Kaimusailing

Geoff and I worked on the Honda CRV, which stands for Constant Repair Vehicle, and eventually got the suspension fixed, but there was still a persistent Check Engine Light and the vehicle going into LIMP mode. In the past the CEL would be cleared by using a product called Cataclean to clear an O2 sensor problem. Now it was something else, the car would not shift higher than 3rd gear, the speedometer stayed at zero, cruise control was unavailable, I found out that this was LIMP mode, designed to protect the engine and transmission when it sensed that there was a problem internally.
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The car worked normally after the suspension strut repair. I was ready for our trip down to Ormond Beach, FL. Only about 2 ½ hours, they say. I left in the morning, leaving extra time in case the CEL and LIMP mode affected us. They did.
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The Check Engine Light came on and the car went into LIMP mode as soon as I went forward with it to get out of the boatyard. I had a plan if that happened to keep on the local slower roads. I made it to RT17 instead of the Big Road, I-95. The speedometer stayed at zero but the tachometer was operative and I figured out that we were at 30 MPH when the tach was at 3000 RPM, so I could use that to estimate my speed.
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We went down RT17 as if going to Amelia Island, but continued, ending up going on I-95 through Jacksonville, traffic was slow and we were not slowing anyone else down. It was like driving to St Augustine on RT1, which we ended up on, but we kept on. Kept on keeping on. Engine light on. See that old guy driving below the speed limit, have pity on him.
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I ended up upping my limit to 4000 rpm and keeping in the right lane following a pickup truck with some loose cargo. They were going slow and I was following. I could blame them. It’s not me and the Constant Repair Vehicle, it’s them, that pickup truck. Then they exited. I was the slow one.
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I wondered if I was wrecking the transmission on the CRV. They say not to do what I am doing. I took an Ormand Beach exit and ended up driving down the beach after crossing the Halifax River. Halifax River is the ICW and I had come through here some time ago on a yacht delivery. I was looking for the Chateau Mar Beach Resort now, not an anchorage.
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The hotel came up on the left and I drove in.
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My daughter, son in law, and most importantly, grandson, arrived while I was up in the suite looking down on the parking lot. I was evaluating all the cars, which was the most derelict, which was the most luxurious, the CRV was, you know, not the most luxurious, then a nice white BMW rolled in. How nice, my phone rang, it was my son in law, we’re here, no, it can’t be, yes, they rolled in with a BMW rental and I went down to greet them and ended up helping them schlep up tons of gear. The baby needs a lot of stuff.
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The reaction of them when they saw the suite was, as I expected, wondering where the furniture was, no furniture.
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When I booked the 2 room suite at Chateau Mar, I did it through Priceline and jumped at the chance for a 2 room suite on the beach at Ormond Beach at a 3 ½ star hotel. To get a deal like this Priceline will not name the hotel and the booking is nonrefundable.
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After I booked I was able to identify the hotel and look at the amenities. It looked great with a pool, beautiful rooms with water views, really great. Then I began reading the reviews.
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Strangely there were a lot of 5 star reviews but also a lot of 1 star reviews, and 1 is as low as you can go. I began reading them and became concerned. Some said don’t believe the photos or the 3 ½ star rating. Concerns included cockroach infestations, rooms with no mirror in the bathroom, bathroom door punched in, grimy floors, stained bedding, no chairs or tables in the room, doors that won’t lock, doors that won’t latch, no phone to the front desk, no one at the front desk after 8PM, groups of partying druggies, loud at night, loud motorcycles. And here I was booking for the week following Daytona Bike Week, and the week I was booking was Spring Break.
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So, it is important for me to give my own review and what I think is really going on at that hotel.
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My first impression was that the facade and entrance to the internal parking lot was impressive, columns, tiled driveway, looked the part of a 3 ½ star hotel. I checked in about a half hour earlier than scheduled with no problem with the staff. It seemed like the staff was very busy and occupied, but I had my keys to the room and I went up to see it. On the 3rd floor.
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There is a small elevator, but large enough for about a half dozen people or maybe a couple of staff with a cart and it took 15 seconds for it to climb from floor 1 to floor 3. The room was a short distance from the elevator and provided a view of the Atlantic Ocean and some nice surf.
