One of those days… 12.15.10

Have you ever had one of those days where nothing, and I mean nothing seems to be going right? That everything you touch breaks? Yep, that was Michael's day today, and if truth be told, yesterday too!

It started last night. He was taking a shower when the sump pump (the pump that pumps the water out of the boat) malfunctioned. It had been sounding ‘a little funny’ lately but, well, we ignored it! That was mistake #1.

Waking this morning we started the generator, which after 20 minutes, died. Oh GREAT! What the hell!!! And before you ask, the answer is yes. Yes, we just got it working, finally, after it being dead all last season. That’s #2

We had noticed a leak in the watermaker so he decided to leave the generator be and take a look at what was going on with the watermaker, which is mounted underneath the settee in the main cabin. He went to grab his big flashlight, which didn’t work. So he went back and grabbed his headlamp which was also dead. (We have been using rechargeable batteries on board for several years and in the past 2 seasons have noticed they do not hold a good charge anymore) So he decided to remove the batteries from both flashlights and put them in the charger, incredibly pissed off. Now Michael has been using his headlamp for about 4 years and just recently a small piece on the battery holder has bent, teetering on the edge of breaking. As you can imagine…it broke at this exact moment.

By now, Michael is pretty close to exploding. He’s frustrated. More than frustrated he’s trying to hold his frustration inside which is not helping anything either!

Since he has a broken headlamp he decides to fix it, it should just take some super glue, no problem. We purchased 4 tubes of super glue before we left Mazatlan. I know what you’re thinking, you think they were all dried up, right?! Wrong. Dead Wrong. He couldn’t find them. Now as a side note I will tell you that we have a ‘junk drawer’. Everyone does, I know it, it’s one of those drawers where you put those things that you need to have at the ready or you just don’t know where else to put them. We have one that has a lighter, scissors, candles, rubber bands, twist ties, etc. That’s logically where I would have put the super glue. But no…..Michael wanted to put them ‘away’ when we got them. So I don’t have one iota of where he has put them.

He begins looking. Inside the crate under the floorboards….nope. Inside many crates underneath the other settee….nope. Inside the tacklebox in the engine room…..nope. The frustration continues to mount. He can’t find those little tubes of super glue ANYWHERE!!! And for some reason I don’t help a bit when I mention if we had just put it in the junk drawer we’d be able to find it! Boy….he sure is sensitive… ;-) I’m only trying to help! Haha… But I think it was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Finally he gives up and jumps into the dinghy to scrub the hull as we have millions of little teeny tiny barnacles clinging to the starboard side of our boat. He takes some of his frustration out on the little barnacles and comes back inside for lunch. He says to me in his most exasperated voice “I can’t believe I can’t find the super glue! I remember putting it in a ziploc baggie and putting it in a logical place!” And he opens up the first place he looked first thing this morning and just like magic, there it is. Inside the little ziploc baggie, inside the first tub. Aauugghhhh!!!!

He glues his little headlamp battery holder and decides he’s done for the day. He figures he might as well quit while he’s ahead and goes up into the cockpit and reads his book. I am working on the computer and ask him if he needs to check his e-mail before I shut it down. Sure, he says. He comes below, touches the computer, and the little 3G dongle we use to connect to the internet bleeps out (which it often does and is not his fault but doesn’t do anything to make him happy about it anyway). What’s that like #5!

We make a journey into town as Joe broke his tooth in while we were anchored in Mantanchen Bay and needs to have it looked at. He has a root canal scheduled at 6pm at the dentist in Bucerias. So Michael, Deb & I go to the restaurant just across from the Dentist’s office and have dinner while Joe’s getting his tooth worked on. After he was finished we wandered the streets of Bucerias looking for the Posada celebration that we had heard about and finally find it, though it was winding down and we decide to get back home.

Now I’ll bet you’re thinking this is the end of this sad tale….I wish it were. We get back to the boat in the dinghy and Michael is getting the dinghy setup on the davit system so we can lift it out of the water, which requires clipping a snap shackle onto a padeye in 3 places on the dinghy. I’m below in the back cabin when Michael yells to me “Rene, please bring me a couple of paper towels as fast as you can”. Uh Oh. I ask what the problem is while I’m getting the towels but he’s unable to answer. The short story is that he got his finger caught in the pinching end of the snap shackle just as the boat lurched as it does in rocky seas. It’s pinched him before, but this time it took a chunk of finger with it. He’s bleeding like a stuffed pig and it hurts like mad. He gets aboard the boat and we lift the dinghy into place and go below to take a look. It’s about a dime sized wound, it hurts a lot, and is still bleeding. We wrap it up and he sits still and patiently waits for it to calm down. Finally we put a bandage on it…..and go to bed. Yep….that would be it for the day and it’s enough for today! With days like these, who needs bad ones!

Please tell me tomorrow will be better… :-)
More to follow…
Rene