Contrasting approaches.....

Diane and I were SO pleased to see a sponsorship donation of £300 made recently by Annonymous. Mr/Ms Annonymous, we don't know who you are, but we really appreciate your support, and you are such a very kind and generous person! Thanks for being such a great supporter of the CF Trust and the Blue Star project!

Contrast that generosity with a recent news article that told how HMRC are not granting gift aid donations when more than one person is named as the donor because they cannot be sure whose tax to reclaim / donate. This seems incredibly mean when eg. Janet and John name themselves and add a note of encouragement when making a sponsorship donation. Surely HMRC could find a more understanding way of dealing with this situation.

......Life Jacket service continued.

So what did I do about my lifejacket (LJ) service? I wanted to weigh the CO2 cylinder to check it hadn't leaked any CO2. The unit was stamped 171g - the minimum weight which indicates it is sufficiently full. But where could I weigh it to a sufficient accuracy? I had a contact at a local commercial organisation and asked to use their scales - no problem; the scales indicated 170g! Hhmmm! Later I was visiting Morrison's in Stone and thought to ask the checkout lady to weigh the cylinder for me as a check - 175g! Hhmmm! Which reading to believe?

I checked the condition of the inflating part of the LJ. All looked well. I checked the reflecting tape sections - strangely one seemed a bit degraded, but still OK. One internet entry said to check the condition of the inflating section by inflating it with a pump, not by mouth because air from one's mouth will be damp and will not be good for the LJ; another advice column said that the modern materials from which LJ's and made can easily deal with a bit of damp air used to test a lifejacket. Which advice to believe? Hhhmmmm!

I needed to make a decision, so chose to use the 'old' gas cylinder to inflate the jacket (perhaps it was under weight anyway?), and send off for a replacement cylinder and trigger cartridge; the new cylinder did not cost that much more than the cartridge alone, and after all this is MY life we are talking about! I left the LJ inflated for 12hours to test for leaks then, after installing the new gas cylinder and cartridge, re-packed the LJ.

'What about the light?' I hear you say. You will recall that I couldn't withdraw the battery unit to check it's 'replace by' date. My LJ is only a few years old so the battery should fine since the battery life expectancy is 5 years. I tested the battery by short-circuiting the terminals on the activation lead that would in an emergency be short-circuited by the sea. The light flashed away brightly! Good!

Job's a good 'un!

Joke:
How do you make a pirate angry?
Take the 'p' out of him!

Testing my lifejacket

Thank you Wolstanton Rotary!

I was invited to give a presentation about cystic fibrosis and the Blue Star GB Challenge to Wolstanton Rotary Club this week. As a show of support the club donated a cheque for £250 for the Cystic Fibrosis Trust, which will shortly be despatched to the trust HQ. Thank you so much Wolstanton Rotary! Your support is very much appreciated!

Joke:
A Rotary visitor to Japan told a joke lasting 2 minutes.
The interpreter then translated using only a few words. Everyone laughed. Afterwards the visitor asked the interpreter how he translated such a long joke so quickly.
"Well, I didn't think they would get the point, so I said, "Our guest has just told a joke. Everyone please laugh."

Life jacket service

I have finally got around to servicing my life jacket. Having read several articles on servicing your own lifejacket I felt confident I could DIM (Do It Myself). Hmmm. Maybe DIM means something else?!
First I unpacked the lifejacket from its cover and checked the general condition of the inflating section - all seemed clean and in good condition. Then I unscrewed the gas cylinder and checked that - it too seemed to be in good condition with no rust etc showing. I checked the weight that would confirm it was still adequately charged 171g. Now the first problem became evident - how to measure the weight accurately. One article suggested getting it weighed at the supermarket. Hmmm. Will need to think about that. Next I checked the automatic inflation cartridge - it was beyond its use by date and needs replacing; new ones can be ordered by mail order, no problem. Then I started to worry about the light. No servicing of the light is usually needed, but the battery life needs checking. The life is usually about 5 years, but I wanted to check the date marked on the side of the light. To do that I need to get the light out of its bracket that holds it against the oral inflator tube. Photos in several articles showed it to be held in place by a removable plastic clip. This is proving a major challenge - the clip just won't come out, despite several attempts at persuasion using a screwdriver whilst Diane shouted that I was about to wreck the jacket completely. Hmmm. Maybe the £12 service charge plus postage is a good deal? To be continued.

