No Boat Travel
Clark continued his work on the re-configuring of the alternators to be externally regulated. While he did that, I decided to pull out my sewing machine and work on a project I planned for well before we left New Jersey. While my arm healed, most of my hobbies were beyond me, so I was happy to be able to pull out my sewing machine finally.
Before leaving New Jersey, Clark and I modified our dock box to have a mahogany table top. I decided that I needed a cover for my new boat table and went shopping for material to make something to withstand the elements. The only material I found in the fabric store that might serve my purpose was canvas, but a browse through Marshall's gave me the idea to purchase a waterproof, fabric shower curtain and re-purpose it to meet my needs.
For $8.00 I got enough material to make a table cover as well as cover two seat cushions for our chairs. I am pleased with how they turned out. Now I just have to see how well they hold up and if they truly are waterproof.
Thursday 12/21/2017
No Boat Travel
We had time in the morning before my first physical therapy appointment at 2:00. Clark continued his never-ending alternator work. Having more shower curtain fabric left over from yesterday's work, I decided to cover two small cushions that we use on the upper helm for back support. These two cushion covers, as well as the items I sewed yesterday, are all easily removed and washed. I am quite pleased with my efforts.
Having learned from experience that we need to leave abundant time when using Uber / Lyft for rides in case there are no cars in the vicinity, we set out at 1:00 in search of our ride. Of course, since we allowed plenty of time to arrive, we got there 30 minutes early. I used the time to do some reading using the Kindle app on my cell phone.
I chose this particular doctor office / physical therapy center by using my insurance company's website to find a doctor "in plan". Pinellas Medical has been a wonderful find. Interestingly, all the medical professionals I have worked with here are male including my doctor, Dr. Albert, and his physician's assistant as well as the x-ray and MRI technicians.
As such, I wondered if the physical therapist would be a woman, but lo and behold, a male physical therapist worked with me to show me stretching exercises to perform for my arm muscles to get back a full range of motion. Stuart, my physical therapist, showed me numerous exercises. A couple of those were simply arm movements, but most required the use of either a pulley system or a 4-foot long stick.
Since I am supposed to do the exercises "at home", they sold me a pulley set. They asked me if I could find a stick to exercise with, and I said, "Yes, it's called a boat hook!" The pulley contraption hooks over the back of a door and is used while seated in a chair either facing or with my back to the door. Although serviceable doors and chairs may be plentiful in a house, that is definitely not the case on our boat. One hands-free exercise requires me to do push-ups against the wall. The folks in PT laughed when I said finding a wall to use on the boat may also be an issue.
Besides arm exercises, he gave me neck exercises to help limber up my stiff neck. So, when I left the physical therapy session after about 45 minutes of training, I had a tall stack of papers to take with me outlining the various exercises I am to perform at home to regain movement and strength. At the end of the session Stuart felt that I was doing so well that he told me that he did not see a need for me to come back for more therapy unless I had questions on the "homework" he had given me. I agreed with him.
From the medical center we took Uber to The Home Depot. Clark had a shopping list for his alternator project. I have never seen anyone so happy to visit Home Depot. He acted like a kid in a candy store dropping items in his shopping cart one after the other. When we finally left there, we grabbed another Uber ride to the marina office to pick up our mail and then walked back to the boat for dinner and to hang out for the night.
Friday 12/22/2017
Depart: St. Petersburg, FL 3:20
Arrive: St Petersburg, FL 4:20
Maintenance Run for Boat
Being away from family for Christmas made me quite melancholy yesterday evening. As nice as the weather is here and as much fun as it is living on a boat, nothing compares to family time especially during the holidays. We made a decision when we loaded the boat that we would not bother with bringing decorations as they would take up space needed for essential items. I did not think it would be a big deal, but this lack of everything Christmas including decorations has added to my feeling of loneliness.
As I lay in bed last night thinking about Christmas, I decided that, although I could do nothing about getting together with my family, I could do something about the lack of decorations. With that in mind, when I got up this morning, I pulled out my acrylic painting supplies to paint myself a Christmas tree.
I thought I might get waylaid from my plans when Clark told me he wanted to take the boat out today to test his alternator work, but mother nature had other plans that allowed me to indulge myself with my paints for the morning.
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| Fog so thick that we could not see the other side of the marina. |
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| The fog cleared a bit and then rolled in heavier than before. |
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| Fog finally started to clear in the early afternoon. |
By mid-afternoon, the sun had burned off most of the fog, and we had a beautiful day for a boat ride. Just after 3:00 we disconnected ourselves from the dock and took Sunset Delight out for a much-needed maintenance run. Besides checking out the alternator work, we needed to, as Clark says, "run some water under the bottom" to clean off some of whatever growth decides to attach to the bottom when sitting too long at dock.
I could not believe how calm the waters were in Tampa Bay. Dead calm! When I mentioned this to Clark, he said, "That's typically the case with fog."
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| Tampa Bay! Not a ripple in the water! |
Although some fog still lingered, we had no visibility problems traveling out into Tampa Bay. Given that, I was quite surprised to see St. Petersburg still shrouded in fog when we turned around to return to port.
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| St. Pete in a hazy fog |
I had abandoned my artwork and put away my paint supplies before we took our boat ride. After dinner I pulled them out again to complete my tree. I am moderately happy with the end result. If I did it again, I would make a couple of adjustments, but it will serve its purpose and while doing so will take up very minimal space on board. It certainly brightened my mood to now have a tree to enjoy for the holidays!
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| Acrylic Paint Christmas Tree Now hanging in the salon! Merry Christmas! |
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