pulling ropes

this time i had to pull ropes on the boat, and man, did i do a lousy job. the middle of a race is a fun time to learn how to do things, especially with a short-tempered shouty captain like ours. heh.

fortunately, i got some good pointers on how to properly pull the ropes under racing conditions. i tried to stay out of the middle of some arguments about how things should be done, and since i've already tried things one way, i can try them the other way next time and see how it goes.

the race was at south beach, again, and this time we took the boat back to TI before having dinner. as it was, we got back to the marina in time for the captain and i to split a hot dog bun. heh. that is fine, there were plenty of beans to go around.

we didn't place a whole lot better than our first SB beercan, but we also were shorthanded and ran into a lot of wind "holes". at this point, things like place and strategy do not concern me. i try to do the best i can, stay on the boat (wait, the other order, which is why i was so slow dousing the spinnaker) and improve a bit time over time.

15 minutes before heading out to the boat, i noticed that my "boating shoes" were in really bad shape: the rubber soles were about to separate from the shoe. i used to keep a pair of jungle boots in my trunk, which would have neatly saved the day, but for some reason they aren't in there any more. so i arranged to have some duck tape at the boat, and i taped my shoes together. this kept them from flying apart dangerously, but had the unfortunate side effect of making them dangerously slippery. i had some shoe-related slowness, but no shoe-related tragedies. but that's pretty much it for those shoes. i liked them while they were good :(

anyhow, it was fun, as always, and i look forward to going out again, even if it's only going to get harder.