"Wayne.B" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 07 Feb 2006 21:41:02 GMT, Shortwave Sportfishing
wrote:

magic refrigerator, the clydedales one, bud light hidden bottles and
the fed ex commercial were my favorites.

Yes, they were all pretty good. For some reason Bud Lite at the
office left me hysterical however.

Watch them again and you get to vote for best and worst.

The weekend boating was interesting, mission was to deliver the GB49
to St Pete Beach early on Sunday afternoon, dock and drive home. That
is usually an easy two day run either outside in the Gulf or inside up
the ICW.

Normally we would go outside to miss the lift bridges and the slow
speed zones but we got a late start on Saturday morning waiting out a
cold front passage and nasty string of thunderstorms. The forecast on
the Gulf was 30 kt+ with 8 to 10s out of the north so we went inside
even with the late start and got about 40% of the way on Saturday.

Sunday dawned bright and sunny as we started out from Cape Haze Cove
on the ICW headed for Venice, Sarasota and points north. We passed
one south bound sail boat in Lemon Bay who had presumably just passed
through a the lift bridge ahead. We called the bridge tender for an
opening when we got there, the siren sounded, traffic began to stop
but the gates never came down and the cars started crossing again.
Repeat twice. The bridge tender informed us the control circuits were
not working properly and he would have to call out the electricians
(on Sunday morning of course).

So we did some exploring and found a way into an anchorage that is not
well charted and did some poking around while we kept one ear on
channel 9 for bridge status. After 2 hours of that we decided to head
back out to the ICW on the off chance the electricians had been able
to do their magic, and were pleasantly surprised when the bridge
tender started his opening sequence just as we arrived. Voilla, it
worked, but now we are way behind schedule and figured we'd be lucky
to arrive at St Pete Beach by 5:00PM (quitting time for the
dockmaster).

More bridge rage ahead. At the north end of Long Boat Key are 2 more
bridges only 1 1/2 miles apart but on synchronized 20 minute
schedules, and 2 more with a similar deal at the south end of Boca
Ciega Bay in St Pete. Too make a long story short, we arrived in the
dark at 6:20 and had to tie up by ourselves after losing at least 3
hours to bridge delays.

Next time we go outside regardless.

I wouldn't do that. 8-10 ft. head seas, even in a 49' GB, is no fun...and
not very safe.