A Fool's Gambit

I went sailing two days ago. It's been over a month since I've sailed my own boat. A travesty, I know, but it just seemed like too much of a pain to get it into sailing mode while I was working on several projects. Plus, I could satisfy my sailing urges at work. But the winds were too good to pass up on Friday, so I got everything into place and went out.

Except everything wasn't in place. As I buried the rail south of Key West, things you'd think couldn't go anywhere went places. By the time I was done, the cabin sole was littered with books, trash, dishes, and various other items of clutter. I sailed for a few hours, came back up to the harbor, turned on the motor, dropped sail, and started back to my mooring. I had decided to motor because it was over half a mile against wind and tide to get to the mooring, through a narrow, high-traffic channel. Unfortunately, I got about halfway there when my engine stopped. Why, I still don't know. It could be as simple as having run it out of diesel. So I pulled out the sails, double reefed for easy handling (I was tired enough at this point that I wasn't too concerned about speed, but rather control and the ease of reaching my mooring). I sailed right up to my mooring (after half an hour of beating), rolled in the jib, and missed the ball with my gaff hook. I bore off, tried to make a quick recovery but botched it (remember, I'm running back and forth from the foredeck to the cockpit), and had to go a little ways off to pick up speed for a new attempt. I was rolling out a sliver of jib for balance when I lost control of the reefing line and ended up with a full genoa. I got into a clear area, reefed in the genoa, and made a second, successful go at the mooring ball. I tied up, about 45 minutes and half a mile after the engine had died, and cleaned up the incredible mess the boat had become. (Of course, I had sailed something like 3 miles to make that half-mile.)

Lessons? Be a bit more picky about how I stow things before a sail. Check the fuel level. But most importantly, I learned I could handle the boat alone in very close quarters in the mooring field, and pick up the mooring by myself under sail in a brisk wind. I have plenty of experience sailing up to docks and such in dinghies, but this was the first go of it I've had in my big boat. I had no doubt that I could handle it - my reaction when the d-sail died was, "oh, man, what a pain", not, "oh, god, what am I going to do?" - but it was good practice to actually do it in real world conditions.

Next up? Troubleshooting the iron genny.

So, keeping an eye on Hurricane Gustav for the past two days (well, I started looking at it as a tropical wave halfway over the Atlantic). Knock on wood, fingers crossed, &c. Most expectations keep it more than a hundred miles away. So let's hope those NOAA guys are right. I'll be keeping a close watch on him as the weekend approaches.

It arrived earlier than expected. By about 8 hours. I was almost prepared. I was planning on moving one of my boats to a more secure mooring, but instead ended up getting to my boat just as things got rough. We had something like 50 knot winds. Rain hurts when it's going at 50 miles an hour. Then, in the middle of the worst of it, my old boat (the 27 footer) breaks free of its mooring (I wish I'd gotten around to moving it!). No way to go after it in that weather, so I just watched it blow out of sight. Luckily, it was picked up and towed to the mooring it should have been on to begin with. Yeah. But that will be costing me a pretty penny.

I was sick for the whole storm, on top of everything. Not seasick, but sick sick. Like, with a cold. I had felt it coming on for several days, and my energy for preparations was pretty low.

But I'm okay. I came through just fine.

Here comes the first hurricane to head to Key West this year. So I'm getting ready for that experience. I'll post again if I'm alive after it comes through.

I'm sitting in a coffee shop watching a story on CNN about CNN's special "Black in America", and how it was received last night. It's Soledad O'Brien patting herself on the back for a great job. I mean, c'mon. Really? This is what the news has devolved into?

And this is what my blog has devolved into? Writing a story about a story about a story? Ah, well.

Oh. my. God. It's still going on. I thought the commercial break would signal the end of the piece, but no. It just keeps going. Everybody on the screen is black. CNN knows that this is a subject on which white people cannot report - they'd be biased (and of course the black reporters aren't). Oh, wait, here's a white guy to introduce videos from the internet submitted by black people who saw the special. I guess dealing with internet videos is the job of this nerdy-looking white guy.

Okay, it's the top of the hour, so they're covering the actual news now. Or as close as the mass media gets to actual news.