Off and Running...

Well, finally the merry-go-round has slowed and I was able to get off. Friday, Sept 20, was my last day at Agilent. Of course, the fates couldn't let an occasion like this pass without some mischief. Thursday evening I developed a severe toothache - bad enough that I got up at 1 AM Friday and drove myself to the ER at Kaiser. They gave me some pain killers for the ache, penicillin for the infection, and said to see a dentist ASAP.

I went in to Agilent for my final day after four hours sleep. I was feeling bad enough that my supervisor took one look at me and asked me if I was feeling OK. I wasn’t – but I wouldn’t have missed lunch for anything. I have so much enjoyed working with this group of people that leaving without saying goodbye is unimaginable. This last 18 months has been the best 18 months of my professional career. This is by far the best educated, most articulate, technically competent and just plain interesting group of people I have worked with.

After lunch, I went looking for a dentist. I had been planning to do this next week as part of my comprehensive physical checkup for the trip. Now I was doing it under some pressure. I had a list of approved providers for my dental plan but it still took three tries to find one that was open and able to take patients. They diagnosed an infected lower right wisdom tooth and recommended immediate extraction. Of course, they couldn't do it - that has to be done by an oral surgeon. By now it was 4:30 on Friday and the surgeon they referred me to was closed until Monday at 8 AM. I was pretty miserable. I left a pleading message on their voice mail in the hope that they might check it and have me come in on Saturday. No such luck.

I called Judy and described my problem. She said she would drive down first thing the next day. She arrived Saturday noonish with food and comforting company. We had planned to spend the weekend together in Placerville celebrating the 10 year anniversary of our first meeting as well as my retirement. I'm afraid this wasn't quite the celebration we had planned.

By Sunday, it became obvious that I was allergic to penicillin. I developed a rash over most of my upper torso. I'm glad Judy was there to notice it. I didn't feel any itching. She called it to my attention. I wonder what symptoms I might have noticed first if it weren't for her. That allergy was news to me. But then again, I can't remember taking penicillin since I was quite young. As far as I know, it is the only medication I am allergic to.

To the oral surgeon's credit, I got a call within 10 minutes of their opening time on Monday saying to come in as soon as I could get there. By 10:30, I was back on the boat minus one wisdom tooth. It was done under general anesthesia so I felt no pain. The surgeon was amazed that I still had all my wisdom teeth (at my advanced age) and that the rest of my teeth were so well taken care of. I give credit to my WaterPik and electric toothbrush.

The rest of Monday went by with me sleeping off the general anesthesia and taking pain pills and a different antibiotic. Judy went home Tuesday but I was still not feeling too great so I puttered around the boat pulling out all the pieces of things I have bought to be added to the boat. It was good to get it all laid out and find out that there wasn't quite as much as I thought it might be.

Today (Wednesday) feels like the real first day of being retired and getting to work on the boat. I started in on some small projects = splicing a snap shackle onto the mizzen stays'l halyard, running some lines for a preventer to keep the main from gybing accidentally and some general tidying up of small parts. I have forgotten where I stored a lot of things on the boat so it was a day of discovery!

I took an early afternoon break to watch the final America's Cup race on television in the harbor master's office. It was quite a thrill to see those big boats sailing along on dinky looking little hydrofoils at 40 knots. I had hoped that Team New Zealand would pull off the final win but it didn't happen that way. The US boat is better known as Team Oracle after the company headed by Larry Ellison - one of the richest and most arrogant of the Silicon Valley billionaires. The "US" team had one US citizen on board. The rest were hired from all over the world - primarily England, Australia and New Zealand. I hate to see Larry Ellison have something to crow about by virtue of having tons of money to throw at the problem. To me, he epitomizes all that is wrong with the distribution of wealth and the attitudes of the very rich in our country. (I do get wound up about this from time to time.)

But enough of that...

Before last Friday, it seemed like there would be lots of time from the end of work to the departure date of Dec 15th (weather permitting) but now it seems like there is an awful lot to do in that time. Not only do I have to get the boat ready but I have to have time to get out and sail her - shakedown cruises, equipment tuning and learning how to handle the boat by myself. Of course, now that I have time to spend on the boat, the SF Bay Fall weather is setting in - it gets pretty cool and windy in the afternoons. Yesterday and today the winds have been in excess of 20 knots - enough to rock the boat considerably. It has been cool enough to remind me how much I hate being cold. It makes me all the more eager to get to warmer climates.

Howard raising the main.

I have been able to get out for a couple of short sailing trips with Howard Brunnings (a mere lad of 50something) my crew for the trip to San Diego. To the right, is a picture of Howard helping raise the main while his son, Sam, steers the boat for us.

I still have not been able to get the self-steering to work properly down wind. The last time out (September 14^th) was a very windy day with the usual short, steep waves that we seen in south SF Bay. I got seasick about the time I started working on adjusting the self-steering and I wasn’t able to devote my full attention to the problem. I am not sure if the problem with the self steering is an adjustment problem or if the short, steep waves in that part of the Bay are just too much for any self steering or the boat does not track well down wind or … ??? I used the same self-steering rig on my previous boat and it worked like a charm.

Next time out, I will try the scopolamine patch if it looks at all rough. My first time offshore, I was seasick every day for the first 10 days. After that I had no problems. It would be nice not to have to repeat those 10 miserable days.

Enough for now. I hope to update this more often - several times a week - as the project goes forward.