late 18th Saturday

Snap
Fri 18 Dec 2015 18:02
18:00N 30:56W So this time i even went south of 2030 , never done that before. Cog/sog 8 knots west.

I should advise readers of the increasingly late morning blog…. This is due to me sailing west, innit, see? Cos daytime starts later the further west we go. Hence the blog gets later and later. So, don’t worry straight away if the blog is late. And anyway, if I really needed help or something went argh badly wrong, there’s not much point sending me an email, is there? Definitely not one saying “are you alright?” cos I’m not going to send one back saying “urgh….. “as a final dying breath, then hook up the sat phone and send it prior to actually dying, am I?

Much more likely is that I’ve been asleep, or the sat phone gear doesn’t work, or of course now and again (like today) I had to adjust sailing things a bit, and then spend an hour or two fixing the tangled mess that my adjustments caused.

Meanwhile, I have to apologise to Stingo, for assuming all sorts of horrid things, when in fact he signed up for the noteasytoremember domain to sort of bagsy it for me. Aw, how nice! But then dunno, he didn’t know when my birthday was (25th July) and/or I annoyed him yet again but anyways he thought he really ought to use the website, hence his clueless at noteasytoremember dot com. John is anything but clueless, but I think I might be slightly clueless on the domain maintenance and although it’s a lovely thought I am fine without the domain name of noteasytoremember, and it’s fab that it is in such good hands. And I am sorry to make fun at his expense a bit too much, assuming he was being grumpy/unpleasant when in fact he was being the exact opposite. He even sent me some commas to help with the blogging, which is very kind. Reminds me of the time some lunatic rang to say that he had run out of paper, so please could I fax him some?

Martin asks - what about the massive boat and just one person on the thing? Do I sleep in all separate cabins, moving round each day? Or do I have special rooms for dancing, music, yoga and so on? It’s not actually quite THAT big a boat, Martin. The main cabin is forward which is super-quiet regardless of generator /engine being on and it has super-comfy mattress, so i generally sleep there. I could have packed the boat more cleverly and efficiently, so instead of putting things in the bilge compartments I used the side cupboards. And I am keeping the cockpit cushions nice so one of the berths is crammed with those cushions … and I have got two oversized beanbags, which makes the cockpit feel as though it has got a couple of very lardy and useless crew on watch all the time. They never complain, though, or answer back, nor mutter about the rubbish skipper, no backchat whatsoever - even when I sit on them.

So!! I am hoping that with feelings repaired all round and even with the mooring ropes finally put away (only took 9 days ahem…) I am ready to face the hellish 5m sea tomorrow, or even the odd indignant e-mail. We’re into the last 1800 miles now, so not far to go, sort of….