Friday, August 14, 2015

Southpaw

I totally forgot yesterday was national left handed day. Yes, I am left handed. No matter how hard those nuns at St Matthews tried to beat it out of me I remain to this day left handed. I suppose somewhere in their education the nuns thought it was the sign of the devil. We all know that beating kids on their writing hand will force them to write with the other one. Stupid nuns.

There have been many studies regarding lefties. I found this article which discusses some of the findings. Some are funny and some are kind of disturbing, but a few explain a lot.

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/aug/13/left-handers-day-brain-research-creative-anger

So to all my fellow lefties,
Cheers!
P

Monday, August 10, 2015

Bombs Away

Yesterday I was getting a few projects done while nursing my sore back. I pulled or tweaked a lower muscle and it hurt like hell if I moved a certain way. I was being careful and trying not to do anything stupid. After a while I got a wee bit tired as I have not had much sleep with this back problem. I decided to lay down in the aft cabin for maybe a half hour.

I was reading for maybe ten minutes and then closed my eyes. I woke up five minute later with rain drops on my leg. If the hatch above the aft cabin is open we will know when it rains because our legs get wet. Damn. It was perfectly sunny out when I went below. Hmm, the rain stopped. I opened my eyes and looked at the hatch to see the blazing sun. Then I looked at my legs. Green. Green dots. Green dots and a blob of...
BIRD SHIT. Bird shit on me. Bird shit on the bed. Bird shit on the floor.

It was a perfect shot. The crap hit the screen and then formed a spray pattern which went everywhere. I told Deb about the mess out back while sanitizing my legs with Purell. I sprayed shout on the sheets and tossed them in the laundry basket and then cleaned up the floor and the rest of the area. Deb went off to do the laundry in a huff and I was too pissed off to lay down.

Nap over.

I remembered Deb had this hatch cover she made for WhisperIII, our previous boat. It was still in the v berth. I immediately took it and deployed the thing. All these years and it took a direct hit from a bird to make me put this thing to use.




When we were in Jax I was told of a day when people were sitting outside having drinks and lunch at a Jax beach cafe when a pelican flew low over the tables and unloaded. Women screamed, men cursed, children laughed. I'm glad I missed it. No pelicans here. Just small accurate birds.

Cheers,
PJJB 

Details

Most of you have noticed by now that my blog posts are random, and do not necessarily follow our cruising timeline. This can confuse people. Even smart people, which make up most, no wait, ALL of my readers. Yes, I'm flattering you. I know some of you are slow but it's all relative now isn't it? You just need to be with the right crowd. Move to Georgia.

I have never really followed a timeline and if I did it was purely accidental. If I come across something interesting or funny while we travel I will write it down on paper and post it later if I remember. Sometimes a port leak will ruin a perfectly good story and you will miss out. Sorry. I'm working on those leaks. Deb said if I used a regular ball point pen to write with I would not have a streaked unreadable post because the ink wouldn't run like a river down the page. Sorry but I love me Gel pens. Smooth they are. I write like a spaz and I need not be hindered by the Biro Brothers invention from the thirties. Does it make you sad knowing there are lost posts due to a leaky port or hatch? I thought so.

Now, if you are indeed curious at all about where we have been and if we ever take photos there, then you need to visit my mate Debra's blog. If you look at the tiny lettering I have in the top right corner of my blog, yes there. Look closely and there is a link to Debra's blog. It's my unselfish way of promoting my wife's creative writing abilities over my own.

Boat Hippies is the travelogue of our cruising adventures and Debra is now writing about the Bahamas and catching up fast. It's detailed, has photos and probably some witty criticism of her adoring husband. I say probably because I have not read the whole thing yet. This gives you a chance to get to any juicy parts before I can comment on or delete them. OK, maybe plead to have them removed, or threaten to post something hideously embarrassing about Deb. No that would never  happen. Women always win. Damn it.

So, check out Boat Hippies if you want proof that I didn't make this whole 'sailing away' thing up while sitting in front of a computer somewhere in upstate NY pretending to be a cruiser, my face smeared with potato chip grease and my apartment filled with cats walking through old pizza boxes.

Cheerz peoples,
Pjb