Gettin’ edjicated

Been on the receiving end of a lot of schooling lately …

I just had a really odd dream. I dreamed that the community college where I teach and the university just up the road got together to provide a workshop for instructors working to prepare students for careers in film production, not just instructors in the film programs, but those teaching such things as English (e.g., script writing) and accounting (production budgeting, etc.). It was a really intense workshop, a week long, and it involved not only classroom work but field work as well; participants were picked up from their campuses by bus and taken to each day’s lesson site. One day involved going out on the water in boats – the one I was assigned to was a nasty green aluminum runabout that seemed designed to make sure its occupants ended up soaking wet and very cold.

At the end of each day of study, there were gatherings to dine and socialize in a large banquet hall at the university. At the end of the final day of the program, spouses were invited, and all went well until Pat tried to hog all of the bread in the bread basket on the table. Then he was told he had to pay for the bread.

As the gathering broke up, many of the participants said they would be looking forward to the next year’s program, but the folks running the show said there would be no repeat – this had cost too much money and was too much hassle to put on.

As Pat and I were hiking out to where he had parked the car, it was uphill. And then it was even more steeply uphill. And I was tired, and getting more and more tired, and my muscles were aching. And the path kept getting steeper, and I kept getting more tired, until finally, I couldn’t stand up anymore, and I was crawling toward the car, which kept getting farther and farther away.

I woke up, and I was still aching. Ugh.

But the whole idea of a workshop like the one I dreamed about really seems like a good idea, since New Mexico is trying to encourage the film industry to produce more movies in-state. We already have good programs in place to train support personnel, and it would be great to have more higher-level personnel close to home.

In real life, Pat and I have been spending a lot of time lately in classes, although these classes are related much more to sailboat racing than film production.

In early November, we headed up to Denver, where we took two workshops over the weekend, one on race management, and one on race judging. Our time there coincided with the first snowstorm of the season, small by Colorado standards, but still enough to ice things over. One of the highlights of that weekend was meeting people from regional and national organizations, including a bit of information about changes in the rules that will be taking place in the new year. We also enjoyed the company of some of our classmates, such as the commodore of the Aspen Yacht Club (yes, there IS a yacht club in Aspen!), and some people we’d already worked with at regattas in Colorado. Part of the idea is to get people doing race management in places other than their immediate home waters, in order to get regional race management certification.

Later in November, we came to Arizona for another workshop. This one was put on by the Arizona Yacht Club, and it featured Dick Rose, who is one of the people who actually wrote the new rules. It was great to learn not only what the major changes in the rules are, but also why those changes were implemented. For example, there is a new rule (although I suspect the vast majority of sailors were already abiding by the practice) that bans intentionally putting trash in the water. There are some adjustments to rule changes made four years ago, for example, fine-tuning the rules about outside assistance.

Once my fall teaching was over, it was back to Arizona for a long-term stay and another training session, this time in handling powerboats and in operating such boats in support of a sailing regatta. There were two four-hour classroom sessions, and then there was a day out on the water, in order to learn hands-on how to operate a powerboat, and in particular how to operate the boats that belong to the Arizona Yacht Club – after a couple of incidents, the club decided to make a rule that those who wish to serve on race committee duty must learn how to operate the boats. The classroom sessions went well – they covered a lot of material, very quickly, since the people attending the class were already reasonably familiar with boats and the water.

The on-the-water session, however, was another story. It was cloudy and rainy, and although the forecast said the weather would be clearing out by midday, it never did. We worked on low-speed maneuvers, and we began to do the capsized-boat recovery, but by that time, it was raining heavily, and it was breezy as well. I was on the first team to attempt the recovery, on a nasty green aluminum runabout that seemed designed to make sure its occupants ended up soaking wet and very cold. The 14-foot boat that we were to recover didn’t just capsize; it turned all the way upside down, making the recovery even harder. One of my classmates on the boat commented that the instructor had certainly arranged realistic conditions, unlike the videos we had seen in the classroom, shot in calm water and clear weather. The instructor decided to declare a break, go to the marina restaurant to dry off, warm up, and decide what to do next. Eventually, the decision was made to finish the training at a later date, with better weather.

Every year, I get a performance evaluation at work, and one of the things I am supposed to do is show how I plan to improve as an instructor in the coming year or two. Continuing education is one potential way to do that. I’m not sure, however, that my supervisors would count dreaming of an intensive film program workshop or taking sailing race-management courses toward that requirement. I guess I’ll have to find something else.

Oh, and one more thing. … I did participate in National Novel Writing Month this year, and as usual, I did get to 50,000 words, with “Murder at the Wedding.” I got to bring back some of the colorful characters from the family reunion a few years back, and various confusions, including a couple of neo-Nazi skinheads who were attempting to assassinate a cat, only to find out that the feline was more than their match. Even worse, the skinheads were the last people (other than the murderer) to see the murder victim alive, so they really didn’t have a good day.

And yes, I did, as usual, participate in National Cat Herders Day, although I was so busy herding cats that I didn’t get a chance to put up my usual post.

Getting set for dockmaster duty

Roughing it in luxury ...

The New Mexico Sailing Club, which operates the marina at Heron Lake, runs as a co-op. One of the duties of all members who have boats in the marina is to spend half a week on dockmaster duty. One requirement is that the dockmaster be physically at the marina at all times, either sleeping on a boat in the marina or camped out on the point above the marina.

Pat's duty doesn't start until tomorrow night, but we got the trailer set up so it's ready.

The Long and Winding Road

Not all who are lost wander …

The few people who frequent this blog might have noticed a lack of activity lately. That’s primarily because Pat and I have been on the road for most of the past three weeks. For a detailed travelogue, including pictures, you can look at Pat’s blog, Desert Sea, where he’s gradually putting up posts about the journey. I’ll just touch on highlights here.

The trip seemed to have two major themes: barbeque and detours. Just about every day, we had at least one great barbeque experience – when I travel, I want to sample the best of the local food, and we kept stumbling on great barbeque places. And just about every day, sometimes multiple times in a day, we ended up someplace we didn’t intend to be, sometimes because of road construction, sometimes because of our unfamiliarity with the territory, and sometimes because of a little of both.

Barbeque, May 2: OK, this doesn’t officially count as part of the journey, but we had lunch at JR’s Bar-B-Que in Albuquerque with the guy who was helping his buddy sell the fifth-wheel trailer we just bought, and exchanged a check for the title to the trailer.

Detour, May 2: Not a really big deal, but our favorite motel in Gallup had no non-smoking rooms available, so we had to spring for a suite.

Barbeque, May 3: Big Belly’s BBQ in Tempe, run by former ASU and KC Chiefs defensive tackle Bryan Proby, serves up massive portions of KC style barbeque. I didn’t have enough appetite for it this trip, but I’ve been told the giant potato is an experience I should have at least once in my lifetime.

