Recovery (almost) Complete. No Casualties.

It is Monday morning and we're back home and ready to resume normal life. I don't have time for a lengthy update since I have approximately 5,000 emails to work through and a desk overflowing with work that stacked up in the last couple of weeks, but since my last post might imply a homicide was imminent I'll give you a quick status report.

The good news is we managed to survive the past week of post surgical recovery without killing each other. I confess it was touch and go at times, specifically at the times when Morley didn't feel well and nothing--nothing!--I could do or say made him feel better. Once or twice I had dark thoughts involving the boat anchor, 60 feet of water and Morley's neck (I didn't say that out loud, did I? No? Good).

Luckily, Saturday morning he woke up feeling better than he had all week, and even though he didn't have the stamina to last the entire day, it was definitely progress. Then yesterday he woke up feeling like his old self again and this time it did last all day long. And I put away the anchor and stopped thinking about what I'd order for my last meal before they strapped me to the electric chair.

Before we came home yesterday afternoon we wandered around the dock visiting friends and thanking them for feeding us and helping us get through the week, and in general giving them reassurance that it was once again safe for us to be alone and without police protection. And then we took the camera and went snooping around the new (old) butt ugly boat.

We haven't closed the deal yet but it won't be much longer and then the work will begin. The scope of renovation is nearly overwhelming--almost everything needs to be ripped out and/or replaced except the refrigerator and washer/dryer which are both almost brand new (this is very good news because appliances built for boats are generally very expensive). Even though there is a lot to do, the encouraging thing is we're getting such a good deal on the boat that we can indulge ourselves with the renovation and still end up with less invested than the boat is worth.

To give ourselves encouragement while the renovation is underway, we found photos of identical boats that have been updated. We saved them on our computer so any time we feel overwhelmed we'll take a look to remind ourselves of what we'll have when it's over.

Below are a series of photos that shows where we are now with the butt ugly boat (the "before" photos on top) and where we want to end up (the "after" photos below):

The salon:

The master stateroom:

Your room (the guest stateroom).

Don't worry that we'll pressure you to come visit before we achieve the "after". Ain't nobody going to be sleeping on the butt ugly boat in it's current state--there might be cooties. And even if there aren't really cooties, it looks like a cootie-friendly environment and you wouldn't sleep a wink thinking about it.

And now I am off to attack the incredible backlog that's staring at me. More news and pix to follow.