When we had Mahdee in the boatyard and were working on her Alaska Yellow Cedar overhead, the yard owner would come by and tease us that we were “making toothpicks” as part of our boatbuilding. And, it seemed that way. We’ll we ‘re back at it–that is taking big, big boards and turning them into tiny narrow boards. This time the AYC is turning into boards for the ceiling that will cover the hull in the main saloon. Yesterday, David and I together spent all day making toothpicks and the result is that we now have the wood needed to begin the process of installing the ceiling! Day before yesterday, David and I culled through our storage unit and pulled out a great big teak board (2-1/4″ x 9″ x 19-1/2 ft) and made it into lovely 1/2″ x 5″ and 1/2″ x 4″ x 19 ft sole boards that will cover our exposed subfloor and match the existing teak sole. We didn’t buy that board so we kept forgetting that we have it–it was given to us along with some other leftover wood from someone else’s boat project.
Today, David will be cutting notches in the edges of some of the new sole boards to fit it around bulkheads and such and then tonight we’ll be bringing our “load” back to the boat for installation. I’m not quite sure where it will all be stored since it has been very rainy and we cannot store it on deck. There’s little room in the boat proper for these long boards to reside before installation…so this will be interesting. We also need to get our chop saw out of the storage and find a place to use it and store it while it is on the boat. We’re certainly going to look like a “lumber schooner” for the next week or so.
This week, we also need to get my military ID card (expired since June) renewed so I can drive on-and-off the bases in San Diego. The wood working shop David uses for some of our projects is on a military base and without proper ID I’m stuck there with him and can’t run errands while he’s making toothpicks because I wouldn’t be able to get back to the base! I think he’s secretly pleased with this situation since I help him with his work if I have nowhere else to go.
