Giant Clams and Elephants

Island Elephants

Memorial Day has come and gone and the tourist season is officially begun. Every year, at this time, I try to put forth some gentle reminders for both tourists and locals.

Tourists:
* Top speed on Shelter Island is 40mph, unless you're a local man in a truck, then it's 65mph. On the surface, that seems a bit unfair. It is unfair below the surface as well, but it's an elephant in the living room, more accurately an elephant on the Island, that we just don't talk about.
* Many of you bring your bikes to ride and that is very nice. And if there's a gaggle of you (seven or more) riding in a group, you may take up a lane on the road and none of the cars will try to go around you. If you're biking in a smaller group, like three, you'd better ride single file and stay way over on the right or risk being hit by one of the aforementioned elephants.
* Courtesy is the key to the Island. Locals may fight and feud, but cutting someone off in traffic, or cutting in any line, or failing to yell to them that they left their coke on top of their car before they get into it, is just not done. So when you're in a food store and a local worker is behind you with his sandwich, bag of cheetos and a drink, and you have a cart full of groceries, let him go ahead of you. He has a 30 minute lunch and is probably going to bolt his sandwich down in the truck, so give the working people a break. And remember, don't make any comments about how the workmen smell. Sweat is the scent of honest work. Not to mention, you will so regret having made a snide comment if you see that same worker fixing your deck later that day. Any worker will tell you that rudeness seems to increase the time or cost needed to complete a task. On the surface, that seems a bit unfair. It is unfair below the surface as well, but it's another elephant on the Island.
* To the visiting women. We know you're here to feel free and have a wonderful time. However, there is a weight and age limit to belly shirts, thongs, sleeveless tanks, short shorts and going braless. If you're over 18 or over 110 pounds, you're over the limit. I myself, was only qualified to wear short shorts for one day in third grade, and then only for a half hour.

Locals:
* Attention MIT's (Men in Trucks); please don't paint those little symbols of bikes, tiny cars and jogging tourists with the big "X"'s through them on the side of your truck this year. It scares people. Please just keep score by carving a notch in your dashboard this year and an accounting will be done after Labor Day, at someone's end of summer barbecue.
* Ladies; please refrain from beating tourists who are taking too long at the Deli counter in IGA with the baguettes . It's childish and unbecoming. If you jam them in the back of the ankles with the cart like I do, they hobble away in pain, which effectively takes them out of line and you can claim the whole thing was an accident. Also, why waste those lovely baguettes?
* We all love shells. Last week I wrote about the loss of shells on the Island beaches, after the article came out - it occurred to me that a big part of the problem is probably tourist women stealing our shells! We either have to invent, or find, a shell scanner that all cars exiting the Island will have to go through. We can erect them by the ferries. As the car passes through, the scanner will outline the contraband shells being smuggled off Island and we can stop them in their tracks and do a conch crackdown. We have plenty of dogs on the Island and they can be trained to be shell sniffin' canines. If dogs can smell drugs through plastic wrap, foil and coffee grounds, then smelling seaweed stuck on a shell at a hundred paces should be easy. This will put an end to the "taking home a pretty shell as a souvenier" mentality! No more freebies, they can buy a T-shirt at the pharmacy like any normal tourist. The Town Board can institute a Brine Fine for those shell smugglers! Of course, locals can take shells off Island whenever they wish. On the surface, that may seem a bit unfair. But it is very fair below the surface where the shells originate. And it does not qualify as an elephant on the Island that we won't talk about, because elephants don't live underwater. That's where the giant clams that eat tourist legs live, but we don't talk about them either.

Driving

Driving Me Crazy

You get very "islandized" living on an island. You think differently about the off-island world...

There are many different reasons for going off-island. Some people go shopping, some go to see relatives, some even work off-island and have to make the trip back and forth every day. When off-island, for whatever reason, it's important to remember that the ways of the off-island people are not the same as Islanders.