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The room had two bedroom spaces, a living area space, and of course a bathroom and a nook with a full sized refrigerator. There was a microwave oven and a small coffee maker. They were situated on top of the fridge. Each of the two beds had a flat screen tv and an end table. The only other furniture was a small patio table and two chairs outside on the balcony. The floor was large tile and was not super clean. Anyone who walked into the suite with their shoes on would leave beach sand etc. I do believe the staff mops each room or suite when they turn them over, but I don’t think they provide any maid service, although if you ask them for anything you can probably get it. I was paying for a two room suite for less than half of what a lot of other hotels were charging for a single room. But I got what I paid for.
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The sunset view was marvelous. We had great weather, not quite warm enough to go jump in the ocean, for me, but there were a few who did, no spring break
crowds, a couple of bikers, some motorcycle noise from the local streets.
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The bathroom was a perfectly normal motel bathroom, a little threadbare here and there, but in good shape with good flow of water, hot and cold.
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The main street here is bleak, but we are not here to see that, we are here to see the beach, that is the 5 star view.
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At some point I asked my daughter how she would rate the hotel and she said “1”.
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3 and 4 star hotels have gyms, spas, maybe a restaurant, room service, laundry facilities, but not this one. It is not a 3 ½ star hotel, at this time. At some point when I was down to the car I was asked to move it for a truck to enter. I asked jokingly if it was our furniture. It was furniture.
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My guess is that this hotel was purchased after storm damage and is under renovation and maybe considering recent years of storm damage on the Florida coast, maybe renovation is a never ending thing. Perhaps another storm will come through and the suites will need new furniture again. The staff said internet and wifi have been out of action for 6 months after a storm last Fall.
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It looks like the hotel is offering cut rate rooms and slowly completing their renovation with what money they have. Staff said there are two suites complete, two that are bare, and ones like ours that are half complete. He said maybe in two months, July?, all suites will have all their basic furniture.
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What we did was add a folding table from Walmart and a couple of camping chairs. We weren’t there to hang around in a hotel room anyway. It worked out, not luxurious, but Spartan.
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All I can say about our stay is that my grandson is a gem of a kid, just a little tot, learning how to crawl and trying to verbalize. Charming. He waves at me and smiles, I tickle him.
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We had excellent food at the local restaurants. We put-put golfed at Pirate’s Cove Adventure Golf, very recommended. My grandson enjoyed it while we played through, developing a thirst. Next door was Riley’s Coney House. Hot dogs and more. Really good.
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I was cajoled into going to Charlie Horse, right down the street. Excellent choice. Lots of kids. Grandson in his high chair interacting.
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He seems to attract other kids and also adults. He’s going to be a troublemaker soon. Charming, and going to take apart everything he gets his hands into.
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Other activities included the boardwalk at Daytona Beach, hiking at Ormond Beach Environmental Center, and hiking at Tomoka State Park. The state park reminded me of Crooked River up in Georgia. I was bushed by all the hiking.
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The next day I disconnected the battery on the CRV to clear the Check Engine Light and maybe get it to run properly and not go into LIMP mode. The engine light did not remain cleared for long, as soon as the car rolled forward it came on.
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To drive the car any distance in LIMP mode can lead to mechanical damage. I needed to keep the car down slow, at 3000 RPM’s or less. I planned a return route to the boatyard along slower roads, like the beach roads. We had a long way to go, so I pored over the street maps on Google all the way up the coast from Ormond Beach, FL, to St Marys, GA. There were a couple of sections where the slower beach roads weren’t available and there I had to go more inland and try not to get onto I-95, basically an 80 MPH road.
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I could drive along the beach up through Ormond by the Sea, Flagler Beach, Hammock, Fort Matanzas, and on into St. Augustine. There I had to cross a bridge to Ponte Vedra where the golf Players Championship was underway. The traffic there was thick and slow.
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Most of the way was very pleasant driving, stuck in 3rd due to LIMP mode, going along at about 35-45 mph. In some places I was holding up traffic and pulled off. I found I wasn’t really holding anyone up much at all, except on the faster sections.
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I planned to go North from Ponte Vedra to Mayport near Jacksonville, take the little ferry there and proceed on A1A onto Amelia Island and then take RT17 to St Marys Road, the rest being local driving to the boatyard.
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At some point I manually put the transmission into D3 mode to try to help it from self destruction. In LIMP mode the car is trying to shift gears, etc., with the caveat that some of the sensors are bad, so whatever algorithms they are using to manage the engine and transmission are going to use stock generic values. It’s as if the car’s AI has gone dead.
