Well, we’re into a routine now. Get up an hour later than we used to (ah, so nice!) and stumble out of the boat about 7:30 am trying NOT to look like we’ve just gotten up. To achieve this, David has taken to wearing his hat to hide that whole “tousled” hair look. Make coffee in the boat shed. Wake up to the projects of the particular day. For David its been mostly interior build-out and plumbing. For me its been mostly paint, paint, and more paint. Well, a bit of varnish in there too.

Other “details of living” include putting the solar shower in the sun and remembering to shower BEFORE its gotten cold again. So, at the end of the day, we take the most amazingly short showers (under/behind the boat) which use very little water. We then figure out a one burner meal to cook on the hotplate in the shed. Seems like beans, rice, more beans and rice along with fresh fruit are becoming staples. Since we still don’t have refrigeration, we only keep a little “6-pack” sized 12 Volt DC cooler running off a transformer. Its big enough for a jar of mayo and maybe some lunch meat for noontime sandwiches. We do have an icemaker, so keeping it running means lots of ice for cold drinks, though. We’re still sleeping on our old double mattress on the sole in the galley. The mattress-maker fellow came and made a template for the stateroom mattress. He’s not been back but said it would be done in 3 days…that was 7 days ago…

After working a long day (with a bit of a lazy lunch during the mid day heat) we go to bed quite early (usually by 9 pm) so we seem to be sleeping ALOT. If we weren’t so tired from all the boat work, we’d probably notice that our bed isn’t really all that comfortable on the floor.

And then there’s the mosquitoes. Terrible. We purchased an insecticide-laden mosquito net for the bed. Something recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) for people traveling in exotic locations. We figure the boatyard is exotic enough to qualify and the mosquitoes are certainly here–along with the potential for West Nile virus. AH, sleeping under the mosquito net is very nice. Quite romantic. Well, except that the cat, Beamer, has to have a way “in” to sleep at the head of the bed. So, we’ve become quite good at rigging a little “entry” for Beamer that overlaps and keeps out the mosquitoes.

Speaking of Beamer. He’s quite thrilled with the new accommodations on the boat. He can sit up by the anchor locker and see back through all the boat. Everything going on is in his view. He seems to really like that. Even when David is making lots of noise with power tools within just a few feet he seems happy. At night he pads around the boat checking out nooks and crannies. He’s only slipped down into the bilge once…scramble, scramble back up he came. It was scary enough without water in the bilge. I hope he manages to keep out of there once we’re in the water!

Well, that’s it for now.

Packing out of the studio today. Gee wiz there’s lots of dust! This has been the dusty/dirtiest place we’ve ever lived. Black dust on the window blinds and window sills gets just everywhere. But, after this week, that’s behind us and we’ll be living aboard while finishing up the work to be done before launch.

Right now, while I’m packing, David’s over at the boatyard piecing together the old sole and installing all the stringers (leveling bits of wood that go on top the floors for the sole to sit on). The new mast steps are a bit wider/longer than the old ones so he’s doing some creative work to re-use the sole.

So, a month has gone by since I’ve updated the blog. Time zooms along and lucky for us so does progress on Mahdee. With structural work completed in late June, July saw mostly longboarding the hull and prepping/finishing woodwork on the exterior. Inside, we have worked on ladders and re-installing the sole as well as painting the bilge, and installing the anchor locker–a Chinese puzzle designed by John and the last thing he worked on before leaving us July 3rd to spend the summer in Canada. We’ll miss him but we were glad that he was able to stick with the project through the completion of important structural work.

David and I will be moving aboard Mahdee (while she’s still in the boatyard) on August 1st. So, we’ve been also quite focused on the things needed to simply “live” on the boat. Like say, a platform for the bed in the stateroom…Beamer, the cat, won’t be pleased with roughing it on the sole, a bed must be in place before his arrival on the scene!

This weekend we shifted things from the storage unit at a nearby military base to the boatyard (the vanished deck hatches for example) and things from the studio apartment to the storage unit (work-related optics equipment and winter clothes). During the week, David will build some shelves in a garage we’ve rented to store extra wood in. We cannot store “obvious flammables” like say…paper, chemicals, etc..in the military storage unit. We expect to store wood in the garage for about 3-5 months after the launch of Mahdee as we will continue to work on interior fitting during that time. After he’s built the shelves we can get the wood up off the garage floor and have room to store some of our tools and things we’ve kept at the studio. Its sort of musical chairs with the studio “going away” on August 1st.

More stories later in the week and hopefully some pic’s too.