Martha's Vineyard Blog

Going Green on Martha's Vineyard Part 1 - Baby Steps

I will attempt to walk a fine line in this article. I like our planet…I think we should keep it! It’s a ‘fixer-upper’, that’s for sure, but I’ve grown fond of it over the years. The more research I do into the realm of becoming ecologically responsible the more I feel that it could be impossible.

You will find no references to song by a certain Frog as I discuss the issue of going ‘Green’. To The Frog I will simply say ‘Ain’t that the truth, Brother!”

As a hotel manager, I make this VOW: I will do what I can to help our planet survive, but some of those steps take the involvement of our guests to be most effective.

The Colonial Inn has changed some of the ways we do our jobs over the last year and a half or so, and I will spare you the mind-numbing research in comparing and contrasting products…I will sum up the entire affair with the words ‘flaming hoops and ecologists with whips’!

We do not have an eco-manager at the Colonial Inn. We all wear many hats and there is not one person with the duty of making sure we are environmentally conscious. Each of us plays a small part of the process and we work at it during the course of our service to potential and in-house guests.

What We Have Done:

 

• Where appropriate, incandescent light bulbs have been replaced with compact fluorescents 
• Every room in the Colonial Inn and the Edgartown Residence Club now has a small blue bin for all co-mingle recyclables.
• The shampoos and lotion in our rooms are in recyclable packaging and they don't need to be rinsed - our waste removal vendor told us that the small bits of shampoo and lotion left in the bottles do not damage the recycle process.
• Every guest has a choice whether have sheets changed and towels replaced daily during their stay.  This helps reduce chemical and energy use in the laundry.
• We are reducing our use of plastics in housekeeping by using canvas bags to tote laundry instead of large plastic garbage bags.
• There are large co-mingle recycle bins in our lobby area and the front desk now religiously uses separate bins.
• We now send 99% of our confirmation letters by email instead of printing and mailing (Sorry Post Office...)

 

 These are some of the steps in the process. There are drawbacks to each of these systems.

There is not a day that goes by without housekeepers or managers finding food waste contaminating the recyclables. The huge white arrows forming the global symbol for ‘RECYCLE’ on bright blue bins apparently confuse some people. 

To use small soaps and shampoo / lotion bottles is an effort to conserve… resources as well as our costs. These little bottles sometimes make it hard to liberate the required liquid. However, with many one-night stays, there is a lot of soap and shampoo thrown away. So…bigger bottle = easier access, easier access = waste…argh!

The canvas bags for soiled linens are no easy feat. Such a simple step to conserve plastic bags, but on a property built in 1911 there are no rolling house cleaners carts (the hallways are too narrow and have little one-step risers at random) so laundry must be hauled, not nicely rolled and dropped like larger more modern constructions. It is a little detail, but speaking as one who has done his share of laundry hauling…it is a workout. The canvas holds more and gets heavier than the plastic and with no elevator, it is all human effort to bring laundry up and down four flights of stairs each day.

These are the ‘baby steps’ of our conservation system. There are more, but this article is already overly long for a subject like this. I may have bored you all to tears!

Sadly, I plan to do it again. Look for “Going Green…Part 2- ‘Meat & Potatoes’” in which I have learned that …everything will kill you! It’s my job to make sure it kills you more slowly!

That last line made more sense in my head…

  

Edgartown Harbor seasons

As Lane touched on in our last post, Martha's Vineyard is a very different place in winter than the beloved Island that most of you see only in it's glorious summer colors.  This morning, I walked up to the top of the Edgartown Residence Club wing of the building, as I do most days, and took a few minutes to look out on the Edgartown Harbor.  I make a point of seeing the water at some point every day.  Even if it is from the window.  It's my version of the wonderful movie line that goes, "It's only an Island if you look at it from the water" (and I'm sure there are many Amity lovers who know that movie).

You see, the harbor is the pulse by which I measure the seasons.  The ebb and flow of the tide is mirrored in the traffic patterns each season.  As you can see from my photo, the sun is shining down on an almost empty harbor today.  There are one or two lonely boats, bobbing on their moorings but otherwise, a deserted stretch of chilly water greets me.  This isn't the case every day in winter though.  It's Sunday today, so I'm missing the early morning rush of scallopers heading out to harvest their daily bushels and bring them back for shucking.  If you have never tasted an Edgartown Bay Scallop fresh from the shell, then I swear you are missing one of the most amazing taste sensations in the world!  Sweet and velvety, they are a treat to behold and worth a special visit during Bay scallop season which usually starts in mid November.  I am lucky enough to have a few scalloper friends who make sure I am well stocked and a chef husband who lovingly prepares them in the simplest ways to let their flavors shine.

