Thank you to everybody who made this sale a success.
If you haven't heard about it yet, the SJ Community Theatre is performing "The Addams Family: A New Musical" and it is sublime. The talent! The costumes! The sets…and the orchestra! What a show!!
This was my old menu. Breakfast: Two flour tortillas, bacon, sausage and egg tacos, with cheese hot sauce, salt and pepper, vitamin water and coffee, and a muffin. Lunch: Soup and/or sandwich, chips or fries, beer and/or soda. Ice cream. Supper: Steak, avocado, tortillas, beer and/or soda. Dessert. In between snacks: Candy bars, jerky, nuts, twinkies, etc.
Colton needs $300,000 to cryogenically preserve his mother. The perfect Mother's Day gift – a frozen mother. What Colton evidently hasn't considered is that the mainstream medical magnates would want to find a cure. The National Cancer Institute alone has spent over 90 billion in the last 40 years in the war on cancer. Cancer fighting is big business. A cure would mean one less thing to declare war on. Heaven forbid. And as far as I know, no one is funding a "Peace On Cancer" campaign.
I would like to give a roar of THANKS to our Orcas Lions Club! Just recently, and for the second year in a row, they have sponsored hearing and vision screenings for ALL of our eligible students. What an incredible service! Seeing and hearing correctly makes learning so much easier. Screening our students is a major effort, and having the Lions bringing their van and volunteers right to our front door has been such a valuable help to us. With their help, we were able to screen almost 200 children in one day! We love our Orcas Lions!
The results of an internal review of former Orcas Fire Chief Miklos Preysz performed by consultants from Bellingham Mediation and Consulting group were recently released to the public following a public records request.
It was a normal workday at the Sounder until we got a call from the Stafford Creek Corrections Center.
The Odd Fellows were responsible for the clean up of the entire length of Haven Road.
Last Thursday I rushed from my friend's house and late dinner to make the late ferry which I mistakenly thought was at 9:10 (look at the spring schedule, people!). I got to the booth with what I thought was 10 minutes to spare and expressed this to Jeff, my favorite booth guy. I told him I knew about the "new rule" to be at the booth 30 minutes ahead of time. Jeff informed me that I was 2 minutes late and had been spit out of the system already! He added I was now on standby! I thought he was kidding but alas, he wasn't. Jeff being Jeff, he took care of my $10 charge and of course there was hardly anyone in line for that late ferry but still, I was very surprised.
I would like to commend Analisa Lee for her heartfelt and important article on white privilege. This is a concept that few of us white folks are very aware of.
Desmund Tutu is famous for promoting the adage, "Don't raise your voice; improve your argument." And so it is with debate. I am writing on behalf of the Orcas Island Debate Team to express our enormous gratitude to all of those who helped us compete in our remarkably exciting and successful 2015-16 season, including our triumphant journey to two different state tournaments. All of our funding comes from the goodness of the hearts of our Orcas family. We are so very fortunate to live in such a charitably minded community. We wish to extend particular thanks to the Orcas Island Education Foundation for their ongoing financial support and for all the generous individual donors who contributed to our team. We could not do it without you! I also want to gratefully acknowledge the time and energy spent by the other volunteer coaching staff, including Ian Lister and Katie Blaine. Here's to next year.
We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of the individuals who contributed their time and effort to make the Lions Health Screening on April 4th, 5th and 6th, 2016 possible—over 150 man-hours went into this project! Thanks to the following Lions for their help during this event: Martin Arnold, Jim Biddick, Karen Hiller, Toby Hiller, Mike Jonas, Leif, Kay Miller, Steve Schaefer and Mac Trunkey. A special thanks to Sunrise Volunteers and Non-lion volunteers helping us this year: Candace Bodenhamer, Mary Boberg, Becky Hawley, Kathy Kantrud, Coleen O'Brien and Bea vonTobel. Additionally, our gratitude to the Northwest Lions Foundation for Sight & Hearing for developing the Van and providing the accompanying screening unit crew, Lions Mike and Pat Parker. Thanks guys—we couldn't have done it without you.
OPALCO members have a proposed bylaw change to vote on this election. The proposed change directs the board of directors to reapportion the board districts to achieve fairness and balance on OPALCO board representation.
There are some things worth thinking about as we cast ballots in the next few weeks for the three open positions on the OPALCO Board of Directors.
With the important OPALCO election coming up, much is at stake. In the face of rising costs, a changing utility landscape, expensive submarine cables and fiber optic installations, we believe Brian Silverstein is the right person to help our electric coop navigate a challenging path to keep electricity bills affordable and fair, manage coop finances transparently, and encourage conservation and renewable energy.
Directors Robert Hall and Jake Perrine brought top quality theatrical productions to Orcas Center this spring.
Mr. MacLeod's guest column "The 'c' in OPALCO?" in the March 30 edition confuses the business and political ends of a cooperative.
Scotch broom is beginning to blossom, and the ground is still too soft to let weed wrenches do a good job pulling up the smaller plants. Last Wednesday I had the help of the Noxious Weed Board's Jason Ontjes ( 376-3499 jason@sanjuanweeds.org.) doing some serious clearing in my upper field. I learned that re-growth comes only from the trunk, and latent seeds that may be lurking at the base of the plant. Roots left in the ground will not re-sprout. Jason used loppers most of the time, cutting the trunks as far below the ground as possible, then covering the stump with soil.. A few were left exposed above the ground, but he stripped the bark down all around the plant, to discourage re-growth. I used the medium Weed Wrench, gleefully toppling the smaller plants. We will burn the pile once the whole job is done.
