Dude Where's my Boat?

5-11-12 Alameda, CA

"Where's my boat?"

I suppose this is yet another installment of "how the world of boats works."  Apparently, this world is not the same as the outside world where customer service is paramount and when promises are made they are kept.  That may seem a bit harsh and it really is, to some degree.  On the other hand there seems to be a lot of "just go with it" and "don't worry, we'll get it done" attitude when dealing with boating related industries.  Being an obsessively punctual person who believes you should never promise something you can't deliver this sometimes frustrates me.  Thankfully I'm getting over this little by little as our departure date nears.
For instance:  We had contacted a local boatyard to replace our standing rigging. (That's the wires that hold up the mast for non-sailboat folks)  They told me they would retrieve our boat and take it to their yard, remove the mast and return the boat to our slip.  Sounds easy enough to me.  Understand that this is equivalent to giving the Cable guy your keys and asking him to fix your TV while you are not home and will not be home for a couple of weeks.  This whole operation entails quite a bit of trust.
Thursday night we arrive at 10:30 after a day of work and a 3 hour drive, unload our stuff and cart it down the dock to our boat.  Mind you at this point I really only gave it a 50/50 Chance that our boat would be there.   Even in the dark of the night I could tell there was not 9 tons of boat sitting in our slip.  You feel sort of silly staring at an empty slip with all of your stuff at you feet.  Knowing that the boat was probably at the marina next door we head back to the car and re-load our stuff and drive next door.  We must have looked trust worthy when trying to get through the gate because the security guard let us in as long as we signed his paper work.  No problem, now all we needed to do was find our boat somewhere in the marina of about 400 boats.  Elizabeth keenly spotted it after checking out only a couple of docks.  This was a nice relief as we didn't have a place to sleep at this point.  Autumn Wind looked naked without any of her rigging or mast.  She also looked really big with clean decks.  I guess this is what it's like to be a power boater.  We hopped aboard and headed to sleep knowing the yard guys would be working on the boats around us early in the morning. 
So I guess it all worked out.  We decided it was a good lesson in "Just going with It".  I am sure there will be many more to come and we might as well get used to it.
All this being said, we met the rigging foreman early the next day and he was nothing but helpful and a great guy.  He even helped us not be a "Barney" when we were deciding on line colours for our halyards. 
So that's the story of how we lost and found our boat all in one night.

The End is Almost Here

5/2/12 - Reno, NV
I suppose I can finally release the confidential information for public consumption....The End is Near!  And I couldn't be more excited.  As of today we have officially given our American dream back to those who gave it to us.
 8320 Opal Station is legally not ours anymore.  I never thought I'd be happier to say I am NOT a home owner.  It has been a long battle to get to this point and I would not wish our predicament on anyone; and now it's finally over!  Everything (and I mean everything except a bag of clothes and our boat) we own is packed into a storage unit; paid cash upfront for 2 months in a little furnished condo; and have truly been enjoying the new found simplicity and togetherness we have gained by not inhabiting 8320 Opal Station.
As of today we have both informed our employers of our plans to leave and travel for a year or so.  There's probably nothing scarier for a guy like me than to tell your boss that you are going to be leaving a great job you enjoy and have been at for 12 years and going to be unemployed, by your own choice.  It seems fairly backwards, especially in this economy we find ourselves in.  Don't worry these facts are not lost on me.  Sometimes you just need to make a decision....Looks like we did.

View from Eagle Rock

 Finally, The end of my single life is here. I proposed to Elizabeth last weekend; and thankfully she said yes. I guess she stuck with me for 14 years so far, so we must be doing something right, right? All I can say is thankfully you only need to do that once, I was nervous as hell trying to remember my rehearsed speech, which I pretty much botched, but apparently I got the critical part out and I believe she said yes. Those moments were mostly a blur to me. Atop Eagle Rock on the West shore of Lake Tahoe seemed appropriately beautiful to pop the question.

Thinking: "I hope this goes as planned"

"Why are you acting so weird"

So life's moving forward at quite a pace right now.  I can't wait to be moving forward at 5 knots in the near future!

looks like we'll be together for a while