ALL HANDS
0K guys, get out the red carpet. I'm a coming, and fast too. Easter - a time of rebirth - falls on Paul Revere Day this year -and it looks as if it's not one if by land or two if by sea but by American Airlines. I should get to Boston about the 25th of April.It's been a long winter here without the boat. Last All Hands before Thanksgiving focused on water supply problems & leaks. Since then there have been the usual share of disasters, including a drain blockage which I finally solved by digging up the whole drain pipe out to the mangrove tree which was thriving on the gray water through roots that filled the pipe and backed up muck for yards.
You've all been through the frustrations of replacing a lost card - mine was my Soc. Sec. card, and it took a month to get a new one. Getting squared away with the IRS took 4 trips to the Ponce office, but most of them were not single purpose trips. I had to get to the Honda dealer for parts. (The motora and I was examining the motora by the side of the road and got knocked into a ditch by a kid in a car necessitating several fruitless trips to the police station before their insurance finally paid up.) Then one Friday I feared the Honda had died in my mechanic's yard in Yauco, but he rode it down Monday, pretty completely rebuilt at a small fraction of the cost of a replacement Motora I was almost inclined to buy. When I got too bored, I tore the stove down, and fixed it so the oven works again, but with the insulation gone with the mice, using the oven makes the kitchen too hot. The refrigerator finally gave out, but my repairman was able to install a satisfactory second hand box that will probably last longer than I will. Ants swarmed over the table where I keep my fruit, crackers & bread. I fooled them by putting the table legs in water, but they found a route up the wall to the overhanging plastic bags and dropped down onto the table. The typewriter has been in and out of the repair shop, chewing up ribbons and worse. Perhaps the biggest occupier of time and effort has been a continuing medical survey, maybe I should call it an experiment. From orthopods I was referred to a family clinic, and they decided to try me out on Noprosyn, at $2 to $3 per pill, running more than $100 a month. That gave me heartache as well as heartburn, and they put me on zantac. Panadol and tylenol also figured, along with my usual consumption of rollaids. It took me quite a while to figure out what they were doing, really trying to fix my guts not my arthritis. They threw in a high cholesterol count from one of the blood tests and had me try a low-fat, no cholesterol diet. This comes out to a real challenge to cooks, but is hardly my style. I'm pretty much released (given up on?) by the medicos at the moment, and holding my own, with the nonprescription drugs, but may need to go back on the flimflams from time to time. despite the fact that I have to give up liquor, including beer for the two weeks or more it takes to calm down the arthritis again.
The windter wasn't all disasters though. I rebuilt the underpinnings of the sagging front porch. A few interesting visitors came by in boats. I used the sailfish hull with short paddles to offer the comforts of the port - water, shower, telephone. Finding keeping the sailfish upright when rigged, with its regular sail, I experimented with making a smaller sail so I didn't lose my balance when I had to look to the lines. I used the sewing machine I had troubled to bring down to make a couple of pairs of shorts and shirts. I tripped to St. Thomas on a power boat with old friends. And the month of March was full of visitors Stan, the Hatches and my sister, some even overlapping. And I didn't get cold at all!
I'm all fired up to get back to Apogee though. Won't be long now. She's in Bang's boatyard at 480 Meridian St, E. Boston 02128. Surer communication is through S.K. Associates, 251 Harvard St., Brookline, MA 02146 (617) 277-3559 (messages), 277-3665 (human when Stan or maybe Wilkie is there). Little chance to catch me, but they'll know where I am.
First thing is the boat, of course - is it still afloat? Are the cockroaches thriving? Will the engine turn over? Refrigerator, lights, bells. whistles. navigation and all the things I've Paid no attention to since October.
Plans: Yes, several, ~but none very absolute yet. Settle in before I make promises. Need to check around to see what I've missed. Need to pursue the unfinished biz of hunting for some gainful employment. So there is no schedule beyond that yet.
In the wind, and depending on what else turns up, there's a wish to go ~back one more time to St. Pierre and Miquelon - a fat week to get there , a couple to see all, including Bastille Day, 14 July, and a couple to get home. Probably out of the question if either of the jobs I'm hoping for come through. Mystic is a blacksmith thing. T'other is Thompson's Island, sort of educational - bit of a survival twist - we all need to survive don't we? And who knows better than I after a bit more than three quarters of a century of survival. I don't need to prove it, I'm here.
Submarine anybody? I have one, and need to sell it. Intended for one man operation, 240' depth, 4 hours on its shore-powered batteries. At the time we started building it, there was still some research and education money floating about. Looks like the present market is limited to someone very rich and a little crazy.
Keep in mind that I need crews, north and southbound, spring and fall, from here on till death do us part. I have a bid, but as yet no commitment from a former crew for the trip south this fall. And this may well be the year (the last possible) that I scoot down the Windward Islands for a ways to see the places that were so good to me way back then. Sailing north and west from wherever I fetch up at will also be open to crew possibilities. Ask around, fellas. Crew needs foul weather gear and carfare both ways. Ocean sailing is not all roses, but the island hopping should be easy and fun, if you can stand me and my slovenly ways. Let me hear from you.
Pedro