change of address

This blog was always my blog. I tried to keep it focused on our plans, our progress and our happenings but it's always been my voice. My perspective. My grammar crimes. This next phase in our lives, we want a blog with both of our voices. Rather than continue the good fight here, we are going to mothball Leaving Normal and create a brand new spot for y'all to keep track of us.

We have a new domain and lofty plans for our home on the intarwebs. In the meantime, please change your bookmarks, RSS feeds, and post-it notes to our new blog address:

http://blog.svhelloworld.com

martian attack averted

We have a broad network of spies throughout the city of Seattle. Partially to stave off martian attack but mostly to capture pictures of our boat as it approaches its new home. One such spy - Alison (not her real name) - grabbed this bit of evidence whilst pretending to have lunch at a vegetarian restaurant in Fremont about 2 miles from where we'll launch her back in the water:

monday monday

Got a call from the trucker yesterday as he was passing through Baker, Oregon. He would like to know where to drop off this fine vessel Monday morning. Now, there's all sorts of events that could happen in the next 24 hours to prevent that from happening up to and including:

• flat tire


• navigational error


• banana peels on the highway


• martians

Barring any of those possibilities, the boat should be here Monday morning.

Oh, and.

I hope you all haven't gotten too comfortable here at imleavingnormal.blogspot.com. There will be a change of address soon...

good news!

After a cavalcade of fuck-ups and delays, things are finally going smooth and our boat will be here sooner than expected!

Hahaha. Nooooo. Not really.

The driver got pulled over in Arizona for blah blah blah whatever I don't care. Boat won't be here until Monday.

I'll be patiently holding my breath until then.

more delays

Apparently the knuckleheads that wrapped the mast (I wrapped the mast) did a crappy job of it and the truck driver that's down there picking it up has to re-wrap it. He's going to do his best to undo those clowns' (mine) wrap job and bundle it up with whatever he has available. He'll take off tomorrow morning.

[sigh]

You just can't find good help these days.

contents may settle during shipment

She is no longer sitting here on jackstands. As of 9AM this morning, she's on a truck negotiating the Mexican roads between San Carlos and Tucson, AZ.

I'm totally not nervous.

(check out pics from Mexico here including the tasty surprise we found sitting inside the mast when we pulled it out)

goodbye $1.20 beer!

We left San Carlos, MX at 10:00AM Friday morning. We slogged all the way back to Seattle by Saturday night at midnight. Rolled out of the car, stumbled down the dock and fell face first into bed. Woke up 10 hours later to my sister knocking on the door.

The boat is still lying in San Carlos. The driver was sick so they couldn't ship until today. An email today let us know they will absolutely be shipping her tomorrow. This is "Mexico" time so we're not holding our breath. Maybe. Hopefully. Cross your fingers.

Still don't have an ETA when she'll show up in Seattle so I'll just keep my cardiologist on speed dial until she shows up in good condition.

buenos nachos

5AM.

I've slept 30 minutes so far the previous evening and Christy is taking her turn napping on the bow of the boat on a cockpit cushion under a towel in the pouring rain. I'm down below finishing up making the sure that the boom and whisker pole sitting on the floor of the cabin below don't go "walkabout" and destroy all the great woodwork we now have.

The truck is scheduled to arrive at 6AM.

We still haven't:
- pulled the prop
- removed 90 lbs of steel anchors from the bow pulpit
- tied down bimini and dodger frames in a manner that won't trash them or the boat
- finished wrapping the boom and all its accoutrements in a metric ton of shrink wrap
- 100 other tiny little things that need to be done to ship a boat.

I grudgingly woke Christy up because our timeline went from 'Urgent' to 'Oh Shit'. We worked furiously until 6AM.

No truck.

8AM. More work. No truck.

930AM. Oh yeah, the truck driver is sick and can't drive the boat up until maybe Monday.

Awesome.

After a 3 hour nap on the boat, we are in Froggy's down several Coronas and much happier. Back to the boat later when temps go down to deal with all the packing we did a crappy job on during the all-night boat prep marathon.

