Wednesday, 1 June 2022 - Hurricane Agatha is slowly crossing from the Pacific to the Atlantic basin/Gulf of Mexico and is predicted to pass awfully close to us here in Marathon in the Middle Keys. The question will be how strong will the winds be when it gets here. I wanted to get down into the engine room and do some work today but there has been no sun or wind to charge my batteries and they are a bit low. Working in the engine room gets very het even without having the engine running so I would need a fan to circulate fresh air into the room and I can't run that fan with the low batteries. I joined Phil and Carol Vachon for dinner at Dockside this evening.

Thursday, 2 June - This afternoon I bought groceries. Prices are going up so fast that even though I thought I didn't need too many things this time, I think I set a new personal record of over $276 for my groceries again today. Susie called and asked that I go to her house here in Key Colony Beach and move her kayak off the patio and into the house since strong winds are predicted soon so I took a taxi there and back. The sun was out today long enough to top off my batteries but this evening I turned the microwave oven on to reheat a baked potato and an alarm flashed to let me know that the house batteries are too low. That's not good at all. Those batteries aren't but about two years old, are sealed AGM batteries, and should last several years if kept charged. My system has always indicated that they never get below 70% charged and have topped off daily, with few exceptions. Something's wrong.

Friday, 3 June - It rained and blew all day here today and the batteries charged up well. I also discovered that one of my stanchions has rainwater leaking in around it. The water runs down the inside of the hull and comes out under the starboard drawers in the settee and onto the floor. Not much, but if it continues, it will ruin the teak and holly flooring. I'm glad I noticed it. I got out in the rain and resealed that stanchion. I could have saved the trips to get water on Tuesday. With the rain we've already had, my water tank is already overflowing and there's lots more to come.
                    The house batteries are already low again tonight at 10pm. Not Good!
                    Hurricane Agnes in the Pacific has boon renamed Tropical Cyclone One after passing over Mexico and into the Atlantic basin and is 160 miles away and headed northeast toward us at 12 mph and blowing 40 mph but I don't think it's going to be a hurricane again before it passes us sometime tomorrow. Still, if it strengthens to even 60 mph, that's pretty strong winds and who knows how many boats anchored poorly in the harbor will break loose and bang into others. About 10 o'clock this evening one of the steel boats that is poorly tended was on the radio asking for help because of the rain and is sinking. Several boaters responded with generator, water pumps, lights, and manpower to save it. We certainly don't need another sunken boat in the harbor, but it probably wouldn't hurt to lose that owner.

Saturday, 4 June - I got down in the engine room today and used the West Marine Oil Extractor to remove fluids from the Drip Pan under the engine. I put it in a V-8 bottle and let it settle overnight. It looks like it is about 1 qt. water and 1/2 qt. of oil. From above and outside the engine room it looked like it might be fuel or transmission fluid. I'm glad it wasn't.

Sunday, 5 June - I replaced the Zinc in the Reverse Gear Heat Exchanger and the Isotherm Refrigeration cooler. Neither one really needed it but I wasn’t sure of the last date that they were changed. The one in the heat exchanger was only about 1/3 used up. This could be because I haven’t taken the boat out in quite awhile. Changing the Zinc sooner made this a much easier job because I didn’t have to disassemble the Heat Exchanger because of a broken Zinc. I also checked the Engine Oil and Transmission Fluid and both were at good levels.

Monday, 6 June - D-Day - After pickleball today I got out my service manual for the Yamaha outboard and went through the step-by-step procedure of setting the timing on the outboard. I was baffled for awhile because the Suzuki micrometer that I have to read cylinder movement for top-dead-center must read and operate opposite of a Yamaha gauge. It took awhile for me to figure out how to compensate for that. Unfortunately, I think the adjustments that I made ended right back where I started and I didn't get to take the dinghy for a spin to see if it made any difference in the planing ability of the dinghy. Maybe tomorrow.

Tuesday, 7 June - It started raining as I walked back to the marina right after pickleball. I was already soaked with sweat from playing so the rain really just rinsed my clothing. Upon returning to the boat I realized that the water tank was overflowing from the heavy rain so I decided to use the extra water I was getting to give the aft deck that is under the bimini top, along with the cockpit seating and floorboards a good rinsing, which hadn't been done in a long time. I probably used 10 to 20 gallons of water but still ended up with a full water tank.

Wednesday, 8 June - It was really hot on the pickleball court today and we'll lose a couple more players, too. Afterward, I walked to Home Depot for a couple of rolls of blue masking tape to seal the hatches with tomorrow for the fumigation. Upon return from there, I checked the fluid in the starter battery which was only a little bit low after over a year. Then I added about 7 Oz. of Prestone Antifreeze and 7 Oz. of water to the engine coolant reservoir. I got to take the dinghy for a spin this afternoon. Resetting the timing didn't do any good. I thought the timing ended up right back where it started, but there was still hope that it would run better. Still baffled.

