Palmetto State Blogging

Lazy Days In South Carolina...


We hadn't been back across the Smokey Mountains through Ashville to Greenville in about a year until yesterday...that situation being helped by the closure of I-40 at the Tenn/NC line last October by a huge rock slide that took until last weekend to repair.

Fortunately we found both east bound lanes of the interstate open and traffic moving like nothing ever happened mid afternoon, and even though one west bound lane was still closed the traffic seemed to be moving smoothly in the opposite direction also.

The Turbo Pup and I are hanging around with my old college roommate for the day while Pat has meetings with a new health provider client, then hopefully the weather will hold up for a lake trip tomorrow--something I haven't done in a couple of years.

There was a time in my life when I almost lived on the water full time, but the absence of important things like OWNING A BOAT since my 32' Sea Ray was stolen in 2003 down in Florida has limited my ability to burn mass quantities of gasoline while floating around the liquid parts of the Earth's surface.

Of course with Gas running over $3 a gallon in marinas I don't miss filling up a 150 gallon fuel tank. Do the math...$450 for a couple of days worth of fuel is a luxury I haven't been able to afford for quite a while now.

The best way to do boating is to have FRIENDS that own the boats, then you go out and drink a few beers and get sunburned, and at the end of the day you toss them a $20 bill for gas and say "Bye...had a good time..." and drive home as they spend the next two hours cleaning things up and tieing things down.

I, actually, being a professional Pirate/Beach Bum and competent deck hand, generally stay around and help swab the decks and wipe the suntan lotion off the upholstery and fiberglass and so on.

It's actually fun to me to take care of a boat...just writing about it makes me want to go to Boat trader.com and torture myself looking at used boats right now.

Pirate Porn I call it...ohhh Baby...look at the Hull on that one...