Boat arrival in Seattle? Can't rightly say. If'n I was a bettin' man, I'd put money on August.

via con huevos

We're still here on the surface of the sun. The signs all say Mexico but I'm not fooled.

The boat? Ours.

The mast? Pulled.

Us? Hot. Tired. Sweaty.

Take care. More updates to follow.

hola!

Here we are in sunny (*really* sunny) San Carlos, Mexico. It's 180 degrees in the shade. We're sitting inside the gringo bar Club de Capitanes finishing up some brilliant ceviche and I don't know how many Negro Modelos.

We spent the morning helping the current owner rig the boat and get it ready for sea trial and survey. Which meant putting on some sails and running the engine up to temperature.

After that we spent the morning photographing everything above decks. Every thing. E-v-e-r-y. Thing. If we ever offer to show pictures of our time in San Carlos: run away. The slideshow will consist 1700 photos of turnbuckles and blocks. Party!

Tomorrow, we meet the surveyor and then head over to Marina Real where the boat is at now. We'll do the sea trial on our way to moving the boat over to Marina San Carlos where we'll haul out and finish the survey. From there, if all things go well, we'll haul the boat over to dry storage and start the Herculean task of prepping the boat for a week of 60 mph winds and Mexican roads and ill-tempered crane operators and blowing dirt and monsoons and kamikaze insects and ninjas. I'm not sure about that last one but the boy scouts said I should always be prepared so we're not taking any chances.

As always, we'll keep you updated.

fourth of july

So there I was, innocently standing on the deck of our houseboat talking to someone during our houseboat Fourth of July party. The next thing I know:



And who is smiling down at me from the dock?



So after crawling out and a furious chase up and down the dock and around the house a few times, I finally caught her.

"Your pants are going into the lake. If you'd like to be in them when they do, you should maybe stand up."



A brief struggle...



..and justice was served.



me: "It's ok. I'll just buy a new iPhone. I didn't need that one anyways."

Christy: "Oh SHIT! I'm so sorry!!!"

me: HARHARHAR



OK, it was a petty victory but it made me feel a little better anyways. We were the only two to brave the water on the fourth since the temperatures were typical Seattle three-day weekend temps. That is to say, not warm.

The rest of the day was spent drinking beer, eating BBQ, and paddling back and forth to the group of friends anchored out in Lake Union on a raftup of sailboats. We watched the fireworks on lawn furniture we hauled up onto the roof.


Jim, Christy and I.


One of the many trips back and forth on the kayak.


Skipper Mike!


Seattle skyline from the roof of the houseboat.


Fisher and I hauling dinghies back to the houseboat from the sailboat raft up out in the lake.


BANG.


KAPOW.


KERBLOOWEE.


Skipper Kim!


Christy schooling Kim on leg wrasslin'


Me channeling Lincoln Hawk. "The world meets nobody halfway. When you want something, you gotta take it."

Wicked fun party. We're really going to miss houseboat life when we leave. Summers here are so much fun. So. Much. Fun.

Ben, owner of a beautiful Westsail 28, was one of the folks rafted up on Lake Union. He took some great shots of the party out on the lake here.

how could this possibly go wrong?

Yep, we decided to truck our shiny, new (to us), beautiful (we think, haven't seen it yet) boat from San Carlos, Mexico to Seattle. To say that we're nervous about this is a galactic understatement. The logistics go a little like so:

• 7/6 Fisher drives our car from Seattle down to New Orleans to drop off his dog with his mom. Stay with me, it'll come around to our boat.


• 7/13 Fisher drives to Phoenix and hops on a flight, leaving the car somewhere near the Phoenix airport.


• 7/18 We fly down to Phoenix and pick up the car and drive to Tucson.


• 7/19 We pick up a bunch of packing/padding supplies in Tucson.


• 7/19 We cross the border and head to San Carlos.


• 7/20 We help the seller un-mothball the boat and get it ready for the survey.


