NO NEWS IS GOOD NEWS.....SORT OF!!!!

SHIP' LOG:

Would that it were true! ABISHAG floats at her dock and gets rained on, snowed on and worked on but all this is happening in Mystic, Connecticut . . . . not according to my plan but evidently according to God's plan and let's face it, we know whose plan is going to take precedence! So I guess until our plans merge, I'll remain in Mystic.

I did not get the firsplace in and as a result I am still not living on the boat. The hold up is the stainless steel reflector plate that is being fabricated. The fireplace needs a plate between it and the bulkhead ( and anything else flameable) so that keeping warn does not entail burning down the boat! It would sort of defeat the purpose of the whole sabbatical! Once the piece is fabricated, it should be a rather quick install. Why do I think it will happen just about the time the weather breaks and stablizes and I will no longer need the fireplace?

It appears the the SSB (Single Sideband Radio) works though figuring out exactly how to operate it correctly ( and legally) is another matter. While I can listen to any station I can pick up, I have to avoid transmitting on those frequencies that are reserved for HAM Operators. The first thing I learned was how to send an emergency signal which will trip screaming alarms on all receiving SSBs. I did it, not because I expect to have to send such a signal but rather, since it is an automatic function on the radio, how not to do and get a S&R (Search and Rescue) operation going unintentionallt. I would not want to do this as it is my understanding that the Coast Guard looks dimly on "false alarms" and levie some rather stiff fines accordingly. But it is nice to have this particular piece of hardware functioning as I can sit in Mystic and pick-up Cruisers far, far away. It keeps the dream alive.

MASTER'S PERSONAL LOG:

One of the things that is frustrating at this time of year is that there are few things I can accomplish on ABISHAG. Not that there are many tings that need doing, but there are a host of little odds and end that could be done. Perhaps the most important is just learning to live comfortably my boat. So far I haven't fallen over board, but just getting comfortable moving around the inside (and outside too) is most important to that sense of comfort, that sense of being at home. I am learning Celestial Navigation. It will be a back up for the electronics and I don't expect to have to depend on it a great deal, still everyone, in every book says that you can not depend solely on one mode of navigating ( especially the electronic) as it just may come a cropper when you most need it and if you don't have another means of navigating, things could get a bit dicey. The same people also reiterate the same idea, that it is not a question of "IF" something will break, rather it is a question of "WHEN." SO redundancy, back ups, and secondary systems are all the rage for a prudent sailor. Learning Celestial Navigation is not only boring, it is also a difficult and rather arcane. One had to learn a whole new lexicon of jargon and technical terms nazd even the best videos have presenters who come across like someone reading the Mahattan phone directory as an epic poem. Now if Emeril LaGasse new celestial navigation, that would be a CD to get. Unfortunately, William F. Buckley, yes that William F. Buckley, not Emerilis the one with the Celestial Navigation DVD. And on it goes.

SORRY ABOUT THE MISPELLINGS AND BAD GRAMMAR

LIFE IN A REFRIGERATOR!!!!!!

SHIP'S LOG:

I did get down to ABISHAG on Friday last to try and do some few projects. If that grammar is not correct blame it on the cold. It was really quite like trying to work inside a walk-in freezer. Still in all I was able to get a few little tasks done before the cold chased me.

I re-installed a brass lamp with a frost glass globe. I set it on the bulkhead over the starboard settee in the saloon. It provides a nice warming light and I suppose could even take the chill off on a summer's evening but in this weather it really is a case of shoveling against the tide. yet it looks nice, very nautical, though the brass is in real need of some serious polishing. I was able to wirebrush off most of the tarnish and corrosion, but it still doesn't "gleam." If I had "crew" it would be a perfect task for them but it's another thing I lack. It also became clear that I am going to need a small funnel to fill the light. Another small item for the "get list."

