Author: Bill

Did manage to get in a movie [kinda] last night before retiring to our cool little bedroom….. I say kinda because that could just barely be called a movie. I was really disappointed. It was a Matthew McConaughey movie that we hadn’t seen yet. Older movie came out in 2012, called Killer Joe (yes….. we both made it a point to remember the title) We both like him as an actor and were excited to find this show…….. OMG….. what a piece of dog poo……. He must have been hurting for money or something…… good lord that was terrible~! Only way to put it. A nice mostly decent nights sleep and I was up and at ’em ready to go diving again. It is toasty warm here now, even early in the morning, so that the water feels fabulous when you bail into it. It was Wednesday, so my Queen’s day to work as well, so I rolled her out at her appointed time. I had intended to skip breakfast again as I was just not feeling it….. but once I made my bride her breakfast it kinda sparked me a little bit and I made me a couple of eggs. We were both soon out the door on our way to work.

My first dive site was one I’ve only dove a couple of times…. but I really like it because it always had a couple of mildly aggressive sharks. (Always good for pictures) We weren’t in the water more than a minute and was greeted by three sharks……. two of them average size 4′ – 4½’….. there was also one that was an easy 6’….. a big un~! As soon as I got my camera unfolded and ready and made sure we had all our divers…. I started calling the sharks….. WOW— that worked…. for the big one, it worked really well…… he made a bee line at me, [[Oh Crap]] that had me swallowing pretty hard…… not sure what he was intrigued with, but he was on me…… he circled me 3 times before heading off to see what else the group had to offer. He came at me fast enough and aggressive enough, I had to ‘bop’ him on the nose to back him off (with my camera). Fortunately….. for you all…. I hit the camera trigger when I ‘bopped’ him and I now have a really fun picture of the ‘bop’. —AND— the video camera was running….. so [if I can get it to load] so you will get to see that whole thing from my view point….. interested to hear what you think…… it is a pretty decent representation of what I see when that kind of stuff happens. Wanna get this up and get a shower… so I’m out….. not sure I’m brave enough to try another movie  😉

Sadly- I could not get the video to load….. I’ll keep working on it.

Vera— Eel warning  😉

Good Night Y’all . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Thankx for stopping in~!

[I think] We watched a movie last night after I got away from here (computer)….. It really is pitiful you know…… two grown adults can’t remember what they watched on TV less than 24 hours ago…… piti-ful…… I remember my Queen did some doctoring on my ankles….. seems as though I have managed to booger them up again and now my lower legs are swelling again. And I did so good getting them back to their normal size there for a little bit. Dammit Emmit~! I’ll just be slapped up side the head though if I can remember what we watched…… that’s almost funny…… I’m fairly sure our A/C is on for the season now…. I can’t imagine trying to go to sleep now without it until around Thanksgiving when it starts cooling off again…. Sure does make for some awful nice sleepin’ though…… even if it is stupid expensive.

Up for diving this morning…… belly still not in the mood for breakfast. I got camera batteries all loaded and everything  readied for the day and hauled out to the Suzuki. I did finally convince myself to nuke a Jimmy Deans breakfast sausage/egg/cheese biscuit and managed to get it down. Still not sure that was a good idea or not. My bride made us grilled cheese and bean with bacon soup for dinner….. tasted wonderful, but the way my belly is grumbling right now – I’m not exactly sure that was a good idea or not either. We’ll see. Had a fun surprise in the mail today….. a “care” package from Rachael…. full of all kind of fun goodies….. just wanted us to know she was thinking about us~~       Two fun dives with a fairly small boat of divers today. Sharks were scarce and uncooperative…. had a couple of fun turtles that didn’t mind me doing my thing and almost posed for me. I have some nice video of them (with my new toy) but there is something different about the way these videos are formatted and I cannot download them yet…. at least not the way I need to. I’m sure it’s because of something I haven’t learned yet. I am anxious for you all to see them tho, to see if you can see the difference in quality. Another small boat tomorrow…. yay…… Probably another movie tonight…… probably ought to write the title down huh ?  😉

Good Night Y’all + + + + + + + + + + + +  Thankx for stopping in~!