When off-island:
1. Do not assume you can park anywhere close to your destination. If you go to BJ's or some other big store, you may have to park across an entire parking lot. Take a pen and sketch a map on your palm of where your car is.
2. If you have parked in some obscure corner of a big parking lot, don't assume you will remember where you parked when you emerge from the store, you probably won't, that's why you should have made a map on your hand like I told you.
3. Don't bother asking off-islanders if they saw where you parked your car. Only Islander's know each other's cars and pay attention to where you parked, or should not have parked, your car.
4. Don't talk to off-islanders in a grocery store. They don't know what's available at the local farm stands to supplement what you're buying in the store, nor do they care. Very few off-islanders can carry on a conversation about squashes and cooking techniques, for more than two minutes. Off-islanders have Podcasts News broadcasts, which they download on their computers. Islanders have Peapodcast News, which is standing in the produce isle in IGA and either listening in, or participating in every conversation. After 20 minutes, you'll be completely caught up on everything going on on-Island.
5. You can drive faster than 40mph off-island. Please remember that. Off-islanders have this thing that you have to go zooming along on their big fancy highways, I've often hit 50mph myself. They can't stop and smell the roses, because you can't even see them at those blazing speeds.
6. There are traffic lights off-island. Since no one can take turns off-island, the government has had to step in and hang up boxes to tell you when it's your turn to go. The yellow light seems to be open to interpretation, but I notice that women think it means Stop and men think it means Speed Up!.
7. All the food we see advertised on television is obtainable off-island. If you buy some, put it in a big black plastic bag and don't open it until you get home and close your shades. If the ferry workers smell french fries, you'll feel so guilty, you'll have to hand them over. If your neighbors see you bringing bags of fast food into your house, they'll think of a reason to visit and you'll end up cutting your Big Mac into halves or quarters. Lesson here; if you can't bring enough for everybody, have the decency to hide what you have.
8. Resist asking off-island cashiers to hurry up, or you'll miss your boat. They'll always look at you like you already have...
9. If you're single, avoid dating off-islanders. Unless they're very wealthy and marriage minded, it's never worth the ferry tickets. One of the reasons that Islanders divorce and marry other Islanders is the natural drive in human nature to conserve ferry tickets unless you have at least three reasons to go off-island.
10. Many off-islanders don't even know where Shelter Island is, always remember the Shelter Island rules. If off-islanders ask where we are, don't tell them. If they ask for directions, misguide them. Confirm all rumors that the government conducts germ warfare tests on Shelter Island. Tell them that one way ferry tickets cost $50. Tell them the ferries are very safe, we only lost a few hundreds people last year from ferries overturning and sinking.

The off-island world is strange, their customs different, but still, we can avoid contamination through diligence, misguidance, blatant and non-blatant lies, treachery and flame-throwers.

She Shells Sea Shells and More

To Shell With It

While sitting in my car and overlooking the beach last winter, I remember thinking how peaceful and pleasant it is to walk the beach at dusk in the summer. Especially at the end of a not-too-hot day, with just nominal wind so the waves lap slowly and lazily up and down the beach. The way a thin layer of water foams and swirls around your feet and pulls back, sinking your feet deeper into the sand. There's something about that experience that makes ordinary shells and stones look somehow special and compels us to pick up a few new ones everytime we walk the beach. I still have a perfect spherical white pebble I found while walking Wades Beach in high school. It looks like a big pearl. It's just a stone, but it's one of my favorite little treasures.

I began to think, always a dangerous activity, about how Shelter Island recycles everything - and long before it was in style. Then I began to think about all the jars of shells and pebbles I have as decorations around the house. And I began to think of all the houses on the Island with jars of shells and pebbles. There's probably enough sand, pebbles and shells in jars all over the Island to build a whole new beach! Maybe it's time for us to recycle some of these shells and pebbles back onto the beach instead of putting them in the back of the closet while we get a new jar of shells this year. I have noticed, over time, that the beach seems to have fewer and fewer nice shells to take home. At first I thought I was imagining it, but now I'm thinking it's because we've all been slowly clearing the beaches of the pretty shells and pebbles and leaving the broken shells and ugly pebbles, cause there doesn't seem to be any shortage of them. So this year, I think I'll recycle, or reshell, the beaches I love with things I have borrowed from them over the years.

