"Ranger" Preview

So, this blog should have been about the fabulous weekend I had for my 44th birthday with a music festival, a phone call from Turkey, and a decadent all-you-can-drink-champagne brunch at Little Palm Island...

             ...But I have breaking news and a video instead!

Jeff is getting a new dog!  Her name is Ranger and she's 4-years old.  She's half Dutch Shepard, which is what Janus was, and half Belgian Malinois.  She only weighs 45 lbs...half of Janus' size so she should be well suited for life on a boat. She's had hundreds of hours of training in handler and home protection and she athletic and agile...as you'll soon see in her video.

We've been assured that she is very social and well adjusted with a great personality...her people at Liberty Dog Camp hate to part with her, but it is what they do for a living!  She'll arrive at the Miami airport on Tuesday, February 5th, and we will be there to pick her up.  Jeff can hardly contain himself and I can't wait either!

Be sure to tune back in for an update of her arrival and lots of pictures!

 [Video courtesy of Liberty Dog Camp. Handler = Colleen Richling]

A Treasure Hunt and Piracy on the High Seas: A Short Lesson in Vocabulary

As we all know, we, here on the S/V Thin Line, live in a desired local which makes us the envy of all our friends and most of our family and makes us pretty content and happy on most days.  But, there is a problem with living in such a tourist destination...the tourists!

Now, I don't mean any of you all.  We love all of our visitors and never tire of showing you all around...you are welcome anytime. [Within reason.]

What irks me during our busier times is the long lines and no parking at the grocery and the additional traffic in this one road town.

More to the point, every now and then you come across that annoyingly rude individual we commonly refer to as a "touron" which is a combination of the words "tourist" and "moron"...the later being the more prevalent quality.

Let me tell you a story to illustrate our new vocabulary word:
Jeff, who we all know is a captain on the Starfish snorkel boat, got a call about a special request for his New Year's Day afternoon run.  A young man wanted to propose to his soon-to-be-intended in an interesting, and memorable way.  He purchased a moderately sized treasure chest and firmly affixed a diamond ring inside with the hopes that a helpful captain would secret the box off to a sandy location at the bottom of the ocean to be found by his unsuspecting, snorkeling girlfriend.  Jeff did so and once back on the boat, kept a vigilant eye on the buried cache.  Our captain was directing the young lovers to the proverbial "X" that marked the treasure spot and everything was going swimmingly...

... until Jeff observed a diver swoop in, open the box, take the ring, and swim away!

[WTH, right?!]

Jeff immediately donned his diving garb and pursued the fleeing thief.  It took a bit of time, but he caught up with the diver before he could make it back to his own chartered dive boat.  After signaling the perpetrator to the surface, Jeff took possession of the misappropriated ring.  The diving touron simply stated that, "people loose stuff around here all the time," and didn't bother to apologize for his horrendous act of piracy.

The ring was then returned to it's rightful owner and the proposal made and excepted.
The young couple didn't let the incident detract from their happiness and with the near-disaster averted, optimistically declared that they now had a story to tell when they arrived home and for years to come about a treasure hunt and piracy on the high seas!

As for our traitorous tourist, there were no reparation or consequences for his act of thoughtless treachery...not even a well-deserved thump on the head - much to Jeff's credit...but I am counting on Karma to catch up with him.

And now, we all understand the meaning of the word "touron."