GX010024 <—- Video [new camera]

Another wonderful night’s slumber….. compliments mostly I suspect due to the fact that once again the bedroom was nicely chilled before we went to bed. We watched the re-make of Red Dawn…… it wasn’t bad….. it wasn’t good…. not quite as cheesy as the original (which I think is a good thing)…… they lost me right at the very beginning when all the parachutes were coming down and the airplanes were under the parachutes……. having made a jump “or two”….. I can say with all due expertise… that’s not how it works folks…… there were several “that’s not how it works” moments and too many of those ruin a movie for me……. but I’m just a grumpy old particular B*st*rd I guess……..but… back to the blog title….. after a glorious nights sleep….. I rolled out, bumped charged all my batteries…. got everything loaded and hauled out to the Suzuki. Against my better judgement, I opted out of making me breakfast. The appetite just wasn’t there and good common sense told me to skip it this morning…… so I did. Fairly full boat, but there were a couple of familiar faces on it and all the others seemed to be good fun folks…… I did my spiel on the way to the first dive site, which was Emerald Gardens……. which as you may recall is ‘home’ to Sea Biscuit…… the islands biggest ‘Sea Horse’.  Everybody did good diving and there was not much else for me to do but take pictures and experiment with my new GoPro. I wound up taking 11 video’s…… and oh good people….. let me tell you what~~~ After all the tutorials I watched yesterday, I set the camera for what I thought I was gonna want…… and oh… my… goodness…… the quality of these videos is nuts….. and I’m fairly sure they’re only get better as I continue to learn the camera….. so expect to see a lot more video’s. It also makes a ton of difference in light of the fact I can now see what I am videoing  😉     I hope to greatly enhance your understanding of what I see during a shark encounter as well….. and yes Vera— even of the big green eels….. but I’ll try and remember the heads up for you  when I put them up  😉   That’s about it for my day…. a little shy of my 500 words…. but I want to get a shower and snag a little couch time. If there is something ‘down there’ you’d like to see…… please let me know— I have a great way to show it to you now~!

Good Night Y’all : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : Thankx for stopping in~!

GX010013 <—— Video

Keeping on with the relaxation and enjoying our weekend… found a movie last night that looked good. We had watched one and it was decent called Horizon. Unknown actors and small cast, but mostly well done. We wrapped that up and saw another that looked like it might be good. Good enough, that we decided to stay up and watch it right then and there. Big steps for us oldster’s….. after all it already after 9:00pm by golly~!! We’ve had our Geritol and in bed usually by then, but we stayed up to watch. Thankfully, it turned out to be really good. Good enough that I did not nod off, not even once.  We were surprised that we hadn’t seen the movie yet….after all, it was 10 years old with Denzel Washington (we both like him). Name of the movie was Flight. You’ll probably definitely want to see that one. It was right at Midnight before we crawled into bed—- but having started the A/C after the first movie….. the bedroom was nice and cool when we got in there, Fading off to sleep was easy peezy last night~!

Up a little later than usual for me after singeing the Midnight oil. Pretty standard morning, news, coffee, FB and breakfast. I did manage a couple of hours of tutorials on my new video camera. Got to try and keep some of the cobwebs cleared out of the old gray matter to learn all these newfangled camera gadgets~! Pretty amazing little camera. I can’t wait to get it in the water with it tomorrow and see what it can do~! Did have time for a movie while my Queen made us a bite to eat. Movie was The Marksmen with Liam Neeson (we both like him too). Another action movie star trying to get in ‘one more’ action flick before he gets to old. Guess I should watch my mouth…..I’m still doing my level best to act like I’m still in my 20’s…….  LOL. It was pretty good though….. I’d give it a strong 7+. We moved up to the table to enjoy our dinner, but already have our next movie picked out….Red Dawn (2012). As a rule, I’m not a fan of remakes…. but for ‘cheesy’ movies I’ll make an exception. That movie is probably in my top 5 of cheesy movies….. With Roadhouse and Con Air both vying for first place. How about you ??? What’s your favorite cheesy movie ??

Good Night Y’all % % % % % % % % % % % % Thankx for Stopping in~!