Skip is planning to come by Wednesday morning and we will install the fireplace. It seems a rather simple procedure according to the plan and instructions as these things go which undoubtedly means that it will be a bear. It is already clear that the location I favor in the center of the saloon will require moving a light. This is not a particularly difficult thing to do except for the fact that I will have to take down the overhead liner in order to re-run the wire. We will also have to avoid the handrail that is on the top of the overhead on deck. I am also going to have separate and and insulate the fireplace from the bulkhead to which it is to be attached. That means getting a piece or two of stainless steel and attaching that first. I also want this installation to be temporarily permanent so that come the summer, I can take it down and get it out of the way until it is needed again. As I said, a "simple job."

I was also able to install a small microwave oven. "Install" is a bit too much in that all I did was unpack it from the box and plug it in. It works and no circuits blew so I can actually "cook" after a fashion. Let's hear it for "Lean Cuisine," "Healthy Choice" and "Stoffer's."

I was also able to "screw in" several panels in the nav station that were being held in place by single screws, and that was about it. The cold got to be a bit much and it was time to leave. The fingers were getting a bit numb and when I could no longer pick up a screw I dropped, I took it as a sign that it was time to boogie.

MASTER'S LOG:

I am hoping for March, expecting April and will probably have to settle for May. What might actually force the issue is the launching of all the boats that are stacked-up in the shipyard. True, most want to be in the water for Memorial Day at the end of May, then again, most don't want their boats in any earlier because it will be "too cold" to do much sailing. Usually, yards have a contract that states a date when they will put the boat in the water, ready or not, which forces people to do their outfitting. People who keep their boats at the dock rather than on a mooring, then to be the first in. I would tend to think that I am in somebody's primo slip and, that as these things go, he/she has the earliest date for a spring splashing. I may have to go sooner rather than later. Time will tell.

One odd thing, everybody else seems antsy about my leaving. It is not that I am going but rather that I haven't gone. People are forever asking when I am finally leaving and seem disappointed that there in no hard and fast date. Hey, no one wants to get going more than I do but it really is out of my hands. One of the three most important things that I have learned over the past few months is PATIENCE. The other two are PATIENCE and PATIENCE. I'll be leaving when I and the weather are in synch and until that happens, there isn't much I can do except take care of the little projects that need doing and learning about the boat. As there is little sense in heading too far south once the weather cooperates (I have to be north of the Chesapeake by June 1st), I tell them I have "tentative plans" (and I mean really, really tentative plans) to sail down to the Chesapeake Bay and then over to Bermuda before going north in the Summer. If it happens, it happens. If it doesn't, it doesn't. It's that simple and if they think it is frustrating for them, it is the same for me though I have just gotten use to it and just go with the flow.

IT'S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE CHRISTMAS!!!!

SHIP'S LOG:

I hate Winter!!!!! It has snowed again and the decks are once again covered with snow and ice! I should be in the Keys or Abacos or any place where it is hazy, hot and humid, with a Mount Gay and Tonic in hand . . . . but I am not. (Sigh!)

I have hunted up a fireplace for ABISHAG and hope to install it this weekend. Once it is in place and "fired-up," I can go back to living onboard. Of course, this means another hole in the boat, this time in the overhead. Talking to another owner of a CN 39 from Massachusetts, I got some good info on where to locate the fireplace and how to install it so as to make it easily removable. That way, once the need for heat is past, I can take it down and store it until such a time as I need heat again (hopefully never).

MASTER'S PERSONAL LOG:

I really want to get back to living on ABISHAG. I am really not comfortable onboard yet. It is still much too much like "camping out" and not like living in "my home." Making the boat my home and becoming comfortable requires, obviously, time spent living aboard. Just getting used to things and creating routines, like wearing a safety harness whenever I am on deck and learning how to maneuver on deck trailing the tether and not getting all hung up and twisted, requires time doing it. I am actually a very routine-oriented person. I am never comfortable, really comfortable and at easy until I am in a routine. It is just not something you can do a day here and a day there at a time.

