The couple from two boats down, Cliff and Lee, who have been kind and sort of adopted us while we are down here, will be coming over for dinner aboard Nelleke tonight. This'll be an opportunity to show off the Turney culinary talents so we are going to do a sort of Italian night with seafood linguini with a nice fresh salad and Barb is going to make her signature pound cake drizzle for desert. This means that we had to head out to the grocery shop for a few more things that we're missing.

Yesterday, at the doggie breakfast, Joseph, the Moulin Jaune maitre d' was kind enough to offer to find a fellow that might be able to make up some frames for me. We're on a boat so I can't put every piece of scribble into a frame no matter how much my ego would like to have me do, but it would be nice to frame up a couple of the better ones to show off a bit when someone comes aboard. Our friend, Al the artist, does his work mostly in acrylics so his work is on paint board and can support itself. Watercolours are on paper and need something to stiffen them up. Who knows? Maybe someone would even buy one and then I can brag that I have sold a painting. Judy of the Alain and Judy duo has sold paintings. Of course she is more experienced and better at it than I am but you never know.

One of the nice things about being "retired" is that you can catch up on a lot of the stuff that you have always wanted to do but never have enough time, like reading for instance. Since starting to cruise I have had a chance to get through and absorb many excellent books. The one that I am on now is one that Kayt bought for me for Christmas called "What Happened" and is written by President Bush's Press Secretary, Scott McClellan. I am finding is very revealing, not because it is particularly well written, because it's not, but for some of the concepts of Washington politics that he is introducing me to. For that alone it is well worth the read. Interestingly enough, he doesn't excuse himself from fault, but he does cling to his point that he feels, even after everything that has happened, that President Bush is basically a decent guy that got very bad advice. His error and fault was that he chose to follow it and to play the Washington games. Not only that but according to Mr McClellan he was driven by a desire to achieve peace in the Middle East and he saw a democratic and "free" Iraq as a cornerstone to achieve this aim. Although the author doesn't say it or even imply it, it is my belief that most westerners don't understand that freedom has a different meaning to people elsewhere in the world. To a third or even second world populace freedom simply means that it is their turn to be the oppressors. Their history is too full of recent tribalism for them to feel any differently. In fact in "What Happened", tribalism between the Democrats and the Republicans is directly cited, although not called that, as the cause for the failure of the Bush presidency.

On a side note, the crew of Nelleke is divided upon the information that we are getting from the hit counter that I put on the blog a couple of days ago. I am finding it interesting and no small amount flattering that there are enough people interested out there to want to read about what we are doing, whereas Barb says, "Shouldn't they be working? Don't they have anything better to do?" I told you we have unleashed a monster! What a grump! I can say that because it is only eight thirty and she is still in bed having been served her mushroom omelette and coffee. Another half hour and perhaps she'll deign to arise. Until then I am safe to write what I want. Hee. Hee.

OK. She's up now. Back on my best behaviour. We bought the necessary groceries for dinner tonight and discovered that Circuit City is in what the Americans call Chapter 11, receivership to the rest of us. This means that everything in the store is on sale for reduced prices so guess where we stopped on the way back to Nelleke. You got it. We bought ourselves a Blu-Ray drive so we can watch the HD movies, some blank CDs and a couple of new movies to put in our collection. All we need for the Blu-Ray drive is an external housing that will power the drive and let it connect to the laptop or to Nelleke's ship's computer by USB port. We have one but, wouldn't cha know it? It's back in Halifax.

I got to work on installing the new dual fuel filter system only to find out that the piece of plywood that I bought to install it upon is ten inches too short. I thought up a solution for that only too late. Barb had already started the major clean up before our guests arrive so I wasn't allowed to break out the tools and get everything dirty again. I was able to get out the scuba regulator and start to clean it up in preparation for another boat job, diving on the hull to clean it off and check the zinc. I am looking forward to trying the new hookah system that we have set up. The idea of diving without the encumbrance of a BCD and tank is very appealing.

From Barb -

Well - what to ramble on about today? Mike has you all up to date on most of the activities - I did a bit more work on the cuff of sock pair number three, from another of Lucy Neatby's patterns - a much harder one this time to challenge myself a bit and keep the brain from getting too dull. I had a rotten night that spun off from hearing gunfire for the second night in a row - just what the heck is the matter with folks hereabouts - they live in a community with lots of sun so they don't need to worry about keeping warm, keeping the house pipes from freezing, driving in icy conditions, the weather is good enough that you can grow your own veggies year-round, the fish are plentiful, there is abundant and beautiful flora and fauna - seems pretty much like paradise to a Northerner doesn't it? So I tossed and turned trying to figure out just how conditions went so horribly wrong - never did figure it out. I was on the brink of a great discovery when peacefully sleeping and deeply snoring Mikey rolled over and gave a snort so loud that it would have been the envy of a wild boar announcing the discovery of a most delectable truffle! I rolled over only to bury my snout in Al the fat cat's furry, pudgy belly (at least I hope it was his belly...) - not sure why Al feels the need to drape his bod over the top of our heads slowly pressing us down the bunk and off the pillows - we all could take a lesson from cats in how to be very comfortable. Perry made his presence known as he was spread out over my legs making the whole rolling over motion a bit more complicated. You might wonder why we put up with our furry kids in the masters' cabin with us - well. If we shut Al out he just hurls himself at the cabin door and keeps up awake. Perry would just plunk himself down on the settee in the main cabin with a most piteous and heartfelt sigh that it would melt a stone - so we are a tangle of soft-hearted humans and much loved pets in a very small space. Mike was very gallant and got up to take Perry up for his morning walk leaving me to try to get a bit more shuteye after such a restless night and as a matter of fact her served me my omelette and coffee in our cabin - much appreciated. The stereo is playing Great Big Sea and hearing them never ceases to make me very homesick! I had better go distract with the supper preparations for Lee and Cliff.