Detour, May 6: This one was on purpose. On our way to the cruise on Saguaro Lake, we went to Arizona Cactus Sales to see what we might want to put into the landscaping if we buy a house in the Phoenix area – many of the properties we’ve been looking at have been bank-owned or otherwise neglected, and so the landscape is pretty much dead. We’d want to put in water-conserving landscaping, rather than recreating Scottish golf courses in the desert. We learned a lot about cacti and how to take care of them – which mostly means leaving them alone and absolutely not watering them or planting them anywhere water is likely to drain.

Barbeque, May 7: Right near our motel in Bakersfield was The Grill Hut. The menu is extremely limited (beef tri-tip or chicken breast, plus sauces and sides), but what they do, they do very well.

Detour, May 8: Trying to get from the Nimitz Freeway to Alameda Island is insane. The bridges that go to the island are not lined up with the roads the freeway exits lead to, and there’s road construction that makes things really “interesting” – such as semi-trucks turning left from an extremely narrow roadway bounded by Jersey bouncewall into another extremely narrow roadway bounded by Jersey bouncewall, during the extremely brief green-light interval of the temporary traffic light suspended from flimsy cables above the intersection, such that one truck takes three cycles of the light to complete its turn because of all of the other drivers who try to get around the behemoth and end up getting in its way, so it has to halt until they figure out that they have to back up to get out of its way. Apparently, “reverse” is not a setting that exists on the shift levers of most Californians’ cars.

Detour, May 10: Visited a friend on his boat in Marina Bay in Richmond, and then sort of got lost on the way out. Found the cheapest gas in the East Bay area, and also the mini-mart that was featured in the movie “True Crime.” Didn’t go in to see whether the potato-chip display had been moved.

Detour, May 11: Needed to do some financial transactions involving our credit union, so we used the credit-union branch-sharing network to find a participating CU in Berkeley. Google Maps got us there, but not back. We ended up taking a scenic tour of Berkeley and Oakland, including Chinatown, that we hadn’t intended.

Barbeque, May 11: We had already looked at our schedule for our time in the Bay Area and saw that the best time for us to hook up with family was Wednesday evening. My brother had the suggestion that maybe we could meet at Sam’s Bar-B-Que in San Jose, where our cousin often plays with a bluegrass band, Dark Hollow. As it turns out, the band was playing there that night, so my cousin saved us a table and we had a great time. The band played “Detour,” written by Paul Westmoreland and played by Spade Cooley, then subsequently by Patti Page and Willie Nelson, among others.

Detour, May 12: We had a coupon. We were hungry. We wanted seafood. Gerald’s Droid told us that Panama Joe’s atmosphere was “boisterous” but the noise level was “moderate.” I guess it depends what you mean by “moderate”; it was college night.

Barbeque, May 13: OK, we didn’t get to eat this, but our motel room was suffused with the aroma. We were right around the corner from the laundry room, which was also the housekeeping staff’s lunch room. Beneath the open window, they had set up a little electric grill, and the bulgogi smelled heavenly.

Barbeque, May 14: Free hot dogs and beer at the Alamitos Bay Yacht Club open house. Those folks are really proud of their new elevator, which is done up inside like a fine yacht, with wood paneling and cabin sole. We’ve been told that Black Magic used to be part of the Etchells fleet there.

Detour, May 14: Met Silver Girl and visited the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, then took an extended side trip to the Coyote Grill in Laguna Beach.

Detour, May 15: Sunday Brunch on the Queen Mary, followed by wandering all over the ship for several hours. We only got lost a couple of times …

Detour, May 16: Dropped Gerald off with the ASU sailing team for several days’ training at the US Sailing Center in Long Beach and made it out of the LA area with only one or two wrong turns along the way. Made it to Tempe, dropped off a couple of things and picked up a couple of things at Gerald’s apartment.

Detour, May 17: Less than an hour from home, we saw smoke rising and lots of red flashing lights up ahead. We got off the freeway onto Old Route 66 and meandered through the village of Paraje before getting back onto the freeway, which we then had all to ourselves until we got to the outskirts of Albuquerque.

Detour, May 18-20: You thought we were done traveling? Nope. First, Pat went to Los Alamos to pick up Dulce, who had been getting royal spa treatment at my folks’ house (dinner whenever she wanted it, an electric blanket to sleep on at night, and other general spoiling). Then we took the big truck (Enterprise) south to pick up the fifth-wheel trailer and learn how it works.

Detour, May 21: I had been scheduled to teach only one class during the summer term, but I was given the opportunity Friday to add another – this one on the West Side campus, where I haven’t taught before. Pat and I took a scenic drive to assess the layout of the place, and man, is it far away!

Today: No detours, but maybe some barbeque – chicken “wings” from JJ’s (they’re actually thighs, and therefore really meaty) should go well with the hockey game. Now I’m getting hungry!

One year ago today ...

It was one year ago today, May 1, 2010, that we lost our very good friend Marty. He was the sort of person whom you always expect to be there forever, but that day, he went into the water and never came back up. He is still very much missed.

Vaya con dios, amigo.

Woo-hoo, new shoes!

The time of financial austerity is over ...

For the past few years, Pat and I have been operating on an austerity budget. Part of that program has meant that I haven't had much in the way of new clothes for a very long time -- we've been shopping at thrift stores for most clothes. But now, at long last, I have the first pair of actual new shoes that I have had in about five years. And they're magnificent: delightful little black numbers that fit my feet like gloves, but with just enough extra stretch that in really cold conditions I can wear a pair of wool socks underneath.

Especially over on Facebook, many friends, including old high-school classmates, have reveled in their shoes -- how many they have, the special virtues of each pair, the stylishness, the excitement of finding just the right pair. Now, I can join them.

Meanwhile, it's not just my feet but also my boat, Black Magic, that is enjoying the end of austerity. We came down to Elephant Butte Friday with the hope of sailing with Zorro as well as working on boats. As it turned out, it was too windy to sail. First, I helped Zorro with patching some cracks in Constellation's deck and re-rigging the outhaul, which had been fouling far too often. Then Pat joined Zorro and me at the mast-up storage lot where Black Magic is, and we replaced a lot of the rigging: backstay control, mainsheet, jib sheet, traveler (including some blocks and other hardware), jib tack, mast block shock cords, and tiller tamer. Zorro also mixed up some epoxy filler, which he used to patch up some gouges in the keel as well as some dents in the deck.

Saturday, we had hoped that at least in the morning, we could get in some sailing; the weather forecasts predicted a breezy morning and a windy afternoon. But it was blustery from the get-go, much too windy for sailing. Zorro did some work on Constellation while Pat and I paid a visit to our favorite used-book store in the universe, Black Cat Books in Truth or Consequences. Gerald has a rule of thumb that a used-book store is not a proper used-book store unless there is a cat on the premises. I think I agree. Pat and I ended up getting a wide range of books, including a German grammar book, a collection of essays about what it means to be human in a technological environment, and a James Patterson (plus one of his more trustworthy co-authors, Maxine Paetro) thriller.

After that, Pat and I stopped by the hardware store to look for bolts to use when replacing the old cam cleats on the boat. In stainless steel, the longest bolts the store had were two inches, so we bought only four, two flathead and two pan-head, with the idea that whichever fit best, we could come back and buy more, and if neither fit, we weren't out much money.