In addition, I have not become comfortable with where stuff is and how it is stored, and I haven't even got all of it aboard as yet. It sounds a simple thing, but being able to put you hands on what you need when you need it is very important. I spent a whole day trying to find a bungee cord I knew I stored but could find the bloody thing. It is really a silly thing to become angry and aggitated over, but it happens. Unfortunately, I can not afford for such things to happen, especially when I am underway. Clear and unemotional thinking (think Spock) is a major factor in safety. Without clear and unemotional thinking and ecision making, I increase my chances of ending up off the boat . . . and I don't mean standing on the dock either.

1500 DOESN'T GO INTO 1000!

SHIP'S LOG:

Well,the learning experience goes on. I have to find a new source of BTUs or heat. It seems that both of the heaters that I have, the oil-filled radiator and the blower, do their task at 1,500 watts. I have discovered that I have only a 1,000 watt inverter and as Sister Mary Mojo told you in school, a big number doesn't go into a small number. Strangely, it has been so cold recently that the heaters worked well enough and the inverter handled the load. It handled the electrical load because it never got hot enough to over load and shut down, that is, not until the recent spate of unusually warm weather. Then suddenly, the circuit breakers kept popping as the inverter heated up with the overload. So now I am without heat and am once again off the boat, at least until I can come up with another form of heating it. Probably go with a kerosene heater as propane on the boat, indeed inside the boat, is a little to scary to contemplate comfortably. Of course, the idea of spending more money on another form of heating isn't what I wanted to do but I like to have feeling in my bodily extremities.

It was interesting to sleep, or I should say try to sleep, on the Tuesday night. I am sure that most people would think that a boat tied up to a dock would be safe and secure during a storm. In one sense it is,, but because it can respond to the waves and wind only just so far, its movements are short and snappy, filled with lots of quick and unexpected jolts. In fact, since the wind and waves often move in competing directions, the boat never gets into any rhythmic motion. Trying to sleep on such an occasion is sort of like trying to catch 40 winks in an RV driving along a rutted road liberally sprinkled with potholes of various sizes. At anchor or on a mooring, the boat always orients itself to the wind. Even though it may "sail" around abit, the motion is much more comfortable and will "rock" you to sleep.

MASTER'S PERSONAL LOG:

I have not gotten that rhythm down yet. Living on the boat still feels like camping out. It isn't comfortable yet. I am sure that it is, in part, because of the cold and perhaps with more heat, be it from a new heater or a radical change in the winter weather, that will change. With all the work I have done over the last FIVE MONTHS, I would have thought that I would know the boat better than I do. I am still not comfortable with all of the systems yet and that will take some time as they are, for the most part, all winterized and are not being used. A late night trip to the bathroom on the other side of the yard is a fun experience I would rather do without, but such is life. Then again, not using the heads on the boat mean that the time until one or the other breaks down is growing longer. (And yes, they will break down. It is never a question of "IF," but "WHEN."

On the financial side of this trip, I have reached and exceeded my planned expenditure of $15,000 for getting the boat ready to go. I had planned, and still do, to use the money from the sale of the condo to cover this part of the trip. Of course, Custer had a plan and look what it did for him. Hey, how was I to know that the housing market was going to go into the toilet. But this too is a learning experience though I wish I was just a little less dense. Evidently God doesn't want me to win the Lottery either for though I am not a regular ticket purchaser, I have yet to get even one number on any of the tickets. Here's hoping that I come up with no more major purchases.

IS IT SUMMER YET????

SHIP'S LOG:

It actually got into the 60's today. Gee, maybe I should just take off now? Well, unfortunately, like I've tried to explain to some many people, weather on land is not always, or even often, the weather offshore. So it is that the waters I would have to transverse have small craft warnings posted. It made for a nice day to work on ABISHAG but not a particularly good days to go sailing. Strangely, it wasn't until late afternoon that the winds picked up on shore, and so it was almost like a Spring day today, a fine day to .......work.

