I HATE SHOES

I knew full well when I got Soveraine  that the transmission was stuck in forward. I thought it was probably a linkage issue that would be easily fixed. Once that possibility was ruled out, I toyed with the idea of leaving it stuck in forward, since I had throttle control. I would really only need reverse and neutral coming into a dock, and, and in all practicality not even for that. I got to the dock I'm at now slowly coasting in after cutting the engine a few yards before gliding alongside it. No sweat. But, since I have the time, I decided to get it looked at professionally. A friend of all Newport boaters and a lifetime diesel mechanic John Whitney came over to look at it and promptly said it had to come out for him to really diagnose it. He said it probably was just a worn part that needed to be replaced (he even narrowed it down to one or two specific pieces, given an exploded diagram of the reverse gear), not a huge deal, just not something he could do with it sitting in m...

I recently, as in last night, watched a documentary called Mansome. More or less it questions the present state, in our uber-modern society, of what makes a man, a man. It made me ask myself, as I near 3 decades of life on Earth, what kind of man-mold do I fit it into? When I graduated college and moved to Boston, I loved the idea of clean pressed solid colored shirts, with a color complimenting striped neck tie, shiny (but not too shiny) shoes stepping gracefully onto the T and starting up a conversation with the lady standing next to me; maybe something about how I recognized her for wearing a fragrance from Channel. Things changed though, once I got there and started living out that vision of what I thought I, or myself as a man, should be doing. Fast forward a few years and I'm a pretty scruffy guy with oil stains on his clothes, holes in his sweaters, and a slight musk of diesel and general "boat" scent. Does this make me less of a man? More so? I'm able to do ...

**WARNING: Due to the blizzard in Newport, I have written a technical blog post detailing how I went about designing new chainplates. It is dry as a bone and there is only one, uninteresing picture. You have been warned. I should also mention that to the right of this post is a link to Amazon and you should see some products scrolling by. These are not random ones chosen by Amazon, but ones I have personally hand-picked because I use them almost daily. I'll go into more detail about them in subsequent blog posts. You'll also see a sprinkling of books, movies and other media I come across that I've found interesting, useful and/or inspirational. Yes, I do get a small kickback from each sale, but in return you get a product that has not only met my standards, but has held up to my daily use in the marine environment. Chainplates are important. For the uninitiated, they hold your mast up and keep you sailing in all kinds of weather. Not something to skimp on. I discovered ...

Even with the swim season and desk job still ruling my life until mid February, I've still been able to get a bit done on Soveraine . I need to make the interior more homey and I decided to start with some cushions. A call to a professional left me in awe with a quote of over $1600 for a set of two bunks with backs and covers! They are about 6' long by 2.5' wide and the backs about another 2' high. Upwards of two grand for a set of cushions was just too much cash, and I started poking around for other ideas. I found out online that you can cut furniture foam pretty easily with an electric carving knife and I looked on craigslist to see if anyone was throwing out any couches/foam mattresses I could butcher. A few minutes later I decided used foam was not the route I wanted to go down with my new home. I contacted a foam manufacturer in Hartford and got a quote for $250 for all the foam for the bunk bottoms and backs! This would require getting to and from Hartford thoug...

Earlier this month marked the three year anniversary of starting this blog. More importantly, it marks three years since I first purchased Winchelsea  and starting taking steps towards changing my life forever. In those fervent annuals, this blog has been the single consistent thing in my life. I'm not using the ubiquitous noun 'thing' without reason either; it's not a human, quite obviously, because I've come to know people within that period I'll never know again;  I've had three boats, crossed the country three times, and gone on some fantastic sailing adventures. I'm not involved with any of them now to a great degree; some of them by choice, others not. It's impossible to guess how much I've learned in these past years, and I'll admit I knew next to nothing when I first started this blog and moved aboard Winchelsea . I've come full circle though, living again in the northeast for a winter. So far, it's been bliss. I've beco...

The old one was a hunk of rotten mahogany and the most visibly apparent reason why I could not head south this year. The new one is three 2x6 pieces of plantation teak, ordered from Florida in October. I had them shipped to Maine with the intent of driving up to my dad's place to assemble and cut it in his wood working shop up there. Unfortunately, the Geo is on its way out and won't make it off Aquidneck Island, I found this out the hard way. My dad came down to Newport with the wood and some tools and I started joining the pieces together the next day. After the epoxy had set, Elizabeth came down from Boston and helped me cut and shape the wood into one resembling the old bowsprit. I had to be careful on the length and get it exactly correct, I didn't want to get a new headstay! My neighbor at the marina here knew a guy with a big sander at the shipyard, that saved me a whole lot of time. After it was cut and sanded, I ordered some bronze hardware to ...

Last night it dropped below freezing for the first time this season. I could see my breath as I went to sleep last night and I was greeting in the morning with a thin layer of ice on the dock. All of this is so wonderfully reminiscent of living on Winchelsea  three winters ago in Boston. As much as I can't stand the cold, that was an extremely pivotal and significant time in my life, and to be revisiting it with the additional knowledge I've gained and a boat I truly desired is blissful. Below is my typical morning: bOatmeal and coffee with my Primus OmniFuel stove, that I plan to put on gimbals soon. Boatmeal is simply a handful of rolled oats (not instant), some dry milk, raisins, cinnamon and hot water with some Grape Nuts or granola on top. Yes, the coffee is instant, but I plan on fixing that soon. Hurricane Sandy was not all that bad on the Rhode Island coast. The floating dock I am tied to was above the fixed pier it is attached to, due to the 3-4 foot sto...