Then Pat and I returned to Black Magic, where Pat set about working on replacing the old cam cleats on the console with the new ones that we had ordered. The old cleats were ancient and decaying even when we first got the boat, but we had never had time or money to replace them all -- when one of them failed, we put a new one in, and we kept saying that we needed to get them all replaced. It took Pat 20 minutes to remove just one cleat. We discovered that flathead bolts were the best for the new cam cleats, but two inches was too short -- we needed three-inch bolts.

Meanwhile, Zorro had done some more work on Constellation but had learned that the Sunday weather forecast was for even more wind, far too much to go sailing, so he decided to put his boat away and head back to El Paso. He stopped by Black Magic before heading south, and he and Pat worked on the shrouds -- we're looking at replacing turnbuckles at the very least and possibly at replacing the shrouds completely. We made plans to do more boat restoration next weekend, including new bottom paint at least on the parts of the keel that got patched. In the meantime, we can get the three-inch bolts and a few other bits of hardware we need. Top of the agenda for next weekend is completely redoing the outhaul on Black Magic so we can depower more effectively in a gust. There have been a lot of those lately.

Zorro is super-eager about all of these repairs and refurbishments, because he really, really wants to see Black Magic racing next weekend. And I do have to admit, I'm excited about seeing my boat finally getting back into a condition where she can sail well. But I'm feeling ambiguous about actually racing. I'm not sure I want to support the RGSC's current leadership -- the current commodore who, when he was vice commodore, tried to call meetings of the board even though the club constitution doesn't give him that power, and on shorter notice than even those who have the power are permitted to do; Zorro's replacement as race committee chairman to whom I gave the blog nickname "Space Invader" because of his creepy behavior toward me even before I learned of the New Mexico court records about him and the many restraining orders women have taken out against him; the club management that failed to notify one of our favorite restaurant owners that the sailing club was planning to hold a skippers' meeting in the restaurant's back room and thereby royally pissed off the restaurant owner ... I don't know that I want to race and thereby seem to support the current club leadership.

I think I'd rather just go sailing. And wear my new shoes.

Saturday sailing at the Butte

It's been a long time ...

At long last, I got in my first sail of the year. Pat had managed to sneak off to the lake a couple of times to go sailing with Zorro, but often it was mid-week, which meant I had to work. The one previous time I had gotten to the lake, the wind was just too fierce -- if the temperature had been warmer, it might have been good exciting sailing, but that day was just too cold.

Saturday, however, was much less windy. In fact, when we got to the lake, there was barely any wind at all. We joined Zorro and set sail on Constellation, hoping that perhaps some wind would fill in.

We had been drifting for about an hour when the wind did, finally, show up. It wasn't much, maxing out at probably 7 or 8 knots, but that's enough to make an Etchells go. Zorro had his handheld GPS, and we got up to 6.2 knots upwind and even faster downwind with the spinnaker up.

Pat was in charge of the spinnaker. He kept the trim up, and he's getting good at gybing the pole smoothly; that's something he and Zorro apparently practiced a lot the last time they were out.

Overall, it was a good couple of hours on the water.

We sailed until near sunset.

There weren't many other boats out. One friend had gone out earlier but gave up on waiting for wind and came in (his wife had chores for him to do anyway). Another came out late in the day. You can tell he's from Michigan; he was sailing in shirt sleeves!

Maybe, in between things like taking care of Pat's dad's estate and working on repairs (both boat and house) and various other tasks, we will have more time to sail this year.

Happy Valentine's Day?

A gift that goes vroom ...

Five years ago, Pat got me a sailboat for Valentine's Day. This year, it's something a bit different.
And it's RED!
And this, too, is better than flowers or chocolates.

What my Christmas letter would say if I wrote one

I don’t dare actually mail this …

Those of you who know me well know that the past few years have been disastrous. 2007 was calamitous; at the end of that year, I hoped that 2008 would be better. It wasn’t. At the end of 2008, I desperately hoped that 2009 would be better – I even said that things were so bad that they couldn’t possibly get worse. Unh-unh. 2009 was so bad that, by the end if it, I was calling it annus horribilis, because of all of the disasters that had occurred.

And then 2010 was even worse. There were times I wondered why the hell I even bothered trying to survive. What was the use?

Pat and I used to send out Christmas cards, which I always chose carefully to express exactly what we wished for our friends and family, along with a letter telling of our adventures and accomplishments over the previous year. I worked hard to keep it honest – no “little Susie is the most accomplished violinist in the state for the third year straight” or “Butch became the first high-school player ever to be nominated for the Heisman Trophy.”

Unfortunately, the need to be honest clashed with the expectation that holiday letters also be cheerful and upbeat. For that reason, Pat and I haven’t sent out a Christmas letter for the past three years.

So … if we were to send out a holiday letter this season, what would it say? Let’s see …

Holiday greetings to all of our friends and family for 2010 and the 2011 New Year!

We’re sorry that we haven’t been in touch lately as much as we should. Life has been busy. If you wish to contact us, you can find our email addresses and cell-phone numbers at the bottom of this letter.

It has been an eventful year, although not always in a good way. Pat continues in his fourth year “between jobs,” so we’re not exactly financially comfortable. We’ve had to cash in retirement funds to pay off bills and fend off foreclosure, leaving us with nothing but Social (in)Security and the New Mexico Educational Retirement Board to fund our “golden” years. And the one-eighth of my paycheck that has gone, without any choice on my part, to the ERB, has been invested 20% with Bernard Madoff and 70% with companies represented by buddies of the governor based not on which was a wise investment but on who got the biggest kickback. Not exactly reassuring.

We lost a lot of good people this year. In March, Pat’s dad died. He had been in declining health for quite a while, but he had never made plans for that eventuality – he had never made any arrangements for his care in the event that he became incapacitated, or much of any other advance plans, other than making some extremely naïve assumptions about how things would work once he was gone. In this case, it was fortunate that Pat was “between jobs,” because if he had had a job, he would have lost it because of all the time he had to spend on his dad, both before he died and after.

For me, probably the most devastating event of the year was the loss of our dear sailing friend Marty Stevenson. On May 1, we were preparing to start a regatta when Marty went overboard from the boat that he was on. He was not wearing a life jacket. We were only a hundred yards away; many other boats were even closer. The Coast Guard Auxiliary was already on the lake, doing an exercise; they and the park rangers were on the spot within minutes. But Marty was gone. His body wasn’t found until three weeks later. Stand by for sermon: ALWAYS WEAR YOUR LIFE JACKET. ALWAYS. YOU MAY THINK YOU DON’T NEED IT. HOGWASH! IT’S BETTER TO HAVE IT AND NOT NEED IT THAN TO NEED IT AND NOT HAVE IT!

OK, stepping down from soapbox.