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After the ferry ride, which was very nice and not too long, I refueled and the speedometer began working again, although the transmission would not upshift when I took it out of D3. Then a while later it shifted with a bang noise and the car was operating normally. It didn’t make much difference in my rate of progress, these roads were slow, that’s why I chose them. Still, I was making very good time. I needed to shop for food, the boat was empty.
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I went to the Walmart at Amelia Plaza and found it had very few groceries. I went up the road to Yulee and shopped at a much larger Walmart. I was looking for langostinos. Unfortunately they didn’t have them there. I settled for shrimp as a replacement for the Trader Joe’s Langostino Bisue Pasta recipe. Try saying that 3 times fast.
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I arrived in St Marys with the car operating normally and picked up a car part at the post office. This was the output shaft speed sensor, a likely culprit in the Check Engine Light problem, but the other sensor, the input shaft sensor, was on its way from Jacksonville, and according to the post office, due to be delivered by 9PM tomorrow, Saturday, only the post office closes at noon. If the part wasn’t there early I wouldn’t be able to get it until Monday.
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I asked the clerk would I be able to pick it up before noon tomorrow and he nodded and said yeah, it should be here. I asked him if he wanted to bet on that and he laughed. It ended up not arriving.
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The image is of the full moon which later was total eclipse around 2AM. I got to see it.

OK, I have to admit poor planning and poor performance. The right front strut on the CRV was broken. I needed to replace it right away. I was advised to order from Rock Auto. No way. I ended up ordering from a semi local distributor on eBay who would have it here in 3 days. Free shipping.
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It arrived and it did not have the front coil spring on it, it was the strut without the spring. Well, we'll just move the old spring and associated parts, probably work out better, both front springs would be more alike.
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Geoff has a spring compressor, which I have worked with before long ago. It's like two hooks on a threaded rod. You have one on one side of the spring and the other on the other. The hooks grab the coils of the spring, the threaded rod lets you tighten them up and voila, the spring is compressed. Then you can take the strut apart and relocate those parts to the new strut.
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Geoff said come on over, he had air tools, I wanted to pop off the wheel and see what we got, we could do it there more easily. It was very easy for me, Geoff got in there with a breaker bar and broke free the lug nuts, then air wrenched them off, zip, zip, and off came the wheel.
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The strut failure was due to the spring breaking, so we had a replacement strut but no replacement spring. We went inside and cleaned up, looked at auto parts on line.
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I felt very grubby, unwashed, dirty from car work. We ended up ordering a replacement, with spring attached, from Rock Auto. I did not order from them just a couple days ago, because of very high shipping cost. Geoff searched now and his shipping cost was a lot less. I ended up letting him use my credit card to purchase the replacement.
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The car was exhibiting some other strange problems. When you parked, sometimes, it would not let you shift from Drive up through Neutral to Reverse or Park. Then I had engine light come on, speedometer go to zero, cruise control stopped working, and it seemed like the transmission is stuck in 3rd gear. Also the car would surge and slow, very strange.
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I cleaned up and went to join them down at the Southern River Walk restaurant. I had some bean soup there. Geoff said come on over for dinner. OK. It will be wine for me, but he made something called Crawdad Etufee, or something like that, Creole dish. I liked it and helped him and Karen drink wine.
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Lawyer John Morgan is forming a new political party in Florida. He is very successful. It sounds like he wants to create a centrist party. Dumb idea. That's like stepping into No Man's Land and and saying, "Here I am, who wants to hit me?". The political machine will go at him from both sides. But I like the idea of not having the Ship of State going off to a right handed helmsman for a while, then going to a left handed one. I don't drive like that, and I hope you don't either.
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Finding that middle course is difficult, because the rabblerousers try to paint extreme on everyone. You"re a Commie or a Nazi, come on, almost none of us are any of that. Political rhetoric.
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We have to face up to our deficit, that's the big problem, not government waste or inefficiency. You want to fire all the government workers and reduce aid to those that really need it. It's our congress that disperses money. There are plenty of safeguards and oversight to keep things in check. We need to pay down the debt at a sustainable rate, not give tax breaks to the rich.
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I don't want a surf-less society, I want a serf-less society.
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But I am not a Florida or Georgia voter.
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A front came through in the morning with gale force winds and a ton of rain. It was very abrupt and quick. Power was out. Geoff texted me that the new strut had come in. We started all over again. Remove the wheel, remove the castellated nut on the tie rod end knuckle, remove the two large pinch bolts, the two small retaining bolts for the wheel sensor and brake line, and remove the 3 nuts at the top of the strut to release it from the car. Out it came, rusty with a broken spring.
