when not in use, but we could not get the locking mechanism to release. So we never even bothered to try out the system as a fallback for the Raymarine auto-pilot.

In the many months since those delivery trips, I have thought often about the Aries windvane and what to do about it. Instead of trying to fix it, I have decided to remove it. If it was working, it would be good to have as a redundant auto-pilot system, but I am willing to forego that option and steer manually when I need to. While I am out in Savannah this coming week, removing the Aries windvane will be near the top of my lengthy list of boat projects. I am thinking it may be easier to work on the hinge and get it to release with the mechanism resting on dry ground rather than hanging off the back of the boat. If I can get it to release, I will try to sell the whole Aries windvane system, including the original documentation, and put the proceeds toward a new Garmin chartplotter. If you know anyone who would be interested in a complete, working Aries windvane, please send me an email message. There's a link in my Blogger profile, which you can get to by clicking my photo under About Me.

Upcoming Trip to Savannah

I will be headed out to Savannah for a long Thanksgiving weekend in a little over a week. It will be a chance to check on Whispering Jesse for the first time since April and to spend some time with my parents. Nan will not be going with me. She is recovering from her hip replacement surgery and should not travel for a few more months. She is making excellent progress and is now fully mobile around the house with a walker and cane. We're looking forward to clearance from her doctor that she can drive again so she's not so housebound.

There are many boat projects awaiting me in Savannah. I have already placed orders with Defender Marine Outfitter for the replacement port navigation light and plastic scupper fitting that I wrote about earlier, along with some teak items: an outboard motor mount for the stern rail, a drinks and binoculars organizer for the binnacle, and some plugs to fill miscellaneous interior holes. And West Marine called yesterday to let me know that the order I placed with them is waiting at their store in Savannah: two lengths of L-shaped teak molding for making frames around the raw cut-outs in the cockpit, a quart of Cetol to varnish all the new teak with, some 3M 5200 sealant to fill some leaky deck holes, and a 12-volt receptacle like a car's cigarette lighter that I'm hoping to wire in for connection to an inverter for charging battery-powered electronics.

All that should keep me busy for a few days, but I'm also hoping to find a good length of pressure-treated 2x12 lumber to make a gangplank out of. I'm thinking it could serve double-duty as a ramp over the steep companionway steps to make it easier for Scout to get in and out of the cabin and possibly also as a ramp between the swim ladder and the water, with some fenders attached for flotation, to give Scout a way to get out of the water on his own.

More later from Savannah...

Nan's surgery

Nan's hip replacement surgery on Friday afternoon went well. The surgical team successfully replaced both of her hip joints in about three hours, with a minimum of blood loss. Now the long, slow recovery begins.

I'm sitting in Nan's room at St. Mary's Hospital in Grand Junction. She is drifting in and out of sleep, trying to find a balance between the pain and the nausea caused by the pain medication. The nurses have been trying different combinations to find what works best and encouraging her to eat more to buffer the oral medications, which are longer lasting than the ones administered through her I.V.

Nan's sister Monica is staying with us for a few weeks to help with Nan's care. She has been wonderful. She just massaged Nan's legs and now she is helping her brush her teeth. She keeps Scout and me fed with her cooking, and she keeps family and friends up to date with texts and phone calls.

The hospital will not discharge Nan until she can walk out of here under her own power. She is making big strides already. The physical therapy people have had her up and walking with a walker twice a day. Today she walked to a chair and sat up for an hour. She should be able to go home on Wednesday or Thursday if all goes well.

The End of an Era

Nan has been running for 35 years. From March through November, you'll find her entering a race almost every weekend. And she does well, placing in the top three in her age division more often than not. She has boxes full of ribbons and trophies, and she can recite her best times at distances ranging from 5K to full marathons. In 2003, she ran in the New York City Marathon. She considers it the crowning achievement of her long running career.

Now it's all coming to an end. Osteoarthritis and endless miles have taken their toll. Nan has used up all the cartilage in her hip joints, leaving her in a bone-on-bone condition of constant pain. On Friday, she will undergo bilateral hip replacement surgery to replace her damaged hip joints with new bionic ones. The procedure is invasive and involves the removal of the tops of her femurs and the sockets of her hip joints. The prosthetic replacements are designed so that the remaining bone grows solidly and securely around them. Full recuperation normally takes up to twelve weeks, though she should be able to walk out of the hospital under her own power after a four-day recovery period.

Nan's new hips will relieve her pain, but they will not withstand the impact of running. She will need to give up running in favor of low-impact activities such as bicycling and swimming. She says it will be worth it, but you can sense her regret.

The photo above shows Nan in a final sprint to the finish line of the Boogie's Buddy 5, an annual Fourth of July race in Aspen, Colorado. She's not sure of the year, but it was probably taken at least ten years ago.

Please keep Nan in your thoughts this week as she prepares for her life-changing experience.

Republicans in Aspen

After living there for twenty years, Nan and I moved away from Aspen a little over seven years ago. We still get back there a few times a year to ski and visit friends, and we notice changes that we might not if we still lived there. This was especially true this past weekend when we made a quick overnight trip to visit a good friend.

On our way into Aspen, we passed the old Poppies restaurant building. The business closed a few years ago and the Victorian-era building has been sitting empty, but it is now serving as the local Republican Party headquarters. There was a sign to that effect above the door and signs promoting Republican candidates plastered all over the wrought iron fence out front. Nan and I both expressed surprise, and I reminded her of an Independence Day several years ago, when some local Republicans marched in the annual parade carrying a banner announcing themselves. I had made the comment: "There they go, all four of them."

Times seem to have changed. We saw Romney bumper stickers and yard signs all over town. Aspen used to pride itself on being a tiny island of Democrats in the sea of Colorado Republicans. It also prided itself on what was called "messy vitality," a kind of small-town funkiness arising from the co-existence of folks spanning the entire economic spectrum. Those points of pride are less in evidence these days, and the reasons are obvious. 

In Aspen, the Great Recession hit late, but it hit hard. During the depths, the all-important tourist dollars dwindled to the point where many businesses, especially the mom-and-pop ones, closed permanently. The businesses that survived were the ones that catered to the uber-wealthy, the people least affected by the economic downturn. Surrounded by empty retail spaces, businesses selling thousand-dollar cashmere scarves and five-figure handbags continued to flourish. During this period, downtown felt like it used to feel during off-season, when all the locals cleared out of town, except that it was now year round. 

What we noticed as we walked around town yesterday is that those empty retail spaces, in the wake of modest economic recovery, are filling in with even more stores peddling super-expensive wares. Rather than becoming more affordable as a result of the recession, Aspen appears to have become less so. It has always had the reputation of being the playground of the rich and famous, but now it seems to be the exclusive domain of the "one percenters." And with that cachet comes the Republican mindset that was so much in evidence all around town.

The good news is that President Obama is ahead in the polls in Colorado and will probably take both the state and the election again on November 6. If he does, I hope that the signs and stickers will come down and that people will leave their divisions behind for another four years to let Aspen return to its funky self.