On to the next obligatory section of the holiday letter: accomplishments of the offspring. That area, too, has not been up to the typical Christmas-letter standards. Last year, the financial aid office repeatedly lost forms that had been filed showing that Gerald’s father was unemployed and that therefore Gerald was eligible for financial aid. Because of the bungling in the financial-aid office, Gerald was found in default of $11,000 tuition for the Fall 2009 term and therefore ineligible to enroll for the Spring 2010 term. We’re still trying to straighten out the records, but at least he was allowed to enroll and take classes in Fall 2010. Problem is, the financial aid office is still losing paperwork, and we’re now sending a barrage of faxes to replace the same forms that we’ve already filed that the office keeps losing, in order that he can enroll for Spring 2011.

On the upside, Gerald seems to have found some direction in his life. He’s discovered that he loves photography, and so that’s now his major. He does, however, recognize that photography is not necessarily something that pays the bills. He also loves nature and the outdoors. He has decided that he wants to become a park ranger, so he can work in a beautiful place and indulge in photography on his days off. Especially at the elite levels in such organizations as the National Park Service, rangers have to perform a wide variety of duties: law enforcement, emergency medical technician, resource management, interpretative services, archaeological preservation, and more. This summer, Gerald got his basic EMT training, so that’s a start on the park ranger track.

OK, now that I’m done bragging about the offspring, I’m supposed to talk about what the parental units are doing. Well, Pat has just stepped down as the commodore of the Rio Grande Sailing Club, and I think he’s glad to be rid of the burden. Pat and I both went to the US Sailing class in race management a month ago; Pat’s already certified as a Club Race Officer and is hoping to get certified as a Regional Race Officer; I hope to get certified at the club level, but I also passed the test for regional level, so if I get ambitious, I could also work on the resume component.

Meanwhile, I’m still teaching developmental English at Central New Mexico Community College. My job is to work with students who need to get their English skills up to the level at which they can do college-level work. On my darkest days, when I am most discouraged, it is my students who keep me going. I may feel like giving up, but then I realize, my students need me and I don’t want to let them down. And then when I come to class, one or another will say something, and it will cheer me up, and then the whole class session is happy. I have the very best students in the world. I am so lucky to have them.

Yeah, not exactly a conventional holiday letter. But then, my life hasn’t exactly been conventional lately.

NaNo in the rain

Yes, I'm still alive, and here's a novel excerpt to prove it ...

Day One of the spelling bee: Contestants are supposed to arrive and check in. Of course, things aren't exactly going right. For one thing, a gas leak has forced evacuation of the building where the registration was to take place. For another, the normal warm, sunny weather that Siete Mares usually gets this time of year isn't happening; instead, there's a rainstorm of Biblical proportions.

Monday morning, it was still raining. Hannah thought maybe it wasn’t quite as heavy as it had been Sunday, but it was still heavy. This was not the sort of weather that Siete Mares usually got this time of year, and Hannah began to wonder whether there was some sort of curse hanging over the spelling bee. It wouldn’t be the first time something Hannah was involved in seemed to be cursed.

Hannah dug out her spare handbag and put her spare car keys in it; she wasn’t sure when she would have access to the auditorium to reclaim her main bag, with her keys, wallet, laptop, and other vital gear. She hoped it wouldn’t be long. Harry drove her to the campus, where she saw that overnight, a large circus-type tent had been put up in front of the performing arts center. So the building hadn’t been cleared for occupancy yet, she thought. She saw that backhoes and other construction equipment were scattered around campus in seemingly random locations, digging holes or otherwise pushing dirt around. This gas line inspection project was assuming epic proportions.

She ducked out of the car and through the rain into the front entrance of the tent. Inside, she saw that tables had been set up to register participants as they arrived. Rivulets of rainwater were running through the lawn at her feet, and she saw that the table legs were sinking into mud. Siete Mares didn’t get much rain, especially in the spring, but when rain did come, the sandy soil couldn’t handle all of the moisture and became saturated quickly. In the wealthy neighborhoods on bluffs overlooking the ocean, mudslides were a constant worry. Seaside Community College was on such a bluff itself, but the built-up part of the college was set back from the edge. Still, the tables and chairs inside the tent were taking on a surreal look, as they slowly sank into the ground, some leaning at increasingly crazy angles.

Grym was seated at the center of the table that faced the tent’s entrance. He had some stacks of papers in front of him, and next to him was a pile of cheap tote bags with the spelling bee logo printed on them, along with the words “Mid Coast Regional Spelling Bee” and the dates for this event. The end of the table to his left was sinking faster than the end to his right, and he was having trouble keeping the tote bags from sliding away. His chair was sinking faster than the table, so the table top, which would ordinarily have been at about the height of his mid-stomach, was instead at chest level. He was wet, as was everybody else in the tent, and he was not looking happy. The cliché that immediately came to Hannah’s mind was “drowned rat,” but really, Grym looked far more miserable than that.

“Ah, glad that at least one of my judges could show up!” he yelled. At this moment, the yelling didn’t seem inappropriate – the pounding rain on the roof of the tent was very loud.

Hannah looked around the tent. As Grym had indicated, neither Marvin nor LaKeesha had yet arrived. Instead, there were a half dozen apparently bored volunteers, waiting for contestants and their parents to show up and register, sitting at the other tables in the tent. Of said contestants and parents, there was no sign.

“Well, come on around!” Grym said, indicating the chair next to his, which, not having had anybody sit in it, had not started to sink into the mud. “Might as well show you the procedure!”

Hannah did as he asked and came to sit in the chair, which immediately started to sink. “When contestants come in, we need to check the list!” Grym said, indicating one of the papers in front of him. “We verify that all of their paperwork is correct! Then we give them this information packet!” He indicated the biggest stack of papers. “We also give them the goodie bag!” He pointed to the pile of tote bags, and then grabbed them as the left end of the table took a lurch downward and started the tote bags sliding.

“What’s in the goodie bags?” Hannah asked.

“Oh, all sorts of stuff!” Grym said. “Information about the event, stuff from the Chamber of Commerce like entertainment and lodging guides, coupons for restaurants and hotels and other services from sponsors, samples of soap and shampoo, a pocket dictionary – worthless if you ask me – from the bookstore, promotional materials from the college, a little bit of this, a little bit of that!”

“So how many contestants have registered so far?” Hannah asked.

“None!” Grym said. “But we must keep to the schedule! It says we start registration at nine a.m., so we started registration at nine a.m.!”

By noon, no contestants had appeared. Grym’s chair had sunk so far that its seat was only six inches above the muddy grass, while Hannah’s seat was a foot above. The table had not sunk so much, so it was about eye level for both of them.

Two men in dark raincoats, carrying black umbrellas, came through the front door of the tent. These men exuded an aura of “bodyguard”; Hannah was put in mind of Secret Service agents protecting the President of the United States. They even had little earphones with spiral wires leading somewhere inside their raincoats. They stepped to either side of the doorway and stood at attention, feet slightly apart. One of them whispered something into his miniature microphone. For a moment, Hannah thought perhaps the President himself was about to appear.

Next, three more men entered the tent – two more in dark raincoats, with umbrellas, one of which was held over the third man, who wore a tan coat. Hannah recognized His Honor, the Mayor of Siete Mares, George del Valle, with his thick, wavy, salt and pepper hair, bushy moustache to match, soulful brown eyes, complexion with just the right shade of brown to be not too brown and not too white, just enough wrinkles to look wise without looking old. Unlike everybody else in the tent, del Valle appeared to be completely dry.