I was able to install the water maker ( the high pressure pump and the membrane filter unit) It fits nicely in place and gives me back my limited counter top space. I have yet to connect any of the hoses yet though the electrics simply await the connection as the power is all run to the pump. Once the system is plumbed, I'll have all the water I need and more besides . . . that is once I get far south enough for the temperature to be above freezing all the time and I can "un-winterize" the fresh water system. We're technically only two weeks into winter and I just know that the 60 degree temperature of today and tomorrow are not long for this local.

Once the watermaker was installed, I spent a good part of the day doing a whole host of little jobs that needed doing. The electrical panel and the cockpit instrument panel where held in place by a minimal number of screws so I found and replaced them all, making things less likely to rattle and, in the case of the cockpit, more watertight. It was in doing that that I was able to discover why the main hatch leaks so. A previous owner had installed a plexiglass hatch and had sealed it with some type of rubber weather stripping. Resetting the screws today made it clear that the weather stripping is shot and needs to be replace. As is typical in boating, one completed job reveals another unexpected one that needs doing. It should be a simple fix which probably means it will be a task and a half.

Tomorrow will see the finishing of the propane system . . .for the second time. Not that there is any rush as I can't use it while I am here, but again the parts are taking up valuable space int eh cabin and I am trying to get a handle on get the place, dare I say it, "ship-shape." The floor has been reinstalled in the cockpit locker so a lot of the stuff that currently occupies that forepeak cabin can be moved into that space, making the boat seem more roomy. It may have to wait as I am having a problem with the inverter/charger. This wonderful apparatus converts the electricity coming from the dock into usable power for the boat, keeping the batteries charged and running the heavier electrical equipment (heaters, tools, microwave) which would seriously deplete the house batteries. For some reason it keeps tripping the circuit breaker and i am not sure why. I'll have to see if I can quiz the yard electrician for an answer and, failing that, get him to fix it as he installed it.

MASTER'S PERSONAL LOG:

I slept the sleep of the just last nice. Rather than using the salon berth, I slept in the aft cabin. I found that since it was smaller, it was easier to heat and it made for a more comfortable nights sleep. I haven't established much of a routine though it has only really be a day. The work part of the day takes care of itself , it is the "free time" which may prove a little more difficult. This afternoon, as I was taking a quick nap, one of the yard workers came on board. Actually just on board would be more accurate. With the falling tide, the deck is a good two feet below that level of the dock and there is no graceful way to get from there to here. When he hit the deck, the noise woke me out of a sound sleep. I thought the boat had broken loose and had drifted into something. There was an instant of panic and then a feeling of "O crap, now what?" I was very relieved that it was nothing to be concerned about and I want to say that it taught me something profound, but I can't think of a thing at the moment.

LOG OF ABISHAG FROM ABISHAG

SHIP'S LOG:

Well, this is a first, the first entry of the Log of ABISHAG originating from ABISHAG. The only downside is, of course, ABISHAG is still in Mystic and will probably be so for the foreseeable future. If God choose to change things up, I will only be too willing to head out but It just seems that I am to be here as part of the personal learning and growing experience that is this "radical sabbatical."

I brought another load of stuff down to the boat today, not too much as I haven't got the last load all put away yet. It will come in small chunks until everything I need to take with me is aboard and then I can start with the stuff I want to take with me. What remains gets "E-BAY"-ed, given away, donated, trashed or stored somewhere. I am still amazed by the amount of "stuff" that I still have, even after what I thought was a "ruthless" weeding - out process. I suspect that a similar weeding out process will have to take place again once or twice more.

The shipyard, like many such institutions, doesn't allow open flame cooking so there will not only be no out door grilling, i can't even use the propane stove. So tomorrow I will have to make the purchase of a small microwave or toaster oven to handle the cooking chores. Refrigeration should not be a problem, unless it is the case of keeping stuff from freezing.