• 7/21 We pick up the surveyor in the morning at Marina Real. We perform the sea trials whilst transporting the boat to the south to Marina San Carlos where we have a tide dictated haul out time of 1300. We have the boat hauled and continue the survey on the hard. Assuming everything goes ok, we hand the owner an oil drum full of cash and take ownership.


• 7/21 Once the boat is ours, Marina San Carlos can un-step the mast and transport the boat a mile down the road to their dry storage.


• 7/22 Everything above decks needs to photographed, labeled, removed and stowed below to prepare the boat for shipping. Shipping a boat means several days of 60MPH winds - just shy of hurricane forces - and constant vibration. This means we need to be really careful how we pack the boat and equipment to make sure it doesn't scar up the woodwork and break stuff.


• 7/23 See 7/22.


• 7/24 The Mexican truck comes by and picks up the boat to haul it to a storage yard in Tucson, AZ. We take off to drive back to Seattle.


• 7/27 We arrive back in Seattle.


• 7/28 The US truck picks up the boat at the storage yard and begins the long slog up to Seattle.


• 7/30 Christy flies out to Connecticut for Clemfest. It's a long story but somewhere along the way, they bury a pig.


• 7/31 Or thereabouts. Our shiny new beautiful boat arrives in Seattle at a boat yard along the Ship Canal and is set up in their yard on jackstands.


• 8/1 I fly out to Connecticut to eat some pig.


• 8/3 We fly back to Seattle


• 8/4 For the next week or two, we re-assemble the boat and tackle any maintenance items that will be much easier while the boat is out of the water and the mast is lying on sawhorses in the yard.


• 8/15 Or thereabouts. We'll motor through the locks down to Shilshole and nestle into our comfy slip. (That we don't have yet.)

Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

caliber 40

She's a 1993 Caliber 40. She's bristling with cruising gear as her previous owners who spent their winters in Mexico aboard her are getting out of cruising. So this really is a "package deal". Life raft. Tender. Outboard. Full suite of ground tackle and sails. Electronics, albeit a bit dusty and old. Watermaker. Solar panels. The list goes on. And on.

She's currently lying in San Carlos, MX. Before you ask: no. We don't know how we're going to get her up to Seattle - probably by truck. And before you say: "aren't those big white flappy things meant to propel the boat in the water by harnessing energy in wind and thereby moving the boat to distant places harharhar?", know this. Sailing a boat north up the Pacific coast is several week long bash into the wind. The prevailing winds come out of the northwest, just about exactly where you want to go. So we're still buying tons of diesel to motor the boat up, PLUS fixing all the things that break when you bash a boat into the wind for weeks at a time. So, do we trust people to dangle our shiny brand new boat from a crane transferring it from the Sea of Cortez to a Mexican truck to another crane to a US truck to another crane and then splash it in the Puget Sound?

[sigh]

We don't really know for sure. There's a few logistic hurdles we need to get around before she's nestled into a comfy slip out at Shilshole (including getting a slip at Shilshole).

I posted the pics we got from the owners so once you click here, you'll know as much about this boat as we do!











Manufacturer's website is here although we don't have the LRC version. Which means we don't have the several hundred gallons of fuel advertised.

offer accepted

whiskey tango foxtrot?

Yeah, I know. I totally went AWOL on ya'all. Ton's of stuff going in our world, the most important of which is.... we made an offer on a boat. That we've completely fallen in love with. And really want. It's beautiful. Well equipped. Rugged. Exactly what we want*.

We'll keep you posted.