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The new strut was somewhat difficult to line up, first the three top studs have to be inserted through the inner fender and nuts loosely tightened, then the wheel and lower arm have to be lined up with the bottom of the strut and the pinch bolts replaced and tightened to 33 ft lbs. The tie rod end is refastened to the steering arm on the strut and the retaining bolts for the brakes and wheel sensor are refastened.
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A quick roll down the driveway revealed the alignment was way off, way toed out. How could it be so far out? We put it back up on the jack and removed the wheel. Geoff needed to put a torch on the tie rod end to loosen it and adjust it. He aligned by eye and I took it for a test ride. Did not pull to either side, seemed to be driveable.
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Geoff had done almost all the work on this and it came to about an hour and a half. I bought them drinks at the corner restaurant, but only later did he explain to me that the restaurant was comping him for work he had done there refinishing tables and lighting their outdoor sign. There was no charge for their drinks.
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I had had a molar crown come off and I saved it in a zip lok bag after cleaning with denatured alcohol. A local dentist took me in and quickly recemented the crown. I then drove up to Tires Plus to have the Honda properly aligned. After about an hour they were done and didn't charge me for the alignment. The front end could not be properly aligned and rear couldn't be aligned at all due to rust. I was only interested in the front end alignment. The detailed print out of the results showed the left front being out of alignment by .03 degrees. 3 hundredths of a degree. I was happy, no charge and the car was good to go.
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The other weird problems did not return. I called an automatic transmission expert friend in Hawaii about what symptoms I was seeing and he said it's probably the output shaft speed sensor. It could be the sensor or associated wiring.
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The crazy misalignment when we replaced the strut seemed to be related to the broken spring. When the car was inspected in Crisfield, MD, they replaced the left tie rod end and I assume they did a front end alignment. Neither of us caught the broken spring at that time, that's when I had replaced the front brakes. Geoff said the right end of the tie rod was bent, probably due to hitting a pothole or curb and that was probably when the spring was broken. So when the shop in Crisfield aligned the left tie rod end, that alignment was no good, now, when the new strut went in.
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Spring Break is upon us and my daughter, son-in-law, and grandson are arriving in Orlando and we will be meeting up at Ormond Beach for the week. Hopefully the Honda will make the 2 hour trip without breaking down. The image is of Ormond Beach.

It's like someone threw the switch and it's no longer winter, it's summer. Eighty degrees. I washed some plywood. How crazy is that. It was stained and will probably have to be replaced. I was recovering from a tooth extraction and some of the meds were wearing off. I was aware I might be woozy or do things unusual.
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I needed to eat something like soup and all I had to do was drive a couple miles up to Pirate's Point, the gas station restaurant, and get some soup. I made a quick call to a friend about getting a new phone and we both got off just in time for me to drive up to the restaurant. I should text Geoff and Karen that I will be there for Happy Hour, but there they are rolling up in her Miata, it is I think the Club version or M version, it is very desirable.
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I went in to the bar, or I should say, out to the bar, it was outside. Cece, the bartender and de facto runner of the restaurant pretended not to know what wine I drank. I am so particular. She had a shirt that said "Cat Woman". She asked if I had arranged to meet Geoff and Karen and I said no. She was already pouring drinks for them when they came in. How did she know?
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"No soup for you", that's not what she said, but there was no soup today, maybe tomorrow. I savored my pinot noir. I ended up having two although the dentist's print out said no alcohol. Aw, come on.
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Geoff invited me for gumbo, and he makes the best, but I had to retire. At the car I noticed it had a lean to the right. It had to be on a level ground like this to see it. I flagged down Geoff as he was leaving, does this look right to you? He thought the spring in front was broken. I thanked him and we left. I was waylaid though, I saw the sun setting like a bright red orb and took a side street.
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There was a family there on bicycles. I took a photo of the sun, not of them. I drove on and they were all over the road, going towards Land's End.
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I had microwaved meatballs with parmesan shaved on top. I posted a previous post. I looked up replacement parts for a Honda CRV front end. Both front struts, including springs would be less than 200 dollars. I should probably also replace the rear shock absorbers.
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I counseled a friend to get a Samsung Galaxy S20+ as his replacement for an older phone that had literally bit the dust. I think that is the last Samsung Galaxy flagship that had the replaceable memory chip, like an SD card, very small. I still have my old S20+, it is a beautiful phone. But they improve, year to year. After a few years the improvements add up and when you compare an older phone with one of the newer phones, the difference is remarkable. The S20+ is not that old, and I think the way the case and screen have rounded edges, it's like something nice, not like my S23+, which is not pale blue and rounded, it is black, like a slab of cold stone, but it moves quickly and the display is unreal. The cameras do a great job. I can wait some time to replace this one.
