Liberty is being free from the things we don't like in order to be slaves of the things we do like.--Ernest Benn

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

Not Fun: Watching a Yacht Race from Shore


And without a good telephoto, you can't get good pictures either. All you get is a little more exercise and a little more canine company than you would usually get on a Wednesday afternoon.

In retrospect, it was either a bad idea or a very bad idea to put Das Boot on the market. Her diesel was working perfectly, until a couple of surveyors got their hands on it. Then they sicked a Diesel Guy on to her and there's been no end of diagnostics and prognostics as a result. Proctology and colorectal surgery. Seemingly endless.

Previously everything was working perfectly. Now she's on the hard and I'm missing races left and right.

Tillerman ("Die on your Laser") and my friend Dave ("This is a beautiful day") are right. My response to noticing my ageing process should have been to assign my eventual survivors the task of selling my boat. My response to all of them -- surveyors, brokers and mechanics alike -- should have been to paraphrase Charlton Heston: you can have Das Boot when you pry my cold dead hands from her wheel.

Well, patience. I'm not a 2nd Amendment kind of guy. I'm going to chill. Eventually, I will sell her. And I will sail her until I do.

6 comments:

  1. Surveyors, brokers and mechanics are to boats what hospitals, insurance companies, and surgeons are to human beings. Stay away from them all, they will only do you harm.

    Deaths in the USA:

    12,000 - unnecessary surgery
    7,000 - medication errors in hospitals
    20,000 - other errors in hospitals
    80,000 - infections in hospitals
    106,000 - non-error, negative effects of drugs

    That makes the medical practice the 3rd leading cause of death!

    Eat plants. Be well. Go sailing. Be happy.

    Beautiful pics, as always.

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  2. Not fun...reading about not sailing. Hope the diesel guys get their act soon so that you and Das Boot can do what y'all are meant to do.

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  3. I think Bruce Kirby might agree with you. Look at all the hassle he has had after he tried to sell his design rights to the Laser (widely assumed to be an estate planning move) a couple of years back. I wonder if he sometimes wishes he had just let sleeping dogs lie and let his heirs sort out the mess afterwards.

    On the other hand maybe he's having lots of fun suing the Laser builders, the Laser class and ISAF, and giving interviews to sailing magazines and launching the Kirby Torch. I don't think I would want to spend my 80's dealing with stuff like that instead of sailing my Laser or Kirby Torch or whatever it will be called by then.

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  4. You need to consult Sozadee and heed the answer.

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  5. A sailboat is not only for sailing... it is also a 'potting shed'. For English gentlemen of a certain age, a potting shed is somewhere to get away from wives; either by themselves, or with like-minded friends; somewhere to "potter about", doing things that they want to [as opposed to doing things that their wives tell them to].

    Keep your boat and enjoy worrying about the diesel not working properly. Otherwise you will have to find something new to worry about!

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  6. Thanks guys! Good advice and consolations above!

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