Upgrade Overdue

Cassette tapes anyone?

Almost immediately after we got Eolian, we purchased a small stereo for music aboard.  It was pretty close to state of the art at the time, and included a CD player, AM/FM radio, and a cassette tape deck.

That was nearly 20 years ago.

We don't have any cassette tapes any more, and despite many cleanings, the CD player portion of the stereo was frustratingly skipping.

After 20 years, it was time for an upgrade.

As is usual on a boat, getting something of a size that would fit in the designated compartment was not a sure thing.  And, surprise, surprise...  Most retailers and most packaging do not disclose dimensions.  So we had to buy something that we hoped would fit, based on the size of the packaging and the internal cushioning they always include.  Cutting to the chase:  the new stereo is quite a bit smaller than the old one, because: cassette tapes?  What're those?

Hello bluetooth!

Time and technology march on...  the new stereo dropped the AM radio and the tape deck, but gained bluetooth capability - something I've been wanting for some time.  So now I can play music from my phone, or from my laptop (where most of my music resides) thru the stereo!

Oh, and it doesn't skip either.

Upgrade Overdue

Where does a song come from?

For some people, the muse is like a friendly roommate, someone who is constantly in conversation with them, who knows them, how they think, what motivates them.  We call these people "musicians".

For me, the muse is more like a crazy uncle who blows into town rarely and unpredictably.  And when he does come it is often at an inconvenient moment - he drops his load and then is gone again - for a long time.

Last nite my muse came while I was asleep.  He gave me a vivid dream, so vivid in fact that it awakened me, of a song in D minor.  But this morning all I can remember is the chords and part of the chorus.  I got out my guitar and firmed it up, and then wrote down what I could remember. 

Maybe he'll stop by again tonite.

Where does a song come from?

Baithouse lament

I'm going to do something a little risky here - I'm going to try to recreate in you a feeling we have.

It's a Friday nite.  It is dark.  There is a soft Seattle rain (some might call it drizzle, but that would be inaccurate).  We have walked down to The Baithouse, a tiny little venue right on the Ship Canal, close to the marina.  In fact, it is actually the daylight basement of someone's house, where a two- or three- piece ensemble has been invited, and where you can sip a beer and listen to live music, not necessarily excellently played, but it is live.  And all the while, there is nighttime boat traffic slowly passing by the window and the tiny little deck outside.  And the rain.

It is simple.
It is unorganized.
It is not a show; its more of a jam.
It is intimate.
Its a little bit of human camaraderie, away from the dark for a while.

And after a couple of beers, we walk home, back to the boat.  In the dark.   And the warm rain.

Sadly, its gone now.

Baithouse lament

How I like a song

A little introspection here.  But not entirely off topic because for me, music and sailing are natural partners, intertwined.  It's a little tricky doing this kind of analysis because the observer is the observed, and the analytical instrument is the target of the analysis.  But here goes:

---

It is extremely rare that when I first hear a song from a new-to-me artist (say, for example Gillian Welch, my latest musical acquisition - thanks Kaci!) that I immediately like it.  "Liking" a song, for me, is not an event; it is a process, and it goes something like this:

• First, the song must be interesting.  That is, there must be some aspect of it that snags my attention and holds it.  It could be the lyrics, but if this were the case then it would have to be something repetitive  - like the chorus, or something that strongly resonates for it to make it thru the layer of distractions that is always present in my brain.  More likely it will be something musical (this bypasses my distraction layer) - an unexpected chord or harmony, an unusual beat, something in the artists voice, something.  If on the first hearing of a song by a new-to-me artist I don't find something interesting, that artist gets relegated to the huge pile of singers that I ignore...  and perhaps not surprisingly, a second chance is harder to arrange (but not terribly rare).
• If there is interest, then I will listen to the song again.  The song that is destined to be in my "like" pile will have additional features that reveal themselves after the basic structure of the melody is grasped by my feeble brain.  So I listen to the song again.  Perhaps I now pick up a word that makes a phrase now become clear.  Or an unnoticed harmony - that happens - a lot.  At first listening, a lot of the music slips right by me, while I am working on grasping the broadest cut at the melody and lyrics.  At this stage, after the second or third listening, I'd say that the song has become "intriguing."
• OK, now the song has its hooks in me.  I will listen to it over and over, gaining more and more detail at each replay.  I will now appreciate all the harmonies and lyrics.  I will start to sing along.  I officially "like" this song.
• The terminal stage is "obsession".  In this stage, my left hand starts to form chord shapes, and I am listening to the finest structure in the music.  I am even listening to the non-verbals the artist makes in the course of singing.  And I will now seek anything else I can find by this artist - to contrast and compare with this song.  This is the stage where the other songs in an album round out my appreciation of the artist.

At least for me, that's The Way It Goes.

Did that one hook you?  It did me.

