So we piled onto Fragile Habitat, and by that I mean Norris, myself and the three huge lovable dogs which by the way each one probably weighs in at over100 lbs.  I wondered if maybe the race committee would give us a handicap for the extra weight? 

START OF THE RACE

All the contending boats begin circling the little harbor getting ready for the start.  Crews are busy adjusting sails. Norris is coughing and groaning, and also messing with his sails.  He tells me to steer the boat and "keep off the rocks!" I go into the pilot house to steer and suddenly realize I had better quickly figure out of his chart plotter to see where the rocks are and to get a read on the depth sounder indicator thingy.  There is stuff all over the place, books and papers and coffee cups, lots of distractions, typical Norris I thought.  Mocha, the oldest dog, is nonchalantly stretched out on the settee totally bored with the whole situation.  The pilot house reminded me a bit of Norris' golf cart back home.  He uses it for transportation between his house and Snug Harbor where Fragile Habitat is normally docked.  He's got all sorts of things in and hanging on that golf cart, mostly found things that don't necessarily have anything to do with anything but things that I'm sure he thinks he might not want to throw away as he might need to use it for something sometime in the future but probably never does.  Some things on his golf cart are useful though, you know things like old oil burning lanterns that he uses for tail lights at night and such.  Meanwhile I get no instruction whatsoever on how to operate the boat from Norris, as lovable Norris, he is as Norris does.   So I give it my best shot. 

Norris hands me in a sheet of paper and grunts "read it".  So now while I'm trying to steer an unfamiliar boat, understand his chart plotter, trying to stay dead out of wind so he can get the sails up, keep off unknown rocks and out of shallow depths, miss other boats doing the same thing in this small harbor, make out what Norris is mumbling to me in his raspy hoarse voice.. and now...I've got to read race instructions!  Basically the instructions said we all were supposed to circle around and miss each other while each other maneuvered to get the best spot right at the start line exactly when the gun goes off.  This is no easy task even in a stink pot with the motor running let alone in a boat with sails up and no wind. 

BEFORE YOU KNOW IT

Boom!  The gun goes off and away we go!  Did I say "away we go"?  Let me correct that, I meant and away we go at slower than a snails pace.  This isn't like the horse races where the gun goes off and you gallop away, no, we just keep going the same minus speed.  Nice thing about it as you have lots of time to chit chat and wave at Paul Barger, the race starter, as we slowly crawl by start line. 

PHOTOS?  DREAM ON NORRIS

So far there is only the hint of an itsy bitsy teensy dribble of wind out on the channel.  Norris is hoarsely yelling at me to get pictures of everyone and I soon understood why the urgency.  It was because all the other race contestants were leaving us lickety split in the dust or salt water and quickly getting out of photo range.  I soon discovered we were on the slow boat to China.  It probably was because Norris had no help from the rest of us meaning me and the three dogs.  Thank God we were only headed up around Jones Island and back today. 

SPEAKING OF DOG

Norris, being sick as a dog, did his best to manage the sails, patiently give me instructions and never said a curse word to me the whole day.  And speaking of dog, those three huge sweet dogs have set places on the boat and you don't mess with their set places as those are their places and nobody else's.  Latte, the oldest, takes position like the queen upon the royal settee in the salon.  Mocha stretches out atop and forward of the cabin right in front of the windshield that you normally would like look out while steering and uses the wood block mount for the air vent as a handy chin rest.  And Blanca, the third and easiest going one, suffices to flop down on the floor of the cockpit where Norris and I are trying to steer and manipulate all those ropes, gadgets and things that I don't know the names of.  You had to be careful the entire day not to step on or trip over Blanca. 

MANAGE THE SPAGHETTI!

Norris can't talk much with his hoarse throat but managed to communicate with made up goofy sign language and funny faces.  We continued to apologize to each other, me for not knowing how to help and he for not being able to talk.  He said for me "Not to worry (about my inadequacies) that I should just manage the spaghetti."   Spaghetti?  What is he talking about now?  I hadn't a clue what "manage the spaghetti" meant.  He said, like as if it was an old nautical term that I certainly should know, "You know, keep the lines neat!" 

Oh, okay, I can do that....so all day I "neatened" the lines.  I kept them in perfect circles and tidy piles but it seemed Norris just as quickly, would mess them all up again.  I eventually came to the conclusion Norris doesn't function as well in tidy environments.  He does better with a bit of chaos mixed in the batch of things. 

BLANCA AN EASY GOING POOCH

No matter how much I tried to tidy those lines, Blanca couldn't help but get tangled up in them but she didn't seem the least bit bothered which only reconfirmed that this is norm around here with Norris.   

GOING TO BE A LONG DAY

Meanwhile we continue to fall further behind in the race that is.  We've become content to watch miscellaneous boats and ferries going by to amuse ourselves.  There's literally no wind (that we could catch).  Norris finally gave up too messing with the colorful red spinnaker (even though magnificent as it was) which secretly I was very glad to see it go down in the locker as I couldn't see to steer with that dang up on one side of the boat and Mocha blocking the view on the other side.  I munched on another one of my donuts.  So far Norris hasn't touched the donuts yet.    

