The happiest days

Every sailor knows the old jaw " The two happiest days in a sailors life are the day he buys his boat and the day he sells it".  This has been the year the old ship has eaten the credit card alive.  The first big project was patching the dinger Kadizzle put in the keel last year.  That was actually a spring and fall procedure.  The trailer for the good ship had to be specially modified last year so the keel project could take place this spring.  This spring the keel was faired, and Kadizzle likes to think the boat is going faster.

The old knot meter has been reading zero for several years, and it was time to bring it back to life. When you are cursed by the sailing gods a simple repair turns into a Gordian Knot.  First the meter itself went to the doctor to the tune of $256.  The doctor said the knot meter was working, but he decided to do some cosmetic repairs.  If it was not the meter itself, it had to be the sending unit.  What the hell buy a new sending unit for another $135.  Changing a sending unit while the boat is in the water is fun. You pull the old one out, and get hit in the face with a fire hose of water until you get the next one in. With the new one in joy spread through Kadizzles heart, but of course it was 20/1000 too small.  Now the new unit had to go back, and it was of course replaced with one that was also too small.  After some southern engineering Kadizzle was able to get the diameter of the sending unit to enlarge. It was simply a matter of soaking  it in Viagra over night.  With the new knot meter in place it was time to try it out.  Sure enough when we got underway it still read zero.  This meant the damn cable was probably bad and another $40 had to be sacrificed to the sea.  Luckily resetting the meter solved the problem.  Now it was time to calibrate the meter.  Of course since the meter was older than the Bible you could not use a GPS to do it.  The instructions indicated you had to sail a two mile course and say some magic words as you picked your nose and faced west.  After Pat and I tried to figure it out, we finally gave up.  So now the boat can always be faster or slower than reality, it is just a matter of choosing which illusion you like.

Every boat leaks more from the top than the bottom, so the Vice Admiral  aka, The Commander, the notorious Jasper Littlebottom, decided she would no longer tolerate her favorite leak. This meant resealing the chain plates.  After this messy and hopeless job The Commander discovered some rot below the chain plate.  This meant another week of repairs and $300 more contributed to the deep.

Water in the bilge was the next mystery.  Every possible source was researched.  After the National Aeronautical and Space Administration reviewed our leak the Kadizzlites concluded it was the packing gland. A few twist and hopefully that is cured. 

Somewhere in this chain of catastrophes the fresh water pump decided it was time for it to go to water pump heaven.  I am sure it went to heaven because it did last over 12 years.  Anything that last on a sailboat over 12 years automatically goes to sailboat heaven in the Carri bean.  Replacing the water pump is fairly simple and strait forward.  First you spend another $112.  That is the first rule in all sail boat repairs, spend some money.  With the new pump in place it was now time to turn it on and blow up the hot water line that ran through the bilge.  With that line replaced now the the pump could come to full pressure and blow out the line in the head, and under the kitchen sink.  So now you turn down the pressure and replace all the cold water lines.  Of course on a boat you have to stand on your head and work blind on everything.  If you manage to get the wrong fittings and have to make a trip to Beulah for a three dollar part, that also make you love for sailing increase.

After all this The Commander and Kadizzle finally got the sail we had worked so hard for.  After a nice meal in a secluded bay the steak dinner with sauted mushrooms was settling nicely when the cook decided to do the dishes.  Jasper shut off the faucet and the water line exploded.  It exploded with a gush, not the loud firecracker noise it made last week.  Fortunately it was just a clamp some idiot failed to install. The idiot of course had to craw upside down in the sail locker and fix it.  This was the same wonderful faucet that blew up last week.  That facet provide hours of puzzling and frustration, but finally got fixed by salvaging parts from the old shower fixture in the head.  The Commander said that facet was history.  Kadizzle set out to get a new one for $25, but The Commander said it was the wrong color and a piece of excrement.  In no time Littlebottom ordered one for $120.  The new faucet has not arrived, but it will surely be cursed and be harder to install than an artificial heart.

Beside Kadizzle sits the new bilge pump.  This little darling was $45 dollars and tomorrow will be a welcome new member to our ship. The Commander has been commenting on how lovely the tattered quilt we call the head sail looks.  Ah, a new head sail will only cost about $2,500 dollars.  If pirates will only attack our ship, sink it to the bottom and let us off on a deserted island, it will save us a fortune.  A review of our insurance policy indicates we are protected from pirates if Visa is not part of their name.