We managed to meet face-to-face with the crew of M/V Bowie over at Waterlogged this past weekend while we were in Canada. Thanks, Tana, Greig, Dosha, & Bui!

And a wonderfully hospitable bunch they are! From the moment we were greeted by Greig wearing nothing but a white towel (we interrupted in the midst of showers ~ my timing is always impeccable) until the moment we said our goodbyes (both Greg and I lingering, fascinated by the projects & our newfound companions), we were regaled with marvelous stories. Evidently, one must drop by in person to get the good boat legends and lore, blogging being constrained by the fact that one’s mother is probably reading it as well! Tana and I have both noted that inescapable fact and tone down the drama of our tales accordingly.

The boats were all fascinating, the Bowie in particular. The original touches are very cool and the engines quite impressive! I even have to admit that I could potentially get disoriented in the myriad spaces on this one (She Who Never Gets Lost admitting that? Truth hurts…)

And of course, one derelict for the road ~

Cute little research boat cruising back and forth across the river. Mapping the bottom? Bored? Lost? Who knows?

Off to Canada for the weekend tomorrow. Photos to follow, of course.

And not only did she receive the “Positive Attitude” award at school, she also has managed to sell 284 boxes of Campfire Candy so far. Her “official” goal was 100 on paper, but she had set a goal of 300 in her mind and will certainly meet it this week. We actually managed to sell 68 boxes last Saturday in front of the local grocery. She’s quite good at it; everyone who says “No thanks” still gets a chirpy “OK. Thank you! Have a good day!” People actually stop and look back because they’re so surprised at her cheerfulness. She’s actually made some sales because people have heard her being so polite ~ they’ve said “I normally don’t buy these, but you have such a good attitude!” That’s my little entrepreneurial genius!

(The shocked look on her face is because she had asked me not to take pictures; I was a Bad Mama and took some anyway. She later forgave me.)

We didn’t make it to the floating portion of the event, as we started too late in the day (they close that part at 5:00pm). We had a great time at the indoor section though.

It was rather fun as we chatted with at least five people who knew Katherine Jane personally. One guy has a friend who also moors at our dock, one was the charter company that had KJ in service up in Anacortes, and one was the group that had installed my occasionally deficient heater. The last was very useful actually, as they had a couple of recommendations for improving the exhaust flow from the unit (90 degree bends are bad for that sort of thing and KJ has three 90s before you even get out of the engine room – apparently the previous owner didn’t always listen to good advice). I’m already dreaming of more BTUs and Greg is dreaming just as blissfully about decreased fuel consumption while still keeping his girls warm enough.

This was probably my favorite ~ very utilitarian and just think what you could do with that overhead lifting capacity!

(Not mine, just gives you an idea of what I got to watch for 1 1/2 hrs)

Also know as a HIDA scan. Just got done with mine this morning to check on that pesky gallbladder, won’t have results back until Monday. But I can say that the injection of CCK during the study did reproduce the pain I was experiencing last week. So we shall see.

I was a pincushion in Nuclear Medicine. It took five pokes with needles before they managed to start an IV line. The last nurse told me that if they didn’t get it on the fifth try, they’d give up for the day and we could try again another time. Evidently, I have veins of steel ~ all of the catheters kept kinking when they tried to thread them into the vein. It took some digging around on the fifth vein, but they finally managed and we were able to proceed with the imaging.

Bleah.