Here are pics of some of the folk who have passed by recently and left comments on this blog.
What a fine looking bunch they are. And what a talented group. One of them has won national sailing titles, one won the trials for the USA sailing team for the Pan-American Paralympic Games, and one sailed to Ireland "and has the chest hair to prove it". A couple of them even make a living at sailing. All of them write blogs too though by no means exclusively about sailing.
Can you imagine them all in the same crew on some yacht? Who would be the skipper? Who would you trust with your life?
The originality and ingenuity of blogging sailors never ceases to amaze me. We have podcasts, video blogs and photo blogs, serious blogs and funny blogs, racing and cruising and voyage blogs. Carol Anne is still publishing her novel about sailing and wizards every Wednesday, and Ant is trying to start a SkypeCast for sailor bloggers.
Then just when I thought I'd seen it all I came across Plutos the Bubblemans' which claims to be a "low down, second hand, third rate, piss poor quality, shoddy shower of shameless sketches."
The author is having "a bit of a yot around the bottom of Greece & around the Islands with some friends" along with1 No. Pencil : HB (used)
1 No. Pen , Bic Medium, Black.
1 No. pad of A4 paper white.
1 No. Brain, Soiled, bitter & broken..
Several of the local Beer Tokens.
and a spare pare of underpants.
He has been sending back sketches of his travels including the following samples.
There are more here and here and here. Always something new.
Continuing the series of posts on how to motivate teenagers to sail. Previous posts in the series touched on how parents need to give their kids some clear air and how the pressures of competition affect kids' enjoyment of the sport.
Last year the yacht club where I was working as head sailing instructor paid a professional videographer to make a video of the junior sailing program. As well as some superb footage of on-the-water action, the DVD includes interviews with all the kids in the program. One of the question the video guy asked every kid was some variation of, "Why did you join this sailing program?"
There were really only two answers that the kids gave. One was basically, "My parents made me!" I guess one day I'll write something about how to handle that whole issue. But many of the kids answered something like,"My friends were in the program last year and they told me how much fun it was and so I asked my Mum and Dad to let me join them this year."
As adults we don't always realize that one of the main reasons that kids enjoy sailing is because they just like hanging out with their friends and doing fun things together. Sometimes the motivation to be with their friends even influenced which sailing class my students signed up for. It certainly affected decisions such as who they wanted to team up with for sailing games or who they wanted to crew for.
On the other hand I have seen kids turned off sailing because their parents tried to get them involved in an adult sailing activity where there was no opportunity to socialize with other kids. The example at the start of my Teenagers post was exactly such a case.
Once again, in the case of my own kids, I think we avoided this mistake more through good fortune than through any special planning on my part. When my sons were old enough to learn to sail we were lucky to be living near Rutland Sailing Club in the U.K. which had an excellent junior sailing program with kids ranging in age from 7 to 15. Then when we moved to the U.S. there was a sailing club on the lake in our town, which though less formal than Rutland's program, had plenty of other kids that my sons could socialize with as well as sail with. I don't think they would have stuck with the sport if their only option was to race with a bunch of grumpy old men like me.
We also lucked out in that we spent a couple of Thanksgiving holidays at the Bitter End Yacht Club in the British Virgin Islands. There were a lot of kids there at the holiday season and the resort laid on special activities for the kids, organized by Sail Caribbean. Once again I'm sure my sons enjoyed it more because they could have fun on and off the water with other kids of their own age.
That club where I worked as an instructor the last few summers ... most kids stop coming to the Optimist classes once they are 13 or 14 and are then expected to crew for adults in the club in the weekend races if they wish to continue sailing. But the club is smart enough to realize that teenagers are looking for an opportunity to socialize with each other so they also run a kind of youth club which meets one evening a week for campouts, sleepovers, movie trips, scavenger hunts and whatever it is that teenagers like to do when they hang out together. (Always with discreet but constant adult supervision, of course). Several times I would arrive for work on a Friday morning to find the floor of the yacht club littered with sleeping bags containing bleary-eyed teenagers -- including my assistant instructor. I'm sure this club provides exactly the kind of socialization that the kids need to keep them involved with the sailing club through those potentially stormy middle teenage years.