Tomorrow will also be "watermaker installation day." That project along with several small items should fill the day up rather nicely.

MASTER'S PERSONAL LOG:

Today really begins the next phase of the learning process. The obvious part is learning to live in and on a 39' X 12' boat, developing routines and procedures and handling things as they come up.The not so obvious part is learning about myself. I will be alone even though I am tied to the dock in Mystic and I would suspect that things are going to arise that I don't expect that I will have to deal with, not with the boat but with me. I am not sure quite what to expect. I will just have to take it as it comes. DINNER TIME!

REASONS WHY I HATE WINTER #375

SHIP'S LOG:

It will not go down as the brightest thing I have ever done, beginning to live on ABISHAG on a day when the temperature never exceeded 20 and go down to 2 degrees during the night. Wrapped up in a "plush throw," a polar fleece blanket and a down sleeping and I still froze! The reason was #375: I CAN NEVER QUITE GET WARM ENOUGH IN WINTER FOR EVERY DRAFT ALWAYS FINDS THE HOLE IN MY DEFENSE! I could get all wrapped up and was getting warm when I would move or shift and that would create a little crack somewhere and in would come the freezing cold draft. I would drift off to sleep, move and then get awakened by the draft. And getting up to use the head was even more exciting!

Lying there in the dark, I was listening to all the sounds that ABISHAG made, trying to get use to what is "normal" and what might be a problem creeping up. Definitely, I have to come up with a way to tie off the halyards to keep them from slapping against the masts. It didn't help that the wind was honking at 30knots causing them to really slap around and the whine of the wind through the shrouds kept going even when the halyards quited down. And I have to find out what keeps hitting the shrouds. Something whacks some shroud on the port side and causes it to ring and vibrate throughout the boat. All of these sounds, along with the groans caused by the lines holding the boat to the dock, stretching and contracting, as well as the boat heeling and righting, made for a very long, semi-sleepless night.

And the cold. The heater worked fine. The 3 - 4 feet right around it it were comfortable but the rest of the interior were ice-box like.I used the berth in the salon, closed off the fore-peak and the aft stateroom, but it still got down to a toasty 30. The heater works fine to take the edge off when it is cold but last night was far outside its operative range. And the next few days promise more of the same. I am going to admit defeat and wait for the weather to get just a little bit warmer.

I also discovered the joys of condensation! It was amazing to wake up and discover how the moisture in my breath had, overnight, turned to ice "inside the boat." The sun coming through the ports, where it focused on the ice, began to melt it and I've got water dripping in the boat . . . and you just know that I got one, big, cold drop right down the back of my neck, just the thing to get you up and running in the morning. I hate winter!!!!!

MASTER'S PERSONAL LOG:

It was interesting to spend the "first night" on the boat. Eve with all the things that worked against it, I enjoyed being on ABISHAG. There is just something about the rocking of a boat that is comfortable and relaxing. It was a learning experience, learning to move about the interior of the boat, learning where things were . . .like lights and switches, learning the sounds ABISHAG makes and trying to understand what each sound means. And even being tied to the dock as I was, learning about being alone. As cold as it was, there was little I could do in the way of tackling projects, so I couldn't fill the time doing things. I spent the evening watching a couple of movies I had downloaded to my computer and then trying to get some sleep, wondering all the time what I was doing there.

I did learn that it when there is a problem that it is better to get up and deal with it rather that lay there and suffer. If I don't it just works on my mind and sleep is a stranger, but it took some effort to make and act upon the decision. I also learned that on a boat things look better in the daylight. I really get the feeling of being closed in at night, that there is nothing besides the boat and things are a little more tense for me.The daylight makes things seem much better and anything is possible. I am going to have to work on night time a little bit more.

Several times, I had a conversation with God during the night, well actually it was more of a monologue. Actually, it was one question, "OK Lord, you got me here, now what?" No answer was immediately forth coming, so I guess it's going to take a little more time and reflection.