I know YOU! You pulled me into the MATRIX of Boat Ownership and I CAN'T GET OUT!

[wsmac]

In a distant past... but not so long ago...
.
"I think it's time for me to have a sailboat in my life! OH the joys of the open sea! The distant islands! Me 'n my gal lolling about on the deck while the boat takes us to port for EXPLORATIONS! NEW CULTURES! FREEDOM!"
.
Then YOU pulled me into the MATRIX!
OH SURE! You offered me a choice... which was no choice really... "Take this pill or that pill... it's your choice WSMac!"
.
There I was... slinking about the docks... eyeballing boats of various lengths - of hull and marine growth -
.
Making conversation with the liveaboards at the marinas , "Yeah, I've lived aboard for 97 years and STILL haven't gotten my boat finished so I can sail her out from the docks! BUT ONE DAY.....! "
.
Just like cruising the internet for por... uhhhhh.... I mean... uh, 'portant information .... I joined sailing forum-after-sailing forum creating imaginative names (that others already took)... hashing out complex passwords so I ALONE could enter the salty dregs of the keel-hauled keyboard Kaptains! "DON'T LISTEN TO OLD BLAH BLAH... he don't no nuttin'! I'ma tellin' ya dis here is the right way to do it... worked fer me nigh-on 2 years!" "SHUT UP YOU OLD SALTYSAILOR WANNABE! Listen to ME WSMac! Why... I was sailing ships when I was snot-high to a crumpton-swigish! Started out with my old favorite 'Tommy the Tug.. in the Tub by golly!"
.
I've spent SO MANY hours, Days, AND WEEKS curled up on the couch with my laptop and library of 147 books on Sailing Basics, Rig Rigging and Rogues, How to tar a wooden Lanteen... that the AMA is renaming the 'Fetal Position' after ME!
I'm so hunched over, when I go down to my boat people call out, "WHO LET THE ORANGUTAN OUT ON THE DOCK?"

.
I've sold so much blood and plasma now to buy "NEW THINGS MY BOAT REALLY REALLY REALLY NEEDS!" that I'm so pasty white my skin offers more UV protection from the reflection than the solar radiation shields on the International Space Station!
But STILL I log into my "...Account Overdue..." at various marine outfitters online... attempting to make "...just ONE more purchase... PLEASE?"
.
I've taped tennis balls to the bottom of my shoes because I want to 'condition' myself for the sea and the rolling waves!
I sit down to pee, and throw my toilet paper in the corner of the bathroom because I read somewhere you shouldn't flush it down the head! All the while engrossed in yet ANOTHER Sailing magazine, Chart, or another used novel about, "How I took my bathtub... made a sailboat outta her... sailing into the big blue... broke through the polar ice cap and circumnavigated 3 TIMES before she finally sank!"
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I now own a boat that I've worked on more than I've worked on my personal hygiene, nutritional needs, and love life that I no longer have to wear waders when 'going below decks'! No longer holding interesting cross-cultural conversations with the mold growing everywhere inside... but still.. when I first get back onboard and catch that slight hint of mustiness... I kinda miss those talks...
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Yep... I once was innocent to this world of the sea, content that the LAND was all I ever needed! Water came out of the faucet... AND IT WAS PLENTIFUL AND HOT!
I could cook my greasy dinner on the stove while heating up coffee water, microwaving popcorn while my movie started playing on the DVD player over my 247inch PLASMA TV , with my laptop playing YouTube Videos over by the fluffy 12 ft couch with vibrating massage and aroma therapy misting ports... and I DIDN'T CARE IF I CAUSED A BROWNOUT in the neighborhood because I had a Cummings Quiet Connect Series 1000 kW Genset out back with enough fuel to carry me through Arrrrrmahgeddin'!
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Yeppers! Life was GRAND as I knew it so long ago!
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But you know what?
The sailing life is kinda growin' on me!

[denverd0n]

Hey! You're the one who decided to take the red pill.

[Tetepare]

I once had a customer with a home on the Snake River. They'd wax on about life on the water and how much it influenced their activities.

When I visited their beautiful home I looked at the Snake River and saw nothing but a pitiful sliver of water. Not even enough to sail a Sunfish.

My life revolves around boating and water. I can live with that. The mall is not my thing.

[boatman61]

[zedpassway]

Clearly all your experiences have been fun. If only you had a life threatening one near the beginning of your experience on boats, then you would not have this problem...you would have another problem

[toddster8]

Originally Posted by Tetepare

I once had a customer with a home on the Snake River. They'd wax on about life on the water and how much it influenced their activities.

When I visited their beautiful home I looked at the Snake River and saw nothing but a pitiful sliver of water. Not even enough to sail a Sunfish.

My life revolves around boating and water. I can live with that. The mall is not my thing.

IIRC, even Hobie Alter kept a home in Idaho.

[wsmac]

Originally Posted by zedpassway

Clearly all your experiences have been fun. If only you had a life threatening one near the beginning of your experience on boats, then you would not have this problem...you would have another problem

Well I DID get a sliver of something jammed under a fingernail recently while cleaning the boat... HURT LIKE THE DICKENS!
Felt like I was a gonna die!
But I kept the boat anywayz

You should have seen how I rode mountain bikes for the first several years... and the xrays... and the hospital bills... but I still ride!
Long and Short-term memory issues can be a blessing... and a curse...

[thruska]

Originally Posted by wsmac

Well I DID get a sliver of something jammed under a fingernail recently while cleaning the boat... HURT LIKE THE DICKENS!
Felt like I was a gonna die!
But I kept the boat anywayz

You should have seen how I rode mountain bikes for the first several years... and the xrays... and the hospital bills... but I still ride!
Long and Short-term memory issues can be a blessing... and a curse...

A song goes like this , I think....
Do you suffer from long term memory loss ?
Refrain : I can't remember....

[liveaboard60]

Originally Posted by zedpassway

Clearly all your experiences have been fun. If only you had a life threatening one near the beginning of your experience on boats, then you would not have this problem...you would have another problem

Oh, I don't know.. Among my first negative boating experiences was in high seas in a relatively small boat..

We were heading south into 25' seas off the coast of California.. For over 5 hours we crested wave after wave, and I just knew the hull was going to split wide open at any moment and we would all be lost.. It was quite the experience..

Believe it or not, I think the excitement and adventure of being stationed on a U.S.C.G 82' patrol boat is what really set the hook in me.. flk k

[barnakiel]

No, no, no.

The sailing life sets in when you hit the first 1000 miles mark and there are at least 1000 miles to go.

You are talking the dock life!

;-)
b.

[UNCIVILIZED]

You know you're hooked when exciting sex is defined by both of you being at the masthead, nude, in climbing harnesses, while under sail in F8 conditions

[thruska]

Originally Posted by UNCIVILIZED

You know you're hooked when exciting sex is defined by both of you being at the masthead, nude, in climbing harnesses, while under sail in F8 conditions

Hahaha, is that the kind of thing that happens when ya hang with clients daughters ?...?? Lol
I must have led a sheltered life after all.
At a certain age , exciting sex is any sex anywhere. Just saying lol.
And there's that irrevocable school of thought of the importance, of the inability of pooping trumping the inability of fooking .:bigg rin:

When the grommet was the tightest seems to make the memory more vivid.
That might have to be my new signature, roflmao