In the original comments that triggered this thread about teenagers and sailing, Ward wondered if he needed "the lure of a crew of naked women" to motivate his teenage son to sail and Carol Anne made a passing reference to how a "Dutch track star in a bikini" was somehow part of the solution to keeping her son involved in the sport.
They may be right. The power of attraction of the opposite sex can do wonders. One of my sons met his first date (or at least the first we knew about) through the sailing club. My other son, while working as a sailing instructor at a summer camp, met a young woman with whom he had a relationship for many years. And on those vacations at BEYC my sons became friends with a girl from Illinois and kept up a long-distance friendship with her for several years afterwards with occasional visits to each other's homes.
So if your teenage son is getting disillusioned with sailing and everything else I have suggested has failed, one solution may be to persuade some teenage girls to join your sailing club. Never underestimate the impact of the combination of teenage testosterone and babes in bikinis.
A perfect sunny summer afternoon fading to the soft light of evening with the sun sinking over the lake. Margaritas in the blender. Rack of lamb with portobello mushrooms over hot charcoal on the barbecue. Tillerwoman's homemade tabouleh. Bottle of Merlot. Scents of rosemary and summer flowers wafting on the breeze. Music from that mix I made for our wedding anniversary a few years ago. Grilled bananas with our special rum and butter sauce. Setting sun making shadows on the wall. Life is good.
This weekend is the date of the Summer Sailstice, a festival of sailing that as far as I can see has no point whatsoever other than to encourage people to go sailing on a day when anyone remotely interested in the sport in the northern hemisphere would be sailing anyway. According to their website...
Summer Sailstice is the global holiday celebrating sailing held annually on the summer solstice, the longest sailing day of the year. This international event was founded to connect the global sailing community in a fun, creative, multifaceted, multi-location sailing holiday.
Which of course is total nonsense. If it's a "global holiday" it's not the "longest sailing day of the year" for anyone south of the equator. It's the shortest day of the year for them. The founder, John Arndt, apparently sails on San Francisco Bay so that probably explains everything.
Sunday is also Father's Day which is when we all celebrate having fathers (something quite hard to avoid, though with gay marriage and IVF and all that I guess its possible) or being fathers (which is actually relatively easy to achieve judging by world population trends). Several websites perpetuate the myth that Father's Day was supposedly invented by Sonora Smart of Washington in 1909 while listening to a Mother's Day sermon at her church. Whereas we all know the real truth that it was actually created by the electronics and hand tool industries in order to boost sales of their products.
Tillerman will be celebrating the weekend by driving up to Massachusetts to see cutest granddaughter in the world again, and of course her Mum and Dad, the Laser sailor recently renamed by one of my commenters as the "whippersnapper". We hear that CGITW has recently learned some new tricks including manic hyperkinetic body shaking in an effort to turn over her Exersaucer so we can't wait to see that. And Whippersnapper has been racing at the sailing club at his local lake and humiliating the other Laser sailors there with his awesome racing prowess. So if the weather forecast looks good I will take up my Laser and there will be another Whippersnapper vs Tillerman Laser showdown to celebrate Dadstice Day.
Before he was fired from his job as anchor of CNN's NewsNight, Aaron Brown always ended each broadcast by reading the weather report for the following day from the Chicago Sun-Times. The forecast was always one word, an adjective, that was off-beat and kooky but surprisingly informative, a word such as "peachy or "illuminating". For example, I see that according to the Sun-Times website yesterday's weather in Chicago was "meek" but today it will be "yummy".
Winds have characters like that. Saturday's wind in New Jersey was by no means meek or even yummy. How shall we describe it? Lively? No, way too tame a word. Frisky? No, still not strong enough. There's only one word that will do: vicious.