How I like a song

Getting ready, getting hopeful

Over this coming weekend, our plans are to circumnavigate Bainbridge Island, stopping in Eagle Harbor, Poulsbo and Port Madison (or maybe Manzanita).  I know that this is not the wide-ranging island hopping trip that others have planned, but it is our plan.  We may be joined by Kaci and Adam at Eagle Harbor, so we (well, Jane - for she is our quartermaster) are making two provisioning lists: one if yes, and one if no.

And like anyone going out, we are watching the weather.  It looks like the temps will range in the 40's at night and right at 60 for the highs.  Winds look to be out of the South in the benign range - strongest (in tonite's forecast now) to be on Friday.

And there will be rain.

So, after a cozy dinner of chicken soup and a baguette, while Jane makes lists, I am playing along with Mumford & Sons (who I highly recommend) and The Jelly Rollers (who I also recommend) and feeling hopeful that we will have a quiet, restful 4 days away from the dock.

Getting ready, getting hopeful

The ideal boat guitar

Tho guitars are not heavy, they are awkward, and on a boat, it is usually difficult to find a good home for one.

Steve, one of the guys in my guitar class (you knew I've been taking lessons for years, didn't you?) has been showing up at class with the perfect boat guitar - a Voyage-Air folding guitar.

This thing is amazing.  Folded and in its soft case, it occupies about the same space as one of those bags designed to just fit in an airplane overhead compartment - as a matter of fact it will fit in an airplane overhead compartment.  To ready it for play, you just fold the neck back and tighten the thumbscrew.  And amazingly, Steve usually has to do very little tuning - certainly no more than I do when getting ready for class, and the ubiquitous electronic tuner (when, oh when, are they going to become standard built-ins?) makes this a trivial task.

Model VAOM-02,
from their website

And aside from the storage advantage, it has another.  Because of the mechanical aspects of the instrument design, the strings slowly but surely distort the guitar, pulling the neck up, as the wood inevitably yields to the load imposed by the relentless pull of the strings.  But since the Voyage-Air is only under tension when it is actually being played, "neck dive" should be essentially non-existent.


Finally, a rarity in the musical instrument world, the Voyage-Air is not expensive.  And from personal experience I can tell you that it sounds good - certainly better than my old Hohner.

The ideal boat guitar

Music & sailing

*REVISED*

(incorporating the feedback in the comments, as of 10/5/2010)

(We're way over 10 now!  Thanks!)

I was reading a book recently where a thread that ran thru the story was this:  The protagonist had received a gift of 100 downloads from iTunes.  The dilemma then was to pick those 100 songs.   The obvious solution of just buying more tunes was set aside in favor of the larger objective of picking the 100 greatest rock 'n roll songs of all time.  For me, this thread was as entertaining as the primary story.

When I brought this up with Jane, we wondered aloud if we could pick the top 10 popular songs which involved sailing.    (OK, yes, there was wine involved.)

We couldn't originally come up with 10.  But with your help, our list now looks like this:

• Sloop John B - The Beach Boys
• Southern Cross - Crosby, Stills and Nash
• Wooden Ships - Crosby Stills Nash & Young
• Sailing - Christopher Cross
• Come Sail Away - Styx
• Closer to Home - Grand Funk Railroad 
• I am sailing - Rod Stewart 
• Vahevla - Loggins and Messina
• Sail On, Sail On, Sailor - Beachboys 
• Brandy -  Looking Glass

Broadening the criteria to include anything vaguely marine-related (not counting surfing), we  add these:

• Ferry Cross the Mersey - Gerry & The Pacemakers
• Riders on the Storm - The Doors
• Horse With No Name - America
• Yellow Submarine - The Beatles
• Orinoco Flow - Enya
• Edmond Fitzgerald - Gordon Lightfoot
• Banana Boat - Harry Belafonte 
• Boat on the River - Styx

You've been great!  We are now way over 10!  Keep 'em coming!

Music & sailing

Guitars and boats

Guitars and boats go together pretty well, don't they?



Found this on Boat Bits

Guitars and boats

43

It's not a bad number.  In fact, it is Scott's age, now.  From my perspective anyway, he's in his prime.  He is a pilot for Horizon Airlines and a flight instructor besides.  And he is getting good on his guitar!

On Monday, Angela from Ghost invited everybody up and down the dock to come to Scott's birthday celebration, and even the NCAA contributed, providing part of the entertainment (too bad Butler lost).  And Zach and Ellie chimed in, first helping to decorate the cake and then to deliver it to the celebrants.

