Small Victories, Let The Pros Do The Work.........If You Can Find Them

I wish to thank you two followers of my blog that toughed it out through the thick and thin of the build. The thick: when the damn epoxy goes off on you in the 105 degree heat. The thin: my wallet, which  has two major bills outstanding, yard fees and canvas work. I am tapping the dwindling reserves that I saved up through the ages. Oh well, that's what it's for as I ages, I guess.

When you build a boat, it's difficult to let someone else do work and figure out the problems. You sweated every detail, you solved every problem. We had three people working on the boat, which complicated everything. There was too much discussion to solve a problem. We all would do a task slightly differently and we had to learn to let whoever was working on a problem work out the details. Some things I had to know so I could fix things in the future. I am currently looking at Budge's plumbing and electrical system. I left him alone to do it, but now I have to use them. I have installed fans and lights and need to figure out how I want to connect them. Budge left plenty extra electrical circuits to do such things. I just have to see what is best for me. The plumbing is complete. I just have to figure out how to use the system.

​Now I have someone else working on the motors. It's best that they do it, but I still hover a bit. I want to know the hows and whats of the process. I can let it go, but my nature is to see what's happening. So, Monday I was ready. The motors were going to be put on the boat. No motor guys. Big emergency from a big contractee that necessitated me not getting the motors installed. Five days later, the big emergency over, we put them in today.

I worked on small victories. I installed stuff I made a couple years ago I organized, re-organized and re-re- organized stuff. I did small stuff. Making it a bit nicer. 

​Tonight I'm drinking a Guinness clone from Shiner, Texas. Everyone says I write better with a few beers.

I spent some time on Sunday on a big shackle tackle. I decided to do a production run. I measured how much Amsteel I had left after the miscue and the first shackle. I had enough for ten shackles, 57½ " (1,460½ micrometers in metric). I cut the ten pieces, I eye spliced the ends, I took a break. I'll do the rest later....................

Remember those things a couple weeks ago? You know.....those things I glued on??? Oh, poo, you don't. Well, I finished them up in this week of small victories. I cut bungee cord and knotted a end and stuck them through the holes in those things and stretched them, and threaded them through those things on the other end and knotted them, too. See? See? They hold stuff from falling off the shelves! Do they work? Dunno, I'll find out.

Tire flat number thee. This was a broken punch that found itself in my tire, It went in at an angle. I rolled my tire down the streets of Galveston finding a tire shop.

Another small victory: epoxy box modification number two: make the area bigger to hold the squeeze bottles.

It turns out that I had no point to attach the main sail. I delved into the plans (grrrrrrr) and caught the gist of the center attachment point. I don't know squat about this stuff, so I made something up that may seem right. It involved gluing a block together of oak. It involved buying a hefty eye strap. It involved buying two stainless lag bolts. It involved drilling holes so the lag bolts wouldn't break off in the oak. It involved coating the block with epoxy. It involved gluing the block to the other block. It involved pre-painting the block. Boat building is a pain in the butt. So there it is.

I glued on the toilet handle holder to the head bulkhead. Hey, small stuff, folks. I made this thing a couple years ago. It seems that I'm running out of stuff to do.....

Huh, why did I take a picture of the mast???? Oh, yeah, I had a bit of mast paint left and some scuffs in the mast. I just poured the two part paint together, dabbed it on the scuffs, and threw the remainder away. Another thing out of the way. Is it perfect?.........not even close. Is it done?.......yes.

I have been working aft picking up clutter from the decks and putting them in the cockpit. The cockpit: the last refuge for refuse. I am chipping away at this stuff.

So Saturday rolls around and, voila, the guys were back from the lose-your-ass-bid job fixing the whatever boat and back on my motors. They got them installed. The motors were back with stuff to do! I can work on them. Are they done the way I would do them? No, but I can do them now. I can get the stuff to work. I can pull it together. I never worked well with others. I have them in my bailiwick.  Hey I am working on a video for the illiterates that can't read. Yes, I'll send a link to the President.

The Music​♪: Guy Clark "The Cape"

We all wear one sometimes.