GroupWBench

 

Life gets rolling along and things like documenting the big and little odds and ends gets forgotten. November 17 was the last post here, so I guess there is a lot of catching up to do.

Shortly after the last post my Jeep Cherokee with a couple of hundred thousand miles on it met it's end. I was rear ended on I-35. The damage was repairable, but cost more than the car was worth. USAA totaled it. When I test drove a replacement SUV at Leo's dealership, he asked me how I liked it. My answer was, "It's ok, but certainly no sports car." Well, one thing led to another and I ended up with the little gem below.

It is an Audi A4 convertible that I really love to drive. It handles like a dream and I really like it.

On the boat front, we finally pulled all of the old nasty glued on carpeting off of the roof of the cabin. That took a lot of scraping, sanding, heatgunning, and just plain working hard. We also had to rebed everything that came through the deck as part of the process. Whew – that was lots of work.

The end result was very nice, though. We'll post some pictures of the final result when we get them next time we go out.

We did get in a bit of winter time sailing. It is good to be in Texas and be able to sail twelve months of the year. Those folks on the frozen Great Lakes must be miserable most of the year. Here is a picture I snagged when the wind and sunlight were just right.

Ivy went to South Carolina and visited her parents. We debated whether or not she should drive there or fly. Costs are roughly equivalent with gas and hotel prices being what they are. Flying is no fun, but driving that far alone is a pain in the butt, too. She ended up flying into Charlotte and driving down to Spartanburg for the visit. She tells me she had a very nice visit with her parents. I know she misses them even though she gets to talk with them on the phone pretty regularly. Her visit coincided with her father's birthday and her folks anniversary. Ivy's niece had a little backyard party to celebrate. That is where this picture came from. Ivy is the cool cat in shades…

In March we went to the Houston Boat Show for a couple of days. The vendor displays were pretty dissapointing, but they had a great program of mini-seminars covering things like plumbing and engine repair, tips for cruising in Mexico, plus cruising how to's and tall tales. We heard the tall tales from the editor of Cruising Outpost, Bob Bitchin. He had a slide show full of sea stories for a packed room. We also got to listen to cruising advice from Liza Copeland and Pam Wall. Pam was particularly good. Her sessions on how to prepare a boat for cruising were very interesting. She was a good speaker and fun to listen to. We went to all of her sessions. It turns out that she does a women-on-water weeklong sailing program in the Virgin Islands once in a while. Ivy is thinking about doing that. I snapped a quick picture of the two of them when Ivy got to spend a little time chatting with Pam.

While we were waiting for a seminar to start we watched the bathing beauties at the hotel pool.

I had a bit of sinus surgery. It turns out that I've broken my nose more than a couple of times over the years. I tried to blame it on Ivy, but everyone seems to think that judo may have been involved. She puts on that sweet appearance and no one believes me when I tell them how abused I am. Go figure. The doc straightened out the deviated septum and then went in with balloons and widened the sinus passeges. I'm breathing bunches better and I'm hoping that this will mean far fewer brutal sinus headaches. Although, that will also mean I lose an excuse for being just a tad grumpy once in a while…I'll have to find another excuse now.

Other stuff - Selene and the kids are doing great. The little ones are growing like weeds and are great kids. Leo had eye surgery that got kinda nasty, but he seems to be doing better now. He got a promotion at work that he had worked very hard for. We are happy for them.

We have been looking at a new-to-us boat and toying with the idea of moving up to something we could weekend on easily. After paying for the sinus stuff and some car maintenance (tires, timing belt, etc.) we may end up waiting a bit, though. Maybe the answer is to just wait and get THE boat. I'm currently really liking a couple of models for that. The Hans Christian 38 is a seriously pretty boat that can go pretty much anywhere. The Island Packet 38 is another tempting boat. We'll just have to see where things go.