Del Valle came up to the registration table, his hand extended. Grym made a clumsy attempt at standing, hampered by how low his chair’s seat had become. He started to fall backwards but grabbed at the edge of the table to steady himself. That turned out to be a mistake; the pressure on that side of the table pulled it downward, and it slowly tipped over, like a dinghy in a stiff breeze sailed by an inexperienced sailor who doesn’t know to release the mainsheet. As the table keeled over, the papers and goodie bags slid off, making spattering noises as they hit the soggy grass. Hannah tried to scoot her chair backwards to get out of the way of the table as it fell, but the back legs were firmly enough planted that all she succeeded in doing was tipping it over backwards; she felt the icy mud on the back of her head and shoulders, but fortunately the ground was soft enough that she wasn’t really hurt. She did succeed, however, in avoiding getting hit by the table, as her legs flew up in the air. Grym ended up in a similar posture. Hannah found herself laughing, not just at how ridiculous Grym looked, but also at the thought of how she must also look.

“What’s going on hewe?” del Valle asked, and his voice dispelled the carefully cultured appearance he had cultivated. His voice was nasal, a little higher in pitch than was truly dignified, and he had some sort of speech impediment. “I’m wooking for Gwymwyr Heebenwober.” Hannah was laughing even harder now; all she could think of was a cartoon character, vowing to kill the “wascally wabbit.”

Grym struggled to his feet, shaking off clods of soggy grass and blobs of mud. “I’m Gwym- – uh, Grymwyr – Heebenlober!” he said. “Who are you?!”

Del Valle was clearly not happy that his face was not universally recognized, even if a spelling bee coordinator from the state office would not normally be expected to know the faces of all of the small town mayors in the state. His face turned red, and he stood up as straight as he could. “I’m Geowge del Valle,” he said. “I’m the mayow of Siete Mawes.”

Grym reached over the wreckage of table, papers, and goodie bags to shake del Valle’s hand. “Your honor!” he said. “Glad to meet you! Very glad indeed!”

“Wikewise,” del Valle said. “Vewy gwad. But what awe you doing in this tent out in the wain, instead of in the auditowium?”

“There was a gas leak!” Grym said. “And the gas company thinks there may be more! All the buildings on campus are evacuated until it’s certain the gas has all been cleared out from all of the pipes!”

Del Valle was visibly blown back by the force of Grym’s voice. Hannah realized that she had become accustomed to his stentorian tones, but anyone meeting him for the first time would be floored. “Do you know when you wiww be abwe to wetuwn to the auditowium?” he asked.

Grym was saved from having to answer, and del Valle was saved from having to withstand another blast from Grym, by the arrival of Benny Quintana. She noticed dark blue dye running down the side of his face from his security guard’s cap – he must have just gotten a new one, she reflected. Well, with this rain, it wasn’t going to be in new condition for very long. “I just got the all clear from the gas company,” Benny said. “It’s safe to go in the buildings. I’m unlocking everything now.” He held up a large key ring with about fifty keys on it. “The performing arts center is open, and the alarms are off. You’re good to go.”

“Ah!” Grym said. “It’s about time! Let’s get out of this miserable rain!”

“Agweed,” del Valle said. “Wet’s get out of the misewabwe wain!”

NaNo sailing

This time around, a little different

Continuing the annual tradition, I'm posting excerpts from my NaNo novel as I go. Since the primary audience of this blog is interested in sailing, I generally focus on sailing-related excerpts. This year, it took a while before Hannah got out on a boat, and, well, as you will read, the adventure wasn't exactly perfect.

Her business with the paper was quickly over, and Hannah realized that it was still mid-morning. She and Flash could get out on the water earlier than she had anticipated. When she got out to her car, she pulled out her phone and pressed the speed-dial key that she had programmed for Flash.

He answered immediately. “Hi, Hannah, what’s up?” he asked.

“Well, I got done early at the paper today,” Hannah said. “I’m free now, if you’re ready to go sailing.”

“Super!” Flash said. “I’ll meet you at the boat in, say, ten minutes.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Hannah said, suppressing a fresh wave of jitters. The nervousness was really getting to her. She realized that it was a good thing she was running early; the sooner she got the business of facing her fears done with, the better.

She drove to the marina and parked in the lot nearest to Flash’s slip. As she walked down the pier, she could see that Flash was already at the boat, curly dark hair tousled in the wind, snapping black eyes reflecting the smile of shiny white teeth beneath the pencil thin Errol Flynn moustache. He already had the jib and mainsail rigged and ready to raise, and most of the docklines had been removed from the boat. Clearly, Flash had prepared ahead so he and Hannah could set sail immediately.

She took Flash’s hand to steady her as she stepped onto Avenger, and his expression changed immediately to a slight frown. “Hannah, you’re shaking,” he said.

“I guess I’m, um, nervous,” Hannah said. “I don’t want … history to repeat itself.”

“Don’t worry, it won’t,” Flash said. “We’ve promised each other, and we’re going to keep that promise.” He squeezed her hand.

She squeezed back. “We will,” she said. “I’m sure of it.” She wished she really were sure, though.

Flash untied all of the dock lines, holding on to the bow line to walk the boat out of the slip; he then cleated the line at the end of the pier so the boat could point into the wind, which, as predicted, was brisk without being too stiff. He got onto the boat and hauled on the halyard to raise the mainsail, leaving it slack and flapping in the wind. He then returned to the pier, untied the line, gave the bow of the boat a shove out into the channel, and then lightly hopped aboard, quickly settling himself at the helm. Hannah sat forward of him, next to the jib sheets.

As Flash pulled in the mainsheet to tighten the sail, Hannah was once again treated to the magic feeling of being on Avenger, under sail, energy flowing through her as the boat heeled slightly and surged forward. She began to feel herself relaxing, the negative energy of dread being replaced by the positive energy of the boat. She realized that she had been holding her breath in anticipation of the moment, and she let it out with a deep sigh.

“You’re feeling better now, hon?” Flash said. “I knew that getting out on the water would be good for you.”

“It is good,” Hannah said. “You want the jib up?”

“Go for it,” Flash said.

Hannah grabbed the jib halyard and pulled, smoothly, arm over arm, to raise the sail quickly, and then she grabbed the jib sheet and sheeted in, all in one smooth movement. She was rewarded with another surge of power as the wind filled the sail.

“That’s my baby,” Flash said, smiling.

Hannah smiled back. “It’s such a relief getting out here,” she said.

“You know, it’s good you got here early today,” Flash said. “The front’s moving in faster than predicted. If you couldn’t get here until noon, it might have been too late. This way, though, we can have a couple of hours out before things get rough.”

“Excellent,” Hannah said. She was focusing on the moment, letting the motion of the boat and the water dispel the last cobwebs of worry. She was here, now, sailing, in the mystical zone that Avenger always put her in.

