This.....


Leads to this.....


You might have thought that when we moved up from a 36ft to a 50ft boat all of our storage issues would have disappeared with those extra 14ft. Well, the dirty little secrete of having a larger boat is that you don't actually gain any space, but just more room for junk and things you really don't need anyway. It's one of the common cruising myths that folks on the larger boats must have empty lockers and drawers...ha ha ha...forget about it. Just like your closet and pantry at home, junk and "valuable stuff" will just grow to fill all the room you have. The collection of things, call it junk or collectibles, that will wind up in an estate or garage sale after we die is an American pastime, right up there with Monday night football and the 4th of July Fireworks. Living on a boat doesn't break this chain of madness, it just puts it right in your face, under your bed, and spilling out of your lockers when the boat rolls over.

In the Battle against junk, I took advantage of the crew being off the boat yesterday and headed into Amy's Bathroom. Now technically it's a bathroom, but since the toilet is decommissioned (who really needs two heads on a boat...craziness) it's just a storage room for things that should have just been tossed out or given away, but for our need to hoard junk. Two trash bags were filled in the sneak attack. One with true trash and one with things that will be donated to the local charity. Amy wasn't too upset when she returned and I even gave her the change to look through the bags for a final good-bye.

I don't really think that the 50lbs of things I got off the boat yesterday will change the sailing characteristics of this 55,000 boat, but I can at least now walk around in the aft stateroom's bathroom and see the counter, floor and walls! Next up is Jason's room, but I'm smart enough to not mess with Lori's junk and my things are not junk after all, but important boat bits and parts. Or at least that's what I tell myself to justify the junk I haven't used or needed now on our 4th year of Cruising...but someday I will need it. Of course I won't be able to find it or will forget that I even have it, but the security blanket of "stuff" is a hard one to toss aside.