Life has been a bit wild since the first of 2016. For her Christmas present, I gave Clarice tickets to go see our daughter and grandchildren in Ontario. I had planned to enjoy New Years with our yacht club here at home while she was gone but the weather was incredible and so I talked a friend into joining me for a run to Seattle on New Years Eve. Jarvis and I ended up getting a rare open slip in the Bell Street Marina right on the Seattle waterfront. I had a great view of the fireworks shot from the Space Needle before going to bed. New Years Morning was perfect for being on the water and so I decided to try single handing the boat for my first time and took her to Tacoma. Shortly before I arrived I heard that my father looked worse and since he was in a nursing home in Tacoma at the time, I caught a ride up to check on him. It was good that my home had moved to Tacoma as I needed to call the family together and be at his side until he died on January 4th. My father had been ailing for several years so in a way his passing was a blessing but I do miss him. The church where we had the memorial service was overflowing as my father was a very quiet person but always passed a sense of caring and love to everyone who knew him.
Once funerals were past, my immune system let down its guard and I ended up with a respiratory ailment that knocked me over for more than a week. Having mild asthma does not mix well with inflamed lungs and I had a good look at what COPD patients must feel like.
Recently we saw an interview with the Goldbergs posted on the Nordhaven Dreamers listserve. As the Goldbergs were the second owners of our boat when she was known as Duet we read the interview with great personal interest. The interview included a lot of history and photos of "The 46" as they often refer to Salish Aire now that they live on "The 50" also named Duet. Here is a link to the interview: http://www.pendanablog.com/guest-interviews/2016/02/28/Ron-and-Nancy-Goldberg--MV-Duet-N50 . We continue to be insanely jealous of their travels but hang in there with the belief that our day is coming!
A big change for me will be a new position in 2 days. Clarice and I are both Registered Nurses. For nearly a decade I have worked in Patient Safety and Risk Management. While the work is rewarding and very interesting in its own way, it does get depressing always knowing who is mad at my employer, who is trying to take my employer to court, and when we have injured a patient. Since the company is opening a brand-new, very lovely, inpatient Hospice unit in the same building where I now work, I decided to apply with the idea that I became a nurse to care for people. I am looking forward to getting back to the bedside which has always been my first love.
I also gained a title this morning, I am now an Armature Radio Operator (AKA: "Ham") at the Technician level (currently waiting for my call sign to be posted). I periodically try to understand our High Frequency (HF) radio and have discovered that it is NOT a plug and play piece of equipment but rather requires a fair amount of understanding to get the most out of it. Since it can function both as a Marine SSB radio and a Ham radio (with advantages to both modes), I decided to go ahead and get the Ham license so I could experiment with its full capabilities. Anyway, currently radio parts are spread around the pilot house (AKA: "Clarice's office") while I try to understand how to get it to function as it is designed to.
Our other update project that was recently finished was adding 3/8 inch acrylic storm windows to both sides of the saloon. We have heard that having them up, even though we are not currently at sea, will help keep the boat warmer and they do seem to help. The biggest challenge was making a second set of stainless mounting pucks. The boat came with a set for one side (commonly the boats only have the storm windows on the less protected port side) but we wanted to do both sides. In the end I had a neighbor cut the blanks with a water jet NC machine and then I further finished them with proper sized holes and threads.
For those who ask for Jarvis updates: He is currently in one of his usual spots at the top of the pilot house stairs watching my every move hoping that I will sit back on the settee so he can jump up and rest his head on my legs.
