Thursday, 6 August - This morning I finally had to deal with the house batteries in my motorhome. They're the batteries that run virtually everything on the motorhome except the starter for the engine and the radio. That includes the lighting and refrigerator, and the lights were very low last night and I've been having trouble keeping the refrigerator running. It runs on either 110v electricity or propane, but needs some 12v electricity when on propane. I certainly hope this solves this problem. I'd hate to have spent $250 for the batteries and not cure the refrigerator problem. I'll know when I return to the motorhome this evening. It turns out the batteries have been in there since 2006, not a bad run! I replaced them with identical replacements, but certainly won't see them last as long, since I hope to be selling the motorhome within a few months.
                When I returned to my usual parking spot this morning under the trees, I saw an eye-opening scene. The tree right next to where I park had had a complete, major limb break off at the trunk and fall. Had I been parked there, it would definitely have crushed the motorhome. See the pictures for this episode. The link is near the bottom of this episode.
                Other than that, the board that I painted with resin yesterday is still too tacky to work with, even though I'd added considerably more hardener than previously, and it's baked in the sun all day now. I also had to figure out why a couple of electrical outlets in the boat wouldn't work. I tracked the problems to a switch on my control board that was marked TV/Microwave, but also controlled these other outlets. I also found a switch hidden up under and behind the front panel of the sliding doors on the liquor pantry/stereo compartment. It controls a string of LED lighting inside the cabinet that I didn't know was there.
                Hey, this is kinda cool. I've been hearing a very loud chirping here in the marina, but could never spot the bird making all the noise. In fact, the other day, I thought I had when I spotted a grackle across the way that seemed to be the culprit. Well, I was wrong (as usual). I was just up on the foredeck and heard it just above me and very close. I finally spotted the bird two masts over on a boat whose mast is considerably higher than mine; a boat of about 65 feet. The bird was on the far side of the mast, so I could barely see him. I took a chance on his not flying away and came back and got my binoculars. It's an osprey! At least now I know what to look for when I hear it. I saw porpoises in the marina the other evening, and last night my next door neighbor said he saw two young manatees. I've hoped to see manatees, but haven't spotted any on this side of the state, yet. I believe I saw one surface momentarily when I was over at Stuart on the east coast. Actually, I was on the Okeechobee canal that connects the east coast of the state with the west, via Lake Okeechobee. I was looking at a nice CSY there when, although the traffic on the waterway there is almost nonexistent, a boat happened by. Just as it did, something surfaced very briefly about 20 feet from me and the other boat owner. He didn't even see it, and I was thinking alligator nostrils, but realized later it probably was the muzzle of a manatee. In that canal it could be either one, or even a crocodile. Did you know that Florida is the only place on earth that crocs and alligators coexist?

Friday, 7 August - More of cleaning tools and dealing with "the board." You know there is a great advantage in my writing this blog and sending it out to all my friends other than staying in touch and letting my friends know where I am and what I'm doing. It also encourages feedback on some of the problems I'm having. Late yesterday, in response to the challenge I'm having with the resin on "the board" not setting up, Gary Powers, a good friend and sailing companion of my parents, emailed with the suggestion that I coat the board in a paste of Twenty Mule Team Borax, because he had had the same problem in the past and it worked very well for him in setting up epoxy resin. I did mixed a slurry of the borax today and painted it onto my boards. Unfortunately, it didn't work too well on my problem. He had used it on epoxy resin and I'm using polyester resin, just because I had it onboard the boat. The point is, I'm getting all this feedback, some that works and some that doesn't, but it's all good. I learn something from each one. Gary had also sent me some great information that he'd used in the past and I'm bound to use in the future on some project. One was about how to remove screws that the heads have broken off and can't be extracted and the other was about using much cheaper exterior plywood instead of the outrageously priced Starboard and how to do so. Another friend supplied me with the information on how to cut PVC pipe in awkward, remote, or tight quarters where you can't easily get a saw or cutters to it by using small, twisted nylon line. Works like a charm! Others have come up with similar solutions, or at least, explanations as to why what I'm doing doesn't work, leading me in a different direction to solve the problem. Keep those ideas coming! I don't always use every suggestion, but I do consider each one when making decisions and value them.
                Later, I showered and went to one of the marina's bars and had a couple of "Happy Hour Margaritas".

