Category Archives: lifestyle

Politics Tonight.

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It’s Tuesday. That means its time for the weekly meeting of my favorite local political group, the Texas Liberty Campaign of Brazoria County We meet every week at a local restaurant for good food and interesting discussions.

We’ve been meeting at the Mediterranean Gardens for a while now (since we moved from China Town). Plenty of good Greek (and Cajun) food.  I’m looking forward to it tonight since I haven’t been in so long.

I miss being able to talk about all this ‘crazy’ stuff, politics outside of the 2 party system, REAL freedom and liberty for America, things not really covered in the mainstream media.  Yeah, most people think we’re a bunch of tin hat conspiracy theorists. 😉

Sometimes I do too. But sometimes I think there really might be something to it (like all the completely unconstitutional spying on everything and everybody the US government does for just 1 example). And sometimes I even think it’s worth doing something about.

I only wish I knew just exactly WHAT to do about it all (other than speak out).

If anybody is interested, come on out and join us! We’re there from 7:00 til closing. 🙂

Screwed Up Again!

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More shit to deal with! My computer is screwed up again!!

Not JUST my blog now, but the computer. I’ll have to take it to the shop AGAIN and hope they can fix this one. 🙁

I hope I can get the old one to work, at least for the next few days.

 

Book: The Gathering Wind

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It’s been a quiet couple of days around here. I’ve been reveling in the fact that I finally found some time to just CHILL!

I wrote yesterday that I didn’t do anything except take my daily walk and cook dinner. Today I got a little bit more done. I did the laundry. 😉

I’ve been reading a good book and thought some of you might like it too. It’s called The Gathering Wind, by Gregory A. Freeman.

It’s all about the tall ship Bounty, (the replica of the one they had the mutiny on). 😉

The Gathering Storm tells the story of the ship, her captain (Robin Walbridge) and crew and how they wound up sinking in the middle of ‘Superstorm Sandy’.

It’s a pretty wild story, especially the heroic attempts by the crew to save their ship and the amazing efforts of the US Coast Guard to save the crew.

It’s a great read, a real page turner. Even tho I knew how it would turn out, it still kept me interested til the end. As a sailor, I kept wondering WHY would they do that? Head out to sea with a hurricane approaching?

The book doesn’t really give a clear answer to that question. It did have a section on the investigation of the sinking, but I would have liked more. I have my own opinion and it mostly has to do with money.

So many of these disasters at sea probably never would have happened if there was a REAL concern for safety, but ‘time is money’ and it gets harder and harder for a seafarer to find employment where the idea of safety is more than just a façade for the insurance companies!

Just a couple of weeks ago, the El Faro went down with all hands, another 33 lives. Lost in another hurricane.

Will the investigation for the El Faro come to the same conclusion? That it was all the captains fault? That only his ‘reckless decision’ was to blame?

Do you really think the captain of the El Faro (or the Bounty) would have taken the risks he did if there were no pressure from the office to ‘make the schedule’? I sure as hell don’t!

With all the new rules and regulations coming out of the IMO and various governmental bodies, I keep wondering when will they get down to the root cause of all this? The people in the OFFICE who run these ships! THEY are the ones who really make the decisions these days, the poor old captain is nothing but a scapegoat for when things go wrong!

There is only so much a captain and crew can do out there! Without the help and support of our employers, we can only do so much! Sailing around a hurricane (or through pirates, or any other extraordinarily dangerous place), is NOT something we should be doing just to save the company a few bucks!

I’m still waiting to see the day when the IMO does something that actually helps the MARINER! Putting at least SOME of the responsibility on those who really make the decisions, and off of the captain who is now only a figurehead would go a long way in fixing a lot of issues out here!

For further discussions of these incidents among the mariners who hang out on Gcaptain, (professional and otherwise), check out these links:

http://www.gcaptain.com/forum/professional-mariner-forum/10134-hms-bounty-hurricane-sandy.html

http://www.gcaptain.com/forum/maritime-news/17656-sea-star-el-faro.html

Quick and Easy

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Today was such a lazy day. I didn’t do anything much. I did manage to take my daily walk around the neighborhood, but that’s about it.

I finally got hungry enough to cook some dinner. I had some pork loin (center cut chops) I got on sale the other day that I never put in the freezer. I figured I had better cook it up before it went bad.

I cut it up into thin strips, sauteed it with some onions til it was pretty much done. Then I added a can of pineapple chunks, some frozen green beans and peas. I had one of those single serving rice cups I threw in the microwave and a few ‘cheese rangoons’ to heat in the oven.

Made a nice (so-called) Chinese dinner without having to go out. I would have called for delivery, but pizza is the only thing they’ll deliver around here.

For dessert I made some Waldorf salad. Apples, celery, raisins, cherries and mayonnaise. Just sweet enough and the apples went nice with the pork.

I like to cook. I don’t usually do any ‘fancy’ cooking (follow a recipe) anymore. Mostly since it’s just me and I don’t like to waste it. I learned to cook on the ship, so it’s still hard to cook for just 1. If I cook from a recipe I wind up eating the same thing for a week and still throwing half of it out! 🙁

Lazy

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Have you ever had a day you just didn’t feel like doing anything?

