Part 2 of "QA, A Touchy Feely Experience"

A clear demarcation exists between the tasks I did in QA before and those after the 7 months I spent away in the 1st Gulf War. My first year as an inspector had been devoted to assessing standards and keeping the avionics technicians honest with plenty of inspections. (read part 1 for more on those experiences.) I had been the bogeyman, the maintenance cop, the guy to watch out for.

Once the war ended however, and I returned to my old home in the Quality Assurance shop, I was shocked at how much had changed. As far as many of the other inspectors were concerned—me included—a terrible wind had roared through Little Rock AFB and had swept away much of what HAD previously made maintenance so effective there.

Two transformations had taken place, both of which had a huge impact on me as a QA inspector.

First, there was no longer a wing DCM. The Deputy Commander for Maintenance, usually a full bird colonel, and usually a pilot but sometimes not, was the “maintenance king.” He “owned” all the planes in the wing and was responsible for their upkeep. We in QA were his “people,” his eyes and ears, and kept him informed on all the doings “out there,” on the flightline and in the shops.

The DCM “went away” under a new-fangled organizational concept called decentralized maintenance. Under that new “foolish” brainchild the planes were distributed out to 4 new Aircraft Generation Squadrons. Each squadron commander of those AGS’s then became responsible for HIS planes. So, there was no more DCM to control ALL the 80 or so C‑130s, and believe me, maintenance suffered horribly because of it--and I'll tell you why I think so as this continues.

The second sweeping change that "enveloped" the entire Air Force during my absence had an even bigger impact on us QA guys than even the onset of decentralization. It was called TQM, which stands for Total Quality Management.

When TQM was first explained to me I recoiled in horror that anyone would be silly enough to try to implement such an idiotic thing for aircraft maintainers. The basic concept of TQM, at least as far as it was interpreted for use on Air Force flightlines, was that quality inspectors were no longer required, and THAT was all I had to hear to know that some moron had finally become the boss of the United States Air Force!

The rationale for the demise of inspections (and inspectors) was simple—under the principles of “total quality,” ALL members of the wing were going to have a new “quality oriented” mindset—with proper training and indoctrination of course—and would no longer require any oversight, because magically it seems, they would take responsibility for always doing the right thing, for doing it absolutely correct and by the book.

So, in 1990 and 1991, during a phase-in time of just over 6 months, the Air Force had made two very major cultural and organizational changes, and from what I could see as an inspector, doing so was a huge error on several levels.

For one thing, a major misjudgment was that "they" hurriedly put into effect TWO incredibly earthshaking institutional revolutions at THE SAME TIME! Now, I understand that there are times when its best to just actuate quickly instead of gradually, but this was not one of those times. It was simply too much too fast.

In one crucial way the quick changes destroyed the very fabric of what makes a unit good at what it does--the level of experience available to it. By decentralizing, virtually overnight, they practically wiped out almost every bit of corporate knowledge among the specialist trades. Where there HAD been a shop all filled with people with THE SAME specialty credentials, now, these troops (and their experience and varying backgrounds) was spread out between four different squadrons.

The idea behind this "misguided" action was that these specialists were “under-utilized” and “spoiled” and so could now be “cross-utilized” for OTHER “more important” "general" tasks, such as towing, refueling, tire changing, and panel pulling. Those had all been jobs strictly done by APGs, or the general mechanics, most of which had the view that ALL specialists were lazy, while all the “real work” was done by the APGs. (By now you might be picking up on the undercurrent of resentment that many APGs had for specialists, especially for avionics specialists!)

Unfortunately, the APGs under the newly decentralized schema were now running the maintenance show and “the abuse,” I mean the "cross-utilization" of the specialists began in earnest. Specialist training suffered horribly; usually, there was no one supervising the young apprentices anymore, at least not anyone with much experience on their systems. Before, there has been a specialist shift leader, a specialist shop chief, and a branch chief, all of whom took particular care to make sure THEIR new people were trained, and trained well. Compared to that, the new system was nothing less than a training fiasco.

Before, when the specialists were centralized in shops, there were always on-call a large population of experienced men and women from which to call upon for the tougher system malfunctions. Suddenly, these people were scattered to the wind and were no longer available for advice, guidance and training.