Thursday, 9 June - I skipped pickleball this morning to get a head start on prepping the boat for fumigation. I needed to get the boac over to Marathon Boatyard at 1 PM. Unfortunately, I didn't make it there on time. When I released my lines from the mooring ball, I knew that, once I was underway under power, I wouldn't have much time to get my lines that had just been my mooring lines and now would be my dock lines coiled and ready before I reached the marina, so I coiled them before leaving the bow. By the time I got the lines ready the wind was blowing me close to the next row of boats, but I still had room to avoid the closest boat...I thought! I shift the engine, which was already running, into forward and gave it some throttle...nothing! No thrust, no steering without motion through the water. I instantly realized I was going to hit another boat, grabbed the VHF radio and called out to the harbor for help. By the time I had grabbed my boat hook and fended off the closest boat four or five dinghies had shown up. I bet it was less than two minutes. Then four of five more showed up to help, too. What a great harbor! They towed me back to a mooring ball, ran my lines through the pendant, made sure everything was safe, and dispersed with my very vocal "thank you" to all. One fellow even volunteered to help me figure out what went wrong, opened up the engine room and dropped down in to observe as I shifted the gears. It was quickly determined that the gears weren't engaging because the engaging button wasn't pushed all the way in. I was back on the way to the boatyard within about 15 minutes and arrived about 30 minutes late. No big deal. In fact, as I pulled into their harbor, they had just turned a boat around that had been where I needed to dock and it was leaving. If I'd been on time, I would have had to wait. I spent until 11 o'clock that evening getting all the food that isn't in bottles or cans off the boat and opening every storage compartment, and sealing all possible exterior air leaks with masking tape except the companionway hatches. (There's a photo of the mess made by opening all the floorboards and every other storage space in the link near the bottom of this page.) It was too dark to see well so I called a taxi and headed over to Susie's house for the night. She's in Ohio, but left me a key. By midnight I had put all the food that needed refrigeration and that I had brought with me, into her refrigerator, took a shower, and hit the sack. Unfortunately, I didn't get to sleep for quite awhile thinking about the day's occurrences and the day ahead.

Friday, 10 June - The fumigator had said that he'd fumigate "in the afternoon" and I still needed to seal up the companionway hatches so I returned to the boatyard by about 10 o'clock and finished preparations by noon. It was hot and muggy and he showed up at 4 PM. He made a very cursory inspection of my sealing job, connected his Vikane and monitoring lines, injected the Viking, and drove away all in about 30 minutes. There's nothing I can do on the boat until he calls me on Sunday, so I returned to Susie's, watered her plants, watched a couple of movies on Netflix, had a pork chop for dinner and called it a night.

Saturday, 11 June - I changed the air filter in Susie's heating/air conditioning system today, walked about two miles to the hardware store to buy some replacement pencil zincs for the engine and refrigeration cooling system on Island Time, had lunch, and returned to Susie's for the evening.

Sunday, 12 June - I had no way of telling what time today the man from Hammerhead Termite Fumigation would call to tell me that the boat is clear of the Vikane poison, but I suspected that it would be in the afternoon, so I pulled some weeds in Susie's driveway, which is gravel, taped the light sensors for the lighting wrapped around the palm tree trunks out front back up with Gorilla Tape, and replaced her front porch light, which is a coiled fluorescent we just installed a few months back that was supposed to last for thousands of hours, but had stopped lighting. After that I started getting ready to leave the house as quickly as possible tomorrow morning since I'll just be staying one more night here at Susie's and need to put as many things back in place on the boat to travel back to my mooring ball by noon tomorrow. The fumigator called at about 2:30 and I went to the boatyard and worked putting things away and restarting the refrigeration until about 8 o'clock in the evening. I got a lot done but still have plenty to do tomorrow.

Monday, 13 June - I got up around 7 AM, ate, and arrived back at the boatyard around 9 AM. I brought all the perishable food that I had taken to Susie's back to the boat and put it away. The refrigeration hadn't gotten as cold as I'd hoped, but it'll have to do for the moment. I put lots more stuff away and got ready to cast off by 11:45, then went into the office to pay the bill and hoped they'd help me cast off and turn the boat in the very small marina then, but the manager said he'd send someone to help and 1 o'clock. One helper came at one, cast off the lines and spun the boat, with the help of the breeze, 180 degrees, and I headed out, termite free. Back on the mooring ball I spent the rest of the day replacing floorboards, removing masking tape that sealed lazarettes, etc. until about 9 PM.