That’s what I’ve been feeling like today. Everything has finally caught up to me and I just didn’t feel like doing anything.

And I didn’t. 🙂

 

Taxman

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Gotta go see the accountant and pay the taxman today (again). Ugh!!!

I got an extension again, so now have until October 15 to deal with the mess instead of getting it all over with in April like most people do.

One more reason to get off my ass and figure out HOW to move out of here! If I can move, the first $100,000 or so of earned income will be tax free. Of course, I have no idea how I would ever earn anywhere close to that amount outside of the Gulf of Mexico, but that’s beside the point!

If I don’t have to give up close to 50% of my income in taxes, that means I can easily afford to live on 50% less income. And, I can probably avoid getting ripped off for another $10-15,000 in the obamascam!  I’m SURE there are many places around the world where I could manage to live nicely on 50% of my income.

Now, the issue is: how do I come up with ANY income if I’m not working in the Gulf of Mexico?

Great song by the Beatles! Who would’ve thought anyone could make a great song about taxes? Now, just think about the lyrics for a minute. 🙁

Taxman
The Beatles

Let me tell you how it will be
There’s one for you, nineteen for me
Cos I’m the taxman, yeah, I’m the taxman
Should five per cent appear too small
Be thankful I don’t take it all
Cos I’m the taxman, yeah I’m the taxman
If you drive a car, I’ll tax the street
If you try to sit, I’ll tax your seat
If you get too cold I’ll tax the heat
If you take a walk, I’ll tax your feet
Taxman!
Cos I’m the taxman, yeah I’m the taxman
Don’t ask me what I want it for (Aahh Mr. Wilson)
If you don’t want to pay some more (Aahh Mr. Heath)
Cos I’m the taxman, yeah, I’m the taxman
Now my advice for those who die
Declare the pennies on your eyes
Cos I’m the taxman, yeah, I’m the taxman
And you’re working for no one but me
Taxman!
And just in case that’s not enough to get you going, here’s an even better one from Stefan Molyneux on Freedomain Radio! Warning: some ‘bad’ language, if that kind of thing bothers you, try your best to ignore it, this guy is worth listening to!!
For some reason, I can’t get the video to open up here (and the editor won’t let me fix the spacing anymore either!!). But please take a look at it through the link. I know a lot of you don’t like my politics, but I really do think if more people took the time to really think through what we’re dealing with, things would change for the better. Yes, better for ALL of us!

Chuck It?

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I just mentioned I’ve been thinking how much I’d just LOVE to be able to just chuck it all and go sail around the world. Seriously.

Yeah, I’ve spent about the last 40 years TRYING to do just exactly that. I’ve spent almost my entire life at sea, hoping to see the world, have some adventures, and earn a living at the same time.

I keep TRYING to get the hell out of the Gulf of Mexico, go somewhere interesting and get a job where I really love what I’m doing, like I used to love what I do now. It seems no matter what I do, even if I manage to find a job overseas somewhere, I keep getting stuck right back in the Gulf of Mexico again. Right back to the same old, same old. Right back to the place where they suck all the excitement and enjoyment right out of being a mariner.

I’m up here at the DP Conference in Houston this week. I’m here hoping to learn something useful, meet some interesting people, get a feel for what’s happening in the DP world, and maybe even get a clue about who might be hiring DPOs.

Well, I have met some interesting people, and I have learned a little bit, but it sure doesn’t look good for anybody hiring any DPOs anytime soon. The more I think about it, the more I think it might just be time to say the hell with it.

I still have no idea how I could possibly make it work, but the more I think about it, the more I want to just GO! The only thing holding me back is the fear of wondering how in the heck will I be able to support myself?

I’ve been trying for years now to figure out SOME way to pay my bills without having to be out on a ship somewhere. I’ve tried vending machines. I’ve bought rental property. I’ve been working on writing, photography, etc.

That’s even one of the main reasons I started this blog, hoping to find a way to get around the editors, to get my photography out to the world (and hoping someone would like it enough to buy it). I still haven’t figured out what the hell happened to the blog when I moved it from wordpress, but it seems I’ve lost most of my readers since then. 🙁

I have actually sold 2 photos online so far. I’ve earned 50 cents for the 2 of them. 🙁 I have had a couple of my articles published, and once I even got paid. I wonder if I stayed home and was able to spend more time on it, if I could somehow earn enough to survive?

I wonder if I just did take off to travel for a while how long I would be able to last? It must be possible somehow, I just don’t know how I can do it!

I need to spend some time seriously figuring out my finances and looking at ALL options. I need to get over being so spoiled and afraid!!!

DP Workshop

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I got home late Thursday last week. I haven’t had time to do much but catch up on mail (and a little bit of sleep). I signed up for the DP conference in Houston a few weeks ago and luckily I was able to get off the ship on time to make it this year.

Today I spent all day in a ‘workshop’. About 100 people (mostly from shoreside) were in attendance. We were given the task of reviewing how to do an incident investigation and brainstorming suggestions to improve on DP incident reporting.

