"Flying Pig" wrote in message
...
"Wilbur Hubbard" wrote in message
news.com...


Then there's the Capt. Skippy philosophy which runs mostly counter to
everything espoused by the good Capt. Neal. Skippy is a relative
newcomer who lacks insight and experience and has had a long litany
of full-of-trouble cruising fiascos up to and including severe damage
to his hull from groundings. While Capt. Skippy does live aboard and
has sold his home ashore, he still has not cut the umbilical cord
because his wife's mother lives ashore and her house is their house
when necessary. Skippy is almost as concerned with shore side
birthday celebrations and weddings as anything else. This also means
a woman and sometimes more than one woman aboard. (and a
mother-in-law to boot, yuck!) This means probably an extra TWO TONs
of useless lubberly crap that goes along with a woman and caters to a
woman's fickle desires. This means more systems and more maintenance
and less reliability and less sailing time. This means schedules and
lots of motoring to meet schedules. This means great expense, cramped
spaces, inefficiency, encumbrance, dependence and a willing,
weak-spined, male attitude. It also indicates shared responsibility
and delegating to an inferior sailor and betting your life on the
fact that the inferiority won't put you under. It practically
guarantees that every cruise or voyage will become a comedy of errors
that any magazine would relish publishing to make modern sailors all
appear a lot of fools.

Poor Skippy!

Wilbur, you know I like your satires.

But, this one wasn't intended to be satire. It was intended to be
educational to show the difference between what sailing once was and
what it has degraded into of late.

But at least get your facts straight before you stretch them.

You certainly know that Lydia's mother lives in England. You may have
missed, however, that she's visiting the son of her two dearest high
school friends.

Well, then who was it you two drove up and down the Interstate half a
dozen times to visit or stay with or watch her house? Was up in
Tennessee or Kentucky, wasn't it?

That's until we get on the boat, with her - at, perhaps, 87 years old,
she having a birthday soon - aboard, to resume cruising.

That's pretty old. You should be more considerate of her and celebrate
her birthday in a nice air-conditioned hotel or resort.

You also know that we don't do "schedules" - which is why we're still
here in the yard - the schedule to be at Stranded Naked, the schedule
to be out of the yard before hurricane season, and all the other
"schedules" which might have been interesting to achieve.

I'm talking about schedules while you are actually cruising like your
rush from the Bahamas primarily so you could make some wedding that was
scheduled in the U.S.

As to "Poor" me, I'm having the time of my life.

Just goes to show you're way too easy to please. Being strapped with one
or two ball-and-chain's is certainly not MY idea of having the time of
my life. Nothing beats true freedom but I suppose you're too insecure to
ever experience the freedom of going it alone.

The boat's in better nick than it's ever been during our ownership,
and many very serious age-related (the boat, not mine!!) issues have
been put to bed not only professionally but beautifully.

Well, that's a worthwhile accomplishment, at least. Time spent bettering
one's vessel is time well spent.

My apologies for not having gotten pictures of some of the latest up
yet, but I'll get to that some time soon, now that the time pressure
of dry weather (caulking) has passed...

You did a half-assed job on the toe rail, dude. Unless and until you
REMOVE it, scrape clean the bottom surface, check the fasteners that it
covers and replace/reseal those that need it, then calk and refasten the
toe rail so you have calk oozing out both both ways, you've not really
accomplished anything more than some amateur cosmetic work.

I hope you're having as much fun as we are, and will, also, continue
in that vein as we again hit the high seas and continue our
explorations. I don't lament others' lifestyles, but you're sorely
tempting me :{))

My lifestyle is that of a true sailor - a regular Joshua Slocum type -
while yours is that of a committe head organizer, a boat yard worker, a
husband, a son-in-law, kennel keeper, day laborer, a wannabe journalist
and socialite.

BTW, I've enjoyed all the chatter essentially off topic, and have not
responded until now to let it die down a bit...

Admit it, you were struck dumb by the many valid points made that did
not make you appear to be much of a sailor. LOL.


Wilbur Hubbard