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Water, waterThere are those of us who choose to live near the oceans.

Most of us have pretty good reasons, but always if you dig deep enough, you will find that people love being around the oceans.

We live on a river with a skiff on a lift behind the house.  My kayak is also there and next door is the community swimming pool which has a terriffic view.

The views of the water are part of the reasons that we moved here. As we have settled into the rythm of life on the coast, it has become clear that it is different than living on a mountain.

I find living on the coast liberating while I often feel trapped when I go back to our mountain.  I think it has something to do with the extra steps required on the mountains.

If I want to go biking, I have to pack the bike up and head down the hill.  It is same thing when I go for a walk.  It I want to walk with having to face climbing a mountain on the way home.

Our mountain is just too steep unless you have to walk it like we did when we had our wonderful companion Chester. 

The beach is different.  Here the ground is level, the kayak doesn't have to be driven 25 miles to get in the water, and using the bike is just pulling it into the drive.

We do get into the car to ride to the beach, but that ten minutes often turns into hours on the beach.  You can enjoy the beach so much that you can almost lose yourself there.

At least I managed to take a few pictures of our experiences on the Enerald Isle beach near the point.

With the weather looking to improve, now is the time to come visit us. 

My main website has these pictures and I will get the rest published as I get  time. 

Each day is a challenge since there are only so many hours which can be used productively.

I try to make deliberate decisions as to what I need to get done in a day.  Sometimes the decisions might not make sense on the surface but in the long run they are very logical.

This morning after I got finished with my priority items, I had some choices.  I needed to write to catch up with some of my Internet spots, the flower beds needed weeding, and my kayak needed checking out. 

Since the morning weather was stunning with rain in the forecast for the afternoon, I decided that kayaking was the best use of my time.  Rain would have washed away my weed killer, and I can write in the evening when I cannot kayak.

I had a great time, it refreshed my soul, and I managed to catch lunch.  My decision ended up being the right one for the day.  I managed to get back home just before the storms struck.  In spite of cleaning my flounder in the rain, I still had a great time.  I will remember catching that flounder on a warm spring day a lot longer than I will sitting at a keyboard typing.

My friend the duck was in a very dliberative mood this morning.  I was pretty well ignored until I got a little close when the duck paddled off slowly. There was no wasted energy. I like to think the duck was carefully calculating what to do also.

I certainly was enjoying the morning breezes almost as much as the duck.  The winds seems to make paddling almost unnecessary while fishing.  I got some good thinking accomplished while relaxing in that breeze which blew away my cares for a few moments.

Often preparing properly for work allows you to accomplish more than if you plowed ahead without the focus that really makes a difference in quality work. 

Even a trip like we did this past weekend to Tryon Palace can help your mind relax so it can be ready to focus on what really needs doing.

Mental preparation through proper relaxation is the first step to working smart.  Living near the Southern Outer Banks just makes it a little easier.

Today I got a note from someone I had briefly helped a year or so ago.  It was just a quick "thank you" for helping.

It was really nice to get the note.  It made me realize how often in our busy society that people do not take the time to say thanks.

I did a couple of things for people today that I did not have to do.  I did them because I felt that I could help and because it was the right thing to do.

So far I have not gotten an acknowledgement much less a thank-you on either item. 

It certainly is not critical that I get a note back, but when you take thirty minutes or even an hour out of a busy day and do something for someone, it certainly makes it easier to do the next time if that person has said "thanks."

A lot of things happen these days which used to cost money.  There is plenty of free information out there, but often people want it organized for them in addition to getting it for free.

I certainly do not mind helping folks, but I also enjoy getting that acknowledgement that my efforts were appreciated. 

Tulip TreeWe are well into the Internet age.  Information is overwhelming us. 

Many of us choose to let others filter our information. 

In a sense that has always been so.  Newspapers had editors and televisions newscasts were no different.

There is no shortage of blogs, all competing for our attention and seeking to mirror our opinions.

Social networking sites provide an abundance of information.  Some comes from people you know, but most is from people who are known only by their handles.

Often riding herd on this information free-for-all are the all powerful moderators who with a click of a button can exile you from your connections. They also have handles and rarely answer to anyone.