It was interesting to hear all the different suggestions, and also how many items were repeated by all the groups in the room. One that stood out to me was the fact that there are so many incidents that never get reported as they should be. So we all lose the chance for the ‘lessons learned’.

I’m convinced that the reason for that is simply fear. Everyone (including even the company you’re working for) is so afraid for their jobs that they just don’t want to do anything that might reflect badly on them. Yes, these reports are supposed to be ‘anonymous’, but I think there’s still the fear that your vessel might lose work if it somehow gets out that there was an ‘incident’ onboard.

That seems to be the norm even when things are booming, when work is as slow as it has been lately, nobody wants to take the chance that an incident report might lose them the contract.

Somehow, the hiring companies (usually the oil majors) have to get across the message that they will not ‘punish’ in the future for an incident reported today. I don’t know how that will ever be accomplished in reality. No one else at my table did either.

Sad to say, I was one of very few DPOs still sailing at todays event. There were lots of people who have moved into auditing and compliance. Lots of people who represent the different DP equipment vendors. Lots of people from the operations side of the offshore industry, but not enough active DPOs.

It’s always great to see old friends and make new ones. So many interesting people to talk to there. I have 2 more days to hang out up here in Houston and see what’s new in the DP world. (Yeah, I can be a geek sometimes). 😉

Free Form Harvest Apple Tart

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This popped up in my email this morning. Yes, my email finally started working again here this morning after 3-4 days of having absolutely no luck with that! No reason why it didn’t work, or why it did this morning. I just hope it continues!

Anyway, this recipe looked so good, and so simple, I thought I’d share it with you. Just follow this link. I think I’ll skip making the home made crust and just use a frozen crust to save time and effort.

I can’t complain about the food on here, the cooks are doing a great job with what they have to work with. Still, I like to cook my own food sometimes. I can’t wait to get home and try out some of these great recipes I’ve been seeing lately.

I’m due off this ship tomorrow. Of course, the crewboat won’t get us off here til 10-12 at night and we won’t hit the dock in Grand Isle til Thursday morning. I probably won’t actually make it home til around 9 pm Thursday night. Great to get off here, but sucks to be SO totally exhausted by the time I get home that I’ll have to waste 2 days catching up on sleep before I can really do anything. 🙁

Share Your World- Week 40

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Here’s another challenge from Cee. I really like her blog. She always has something interesting going on over there (and she takes some gorgeous pictures!). One of the things she does is run a “Share Your World” challenge. Check out the link to see others answers to her questions or to join in yourself. Here’s my answering post for this weeks challenge…

If you have been to a foreign country name those you have been too? I’ve been to a lot of foreign countries (check out my previous port calls). There are still plenty I haven’t been to yet and would love to go visit at the first opportunity. I’m still looking forward to seeing India, Egypt, Chile, Vietnam, Uruguay and Antarctica (even tho it’s not a country).  I travel every chance I get!

I started out young, I went to Canada and Mexico with my grandmother. Then I got to go to school on a sailing ship. We left Athens, Greece on the ship and sailed to ports in Italy, Spain, hit the Canary Islands and crossed the Atlantic to Martinique. We left the ship and flew to Caracas, Venezuela. We traveled overland to Columbia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. I joined the same ship again in Martinique. We sailed to the Azores, then France, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, the USSR and back to Copenhagen (Denmark).

After that trip I was hooked on traveling. I’ve since been to the UK (England, Ireland, Scotland). I’ve been to Turkey, the UAE, Oman, Bahrain, Mauritius, Angola, Congo, Solomon Islands, Kiribati, Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, China, Indonesia, Thailand, Laos, Singapore, Honduras, Belize, Nicaragua, Costa Rica.

Is the glass half empty or half full? What type of glass is it and what is in the glass? I have to admit, I am a natural pessimist. I almost always see the glass as half empty. I will say, I’ve never really thought about what kind of glass it is. I would say it’s probably a beer glass. One of those hour glass shaped ones they give you at the beer joint. And of course, BEER would be in the glass!

If you could have an endless supply of any food, what would you get? I would get a burger. I LOVE a good burger and there are so many ways to make them!

List:  List at least five places worth shopping. I’m not much of a shopper, I usually only really enjoy shopping for books and food. 🙂 I like shopping at AmazonSmile, a (small) percentage of everything I spend there goes to a charity I choose. I also liked to shop at Powells Books in Oregon (tho I haven’t been able to get there for ages). I like Half Price Books on the way to Houston. I like to ‘shop at the Goodwill and Salvation Army stores. They have lots of interesting things and decent prices. I go there when I’m looking for furniture or appliances for my properties, or for work clothes. I also like to shop at museum stores, I almost never buy anything, but they always have beautiful and interesting items for sale.

Bonus question:  What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up. I am grateful to have a job, but I am SO looking forward to getting off this ship and going home!!

Songs of the Sea: Shark in the Water

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I’ve really been falling behind with posts in my ‘Songs of the Sea’ series. Sorry to have left you all hanging, but on this vessel I just haven’t had the internet access I need to keep up with my blog or anything else.