Jean: "Ahhhh, Sally, how nice. The beach looks better already. How many jars is that, six?"
Me: "Seven. I don't know which shells came from which beaches though, I may have mixed the Wades Beach shells with the Louis' Beach shells or the Shell Beach shells. But I don't think it matters, do you?"
Jean: "No, I don't think it matters as long as they're from local beaches, but what about this batch you left over here?"
Me: "Those are shells from Tamalpais Beach in California, I had four jars from there. I thought it would be nice, as long as I was in a reshelling mood, to add a few exotics...."
Jean: "I think the reshelling idea is great, but I think you should only reshell local shells, to maintain shell consistency, you know, Shelter Island has standards. Lots of areas limit your paint color choices when you paint your house and such, I'm just not sure that you should..... WAIT! What's that over there? Why is the sand pink and purple? And why is it glittering?"
Me; "Glitter? What glitter? It's the sun playing tricks with your eyes."
Jean: "I don't believe it. Where did you get pink and purple sand filled with glitter?"
Me: "The Honolulu Hilton gift shop. It was a tourist trap, but the shells were so pretty in the colored sand, I just had to buy a few jars. I think the sparkles give the beige sand a little zip."
Jean: "What about the shells? None of these shells are local! The spiny conch shells look awful here, and the little shark jaws have got to go - you'll scare people."
Me: "I thought it would be nice for the kids to find unusual things on the beach."
Jean: "No mother wants her toddler to reappear at the beach blanket with shark jars."
Me: "I see your point."
Jean: "Okay, let's just pick up the little jaws and spiny shells that kids can step on. You had such a good idea, and as always, you just have to go over the top. Why are you looking down? What else have you done to our pristine beaches? 'fess up!"
Me: "Well, the glitter looks so pretty mixed into the sand, and I just thought..."
Jean: "I saw empty plastic bags labeled, "Sequins", in your car, tell me you didn't...."
Me: "No, no, there's no sequins here."
Jean: "Thank God."
Me: "I spread them all over Wades Beach yesterday. The sand looks gorgeous now, you should see it before you judge me."
Jean: "Get in your car! And wait there while I find a piece of driftwood to beat you to death with."

The Shelter Island Tonite Show!

Shelter Island Tonite!

After seventeen years, Jay Leno is down to his last few weeks as host of The Tonight Show. For his first ten years as host, I was still saying, "I'm watching Johnny Carson." Johnny was such a consistent presence in my life from childhood up, that I felt a real loss when he announced his retirement and then disappeared off the radar altogether. Now, when I've finally gotten used to Jay and memorized all his staple routines ( I love Monday Night Headlines), he's leaving me too. Conan O'Brien takes over soon. Conan is okay for someone who thinks his staring contests with guests are funny, but I always switch to Craig Ferguson on The Late Late Show after Letterman, he's very original and spontaneous. I'm okay with Letterman, but only watch if he has a guest I want to see. So I guess when Jay leaves, I'll have to train myself to watch Letterman, it won't be easy, but these things happen in life. You just never know when your TV viewing will hit a speed bump and disrupt your insomnia. Of course, if Shelter Island, which has its own channel, had a late night show, I'd have a real choice again.

Announcer: "Shelter Island Tonite! with your host, Bill McGill. Tonight's guests are; Sarah Schmopit, Winner of the 2009 Seashell Yard Design, and Harry Bicker, with fascinating tales of a Shelter Island Taxi driver, and lastly, we have a demonstration of the new routine from the Shelter Island Lion's Club Power Mower Racing Team."

Bill: "If you've never seen our Power Mower Racing Team, folks, it's a real treat. Using synchronized mowing, they mow a design in the huge lawns on Shelter Island, the homeowner just has to host a barbeque. The accuracy and amount of detail in the design is directly dependent on whether they mow before or after the Barbeque. Before the barbeque, you can get a replica of something elaborate, like Washington Crossing the Delaware, after the barbeque, you might get "Budweiser" spelled in big letters across the lawn. Crop circles have nothin' on our boys and their John Deere's!

Bill: "Before we call out Ms Schmopit, we have a few announcements; low tide will be at 5:54AM. If you're new to clamming, get out there by 6:30AM to get in a good two hours. If you're old to clamming, stay in your own clambeds. We only have one cop on at that hour and if he has to come down and break up another clam rake duel, he'll permanently confiscate the rakes of the involved parties.
We have a 10mph breeze expected from the southeast bringing warm weather. It'll be a perfect day to put up a little canvas, but if you feel the need for speed, call your friend with an outboard.
Remember to bring your own bags and egg cartons to the farm stands. If you're trading, use the Island's pound for pound exchange rate. You can pick up a pound of zucchini if you leave a pound of shellfish. Two beers counts as a pound and also one ferry ticket counts as a pound for exchange purposes. If you observe an off-islander abusing our honor system, get their license number and call this show. We will publically humiliate them at no charge and their car will be clammed by the next islander who sees them. That's right off-islanders, I said clammed, not keyed. It's illegal to use your car key to scratch someone's car, however nowhere in New York State or Federal law is there any law regulating the use of mollusks.
And now, let's welcome Sarah Schmopit! Tell us Ms Schmopit, where did you get the inspiration to replicate the Eiffel Tower in sea shells in your front yard?"