Every spring I watch as slowly but surely, the harbor once again fills up, until there are rows of neatly moored boats of all shapes and sizes enjoying all that life in this bustling summer town has to offer.  I know summer is here when I see the Edgartown Yacht Club moor its pontoons for the kids sailing programs, then watch as all those little sails bob precariously in and out of the other boats while the children learn skills that I dream of having time to learn one summer!  Huge and luxurious yachts become a talking point, "Did you see the one with the heli-pad?", "There's one with guards at the end of the dock - who owns that one?". Charter fishing boats take hopeful groups on high seas adventures, and the harbor launch works overtime shuttling people and their purchases back and forth to their chosen vessel.

Then the exodus begins.  The pontoons are dismantled and stored away 'til next year, the families with kids and dogs in life preservers are fewer and there's a bit of a lull in harbor activity for a couple of weeks. Then mid September hits and brings with it the biggest event of the Edgartown Harbor calendar - The Martha's Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby The dates for this year's event were just announced, so grab your favorite fisherman/woman and make some plans!  You can even take advantage of the Book Early and Save promotion at the Colonial Inn.  

So, the harbor life continues, the fishing boats are pulled out of the water for the winter, the harbor empties and then, here we are again with a deserted harbor and bay scallops.  I love to watch this cycle every year, mostly because I know that the next step brings another part of life on the Vineyard to look forward to.  If you want to keep an eye on this cycle, check out our webcam, overlooking Edgartown harbor to see what's going on while you're gone.

Martha's Vineyard Winter Maintenance

Perhaps the most frequent question posed to island people is, "What do you do in the winter?".  I get the feeling that many of our summer friends have a vision of a big, domed platter cover coming down from the sky to envelop Vineyard while the locals hibernate from New Years Day until Memorial Day Weekend. Ah, not so.  Entertainment is at a minimum, but far from non-existent.  It's just that we have a lot more of everything in the summer.

But I'm getting off track here.  Mostly, what we're doing here in the winter, is getting ready for the return of all our off Island friends in the Spring!  A summer resort takes a huge amount of maintenance! The biggest projects this year are our bridges!  I'm sure you have all watched the slow progress of the building of the temporary Lagoon Bridge between Oak Bluffs and Vineyard Haven.  Well, it finally opened this month!  It took two barges to being over the new drawbridge section AND the incredible crane that put it in its place.  Now the old bridge is being cut up into sections and taken away the same way.  The temporary bridge is such an impressive structure, it's hard to believe that it too must eventually meet the same demise.  By the time you return this year, the new permanent bridge will be well underway.

Moving along to the other side of Oak Bluffs...Watching the progress on Little Bridge and Big Bridge (as they are affectionately known), along the Beach Road to Edgartown, is an education in engineering in itself.  If you were one of the lucky ones who had your 2009 visit spill over into the beautiful fall, you watched as the mobile traffic lights were erected and both bridges lost their ocean side lanes.  Since then the rebuilding has begun, with barges, cranes and equipment I've never seen before.  Talk about a feat of engineering? How do those four story cranes withstand the gale winds that have been blowing across the pond? And while I'm at it, I'd like to applaud the work crews and traffic cops battling the same winds and storms, sometimes so concealed under thick winter clothing that all you can see is a slit of their sunglass covered eyes.  But progress is what they are making, and I'm sure by the summer, all kids (young and old), will be jumping off the newly rebuilt Big Bridge.  And when they leave in September, the traffic lights, cranes and construction crews will return to perform the same magic on the pond side of the road next winter.  

Going back into Oak Bluffs Center, its east to get distracted, as there's no more Steamship Authority ferry terminal.  There again, all you see are large cranes, some very strange looking, large vehicles, and a pile of humongous boulders.  Yes, we are finally going to get a new terminal.  But not without complications.  It seems the old foundation has massive cracks in it, so instead of building the new building structure on it as originally planned, it will have to be replaced too.  Why does everything end up costing more? (It's the same at my house!) But things are taking shape.  If you can see between all the equipment smothering the dock, you can make out shiny new railings.  All should be pretty spiffy for the 2010 season.