Now, instead of a 3-level having the advantage of being exposed in training to several 5 and 7-levels, once assigned to an AGS they usually trained under a single 5-level who had also been trained similarly. After a year of that nonsense the damage was done. What the heck were "they" thinking!

And speaking of training, previous to the formation of AGS’s, there had been almost 80 aircraft upon which to train at LRAFB. With so many airplanes it had been relatively easy for a supervisor to find the infrequent jobs for apprentice technicians to train and learn on. Suddenly, not only were there fewer experienced trainers, now there were less than 20 aircraft to use for that training. The result is that a new troop might NEVER get a chance to see and learn many of the infrequently seen tasks and malfunctions. Now THAT wasn't very smart, was it?

All together, I can’t imagine anyone coming up with a more efficient way to destroy the abilities of what had been a very fine set of avionics experience. I can't speak for all the other specialists, like the electricians, and the hydraulic and engine troops, but for me, it was a sad thing to see, especially considering how amazing the specialists had just performed during the 1990-91 war.

This new situation—the dispersing of planes and specialists—really began to limit the abilities of the newly qualified troops. It sickened me to watch it because once the core set of veteran technicians began to either leave or get promoted off the flightline, their lost expertise was virtually impossible to regenerate.

Luckily for me, and luckily for the 314th TAW, the decision was made NOT to disband the QA shop and therefore my life in “quality” continued, albeit in a metamorphosed state. As it turned out, it was one of the best periods of my life in the Air Force. I’ll get into exactly why in part 3 of QA, A Touch Feely Experience.

Part 1 of Bicycle Memories "My Flying Father"

Running hasn’t been the only way I kept in shape over the years. Since before high school, the bicycle was a common mode of transport for me, and of course I also reaped the secondary benefits of extra aerobic fitness.

I bought my first "very own" 3-speed from Sears not long after I started my new life as a post-military brat. I say very own because I paid for it out of my allowance savings. It was the first "major purchase" of my life. I needed it after having just gotten my first job ever delivering The Saginaw News house-to-house.

It was less than a year since my dad had retired to his home state of Michigan and we were still living with my grandma Haley and Uncle Bill in Birch Run while a contractor built my parents' "dream house." It was during my 13th summer, the June-July-August period just before I started the 9th grade.

I nicknamed that bicycle “Blacky.” I’ll give you one guess what color it was.

I can’t remember for sure if I had my own bicycle before that one, but I’m pretty sure my parents had bought me one that I quickly outgrew. I’m dimly aware of having a little red boy’s bike when we lived in Turkey for the second time from the autumn of 1969 until late 1970. In fact, now that I think of it, I’m sure I did, because even as I write this that little red bicycle is prompting memories of another red bicycle—my father’s.

During that second tour at Karamursel Air Station, my dad bought a used direct drive bicycle, the kind with no gear shifting. The chain simply went from the pedal hub sprocket to the rear wheel sprocket. To stop while riding it, the rider stood on the pedals in the reverse direction exactly like BMX bikes still work today. When it was new that bike had been painted red, but when my dad brought it home you couldn’t tell where the rust started and the paint ended.

He took that clunker apart, sanded off all the rust, fixed its mechanical problems, and painted it a bright candy apple crimson. He had that thing in pretty good shape too—it looked brand new when he was done. That’s my dad—always has to have a “project” going, and fixing up that crappy bike and making it new was just one in a countless series of his undertakings over the decades.

One early afternoon, he didn’t see me, but I saw him on that shiny red bike of his. He was coming home during a break from where he worked in the “elephant cage,” which was a gigantic peculiar looking Cold War eavesdropping antenna that the American Air Force used to “listen in on” the Soviets.

I can see him now as he was then, wearing starched and creased olive drab fatigues with sharply contrasting bright white and blue master sergeant stripes on his short sleeves; a day-glo orange squadron cap is pushed down low over his eyes to keep it from blowing off as he rides.

I watched him from my vantage point on one of the deserted little league fields. I was hanging out in the 1st base dugout behind a chain link fence. It felt like I was spying on him, since he didn’t notice me watching him. It seems strange to think about, but at 42 he was eight years younger than I am now.

Riding that bike back and forth to work everyday must have gotten him into pretty good shape because he was really zooming along. I thought about calling out to him as he passed by only about 20 yards away, but I was enjoying seeing him like that, tooling along down the long straight road from his radio maintenance shop. I knew he was heading back towards base housing where we lived for a quick lunch break and I didn’t want to hold him up from that.

