Third time's a charm... almost.

I ordered some vinyl graphics for the name and port of call for my boat.  I specifically ordered curved ones and paid about $75 for the whole order.  When they arrived the name graphics were straight across and distorted.  I called up the place: www.boatletteringtoyou.com, told them about the problem and they shipped new ones out straightaway the same day.  Everyone makes mistakes, and I was glad that they took car of it in a timely manner.

After receiving the proper graphic stick-ons, I went down after work and bailed the water out of my little dinghy (it was more than half full this time, but still floating) and tied onto the transom of Aequitas while I taped and measured the layout.  I re-taped and re-measured quite a few times.  Every time I thought I had gotten it just right I would shove off and row back to take a look and make sure everything was level and centered.  After I knew what needed to be changed I would row back up to the boat, tie on, and get back to work.  It was a bit difficult because the little dinghy kept trying to float away every time I pushed against the stickers.  Eventually I was satisfied and stuck them on permanently.  Then I had to do the process all over again with the bigger graphics for the name, but now it's done and I'm very pleased with the outcome.  It may not be laser level, and centered perfectly with a micrometer, but for floating in a little boat at night, I'd say I did pretty well.

Saturday they weather was very nice so I went about calling and texting everyone I could think of to come help put the mast up.  Anyone that had helped last time had been scared off by the considerable amount of physical effort required.  In the end I got my brother, Spencer, and by brother in-law, John, to come down and help.  I got everything squared away, and my neighbor who had helped raise the mast last time, (and who measured the gap between the old shrouds and the chainplates) came along and rounded up volunteers from the dock for me.  It was great to have 8 or 9 people chipping in, I don't know how I would have done it without them.

I did get the boom rigged up to act as a lever, then we used halyards to steady the mast.  With that many people it went up rather easily.  The forestay fit just fine, the backstay I knew was gonna be short, so I was prepared with some length of chain to fill the gap.  Then we ran into the problem.  My shrouds that were 16" too short were now 5" too long!  The turnbuckles couldn't compress down that much, and so we had to kind of jury rig the port side while the starboard side was just cranked down super tight.  So it's not very sold, and the mast is listing to port.  The thing that frustrates me is that I need to spend MORE money on getting this rig done.  It'll all be worth it in the end, but the end (when my boat is all ready to go) keeps getting pushed farther away.

It was fun to have my little nephews running around playing pirates again on the boat.  I can't wait to actually take them sailing.

Sunday I decided to redo the bolts through the turnbuckles just to be safe.  When I was going to bed I noticed that the mast was slopping around back and forth a lot.  It made me kinda edgy.  Just as I was drifting off to sleep I heard this loud slapping sound.  My mind yanked out of sleep mode and I pictured a turnbuckle breaking free, and the mast toppling onto someone elses boat.  I'm glad I have insurance, but I don't want to have to make a claim just yet.  I got up and checked, but all was well.  As I drifted off to sleep again I heard the noise.  I decided to stay awake (or at least try to) so I could determine the source of the sound.  After the third time I remembered that we have quite a few very large carp fish in the harbor that are in full swing for mating season.  They chase each other under the docks, wrestle around on the surface a lot, and generally slam into boats as they do their business.  These fish are about as big as my niece, so when they slam into a dock or your boat it makes a bit of a ruckus.  (years from now she'll look back at this and think I was calling her fat...She's a baby!)

Satisfied that the noises were just aquatic procreation I decided I could sleep.  A couple hours later the wind picked up and there were more noises.  My mind gets very paranoid at 2:30 in the morning.  As it runs out it was just the flag on my neighbor's boat slapping against the mast. 

Today we're scheduled for severe thunderstorms and damaging winds, so I guess we'll see how well the rig holds up while I try and get a rigger to come down and fix my problems.