You see what I mean? A sustained 15 knots with gusts of anything up to 30 knots that would come in from any point of the compass from west to north. Unpredictable. Aggressive. Vicious.
I was originally planning to sail in the Brant Beach regatta at the Jersey shore. But the weather forecast on Friday was calling for 35 knot gusts at the shore on Saturday and I figured there was a chance that the regatta organizers would call it off on the morning of the event. Or, even worse, keep the sailors hanging around for half the day and then call it off. In any case, I was feeling in more of a mood for play than competition on Saturday so instead of spending two hours driving to Brant Beach I took the much shorter drive to our local reservoir.
On the drive I was feeling under the weather. Still a bit ashamed of ducking out on the regatta, of being too lazy to get up at 5:30 in the morning to be able to arrive at the regatta on time. Legs more than a little tired after Friday's 8 mile run that I had started at a faster pace than I could maintain and had run out of steam at the 6-mile mark. Hay fever from grass pollen playing havoc with my sinuses. Not to mention suffering from lack of sleep because of the wind howling in the treetops around our house all night long.
How would Aaron Brown describe my mood? Melancholy? Bummed-out? Murky? I like murky.
When I arrived at the lake the surface of the water was covered in whitecaps and huge gusts were sweeping down the lake. Nobody out sailing except for a couple of windsurfers. I unpacked the Laser and started rigging.
Anyone who has ever rigged a Laser will know that one of the trickiest things to do in a blow is attach the clew of the sail to the outhaul. Basically you have to hold the boom in one hand, grab the clew of the sail which is flapping wildly with your other two hands and then attach the hook or shackle to the clew with your fourth and fifth hands. After struggling for about five minutes with my grossly inadequate allotment of two hands I finally got the damn thing hooked up.
I stepped back to take a breather and then one of those vicious 30 knot gusts came in from the side (I had the boat head to wind of course) and knocked the boat (and the dolly it was tied to) over on to its side on the grass. The sheet was running free, the vang wasn't yet attached, but there was still enough force in the wind to "capsize" the boat on land. Hmmm - that's never happened before - sailing in this wind is going to be interesting.
A windsurfer who was rigging a few yards away came over with a worried look on his face and asked if I needed any help. Oh no, I told him nonchalantly, it's easier to rig it this way. Who was I kidding? Actually, I did discover it is much easier with the boat on its side with the mast horizontal to attach the clew tie-down strap. You can teach an old dog new tricks.
I managed to complete the rigging without further incident and headed out for a sail. At first I found it almost impossible to keep the boat upright and moving in this wind. No sooner had I trimmed the sail properly and balanced the boat than one of those 30 knot gusts would hit me from a random new direction and I would be scrambling to keep the stick thingie pointing at the sky. After 30 minutes or so it started to become a little easier, only a little, and I started sailing with more, a little more, confidence. I consoled myself with the thought that although I may not have been sailing well, at least the experience would serve me well for sailing in slightly less vicious winds.
I practiced a few gybes and tacks but it was the beating that turned out to be the most adventurous endeavor. Once I was hiking hard with toes under the hiking strap there was no defense against a sudden slam-dunk header. The boat heels to windward, my body goes underwater and the soles of my hiking boots are pointing at the sky. I've learned from experience that if I hang like this for a few seconds the boat will right itself and I can start sailing again.
After about 90 minutes of flailing around I went in for a breather and a snack. Some of the windsurfers told me that they were planning to sail around to the next bay in the reservoir so I joined them on the trip. We headed downwind to the entrance to the bay and then beat up through the narrow gap between two headlands. The wind was being channeled through this gap and was even stronger than nearer the launch area.
Man it was hard work beating up into that bay, but worth it. Even stronger winds and bigger waves for wild planing reaches. What a fantastic afternoon. A couple of other sailboats were out now but none of my buddies from the sailing club. It was their loss.
