Maine – The ExhaustNotes Blog

By Mike Huber

I found myself without my motorcycle spending the holidays with friends and family in my hometown of Augusta, Maine. Normally Augusta is a pretty low key (boring) town to me. I pass my time here watching my favorite evening news show 207. The show covers local hometown people, their unique to Maine hobbies, and the lives of those that reside in Maine. The show is hosted by Rob Caldwell, and my favorite, Samantha York. It’s always a pleasure for those who are within earshot of me during this show. I constantly blurt out entertaining Maine stereotype commentary throughout the show. Everyone really loves and embraces my unedited commentaries as the show goes on (no they don’t).

Sadly the week or December 18^th would not be a week of me watching my beloved 207 news show due to a massive rain and windstorm that blew through the state that Monday. In all fairness to my obnoxious sidebar comments it was a hell of a storm. Up to 5 inches of rain and winds topping out close to 70mph. Although we made it through with minimal power outages, we were in the minority as close to 80 percent of the largest power company’s customers were down. Throughout the state about 400,000 were out of power (about a third of Maine’s entire population).

The following day I decided to go for a ride into the bustling city of Augusta to see what it looked like after the storm. I thought it would be quiet in the city; boy, was I incorrect. There were lines for gas that were easily 40 cars deep in almost every gas station. An attempt to go to a local grocery store was quickly shot down when the line to just get into the parking lot was about as long as the gas lines.

Now my biggest concern at this point was when the internet and cable would be restored so I can watch 207 and continue to absorb Maine life through their perspective. It was another letdown on Tuesday as when 19:00 came around, there was still no cable, which meant no 207. I had a bit of a cell phone signal to help pass the time and a decent book to read, but it just wasn’t the same without 207 to light up another dark evening. My mom helped me pass the time by having me engage in crosswords, and as I did it allowed me to reflect on my poor decisions in life that led me to this point. Either way as 19:30 approached that constant red light on the modem continually reassured me this would be another night without 207 had come and gone.

At the writing of this on Wednesday morning the water of the mighty Kennebec River has crested and I can only assume it will be another quiet evening without the internet (or 207) as the river level lowers and the heroes who work at the power companies restore power. We are all maintaining continued optimism for a speedy internet and power recovery so that we can enjoy 207 during the holiday season.

Stay strong my fellow Mainers!

Never miss an ExNotes blog:

Don’t forget: Visit our advertisers!

By Mike Huber

It was May 2012, Boston was becoming extremely boring, and the thought it might be time to expand my horizons began to grow inside my head. Still remaining as a “work from home” employee and having traveled throughout most of the United States with not so much as a hiccup in missing calls or people asking “Hey, where are you working from today?” Most wouldn’t expect any type of a response outside “my living room” or “the kitchen table” since that is what everyone was doing and to think an employee was winding up roads in New England on an Italian sport bike or hanging out in Haight Ashbury in a coffee shop while leading a project team call was unthinkable. Now, many will read this and think I wasn’t working and just touring the country while attending a call here and there. While that perspective isn’t totally wrong, it isn’t fully accurate, either. My organization was giving me awards every quarter, to include project manager of the year. While this was all happening, our company was constantly laying people off to the point where morale was extremely low.

Even with my newfound freedom I felt myself being dragged into the depths of depression due to the constant threat of layoffs. It was time to take this working from home to the next level. That being the “what if I don’t have a home” plan. It wasn’t much of a plan, but more of an execution of an idea born over a few beers in a dark Boston bar two years earlier.

Want more content? Please keep us going by clicking on the popup ads!

As with everything in life the first step is the scariest, but also the most critical to set the wheels in motion. After thinking this over for a bit the most effective way to ensure I followed through with my plan of setting myself free geographically was to rent out my Boston condo. This was easier than I expected, and had it rented through a management company in under two weeks. June 1^st my new tenant would move in. This was it. I was going to not have a home for at least a year. A timeline was now drawn for me to sell everything I owned and find out where my new “home” would be.

Somehow, I knew that returning to Boston wasn’t going to be in the cards. Having a massive fire sale seemed the best way to clear my life of material possessions that were now just clutter, and there was a lot of clutter to be cleared. With time being short it was an emotionless task to sell, donate, and give away almost everything. Paying for a storage unit for an unknown amount of time seemed pointless.

Once everything I owned was condensed into a small box of keepsakes and my travel backpack it was time to decide where to go. As I looked around the condo (which echoed because it was empty), I was left with the question that I probably should have started with before taking all these drastic actions. Where the Hell am I going to go? This is one of those “I may have screwed up” moments.

Originally the semi sorta kinda plan was to just drive around the United States and spend a month or so in each state and see what became of it. As I was looking at a map figuring out a few first stops on my new journey my phone rang. It was a 617 Boston number and instantly thought it was a spam call. Well, this is one call I am glad I didn’t push to voicemail. It was one of my relatives whom I had gifted a Magic Jack plug a year or so ago. He was calling to catch up and let me know he was had just moved to a house in the jungles of Nicaragua and had internet service that was just as fast as in the USA. My jaw dropped and I threw the map of the United States into the trash can that was already overflowing with trinkets and other items that I felt would never be needed again.

Feeling so lost in the United States (on many levels), a new environment would not only be healthy mentally for me but might propel my work motivation (which was currently nonexistent). Right about this time most of my friends and family were sure I had lost my mind. Going to Nicaragua on a one-way flight for an undetermined amount of time seemed reckless and a sure way to lose my job (some even felt my life would be in jeopardy).

Having previously traveled much of Central America, I knew most of these concerns were unfounded or pulled from a news article where one person had a bad experience. The news never really covers the thousands who traveled to this part of the world and had nothing but wonderful things to say about the people, the culture, and the sights that many will never know. Having grown up in Maine (where for many fear to even venture to Boston) it was incomprehensible for them that I would move to Nicaragua.

As I arrived in Maine, I parked the Ducati in the garage, closed the door, and wondered when I would next see that beautiful machine. Little did I know that it would be a year and a half before I would hear the magical dry clutch clacking again. Later that day I boarded a flight out of Logan Airport. With reality setting in I stared out the window. I was really doing this. Nicaragua was going to be my new home.