And last but not least, lets not forget two major construction projects coming to an end soon and both adding huge new services to the Island -  the brand new YMCA and the shiny new, state of the art hospital, both opening this spring.  The hospital opening was supposed to have been in February, but due to some faulty flooring adhesive, it has been moved back until April.  Details. details.  But not to worry, you will have a state-of-the-art facility to bring your skinned knees and sunburns to this summer.

So, you see, life hardly stops on the Island when the days get shorter.  In fact, there is quite an impressive flurry of activity.  And what does all of this winter maintenance say to you?  I sincerely hope the message is that we really care for and about our summer family and want to offer you the very best when you return to us!!

Christmas in Edgartown

 

It is the Holiday Season again, and with Thanksgiving behind us, the next big event on Martha's Vineyard is "Christmas in Edgartown".

Let me say up front that I am...less than enthusiastic, shall we say...of the Christmas season. I have an incredible dislike of commercial jingles, (did they start in mid-October this year? Curses...), smarmy holiday TV specials infuriate me and flamboyant decorating drives me nuts. I like a holiday of quiet reflection in keeping with my faith; I enjoy quality time with family without all the madness of shopping and messages of greed that assault us. I never achieve this, so I become a Grinch^TM.

I know where this comes from. My mother is a very religious woman and every year, she vows to organize herself with her holiday crafts and gift ideas well beforetime and every year plans more than she can possibly accomplish. She wants so much to have a quiet holiday that every misstep in the schedule causes frustration and anxiety. Therefore, she cancels it.

From when I was maybe eight or nine years old until...well...two or three years ago, actually, my Mom cancels Christmas. All of Christmas, mind you. No half measures here. Dinners, cookies, trees lights, gifts...you name it, she's done with it. This starts anywhere from the end of September and last until two days before Christmas. We always HAVE Christmas, but the three months of ranting cancellations have perpetually dampened my Holiday Cheer.

Genetically, I tend toward this pattern, but I have an almost two-year old girl-baby. She loves Christmas. The photo shows her at the Wharf Pub last year at the Breakfast with Santa event. She doesn't look very enthused about it, but THIS year...well, from talking with her, she's ready this time. (Video evidence of this years trip to the Christmas Loft store tends to make me doubt this claim...but we will see!)

(If your browser won't display this video, click here to open a new window.)

Kate's enthusiasm for Christmas this year and participating in last Christmas in Edgartown events last year are slowly chipping away at my Fortress of Grinchitude.

Edgartown is beautiful in so many ways, throughout the entire year, but during the ‘Christmas' weekend December 11^th - 13^th, the town becomes truly magical.

The Edgartown Board of Trade organizes the weekends schedule the weekend, and posts a Calendar of Events. So many Inns and shops participate that there are very few places where there is no sparkly-wonderment to be found.

The excitement for that weekend is evident. Reservations requests for available Suites to rent for that weekend have been coming for months. The Edgartown Residence Club is participating in the Inns of Edgartown Tour on Friday and Saturday from 2-4PM.

From the lighting of the Edgartown Lighthouse to hayrides from Main Street to the end of Water Street, there are free events that are great fun for all ages. (Even I enjoyed seeing Santa cruise into town on a fire engine during the Saturday morning parade down Main Street.)

Several events, like the Felix Neck gingerbread cookie decorating or Donaroma's wreath making workshop, have a fee charged for the cost of the materials.

Some events have entry fees that support the organization's event. The Minniesinger's concerts on Friday and Saturday are a longstanding tradition on the island, and the kids put a lot of hard work into each production. A Holiday Soiree at the Daniel Fisher House benefits the Martha's Vineyard Preservation Trust.

For those of you who are bold advocates of a particular charitable organization now is your chance to call the shots! All you have to do is win the 4^th Annual Cookie Tasting event at Espresso Love. The event proceeds go to the winner's choice.

The Dickens Village display at the Point Way Inn from 11AM to 5PM and the Faith Community Church's Live Nativity on the steps of the Old Whaling Church on Saturday will immerse passersby in scenes of Christmas tradition.

There is too much going on that weekend to pass it by.

My Grinchy^TM heart may not end up two sizes too small that weekend. 

