However, first things first....

SHRIEK!

Yet another rainstorm! Enough is enough already!!!

However, I do seem to have rectified one small nagging issue that we had on the boat for the last couple of days - the computer seemed to be drawing an inordinate amount of power and the new 24-12V converter was running quite warm. This was not something that I particularly wanted to go to sea with. We have already had one fire aboard Nelleke and I don't care to repeat the experience. First, having done a wee bit of research I have come to the conclusion that USB powered devices do force the computer to draw a lot more current that the computer by itself would. Second, if the USB connectors are not firmly seated in their port in the back of the computer, this amount increases yet again. Thirdly, minimizing the connections in the power line is a great idea. Every time that you splice a line in or join two wires together you introduce the possibility of resistance and subsequent voltage drop. Based on the power formula P=VI with every less amount of voltage the current must increase to keep up the power requirement. And, fourth, 24V to start with is better anyway as the current requirement for a given wattage is much less to start with.

Now, today we got working early as I have mentioned rewiring the computer and once that was done we activated our NEXUS cards. For those of you who don't know, this is a new program that Canada and the US subscribe to whereby anyone with NEXUS is considered a trusted traveler and gets short queued when arriving at the border. It should really speed up processing when we enter either country. The one thing about it is that if you ever screw up and get caught, not only do you lose your trusted traveler status but so do all you family members. It tends to make you even stricter on yourself. For instance, when they say that you are allowed 40 oz of alcohol, then 2 x 26 oz is too much and you fail and you lose and so do you uncles and your grannies and you kids..... Fine with us. We don't do that sort of thing anyway.

I also started to work on my pension documentation. Can you believe it? When they packaged everything up to send to me most of the stuff was in French. I speak pretty good French but if you are familiar with the language, written French is a lot more florid than what you would normally speak to someone. You don't just say Yours Truly at the end of a letter, you say something like "please be assured of my highest regards and salutations....." only in French of course. After you plough through all that and realize that it is only bumph you have lost most of any sense of Ha Ha that you may have started with. Considering all my communications with them, written and spoken, has been in English, I am flabbergasted as to why they would send me any documentation in French.

I made the pre-holiday pilgrimage to the Binnacle to get the parts to do the work if the weather ever improves. Hopefully I got everything that I need.

The rain let up a little so we were able to put the cable supports in for the solar panel and tied down the power wires from the panel. The weather is calling for sunshine for tomorrow and the next day so maybe, just maybe we'll get the rest of the jobs done.

Keep your fingers crossed.