(*andohbythewaysittinginmexico)

a brief buckeye interlude

Hey kids, I have to take a brief intermission from the Bahamas sailing trip posts. We're taking off tonight for a whirlwind weekend tour of Ohio that includes meeting Christy's grandma, all 700 of her friends in Cleveland, the "other" Jason Anderson, a wedding, sailing Lake Erie, Columbus, Cleveland and Toledo.

our first offshore sailing experience, pt. 2

(continued from here)

getting there

Our plans to get to the Bahamas were comprised of a patchwork quilt of airlines with flights landing in and taking off from all sorts of cities around the US before depositing us into Marsh Harbour on Great Abaco Island. The keystone flight in this byzantine plan was from Denver, CO to Ft. Lauderdale, FL on Frontier Airlines. 5 days prior to leaving, Frontier Airlines cheerfully notified us that they were no longer flying into Ft. Lauderdale and therefore, cancelling our flight. Always happy to help, Frontier generously offered to refund the cost of the flight, never mind that we now had an North America-sized gap in our itinerary. Continental Airlines rolled it's eyes at Frontier and stepped in to save they day. The Continental agent booked us on flights from Seattle all the way through to Marsh Harbour without fuss or fanfare.

Lesson learned. Frontier == the suck. Continental == way better.

We landed in Marsh Harbour on Saturday afternoon and were met outside the airport by a pre-arranged taxi driver holding a sign with our names on it. I've always wondered what it's like to be one of those people who have drivers waiting specifically for you. Especially drivers who are sweet and pretty and smile and talk and laugh with you while she drives. This really ruined all of my past body-odor-and-pine-sol taxi experiences.

man o' war cay

We were whisked off to the Moorings marina where we were met by Christy's dad, Carl. As this was the first meeting with either of Christy's parents, I took particular note of the fact that Carl had just recently purchased a machete. "For opening coconuts", he said. I'm not nervous.

Carl led us down a maze of docks towards the end where Bright Ayes awaited. She's a beautiful shiny Caliber 47 LRC (Long Range Cruiser), cutter-rigged and center cockpit. After introductions with the owner, Wayne, we went through a briefing on the boat and stowed our gear in the forward stateroom. Afterwards, we shoved off from the dock and quickly anchored out in the harbor. We all hopped in the dinghy and ran to shore to grab the last of the required provisions from one of the few, good grocery stores in the Bahamas.


Bright Ayes at anchor.

Upon arriving back at Bright Ayes, we made ready for sail. Both Wayne and Carl were in the Navy aboard nuclear submarines and Wayne runs his boat with a few holdovers from the Navy days. The etymology of the name Bright Ayes goes back to the Navy tradition of responding to a command by repeating the command followed by "aye". So after each command given, we were to repeat the command back followed by "aye". We fell lockstep into this pattern and now, two weeks later we still "pass the salt and pepper, aye".

I took over the helm as we raised anchor and Wayne guided me from the bow via radio headsets.

Wayne: "Steer two six zero."

Me: "Steering two six zero, aye."

[pause]

Wayne: "You went passed 260, didn't you?"

Me: "Um, aye?"

We motored out of the harbor and raised sail on a quick reach across Abaco Straight towards Man O' War Cay (pronounced "key", not "kay"; only yokels pronounce it "kay", ask me how I know).


"Machete" Carl hanging out in the cockpit on our sail over to Man O' War Cay.

We were headed to Man O' War Cay where friends of Carl and Anne (Christy's mom who will make an appearance later in our story) have a beautiful compound-esque house looking out onto the Atlantic Ocean. Man O' War Cay is a small island east of Marsh Harbour where the only transportation is golf carts.


Being welcomed into the harbor at Man O' War Cay.


Wayne wrangling the dinghy.


Lest we get lost, a map!


The main transportational arterial on MOW Cay, also known as The Queens Highway.

We settled into the Dune House portion of the compound which sits (surprise!) on top of a dune. The upper deck looks out over the Atlantic Ocean which makes it a great spot of for sunrises. We scrounged the neighborhood for coconuts and found three good candidates for whacking. Apparently, Carl really did buy the machete for opening coconuts. I totally wasn't nervous.


The lower room in the Dune House.


Deck overlooking the Atlantic.


Coconut harvest.


Carl showing us how to get into a coconut with a machete.


