Charles W. Moore

Valentines Day 2015

The day started with me telling SAM Happy Valentine’s Day.  After that it was presenting the “Wife” card and the “Read My Lips” candy.  I’ll post the picture some time.  Later we attended the church function of a pay for Valentines Day Dinner  which was OK.

.Prior, we asked Al & Carol to go with us to St. Augustine to the Sailor’s Exchange where Al & I spent an enjoyable hours of dreaming of our next expenditures.  We enjoy their company and SAM especially treasured the crochet mouse she received from Carol the artisan.  The mouse is an original creation that is crocheted and stitched with a solder wire tail that allows it to stand in a self-supporting manner. It is pretty cool and beautifully wrapped in its own blanket.  Thanks Carol.

We spent the day enjoying the cool temperatures under a full sun with light winds from the southerly direction.  This evening is supposed to be in the 39°F range but last night was a hard freeze night.  We managed to maintain reasonable temperatures with the two electric heaters but it got cool inside with the early morning dip in temperatures that takes place as the dew evaporates.

The whole friggen day!

The whole day, I mean all of it, was spent talking with the Healthcare.gov with only very limited success.  A lot of time was spent trying to take pictures of various documents and sending them to a “cloud” in the sky that will judge whether we owe this or that.  It finally got to the point we said we would pay the whole enchilada just to get them out of our hair.  By this I mean we will cancle Obamacare and just pay “whatever” it takes to get an healthcare package for SAM.  As for me, CWM, I am so totally fed up with the whole BS I want to move the boat to some latin american country and tell my country bye.

Another birthday past – except = 70

Since my last post I have turned 70 years old.  This momentous occasion was accompanied with little fanfare.  The very small party consisted of my sister, Lee, my wife and myself.  We had a good time.  The next evening Al & Carol, our South African friends, came over and we also had a good time with them.

Here is what I wrote in another blog for 5 February: I awakened about 0530 this morning to the sounds of water and surging; therefore, I was on high alert listening for issues but a few minutes of listening produced no sounds worthy of alarm. However, I was awake and there was no turning back to sleep mode.  Now, I am writing  and slightly cold  as the heaters are not really keeping up with this size of boat. I have an estimated 3KW running and this is about 10K± BTU’s which is not sufficient to do more than take the chill off.  Still I am happy for this and am feeling like making some coffee on the stove to add a bit more heat.

Today I awoke early and went down to the clubhouse.  Later back at the boat I mapped out the day to SAM.  I was going to the camper and clean up and move stuff from the car to the truck.  Also on the table was to get the truck out on the road and drive a few miles.  Upon return from the little jaunt SAM and I loaded the camper and re-organized.  We also put air in the tires and pumped up the air shocks.  She is sitting pretty now.

Later we organized the boat and partitioned stuff to go to the “lock up”.  Still latter we lounged around the cockpit and watched the sun go down and the chill starting to creep into the bones.  Right now SAM is fixing the food and it smells great. This is the end of a beautiful day – full of sun, low winds and moderate mid-60’s temperatures.  Tomorrow looks to be a repeat of the same.

Just an update but nothing special

This is the first time I have sat on the boat writing on the computer with all systems running including air-conditioning/heat pump. Yea, and here we are many $1000’s later. Marina just changed antifreeze (not needed but gives me assurance), oil (probably not needed but again those assurances) and adjusted valves that definitely needed attention ( a burned valve would be just around the corner). To-Do is to add a solenoid that assists existing starter manual solenoid so as to allow a much more direct connection to the battery as the generator was not starting so good. Also needs a new start 12 VDC Battery. I hope all the locals appreciate the tens of thousands we spent here this year and in all probability will continue to be spent in foreseeable years.

We bought a Start Battery from Advanced Auto here in Green Cove Springs that has 1000 CCA and 800 CCA @ 32°F.  From there we went to Walmart and bought a 12 cup Regal coffee maker (a steal at $8.77) .  Upon return to the boat we de-boxed the machine and it fit the nook intended for it perfectly.  The old machine will be placed on the FREE table at the club house.