I was 12 years old, so that was 38 years ago, but I can still envisage his legs pumping like pistons. His head low over the handlebars, he stood on the pedals straining for speed. As he approached I could hear him breathing strong and rhythmically, almost panting. Boy oh boy, was he ever flying!

I had been lying lazily on the scarred wooden dugout bench having just ridden there on that little red boy's bike I described at the beginning of this post. It was leaned up against the chain link just a few feet away from where I had been idly reposing; but then, excited to see him so unexpectedly, I stood up, pressing my nose against the links of the fence for a better view of my “flying father.” I remember feeling a surge of love for him and being so proud that he was my dad.

Good memories those…

If you get the time, come back later for more “bicycle memories” in some future posts…

Tiger’s Lucky 13

The last time I wrote about Tiger Woods' golf play in a “Major” was when he lost to Angel Cabrera in the 2007 U.S. Open a couple months back. I’m afraid I didn’t cut him a whole lot of slack after that loss, and I suppose I should have considering his baby daughter was about to make her entrance into the world.

In that post I also questioned Tiger’s continuing loyalty to his caddy, Steve Williams; I disparaged the robust New Zealander, perhaps unfairly, saying that his greens reading ability seemed to be wanting.

It’s funny how a win can suddenly change attitudes and outlooks. As far as I’m concerned, all is forgiven. Steve Williams, Tiger’s faultless Kiwi caddy, is the man; and Steve’s unbeatable boss man, El Tigre, is EL SEÑOR!

Am I a fair weather fan or what!

How wonderful is it to be retired and not have to worry about staying up for three or four straight days from 3 a.m. to 7 a.m. to watch Tiger play live in all the annual major championships? Well, its VERY wonderful! I do it four times a year, once for each of the four majors; but I almost didn’t continue to stay up all night after Tiger’s ho-hum score of 71 on Thursday. I hung in there though, and after Tiger’s 63 on Friday I wasn’t about to miss even a moment of the rest of this year’s so-called PGA of America.

He almost set a new record in that second round when he came oh so close to shooting the first 62 ever in a major. With Tiger, you EXPECT the man to break records every time he plays, and that record 62 was SO tantalizingly close! On the final putt the ball was half way into the cup when it lipped out instead, very nearly doing a 180. Still, his 63 ultimately provided him the cushion he needed to win the tournament two days later.

As I said, I had missed most of Thursday’s first 18, and after seeing that Tiger was 6 shots back and apparently nearly out of contention I almost blew off doing the rest of the 3 sleepless nights in a row thing. I decided to go ahead though, when I saw that “rip it & grip it” John Daly had the lead. I figured, ‘What the heck, might be interesting,’ and as it turns out, I stayed up instead to see El Tigre roar to the front of the pack in one fell swoop because of that magnificent 63.

Poor John Daly did his usual “thing” for the crowd, which is to “swing for the fences,” and quickly fell away on the leader board when he continued to hit “foul balls” instead of homeruns; but he did get plenty of “oohs and ahhhs” though, so all was not lost for the chunky blonde Arkansan.

Watching it on TV from here in the Philippines, the Tulsa Southern Hills golf course used for this year’s PGA didn’t look all that hard, but from the generally low scores, it must have been a real doozy. The fairways looked exceptionally narrow and virtually hemmed in by tall trees, while the greens looked similarly well-guarded by lots of sand and water; but the real killer were the roughs.

In the hot dry summer climate of Oklahoma, the grass of choice for most golf courses is the hardy Bermuda variety; but it’s wiry and tough, and can almost pull the club out of a golfer’s hands when trying to swing through it. Again and again I’d see shots barely roll out off the second fairway cut and literally disappear into the Bermuda rough; or just the opposite, the ball would come to a rest high on top of the thatch of thick tendrils so that a swung clubhead passed almost completely under it and cause an embarrassing whiff. That tricky rough was the real culprit for all the low scoring. They should have put signs up on the edges of each fairway: “All ye who enter, BEWARE!”

