Bon Voyage

Carol toasts Seas the Moment on what was likely our last "normal" cruise

On Saturday Morley, Carol and I took Seas the Moment out for a nice little excursion, sort of like expectant parents take their firstborn child to DisneyWorld just before his new baby sister is born and steals the limelight away from the poor unsuspecting kid.

In our case we're expecting a Butt Ugly Boat any day now (although I should point out that we'll go into hard labor after the baby arrives), and the blessed event will happen just as soon the current owner can arrange his flight schedule to get a layover in Atlanta. Once he's in town we'll rush to the hospital, er, lawyer's office to close the deal.

After the new boat is officially ours we'll be all excited and we'll want to spend all our time ooohing and aaahing over it and taking photos of it, and we'll hardly pay any attention to the old boat. We probably won't even throw balls with her anymore or go to any of her Little League games.

(This whole baby-boat thing is getting totally out of hand, isn't it? Okay, I'll stop now.)

Since this weekend was likely to be the last one when Seas the Moment is the star of the show the three of us went up to the lake to take her on a cruise. This is what we saw when we walked down the dock:

In the foreground is Seas the Moment, floating there minding her own business, not realizing there's now a "for sale" sign on her pole. In the background is the new baby--the Butt Ugly Boat which is soon to be rechristened "New Latitudes". I don't think I've mentioned it before but we decided against "Seas the Moment 2". We figured that a new boat, a new life, and new adventures calls for a totally different new name. We're still tossing names about but New Latitudes seems to be leading the pack so far.

The last normal cruise turned out to be quite a bon voyage party. By the time we left the dock there were nine people aboard and once we anchored out two more boats joined up with us. Seas the Moment felt really special and loved all day and she doesn't have a clue that we're about to dump her like yesterday's newspaper. We're not telling her either--it's a well known fact that boats tend to get even by breaking down and requiring expensive repairs at the very moment an interested buyer shows up. We're trying not to tick her off until we find a buyer and the check has cleared the bank.

We ended the day by going to an intimate little soire our marina threw for all 1,500 slipholders, and party animals that we are, we were back at the boat and ready to hit the sack by 9 PM. Here's a shot of Morley and my friend Max posing with the "Fair Tax" bumper sticker I scored at the party:

Unfortunately today (Sunday) all that bon voyaging and loafing about and having fun came to a screeching thud. We came straight home early in the morning so Morley could work in the office all day while Carol and I finished off some wedding stuff.

As of tomorrow we are officially in Serious Crunch Time: just two weeks to go until our mission trip to Nicaragua, then the wedding is only six days after we get home. I have two weeks to have every single detail resolved before we leave, plus be ready for a houseful of company as soon as we get back. And somewhere in all that we're going to have a Butt Ugly Baby. Er, boat. I meant to say Butt Ugly Boat.