While at Walmart we had to continually re-think our ice box/ freezer situation:  we have lots and lots of space now.  So much so we could provision for weeks and weeks at sea.  the upper part is for slightly chilled items like veggies and tender things and the bottom which is quite a bit cooler for the longer deep cool items like milk, some meats and our special bread.  There is a 1.5 cubic ft freezer for the stuff that needs to be deeply frozen for longevity. The Fridge-a-boat cooling system is set up to maximize life on the waters deep with with its microprocessor controlled system. Not too sure where the temperature probe is located and what it is optimized for but we will find out in years to come.Some of the last parts on order have just arrived and they sit up in the very cold cockpit to await further action in upcoming days.  Speaking of cold cockpits and the freezing temperatures expected on this mostly full moon, SAM just left for the RV to fix dinner and take care of our wee one Abby.  I told her I would be along directly but secretly hope she brings food to the mother ship but this is not too likely!

I am currently sitting here listening to the water pump pumping to its heart content and feeling the heat coming out of the water to heat my body. This is not an obtrusive thing but a natural evolution of bringing heat or cold to the microcosmic space I now occupy.  Truthfully I love it and enjoy hearing the roaring gale outside while the boat presses ever closer to the floating dock and is seperated from oblivion by 5 sort of tired fenders of the 8″ variety.  With that missive ZI will close this particular thread.  Bye to all.

Hurting for Certain

I have now spent weeks trying to recover from the excesses of the stainless polishing episode. I still hurt all over my shoulder and neck which are know weak spots for this old guy. I have had to slow down and take it easier. So in that vein I have been using the notebook a little more.  Lots of ibuprofen going into the system after a round of Prednisone  to suppress the irritation wherever it was.

I came across this Pin tonight and just sort of connected with it.

Today we were informed that Grandson DJ has cancer of the intestine.  They operated on him and removed a section of his intestine.  After a suitable recovery period he will undergo Chemo and Radiation treatments to irradicate remenants of the disease.  We are thinking of him constantly throughout the day.

It rained all day and is still raining and will continue to rain until tomorrow.  When I checked tonight the boat was dry since we replaced the lens on the aft size 40 hatch.  The forward size 60 hatch has not been replaced yet as Holland Marine continues to work on it.

I have replaced one fluorescent light on the boat with LED’s and the experiment was moderately successful but will require a few more warm white LED’s to fill in a few spots.  I have at lease 3 more fixtures to go and the rest will remain fluorescent as I should now have spares for quite a while.  The two head bar fluorescence’s will be changed out to RED/WHITE LED’s too.  so I guess that makes 5 to go.

Just a blather

Lots of parts for the boat arrived today and yesterday. We installed the blower that arrived yesterday and it took all of our time to get her done. All that remains ist to shrink the tubing and apply the green/yellow ground.

The life in the camper is getting a bit close and we are getting on each others nerves a bit. With no place to escape, to avoid escallation, I usually go silent an brood for a while but soon forget whatever was the problem. I’ll be glad when the boat is in the water. We need good dry weather to do the teak to teak sealing so SAM can apply two coats of Cetol and we are ready.

I cannot wait to get out of this very tiny RV. I activated the Verizon hotspot at $30 per month and it seems to work very well with plenty of bandwidth and I set it up to run three devices. I posted the speedtest.net results on facebook. it was 10 down and 6 up.

A rainy day and the week ahead.

Today started with light rain hitting the camper top. I like that sound and it is soothing. A quick peek outside revealed not leden skies but some bright spots too. It was lightly sprinkling as we arrived at church and the same when we left that the end of the service. We stopped by the grocery – actually two of them. Out main purchase was some good fish but there were other items in there too.

Back at the RV we ate lunch and took our Sunday afternoon day of rest. For dinner SAM made some of the fish down at the clubhouse but not too much was going on but football so we left to eat supper back at the RV. After that I did some research on Mini Maglite 272 lumen that are not turning on correctly. I think it is extremely poor that a $24 flashlight does not even last a year. As a matter of fact the newest on does not turn on at all when you turn it on. If you let it sit there long enough it comes on all by itself in a minute or three. Pretty poor, and I told them that.

