Kaimusailing

The way to beat the heat is to get up early and get some work done before the temperature soars up into the triple digits. I got up early and after breakfast got the electric bosun's chair ready for action, mounted the brick battery, hoisted the single block up with the genoa halyard. I got the safety harness organized with the spinnaker halyard as a safety line threaded through a Petzl descender. A bag of tools was organized, wire stripper, multifunction screwdriver, bottled water, pliers. It looked like the steaming light, which had been hanging by its wiring, needed one of the wires to be reattached as well as reattaching the steaming light to its "Quick Fit" bracket on the mast.
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The new winch on the bosun's chair is almost exactly the same as the old winch, but it doesn't hold position as well when you stop it. It starts to free wheel slowly. Pressing the UP button a couple of times would get it to hold position. I went up about 1 foot at a time and paused to take out the slack in the safety line. The winch will pull in about 5 feet a minute, so it is slow going.
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When I got up to the light I undid the fixture from the wiring and bulb and dumped out some water that had collected in the light due to it hanging upside down. There wasn't much in there. I found that the fixture was slightly out of shape and the Quick Fit latch wouldn't grab. It is likely the fixture will get loose again, I will have to go up again to work on it. I expected to make a couple trips up there.
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Going down was much more rapid that going up. The motor would free wheel a bit, then slow and stop, so I would give it a DOWN button to get it going again. A small group of yardbirds were gathered in front of Kaimu, I was the entertainment. I noticed it was already hotter on deck than before. It was heating up.
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Richard and Gill had packed up and were heading by air to the UK, said goodbye. They will come back when I hopefully won't be in the yard anymore. It is a time of transition in the boatyard. Jock of the catamaran Sophie steamed up the North River on a voyage from Panama, most of it singlehanded. I guess his heart surgery was successful. Another catamaran is double parked at the floating dock. The boatyard is beginning to fill up as hurricane season begins.
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I had wanted to make Tom Yum soup for a while, but my instant Tom Yum paste is now more than 2 years old. I took a little taste of it and it wasn't foul, but definitely had a stale taste. I made a soup anyway and it turned out OK. I then ordered new paste and hot sesame oil, which I was out of, from Amazon.
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The soup is something I can make anytime at sea, two pints of water, two chicken bouillon cubes, two tablespoons of tom yum paste, four tablespoons of balsamic vinegar, then drizzle two beaten eggs into the boiling soup, slowly, to make egg drops. A portion of the water is liquid drained from a can of baby clams. The clams are added last and the soup is ready. Hot sesame oil would have been added at the end if I had any. Other ingredients could be any shrimp, chicken, or mushrooms. Tofu. I had made it once with canned clams and canned straw mushrooms. The balsamic vinegar takes the place of vinegar and brown sugar in the original recipe.
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The image is of a painting titled "Hades" by Leonardo Godoy Mushsam of Greece, available for purchase at saatchiart.com.