Good editorial, "Ferries need to support local riders," in last week's Sounder.
It's unfortunate that the Sounder has plunged into partisan politics by publishing Cali Bagby's San Juan Journal article regarding Congressman Rick Larsen as an editorial. It should instead have appeared as a guest opinion.
It is very sad when a resident of the San Juans writes a mean-spirited letter to the editor which promotes boycotting a local business that provides local jobs to hard-working people and provides a high quality, much needed service for myself and fellow islanders. As a retired "techie," I find it additionally sad that the letter also attempts to denigrate these hard-working local people by using the term "techie" and saying that they really hate that "old technology."
Many people are surprised and upset to learn of a new ferry system policy from articles recently printed in the local press. It is disturbing that the ferry system has changed its policy regarding when a person with a reservation needs to show up. You now have get TO the ticket booth 30 minutes prior to sailing or your reservation will be cancelled, as opposed to previously needing to get in line 30 minutes early.
Thank you to the volunteers, businesses and participants who made this year's Shakespeare Festival a success.
Cascade Creek has, like most creeks, small beginnings. It's an ignominious little tumbler as it scoots over, around, under and through the rocks, logs, sticks, eddies, falls and stillwaters. Suddenly, it's a respectable creek in all her natural glory.
It is increasingly difficult to remember that the "C" in OPALCO stands for "cooperative." No one is having a harder time doing so than its management and board. Remember when the annual meetings allowed members to stand up and ask questions of management and the board?
The new 30-minute rule from Washington State Ferries requires riders to be past the tollbooth in order to not lose their reservations.
Looking at the available financial data, Rock Island is now OPALCO's "hobby business." It will always be unprofitable and will always need to be supported by ever higher electric bills.
We would like to thank the United Way of San Juan County for generously supporting the Funhouse Commons' Healthy Teen Development Program this year. United Way's contribution is enabling us to connect Orcas Island teens and their parents with trained therapists for information, life-skill building, and tools to foster positive social, emotional, and physical growth for teens.
In all of the hundreds of articles from the various bloggers, pundits, and news sources that I've read to date reflecting on this year's democrat candidates the following from www.Truthout.org stands out in my mind the most:
My sister has Stage Four breast cancer. She was able to enroll in a health insurance program this past year even with this serious pre-existing condition. We have friends that have chronic diseases that previously made it difficult to obtain health insurance because of their pre-existing health conditions.
On March 12, my wife and I received in the mail two separate surrogate affidavit forms, along with a page-long letter from William J. Clinton, telling us why Hillary would be best for America. This came within an envelope with the return address, "From the desk of William J. Clinton," in capital letters along with a Seattle address and a footnote in bold letters saying, "Special Message from President Clinton."
When the Design Team for TEDxOrcasIsland decided on the theme for our 2016 event, we reached out to Corey Wiscomb, a design and art teacher at Orcas High School, for support in creating a logo that spoke to our theme, "Best of Both Worlds."
We want to thank everyone who was part of the MAG concert on Sunday, March 6, and helped us raise money to support the music program at the Orcas Public Schools. Thank you to the Orcas Choral Society, Orcas Island Community Band, Island Sinfonia, Orcas High School Band and Strings, Hilary Canty, Dick Staub, Dimitri Stankevich, Linda Slone, Susan Gudgell, Lynn White, Cindy Morgan, Jana Webb, Finn Rubottom, Alanna Lago, Steve Alboucq, Roger Sherman, Karen Key Speck, Jim Shaffer-Bauck, Ned Griffin, Victoria Parker, Chris Waage, Kahana Pietsch, Anthony Kaskurs, Pamela Wright, Darren Dix, the Orcas Island Fire Department and everyone who attended our concert or contributed to MAG. We would not be where we are without you and your support.
I've lived on this island now for almost 10 years. One thing I've come to value – in addition to Orcas' natural beauty – is the shared sense of community. By and large, people seem to want to get along. Differences in religion, worldview, political party, basic values, wealth or lack of adequate income don't usually result in yelling, name-calling or physical violence.
On behalf of this year's sixth grade class at Orcas Elementary School, we would like to express our gratitude to Orcas Island Education Foundation and former Chair of NatureBridge Valerie Anders for their generous donations toward our trip. NatureBridge is rated first in the country for science field learning for children. Together with class fundraising activity this year, their donations have made the trip accessible to everyone.
A Friday Harbor woman's Facebook request went viral, reaching more than 30,000 eyes.
As a supporter of Bernie Sanders for president, Morgan's comment about Hillary Clinton supporters being afraid to attend the Democratic caucuses is of great concern. I have heard some not-so-nice comments from Hillary's supporters, too, and I know it does not feel good. When passions run high, this happens from time to time.
A guest column in the Dec. 16, 2015 Islands' Sounder, written by a high school student advocating for easy-access condoms, is still on my mind because it embodied the same message our culture taught me as a kid: instant gratification.