They sailed out of the harbor and into the open ocean. Here, the upcoming front was making its presence known. The swells were steep, kicked up by winds farther out at sea that would be arriving at the coast later today. She imagined the avid surfers of Siete Mares were enjoying some really knarly waves. If the high they got from surfing was even half as great as the high she got from sailing, they were probably absolutely euphoric.

Flash and Hannah sailed back and forth, Flash steering the boat masterfully through the waves, its knife-like hull punching through the walls of water. Hannah was glad she had remembered to bring along her heavy-duty foul-weather gear; Avenger was a wet ride even in gentler conditions, and the jib trimmer got hit with every wave. Flash stayed much drier at the helm, as Hannah was blocking most of the spray.

The wind and waves were increasing, and Hannah was beginning to feel a twinge of … something … in the pit of her stomach. Seasickness? The return of the nervousness?

“Let’s go in,” Flash said. “I think it’s time to call it a day.”

“Yes,” Hannah said, noting that the little twinge in her stomach eased up. “We can get the boat put away before the really nasty stuff hits.”

Flash steered the boat downwind back to the harbor, surfing on the waves. At first, the feeling of flying was blissful, but then that little fluttering in Hannah’s stomach returned. No problem, she thought. Just a little reaction to the conditions, nothing to get worried about. She concentrated on trimming her sail, making sure to keep the telltales flying.

Then Hannah started feeling a little more queasy. No, she told herself, she couldn’t be seasick on Avenger. She and the boat were soul-mates. She swallowed, hard, three or four times, and that seemed to settle her stomach a little bit.

The wind got harder and the waves got bigger. Flash was steering the boat fiercely, keeping it as level as he could in the gusts. Now Hannah felt cold sweat coming out on the back of her neck, and her stomach was refusing to settle itself. She was losing the ability to concentrate on the sail, instead working on making sure her stomach held onto its contents, alternating swallowing with shallow breathing, gulp, pant, gulp, pant, gulp, pant.

Flash glanced over at her, and his expression became grim. “You’re not looking so good,” he said. “Maybe we should lower the jib and let you rest.”

Hannah agreed with that, although she couldn’t say anything while she was working on keeping her stomach under control, so she nodded emphatically. She ran the jib halyard through her hands to make sure it would run free without tangling, cleated the jib sheet down tight, and uncleated the jib halyard, then got up on the foredeck to pull the jib down, all the while gulping and panting to settle the stomach. The activity seemed to help curb the stomach’s urge to hurl up its contents, and when she came back to the cockpit, the boat seemed a bit steadier, so she was able to breathe evenly again.

She sat down next to Flash, and he placed his arm around her waist. “You were looking really bad there for a moment,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anybody get quite that green before. You sure you’re all right?”

“I am now,” she said in a voice that sounded very thin and weak, enjoying the feeling of solidness and reassurance that Flash’s arm provided. “I don’t know what happened.”

“Maybe Harry’s right,” Flash said. “Maybe you’re not really ready for intensive sailing yet. Maybe you do still need more recovery time from your injury.”

Tears came to Hannah’s eyes. “I can’t give up Avenger,” she said. “Since I’ve started sailing on this boat, I’ve become so much better. I’ve gained strength, equilibrium, confidence. Giving up sailing her would be like dying.”

“I know,” Flash said. “I could never ask you to do that. But I think maybe, at least for now, we keep it to gentler conditions.”

Hannah wrapped her arms around Flash, while being careful not to interfere with the arm that was controlling the tiller. “Thank you,” she whispered in his ear.

“Hannah, I know how important sailing is to you,” Flash said. “I could never imagine making you quit.”

A big wave hit the back of the boat, and it careened forward. Hannah felt her stomach lurching up again. “Oooooh,” she moaned.

“Oh, God,” Flash said. “Try to hold on!”

Hannah resumed the alternating gulp, pant, gulp, pant routine. It wasn’t working so well. She felt sour liquid rising in the back of her throat.

After what seemed an eternity, Flash brought the boat into the mouth of the harbor. It seemed to Hannah that all three – she, Flash, and Avenger – breathed a massive sigh of relief upon getting past the breakwater and into calmer waters. The boat settled down, and so did Hannah’s stomach, and Flash calmed down as well. Hannah hadn’t realized it, but he had become very tense during the last part of the journey back to harbor; she could feel his back muscles relax through her arm that was still hanging on to him.

November approaches

Prepare to do without me for a while

Those of you who know me know that I participate in National Novel Writing Month every year. This is an exercise in simply cranking out the words – 50,000 of them in 30 days.

I have been participating in NaNo since 2004. Since 2005, I have written a murder mystery every year, focusing on Hannah Montgomery, a community college English instructor who has a Jessica Fletcher-like habit of stumbling upon dead bodies everywhere she goes. The series’ inspiration was an unusually stubborn malfunctioning photocopier in the faculty workroom at the community college where I teach. It gave me the idea to write a mystery using a photocopier as a murder weapon, and presto, Murder at the Community College was born! In that mystery, a particularly unlikeable faculty member was offed by a booby trap set at the point in the copier’s paper path that always jammed.

Since then, Hannah has solved murders at the yacht club (vice commodore killed by an unusual subspecies of venomous snake), a family reunion (obnoxious great-aunt stabbed with a Sikh knife at Hannah’s fiancé’s family’s lake house), the little theater (the actor playing Sir Lionel in Camelot didn’t come back to life the way he was supposed to after the joust), and the sports desk of the local newspaper (an intrusive photographer clobbered to death with a hockey stick). Along the way, Hannah has fallen in love with a police detective, suffered a traumatic brain injury, been involved in a race riot, developed a fascination with racing sailboats, performed on a low-budget recording that went viral on the Internet, been raped, and met all sorts of interesting people.

So what’s next for Hannah? As she and fiancé Harry O’Malley plan their upcoming wedding, where will the next body turn up? I’m open to suggestions.

When machines rebel

Open the pod bay doors, Hal ...

For quite some time now, our aging Ford Expedition has been having problems. Mostly these have been little quirky things, like insisting that a door is open when they're all solidly shut, or randomly turning pieces of the instrument panel (gauges, lights) on or off.

According to the owner's manual, this vehicle has a fairly sophisticated brain. It even does such things as monitoring driving habits so as to be able to adjust engine settings to maximize fuel efficiency given the way the vehicle's regular drivers drive. When we first bought the truck, Pat commented that it sounded like the Expedition was smarter than he was.

But lately, the brain has been slipping, and this evening, it had its biggest slip yet -- as we were on our way to the lake for the Rio Grande Sailing Club's Desert Classic Regatta, as well as a club board meeting and a club general meeting and a potluck dinner, the antilock brakes decided that the truck was NOT going to move. Amid fumes of burning brakes, we found ourselves stranded on the shoulder of the interstate.

The way the truck's brain has been slowly going insane reminds me rather much of HAL, the supercomputer controlling the space ship in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, which started out with minor lapses and gradually became worse, eventually to the point of killing off nearly all of the crew (and trying very hard to kill the last one).

We used to call the Expedition Babe (as in the big blue ox); I'm tempted to rename it HAL.

