Just as I suspected, the leftovers of Hurricane Mikey's Hashbrown Casserole-Over and Get Me Some Breakfast, Bitch! were just as good as, if not better than, the first serving. I had some more late last night, and again this morning. Rob even dug in at some point last night and gave it an enthusiastic thumbs up.
Of course, a meal like that is kind of like spaghetti--if I make it, I'm stuck eating it for a couple of days until the leftovers are gone--there's no good way to make a single serving. I can tell you this, though, I'll be making it again, in advance of the Brethren of the Coast Cruise to Catalina next March. Yep, we'll have that for breakfast one morning, instead of hardtack and grog. Actually, I'm pretty sure we'll still have the grog, but the point is that we'll dine much better than our seafaring ancestors did.
Speaking of which, now that the move is behind me and I'm almost caught up on all the pain-in-the-ass expenses I've been faced with this summer, I'm thinking about sailing a lot more. Maybe I just need a vacation, but at least I have something to look forward to. The holidays are going to suck again this year. Unless I take an unpaid leave of absence, I can't have any time off for Thanksgiving or Christmas, so a trip back to Tennessee to see the family is out of the question. That leaves the 'Buffoons at Sea' trip in March.
And since I take my skippering responsibilities seriously, I've been learning all I can about the systems and sailplan on the Jeanneau Sun Fast 35, the boat we're looking at to use on the trip. It's got a lot of room for a 35-footer, and apparently she's pretty fast, too. We'll see how much I like it later this fall--I'm gonna go out to Marina Del Rey and rent one for the day with an instructional skipper for a few hours of hands-on sailing. If it seems too small, we'll have to upgrade to something bigger, like the Hunter 420, which I think I like better and would probably be more suitable for our group. I've spent a few days with just four people on a 36-footer, and it's tough to imagine having seven people in the same space, especially if the weather turns sour and we're all stuck below deck. Seven more feet in length seems to create a whole lot more than seven feet of space.
Actually, the more I think about it, the more Chief Brody's immortal words ring in my mind: We're gonna need a bigger boat.
I'll have to run the numbers to find out just how much it's gonna cost. And I'll definitely have to get some practice on that beast. I've never handled anything bigger than 36 feet on my own. I've spent time at the helm of a 42-footer in the past, and actually spent three days chartering one, but there were more experienced people than me onboard. But 42 feet a big damn boat when you're in the harbor with lots of expensive things to run into. Hell, I helmed a 60-foot gaff-rigged schooner with a long pointy bowsprit all the way from Avalon to Long Beach, but again, there was always somebody around who knew what they were doing.
Not that I don't know what I'm doing, but the fact that I'll be the most experienced person onboard and also responsible for the safety and well-being of the rest of the crew is cause for a little contemplation on my part.
Oh well. I've got months to prepare. And it'll be lots of fun, too. I can't wait.
Mikey
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