Christy giving a coconut what for.

sandy cay

After spending a relaxing evening in the Dune House, we dinghyed back to Bright Ayes and got her ready for a sail south to Sandy Cay. Our plan was to kill off the day snorkeling at a reef down in Sandy Cay to give some weather north of us time to clear out. Around dinner time, we'd start the journey back north - destination: New Jersey. After a great three hour sail south, we arrived at Sandy Cay. A quick lunch and then we all threw on snorkel gear and hopped in the water. First sea life we see when we approach the reef? A shark. Did I get a picture? No, of course I didn't.


This particular ship didn't quit make it past the opening in the reef between the Straight of Abaco and the Atlantic. Apparently, it's been there for the last 18 months.


Here's some coral and... uh, other stuff.


Here's a fish.


Some more coral. I think. Or maybe it's a mushroom. What am I, Jacques Cousteau?


Christy getting her snorkel on.


We saw three of these guys flying in formation.


Carl cruising the coral.


Wayne just hanging out.

UP NEXT: the mighty Atlantic Ocean and how she made us her bitches. Stay tuned!

our first offshore sailing experience, pt. 1

I don't have the time to do a full write up of our trip sailing from the Bahamas to the Virginia ("What happened to NJ?" you say? Well, that comes in the next blog post) so I'll throw out a few lists and facts as an executive summary and follow up later on this week with a full report.

Here's a list of things Christy threw up the first 2 1/2 days at sea:

• one ham sandwich


• three peanut butter crackers


• an apple


• 21 saltines


• an anti-seasickness pill (Irony - you are a cruel mistress)


• Christmas dinner, 2007


• one pair of Keen sandals, green


• 8 bucks in Sacajawea dollar coins (dibs!)


• and a partridge in a pear tree

Now, I know what you're thinking: Jason, you steely-eyed man of action - you never once got seasick! Well, ahem. Rather than mete out my vomit in polite deliveries into the galley sink or overboard over the course of a few days like Christy, I chose to save it all up into one single gastronomical Pompeii all over Christy, the cockpit, starboard side deck, and lifelines. And I still ejected enough detritus overboard to create a navigation hazard. So if you're currently sailing the Gulf Stream, keep a weather eye out for Puke Island.

Here's a list of things I smashed with my ass while flying from the port side of the boat to the starboard side of the boat after we plowed into a particularly disgruntled wave:

• starboard hanging locker door


• my ego

Some fun facts:

• number of sharks seen while snorkeling: 1


• number of times I touched the GPS screen after distinctly being told not to: 2


• highest wind speed seen on the anemometer: 36 knots


• highest wave height experienced: 18 feet


• highest wave height experienced according to my estimation: 70 feet


• number of times Christy flew off the starboard settee while her dad, Carl, and I changed tacks without warning her: 1


• number of times Carl and I unfurled the staysail only to immediately refurl it back in (average per watch): 24.5


• number of coconuts jettisoned off Virginia Beach to avoid the wrath of U.S. Customs: 12


• amount of produce frantically shoved into our mouths as three armed U.S. Customs officials walked down the dock towards our boat (in pounds): 8


• amount of pleasure from inhaling the first Dairy Queen milkshake upon landing in Norfolk, VA after 6 days at sea: not numerically quantifiable

That's all for now. All kidding aside, it was a great trip, lots of fun and we gleaned buckets of information. More to come when I get the pictures uploaded and a little time to sort out the trip in my head.

(continued here)

island time

Our flight leaves at 11:45PM tonight. If Christy had her way, we'd be at the airport at 11:35PM. If I had my way, we'd be at the airport at noon. But once the last of three flights touches down in Marsh Harbour, time will be much less meaningful. We'll be on Bahamas time. Island time. Time for a nap on the beach time.

Not for long, though. Once a weather window opens, we'll be hopping onto a 47' center cockpit Caliber called 'Bright Ayes' and sailing north to New Jersey with Christy's dad and the owner of Bright Ayes, Wayne. Check out their blog here.