Watching him play to his 13th Major win I thought back on Tiger’s career. A few years after he first hit the professional circuit more than a decade ago, his incredible distance off the tee was the talk of the town and that unmatched ability to hit the long drive began to get under people's skins--the guy just wasn't human. Not so much anymore, but back then, off the tee, he could pop a ball easily 30 or 40 yards past most of his competition. Now, the other players all have learned to hit almost as long, so the "long ball" isn't quite the advantage it once was for "The Tig." But at the time, the chatter was that it wasn’t fair and that perhaps “something” should be done to “Tiger proof” the courses.

Simply lengthening the fairways wouldn’t work; that would just play into Tiger’s strong suit. Even though no one in the PGA has admitted it, I’m sure they started trying to “equalize” the play by “adjusting” course designs in ways to make accuracy as important, or more important, than distance. The problem is that virtually everything they’ve tried, whether making the greens more “slippery,” narrowing the fairways, or adding sand traps, water hazards, and trees, NOTHING has worked to stop Tiger’s domination.

The problem, if there really is one, is that Tiger’s game isn’t just about hitting the ball far, although that’s always been one of his talents. The man is accurate too. I’ve seen him on TV do demonstrations of that accuracy. He’d hit a tiny target with an iron from progressively further away, as far as 50 or more yards, something that seems almost impossible to the average player.

During one of his British Open wins, I first remember Tiger using his ability to use long irons with great precision to hit his famous “stinger.” A stinger shot is where he uses a two or three iron to strike the ball so that while traveling a long way, it never gets more than 10 feet off the ground. The winds were so strong during that tournament that any shot over 15 feet high was at the whim of the swirling gusts and could end up anywhere, usually at the bottom of a deep pot bunker. Because of his ability to hit that stinger, Tiger won that one running away; and you know it wasn’t an easy shot, or everyone else would have been doing it too.

The irony is that in trying to reel him back to the “mortal players,” what they throw at him, of course they throw at the other players as well. It never works—Tiger usually adjusts better than most anyone else out there, so it just doesn’t matter what they do. When he beats the course he usually wins the tournaments as well. The only way to bring Tiger Woods back to the field is to either make him play blindfolded or to just handicap him—make him start out with 5 or 6 strokes. I’m joking, but its true. Supposedly in jest, his fellow players, all exasperated, say this exact same thing all the time.

The “problem” with Woods is that he doesn’t really have a single strong suit; his entire game is solid. When one facet fails him, the rest of his shots are still available to carry him to victory. It’s no wonder then that he ALWAYS seems to be at or near the top of the leader board. The amazing thing is that he’s in contention EVERY time he plays. None of the other world’s top ten players can say that. In fact, no one is even half as consistent as Tiger Woods.

A few years back I made a remark to my brother that Woods must be some kind of natural phenomenon, as if God sprinkled Jack Nicklaus dust on him when he was born.

He disavowed me of that notion very quickly when he remarked, “Nah, no way. The guy is good because he’s practiced since he was 2 years old. He worked hard to get that way and you diminish his skills by saying it all just came naturally, as if he didn’t have to try.”

My brother is right. Tiger Woods is an athlete that has perfected every portion of himself that makes him successful at golf. His body is sculpted muscle and trained sinew designed in his workouts for golf and golf only. He has a complete handle on the mental side of the game, which is perhaps THE most important part. I’ve heard say that his Buddhism helps keep him unruffled and focused. His dad instilled a work ethic that drives him to hit thousands of practice shots in ALL conditions. He practices in the rain, cold, heat, and wind; because he knows he might just have to compete in those circumstances. Somehow, I just don’t think that other players like the overweight Darren Clark or the similarly paunchy and cigarette smoking Angel Cabrera takes their training as athlete-golfers nearly as seriously as Woods does.

The best way to play Tiger competitively is to NOT play WITH him, because if he can see you across the tee, or across the fairway or on the green, he WILL beat you. In fact, the best thing that could have happened to Angel Cabrera during this year’s US Open that he went on to win was that he was NOT paired with Tiger during that last round. If he had been, it’s almost a certainty that he would have gotten spanked. Tiger’s very presence seems to cause unforced shotmaking errors and mistakes in judgment in players attempting to tee off with him. It’s almost funny.

So what is it about Woods that causes other players to breakdown out on the course once they “earn” the dubious privilege of pairing with him? I chuckle every time I hear the brave words quoted from these luckless fellows during their pre-match interviews. They'll say things like, "he's beatable," "I'm just going to keep playing MY game," or "...its a thrill," or "I'm looking forward to it." Yeah right! They don't mean a word of any of it.