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The wind piped up today, maybe 25, gusty, and the small boats went out from the relocated floating dock. There was a Hobie adventure triple canoe, he got out OK and scooted up the river. The other was the Chesapeake Light Craft dinghy kit, the one with red sails, such a sweet boat. Worth every penny.
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The red sailed dinghy struggled to get away from the dock and was rigged with a lug sail. The lug sail lets you adjust the rig and get it balanced perfectly. I've never sailed like that. Even if I thought I did. He got it sailing. I hope I present a better instructional video when I sail my dinghy.
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Geoff wanted me to buy a strut(s) from Rock Auto, online. So, I now had a weird sequence of calls and texts.
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The Rock Auto Geoff wanted me to buy from had sold me a pair of lower ball joints for a Mazda Miata years ago. They say to replace them at something like 60,000 miles and this car was more than twice that, so I replaced them with ball joints from Rock Auto.

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Back then I was working in Northern Virginia. I had a 68 mile commute to the office. I went to a client that was at least as far and when I pulled into the parking lot, I thought I had hit a pothole. It was one of the new ball joints, failed after less than 100 miles. AAA flatbedded the Miata back home and I replaced the broken ball joint with one from a local auto parts store.
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My friend Marco called and said he was at the Ravens' stadium, done for the day, let's go drinking at Fell's Point. I picked him up and was in the middle of telling him about the broken ball joint when, blam, the other Rock Auto ball joint failed. I was flat bedded again home.
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So, I did not buy a replacement strut for the Honda CRV from Rock Auto. They had a good deal on one, closeout, but no estimate on shipping time. I instead bought one on eBay with 3 day delivery. It was ten bucks cheaper than the closeout special.
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I was advised to replace both struts in the front at the same time, but I decided to replace the broken one, see how that went, then replace the other if necessary and get the front end aligned. The car seemed to be driving OK as is.
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The image is of my grandson Ike in Oxford, UK. He and his folks will be visiting just South of me next week. He is one cute keiki.

I fell for the cheap chicken leg quarters at Walmart and ended up cooking all of them with a package of frozen vegetables, end of story. I had to doctor the resultant broth with its foam on top and trouble with the propane. But the main ingredients were the package of chicken leg quarters and a package of Walmart's soup vegetables, frozen.
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I thought I had to add more vegetables but the package nearly filled the medium soup pot. I could fit the chicken in there and some water, but I spent an hour lifting the lid for a bit, I was mothering the chicken soup, how nice.
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I watched TV or had YouTube on my phone. I found out an interesting clue to malware on your phone.
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If you get a request to download a game or something, even in a trusted game, don't do it. If you ever get a request to log in from one of your online accounts, don't do it, get out of there. The best thing to do is to restart your device. Of course they have already thought of that.
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So, how did the soup come out? Like Granma's. The old standard. Coulda put mushrooms in it, coulda creamed it with some half and half, coulda, coulda, but this is honest soup, chicken, vegetables, and some spices. No brainer. I think the next time I will cook the chicken in the pot separately and then set it aside. The frozen soup vegetables were OK, but I overcooked them. They should go into the soup later. So, saute the chicken first, set aside, then make the broth with the veggies, I think the frozen mix was 4 to 5 dollars, but it was a large amount and you could just get the usual onion mirepoix for half the price, but it was already cut up. I don't mind that. I do mind when they add chemicals, but a lot of times they are just doing what the old time butchers did back in the old days.
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The chicken soup went out on deck tonight, gonna get cold, like a mother nature refrigerator.
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When you get old you have to put as much nutrition into your food as you can. They say to eat nuts and berries, and fruit. So, a good breakfast would be a fruit salad, or fruit cocktail, but fruit is fruit. What about the grape, a monumental fruit. You might have to change your morning routine and have a glass of wine for breakfast, maybe with cheese and a bread sauteed with Irish butter and some parmesan on the bread. The other cheese that I would like right now is the Gouda, the Dutch cheese.
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I had an inquiry about doing a yacht delivery with my old captain and I said I was interested. Later he asked if I had a current captain's license. I never have had one. I put him in contact with my old friend Tom who did have a license, but unfortunately had let it lapse, so none of us three had a current captain's license and the delivery, for us, was canceled. Some other crew will be sailing through the Caribbean on a catamaran for 3 weeks.