Saturday, 8 August - I woke up this morning and tried to turn on the radio to listen to some classical music with breakfast. I had left the headlights on all night, so the battery was as dead as a door nail. I had breakfast in silence and went and bought a few groceries at Walmart. One of the advantages of the dual battery system on both the boat and the motorhome is that, by simply flipping a switch, you can start the engine with either set of batteries, so I was up and running without having to call AAA, beg some stranger for a jump start, or start the generator house batteries to charge the starter battery. Wow! It's a good thing I finally got around to buying new house batteries on Thursday. The situation would definitely been worse with all my batteries down at once. That has to have been one of the very few times in my life I've had such perfect timing! I had been putting off buying those new house batteries ever since I got the motorhome!

Sunday, 9 August - I'm running low on walnuts, I started out with about 50 lb. and am down to where I'll soon be opening my last 2 lb. bag. I'll certainly miss them on my cereal each morning and as occasional snacks when they are gone. At $8/lb. in the stores, I probably won't be buying many.
                I decided "the board" is going into the lazarette, tacky or not. I figured I can just cover it with newspaper which will keep it from sticking to everything I set on top of it, and to the sides of the compartment should I ever need to remove it to access the steering cables and pulleys or the plumbing that is below it. Still sticky to pick up and to anything I set it on or lean it against, but guess what, I can't get the newspaper to stick to it at all! I think Murphy's in the lazarette. I went ahead and installed the board and loaded the space with swim fins, snorkels, dive masks, a fishing spear, reels, lures, and other fishing gear and life preservers, a pump for the dinghy, etc. Finally!

Monday, 10 August - I came to the boat this morning set on repairing the refrigeration in one of the freezers today. It's been getting warmer every day. The previous owner had added freon to the system while I was here and explained that I might need to do so every six months or so. It's only been a few weeks. After removing the cockpit flooring and hatch covers and delving into the system, I realized that he had added freon to the other, engine driven system, not the 12V system I'm having trouble with. Luckily, I have the owner's manual and wiring diagrams for it, so I studied them for a while, and decided that a lack of freon probably wasn't the problem. It's probably not low on freon, it's just not coming on. I checked out the terminal block wiring and discovered that the positive wire was so corroded that when I touched it, it broke off. Aha! Easy fix. Near the end of the day, so I'll bring back my bag of electrical fittings tomorrow when I return. They are still in the trailer.

Tuesday, 11 August - After discovering the broken wire on the terminal block for the refrigeration yesterday, I brought my bag of electrical fittings to the boat and fully expected to simply replace the one little terminal and be done, but Murphy was hiding in the engine room. I replaced the connector on the wire, plugged it into the terminal block and ....nothing. Next, I discovered two wires that, according to the wiring diagram, are juxtaposed, so I switched them...nothing. Well, not quite nothing; the compressor runs, but not the pump that circulates water through the system to remove the heat from the freon. So I switched them back. The pump still doesn't run, so I still have no cooling. Next, I observed that the drive belt that runs the water maker and one of the alternators were touching. This isn't good! I knew there must be a way to move at least one of them. Using a mirror, I finally discovered the four metric Allen head bolts that allow the water maker pump to slide, then, working upside down and totally by feel, I eventually was able to move that pump over about 1/4". I noticed that the previous owner had lots of spare belts, perhaps this is why, but surely he wouldn't have let belt after belt just destroy each other by running in contact with each other all the time. It was so obvious, and he is such a good mechanic. Anyway, I left the boat without refrigeration and went to dinner with Marcus Libkind, one of the other new boat owners two slips down.

Wednesday Morning, 12 August - First thing this morning I walked over to the marina office to see why I didn't get a notice about paying for the slip for this month and to pay the bill, then I picked up some ice to bring back to the boat since I still don't have refrigeration aboard. After that, I thought I'd better catch up on and send this out.