it's just. the weather.

20°34' N
34°49' W
0656 UT
23.2.08
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well. we're in a bit of weather now. not anything too exciting, mind you. weather nonetheless. (when in rome, as they say).

watch ended with a whimper and the moon waning gibbous. though overcast for a great deal of the night, the clouds parted for a nice long look at the moon. wind started to drop and then it was time to make the ship's log entry. midway in there began a tiny rain, which rapidly grew into a squall. marilyn ducked in to grab rain gear and this wind came up from out of nowhere. we were on auto mode and the sails went all wonky and so on. since i was barely off watch, i jumped right in; let the games begin.

switched to manual mode and altered course until we were sailing close to 285°. the sails started behaving, though we were suddenly doing 5 knots better velocity wise. marilyn got back, it mellowed rather quickly and then even stopped raining. course went down 20° and then the wind dropped to nothing. well. 3 knots. and we decided that it was time to rouse cap'n matty, and figure out what to do with the weather's personality disorder. he was certainly manufacturing the Z's. he said he'd been swimming surrounded by beautiful women. ha ha. sorry, bud. we put away the sails and were advised to motor until the weather sorts itself out. matt is back trying to find that tropical island again i think. a more exciting 10 minutes than my entire watch put together. on my watch, i ate a cookie and made soup. oooh.



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afternoon watches seem to be more about getting stuff done than being on watch. when there are 5 people awake and running around, there's really no excuse for sitting around for the whole 3 hours. i still like to play guitar a little after 5 though. tomorrow i think i'll be cleaning engine rooms again,
unless there's random unpredictable stormy action.

funny thing about these trade winds is that they kinda just blow and don't change a whole lot.
there are some changeable times, like when there's a localized storm, around sunrise and around sunset.
when the weather does crazy stuff the job list doesn't get much shorter, but sail changes and that sort of thing is really what this is all about in my head. oh yeah, the sailing part. there is a lot of work surrounding it, but that's what actually floats my boat.