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This brief flash of sailing opportunity got me out of my shell, out of my neglect, if I were going to crew on a sailboat I would have to perform. And so I started fussing around on Kaimu, cleaning off a shelf in the galley that had been left like it was for too long. I put the shelf's contents in a 5 gallon bucket. It hadn't taken very long so I continued on the shelf next to the galley stove. There was an attractive wooden cigar box that I had intended to use in the future. I opened it and there were 4 large palmetto bugs in it, scurrying around. I had a spray bottle of denatured alcohol on hand and gave them the business. I think I demised 3 of them. After that I was hesitant.
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The galley stove was from Harbor Freight. They don't sell them anymore, so it is 15 years old, at least. It was encrusted, and I use that term lightly, with layers of congealed cooking oils, spills, and looked like hell. I sprayed it with Awesome cleaner from the Dollar Store and scraped and scrubbed it clean. It is stainless and now is shiny clean.
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The spices that were stashed willy nilly on the shelves were put on the top shelf. There are still more. I have to sort them out. I must have 10 chili spice jars. Of course there are missing spices that I should have. Not a well run galley.
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When I shopped next time I thought I should make something, but I had no idea what. I should make something I like. Meatballs. I had a recipe on my phone that called for 1 pound of ground beef and 1 pound of ground pork. I normally like to use meatloaf mix. There was none of that available, so I ended up with a pound of ground beef and 1 1/3 lbs. Of ground pork. I would be cooking this as soon as I got back to the boat, there was really not much else on board that would qualify as dinner.
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I was cooking like a sailor, one pot, and a pan, I mixed the ground meats and Italian breadcrumbs along with one egg in the pan. I spiced with Italian spice mix and black pepper. When I formed it into meatballs I had a dozen meatballs the size of a baseball.
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I set them aside and heated the large stainless skillet up until the Carapelli EVOO almost began smoking, then I put in the meatballs, all save one that wouldn't fit. I kept it aside, we'll cook it somehow. I had prepped an onion and that went into the pan. Then I prepped a small box of mushrooms and they went in. About a tablespoon and a half of garlic went in. Mix. Get those vegetables to expel their liquid and shrink, caramelize, then add a large can of crushed tomatoes. Keep scraping the bottom.
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I had the cooking pot with garden pasta in it, cooked, drained, and now the meatballs went in. I had finished off the last meatball in the pan while cooking the onion. It and the onion mix went in on top of the meatballs and pasta. I simmered the pot for about a half hour. At that point I couldn't stand it anymore and got out a meatball and some of that onion mushroom sauce. I went back for seconds.
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I had a viewing party of sorts with my older brother in Hawaii. I was watching the new NBC nature series, "The Americas", when I got the urge to call him and get him to watch it. It turns out the airing in Hawaii wasn't for about 3 more hours. I stayed on the phone and we just talked and talked. I described the meatball cooking while slaking it down with some pinot noir. When the show came on we broke it off. He could watch the show and I could sleep it off.
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The next morning was difficult. The forecast was for rain all day and it was chilly. I got several phone calls to ordeal. I didn't want to go out in the rain, but on this boat the fridge is in the pilothouse and you have to go on deck to get there. I got the kettle boiling to make coffee and quickly got a portion of meatball and sauce, plus a stick of Irish butter.
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I could have shaved some parmesan onto the meatballs, but instead I made ciabatta rolls sauteed in butter and put the meatballs and sauce on top of that. It turned out to be more of a meal than a breakfast, but that was OK, it was 2 o'clock in the afternoon.
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The image is of sunset across from the boatyard, but also across from a local street which housed the pirate ship from Pirate's Point. More to follow.

The marsala chicken was not a total disaster. I was trying to do everything in my small cast iron skillet and almost succeeded. First I fried two unskinned chicken thighs in a couple tablespoons of Irish butter and Carapelli olive oil, 5 minutes on a side, at the same time microwaving a potato, 5 minutes per side, handy timer there.
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The thighs were overdone. They were set aside to rest while the potato was cut in half and placed in the pan face down. While they were getting a nice brown crisp I prepped a small box of mushrooms, a red onion, and a couple garlic cloves. The potatoes came out and covered with thin sliced parmesan, placed back in the microwave for one minute, and the onion was added to the pan.