We'll be taking lots of pics on the way and post them when we get back. Can't wait can't wait can't wait!

bellingham crealock 37 the sequel part II

Crealock 37's are a known commodity in the boat market. They are typically well cared after boats and well outfitted. And there's enough of them sold to establish a reasonable range in market value. So we made an offer on the Bellingham Crealock with a price that we felt was slightly above market value given the number of hours on the engine and the general condition of the boat. The owner counter offered with a final offer at a price that was slightly below hostage negotiation value.

Sadly, this boat is not to be ours.

he just smiled and gave me a vegemite sandwich

More random thoughts on Australia because I can't be bothered to compose a coherent train of thought. You're welcome.

• I am continually amazed at how beautiful Melbourne is. The architecture is a suprising mix of modern and classic. And the green space. Oh man, what incredible parks these people have.



• The guy sitting next to me in the office has Beastie Boy's Intergalactic as the ringtone on his cellphone. So at random points during the day I rock out to MCA, Mike D and Ad-Rock. But only for four seconds at a time.



• It gets dark here early, around 5:30. It is after all, winter. (I'm a little confused on how it can be winter in Melbourne AND Seattle at the same time but it is what it is.) So my routine has been to get up early - around 4AM - and walk around to the places I want to see before work so I have a chance at seeing them in the daylight. My body has no idea what time it is anyways and seems to be just fine with the 80yr old man schedule of in bed by 9:00 and up by 4:00.



• Speaking of walking in the dark, Melbourne feels safe to walk around any time of day. I've yet to be even slightly concerned anywhere I've walked in this city.



• The other night I was walking around downtown looking for a reasonable place to eat. And by reasonable, I mean less than $35/plate. When lo and behold, I stumbled across Beers Deluxe. Since the only thing better than beer is deluxe beer, I figured I better give it a shot. When the waitress set down in front of me a spiral bound notebook of their list of beers including a table of contents organized by genre, well. As we say in Montana: I was happier than a two-peckered billy goat.



• Beers Deluxe was in this place called Federation Square. Just frickin' cool. Go there at night. Thank me later.



• "For someone who said he wasn't going to do any blog posts, you sure do blog alot." Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wait until I'm back in San Jose, CA in a few weeks. Be happy I won't be blogging about that trip.



• Seven out of ten toes do not have blisters on them. That's a clear majority so suck it up, Sally.

where women glow and men plunder

Some random thoughts on Australia:

1. Not to fret, people of Seattle. You aren't the only ones who've mastered the art of no-eye-contact-no-smiling.

2. Perhaps everyone here is too busy contemplating their architecture to smile. Melbourne is packed with really interesting buildings. No HomeOfficeDepotMax buildings-in-a-box to be found.

3. Public transportation is everywhere. Particularly streetcars. All of their streetcars ("trams" to the locals) are packed with people. Haven't seen many buses to speak of.

4. Everybody walks on the left. Except me.

5. I've completely stopped jaywalking because I have no idea where the cars are going to be coming from. Directly out of the sky for all I know.

6. There's an old tall ship moored across the river from my hotel called Polly Woodside. Ironic: not made of wood. More ironic: made of iron.

7. americano = long black

8. Piles and piles of really cool things to do here that I don't have time for. I should have stayed an extra day. Or week.

9. Melbourne is frickin' beautiful. The promenade along the Yarra River is a fantastic walk, especially at night. Albert Lake sits smack in the middle of South Melbourne surrounded by great green space. St. Kilda beach is just beyond and I may try walking down there tomorrow morning if I wake up at 4:00AM like I did today.

10. Sure, string theory is complicated and all but try figuring out Australian rules football.

on a hippie trail, head full of zombie

I took off from Seattle on Saturday afternoon. I landed in Melbourne, Australia Monday morning. Sunday, April 27th, 2008 never existed. This is only one of the many things I'm still fuzzy on. What day is it? What time is it? What season is it? When I walk across this street, what direction is the car that runs me over going to come from?

I've been here for 10 hours and so far: no kangaroos, dingos haven't eaten my baby, Crocodile Dundee is no where to be found and there isn't one damned shrimp on that barbie. The Australian cliches we Americans are so fond of are woefully disappointing.