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I’ve finally done it – The Crusty Seamen’s Choral Society should have its first shanty sing within the next couple of months. If you know anyone who is interested, point them to www.crustyseamen.org

An Ides of March resolution? It’s not quite then yet, but a March 12 resolution seems fairly odd. Chinese Arbor Day resolution? Mauritian National Day? There must be something significant to tie this to… in any case, once again, I’d like to try to start updating this site on a regular basis. The Sea Muffin project is progressing rapidly, although it’s unclear what it is now. The boat isn’t called Sea Muffin, and I don’t think we’re going to be sailing around baking muffins – and it’s not clear we’re even going to be able to circumnavigate.

But we’re going to have a boat, and she’s the kind of boat you’d want to sail around the world in! Ted’s got the floors all in, and the bulkheads, and I’m hoping to see the thru-hulls in now and maybe get an idea from his welder as to how we stand on reconfiguring the stern. I’ve got him working on bedding deck hardware, too, and I’m hoping his welder can flatten out our stanchion bases so I don’t have to buy new ones.

This weekend I think I’ll finally get the bilge pumps in and start figuring out how to plumb the tank vents and head. I need to drop a note to Neil, too, about working on the engine again and whether he can get us the transducer for the depth sounder he scrounged for us.

Still, even though the boat is coming together, I feel like the dream is slipping away. I have no idea how we’re going to get a cruising kitty together – the added expense of my… condition? Disease? I never know what to call it… just feels like it’s put it over the edge. We can’t be sea gypsies, sailing for a while, working for a while – because if I don’t have my medicine, I will die. That sounds so melodramatic, but it’s true. We need to have our ducks in a row – or at least I need to have my ducks in a row – in order to make it.

So what’s the solution? Do a little bit of cruising at a time? I just hope we don’t end up living our lives along, staying here in Maine, with our boat at the mooring, and then we wake up one morning, and we’re 60 years old, and complications have started to kick in and I can’t sail anymore.

Start playing the lotto? Sell our side business? Sell the house? I don’t want to sell the house; I worry we’d never make it back into our wonderful little neighborhood. Well anyways, these are the things that get me stuck.

Ted sent us this picture on Sunday:

It looks like a boat inside!

Hooray for our new carpenter, Ted Morse! He’s doing some fantastic work, and I hope to be posting some pics of the progress he’s making by the end of the week. Yay!

Helped deliver Zora back down from Camden over the weekend. Nice to be out on the water, even if it was in a tropical storm. Thanks, Neil!

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Well there’s our engine, all shiny bright and ready to drop in…

I went up to the barn to meet with Myles yesterday, and got some bad news. He took a job at BIW – a union gig, with benefits and all that. Can’t hardly blame him – he’s got a family now and all that, and it’s amazing how much more you care about things like health insurance and a steady income when there’s a baby involved. But… we’re bummed out. Norman is still pretty much torn apart, and we’re facing losing the barn and don’t have anyone to work on her. He’s promised to get the engine, thru-hulls and bulkheads in before he’s done, and that would be a big help… but it’s still a real bummer.

Anyone want to work on our boat?

We ended up buying the W46 out of Chase, a Swan 40 owned by a bunch of guys up here. They’re going transatlantic soon, and wanted to repower. So they have a nice new 44B, and we have a W46:

“W46

Not the prettiest engine, but it came with tranny, panel and alternator, and they guys said she’s a good runner. I found a place that sells rebuild kits, so if time and budget afford, we will rebuild before heading out. But we have an engine! Yay!