Merry Christmas!

    Good day to all my readers. I'm currently sitting on my brother's, Andy's, couch just outside Atlanta, GA. Cassandra is safely anchored in Factory Creek near Beaufort, SC for the week while I go visiting. I'll be back aboard on the 26th. Most of you know my laptop gave out on the way to Georgetown, but I didn't mention that my cellphone also stopped being able to send of receive texts. Luckily, I was able to get on ebay and order an identical replacement phone and a new keyboard for my lappy (that's laptop for those of you not familiar with the Strongbad-ism). Both came in shortly after I got in at my brother's and my electronics are all up and running again.
    In some ways I liked being without texting or gps. I felt like I was truly exploring new areas. I got to skirt around hidden mud shoals by the ripples on the water and a careful eye on the depthsounder. I got to guess the tide state and range by the docks, other boats at anchor, and direction of the current. I got to feel lost on occasion. As a member of the PDRacer forum, John Wright, once said, "Without the element of uncertainty and even danger... there is no adventure." Without my nav. computer there was definitely more uncertainty, and somehow it felt more like an adventure. Amazing what 'old' guys know.
    I'm trying to make myself useful while I'm here. I tore apart a bread maker, but couldn't get it to work. I spent a few hours pounding dents out of my brother's wrecked car. There's more work there than I can accomplish in the next day which I feel a little bad about. I did manage to fix their entryway lamp, but that seems to pale in comparison to the food, lodging, and touristy things they've shared with me these past few days. I feel like I've been taking much more than I've been receiving on this trip. So many people have been so kind to me, and it feels like I haven't been able to return the favor, or pay it forward. I hope to remedy that in the coming months.
    So, the plan is to shoot through Georgia and on into Florida where my sister and I will try to connect somewhere so she can come along on this unusual expedition. Hopefully I'll also be able to meet up with my friend Don and do a little cruising. Last I heard he was in Palm Beach. I'd also like to meet back up with Impulse if possible; I'd like my anchor back someday, and it's been a while since I've seen them. Incidentally, you can follow them over on lifeforsail if you want to know what they're up to. I'm always amused, and starkly aware of the difference of experiences for a boat of three and my boat of one.
    So there it is, my life in a nutshell. I feel a little guilty for not having more to tell you yet.
Happy Christmas, Merry New Year and Slán for now.
 -Brian \|/ 

Goldilocks

    One of the things that has always somehow attracted me to living on a boat is that it's an exercise in the extreme of 'just enough'. You find the boat that is the biggest you can afford to maintain and dock, but not so small it's unlivable. Then you pare down everything you own to fit in that mould. You find just the tools that you need and try to figure out just which spare parts you'll need when who knows what breaks down. You install only the systems you can't do without. Do you need pressure water? Do you need a refrigerator? Do you even need an ice box? What food do you need? Do you go with steaks and a three burner stove, or do you boil up rice over a tea light? The funny thing is, everyone comes up with a different answer to these questions. And it's a happy little surprise when you come across someone who came up with some of the same.
    The other guy on a 20-something footer makes you feel more comfortable. The person turning beans, rice, and lentils into tasty soup on a little propane stove makes your Ramen and eggs seem like an acceptable meal. Those retirees on their 47 footer with watermaker, radar, shower, icebox, heater, full enclosure... sure they seem to have it great, but everything they own will break eventually. And while they're shoulders deep in the bowls of their behemoth (which they can't manage to fit into a slip without help from the dockhands) tearing into their $1000 refrigeration system so the 50lbs of food won't rot before sunset, you're anchored a few hundred feet away, nibbling away at some rice and beans smiling smugly to yourself, just like they'd been when they motored past you three hours before while you were getting soaked in the rain.
    Some people will tell you that they "can't live without" their, whatever. Some people tell you that the minimalist experience enhances the beauty, the connection to the trip. Seeing as how I am, indeed, on the more minimal side of the spectrum, I do believe I've gotten more out of the experience than those 35-50 footers. I've been forced to figure out what is just enough for me. Some things aren't enough; I wish I had more tools. Some things are too much; I haven't worn a third of my clothing and I feel crowded by some of the general clutter. But, I've seen the edges of what I need to survive. Enough keeps me content, more will never make me happy. Then again, that was part of the whole point of this trip, to live with less. The folks with everything aren't out here for that experience (but if they are, someone should tell them they're doing it wrong). There are things I miss. I miss my LEGO, my car, my modeling area.
    Of all of it, only the tools I've left at home have really impacted how I live day to day. I live by my hands. I craft things because words are sometimes meaningless. When I try to write it feels like a shallow mockery, like a kindergartener trying to write a sonnet. Without those tools I feel lost, I can't turn imaginings into anything more than strings of characters on damp leaves of paper. Some people craft in words, some craft within people. I'm only able to turn out rude facsimiles of the visions I wish I could create, even with all my tools. But time, practice, and patience may change all that. Only time will tell. Until then, I will take what I have and use it to the best of my abilites. I will turn enough into more than it seems.