I found this video in my drafts tonight, just trying to see if I could find something quick to post. I hope you like it. 🙂

10 Maritime Blogs- Plus 1 For Good Luck!

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Just so you know, I haven’t been purposely neglecting my blog and my faithful followers. 😉

I’ve been hard at work on the DSV Mystic Viking and my access to the internet has been extremely limited.

After my experience on the tuna boats, I promised myself I would never take another job offshore where I didn’t have internet access. Even the IMO recently came out with the ‘news’ that internet access offshore is “important for attracting and retaining crew”!

I meant to write this post a few days ago, to get into the spirit of ‘Maritime Awareness Week’. I’ve been working in the maritime industry almost my entire life; in commercial fishing, party boats, yachts, oil & gas, tankers, research. I still haven’t even really broken the surface of all the different aspects. I think most people are pretty unaware of how important the maritime industry is.

Yeah, I guess most people know about the oil and gas sector. That is where I’ve been most involved in the last few years. The transport sector is one part I’ve never really been involved in, other than tankers. There’s a good book about that part of the field. It’s called Ninety Percent of Everything. Check it out if you can, it’s really pretty interesting and I bet you’ll learn something!

In an effort to promote Maritime Awareness Week here on Captain Jills Journeys, I want to share a few of my favorite maritime related blogs. I want to try and show the huge variety of what goes on out here at sea where most people today never venture. I hope you’ll take a look and enjoy these blogs too.

Here’s one that’s just about everyday life on the water. The writer lives on a longboat along the canals of Great Britain. She writes about living aboard with her husband and their cute little dog.

Here’s one from Lisa, she sails around the world and has the most amazing adventures. All on OPB’s (other peoples boats). 🙂

Here’s one from Paul B. A guy who’s basically just starting out on the journey I started more than 30 years ago. Yes, I am also a hawsepiper. 😉

Another hawsepiper at Blue Ocean Mariner has a different perspective on the journey.

Here’s one from Augustin, another mariner. He’s sailed some really cool ships, including a couple of tall ships (which is how I got sucked into this too!). He writes mostly in Portuguese, so I can’t really understand all of it, just enough to get the general idea.

Here’s the Captains Log from the barque Picton Castle. Another tall ship (where I actually sailed with their captain back when I was a cadet and he was a mate). 🙂

Here’s an interesting blog if you like the scientific side of things. Southern Fried Science always has something new to see.

Here’s one from Ben at New England Waterman. He writes about working various vessels working around the harbors in the Northeast of the US among other things.

Here’s a link to Barista Uno’s Maritime Café Blog. He always comes up with some good stuff. Lots of art lately. 🙂

Here’s another all around interesting blog with lots of good art. Bowsprite is one of the first blogs I found when I started my own blog here.

Don’t think those are a complete roundup of good maritime blogs online. The few I posted are just a few I could come up with and link to from here. There are SO many more of them out there and (I think) they’re all pretty interesting. The world is covered in water and there are people all over the world who spend their lives working out there.

Not to forget, here’s one for the families we leave behind when we go to work. Thanks Callie!

Explosive!

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How many days do you get to go to work looking forward to blowing something up?

I’m looking forward to blowing up something today!

Really.

Yeah, really. I’m still here on the Mystic Viking. We finally got all our certs so we could leave port, so we loaded up on fuel and got the hell out of town.

We did one quick test job and then moved over here (SP) to do another quick job using explosives. There are hundreds (maybe thousands) of old platforms out here in the Gulf that have become obsolete and now need to be removed.

Instead of leaving them alone to continue serving as artificial reefs, the powers that be have decided they must be completely removed, the legs must be cut below the ‘mud line’. Thankfully, that gives us a lot of work, cutting them all up and then putting them on barges to bring them in for scrapping somewhere.

We’ll eventually be working with the Versabar 10,000. They’ll do the heavy lifting after we do the cutting.

For this job we set up a ‘bomb’ in order to blow up the leg of an old oil platform off the coast of Louisiana. The top has already been removed, so we are using the ROV to run the ‘bomb’ down the leg and run the detonation cord up to the ship.

Once we get the thing set up, we have to wait til the turtle watchers can come out and ensure that no turtles are harmed in the explosion. (Yeah, seriously).

I want to see something blow up!

Arrrgh- I Missed It!

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Aye, I’ve been so busy here on this old ship, I totally forgot that yesterday (Sept 19th) was International Talk Like a Pirate Day!

Yaaar, I be stuck here on this old ship, but I still could have had some fun with the whole pirate thing. Yeah, even here.

Of course, it would have been a hell of a lot more fun to be off. There are parties all over the world to celebrate and for sure I would have been in attendance!

Next year, I’ll be sure to remember next year.

 

Still Busy

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We’re still at the dock and still busy as hell. I’m hoping we might actually get the hell out of here some time tomorrow.

It’s been a rough week. I haven’t really stopped since I got here. Not much time to relax or do anything other than work. Trying to get this old boat through all the inspections, audits and etc so we can go offshore and actually start the job the boat was hired to do.

