You can just go ahead and call me Mr. Fix-it. Today was a typical day in the life of boatwork. It went something like this...

Time to install a fan in the v-berth. Pretty simple operation...drill 2 holes, mount the fan, run the electrical wire and be done, right? Not on a boat. Drilled 2 holes. 1 hole stripped out and a screw broke off in the other one. Found another screw, drilled 2 more holes. Realized that the mounting plate is on backwards and the broken screw is in the way. Ground down the broken screw and remounted the plate, drilling another hole. Whew. Fan Mounted, Check. Ok, time to run the wire. Hmm, it'll look so much better if I unscrew the molding along the wall, so I can hide the wire behind the molding. (does molding have a 'u'? oh well.) Pulled off the molding, located 2 spots that have been leaking behind the molding. I should probably fix the leaks before I replace the molding. Ok, unscrewed and rebedded the leaky screws...leak fixed. Wait, why're they still dripping? Crap. It's not the screws, it's the window above the screws. The sill seems to be holding water, which would explain why it's leaking despite dry weather. How does this window work? Looks like I'll pull out the rubber edging and go from there. Wow, it looks like somebody did a crappy job of rebedding this window a while back...I should probably take the whole thing apart soon but I'll just reseal this edging for now. Screws still dripping. Take the screws back out and see the wood inside is soaked. Great. These holes will have to dry out before I can get anything else done. Paper towels under the holes to catch water, plastic bag taped on the outside to prevent more water from entering. Ok...I'm done here until these things dry...what's the next project? (So, here I sit, a fan that doesn't work, a window that still leaks, holes that drip, with a long piece of molding (nah...i'm sure it doesn't have a 'u') laying in the cabin getting in the way. But I'm making progress, right?)

So, that series of events and about 4 more just like it occupied my day. Needless to say, when I was invited to sit and have a drink with a few people beside a chimnea down the dock, I was definately up for it. Meet Hank, Cathy, Cathy, and sadly I've forgotten the other fellow's name. I'll call him Paul until I find out what it really is. (as in Bunyon...he'd had a few to drink and thought he could bust up an oak stump small enough to go in the chimnea using only his heel.) Paul & Cathy are from Tupelo and know Dr. Doug Clark, the only person I know from Tupelo. Their boat 'Jade East' is a Fermosa 51. Anna Catherine and Goob said it looked like a pirate ship...it's certainly a neat looking boat. Oh, and 51 is actually just the length of the deck, the length of the entire boat is nearly 57 feet. At least I thought it was interesting.

Hank & Cathy are as nice as could be. They live in nearby Fairhope and have a Pearson 31 'Sol Mate'. They're members of the Pointe Yacht Club across the bay and invited me to go along with them on their next cruise. That'd be cool. (BTW...'cruising' is the term used for basically sailing from place to place, whether it be for a weekend, for for two years.) They also said that they'll be heading to Port St. Joe around the last week of May, and I'm welcome to follow their group if that ends up being about the time that I leave out. Maybe that'll work out, because I think it'd be good to do the first 3 or 4 days with another boat nearby to help out if I get into a bind.

Cathy brought me up to date on all of the marina happenings. She also said that if I brough t my charts over tomorrow she'd show me all of the good anchorages and beaches in the area...I'll certainly have to get her to do that...there's no substitute for local knowledge. Oh, I also learned that there is a neighborly quasi-competition between the east dock and the west dock. (I'm on East Dock.) They call us the slums, and they're supposedly the First Class, due to all the expensive powerboats over there. It seems that if we do something over here, (i.e. Cathy building a patio with a covered area) they have to try and do it better. We had a moment of glory when the roof blew off of theirs!

Hank taught me more about Mardi Gras in 15 minutes than I've ever known. Apparently it started in Mobile, not New Orleans. Who knew? Something that I really didn't understand was all the parades. Mainly, because they were all given by a different group. Mystics of Pleasure, for example, was the group that gave the parade last night. Hank's a member of the Knights of Echo Rouge. Each of these different groups are a secret society of sorts that meet year round like some social club or something. Learn something new every day.

It wasn't long after I'd become an expert on Mardi Gras that the two Jims walked up. Jim Freeman and Jim Anchor. Anchor's 'Katie Lee' sits next door to 'Sol Mate', and Mr. Freeman's got a huge powerboat down on the end. They told me how Anchor got his name, but it's one of those stories that isn't funny unless you're there. The other stories these two told were pretty hilarious...get me to tell you the one about the Pier Inspector. Mr. Freeman has a dog named Bob. I'll have to get a picture of Bob...he's a trip, although not quite as interesting as Mo (Mo is my family's dog back home...I'll save that story for another day). You should have seen Bob with his Mardi Gras beads on. Well...off to bed...lots more boat work tomorrow.