TAMMY-PROOF?

Today I found some windproof matches.

I tried one to see if it worked.

Then I tried to blow it out.

I hope I don't burn down the ocean.

QUESTIONS FROM MAREN

Maren: When are they going to launch for good?

Darn if that isn't a good question! I'm sure you're not the only one wondering that -- including us.  We thought we might be gone by now, but just this week, we took the dinghy motor to be repaired, and they said it would take TWO WEEKS. We're waiting for our new grill to arrive and still have to sell both of our cars before we can leave. In the meantime, we're trying to get other boat chores done.

For instance, we want to buy solar panels, so we can get our electricity from the sun (your mom will like this). You might have seen one solar panel on the back of Cara Mia:

Solar panel is just above and in front of the flag.

There are newer solar panels about the same size that will give us twice as much power in the same amount of space, so we want to replace it.

Maren: Where will they go first?

When we leave, we will go north to the Chesapeake Bay. Even though you could get there by car from the Outer Banks in a few hours, it will take us several days by boat. At its fastest, the boat only goes about 7 miles per hour. Ask your mom or dad to show you how fast (slow, actually) that is next time you're in the car. Make sure there's not anyone behind you, because they'll honk!

We'll stay in the Chesapeake until hurricane season is over this fall. In the Chesapeake, we can practice sailing in a huge body of water without being in the ocean. Our boat is new to us, so we want to get to know it and get it set up like we want it before we go in the ocean.

We'll be going back to school like you, sort of. There's an online class we'll be taking to get our captains' licenses. In the class we'll learn about safety and how to find our way around (called navigation).

Thanks for reading!

MAKING MUSIC

For the last three months, we've been stuck with old technology on the music front, since the stereo on the boat did not have an input to play music from our iPod.

After that long slog of putting all our CDs onto the iPod a few years ago, we were down to one CD that actually belonged to Dylan: Nickel Creek's Nickel Creek album. Now, I love Nickel Creek, but one CD for two months was getting REALLY tedious.

So Chip bought a new car stereo for only $59, (why didn't we do this three months ago?) and we toughed through installing it ourselves, a task that could have been ridiculously easy if the billion-wire plug was the same on the old stereo and new. No, of course not, so we spent an hour or so splicing wires while sweating (we had to turn off the power and thus the air conditioning).

Now thanks to technology our musical repertoire has exploded without taking up an entire room.

Thankfully the new stereo has not exploded -- at least so far.

YOU KNOW YOU'RE OFFICIALLY A CRUISER WHEN...

...you marvel at washers and dryers that operate without demanding quarters.

...you have more bags than you have clothes.

...you get annoyed when all the articles about John Kerry's new $7M sailboat talk about taxes and not the boat!

...it takes three whole days at the in-laws, before you realize you can use HOT WATER to wash your face.

POST OFFICE BLOCKS

Our tenuous plan for handling our mail: Get a P.O. Box near Chip's parents in Bridgeville, Delaware. Easy.

My conversation with the post office worker went something like this:

Me: I need info on renting a P.O. box.

Dude, looking all confident: All you need is a driver's license and a car insurance card.

Me, feeling hopeful: Do I have to be a Delaware resident?

Dude, looking impatient: No, but we have to send a letter to your current residence and have it sent back to us with proof of residence.

Me, feeling less hopeful: You mean, like a physical address?

Dude, looking somewhat confused: Yes?

Me, feeling ashamed: I don't have an address. I live on a boat.

"You live on a boat!?!?"

We stared at each other for a minute or so.

Me, grasping at straws: What if I used my in-laws' address?

"Okay, what's their address?"

"I don't know. I don't live there."

Dude, longing for a customer who wants a simple book of stamps: I better go ask.

He walks away and then turns back: How long are you gonna be doing this?

As far as the U.S. Postal Service is concerned, we do not exist. I hope they notify the IRS.

ONE LESS TO DO? BOO HOO.

We fix, we polish, we stow, we order parts, we tilt away at a very long TO DO list that looks like this:

--Fix the water filter

--Get the dinghy motor working

--Fix the hand pump

--Organize the cockpit lockers

--Get the stereo working with the iPod

--Order the grill

--Service the air conditioner
--Clean out the bilge
--Get a P.O. box

--Research electronics

--Sell cars...

You get the idea. We're always anxious to scratch something off the list.

We ordered a fantabulous, all stainless Galleymate grill with visions of T-bones in Manteo, mahi-mahi in Hopetown dancing in our heads -- and marking "order the grill" off our list.

The grill arrived last week while we were at the boatyard. Our anticipation was so great, we had already bought the first meal to cook on it. Alas, it looked like this:

Boo.

Boo hoo.

Remove "order the grill" from the list. Add:
--Box up grill and take to UPS
--Wait for new grill to arrive

[Insert your own trite phrase about forward progress here.]

QUESTIONS FROM MAREN

This morning I had this message from my friend Ivy:
"I thought I would transcribe the “20 questions” Maren has asked since being on your boat. Thought you would get a kick out of seeing your life through the eyes of a 6 year old. We decided this morning we would read her your blog and follow your journey. I love that you are teaching her (and others) to live their dream!"

Well, Maren, I'm so excited to have your questions. I'll occasionally put one of them here and tell you the answer. Thanks for reading. (Maybe you can send me a new picture. This one is over a year old. You're much more grown up now.)

Question #1:

Maren: “where do they get drinking water from?”

Cara Mia has a big tank under the living room floor that is made to store water. It holds as much as three bathtubs -- maybe more!

Look around next time you're at a dock, and you'll see faucets, just like the ones in your yard. When we're at a dock, we attach one end of a hose to those faucets on the dock and one end to the tank on the boat, then turn on the water until the tank is full. There's a gauge, like the gas gauge in the car, that shows us how much water is in the tank.

We filter the water as we put it into the tank and then again before we drink it. Filtering means putting the water through something that catches any bad stuff that might be floating in there. Have you ever dragged a net through the water? The net catches whatever is bigger than the holes that are in the net. Our filters work just like that, but the holes in the filters are so tiny they catch things that are too small to see.

When I lived in a house, I used water without ever thinking about it. Now that we have to carry all the water we use and then replace it, I am much more careful about when and how I use it.

TRY THIS: When you get up in the morning, fill a one gallon milk jug with water, and pretend it's all the water you have for the whole day. Every time you need water to wash your hands or brush your teeth or have a drink, take it out of the jug. By the end of the day, you will not only see how much water you've used, but you'll learn to use it more thoughtfully. That is what we are doing on the boat but with a much bigger jug!

Some day we would like to get a watermaker, which doesn't really make water, it just takes ocean water and removes the salt and other stuff that makes it taste icky. Watermakers cost a lot of money, but once we have one, we will have water as long as there is water in the ocean!