Thanksgiving, Martha's Vineyard Style

This year was my 10th Thanksgiving.  Yes, it's the Scottish girl again with an outsiders perspective but I feel I might not be fully qualified for this post.  You see, the problem is that ALL of my Thanksgiving experiences have been here on Martha's Vineyard and from what I can tell from friends in the 'real world' and all the crazy talk on TV, Thanksgiving on Martha's Vineyard, like everything else about this Island, is quite unique. 

Yes, the lines in the grocery store are huge on Wednesday, but then I can always go to Morning Glory Farm for my veggies and a yummy fresh baked pie.  Yes, many flee to destinations far and wide to spend the holiday with loved ones and many also arrive to spend Thanksgiving with loved ones on the Island but there are no 4 hour back ups on our highways - that would take every car on the Island on State Road all at once!  Yes, there are sale signs in the stores, but there will be no "Doorbuster Specials" or lines outside stores at 4am to buy a cheap TV or the latest must have toy.  It's just different here.

The transient nature of many of our residents means that a lot of folks cannot be with their families for the holiday and so this is where our 'Island Family' kicks into high gear.  Let's face it - there's no Thanksgiving where I come from, so I'm not heading home for the holiday.  Also, my hubby and I almost always work at least part of Thanksgiving Day helping others enjoy their holiday but every year we are invited to at least 5 homes to share the holiday with our Island loved ones.  There is always an extra place at the table, delicious food to be shared and many laughs to be had along the way.  Now I know what you are all thinking, "That's not so unusual Joanne - we do the same with our friends here!".  But how many of you can come home from a long day of serving up turkey and the trimmings to hundreds of hungry guests, feet throbbing and tummy growling, to a cooler on your doorstep, left anonymously with a "Happy Thanksgiving - Enjoy!" note, packed with yummy leftovers ready to be made into that long awaited leftover sandwich?!  It was like a secret Santa but for Thanksgiving!  Now, I know the next thought in your head, "Really? You ate food someone left for you on your doorstep and you don't know who left it???" and that's the unique part - we didn't think twice about that - some lovely friend (we're still not sure who and this was a few years ago), was sweet enough to think of us and deliver a feast, complete with dessert, to make our day a little brighter! 

Living on Martha's Vineyard has taught me to lead a simpler, more honest and more trusting life.  I don't need to shop til I drop.  I don't need to buy things just because I got a deal.  I don't pour money into the big box store machines.  I buy almost everything I need right here, in locally owned and operated stores.  I get my shoes at Brickmans or Petunias, I get my clothes at Basics or the Green Room, I buy home goods, not at Home Goods, but at Le Roux, Bowl and Board, or one of the other amazing boutiques here.  Yes it costs a little more sometimes but it helps my friends and neighbors maintain a life here, just like my friends helped me by delivering yummy treats to a hungry worker.  I've learned to appreciate the simple stuff that many are missing in the 'real world' as they sit in traffic, waiting to get a parking spot at the mall. 

I am truly thankful that I landed on Martha's Vineyard and made it my home.  We are all lucky to be able to experience this little slice of heaven, whether you are here for a few days, a few weeks or a lifetime - there's no place like it!  What makes you thankful to be on Martha's Vineyard?

 

Photo Credit: Petersbar

Martha's Vineyard Blog has moved!

You might be looking at this blog thinking "There's something different going on here", and you'd be correct!  We have moved our blog, and our entire Colonial lnn website to a new host to help us better manage all the great Martha's Vineyard news and goings on that we have to share with you.  We hope you like the new look!  If you find anything that doesn't seem to be working as it should, please let us know. 

 Photo Credit: RBertieg

Vineyard Autumn

Fall is the opposite of spring. Nowhere have I seen the contrast of the two as obvious as on Martha’s Vineyard. In April, we see a world coming slowly and ambitiously to life. I’m not just talking about the overnight sensation of your brown lawn suddenly showing little patches of lime green.  I liken what happens here to ants coming back out of the ground. Suddenly, workmen on ladders are taking plywood down from windows and sprucing up storefronts, and shopkeepers are dusting and sweeping and carting in new merchandise. Seasonal homeowners, fed up with winter, venture back to open up musty houses in hopes that it will hasten the advent of summer. And if we’re lucky enough to get some sunny weekends, brave souls in shorts, but still wearing layers of sweatshirts, descend on the towns to get a jump on the new season. Those of us who live here have fun taking note of the local merchants who move to new venues, thinking the change will bring them a better season than the last. The most positive sign that things are on the upswing is the first time the ferry pulls into Oak Bluffs since last fall. Hope is definitely in the air.