As soon as they start play these "big talkers" wilt like day-old cut lettuce. During this year’s PGA he did it to Tway on Friday, to Verplank on Saturday, and on Sunday to Ames.

He ALWAYS does it, and I love it that he does. He’s like history on legs. Who was it that broke Hank Aaron’s homerun record, Bonds was it? I forget, because that cheater doesn’t come close to the legacy being made by Tiger Woods.

Throwing the Baby Out with the Bathwater...

As soon as I heard about the “Baghdad Diarist” and then read of his “first hand” descriptions of “scandalous” troop actions in Iraq, I was skeptical.

Why? Because of my own experiences in today’s all-volunteer professional armed forces. I’ve only been retired for 5 years; I still know people who serve and I think things have not changed so much since I got out.

The “USA haters” that seem to predominate the media are infected with the mindset that people who serve in uniform MUST have something “wrong” with them; after all, they think, ‘Why would “these people” join up and continue in a military that pursues such an “evil and misguided policy?” ’

Speaking for myself and others like me, if I were serving in-theater and saw that our policies were truly immoral—I WOULD "quit" (not reenlist); or, desiring to continue my career, I’d find some other way. I’d probably blow the whistle to my congressman and senators; I’d tell everyone I knew about the wrongs I was seeing, and I would DEMAND that they get us the heck out.

But, isn't that what Beauchamp did? ...or was it?

I can tell you that that way of thinking is the mindset of most military folks, people who are extremely honorable. Thing is, that’s NOT what is happening. By and large, the troops serving in the war are not squawking about being a cog in some nefarious endeavor. In fact, statistically, most are reenlisting; and by all accounts the morale is not low.

The best way for the antiwar crowd to explain this phenomena is to discredit those directly involved in the war, and what better way to do that than by finding one of the troops “willing” to actually describe how truly awful the whole thing is. When they found Scott Beauchamp they must have thought they had hit the journalistic lotto; that they had found their next little John Kerry. They must have been so excited by the prospect that the concept of checking the veracity of the storyteller (and his story) must have flown right out the window. Kind of like when “Baghdad Pete” didn’t bother to prove that US forces had actually used nerve gas in Laos in 1970 before publishing it as fact. (To this day Peter Arnett STILL believes this fabrication).

Putting myself in Beauchamp's shoes, maybe I too would “make some stuff up” to make my whole outfit look bad. Perhaps I would do this if I was some low-ranking Sad Sack with a chip on my shoulder and an emotional screw loose, maybe with a beef against an “overbearing” sergeant or arrogant officer. Malcontents have been in the military since before the days of Alexander, but his aggrieved rank-and-file did not have internet access. In Pvt. Scott Thomas Beauchamp's case, he found out exactly how easy it was to make some horrible stuff up so that the Bush-hating lose-the-war-at-all-costs-crowd would EAT it up. He told them what they wanted to hear and they were off to the races.

As it turns out, this private, although technically in-theater, is by no means near any of the battle zones of Iraq. His experiences can only describe truthfully what he’s seen in the safety of the rear areas of Kuwait, but that’s NOT what he claimed in his anecdotes. That the anti-war media latched onto the falsehoods written by this obviously peeved and probably troubled individual says a lot about their agenda of getting us out of Iraq no matter what it takes, even if it means publishing “made-up stuff.”

In a phrase, I find what Beauchamp did to be very “John Kerryesque.” Remember him? He did the same thing when he came back from Vietnam in the early 70s. He also appealed to an antiwar crowd by confabulating his former mates into war criminals, all in the interest of establishing a liberal political career. Just like Beauchamp, he did this by smearing his own comrades. In my book it makes both of these fellows similarly despicable, although I’d rate Kerry far higher on my “contempt scale.” Beauchamp is a lying “no body” turned into a “some body” by some defective “alleged” journalists.

Let me tell you something. THE most idealistic and professional military EVER is the American one. It is made up of THE most freethinking bunch of individuals that have ever served in ANY significant military force.

It is THE most educated group, military or not, of its size per capita ANYWHERE in the world. Not only that, it is the best trained, not only in what they do, but also in how to do it ethically. Every year, for the last ten or so years that I served, I took mandatory classes on such subjects as the Law of Armed Conflict, The US Military Code of Conduct, The Code of Ethics in Government, and Human Relations. The troops in the battle zones are continually bombarded with Rules of Engagement and how to properly conduct themselves in virtually every conceivable situation. Believe me, our people KNOW right from wrong; if not from what they learned at home BEFORE they enlist, then by what they are immersed in AFTER they are sworn in.