Enjoying the weekend……. kinda sounds like I work for a living huh? Nice to know I don’t have to anymore. Retirement has actually turned out to be soooo much better than what I thought it would be. Of course, a big part of that I guess is I had no idea what to expect…… guess I had it stuck in my brain, I wasn’t going to get to see much of retirement….. but hey– look at me here ‘killin‘ ‘ it~!  Broke down and fired up the A/C last night…… jeeez that felt good to lay in there sucking up all that conditioned air~! PLUS— you don’t hear the barking dogs, horny Peacocks, falling Mango’s or grazing horses if they are out and about. I woke up a little before 05:00 painfully aware of the fact that I had to whizz…… wanting to sleep in…. I went ahead and got up, did my stuff and went.back.to.bed. I was so proud of myself…… and actually stayed there until a little before 08:00…… a lot of that was because my Queen kinda prompted some of it….. but it sure was nice to lay in that dark, cool room and just kinda snooze…….. that’s what I’m talkin’ about. We were sitting enjoying out coffee when a jeep I recognized pulled up. It was Stephanie’s friends (Chris & Elizabeth) They were dropping off some supplies they didn’t use and wanted to thank us once again for helping them out and showing them around the island. A nice young couple. We wished them safe travels and they were gone. We had a small breakfast. I wanted to try and stick to the list I had made yesterday…. so almost as soon as we were done eating….. I got up and waddled my big ole fat touchas outside, dragging my little ole shop vac and some paper towels with me. For the next hour or so, I worked on the little red Suzuki. Was definitely in need of some TLC. It’s nowhere near show room condition, but looks a hellva lot nicer than it did and the owner should be able to tell a difference. I did a light check on it….. it needs a right head light, a front left turn signal and a left brake light. If we had a place here- I would happily go have those items repaired as a thank you for letting me use the vehicle, but sadly here on this island, that is probably a 2 or 3 day event. We’ll see.

Finished that up and came in and put away the Windex, the Pledge, theWD-40, the shop vac and the paper towels. I sat and cooled off (it’s getting toasty here) before donning a T-shirt and headed into town. I swang out past the dump first and dropped off a bag of gar~bãge before stopping in at Mitch’s (neighbor who owns a dive shop and is a GoPro dealer). Yeppers….. after a frustrating wait….. (I’m getting better) I finally left with a pretty little GoPro 10 and a couple of accessories. Kind of ‘irked‘ me a little bit, in that, before I could do a friggin’ thing with the camera— I had to go online and install updates. Now ain’t that a kick in the shins ?? I digress…… Updates completed….. batteries are charging. I should be able to just drop it right on to the bracket for my old camera (which I am still trying to resuscitate) and then spend a couple of minutes learning how to use it. Should be fairly self explanatory. Well, would you look at that….. here I was gonna get on here and tell you I ain’t got a heckva lot to talk about and I’m already over 600 words……. what a motor mouth~~

Good Night Y’all >> > > > > > > > > > > > Thankx for stopping in~!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my Cutie Pa-tootie~!!

GOPR0001  <—-Bridled Burrfish video- check it out-he’s a cute little beggar~

Birthday girl

My bride, Chris and Elizabeth

Miss Cynthia

What I wound up making myself for dinner last night

I’m such wild child~~ Rebel as it were……

So– I did this………….

A weird night of sleep……. if I didn’t know better I would think I was having flash backs from the Chantix….. weird dreams, back itching, almost sweating (no, I still haven’t turned on the A/C yet but it’s getting closer), but whatever the issue is….. just wasn’t a stellar night’s sleep. Up, gear all put together….. made me a decent breakfast this morning. Was starting to get into the habit of skipping that — even though I know it is a bad/stupid thing to do. Diving was awesome today……to start with, we only had 2 guests on the boat….. count ’em– 2. They were both decent divers, so didn’t require any additional attention. Neither were zoomies, so I got some awesome shark pictures….. the visibility was crazy…. well over 200′~! Kinda like swimming around in a big aquarium. Loved it~! Plus– I got to spend almost every bit of each dive…. diving [instead of baby siting] and playing with my camera and I have the pictures to show for it….. they came out so good~! Back here and got pictures edited and put up. Home early, done editing early…… just the way I like it. Looking forward to a shower and maybe a movie. We wound up watching Spiderman (II?) Not sure, just know I hadn’t seen it yet. It was okay…. pretty cheesy and I really miss MJ not being in it….. We need to find another series to watch. Vera— we wound up watching The Lincoln Lawyer [series]…. we both loved it…… just wish it would have had a few more seasons. Thank you for the recommendation~! (also….there are a couple of [small] eel pictures below)

Easy and hopefully not to busy day planned for tomorrow.  I want to go to the local Deli and see if I can score some decent sammich fixin’s….. Turkey &  Chicken as I am trying to eat a little smarter, although I may snag some German Bologna if they have any as well. Somebody put up another picture of a big ole Fried Bologna sammich on FB and dang if it doesn’t look good~!! Looks like I’m gonna have to swing by the local dive shop and look at a new GoPro…… I gave it the old college try and still haven’t been able to get my ‘4‘ to come back to life  🙁  .  I also intend to spend a little time showing the little Suzuki I’m driving some love. It looks like it hasn’t seen any recently, so as a thank you to the guy letting me borrow it, I’m gonna spruce it up a little bit. For now, I’m gonna go in and see what I can rustle up to eat….. my belly is starting growl….. guess I should have went to the Deli today~~  😉

Good night Y’all – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – Thankx for stopping in~!