We’ve been having drills for the last couple of days. Trying to get everyone used to their emergency muster stations and duties. It’s a little more difficult than usual since we’re pretty much all new to this vessel.

Hopefully, we’ll pass our Coast Guard inspection tomorrow and then we’ll be free to depart for sea trials. 🙂

DSV Mystic Viking

DSV Mystic Viking

PS- I noticed someone had been searching online about who bought the Mystic Viking and that’s how they found my blog. If you’re still around, all I can say is that I’m not quite sure. Crowley or Deepcor. We’re working for both on here, so I’m not real sure who actually owns the vessel now. Deepcor did buy a few of the other old Caldive boats.

When Is Crew Change?

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I haven’t even been here a week yet and I’m already ready for crew change!

We’ve all been running around like a bunch of chickens with our heads cut off. It’s been non-stop since I got here and I’m wondering how much longer it will continue like this?

It’s ALWAYS rough when a vessel has been laid up for a while. Or when it’s new and just coming out of the yard.

I didn’t know the whole story when I took this job. If I did I think I might have turned it down. Yeah, even knowing how slow things have been lately.

As it is, I’m glad to have the work, but jeez, I wish it was finished already!

IMO Blues

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We’re working hard trying to get this boat ready to go to work next week. It’s been raining (hard) off and on since I got here yesterday. I’ve been lucky so far to have avoided getting soaked. Instead I’ve been working on paperwork all day.

The vessel I’m working on now has just recently changed owners. So we’re in the process of going through inspections and getting approvals from all the involved agencies. We are mainly dealing with the DNV and the ABS (class societies).

They are doing ISPS, ISM audits at the moment. We will probably have a visit from the Bahamas inspector too while we’re here for a flag state inspection.

For those who are not seafarers, the ISM Code (International Safety Management) and ISPS code (International Ship and Port Security) have been driving us all crazy out here since the IMO came up with the idea! Of course, the bureaucrats and lawyers must have been thrilled with such a humongous generator of useless paperwork.

I suppose some will say it’s done some good. I am not one of those people. I went to sea for the freedom of the job. The ability to just do the work I love and NOT have to deal with all the stuff like the ISM and ISPS (and those 2 are only a small part of what the IMO saddles us sailors with now a days). I really don’t know of ANYONE who went to sea in order to deal with paperwork all day. 🙁

It’s a real shame, what they’ve done to the life of a sailor, and you know what the really sad thing is? They really believe they’re doing all this stuff for our benefit!

Mystic Viking

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I made it to my ‘new’ ship this morning. It looks like it’s going to be a long 28 days. If my ride hadn’t already left, I might have turned right around and gone back home. 🙁

And we haven’t even got started yet.

DSV Mystic Viking

DSV Mystic Viking

Hail?

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I heard from the tenant in my beach house last week. He reported that the siding on his house was coming off. Oh wow, just what I needed to hear when I’ve recently been unemployed and hemorrhaging cash like it’ll never run out (insurance on 2 places, credit cards from last vacation and estimated 2015 income taxes!).

Since I was home (looking for a new job), I went down there to take a look and get some pictures of the damage to try and decide if it was worth calling the insurance company about.

Turns out, on one side of the house most of the siding was already falling off or gone! My property manager mentioned that I should take a look at the roof too, since there was a bad hailstorm recently. I figured I had better call the insurance company.

Since it was already late Friday, I couldn’t call them yet. I had to wait til the holiday weekend was over. I figured I might as well enjoy my planned sail on Saturday (and I did). 🙂

Tuesday morning, bright and early (a LOT earlier than I like to wake up), I called the insurance agent. Since I was leaving to go back offshore in just a couple of days, they tried to get me set up with a claims adjuster as soon as possible.

So, that’s how I spent my afternoon (morning was spent frantically trying to finish up taxes to deliver to the accountant since the deadline to get them in to the IRS would fall before I’m due back). Turns out, there was quite a bit of hail damage (I never would have noticed- but then I don’t spend much time up on the roof anymore). 😉

Looks like I’ll already be plenty busy when I get home. Trying to deal with this kind of thing is not real easy from hundreds of miles away. I do have a manager and she’s extremely helpful, but I still like to see the estimates and make the final decision.

So, I guess I’ll deal with roofing and siding repairs when I get home. Hopefully we don’t have any hurricanes come through here before then!

Looks Like I Got Lucky

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As I mentioned before, I was laid off from my job on the drillships recently. With all the bad news from the oilfield and thousands of lay offs every week, I thought I might be out of work for quite a while. I thought I might have to wait til the price of oil went back up. Many of my friends have been looking for months. 🙁

I started looking around online and asking friends even before I got back home from vacation. None of my usual companies had any work. Everything was dead slow.

Last week a friend told me about a possibility and he passed on my resume. This company called me and we’ve been talking ever since. It looks like I’ll be headed back offshore much sooner than I ever expected. 🙂

I’ll be leaving early Thursday!

 

What I Did for Labor Day

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I know everybody’s out there enjoying the holiday weekend. 🙂

I went sailing again. Not racing this time, just a nice, relaxing cruise. I went out with the Sail La Vie meetup group. We went sailing for the day and then came back to join a BBQ party in progress on the dock.

