It Should Be Summer! ! ! ! ! !

SHIP'S LOG:

      . . . .  but it ain't! True, it does actually get comfortable enough to wear shorts and t's, but it is still "chilly."   Stand in the blowing wind, it is actually cold. Temps at night are down in the low 50's, the water temperature is still official "cold and the wind blows constantly. The  again, it is happening in New London as opposed to it happening in Portland, so it could be worse. But really, I don't care a lick as I am here and not there and I can go sailing any time I want!

     Then again, I really have to get ABISHAG cleaned up and ordered.  I am still trying to figure out where everything goes on the boat. Last year, everything had its place, but so far this year there is still a lot of stuff in the salon and I can't seem to remember where and how I had it stored last year. In addition, there is still more stuff to come, but I can  bring it to the boat until I find a "home" for all the stuff that I have now.  

      I had though that it would take awhile to get into the routine of living on the boat again. Truth be told, it took less than a day. I got right back into the mind-set. As I lay in my berth Tuesday night, the wind was blowing quite a bit. I could hear the "comforting sound" of the wind generator turning. There was, however, a ticking, clicking sound when the wind blew strong.  My first, and actually only thought, was that something was screwed up with the generator. It actually sounded as though the blades were hitting a shroud our something. Since it was night and the generator was 40 feet in the air, there was nothing I could do about it so I rolled over and went back to sleep. The next morning there was no wind . . . . at first, so I could not track down the source of the sound. Eventually the wind picked up enough to get the generator turning a  good clip so I went to the mizzen mast and put my ear against it. There was some rattling so I gave a gentle pull to the wires running from the generator to see if maybe there were loos and so whacking the inside of the mast. I went into the stern cabin to see if I could still here the sound and . . . .yup, it was still there! Damn! As I "raised my eye to heaven in prayer" figuring now that I would have to go all the way back to Portland so they could fix the problem, I happened to glance out the hatch and could see one of the shrouds really vibrating. Hey, perhaps this is the problem, one that could be solved with a simple tightening of the rig. So it was back up to the Mizzen Mast and that shroud. But it wasn't the shroud exactly. Attached to the shroud is a small flag halyard cleat, on of five on the boat. With no flag attached, the halyard was secured to the cleat and the two bronze clips, used to attach a flag to the halyard, were right at the cleat. And as the shroud vibrated, they beat a tattoo on the shroud producing the clicking/ticking sound. I retied the halyard with the clips up at the top near the block. Problem solve! Huzzah!

     All eyes down here are on the 1st Hurricane of the season which came to birth on the first day of the official Hurricane Season, June 1st. True, ANDREA is only listed as a "Tropical Storm," but then so was SANDY and IRENE! Right now she is moving along the coast of South Carolina and head our way. Hopefully, Cape Hatteras and its barrier islands will do their job and send her spinning off into the Atlantic, keeping her far from us.  We are already feeling the effects here and the weather today and tonight will be a bit nasty, with lots of rain and some decent wind. It is being pushed by ANDREA, but it is more her influence than her real impact. Still, it is a bit disconcerting to have a storm  like this possibly headed our way so early in the season. I haven't been paying much attention to the weather for the past 6 months, now once again, it has to become part of the daily routine. O Joy Of Joys!