A Day at the Races

There we were, on the first leg of the first race, close hauled on port tack, among the leaders after a nice start, Dave at the tiller, Ross sitting on the cabin top to hike moderately hard. In response to nothing in particular (the wind was steady, the water flat) Ross adjusted his position — only slightly, but enough to lose his balance, fall backwards through the companionway, strike the back of his head on the coaming, and fall to the bottom of the boat, knocked unconscious for just a few seconds.

Ai yi yi! Yet he came to almost right away and answered repeated insistence that we should return to the dock with repeated refusal. He lay there a while and, after we were both satisfied that he had recovered, we went on to…win the race. We were third around the first mark (after our little "moment" led us to overstand it), but passed both boats ahead of us on the downwind leg, and stayed ahead on the second upwind and downwind legs.

Naturally, in the second race I asked Ross whether he would be willing to knock himself unconscious again, since it seemed to work so well for us, and would you believe it? He said no! Whatever happened to taking one for the team? This race, the most he was willing to do was whack his arm hard enough against a bulkhead to raise a lump and, predictably enough, we only came in third. That result had nothing to do, of course, with the helmsman making bizarre decisions on downwind legs.

And so it went. Our worst finishes came when Ross merely cracked a fingernail or almost (but not quite) fell overboard (a fifth, out of ten, in both cases). Once again, of course, the helmsman's tactical decisions and performance could not be faulted.

In the fifth and final race, Ross was kind enough to wrench his knee, and so our performance improved — we finished third once more. And so, a third place finish over all, with no one (permanently) hurt and nothing damaged (except for the other boat in the collision I didn't tell you about, in which of course we were blameless.)

Ah racing!

Tea Party - Raven Riddle

`You should learn not to make personal remarks,' Alice said with some severity; `it's very rude.'

The Hatter opened his eyes very wide on hearing this; but all he said was, `Why is a raven like a writing-desk?'

`Come, we shall have some fun now!' thought Alice. `I'm glad they've begun asking riddles.--I believe I can guess that,' she added aloud.

`Do you mean that you think you can find out the answer to it?' said the March Hare.

`Exactly so,' said Alice.

`Then you should say what you mean,' the March Hare went on.

Wetsuits are for Wimps

Went for my first ocean swim/bodysurfing of 2008 yesterday. Waves were great. Water was a chilly 59. It took me about 10 minutes to get "all in' but it was worth it!