Things didn’t start out too well. It was pouring buckets on the drive up to Kemah! I had to slow down to 30 mph a couple of times, just to see where I was going. It was still raining when I got to the dock, but just a light rain so it wasn’t too bad to unload the truck and get down the dock to the boat.

We had a full crew for the Paradise,13 including Capt Kent. Everyone was in good spirits, even if they were all wet. The mimosas helped quite a bit. 🙂  No fair weather sailors in this crew! We checked the weather online and saw there was a pretty big squall line right over us. We decided to wait out the rain in the cabin before leaving the dock.

outbound, waiting for the rain to stop and the wind to start

hoping for the rain to stop and the wind to start

We got underway and headed out into the bay. Capt Kent brought along his dingy. The plan was to sail for a while and then take the dingy in for lunch. Once we got out of the channel, we put up the mainsail and found out there was no wind. 🙁

The weather was still against us, so we decided to go ahead and have some lunch and hope the weather would improve. We put the sail back down and motored over to ‘Noahs Ark’ in Bacliff. It was a little hard to find it, but with the help from the internet (google maps) and a good lookout, we found it pretty quick. Kent had to shuttle back and forth a couple of times to get everybody over there. He had a little trouble with the outboard, but eventually managed to get us all over (and back). 🙂

Gary and Bill dropping the anchor

Gary and Bill dropping the anchor

It didn’t help that they insisted they wouldn’t allow us inside without ID! (How ridiculous is that?! I never heard of anything like that before. Yeah, I know you can’t serve alcohol to someone without ID, but FOOD??) They lost some business over that cause a couple of our crew didn’t have ID. I never thought the USA would devolve into a state where ‘let me see your papers please’ was the accepted reality. 🙁

So, a couple of people had to stay on the boat, but they took it pretty well and there were plenty of drinks and snacks so they didn’t starve. We had a pretty good lunch ashore. The music was just right for our bunch, lots of Jimmy Buffett and 70s-80s stuff. We liked the décor, open air palapa bar, lots of funny signs and pictures around the ceiling, nice underwater painting. The food was good, I had a patty melt with onions (but it didn’t come with mushrooms).

Nice choice for lunch (except for the thing with the IDs)!

Nice choice for lunch (except for the thing with the IDs)!

By the time we were ready to go, the sun was shining and the wind picked up enough that we could set both sails. We had a great sail back to Kemah. We had good music,  good snacks, good conversation, good wind, plenty to drink and not much traffic. Not more to ask for on a day on the water.

Alright! Now we have both sun and wind!!

Alright! Now we have both sun and wind!!

Capt Jill teaching Kim how to steer a course

Capt Jill teaching Kim how to steer a course

We dropped off the dingy and motored into the dock around 6:30 and then headed over to the Sail la Vie BBQ party. Our chefs for the event Vic and Paul had some special recipe chicken cooking and there was plenty of fruit, macaroni salad, chips and dips, cookies and drinks to go around.

Vic and Paul explain their selection of BBQ sauces

Vic and Paul explain their selection of BBQ sauces

It was nice to meet some of the other members and catch up with some I hadn’t seen in a while. I haven’t been going to the meetings for a while, mostly because it takes me so long to get up to Houston and home. I don’t go up there anymore unless I have more than one thing to do.

I wound up getting home about 11:00. Too tired to do much but hit the sack. It was so nice to sleep in today. I plan to do it tomorrow too! 🙂

That’s how I’m spending my holiday weekend (nope, nothing about remembering what it’s really all supposed to be about- LABOR day and all that). Just chillin out and enjoying the time off.

How are you spending your weekend? Let’s hear it. 🙂

 

Flower of the Day- Orchid

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I’ve been having a hard time keeping up around here lately. Since I moved my blog, I’ve had nothing but problems. I’ve been spending a hell of a lot of time just trying to get things working around here again.

But I always like Cee’s photography challenges and I did have a few decent photos of orchids around on the computer. So, I figured I’d join in on this one.

Here are some orchids from the Singapore Botanic Gardens, they have a really great orchid garden along with a lot of other beautiful plants. It’s a very relaxing place to go when you get tired of the ‘city’ of Singapore. 🙂

Still Working On It

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In case you’re wondering, I had a little time tonight and I’ve been TRYING to get my blog back in some kind of decent shape. As you can see, it still has a LONG way to go to get it back to where it was before I moved it.

The biggest concern I have is to get the ‘follow’ button working again. I think I’ve actually been losing followers since I moved. 🙁

I hope those of you who are still here will stick around while I’m trying to fix this mess. It’s looking like it might take me a while. 🙁

Rum Race #7

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I’ve been busy. You would think things would slow down around here since I’ve been laid off, but nooooo… I’m just as busy as ever!

Saturday I went out with Capt Vic on the Bat Boat (she’s a C&C 38). We were a little late getting underway due to some trouble with the battery (it was dead). We made it to the starting line right on time (actually about 2 minutes early).

