Nail biting fun, and dues to pay at the "Bates Motel"!

The wind has been unfavorable, it appears to always be right off the bow, no matter what direction we are headed?! We have been motor sailing WAY too much lately. It feels like cheating on a lover?! Yay, you get there, but a little anticlimactic,
just the same.

As we are headed towards Point Loma, the wind comes to our favor and we are excited to throw up some sails! The seas were somewhat choppy the whole way and Miss Q was looking a little green, so it was a push/pull on our decision to put sails up, but adrenaline won! Q went into her safety bed and we were moving and shaking in the cockpit!! In no time we were hitting 8+ Knts. SOG!! (speed over ground). The starboard rail was buried in the water and there was a lot of crashing noises down below (easy fix, later...) it was so fun!! A good solid hour of full sails, peace and quiet except for the sound of the wind and a few waves over the bow. Alas, we rounded the point and hit the wind shade. Mike fired up the engine and I was preparing to steer the helm up wind so we could pull sails in and clean up the deck before docking. However, as I was turning into the wind, a big gust came out of nowhere and pushed us over to starboard again. We were low on fuel, very low. The gust was growing in strength, the engine sputtered and then died, we were healed over with a dead engine! Normally this isn't a problem, unless you're coming into a busy waterway, laden with big ships and lots of small craft traffic too. We were healed over the opposite way of the fuel pickup and it was sucking air. Crap-ola!! Soooooo much traffic in this entrance!! Point Loma is a huge Naval site, with huge Naval ships in and out of this entrance, countless Marinas, day sailors, SUP'ers, kayaker's, guys in inner-tubes fishing....sheeeee-it!! No engine, REALLY??? We turned up into the wind as soon as possible. Mike was saying that this might be a task, because he would probably have to bleed the fuel line before we had control of the boat again under power. Fortunately for us, that was not the case! The Gods were with us and Freebird fired right up and smiles were restored to our faces! Into our new home harbor, we went!

Off to West Marine.... Cha-Ching$$$ The head gets fixed and new dinghy fuel fittings, man-over-board life buoy...$$$$$ other stuff, it never ends, BOAT!!

We took a small road trip. It was one of my BFFL's 39th (;) Birthday. We were driving to Malibu and going to stay for the night. No driving after a festive night, right! So it was kind of a last minute reservation on a popular online, cheap hotel website. I hastily made this reservation, first thing in the morning, before COFFEE, and seriously?!!! Are there ANY BAD places in Malibu?! It's Malibu, can't happen, right??? HA!! Guess again?!! I am not even remotely on the embellishment side!! This is nothing short of the "Bates Motel"!! The office was a funky little room in the middle of the room line-up, with a man, banging on a pop machine with some sort of antique tool. Sitting next to him was a woman with cigarette smoke permeated skin. Perched on top of her head, was a faux fur hat of some sort? For all I know , it could have been an old hand muff. They were nice enough alright, but I couldn't get over the old gnarly cat, sleeping in this ratty armchair, looking like he was resting up for another brawl with whatever it was that attacked him In the first place. This place was complete with bare electrical wires and open light sockets, shower curtains that looked like they were made from Grandma's church dress with blood on it, fine art on the wall that was stolen from a third grade puzzle student, knife slashed upholstery furniture, and conveniently placed mirrors next to windows with even more conveniently placed busy bus stop benches right outside the room!?? Even Miss Q was sketched in this room! At first she crawled up onto the middle of one of the beds and kept a watchful eye on the fake fireplace. When she's at home, she knows if she looks at it long enough, eventually it will turn on and then she can take the cliché kitty spot in front of it and purr her head off for the rest of the night. It was very perplexing as to why, the laser focus staring, wasn't working for her this time?! Mike and I could only laugh and investigate the creepy window fixtures and holes in the walls!! Meanwhile, Miss Q was now in protest over the cruel trick of the non-working fireplace and had taken it upon herself to crawl up into the under lying works of our mattress! Just great!! If we sat down on the bed, we would squish her! Note to self, when we got back to the room from our evening, check the bed first, THEN take a load off. For Gawds sake, REALLY??? We both agreed, this was a one time thing! We couldn't miss my friends Birthday. Nope/yep..... Stay'en for the pure adrenaline rush now. :/

My friends Birthday party was nothing short of AWESOME!! Her husband is such a treasure! Really stoked that we all re-connected after 35+ years from our "pasture rat" days!! (We all had horses and ponies together, in our youth, on the shores of Santa Barbara, CA. Love all our GF's so much!! We are our own special little family unit) but this was her crowd now. Very few pasture girls there, yet everyone was so warm and welcoming. What a great evening!

The next morning we woke to find ourselves alive and no trauma, bug bites or bruises! Bonus round!! Off to the famously proclaimed "Geoffrey's" restaurant, on the lower cliffs of Malibu beach, for some brunch and some fresh sea air! It was a beautiful morning that merged into the afternoon, with good conversation and a natural facial from good ole Mother Nature. A small pod of Dolphin swam by. We watched a group of Sea Lions fishing in the kelp beds and a huge flock of Pelican were fishing off the fringes of the Sea lions wake. Time to get back to the boat. Miss Q was happy to leave the "Bates Motel". I put her little carrier down and she usually gets real vocal and hisses at me before she crawls in. This time she eagerly climbed in, like "get me the Hell out of here!" My favorite part of this was when I asked for a receipt for the room! I had to take a picture of it, because I just cracked up! A hand written one, on some little note paper! Priceless!!

On our return, we received some seriously distressing news. No one died, but the kind of shit that you just don't want to hear...
It's personal, so I don't need to get long winded about it, but fuuuuuuuck! "Life is what happens, while you're busy making plans!"
Jimmy Buffett