CAN'T REMEMBER A STITCH

We tack a couple times and Norris rattles something to me, in nautical terms that I'd forgotten the meaning of.  Rap the rope around the which-a-jigger, the wench or smench, who the heck knows what that is?  I wasn't much help.  About the only thing I could do was steer but even that was difficult because you have get all those flying strips of string tied way up high in the sails to fly in a straight line to the wind but if you ask me that's another impossible task.  Norris kept telling me "go port more" and then "go starboard more".  I didn't have a clue what direction to make those strings stand up and fly.  Make up your mind I thought.  Over and over, we had to keep adjusting the direction.  Oh and another thing about sailing...you never go in a straight line to your destination.  No, you have to keep crisscrossing over the direct route to get, somehow to the end, to your destination at the end of a normally direct route.  Does that make any sense? 

NAPPING WHILE YOU RACE

Everyone we were racing was completely out of sight by now.  The only way we could get an inkling of where the other racers were was by radio communication.  We finally just started to relax giving up the idea of winning the race and just settled in nicely to our demise.  The dogs were all sleeping and Norris decided he'd get some sleep too, right up front along side of Mocha, you know, the one that blocks the wind shield.  My job continued to be to the steer master.  The job was becoming easier now especially when Norris was asleep and not telling to turn this and that way and since it took us so long to get across to the other side of the channel before you had a choice of either making a turn or run the boat directly into the shore.  It was a no brainer and since it took so long to get to the other side it gave Norris plenty of time to nap before he'd have to get up and change all the sails again so we could go back in the same opposite direction.  So this is how we spent our time and how he took his naps most of the day.  I just steered and did my darndest not to get in the way of or step on the huge golden retriever under my feet. 

 

DRAGGING A SEA ANCHOR?

It seemed like we were going no where for the longest time but I just thought it was normal.  Norris woke up at one point and noticed we had been towing a big log.  Mysteriously one of the lines had dropped in the water and had wrapped itself around this big log.  God only knows for how long!  There it was, in a perpendicular position to the boat, like a big boom dragging itself along in the water! If we had tried to do that on purpose it would have been completely impossible.   Maybe that's why we were in last place?

GOT TO PEE?

Around noon we still hadn't even reached the half way point which was Jones Island.  I suddenly realized the dogs had been out on the water a long time without a bathroom break and wondered if they were going to make it until we got back.  Then it dawned on me that they hadn't gone to shore since Norris left Snug Harbor really early this morning!!!  I confirmed that with Norris when he woke up from his nap and he said "Yeah, don't worry they can hold it a long time."  Blanca suddenly, maybe at the urge of our conversation, got up for the first time that day, headed up over the settee in the cockpit and stopped strangely for a moment before heading onto the gangway.  I noticed some water droplets below and asked Norris if maybe she had pee'd.   He said "NO, the dogs don't do that!" and then to prove it to me he reached over, wiped up a droplet with his finger and tasted it.  "Nope, not pee!" he said.  Obviously you can see now, if you hadn't noticed earlier, that Norris is a character and will go to any lengths to get a laugh or to tease!  He's a real character but lovable!

SOUP'S ON

At noon, Norris headed down into the galley to rustle up some clam chowder for lunch and when I use the word "rustle up" I mean it.  You wouldn't have believed the ruckus he was making down there with all the banging and clanking going on.  Then for the longest time he couldn't get the generator running to heat up the soup.  He tried and tried to get the starter to work.  I thought to myself it was a hopeless effort and wondered what cold clam chowder out of the can would be like but eventually the trusty old generator kicked in and soup was on!

A few minutes later he heads back up to the cockpit with a bowl of steaming hot soup in hand and gulps it down leaving just enough for the Blanca to lick out as she happily cleans out the rest in the bowl. 

 

 

 

A LITTLE EXTRA HELP

Once Norris had freed the log tow, we started to make some headway.  Everyone by now though had made the turn around Jones Island, the 1/2 way point and were now heading down the home stretch passing us along the way.  We still had to make our way around Jones Island and we both knew how slow it was going to be as the island cut the wind off on the other side.  Once we got on the other side of John's Island though and out of sight of the others, Norris reached down and turned the engine on and so we puttered away for several minutes making good time which lasted only until we came back out in the channel and in view of our other competitors which he then quickly turned the engine off.  I laughed and got such a giggle out of it as officially it was what you call cheating but I was 100% behind him on the decision.  We were so far in last that we might never have made it back before dusk!

NO STRAIGHT ROUTE TO YOUR DESTINATION

So, we continued to zig zagged our way now back down the channel, back and forth, back and forth.  Larry and I would've been up and back 50 times in the little Protector boat by the time it took us to get back to Ship Yard Cove that day and that's including the times Norris turned the engine on.  Of course I'd hate to think of the fuel we'd have used and the cost of it at today's prices.   

You've got to hand it to these sailors they've got patience.    

THE HOME STRETCH

As we FINALLY approached Friday Harbor, Norris started the engine up again so we could skirt out of the way of the big ferry coming out and this time he left it on so we could putter her right back to the dock at Ship Yard Cove. 

All in all it was a great day and Norris had the patience of a saint to put of with me and me probably with him (just kidding).  Setting all the sarcasm and humor aside I had a wonderful time and will always look back on this day with fond memories and appreciation that he let me tag along.  I loved being on the Fragile Habitat and being with the good company of Norris, Mocha, Latte and Blanca and would do it again gladly!  Norris is quite the character and so adorable and kind hearted.

PS - The dogs did get to go to shore finally and then all hopped back on the boat as Karen and Norris sailed back that night, all the way to Snug Harbor!  That's a heck of a lot of hours sailing!  Hope your feeling better Norris and thanks for a memorable day!    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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