Another presentable nights sleep….. well, for most of it. I think I need a new pillow. Mine craps out about an hour before I am ready to get up. I beat it up, fold it, tuck it and here lately just cannot get it to feel the way I need it to. That is one of the reasons I get up long before I need to. If I stay there, I wind up with a sore neck and usually a headache— which is a sucky way to start your day, so I just get on up. Now I just have to get my touchas to the store and look for a new one. About 2 years ago, I ordered a “My Pillow”….. jeez what a freakin’ joke that thing was….. and a phenomenal waste of money. I especially like the way they conveniently don’t tell you that you will need to tumble your pillow in a dryer for 45 minutes before using it….. like all the other crap on the idiot box…. you can’t believe a word you hear. I rubbed some Biofreeze on my neck and got started on my day. I made me and my bride a bite to eat and got us both out the door. I had to leave my little GoPro here. It sat in rice over night, and this morning I did get a light to come on (which is a really good sign) but not usable, so I repacked it in rice and let it sit. I’m gonna try to resuscitate it when I’m done writing this. If I can’t get it to work, guess I’ll go shopping Saturday……

Dives today weren’t bad. Had a few extra people that required some attention, but not real bad. Nothing spectacular on the dives, a couple of lobsters, some lionfish, a couple of sharks, but I couldn’t get them anywhere near me. We had a couple of zoomies on the dives. If you don’t know what a zoomie is, anytime there is a fascinating creature…. a zoomie will kick as hard and as fast as they can toward that particular creature, which in turns terrifies the creature and they do their level best to avoid you….. and they can always out swim you~! If by chance the poor creature is trapped in a tight spot and can’t get immediately away, the zoomies will flail and kick enough to stir up enough sand and crap in the water it will take hours for the waters to clear up, so it’s best to just swim on by. It’s aggravating in that you miss some really nice shots some times and the flailers often collide with the local plant and coral life and tear the hell out of them as well. They don’t mean to, but the results are the same. If they get to stupid with it… I will stop them. I don’t care if they get pi$$ed or not…….  Wow….. I just spit out an entire blog on that…….HMmmmm…. I was going to talk about how good the water felt today (hence the title)…. I always put the title and then [try] to write something that correlates to it……. try~~  😉

Good Night Y’all # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # Thankx for stopping in~!

#bill_hein_photography             http://www.billhein.passgallery.com 

After a much better night’s sleep and some decent rest…… I rolled out well before my alarm excited at the prospect of getting to get back in the water. It’s only been 3 days, but seemed much, much longer. I tend to panic that I’m gonna forget the blue dozen different things about getting my camera ready….. probably silly, but I have to deal with it. I got my bride fed and out the door and I was shortly behind her. I’m in my ‘loaner’ vehicle now. A beat up, mostly red, little Suzuki. It is a 5 speed that looks like it has had a long road to hoe….. but it runs and it enables me to be able to dive~! Can’t ask for a heckva lot more (and the owner isn’t charging me a dime to use it!!)  A dash light on here and there…. you can’t see out the side mirror on the driver side, your leg gets warm from the heat coming through the tear in the gasket around the shifter, it is a 5 minute two handed event to get the window on the driver side back up…… but I’m tickled to death to have it.

Dives today were sharky~! I didn’t get the quality of pictures I would have liked for having them that close to me…… but it’s one of those things….. my strobes weren’t set ‘just so’ and picture quality goes straight to $hit when the strobes are not lined up right…. and currently…. there is no way for me to tell that in my picture preview when I take a shot……. so a lesson learned…. check on strobe position more frequently~! I had another AWW $hit during the second dive today…. my little ole GoPro case sprang a leak and flooded the housing. Now you all know I have been debating about whether I want to spring for a newer model GoPro……. I may have resolved that issue today. Dammit Emmit~!! I currently have the camera opened up and filled with rice and have everything buried in rice. I’ll let it sit overnight and see if it is going to be salvageable. I’m not gonna hold my breath. Even as nice as that new GoPro would be….. I hate to loose that little 4….. me and it have been through a lot together~! A little shy on words tonight….. haven’t had my shower yet and want to get that out of the way.  Another small group tomorrow– diving~!

