July 9, 2009.

This evening a guy stopped by the boat in his dink. His boat is anchored nearby and he stopped in to say hello. It turns out that he’s also from New Jersey and had met us just before we departed 3 years ago. He and a buddy boat are here in the Chesapeake for a 2 week cruise. Back in Barnegat Bay we kinda stuck out like a sore thumb. We’re a fairly large boat with a lot of solar panels and a wind generator. Not a very common sight back on the bay. Anyway, he remembered the boat and stopped in for a quick hello. It’s hard to believe that we’ve been gone for 3 years already.

As for us, life’s been treating us pretty good. Christy’s been taking care of a lot of our boat chores and I’ve been working. Work has actually been a pretty good gig. I like the fact that it’s always something different.

It’s also been eye opening. No matter what kind of boat maintenance woes we might have it seems that somebody else has something worse going on. I met a woman the other day whose father died and left his sailboat to her and her husband. They love the boat and are using the boat as much as possible. Unfortunately, it seems that Dad didn’t actually believe in taking care of his boat.

It’s a bit Spartan but nice enough. Unfortunately the boat needs thousands of dollars worth of work to get it back in normal running condition. It needs belts and hoses, an oil change, a raw water impeller and a new transducer for the depth sounder. An external oil line is rotted to the point of leaking. The raw water sea strainer actually has a hole rotted right through the bottom of it. There are literally 20 things on their immediate “to do” list. When presented with the estimate for the list of repairs she never broke her smile and said “great, when can you have it taken care of”. She obviously still in her “new boat” infatuation stage.

I usually bitch about people who come in and drop the hook like they don’t have a care in the world. This couple was from the other end of the spectrum. When they dropped the hook they didn’t


actually set it but they did spend over an hour at the bow monitoring the situation. They alternated between gingerly touching the anchor rode to “feel” if the anchor was dragging and looking all about. It seems that they drag fairly regularly. I guess they didn’t get to the page about actually setting the hook but at least they’re conscientious in their ineptitude.

The other night Christy made some cookies that looked less than appealing. I forgot to put on my poker face when I saw them. She was a little disappointed in the fact that I might find something unappealing just because of the way it looked. Alright, she was pissed and forbade me from having any. After a day or so I was finally allowed to partake in these treasured little gems of culinary delight. Looks aside, these are the best damn cookies I’ve ever eaten. Ever. I’m not just saying that because I want more either. I even served them to friends the other night (after dark) and they thought they were fantastic as well.