Today’s army is not the one that served in Vietnam, which was made up by and large of non-careerist draftees. Even so, those citizen soldiers mostly served with distinction, bravery and attention to duty; but you’d never think so if you watch the films about that war that have come from the skewed minds of the other batch of USA haters that run Hollywood. Both batches of America haters, the Hollywood and media ones, simply feed off each other’s regurgitated hatred. What isn’t accurate, in the interest of furthering their agenda, they’ll simply dramatize into existence. Their message: “See how bad WE are!”

Some of the things Beauchamp claims to have witnessed are really not all that terrible—lowdown for sure, but not criminal. Making fun of a disfigured woman, running down dogs with their vehicles, and wearing bones on their helmets are all undoubtedly screwed up things to do, but by no means do they rise above mere awful behavior. Even so, I have no doubt that any NCO or officer witnessing any of those things would immediately step in and correct them. Beauchamp himself should have turned in anyone doing such actions. By not doing so, under military code, he also was complicit.

This is not to say that some individuals do not do dreadful things. I’ve witnessed idiots in uniform do plenty of stupid things. Every time I saw it I stepped in and corrected it. It’s the beauty of the military system because every NCO and officer is REQUIRED to do it. I miss the days when I could go up to some young E-3 or O-1 in the base exchange, identify myself by my name and rank and remind them that they should watch their language in a public place. Try that in a Wal-Mart and you’ll more than likely receive a healthy dose of “F**k you!”

In fact, we are much better at institutional self-correction than most any other organization, including religious ones. I wonder how many priests, cardinals and bishops knew that one of their own was messing around with altar boys and did nothing about it? (Obviously a rhetorical question.) We know what happened at Abu Ghraib because a troop seeing wrong being done turned it in. The Army was already investigating when the press got wind of it. The same thing goes with the Marines and Soldiers who were recently tried and convicted of rape and murder. It wasn’t some reporter who exposed those crimes—it came from people within the service, and that’s exactly how it was designed to work.

Regardless of how the war ends, whether we leave with the terrorists in charge or with a valid Iraqi government in place, I am positive that for the most part our troops will have conducted themselves honorably. We will always have aberrant behavior from a few individuals, but the system is set up to put them right. The one thing we should never do is throw the baby out with the bathwater, especially THIS baby! Historically, there has NEVER been a more upright baby than this one.

The Rainy Season "Dodong" Blues

It’s just past 9 p.m. Tropical Storm Dodong passed over us all last night, all day today, and has been dumping rain in big buckets since the afternoon. It’s coming down so hard right now that I can hardly hear the TV. Looking at it on the Internet on the Pagasa weather site I can see that we are now on the backside of the “eye.” Click on the photo to get a better view of the overlay.

Tropical Storms don’t have the violent winds that typhoons possess, but they certainly can unload a whole lot of precipitation. My first time in the tropics was Western Africa in 1977-1978 and I learned then about the difference between tropical rainstorms and what I was used to up in the northern climes.

The primary distinction between the weather nearer the equator and the northern climes, other than the obvious temperature difference, seems to be the sheer volume of precipitation in the tropics. During rainy season, what passes for a gully washer in the States is just a passing shower here, only here it can last for hours.

Based on the unbelievable quantity of falling rain in these parts, I can see why it would be so important for countries like this to manage the cutting of their forests, especially in the hills and mountains. Lasting for days at a time, this kind of rain will easily super saturate hillside soils that could then potentially collapse under its own waterlogged weight, something that does indeed happen here on occasion with dreadful results.

Last year, during a visit to the northern valley province of Cagayan I saw the indirect negative effects of how this rainy season rain can be extremely destructive when the harvesting of forests goes “unmanaged,” which is one way to put it. I spent several days in the little town of Gatarran on the Cagayan River and I was struck at its wideness. It seemed as wide as the Colorado or the Mississippi.

I spoke to a wonderful 87-year-old woman who had lived there her whole life; she told me that the river is now more than three times the width it was when she was a girl, and it gets wider in some spots by as much as 10 meters a year. The river is literally eating up the valley. She blamed the greedy timber harvesters, land developers, and shameless officials that let it happen. Every year, more houses and property fall into the river, forcing people to rebuild a little further away or to just move on to some other location. What a shame, and totally avoidable.

