Scooting
Panatlantic
Thu 13 Dec 2007 14:43
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Dear All,
I trust you are all well, i am reliably informed
that it is a thursday back in England, so i wish you all a happy thursday! We
don't have days in the Atlantic, and time is now referred to in terms
of 'shifts' rather than 'hours'.
I understand from correspondence with home that we
continue to push through the 'best of the rest' and are slowly making ground on
the 5 lead boats. Which is nice. The fabulous force 2/3 winds we've been having
appear to have eased now and we had an almost perfectly flat sea earlier,
which is something to behold! Conditions such as these suit us over other teams
as we have a Burge. He is the largest male ocean rower this year (2 of the
Atlantic 'Angels' are bigger) and no one can row an ocean row boat harder. Flat
conditions require power whereas big surf calls upon an entirely different set
of skills, which we don't really posess! So, given that we have a power
advantage over the rest of the fleet we should continue to make up ground....
but time will tell, of course.
We've had another good 24 hours at the oars,
motivation is high and we're adapting well to our shifts. Neither of us are
napping much through the day now, and although one is frightfully tired when
woken at 3am to row for 2 hours, that soon passes and we are coping well with
the broken sleep. Both of us have had little senile episodes at night, getting
up inexplicably and coming outside to start our shift no where near when we are
due. The feeling when it is made clear what you have done is somewhere between
relief and confusion, but generally just relief!
i enjoy my 7-9pm shift, and my 3-5am shift, it's
the 11-1 shift that gets me. This morning it took 80 of those minutes for me to
be able to focus and see the compass with any clarity! We had 3 directions of
waves last night too, which made for strange rowing as they were only about 20
degrees apart: one second you'd be flying along on a bearing and the next you'd
have turned 20 degrees, then 40, and now be heading in totally the wrong
direction! During daylight this is manageable as you can see the waves coming
but at night they just hit you and you are, to a certain extent, at their mercy.
It's strange when you first wake up as
the balance centre in your brain is quite obviously thrown into a state of
trauma! Going from a prone (always on your back) position, being tossed around
considerably, to standing - with no fixed objects to set your horizons - in a
matter of 2 seconds throws your brain into panic and it is very easy to lose
balance and fall! Once you're settled in to your rythm things are generally ok
at night, only that as you can't see waves coming you have no way of bracing
yourself and end up wobbling from side-to-side quite frequently, precicely the
motion that tears your poor abused backside to little pieces!
It appears that we are being spoken about in a few
public places in Bristol, wihch is marvellous! Below is an extract sent to me by
an esteemed colleague who was training at a gym in Kingswood last night only to
overhear 2 'kingswood slags' having what must have been a highly intelligent
conversation for them! Enjoy:
"Ere, you remember James Burge don't you. He used to work ere a
few
years ago" "Don't fink so. Where did he work?" "In the gym. Was always training. His old man's always on the rowing machine" "Oh yeah, I fink I remember him. The really fit, tall one?" (sorry Niall, but that is actually what they said) Are they really talking about the same James i know?! "Yeah, that's him. Well fit weren't he?" "Oh yeah innum. He's lush" "Anyway, what about him?" "He's rowing in the atlantic with a mate of his" "Really, how far?" "Think it's somewhere around the Canaries" To which some local chav pipes up "No, they're only f***ing rowing all the way across to the Caribbean?" "F*** me, how long that gonna take em? Must be at least 2 years" the Slag replies. "No, think it's about a month or so" "I assume they've got an engine in the boat, otherwise they'll be knackered" said Slag 2 I didn't quite catch the rest, but I think the chav then informed the local Slags that that was the general challenge and idea of doing it - it was going to be very hard. Then one of the slags said, "Well good luck to em. He was well fit though"!!!! Inspired!
Back to a subject very close to my hart: My bottom.
i have employed 2 new tactics in the fight against chaffing! Tactic number 1 is
the use of E45 cream after shifts. Now i'm not really the type of man who
condones the use of moisturisers, or things like hair gel or soap, they're for
women and meterosexual men as far as i'm concerned, but when needs must! Without
fail after every gym session James and i had this year he would offer me some of
his coco-butter with goat extract to rejuvenate my ageing skin:
"McCann you old Devil, might i tempt you with a
sample of this here fine balm? Go right ahead and embalm yourslef my dear
fellow, it hails from one of the barbarian countries in the far-flung reaches of
the empire."
"Ere Burge, i aint usin' that rubbish, tha's
for gays innit."
Or something like that.
So, i'm using E45 after shifts and still
relying on Vaseline before shifts, though i am losing hope in its healing
properties: "Vaseline, soothes dry skin and lips" - they forget
to mention "but does nothing for your arse".
The other tactic came to me in a moment of genius
from a family friend, who sent me this:
Dogs with anal sac disease often present
with signs of self-trauma or hot spots around their rump or a history of "scooting"(dragging the anus along the ground in a sitting posture).... So, despite the danger of falling overboard from
standing up to move around the boat, James and i will henceforth stop moving
everywhere by 'scooting'.
I changed the trim of the boat yesterday as we were
listing to port, i moved a few bags of mule bars that were donated by some of
the other competitors. I noted, as i examined the packaging, that one of the
flavours was Hunza Nut:
"James, this is interesting, i presume the Hunza
nut is from the Hunza valley in Northern Pakistan?"
"Yeah, that's what i was thinking".
I have today been teaching James about the
evolution of language in Europe and the associated genetic differences seen in
European populations arose, how the model language 'proto-indoeuropean' spread
westwards from the Urals with the onset of agriculture, and how the Basques seem
to have been the one stronghold this language was unable to penetrate, to
which James has been listening fascinatedly.
By way of quick explanation (as i failed to write
anything about the photos i sent, given that i was convinced they wouldn't
send!) the first photo is of my arm on the morning of friday 25th November, a
few hours after the operation. You can see 2 of the drainage holes, the other
one is further up behind my elbow. Exciting hey! The other two are the first of
what will become very many rowing photos, one showing the boat listing fiercely
in high winds and the other showing a wonderful sunset, the like of which we are
treated to every evening.
Right good people, i shall leave you there as i'm
due back on the oars. James will pick up with you tomorrow.
Until Saturday, I wish you all
farewell,
Niall
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