Almost all of these folks are unpaid volunteers and often people attracted to the task by the power over others.

I find there are a couple types of information on the Internet.  One is information that is being provided in the hopes that I will click on a link somewhere around the information.  Sites which have hundreds of thousands of visitors can make a substantial amount of money from these clicks.

The last thing that they want is for there to be someone on the forum who might siphon away clicks.  They create a charade of information just below the level of what you might find by going to one of the clicks which ends up paying them money. 

The sites are built on the hope that you will click.  I participated in one such forum.  There were questions on flood maps and I provided a link to state flood maps.  Because if provided a way to get to professional information without going through one of their advertising clicks, my link was censored. 

It didn't make any sense to me at first.  Then it occurred to be that the forum's purpose is not to provide real information, but just to whet you appetite for real information to the point that you will click on one of their paid advertisers.

People come to forum thinking they are getting untainted information from people whose opinions have nothing to do with making money.

What they have actually done is come to an environment where any information is likely very subjective and impossible to verify.

I guess it is a measure of our society's infatuation with making decisions without doing the hard work to create a real basis for those decisions.

We go to a place where we take the advice of strangers and let unpaid volunteers monitor (another word is censor) the content, and we use that advice to make life-changing decisions.

Actually this is where our virtual world comes in handy.  Probably the people who pay the most attention to forum advice are the people least likely to actually follow the advice they have found.

They are probably stuck in their virtual worlds.

The second type of information comes from people who only make money if they give you and others the correct information. They also have to keep doing it right time after time.  They keep their job only if they get it right and if they get referrrals from satisfied customers.  They cannot hide behind a handle.  In fact if they make a mistake they could even lose their job or face censure from their state board.

So my advice is if you want real information, find it yourself, or get if from someone whose job depends on their information being reliable.

If you are buying real estate, that would be a Realtor®.  We are actually local experts.

This is my area, the Carteret County part of Coastal NC.  If you want to know something about it, give me a call.  The information is free, reliable, and has no strings attached. 

Golden Roanoke SunriseWhile visiting Roanoke recently I was reminded that civilization can be just as lonely as the wilderness.

Sunday afternoon some wild winds hit the area.  The combination of the winds, downed powerlines, and some human carelessness brought some challenges to the Roanoke area.

The next day we were surprised to find the fires still burning. 

Today we can smell the smoke of the fires on our deck fourteen miles away.  Last night my wife dined with some friends.  She was atonished to find one them had been without power for over twenty four hours.

This morning in the paper there was an interesting chart that showed that nearly 25% of Roanoke City customers and 22% County customers were without power at 6 pm on Monday over twenty four hours after the storm hit.

It is a great reminder that civilization is no real protection from mother nature. 

The storm is now being compared to the major ice storm that we had in the early nineties.

While I was amazed that our friend's power was out, I was a little stunned that they were turning down invitations from neighbors with warm homes.  That was happening as they were being told that it might be Friday before their power was fixed.

Then I started thinking about it.  They were running a gas fireplace to keep the pipes from freezing so it made sense for someone to be in the home at all times.

Still with so many people without power, I have to wonder if some are suffering while others in their neighborhood are warm.

It is the nature of our modern communities that people offer suffer because no one knows.

Small communities no longer have party telephones lines like we had when we first moved to Canada, but they do have ways of knowing when someone needs help.

I can attest to that since when we were doing our cattle dispersal and close to being stymied by persistent bad weather, all the men of the community showed up to help.  I will always remember being touched by their generosity and willingness to help.

I think that spirit is still alive in our neighborhoods, unfortunately the larger the neighborhood, the harder it is for people to actually help each other.

Maybe that is the reason I'm more comfortable in a smaller setting.  I like to think in Cape Carteret people know enough of what is happening to intervene when a neighbor needs help.

This winter we have not seen things get nastier than a little fog on the Southern Outer Banks.

The weather to change and our time will come.  Before than happens I can at least enjoy the sunset on the beach while figuring out what to do when we are up the creek without a paddle.

It might not solve the problem in advance, but at least I will approach it in a mellow state of mind. 

Somehow in the cold of winter in the mountains, those warm temperatures on the North Carolina coast make it very easy to justify the time we spend there.