Thursday, December 23, 2010

Total Awesomeness!

Like most people not born on February 29th, I have a birthday every year. This year I had one very recently, and something came in the mail that made it one of the best, if not the best birthday ever. Before you watch the video, a little explanation is in order.

My 2 year old Grand daughter, Naomi, is potty training, She is doing so well that she earned a coaster bike (future mtn biking partner for Boppa?!). Given that all is going well, Naomi's focus in life is, you guessed it, the toilet, and of course, potty humor is very high on her list. When my daughter, Sarah took her to the store to find a birthday card for Boppa, she naturally chose one that could not have been more appropriate.


Some credit goes to American Greetings, but the true master is Naomi.

Sunday, December 5, 2010

Sailing in AZ

I dropped the boat in Lake Pleasant this morning about 11:00am . Paddled out of the harbor and sat for about 30 minutes, just ghosting along without enough wind to fill the sales. Then, about 11:30, I could see some riffle on the surface off in the distance. It took about 10 minutes to reach me, but then picked up to about 5 mph. I got in about 2 hours of sailing with light but steady wind. Pretty much died by 2:00pm.

The main thing I wanted to see was how well I fixed the leaks that were pretty bad 2 weeks ago, mainly around the centerboard trunk. It looks like I fixed about 95% of the leaks. In the time I sailed today, I don't think I took on more than 2 or 3 cups of water.

Arizona is not a very good place to sail, not only because there isn't much water, but because I have a wood boat, and the extremely low humidity is hard on it. Out of the water, the wood shrinks and opens seams. In the water, the seams don't really want to close up. In the next few days, I will be carving the seams a bit, then pouring epoxy into them to close them up.

As hobbies go, small boats aren't too costly, but the ongoing work can be a bit time consuming.