Sarah: "Call me Sarah, Bill. I got the inspiration from seeing a picture of this thing in Paris, which as you know, is quite off-island."

Bill: "Ah yes, the off-island influences, they are all around us all the time. It's hard sometimes to choose which information we want from the off-island world."

Sarah: "Well, my husband and I built this replica, six feet tall you know, and we improved on the original design."

Bill: "You improved the engineering design of the Eiffel Tower? That's impressive! What did you do exactly?"

Sarah: "Well, our tower features four built in bird houses and green and red, port and starboard, lights on the top. Just think, if the original tower in Paris had port and starboard lights, how much easier it would be for pilots to steer the airplanes to the right of the tower. I guess the French, drinking all that wine, never thought of that..."

Bill: "Well, it just proves the point that there's not much in the off-island world that we can't improve on here."

Laid off - What Now????

Can't you wait till 5pm???

"AP - Wed Apr 15, 8:20 pm ET
MADISON, Wis. – A nurse was called out of surgery so a manager could tell her she was being laid off. ...The Madison-based health care provider announced Wednesday that it planned to "immediately" lay off 90 employees. Dean Health spokesman Paul Pitas said the incident happened at Dean's West Clinic in Madison on Wednesday or Thursday. Pitas declined to name the employees involved or what type of surgery the nurse was attending when she was called away."

I've heard of getting laid off on short notice, but this really takes the cake. The employers should at least let you finish your shift before laying you off. Geez, what if that happened here?

Patty: "Look at the ferry guys, Mary, they just took out money, now they're coming back this way again. Wait a minute, they're handing money over to people, what's going on?"
Ferry Worker: "We just got a call, we've all been laid off effective immediately. We're giving everybody their money back before we leave."
Patty: "Whaddaya mean leave? You can't go in the middle of the trip! You gotta get us docked and off the boat!"
Ferry Worker: "The heck we do! We're being picked up now. You people will be fine, the tide is coming in, you'll run around on the Sag Harbor beach."
Patty: "I don't wanna run aground in Sag Harbor, I wanna run aground at Bridgehampton Commons! Wait ! Come back here!
Mary: "Forget it, they're all going over the side on a rope ladder. That clamboat is picking them up. Everybody's getting out of their cars, lets see what we can figure out together."
Passenger 1: "We're drifting sideways, can't we straighten the boat out somehow?"
Patty: "You can go up in the wheelhouse and try to drive, but it's like trying to steer a giant soapdish."
Mary: "Well, we're moving fast enough. I can see people on the beach starting to stand up and look at us. HEY! On the beach! Get your kids out of the water!"
Patty: "Some of the men are running into the water, what are they going to do? Swim out to us? They should just stay where they are, we'll be there in a minute. Unless, of course... they're going to try to board us."
Passenger 2: "That's it! Those Sag Harborians have wanted their ferry for years, they're going to try to board us and take our ship!"
Passenger 1: "Not without a fight! Attention everyone! Prepare to repel boarders!"
Patty: "Search your cars for whatever can be used for a weapon!"
Passenger 1: "Here they come! I count six men, but that's probably just the first wave. Cast off the rope ladder!
Mary: "Patty! What are you doing? I have to return that toaster to Target."
Patty: "It's no longer a toaster, it has been re-purposed, it is now a defensive weapon! Watch this! Hey! Saggie! Smile!"
Mary: "Bullseye! Way to go Patty, you knocked him out!"
Patty: "Go get the kids carseats! They'll never take us alive!"

Local Papers May 8th edition:
Islanders Repel Saggies!
An attempt was made by the residents of Sag Harbor earlier this week, to commandeer a Shelter Island ferry. Islanders, in a valiant attempt to save their vessel, put up a noble fight until their ship ran aground and they were overwhelmed by the superior numbers on the beach. Choosing to destroy the vessel rather that have it and all it's technology fall into the hands of an envious neighbor, the Islanders set the boat ablaze. Sag Harborains saw the smoke from all points of town, and thinking it was just a hell of a bonfire, hundreds arrived with marshmellows and beer. Several Saggies, obviously under the influence, claimed they were attacked with toasters, child seats and other objects as they attempted to board and assist in what appeared to be an out of control ferry. These two tribes have lived together in peace for generations, separated only by a thin strip of water. We can only hope that the peace of the south fork will be restored and the Islanders will give up their obvious attempt to create a new landing zone on the Sag Harbor beach. We will print updates as we receive them.