It was a gorgeous day, there were lots of boats out sailing. Capt Vic said about 60 were in the race with us. A few different classes of boats. I’m not really sure what they all were, I’ve really only started learning about racing sailboats.

These races are set up through the Galveston Bay Cruising Association. They have all sorts of races, regattas, cruises, etc. I don’t know much at all about how they run these races, just that we were one of the bigger, heavier, slower boats. Not using spinnikers.

The sun was out and the wind was about 10-15 kts for the first part of the race. It slowed waaaay down after we made the turn to head back towards Kemah. We took down the jib and put up the ‘gennaker‘ (the bat sail) and it actually helped a lot in the lighter winds.

We did lose some time, mostly because we were not used to setting that sail and it took us a while to get it working properly. Once we got it set, we had a nice, leisurely sail back towards Kemah. We were doing pretty good in the race til then, but we fell behind while we were messing around with the gennaker. 🙁

We made it to the finish line right before sunset and got to watch the sun go down and the full moon rise over the bay. The sunset was nice, but the moon was absolutely stunning! I wish I could have taken some better pictures, but I was on the wheel at the time and couldn’t concentrate on the camera, I had to pay attention to the traffic in the channel.

It was getting dark by the time we got to the dock. We fought off the mosquitos while folding up the sails up the dock. Once we got everything secured, we could try out the ‘dark and stormies’ we had been hearing about all day. D. came up with some mosquito spray and we had our 1st rewarding rum drinks out in the parking lot.

Not too bad. 😉

We slowly made our way over to the clubhouse for the afterparty. The Rum Races are sponsored by Cruzan Rum and so we had to head up there for the end of the race announcements. We had to see who won (even if we knew we didn’t), we could still enjoy the rewards. Free rum and snacks to go with it. 🙂

It was fun to hang out for a while and talk over the race with the other sailors. Everyone was friendly and in good spirits. The free rum helps with that. 😉

Some of us decided to go out for a more hearty snack from there and we met up at Sam’s Boat for nachos, sliders, chicken wings and more good stuff. 🙂

I made it home about 3 am. Days like that really make me appreciate the life of a sailor. 🙂

Rum Racing

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Hey, I got back home last weekend and ready to go out sailing again. Luckily, Capt Vic has had a standing invitation to join him for the Rum Races in Galveston Bay. I’m going out tomorrow! 🙂

Hopefully, the weather will be co-operative and we will have a little wind. I always love to go sailing. Not too much beats a day out on the water IMHO. Here’s a picture from the last time I went out racing with Capt Vic.

 

Now What?

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I know I haven’t been doing a lot with my blog lately. I moved it to a paid site and it has been driving me crazy since then. I’ve had a hard time even getting to where I can make a post lately.

It seems I’m at some sort of crossroads here. I just got laid off from my ‘real’ job. Yeah. I was on vacation in Nicaragua and they (finally) sent me an email. They wanted to know why I was refusing to return their phone calls!

I sent them an email back and told them that they should have known not to call me (besides the fact that we have NEVER done anything over the phone). I worked over last hitch for a month expressly in order to be able to take this vacation and my ‘boss’ (the pool co-ordinator) knew perfectly well I would not be available til at least mid August.

Anyway, we finally made contact on the phone. I was thinking it was probably for bad news and I was right. They called me around 2 am Sunday night so they could tell me I was being laid off. Yeah, nice of them to call me. Kind-of put a bummer on the rest of my vacation. 🙁

According to the company, due to the low price of oil, they have NO MONEY in the budget anymore for anyone in the resource pool. That is where I’ve been assigned since they hired me. I have no idea why they kept me in the pool. In actuality, I was getting more than a little sick of it. Still, it always sucks to be fired (laid off- same thing). Unless they give you a nice severance package, which of course they did not in this case.

I wonder how they plan to cover for all the people they have left when they need time off. That is what we were in the pool to do. They couldn’t really even manage when they DID have people in the pool! They have over a dozen ships they need to keep crewed up and each one has to have 4 DPOs onboard at all times. They only had 2 DPOs in the pool to cover for all those peoples vacations, sick leaves, time off for courses, etc. I know they kept me busy all the time.

Not my problem anymore. I know.

Now, my problem is to figure out what to do with myself. I’ve always worked and I’ve always been lucky enough to have skills that have been in demand. That is no longer the case all the sudden. For months now, I have been watching the news and hearing from friends how jobs have been cut by the thousands. Most of my friends have already been laid off.

I’m pretty sure there will be no work available in my field until the price of oil goes back up and stabilizes and the companies start hiring again. Winter is always slow anyway, so I don’t expect there to be ANYTHING til at least next Spring and maybe not even then.

So. Now what?

Norms Thursday Doors

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I’m still here in Nicaragua, but leaving tonight. I should be back home in Texas by morning.

I figured I’d add another pretty Nicaraguan one to Norms Thursday Door challenge this week. They do have a lot of very nice ones around down here.

I really liked the carvings of the toucans on these doors. These were in Granada.

So Nice!

