Varnish work continues...

I've been so tied up editing ICON: The Journal of the International Society for the History of Technology, that I've gotten a bit behind in posting our site here, but in the next week or two, I'm going to try to catch up.

The first week of April, I spent another week on the boat tackling the varnish issue.  I arrived Saturday afternoon, March 31st, hoping to do the sanding prep on the varnish job I had to finish, but it poured rain for two hours.  I waited the worst of the rain out at the little cafe at the marina, then carted stuff from the car to the boat and put things away.  The cafe had its anniversary party in the evening, so at 18:30 I went up, had fish and chips for dinner, and the guitar player who handles entertainment - Charlie (about 20 yrs old) - asked me if I'd bring up my keyboard for a jam session later ... which I did about 19:30.  I stayed until 21:00 or so, and then carried the keyboard back down to Alizee.  

Next morning at oh-dark-thirty, I got up to help Francis and Linda Miko untie their lines and embark on a leisurely cruise up to Annapolis.  They had their boat Skye in a slip adjacent to ours for a year, and both Penelope and I enjoyed getting to know them. They both retired from the Library of Congress, and Francis, who worked for the LC Reference Service (which provides reference service to members of Congress), still is asked to assist governments all over the world in setting up legislative reference services.  I have to say, I'd like to have been starting off on such a four-five month trip, and just laze the way up to the Chesapeake again.  Well, I'm going to miss them and big galoot-of-a-dog Sophie a lot.


I spent Sunday through Monday, March 12th, taping, sanding and varnishing the teak cap on the cockpit coaming and the rear pulpit seats plus putting touch-up coats on the hatch covers and trim.  I also inventoried provisions on the boat for our upcoming cruise, spent an afternoon at the super buying the dry provisions, motored the dinghy around to the fuel dock in Salt Creek and topped off the gas tank and filled up our stove's propane tanks.