Boy, Ghost is big inside.  She is the same kind of boat as the one featured in Captain Ron - the movie set made it look like a suburban house inside, but Ghost is not far from that (except, of course, for the stand-up engine room).  I think Jane and I counted at least 15 people in the saloon and seated at the dinette (I think all of these folks were present at the same time):

• Rich & Echo from Veja Du
• Fred from Black Opal
• Brent & Jill from Ambition
• Doug & Ruth from Angelique
• CB & Tawn from Palarran
• KC & Elaine from Hawkwind 
• Scott & Angela from Ghost
• Zach & Ellie from Ghost
• Bob & Jane from Eolian

I was reminded by another blog posting this morning that there is never enough friendship in the world.   Well, this evening went a long way towards addressing that...  it was an evening filled with friendship.  Thanks Angela and Scott for bringing everyone together!

And Happy Birthday Scotty!

43

Choose Two

Last nite, my friend Jim came over for dinner. He brought his guitar and a couple of bottles of wine. Jane took care of everything except the meat.  My responsibility was the meat - only the meat.  So, I put two racks of short ribs on the grill to slow smoke them.

Slow smoking means to cook them at basically the desired end temperature. That is, if you want the pork to be 180° at the end, you cook it at 180°... with lots of smoke, and for a long time. I have been very successful with this technique. Until last nite.

Last nite, there were the additional distractions:

• we got to playing guitars,
• and there was the aforementioned wine.

Let's just say that after 2½ hours, I remembered that I was supposed to be cooking dinner.  The ribs were done.

I mean they were clearly done.  They were black on top (which they should be), but...  they were not glossy black - they were a kind of flat black.  And they were crunchy.  I had trouble sticking in the meat fork to belatedly take them off the grill.

Jim was a gracious guest.  He ate 2 or 3, as did Jane and I (what else were we to do?  There wasn't any other meat...).  They were horrible.  I was terribly embarrassed.  And Jim left early - probably to go eat dinner somewhere - I wouldn't blame him - I would have if I could have.

So:  Two resolutions:

1. Between wine, guitars and cooking, from now on choose two.
2. We got some more ribs.  Tomorrow I will do them up properly, and deliver them to Jim's house.
   

Choose Two

Fall Morning at Anchor

This last weekend we made a quick jaunt over to Port Madison. We drove over using the engine, rather than sailing, since there was no wind. We had a wonderful afternoon at anchor (I worked some more on my Betsy Ross project). My eye was attracted to this dock ramp, which the years have given organic curves.

The evening cooled off rapidly, so we made a roast porkchop dish with cabbage in the oven, and got free cabin heat besides. It all went very well with the wine and guitar later.

When we woke up in the morning, the gift from the oven was still giving. All the moisture from the propane burned in the oven raises the relative humidity inside as well as giving heat. Over night the heat dissipates, but the moisture remains. It was 56 degrees inside, so I fired up the trusty Dickenson diesel heater, and we had it up to 70 in a jiffy. Bonus: the combustion air needs of the Dickenson inhale the moisture and expel it out the stack, so aside from the heating, there is also a net drying due to the air exchange. The windows cleared right up.

Slack water at the marina was to be at 14:15, so we needed to leave at about 12:45 to arrive at the slack (avoiding difficult currents at the dock). However, there was a competing need - the wind was forecast to rise to 20 kt in the afternoon, and we wanted to avoid docking with that much of a headwind if possible. So we decided to leave early, and hoisted anchor at 10:00.

It turned out to be a wonderful sail back across the Sound - we had wind off the beam at 12-18 kt, and Eolian scooted along at 6+ kt under just the yankee. It was great that what could be the last sail of the year was so wonderful (yes, I was feeling maudlin again...)

Due to our excellent speed, we arrived earlier than planned (but had the high wind anyway), and so had to manage the docking maneuver with both a 20 kt headwind and with significant current pushing us off the dock. In some ways it was easier, since I had to use the motor a lot just to counter the push of the North wind, and this meant that I had the use of the directed thrust from the prop and rudder available a lot more than usual. Curtis and Cynthia from Wind Dancer next door caught our lines, which was a big help.

I guess I am ready for the season to be closing, tho we may yet steal a day or two if moderate weather hits on weekends.

I guess I am ready.

I guess.

Fall Morning at Anchor

(The) Last Night

I don't know if our weather here in Seattle has been gaining any national publicity... but it has been delightfully warm. All week, there have been gatherings on the dock every evening, but last night, for me anyway, was the culminating one. Perhaps because, very unusually, there was no wind.

We had Roy from Mabrouka, Fred from Black Opal, Doug and Ruth from Angelique, Curtis from Wind Dancer, Scott, Angela, Zack and Ellie from Ghost and Jane and I (did I leave anyone out?), all sitting in collapsible lawn chairs (de rigure for dock gatherings), talking and drinking wine, etc. Finally I got my guitar out and we passed it around and around. It was still warm when things broke up finally at 10:30.

The weather is now predicted to change, drastically. We are told to expect a "marine push" tomorrow, with temperatures 25- 30 degrees lower.

(The) Last Night