Joke:
One day George W. Bush, Al Gore, and Bill Clinton were in a boat. All of a
sudden the boat sprung a leak and they had only one life jacket. They decided to
take a vote to see who would get the life jacket. When the votes were counted,
Al Gore had 1, Bill Clinton had 1, and George W. Bush had 7.

The gas cylinder seems to be OK

The auto-inflator cartridge is out of date

The light - IMPOSSIBLE to remove from its rubber holder!

The two US Sailors

Did you read in the newspaper recently about the two american sailors who had to be rescued by the RNLI? In fact we chatted to Bob Weise and Steve Shapiro when we were in Inverness last year, just before our transit of the Caledonian canal. They had begun their journey in Norway and intended to finish in Maine, USA. I remember that their boat had just been taken out of the water for repairs following a grounding which damaged their engine too as I recall. I thought at the time how desperately unlucky they had been. Advance the clock by several months to today and.....

We now read that Bob and Steve have had to call out the RNLI numerous times during their journey - so many times in fact that one wonders whether they really have a clue what they are doing! One report that reached me even suggested they were navigating by road map! I don't know whether that is so, I hope not. I'm not quite sure what to make of it all. On the one hand one has to admire two people following their dreams, but on the other hand are they wasting the time of the RNLI and putting others' lives at risk? And of course the RNLI do like to take part in training activities anyway. I can't help but think these guys would benefit from a refresher RYA course though!

Steve Shapiro

Bob Weise

Joke:
If at first you don't succeed........
Singlehanded nonstop sailing round the world racing may not be for you!
(But maybe you can just about get away with pottering along the British coast!)

Harrythefishmonger and Spencer

Having sold the various bits of the original navigation electronics that was on Blue Star when we bought her, boxed them all up and posted them off....... I then received a message from a chap whose ebay name is Harrythefishmonger. (I don't think that is his real name by the way). Anyway, Harrythefishmonger wanted know where his lead was for his chartplotter, which I had said was included in the sale. To be quite honest, I really don't know where the lead went. It must have existed for me to mention it, so I was a bit surprised when Harrythefishmonger said it hadn't arrived with his chartplotter. I can only think it must have been despatched with a different bit of kit, which isn't very clever of me. I suggested that Harrythefishmonger acquired a lead from elsewhere, and we would then agree on recompense for that. Shortly later a reply came back saying that Harrythefishmoner appreciated that this kit had come off Blue Star and was part of a project to raise money for a very worthy cause, and therefore I did not need to worry about the lead! Well! Top marks to Harrythefishmonger for a) his detective work in figuring out who he was buying kit off, and b) being so very magnanimous about the lead! To show my gratitude to Harrythefishmonger, and as a way of atoning for my sin, I have resolved to donate a further £10 to the CF Trust via my blog link!

I can also report that another kind soul, Spencer (I think that is his real name), who recently visited Stafford Coastal Cruising Club was giving up sailing (sharp intake of breath!) and giving away some sailing kit. I duly acquired some spare sailing clothes that might be useful for crew sailing on Blue Star, and resolved to donate a further £20 to the cause in recognition of the donation from Spencer! Thus, £30 in total is now added to donations!

Jokes:
* Noah started building several arks for various parts of animal kingdom. One was a split level job for all the fish – a multi-storey carp ark
* What do you call a fish with no eyes?…Fsh
* How do fish go into business?…They start on a small scale
* A fish swam into a wall and said, “Dam!”
* Why are fish so smart?…They are always in schools

Does not include yacht........

Roger and I have finally got around to selling (on ebay) some of the 'old' electronic navigation kit that was on Blue Star when we bought her. We managed to work out how to use ebay and got all of the kit advertised. For most of the kit there have been a number of enquiries, which is great. This is the first time I have used the ebay site to sell things, and I must say once you have worked it out it is very easy to use. There is scope for potential buyers to ask questions too, which I suppose is good, but it has meant that I had to keep on checking various details about the bits of kit:

What is the model number?
What leads does it come with?
How do you connect it up?
Can you send it to Timbuktu? (How much will that cost?)
Does it have any marks on it?
Does it have an internal thingamy?
Does it come with all of the other gubbins?
Does it include the rest of the yacht? :-\

You get the picture, I'm sure! I imagined that once you posted your adverts, that was it, you just got paid and sent off the stuff. Now I'm not quite so sure? Anyway, hopefully some sailors will be very pleased with the old kit and get it at a good price with several more years of service.

Happy New Year to everyone who is following our blog!

Joke:
Salesman: This computer will cut your workload by 50%.
Office Manager: That's great, I'll take two of them.