So where IS it five o'clock right now?

Here's a device to answer that question ...

One of the most frequent searches (perhaps even THE most frequent) that brings people to this blog is, "Where is it five o'clock right now?"

Some years ago, I had an idea for something I could sell as a fund-raiser for the Rio Grande Sailing Club -- a clock that would tell its viewers the answer to exactly that question. I ordered clock parts from the Internet, got a couple of sheets of photo-quality printer paper, and put together a couple of prototypes, including the one pictured above. This is definitely a rough version; it needs some adjustments to the alignment of various elements. Also, each clock would have to be customized to the time zone of the purchaser, and I would personalize each clock by putting the customer's home waters in the five o'clock spot.

The price for the clock parts starts at $7 each, with the unit price going down for larger quantities. The photograph-quality paper runs $1 a sheet, and there'd be some printer toner consumed for each clock face as well. I was figuring I could sell the clocks at $20 apiece and make some money for the club.

Well, that idea never got off the ground. But I still like it, especially since there seem to be a lot of people out there who want an easy way to answer that question. Maybe I just ought to remove the sailing club logo, sell the clocks myself, and make some money. I could put Pat to work printing out customized clock faces. (Interesting customization idea: put the customer's home sailing club logo or burgee in the center of the clock, for a small additional charge. Or maybe offer quantity discounts for sailing or yacht clubs that want to order lots of clocks with their logo.)

So .... if you had the opportunity to buy a clock like this, would you? Or is this a "get-poor-quick" scheme for me?

In Memory of Richard Dittmar

Yee-Haw!

Yee-haw!

All right, let's try it again, Yee-haw!

Now, again, with feeling, Yee-haw!

OK, that's better.

Everybody who sailed with Richard, whether on the same boat or on another boat at the same regatta, knows yee-haw. It was his signature line.

He could use it in many ways. If conditions were brisk, knocking his boat down in ways that only a low-budget, water-ballasted, non-racing boat could ever demonstrate, his "yee-haw" was one of excitement. In a drifter, where even the fast boats were barely moving, and his boat wasn't really moving at all, the "yee-haw" was full of irony. He could shape "yee-haw" to whatever emotion he wanted to express.

Irony can also describe the way he got into sailing. He was an insurance salesman, and his idea was that he could join the sailing club, and then he would be rubbing elbows with all sorts of well-to-do yachtsmen, and then he could sell them insurance. He didn't realize until after he joined the Rio Grande Sailing Club that its membership did not contain the sorts of customers he envisioned – we have a whole lot of working stiffs, middle-management types, unemployed and underemployed people who sail because it's something to do, and a sizeable number of other insurance people. I don't know that he ever sold any one of us a policy.

But he did discover that he loved sailing. And he learned to do it well. He had a Hunter 26, a boat designed to be comfortable and affordable to middle-class Americans, but not designed for high performance. In spite of having a low-performance boat, he entered races, and he managed to do well. He learned the ways of the fickle winds on Elephant Butte Lake, and on occasion, he even put the higher-performance boats to shame.

In recent years, he did buy himself a true racing boat, an International Etchells, but his declining health prevented him from realizing its potential – if he could get the sort of performance he did out of the Hunter, there is no telling what he could have done with the Etchells if he had had the chance.

Unfortunately, that was not to be.

Yee-haw, Richard, wherever you are.

Waves

Coincidence, serendipity, whatever you call it …

OK, this post is going to be a tracing through of a lot of one thing leading to another leading to another, a la the former PBS/BBC television series "Connections" (which reminds me, I still haven't explained how the Earth's being spherical led to my car getting totaled, but I'll get around to that).

First, Captain JP put up a post about a website that maps photos taken online. This website not only plots where the photos were shot; it also makes an educated guess about how many photos were shot by locals versus how many photos were shot by tourists. Now, according to this website, London is not only the most photographed city in the world; a preponderance of photographers in London are actually locals and not tourists.

This got me to thinking about Japan, a country whose people seem especially fond of cameras and photography. I have heard it said, for example, that Mount Fuji is the most photographed mountain in the world. Think about it; there's even a brand of film named after it.

That led me to think about Fujiyama itself – even before there were cameras and film, the mountain was special to the Japanese people, and artists were making images of it. The most famous of these artists was Katsushika Hokusai, (1760-1849), who created a series of woodblock prints depicting the mountain, Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji. The best-known of these prints is "The Great Wave off Kanagawa," which depicts three boats whose occupants are taking refuge as a massive wave crashes down upon them. Fujiyama is merely part of the background of this drama. This picture is also used as a signature image on Zen's Sekai II, although Zen has stretched the picture horizontally, so the wave isn't so steep.

In 1985, the science fiction author Roger Zelazny, who lived in Santa Fe at the time, wrote the novella "24 Views of Mount Fuji, by Hokusai," inspired in part by the mountains of Northern New Mexico, and in part by Hokusai's work. Zelazny won a Hugo and was nominated for a Nebula for the novella.

Meanwhile, mathematicians have been looking at Hokusai's style. I can't pretend to know very much about fractals, except to admire the images they produce, but the way Hokusai depicts the foam on the waves in his art is, according to what I've been told, an accurate rendition of fractals in action.

Then, Joe over at The Horse's Mouth put up a video featuring big waves. Duuuude! The weird thing was that I kept looking for fractal curls in the foam of the waves – at least during the few nanoseconds when I wasn't watching for the surfers' next moves – or wipeouts. What would Hokusai have done if there were surfers in his view?

Waterbloggers’ Food Tour so far

Turnout has been low – let's see more responses!

As far as I can tell, I have had only two responses to my writing challenge to describe the menu for the Waterbloggers' Food Tour – what would you serve if you were entertaining your tired and hungry fellow waterbloggers after a day on the water?

The requirements are fairly simple: It has to be yummy. It has to be relatively easy to prepare, as you will be just as tired as your fellow waterbloggers at the end of the day. And it has to be on or near the water, using whatever facilities are available wherever you are.

First, almost simultaneously with my issuing of the challenge, Baydog came in with his oysters with shiitake mushrooms and jalapeños in a cream reduction garnished with basil chiffonade. Now, some might debate whether this dish meets the criteria for the contest, but I'm going to make a couple of assumptions here. One, he's a foodie who doesn't mind putting forth the effort to create this dish even at the end of a long day; and two, his kitchen is somewhere near the water, so he can prepare this food more-or-less on the spot.

Today, Bonnie Frogma rang in with her entry, a complete meal rather than just the entrée: Spam musubi from L&L Catering, plus side dishes made from fresh produce from her garden. In fact, she had originally toyed with the idea of having L&L do the whole meal, but then she decided the garden produce needed to be given its chance to shine. Wait a minute, I hear some of you saying, isn't it cheating to have a caterer provide some of the food? Well, if you look at the rules, I don't actually have a requirement that you, yourself, prepare the food. The requirement is that you, yourself, not over-exert yourself since you're as tired as your guests. As long as the food is on or near the water, and you have the budget to pay for it (and of course you do, since this is fantasy), you could conceivably take us all out to a waterfront restaurant and serve us up something special in the banquet room.