Tuesday, 14 June - I was surprised to find seven other pickleball players at the park this morning. They had been rotating on one court until I got there, then we set up another net since we then had 4 full teams. As soon as pickleball ended I headed back to the marina, paid my mooring ball rental for next month and stuffed another 50 bags with brochures for the new people that check in to the mooring field. I met Phil and Carol Vachon at Dockside for musical entertainment and a few drinks this evening.

Wednesday, 15 June - Pickleball this morning with the usual eight remaining players, then this afternoon I spent trying to find a marine surveyor that can inspect my boat soon. The insurance company that issued my policy has decided to cancel all policies that were sold through independent agents when their policies are up for renewal. Mine expires on July tenth and my agent says he has to find new policies for about 300 of his clients whose policies won't be renewed. All new insurers will require a recent survey and my boat hasn't been surveyed since I got it. Of course, that means that thousands of boaters are suddenly in need of fresh surveys and the surveyors are swamped. There has been a surveyor here in the harbor. I saw him last week and his truck in in the marina parking lot but when I enquired about him at the office, I discovered he passed away over the weekend. Bad timing on my part. I may have a hard time finding a suitable surveyor in time. I spent about an hour trying to adjust the throttle control cables on the Yamaha outboard this afternoon hoping they may be the reason the dinghy won't plane up, but to no avail, but I still haven't given up hope.

Thursday, 16 June - Pickleball in the morning and continuing to try to find a marine surveyor that can survey my boat. There aren't too many marine surveyors here and my insurance agent told me that the insurance companies will require the surveyors to be NAMS OR SAMS certified. The surveyor that died recently was SAMS certified and the only other one within 35 miles says he's surveying the whole Boy Scout fleet in Islamorada and will be tied up doing that for quite awhile. I found a local fellow, but he is ACMS, Association of Certified Marine Surveyors. He is a Master Marine Surveyor with over thirty years in the business, but still may not qualify. That's nuts.

Friday, 17 June - I hosted the Cruiser's Net this morning then headed to pickleball. We only had seven players so we had to rotate into the one court. We got a bit of light rain but played through it. I spent the rest of the afternoon trying to find another insurance company that will insure Island Time. One said it's too old. Progressive, Liberty Mutual, and Chubb no longer insure boats over 35 feet long, although Chubb only told me that after talking to me for over thirty minutes. I filled out an online form with Offshore Risk that took about 45 minutes and will see what they quote if and when they get back to me.

Saturday, 18 June - My bike lost its ability to shift gears several months ago but since Susie has been quite willing to take me places and since I've been buying way more groceries each trip and taking a taxi back to the harbor, I haven't used it much. I decided to fix it today and, although it is stuck in high gear, I rode it down to the bike shop mid-day to get a new shifter. They didn't have what I needed, but showed me what to order via Amazon. Dinner with Phil and Carol Vachon at the Takara Tai Restaurant across from the from the marina, then off to Dockside for music.

Sunday, 19 June - JuneTenth - I've been aware of JuneTeenth all my life because in Texas negroes all took the day off, but everywhere else it seemed to be a non-event. I hadn't heard anything about it again until last year; now it's a national holiday. Wow!
                    I had dinner with Phil and Carol at Dockside while listening to Randy, Popeye, and the boys play.

Monday, 20 June - One of the city park employees was nice enough to set out the pickleball equipment on her holiday so we could play. Very nice of her to come to work just for that. It was very hot today and we had no wind so we didn't last but about an hour and a half on the court. This afternoon I loosened up the zippers on the under-seat storage bag in the dinghy and replaced two of the zipper pull tabs with tabs off a worn out pair of shorts that I hadn't gotten around to throwing away. I also replaced the quite rusty combination lock that secures the outboard motor to the dinghy with a brand new one and placed the old lock in a small container of 30% acid to dissolve the rust by soaking for a day or two. When it's done, I'll rinse and lubricate it and it should be fine to use in some protected area of the boat if necessary.

Tuesday, 21 June - A couple, Sandy and Terry, from northern Florida joined us at pickleball this morning and will be here for the week. He said that their local pickleball facility has about 800 active players with 80 courts, some of which are covered. Nice. They are both good players and used to play in tournaments but she doesn't like the pressure so they don't compete anymore. This afternoon I'm dealing with insurance companies again.

Wednesday, 22 June - Most of today was spent trying to find out how to insure the boat again. Other than that, I cleaned up the lock that had been soaking in vinegar, dried it out and oiled it well. I had wasted my time cleaning it up. By the time I got it cleaned up, several of the digits has corroded away making it impossible to read.

Thursday, 23 June - Yahoo! Susie's coming back this weekend. She found out that the seawall at her home here in Key Colony Beach has had the contractor show up to rebuild it and she needs to be here to make sure it's built to her wishes. She found out this morning and was in her car and headed this way before noon.