Good Night Y’all x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x Thankx for stopping in~!

Up WAAAAAY earlier than I wanted to be on a morning where I could have slept in and really, really, really, really wanted to. I got brave last night and had a couple of mixed drinks. I didn’t get get out of hand…. I think I had 4 drinks….. at the most. Turns out that was a really bad idea. The belly pains that I haven’t missed in months….. came back with a vengeance this morning and had me up and doing the morning sprints that I had come to hate. I got an ugly reminder this morning just how bad I do not miss that. So- I was up entirely too friggin early and between worn out from sprints…. my chest feeling like someone trying to push a finger through my breast bone and tired….. I finally weenied out and went in and laid down for a bit I didn’t really nap…… just kind of in and out of napping, but I got some rest and got up after 45 minutes feeling a lot better than I did when I laid down. Friends from the states were scheduled for their ATV ride at noon- so I got dressed and headed out the door. My Bride, watching it sprinkle and looking like it was going to pour, opted to sit this one out.

Got into town and loaded up on the ATV’s and away we went. A nice quiet relaxed ride. Our visitors did a good job riding, so we got to relax a little bit more than usual and enjoy the ride as well. Got them up through the mountain tops and rain forest and back safely. Island Kids wanted to get together for dinner— so I ran past the house to rinse the dust off of me (never did rain on us) and away we went. A nice long relaxed early dinner. I tried out their pulled pork sammich. Not bad, but I wouldn’t write home to Mom about it. The company is what made the meal so enjoyable. Everybody’d bellies full we all headed our separate ways. I ran out to center island to the staff house. One of the Instructors has a second car and offered it to me if I needed it. “It’s not much to look at, but it runs good” is how he described it. I got a call during dinner that my truck needs a new fuel pump and that by the time they order it and get it here from the states…. it will probably be Tuesday or Wednesday of next week before they get it. AAhhh Island Life…….. So I took up the guy’s offer on his vehicle. Wooey….. he wasn’t kidding, but I’m not complaining….. beats the hell out of being stuck at the house…. and now I get to dive~!!! He didn’t mention it was a standard shift. Guess he figured an old fart my age is gonna know how to drive a stick. I got home and showed it some love. I put a quart of oil in it. Filled the coolant container and the wiper fluid container and I put the front license plate back on. Good to go~! Diving tomorrow~!

Good Night Y’all > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Thankx for stopping in~!

I don’t know…….. maybe it’s getting older and less tolerant……. maybe just the way I am looking at stuff at this point in my life. I almost dreaded this holiday.  I know most people mean well…… they’re just stupid… going with whatever the ‘masses’ are saying or doing. Crazy the amount of well intentioned adults that don’t understand what this holiday is really about. I get the ‘kids‘ don’t get it. It’s really not their fault…… it’s their dumb ass parents that I fault. The kids are just going with the flow they see on social media. The people that gave the ‘ultimate sacrifice’….. they gave their life, so today’s moron’s can jump up and down and act like they care about something……. I didn’t fully realize it at the time when I enlisted….. but I signed up to do the same thing…. anything, up to, and including giving my life, to defend this country against all enemies.. foreign and domestic~~~    wow….. had absolutely no intention of even discussing any of this— but have seen and heard enough stupid bull$hit on the matter…… I guess it worked through. Please people…… do your due diligence on the holiday.

On to other things. I met our visitors at my shop this morning and it didn’t take long before they were immersed in the knowledge to do their first SCUBA dive. For me, it’s fun to watch these ‘newbies’ going through the training. I can very easily remember what was going through my brain when I went through it.  While I am rapidly approaching my 1000th dive….. sometimes it seems like just yesterday— that I was the newbie watching the person in front of me, wanting me to breathe under water and worrying that I was gonna die. They both did great— and according to them, had a great time. I got some really nice pictures of them doing their thing. They came out to the house and I grilled up some burgers while we previewed their pictures. I think……….. since I started this sentence….. there have been about 8 different things that have taken (or tried to) to take place…… right now… have NO idea what I intended to say……. DAMMIT Emmitt~!! Yes— yes I have…. am drinking….. and admittedly have [apparently] become quite the cheap date……. SOOooooo….. I’m gonna quit….. right here….. cause the harder I try to remember the point I wanted to make…… the more ridiculous its sounds (in my head)….. I think………….. ATV’s tomorrow……..!

Good Night Y’all ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! Thankx for stopping in~!