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The weather here in Matagalpa is SO nice! It’s so cool. 🙂

After spending the last couple of weeks down around the coast of Nicaragua and Costa Rica where I was so hot it felt like I was sweating to death every day, it’s great to be in a new place where it’s actually enjoyable to be outside. At night it actually gets a little chilly when the breeze is blowing. 🙂

My old friend Tom from high school on the ship (the Oceanics) showed up the other night to visit me down here. That’s a whole ‘nother story! Yesterday we went to check out the local market which we both have always loved to do. It’s a great way to learn more about how people live. It’s also fantastic for photography.

We went looking for a nearby town that my (2006) guidebook mentioned had an indigenous market with weavings and pottery. Turns out there was no market in San Ramon. Just like when I came back to Granada because the Hipico was supposed to be last weekend and they changed it without telling anyone! Too bad I can’t stick around Granada til the end of the month!

So, since we couldn’t find the indigenous market, we came back through Matagalpa and stopped by to visit a guy I had met in Granada. He’s been living in Matagalpa for a while and knows about the area. He told us about las Cascadas.

It was a beautiful waterfall with a big swimming hole beneath it. We only managed to find it after we stopped to ask directions of a group of kids by the side of the road. One little boy was going that way so we gave him a ride. He told us to stop as we drove right past the place.

It was worth the drive through the mountains. Even with the hairpin curves and steep slopes. The place was really pretty. Lots of plants and flowers. The sound of the waterfall and the little river flowing by. We were the only ones there. We had a little snack and a couple of drinks (non-alcoholic) at the little restaurant /hostel about halfway down the slope.

We made it back to town late in the afternoon and had a quiet evening at the hotel. Sitting out on the veranda having rum and cokes and dinner from the little place next door. Nice BBQ chicken, beef, pork, tortillas, pinto gallo (rice and beans), and plantains.

I was still tired from partying too late the night we got here, but still managed to stay up til midnight last night. I think I’ll need a vacation from my vacation when I get home (and sadly, it looks like I will get one). More on that later.

Moving to Matagalpa

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I won’t have much time to get online today. Maybe not for the next few days. I’ll be leaving Granada and heading North to Matagalpa. Its supposed to be cooler up there. I sure do hope so! The heat and humidity here is killing me. Yeah, I know. I live in SE Texas, I should be used to it. But we have air conditioners and we USE them!

I’ll be leaving here around noon with a guy I met before I left for Costa Rica. I’ll be staying at a little place recommended by another guy I met hanging out at a bar/restaurant on the main drag the other night. Hopefully these guys are reliable. 🙂

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Last look at Granadas ‘main square’, it’s really a nice area to hang out. I’m staying only a half a block up the street. If only it wasn’t so HOT, I’d really miss it!

Songs of the Sea: Pirate Jenny

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Here’s another Song of the Sea. More jazzy than most. It’s a real classic!

Nina Simone – Pirate Jenny Lyrics

You people can watch while I’m scrubbing these floors
And I’m scrubbin’ the floors while you’re gawking
Maybe once ya tip me and it makes ya feel swell
In this crummy Southern town
In this crummy old hotel
But you’ll never guess to who you’re talkin’.
No. You couldn’t ever guess to who you’re talkin’.Then one night there’s a scream in the night
And you’ll wonder who could that have been
And you see me kinda grinnin’ while I’m scrubbin’
And you say, “What’s she got to grin?”
I’ll tell you.There’s a ship
The Black Freighter
With a skull on its masthead
Will be coming in

You gentlemen can say, “Hey gal, finish them floors!
Get upstairs! What’s wrong with you! Earn your keep here!
You toss me your tips
And look out to the ships
But I’m counting your heads
As I’m making the beds
Cuz there’s nobody gonna sleep here, honey
Nobody
Nobody!

Then one night there’s a scream in the night
And you say, “Who’s that kicking up a row?”
And ya see me kinda starin’ out the winda
And you say, “What’s she got to stare at now?”
I’ll tell ya.

There’s a ship
The Black Freighter
Turns around in the harbor
Shootin’ guns from her bow

Now
You gentlemen can wipe off that smile off your face
Cause every building in town is a flat one
This whole frickin’ place will be down to the ground
Only this cheap hotel standing up safe and sound
And you yell, “Why do they spare that one?”
Yes.
That’s what you say.
“Why do they spare that one?”

All the night through, through the noise and to-do
You wonder who is that person that lives up there?
And you see me stepping out in the morning
Looking nice with a ribbon in my hair

And the ship
The Black Freighter
Runs a flag up its masthead
And a cheer rings the air

By noontime the dock
Is a-swarmin’ with men
Comin’ out from the ghostly freighter
They move in the shadows
Where no one can see
And they’re chainin’ up people
And they’re bringin’ em to me
Askin’ me,
“Kill them NOW, or LATER?”
Askin’ ME!
“Kill them now, or later?”

Noon by the clock
And so still by the dock
You can hear a foghorn miles away
And in that quiet of death
I’ll say, “Right now.
Right now!”

Then they’ll pile up the bodies
And I’ll say,
“That’ll learn ya!”

And the ship
The Black Freighter
Disappears out to sea
And
On
It
Is
Me