Friday, 24 June - My net this morning lasted about 45 minutes and I was on the pickleball court by 10am. We're all getting better so the volleys last longer, which makes it even more fun. Unfortunately, two visitors that were better players won't be back Monday. This afternoon was spent, once again, trying to get estimates for insurance on the boat. I spent considerable time filling out a form for USAA insurance and when I clicked on the last button to send the form, the server replied, "Sorry, our system is down. Try again later", and the form went away. I'll have to start over.. Frustrating. I spent the evening with Phil and Carol listening to a blues band at Dockside.

Saturday, 25 June - After opening the hurricane shutters at Susie's house and getting everything out of Susie's car from her trip up north, we cleaned up then picked up Phil and Carol at the city marina docks and took them to dinner at Havana Jack's. The Tye Thurman Band was playing there and we always enjoy them. Phil and Carol had never been there since they don't have a car. It's close to Susie's but about 7 miles from Boot Key Harbor.

Sunday, 26 June - Susie and I had breakfast at the Wooden Spoon Cafe this morning then visited with her next door neighbor, Hillbilly, who is preparing to sell his house and move north to live with an old high school girlfriend that recently reconnected with him. He's a Vietnam War veteran and is in pretty poor health. She's talked him into moving in with her and we hope it works out well. She says she'll take care of him and has plenty of money to do it but several of his friends are afraid she may be a scammer. He'll be alright as long as she doesn't talk him into consolidating their finances. We joined Phil and Carol for dinner and dancing at Dockside's Open Mic Night. The band is good and Popeye Cunard showed up and we always enjoy him. In fact, we think he's the best entertainer in the middle keys. He doesn't have the greatest voice; most rockers don't, but he has a great '50s, '60s' and '70s playlist of danceable songs and enjoys playing and performing so much that the audience can't help but have fun, too. We can't believe he comes over to Marathon from a couple of islands away so often to play and entertain for free on open mic night, but we're really glad he does.

Monday, 27 June - We only had seven pickleball players this morning so we rotated in and out of the games on one court. I came back to the boat and spent several hours rechecking the timing on the Yamaha outboard motor and adjusting the throttle control cables, but to no avail. The dinghy still won't plane up. I'm really out of ideas about what to try next on that engine.

Tuesday, 28 June - Up early to be ready at the dock when Susie picked me up to take me to get my right shoulder scanned to determine how much damage was caused when I tore my rotator cuff pulling on the starter rope of the Evinrude when Bob Dahmer returned it with a shortened pull rope back in March or April without telling me. I yanked on the cord expecting its full length and obviously damaged my shoulder. I have restricted movement, can't sleep on my right side, and have to lay my right arm by my side if sleeping on my back or my left side. It hurts to even reach out and pick up a drink with that arm. We spent an hour driving to Key West, had a bit of breakfast, spent twenty five minutes in the medical facility, then headed back to Marathon. While Susie was in Ohio and my boat was being fumigated, I had spent two nights at her house. While there I had walked to Specialty Hardware and bought four pencil sacrificial zincs for my engine and refrigeration system. They turned out to be the wrong size so I returned them today when we got back to Marathon. This evening we met Phil and Carol Vachon at Dockside for music again.

Wednesday, 29 June - I played pickleball this morning then headed over to the project room at the marina to replace the shift mechanism and cable on my bike. Of course, that took about four times as long as I intended, partly because I didn't know how the handlebar grips were attached and I didn't want to tear one up in the process of removing it, and the other because the shifter fit the handlebar differently than the old one and I had to jury rig the cabling. Thank goodness I had saved some of the cable housing from when I changed the brake cables a few months ago. I returned to the boat about 4pm and had a sandwich for lunch then contacted three more insurance companies about getting the boat insurance renewed, but was turned down by two of them, after asking them up front if my boat, made in 1977, would be turned down because of its age. I was turned down because of the age of the boat, but only after about 25 minutes of answering questions about the boat. Did I mention that I told them the age of the boat up front? They must be getting paid by how much of perspective clients' time they can waste. The other turned me down because my boat is 44 feet long. I had just told him its length when he said, "Well, your boat is right at the cusp of our 35 foot cutoff, so I think we can probably insure it." Idiots, all of them. Oh, and did I mention that I filled out another online request that took about 30 minutes to answer all the questions only for the site to tell me that the last question about the length of the boat disqualified me? Sorry if I sound frustrated...I am.

Thursday, 30 June - After pickleball this morning I returned to the boat, had lunch, and proceeded to call more insurance companies, only to be turned down by all of them. I finally called a local insurance agent and will let them do the work; hopefully soon, although Monday is the 4th of July holiday. I called the surveyor and arranged to have him do an out of the water survey on Tuesday if Marathon Boatyard can haul the boat then.