On the drive home I was feeling terrific. A good day on the water will do that for you. Those aches in the legs from a too-hard run had disappeared and been replaced by that satisfying all-over ache that said I had just sailed a Laser all-out for several hours. Hayfever, what hayfever? Sleep deprivation, no way, I was pumped up. Later that evening I saw on a sailing forum that Brant Beach YC did call off the regatta on Saturday because the winds were too high. Yeah. For once I made the right decision.
WWAS -- What would Aaron say? How to describe my mood? Exultant? Ecstatic? Buoyant - yes, there's a good nautical word. Buoyant.
I was shocked to discover today that Jill Murray, the author of Exponential Blogger, apparently thinks that I am a cult -- or perhaps it's you dear readers who are the cult. I think she meant it in a positive way but I'm not sure.
J. Gordon Melton said that his working definition of a cult is a group that you don't like, and according to religious tolerance.org the meaning of the world cult varies from the positive - devotion or homage to a particular person or thing - to the very negative - a small, evil religious group, often with a single charismatic leader, which engages in brainwashing and other mind control techniques, believes that the end of the world is imminent, and collects large amounts of weaponry in preparation for a massive war.
I promise you that I'm not collecting weaponry of any kind (unless you count an unreasonably extensive arsenal of sailing clothing and accessories) and I have most certainly never been described as charismatic, but, just in case, please, please... whatever Tillerman may ask you to do in the coming months, don't drink the Kool-Aid.
I posed some questions in this post about how parents can avoid putting too much pressure on their kids to excel at sailing. And I pondered rhetorically how the kids of champion sailors such as Gary Jobson can cope with sailing in the shadow of the achievements of their parents.
Turns out that Gary Jobson has already addressed this subject in an article titled Encouraging Your Sailor first published in Yachting Magazine. He also touches on a question often posed to sailing instructors and much hashed over in sailing forums, "At what age should my kid learn to sail?" Gary has some excellent advice in the article -- do read the whole thing -- but the tips that I thought were most helpful were ...
- Explain that the difference between winning and losing is not that important.
- Demonstrate that most sailors experience many defeats before achieving success. (Personally I was a great example of this for my kids.)
- Emphasize restraint when winning.
- Don't always race. Kids love games.
Do you ever feel like taking out your aggression on a fellow boater? Here's your chance to indulge that ultimate fantasy in a group where it's OK to sink your mate's boat.
Check out The Australian Battle Group a society of Aussies who "build and sail 1/144 scale Radio-Controlled Model Warships from WWI and WWII which are armed with CO2 powered cannon and armoured in thin balsa. These vessels engage each other in combat on ponds across Australia, endeavoring to punch holes in each others hull with their cannon until one of the vessels sinks or flees. Yes, the cannon really do fire, the vessels really do take damage and sink, and yes, it is legal in all states and territories of Australia without a gun license."
Does that look like fun, or what?
A commenter to one of my posts this week said, "As a non-sailor I really enjoyed this piece, good writing transcends subject matter; don't you think?"
Leave aside your feelings for a moment about the totally undeserved compliment to my writing, choke back your nausea at my self-serving repetition of it, and ponder the following questions ...
Do you think that generally he's correct? More specifically, can a blog about sailing attract an audience of non-sailors? If you were going to write a sailing blog in a way that would be interesting to non-sailors what would you do differently from if you were only writing for fellow sailors? Is it possible to write a blog in a way that it would be of interest both to ardent sailors and to non-sailors? And if it is possible why would you bother to do it? If you are a non-sailor what would attract you to read a sailing blog?
And this one is from the "my wildest dreams" category, could a sailing blog even attract non-sailors to try out the sport?
Comments please.
There are more here and here and here. Always something new.
You see what I mean? A sustained 15 knots with gusts of anything up to 30 knots that would come in from any point of the compass from west to north. Unpredictable. Aggressive. Vicious.