Ok, so now I am winding down the day writing in journals, blogs and more blogs. Night.

Cold tonight – a Florida Freeze Warning

We are expecting a cold one tonight here in Green Cove Springs. Even though we are on the water it is expected to get into the 20’s tonight. The heater is now on and runningalmost constantly. I may have to awake in the wee hours and turn it up from I setting to II setting. This temperature may even challenge this but we will have to endure.

Here is the NOAA Forcast:THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN JACKSONVILLE HAS ISSUED A FREEZE
WATCH…WHICH IS IN EFFECT FROM LATE WEDNESDAY NIGHT THROUGH
THURSDAY MORNING.

A FREEZE WATCH MEANS SUB-FREEZING TEMPERATURES ARE POSSIBLE FOR
AT LEAST 2 HOURS. PRECAUTIONS MAY BE REQUIRED TO PROTECT PLANTS…
PETS AND THOSE SENSITIVE TO THE COLD IF A FREEZE WARNING IS
ISSUED.

I started the Prednisone blister pack to try and combat the arm weakness that has plagued me for the past few days. It all started when I did three long days polishing the stainless steel and then did a lot of nook and cranny work that stretched my neck this way and that. I developed a stiff neck and then an extremely sore sholder and neck that later migrated to arm weakness. This persists but my neck feels better.

Boat work goes slow and we are now waiting tfor the 3M 4000UV to seal the cap rails to the cap rail trim. SAM has been doing this type of work so it will be new for her and will probably be frustrating until she gets the technique down. I say all this because I have to take it easy for quite a while to avoid permanent damage to nerves. Meanwhile we continue to live in the small RV that sits atop the bed or our truck. It is tight but we are managing. The boat will feel like a palace!

Between Christmas and New Year 2015

We are still land based and Inspiration is on-the-hard waiting for the lift crane operators to return from Christmas break. During the pre-Christmas days we went to St. Petersburg to spend Christmas with Martha. While there we went to marine shops to buy goodies that were our Christmas presents to each other. We left 12/27/14 for GCS. We went to see Jerry Moeller in Ellenington and Steve L on Treasure Island while in town. We did some food shopping at Aldi’s too.

Upon return we attended First Assembly in Flemming Island. It is about 15 minutes from where we are staying in our RV at Reynolds Park Marina. Inspiration has been expensive this month! If this keeps up it will be Inspiration II OR BUST.

Today 12/30/14 GCS: We spent the day today running between the Ace Hardware here and Inspiration II: Needed not so specialty Stainless Steel nuts and bolts. Wouldn’t you know that the last machine bolt to install had a thread issue and was unusable! SAM scraped Cetol and painted Cetol Natural Teak and putty’d in some rough spots on the cap rail fairing. She also re-installed the boarding ladder steps she has been painting with Cetol NT.

Polishing Stainless Steel

I have spent the past two days polishing Stainless Steel on the boat. A patina of rust had developed on the railings and stanchions over the last years? the previous owner had her. I did manage to polish the dingy davits and some portions of the aft railing. I have to say it looks good thanks to the polish I found at Advance Auto: The name is Blue Magic, s blue colored cream paste that has a smell of ammonia. I must say it really works well. However, it still takes a little muscle power. It is very gratifying work.

Today, I hooked up the ground and turned on the DC power to the boat and checked the bilge pump which hummed away. Then I tried the radio which also worked. As we were leaving the boat near dark, I wanted to check the nav lights but forgot so that will be another day.

So here I sit on the bed in the RV writing this blog line with the electric heater humming away and it is warm on this cold night. Frost warnings are out again for the 5th straight day. We actually had freezing temperatures one of those nights. Since we arrived two weeks ago we have had to have the heater on every night. I hate to see the temperatures when it gets to the cold part of the year.