Expariencing some ttttttttttechnical difficulties

So, due to cicumstances beyond my control, my laptop is out of commission. The supposedly waterproof keyboard got wet and stopped working. I have a new one on order but have to meet up wih my brother to get it possibly in Savannah, though that is currently questionable. Hopefully I can spend Christmas with him as well. We'll see. Anyway, not having a computer means my navigation is all paper charts and all internet must go through my aging itouch. I'm currently anchored just outside Charleston, SC. I don't know when my next update will be, but I wish you all the best of fortune until then. - Your humble correspondant, Brian \|/

Traveling in Time and Space.

    Where do I begin... I'm currently in Southport, North Carolina waiting for SomeDay to catch up. They should be in sometime today. I got my hair cut and shampooed, a treat I can tell you. And I also picked up some copper wire and jewelers' pliers so I can start making some pendants and things that maybe someone will buy. On that note, I was doing the math last night and my student loan payments till May almost equal the amount I have in checking. Pinching pennies will become important quickly; gotta stop eating out.
    So where did we leave off? Oh yes,  I was leaving Elizabeth City. I got a head start on SomeDay who left a day after I did. The couple on Permission Impossible stayed to sell off their small outboard for food money. It was three days or so to get to Belhaven where SomeDay and I stopped to wait out heavy winds. From there I went on to a beautiful marina at $1.50 a foot where I had my first shower in a week and enjoyed a sort of Thanksgiving dinner of Roastbeef, gravy, mashed potatoes, and corn. The following day we pulled into Oriental where I met an older Canadian couple headed south on their Catalina 37. They had leftovers from a Thanksgiving potluck which they gladly shared as we talked into the night about boats, scale models, and film careers among numerous other things. So far that has been one of my favorite interactions of this trip, one of those moments you treasure up in your heart, as it were.
   From Oriental it was a short 25 mile hop down to Moorhead City, then 30 or so a day to Swansboro, Sloop Point anchorage, and finally Carolina Beach where I spent last night. SomeDay was a day behind again and I took the opportunity to stop in at a bar and grill which was having an open mike night. It was a long but pleasant row from the boat to the town docks at the far end of the basin, and even more pleasant on the trip home. The water was glass smooth, rumpled only briefly by the passage of Hope and steady strokes of  my oars, the stars glimmering above and again beside me in a breathtaking dual-sky mingling with pleasant self-reflection and passing melancholy. Days like that sum up my existence. A lone soul of happiness and helplessness lost into itself amid the bright bustle of the "normal" lives of everyone around it. Content, and still wanting; a living contradiction.
   So that's the news from Lake Woebegone. I know I've glossed over some things and completely forgotten others. If any of my readers (strange that I actually have readers) want to hear more about anything leave a comment and I'll try to do a post on whatever it is you're interested in hearing about. Salud!