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I sauteed the onion for 8 minutes, added the garlic, dusted with some flour, added the mushrooms a few minutes later, then gave the pan a shot of Taylor generic sherry wine and a dab of Better than Bouillon Beef Base. I continued scraping the bottom of the pan and mixing the roux. Maybe a half cup of water was added a little at a time to keep the flour mixture loose and smooth.
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The chicken thighs went back in and simmered in the marsala sauce for about 10 minutes, turning over once.
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I ate one thigh and overcooked potato half and put the others in a zip lok bag in the fridge.
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The next day I was on the phone and got nothing done. I microwaved the remaining potato half and chicken thigh. I could make it better, don’t burn the chicken, don’t overcook the potato. Maybe it will come out better next time.
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I noticed the boatyard had unloaded all the dinghies on the dinghy dock, including my D4. Geoff, the chemist, was going through the yard and we chatted about politics and the future of the world. I asked around and they were moving the dinghy dock and mooring work boats of Atlas Marine in its place.
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I had noticed a dinghy or sailboat out on the river with red sails. It turned out that I met the owner, builder, and sailor of that dinghy. It is a pram from Chesapeake Light Craft, maybe Passagemaker. I spoke briefly with the owner that I had used the CLC study plans to get the seat shapes that I ended up using. It was obvious looking at both dinghies how similar the seat shape was. He seemed to ignore me.
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Now I was finding out that they would put the dinghies on the dinghy dock after they moved it, or did I want my dinghy at my catamaran. Yes, I was wondering how to get it over there, row it over and pull it out, beg Komputer Ken to drive his electric utility vehicle and bring it that way, or just put it on a hand truck and bring it. Now they moved it and I was very happy.
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I made the Chicken Paprika and avoided the pitfalls that I had run into with the marsala dish. It was controlling the flame under the skillet that made the difference. The chicken thighs were sauteed in olive oil and Irish butter for about 5 minutes a side and set aside.
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The onion was cooked on this same low heat for quite a while, maybe 8 minutes, then a couple cloves of thin sliced garlic went in. When the aroma of the garlic hits you, it’s time to do something.
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With garlic you have to act quickly to capture its essence. Most flavors are soluble in oil or water, usually not both. The garlic needs to be hit with water to capture its essence. You’ve been sauteing in oil and butter and the water will go off, but adding some water or liquid that includes water, like wine, will capture that flavor.
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I had put about 3 heaping teaspoons of flour on the mess in the skillet and kept moving it around and breaking it up. I knew I had to go about 3 minutes to allow the flour to lose its uncooked flavor. I kept chopping and scraping, tasting until the uncooked flour flavor wasn’t there anymore.
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I added a can of diced tomatoes, which immediately made a strange paste in the pan. I kept chopping and scraping. I forgot to add the sour cream, which when added made the sauce a nice consistency.
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The chicken thighs went back in, except there was no room in the little skillet for all this stuff, half the concoction was ladled into a zip lok bag along with a par-cooked chicken thigh, the other went into the pan and it got cooked a bit more, along with half the microwaved potato that was now cut into thin slices.
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The chicken and potato leftovers were put in the fridge. I ate the batch in the skillet. Not bad. You could make this for a crowd.
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My attention now turned to making the sailing rig for the dinghy. The plans for the D4 are a pdf file and some of the measurements are illegible. The sprit sail had a couple of questionable dimensions. Is that a 6 or an 8? I was able to find a legible plan of the sail from “Mother of all Maritime Links”. The sail can be cut from a 6’X9’ tarp, one of which is on sale at Harbor Freight. It features 1400X1400 denier and 14 oz. Weight of fabric. Perfect. The centerboard and rudder can be made of a half sheet of 3/8” ply. The ply is good on one side, so the rudder and centerboard are made of two layers, good side out, bad side in. I may have enough ply on hand to make it, otherwise I will be at Lowe’s to get new.
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I was planning on putting stays on the mast, but after reading accounts of builders who actually sailed this design, an unstayed mast would probably be OK. I could always retrofit.
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The image is of the sprit rig plan from the pdf dinghy plan file.

I went ahead and made the lobster bisque with pasta, a variation on the recipe from Trader Joe’s, the one that is “viral”. I don’t want my food to be viral.
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I didn’t make the pasta, but it is easy to make, 1 egg to 1 cup of flour, roll it out and cut it up.
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Here are the ingredients, what I shopped for:

Thaw langostinos and set aside.
Cook pasta, drain, reserve liquid, and set pasta aside.