The rain is slacking off now. These storms are like that. From the satellite I can see that a mini-eye is passing over, but once it moves north with the rest of the storm towards Taiwan I know the hard stuff will continue.

I shouldn’t have gone out today, but the rain didn’t seem so bad at 12 noon when I buzzed away on my Chinese scooter wearing my waterproof camping suit. The rain had been falling steady and not crazy hard like it eventually did. By 6 p.m. when it was time to head home it had been a deluge for at least three hours and the streets could not hold the runoff.

I had been listening and watching it fall like that and feeling an intense dread the longer and harder it fell. The reason for my trepidation is the acute unreliability of my “ride.” My scooter is Chinese, an “American Voyager,” and basically it’s a piece of crap. It didn’t seem too bad when I bought it in February 2004, but its crappiness soon became apparent as it began to average downtime for repairs of at least once a month. For instance, I’ve had to change out my accelerator cable a dozen times, the first time only 5 months after buying it new, and that’s just the start of its shortcomings.

My advice: don’t buy Chinese motor transport of any kind for at least another 15 years; spend the extra money and go for Taiwanese or Japanese wheels. My next motorbike will be a Honda or a Yamaha.

The worst thing about my Chinese piece of crap scooter is that it hates rain, and that’s not good when you live in the Philippines. It doesn’t matter that I’ve replaced or rebuilt virtually every part of the darn thing, it still gives me fits in the rain, and with today’s extreme conditions it did me in once again.

I was half way home and thought hopefully that I might just sputter all the way back into my carport just over a mile away. That is until I chugged slowly off the north end of the Hensonville Bridge and into a foot deep rivulet. That’s where it stalled.

I had to totally wet my shoes and socks to push my POS* scooter to a higher and drier area somewhat out of the way of the splashing traffic. Then, with a prayer and a curse on my lips I pressed the starter button. I don’t know if it was my entreaty to the Lord or my curses at the bike, but it weakly turned over, and happily for me, continued to do so.

I hopped back on and throttled her up hoping to blow out any of the stray water that had killed it to begin with. The engine didn’t sound very convincing to me, it hiccupped and refused to roar back to full gallop, but I figured what the heck—Go for it!

I knew the back road to my subdivision was going to have the deepest water yet, so I determined to keep the throttle going with my right hand while working the brake when necessary with my left. My hope was that keeping the engine well gassed and revved would allow it to fight through the occasional “gulp” of water.

Sure enough, when I made the turn onto the dreaded road that was more river than road, it was worse than I had imagined. I was directly behind a jeepney chock full of miserable looking damp passengers and I watched some of them curiously watching me from their sardine-like positions. We were barely moving, but as long as I WAS moving then I was satisfied with the forward progress. I held my breath listening to the sick sound coming from the engine of the unwilling Chinese two-wheeled fiend under me.

The jeepney pulled over to drop someone off, and with a warning beep, I carefully passed it trying not to splash anyone. At last, a high place in the road and I relaxed a little. Soon, however, I found myself back in the floodwaters and directly behind a pair of trikes moving in tandem as slow as they could without being motionless.

Now, I had a problem. I could NOT go that slow and keep the engine lit. Several times it nearly died as I jockeyed the hell out of the throttle while jamming on the brake at the same time. So, I had no choice but to pass them, even though I did not want to do it. I knew when I eventually went around that I was going to drench them with my wake water, but good.

I sighed, gave them a quick beep, and cranked it up to make my move. I tried to shift as far to the left of them as I could, but my bow wave was necessarily high as I goosed my speed up to pass before an oncoming car reached me.

I cringed hearing the passengers and drivers of the two trikes protest loudly at the dirty road water I was splashing up onto them. “Hey!” one particularly outraged fellow yelled at me.

“Sorry!” I called out, but I was also irritated that they had forced me to it.

Luckily, with only a few more sputters and hesitations in some of the really deep spots, I made it all the way home. I learned my lesson though—next time I’ll just stay put until the storm passes. OR, better yet, until I get me a more dependable scooter. Hopefully soon, my next bike is going to have a stamp that says “Made in Japan.”

*piece of sh*t