Ah, but I am a fall person. I’ve never bought the theory that it’s a time when everything dies or goes to sleep. There’s a tingle in the air that makes this time of year at least as promising as spring. If you’ve read my previous blogs, you know how I feel about the colors of fall, the long shadows, and the unique quality of the light of October and November. Driving my daily commute from Oak Bluffs to Edgartown, I can barely keep my eyes on the road the marsh grasses on the pond are such a delicious palette of ochres, rusts, greens, and lavenders. And the road, as it takes you toward the Triangle is dappled with sunlight filtering through the tunnel of the tree limbs overhead. You have to beware of deer, fooled by the autumn light into thinking it’s evening, running out in front of you here.

The whole experience is spring in reverse. One by one, we watch the seasonal stores and restaurants locking their doors and posting, “Thank you for a great season” signs in their windows. Now is the time to take advantage of fabulous sales. No department stores with specially brought in sale merchandise here. What you get is dramatically marked down prices on all the unique items you were eyeing in August. Bring your holiday gift list.

You’ll find that activities and entertainment don’t disappear when we roll up the beaches. In fact, there is no better time than an autumn day for a long walk on a beach that was closed to all but town residents in the summer. We still have theater right through the holidays. We have concerts and dance parties, complete with pre-party lessons. Nature walks and kayaking are breathtaking events. Restaurants have specials and two-for-one nights (more on those specials soon). And local bay scallops are in season!

Where we island people made note of location changes in the spring, we now take joy in counting the restaurants that are staying open for the off season. This year, there are several special new ones;  State Road in West Tisbury, Deon’s in Oak Bluffs, The Atlantic in Edgartown, and The Mediterranean in its new Oak Bluffs location. Come enjoy dining with the locals who venture out to dine after the throngs have dispersed. You’ll find some of us may be a bit quirky, but in general, we’re a very nice lot and enjoy talking to the visitors who, like us, appreciate our island at this special time of year.

A Haunted Inn in Edgartown, Part 3

As I mentioned, Jim, our maintenance man, grew bored of winter island life. He decided to entertain himself by rooting around under the building for relics. Therefore, with fedora and bullwhip, he began his search for coins, arrowheads, old bottles etc.

We were not expecting him to find bones. Large bones. I’m no expert. I looked up the human skeletal system online and it looked to me like the thighbone. It had the L shaped knob that goes into the hip…
Jim found them sticking out of the side of the dig site and brought them to our attention. We called town hall first. In a town this small, everyone is going to know pretty soon so we might as well fess up.

Enter RED-Tape stage: Ron, the site supervisor for the construction company, agreed with us. He walked the bones over to the town hall and they told him to call the State Police. The State Police told us that they’d be right over to investigate. The newspaper photographer and reporter were here first.
Oh…by the way, we also needed to call the local tribe representative of the Wampanoags, the local Native American group. This whole affair made me a little nervous. Forget the scary bits…The fact that this street has had numerous ghost stories told about it, the phone call and bones…etc.
If the remains were human, the de/construction would have to stop until an investigation took place to everyone’s satisfaction. (I have a muddy ‘Slip ‘n slide” for the front yard of a hotel that was supposed to re-open in April. The LAST thing I wanted were delays!)

I feared for nothing. The Police sent the remains to the hospital for testing. The Wampanoag rep came and looked around. She gave us tips on what to look out for while further work took place and praised us for our diligence. Most people in these circumstances, she said, would have tossed the bones in the dumpster and kept on building. Forget the historical possibilities. She was going to call the newspaper and let them know how great we were…

What a let down this will be for some of you. The bones were not human bones said the hospital. They don’t know what they ARE, but they weren’t human. The newspaper made no mention of our historical uprightness of morality.

The digging recommenced the next morning and now all is right with the Colonial Inn world.

However, that doesn’t explain the phone call, does it? We may never know…

A Haunted Inn in Edgartown, Part 2

A Mysterious Phone call!