I, of course, have already described my main dish, beer-can chicken, but I will be adding side dishes and beverages to make this a complete meal. You can expect some down-home cooking thanks to my Arkansas relatives, but there's one dish I picked up in England that will add an international flair to the menu (and no, it's not mushy peas). Stay tuned.

Meanwhile, I'm still looking forward to hearing from some of the rest of you. Tillerman, with your house facing the water and with Tillerwoman's bountiful garden, what will you serve? Captain JP, what can we look forward to on the London stop of the Waterbloggers' Food Tour? O Docker, even if you have trouble keeping basil from going the way of Monty Python's parrot, can you serve up a banquet on or near the Berkley Marina? Zen, is it possible to create Asian fusion on a boat?

And anybody else out there, feel free to jump in with what you would serve up, given the resources available to you, if you were hosting a gathering of your favorite waterbloggers. The deadline is midnight Sunday, June 20. Of course, since this blog is about using time zones to advantage, that's midnight in the UTC-11 time zone.

If you have a blog, write a blog post describing your meal, and put a link in the comments here. If you don't have a blog, put your meal description in the comments.

A brief update

A few more questions answered

Heard today that the Office of the Medical Investigator has released findings. Apparently Marty had a massive heart attack -- although it's not clear whether it was before or after he hit the water.

So a life jacket might not have saved his life. It would, however, have saved his family and friends 20 days of searching and anguish, and the State of New Mexico tens of thousands of dollars in search expenses, and a couple of other guys the trauma of finding his body on the beach.

Serendipity shopping

Luck + creativity = success

For the most part, I hate shopping, especially for things like clothes. I don't like malls or department stores; I don't like big crowds of people; I find it excruciating to pull money out of my wallet and hand it over to someone else, even in exchange for something nice.

On the other hand, when I take measures to minimize the amount of money I have to fork over, I get into adventurous country. One such realm is the dollar stores, which get leftovers from other retailers and mark them down to a fraction of the original cost. The trade-off is that what's in the dollar stores is somewhat random. For example, not too long ago, one store had some super-premium brand shampoo and conditioner in the color-preserving formula – but only for red hair. Sorry, blondes and brunettes … but I'm set for a couple of months.

Another great place to save money is thrift stores. I've discussed them before, here, and here, and here, and I've given them passing mention a few other times. Even more so than the dollar stores, what is found at thrift stores can be seriously random. I have discovered that when I have a need, the thrift stores will provide, although not necessarily in the way I had envisioned at the start. Call it fate, or God, or whatever you happen to believe in, but the randomness of thrift stores has often led me to come away with something far better than I would have ended up with by going to a department store or mall boutique with something specific in mind.

Sunday, we had a shopping trip of that sort. First, I was looking for a dress to wear for the formal dinner-dance at my high-school class reunion, which is fast approaching. The Methodist thrift shop in Pagosa Springs is usually best for clothes, but that shop was closed – funny thing, they all seem to go to church on Sundays. The Humane Society's shop has a much smaller clothing section, but that was what was available. But in that small clothing section was the perfect dress – floaty, flowing chiffon in a swirling Victorian rose print, with empire waist, cap sleeves, and a solid enough lining to hide various figure flaws. That was eight dollars.

On the way to the cash register, I paused to look at the rack of CDs. There, I spotted a two-disc set of great artists from the mid-20^th century – Doris Day, Petula Clark, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, and more – Zorro's favorites. I figured he could use a little cheering up, so I nabbed the CD set for two bucks.

Then we went down to the bargain basement, where we stumbled on our greatest find. There were two brand-new, never-been-used, still-in-original-packaging inflatable life preservers for $16 each, a fraction of their original price. We pounced on them. Since May 1, Zorro has been wearing a life jacket every time he goes out on the water, but he's been complaining about how bulky and uncomfortable it is, and he's been saying he wants to get an inflatable. Well, now he'll have one.

Seek and ye shall find. For that matter, ye shall find even if ye don't seek.

Writing challenge: your stop on the waterbloggers’ food tour

Beer can chicken is just the beginning

People have reacted positively to my previous post on beer-can chicken, and there have been a few food-related comments on other blogs that I frequent, leading me to believe there is an interest in this project.

It would be fantastic for all of us to get together in sort of a global progressive dinner, where we meet weekly or monthly, each time at a different waterblogger's home waters, and enjoy a meal together.

Alas, such a scenario is not merely figuratively but literally fantastic, defined as "characterized by fantasy." It's not likely to happen in reality, unless one of us suddenly becomes obscenely rich and finances everybody else on the journey. So we will have to do with the virtual world and share our imaginations. Thus I propose this writing project. Here is the scenario:

A horde of your fellow waterbloggers has come to your home waters to join you sailing, paddling, or doing whatever other sort of water recreation you do. It's the end of the day, and they are now all tired and hungry. What do you serve for dinner?

There are some requirements. For one, it needs to be easy – if all of your fellow waterbloggers are tired at the end of the day, so are you, so you don't want to spend great lots of effort slaving over the food. It should also be really yummy. And it has to be prepared on or near the water – on your boat, in your marina, or using whatever facilities are close to hand wherever it is that you are.

Give us a detailed description of that dinner, so even if we can't come to join you, we can imagine the experience. Include recipes if you wish, so we can prepare the food ourselves and pretend we are in your company as we enjoy it. If you have a blog, put your entry into a blog post and give a link in the comments here; if you don't have a blog, paste the whole entry as a comment. Deadline for this challenge is midnight Sunday, June 20.

Beer can chicken

An insanely easy recipe

One of the challenges in cooking a chicken in an outdoor grill (whether charcoal or gas) is getting the outside of the chicken nicely browned and crispy while keeping the meat tender and juicy. If you wrap the chicken in foil or a bag, the skin stays pale and soggy, but if you leave the chicken uncovered, the meat often dries out.

Beer can chicken solves the problem. First, you season the chicken, inside and out, with whatever herbs and spices you're in the mood for -- pick seasonings that complement the side dishes you plan to serve. Then, open a can of beer (you can drink some of it if you wish, but leave at least half in the can), and slide the body cavity of the chicken over the can. Place the assembly in a barbecue grill over medium-low heat, close the lid, and cook 1 1/2 to 2 hours, until the juices running down the outside of the beer can are clear. If you wish, during the last 15 to 30 minutes, brush the chicken with your favorite sauce -- barbecue, teriyaki, or whatever.

As the chicken cooks, the skin crisps up nicely, and the beer evaporates to permeate the meat, keeping it moist and tender, as well as imparting some flavor.

Gerald and I cooked this up at the marina at Heron this evening. Lots of people asked us where we got this recipe. Thing is, I couldn't say. I think I've known about it pretty much all of my life, possibly courtesy of my Arkansas relatives.

Nowadays, you can even get a metal frame that holds the beer can and keeps the chicken from tipping over (as pictured above, courtesy of Life on the Water Magazine). You can find one in many mail-order catalogs.

Yeah, once in a while, rednecks come up with a good idea.