I'm not quite sure what a "Sonny do" list is,
although I think I get the gist.

One month ago, I spent three 100F+ days repairing
the keel and bilge of our Catalina 27. The repair
included referring the keel and installing
stiffener plates in the bilge along with new keel
nuts.

The Catalina is currently at the Fiberglass shop
with a new bottom job, and freshly buffed and
waxed topsides. It looked so good when it was
finished that we decided to re-gelcoat the deck
while we were at it. My wife and I spent all day
yesterday stripping every bit of hardware off of
the deck, and pulling everything out of the
interior as well. I finished the last of the deck
hardware this morning by removing the rub rail (a
bazillion screws...) While the fiberglass shop
does deck repairs and re-gelcoats the deck, I'll
be spending the week power sanding, staining,
refinishing, (and building new as necessary)
interior woodwork. Oh yes, and re-painting the
1996 Yamaha 4-stroker. Its amazing what that
Texas sun does to paint left outdoors all the time.

When the fiberglass shop is finished with the
deck, we will re-bed and re-install all of the
hardware, re-install the interior, and re-mount
the engine. In the meantime, we are making custom
sunbrella covers for everything so that hopefully
the re-finished teak will look good for a while.

I'm not sure that this amount of effort was a sane
thing to do for a 1979 model Catalina, but have
you priced the new ones lately? They've jumped
quite a bit with the high oil prices. This way
we'll have a nice lake sailboat without spending a
ton of money, and we'll know what has been done to
the boat--unlike when you purchase a used one.

Meanwhile, the rudder to our Irwin Citation 38 is
in the garage awaiting repairs, and we are still
re-bedding and caulking trying to get all of the
rainwater leaks stopped. Since the Irwin is on
the coast 3 hours drive time away, this fun work
takes place every other weekend.

Awwwww... We'll get there eventually. At least
that's what I keep telling myself ;-)

Don W.