Warm weather

Oh, so nice! Its warm and dry. I’m back to working on the masts and David is installing radio(s). Christmas for David was getting a ham UHF?VHF radio as well as a HF/SSB radio (for email).

Nothing much “pretty” to show pictures of. I’m filling tiny imperfections in the masts–and its hard to be excited about the beauty of filling little 1/16″ cracks and dings on the equivalent of a 70 ft telephone pole…but that’s it right now. At least David’s project can be useful in that we’ll be able to tune in NPR and listen to good music as we work!

Other happenings…my favorite computer keyboard finally died today and I had to get another. I’ve moved into the “modern” world with a mini wireless keyboard and wireless mouse that are great. I can work up to 10 meters (39 ft) away from the computer according to the packaging. Should mean that I can have the computer down below in the radio desk but the monitor up in the chart house and work with the keyboard up there. That all sounds too wonderful.

More later,
Brenda

Fair Winds to All for the New Year

“It’s remarkable how quickly a good and favorable wind can sweep away the maddening frustrations of shore living.”

-Ernest K. Gann

David and I are feeling very, very antsy to launch! And take advantage of the winds! 2008 was a wonderful year of learning new skills and applying them to the rebuilding and restore of Mahdee. 2009 should be an even more fulfilling year once we’re on the water.

We wish all of our friends and family the best in the upcoming year. Fair winds to all.

Victory at sea

OK, on land…

The stove works! Last night 11 pm we had our first fire in the Shipmate stove. Seems the newly-cast firebricks didn’t break and we’re still here so the boat didn’t burn down 🙂

Of course, all the paraffin-based lube/sealant we’d put on the stove to keep it from rusting slowly “smoked” off and the boat smelled like way too many candles burning. Yuck. We had to keep a couple port holes open to clear that paraffin smoke once it started.

With Brenda feeding stovebox periodically all night, we had a fire until about 5:00 am when we ran out of wood…and Brenda didn’t feel like going out into the wet, cold morning to get more scraps of hardwood from our scrap-wood pile.

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