Due to the magnitude of the project of constructing the Edgartown Residence Club over that winter,

we decided that we needed a maintenance man on hand  to answer questions on where the water cut-off is, where the circuit breakers are, etc. He could also learn where the new installations would be for electricity and water. It would help with his maintaining of the building in the future; therefore, we asked Jim to spend the winter…

Jim is a Snowbird. He departs for warmer climes as soon as the hotel closes for the winter months. He reluctantly agreed to stay on and assigned himself tasks to keep himself busy. Intrepid Man of Maintenance that he is…he keeps busy well, but in a Curious George sort of way…forcing me to don a yellow hat to contain the wreckage.   The beginning of our enigmatic events occurred while the digging underneath the porch wing was going on.

Now, a hotel closed for the off-season is a creepy place, exactly in a Jack-Nicolson-The Shining kind of way; but when you’ve emptied a wing and there are new creaks and groans from excavation, and people you don’t know wandering about constructing or de-constructing things, it gets creepier?…more creepy?…Extra creepish?

You find doors UN-locked that should be locked. You hear movements from the floors above where you didn’t think there was anyone working.  But take my word for it, when you get a phone call on your office phone that your console tells you is from the abandoned wing…that tops the Casey Kasem Weekly Top Eerie.
It’s not just the fact that it’s post-season (we closed the hotel and there should be no calls from that wing). It’s the fact that we removed all the actual phones and brought them into the main building where they lie in state, still cocooned in plastic bags.

Theory: What if someone got into that wing AND brought their own phone with them just to creep us out? Plausible but for that fact that Jim…superhero of the maintenance world…removed all the phone jacks so there is nowhere to plug a phone in.

Whence came the call, I ask you? What are the odds that a practical joker would know which wires to splice a phone just to dial ‘0′?
It was all very puzzling.

Then we found the skeletal remains…

A Haunted Inn in Edgartown?

Editor’s Note: Just in time for Halloween… this 3 part series is about the spooky events surrounding the 2006 construction of the Edgartown Residence Club on North Water Street, at The Colonial Inn.  If you are interested in more spooky (but true) Martha’s Vineyard stories, you should check out some of the books by local writer Holly Nadler, including Haunted Island.

Once, upon a time, there was no Edgartown Residence Club! We have been operating for so long now that it is hard to remember back when it was simply the Porch Wing of the Colonial Inn. The creation of the Edgartown Residence Club involved a major restructuring project. The Porch Wing was an annex to the Inn with fifteen rooms on three different floors. The project was this: to change these fifteen rooms into six luxury suites that would be available for fractional ownership. Easy enough with an industrious crew; but the building was on sand, which means there were no true right angles left in the building. Designs drawn to shore everything up and put some beams underneath the building also included plans to replace the crawlspace underneath the entire building with a full basement.

We closed the hotel for the winter so this was the sole form of excitement for us, not to mention the entire town. (A beach town in the winter is an easily entertained entity.)

We spent the month of December in a frantic scramble to empty the hotel rooms in that wing. When you look at a hotel room, it really is more full than you realize. Stationary, ironing gear, fridge, phone, toiletries, TV, bathrobes, coat hangers, shower curtains, towel racks, pillows, bedspreads, mattresses, end tables, chairs, armoires…they all have their place and they look great where they are. However, they all take up loads of space when you take fifteen of any one of those items and put them somewhere else. In fact, they seem to grow in mass.

Now, add in the fact that the armoires weigh approximately as much as a small moon. In addition, the stairwells were too narrow to allow the armoires to leave. (They originally entered by means of a huge crane jacking them up through each floor’s porch doors, and that was how they left in the end.)
The next step was to call one of the few moving companies on the island. They sent a crew of workers who may or may not have understood a word I was saying. I had to monitor each person’s load and tell him where to put it (so to speak) on almost every trip up and down stairs.  Eventually the building was empty of everything we wanted to keep. Our maintenance man, Jim, removed sinks and toilets, as well as light fixtures, mirrors, towel racks and phone jacks. It was a maintenance man’s buffet of spare parts.

Many large, loud pieces of equipment then came in, tore everything in our front courtyard out, dug twelve feet straight down and suspended the entire wing on big Jenga-like block columns. Our neighbors, who were earlier so pleased to gawk at the goings on, now turned against us. Local restaurants claimed we were driving away business, and neighbors reported that the shaking of the ground from the equipment caused stress cracks to appear in their walls.  In other words, the site had been thoroughly disturbed at this point.  That’s when Jim got bored and things got weird…