Prep shallots and garlic, saute in butter, add flour and tomato paste, add sherry, after about 3 minutes start adding liquid to roux, keep it smooth, add half and half. When sauce has thickened add pasta and allow to come up to temperature and simmer for a few minutes. Add langostinos, garnish with hard cheese.
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Sorry, those are cooking notes. I got one shallot, a good sized one, a tube of Cento tomato paste, a bottle of generic sherry, the frozen Langostino tails, the package of 5 bucks per pound of papperadelle from Italy.
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I hate to say it, but this is a one pot meal. You could cook it almost anywhere. A pot of cold fresh water thawed out the langostinos which were set aside. It was brought to a boil and the pasta was cooked for 1 minute less than what they said on the package. The boiling liquid was drained off the pasta into insulated glasses, to be used later. The pasta was set aside. The pot was cleaned out, roughly, with a paper towel.
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In went ¾ stick of Irish butter, the shallot that was sliced like onion rings, along with 3 thinly sliced garlic cloves. A splash of sherry was added. The paprika and some parsley flakes were added. A little bit of Italian herb mix. Time to add some of the pasta water. The mush was mixed with a spatula with a wide flat end. Make sure nothing starts burning on the bottom. Keep adding liquid including the half and half making sure the half and half won’t curdle. The butter and paprika make a yellow orange streak that is an accent on the creamy pasta and langostinos. It is done, take a scoop and taste. We haven’t salted this, but we did add thinly sliced parmesan and that adds salt. Mixing the concoction is an exercise to get all the components more homogenous. But there is so much flavor there, each little pocket of flavor exists, the dish is fresh and in a way raw, the flavors have not totally combined. I stopped after having 3rds.
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The old Honda CRV has a problem with its driver window. Automatic, up and down, but it has a little wiggle that causes it to get snagged on the way up, then it stops and cycles down about halfway. I have my right hand on the glass to try to prevent this from happening, but this causes the car to drift to the right, toward the ditch. My bud Tom is riding with me and adjusts the steering wheel so that we don’t contact objects on the right side of the road.
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I suppose he will be another that accuses me of being a bad driver, I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Tom, you know what happens to people who criticize my driving, they perish in car accidents. Yes, they are accidents, I have nothing to do with it, except to set a bad example.
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Why would you dismantle the public health agency, the one that announced the pandemic and scientific based techniques to avoid it? Now we have bird flu doing its damage. Yes, democratic, nay, leftist, under Biden’s watch about 150 million fowl were euthanized. Mostly ducks and chickens.
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This is the Balkanization of the USA. Let the states figure it out, why do you need a big inflated federal government, the locals and the states can get things the way they want. Don’t like it? Move to another state.
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Cap’n Webb Chiles had sailed off to Culebra from Hilton Head Island and curiously turned around and sailed back. I thought of a million reasons he might have come back, boat damage, including encounter with a floating object, illness, maybe some news from shore, although he doesn’t stay in touch when he is out at sea. I waited to see what he had to say after his return.
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In the mean time the Super Bowl happened and although the Kansas City Chiefs were slight favorites, they couldn’t handle the Philadelphia Eagles lines. They couldn’t protect Patrick Mahomes who was sacked at least a half dozen times, and on the other side of the ball the Eagles were able to run even though the Chiefs were focusing on stopping the run, ie Saquon Barkley. Their quarterback had a good day throwing the ball downfield. The game was a rout.
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I found a cache of pennies, about 4 dollars worth. The news is that the USA will stop minting pennies and I wondered if their value would increase or drop. I tried out an app called Coinsnap that uses the phone’s camera to take photos of coins, identify them, and also assign a value, although on line reviews say the valuations are unreliable. It took quite a while to sort through the pennies. I was spurred on by the thought of maybe one of the 400 or so pennies might be rare, you never know. Well, now I do know. About half the pennies are worth more than a penny. The highest valued pair are worth $9.26, according to the app.
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Cap’n Webb says he grew impatient after about 3 days of no wind, so he sailed back to Hilton Head. No mystery, but he hasn’t posted his log of the voyage yet.
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The image is the photo of Venus that I took after a flurry of activity, watching this light in the heavens that looked like the landing lights of an aircraft or a very bright anchor light atop a sailboat mast, but there was no boat below it and it didn’t move like an airplane. When I figured out the night sky had Venus near its brightest and aligned the star map with the sky overhead, I took the photo with my phone and 30X zoom.