Archer

2154hrs, drinking Cosmopolitans on a terrace bar and in 24 hours more I'll be somewhere over the Atlantic on the way home.

When I went for my last drink, Archer, the barman, asked what I did for fun. I said walk my dogs, sail and sing. He said sing what, and I said not reggae, but I do know all the words to Redemption Song.

He said, so rap it. I don't rap. But we then sang it together, whilst he shook my drink in it's shaker for precussion. I'm drinking it now, and it is good.

Most of the Americans in the bar ignored us, engrossed in a football game. But an elderly couple at the other end of the bar did give us a round of applause. 

I've grown quite fond of Jamaica. I shall come back one day.

The photo was yesterday's sunset. The only photo I have of today is of Nikki, but she refused to smile as she saw the camera coming. 

She's been smiling pretty much most of the last ten days though. We were thirty years married on 6th Jan, I count myself a lucky man.

Jamaica

So, we've barely seen the sun since we landed and it rained pretty much all day today.

But all is good. Spent yesterday afternoon on the beach in the shade of clouds but warm enough to warrant a frequent swim. 

Now sat on the veranda of the hotel bar in the balmy heat enjoying a dry martini, thinking I might indulge in another in a moment.

Life could be worse.

Clocking out, clocking in

 2025 is dead, long live 2026.

61 gigs made for a busy, occasionally fraught year, but we shared some amazing moments.

Upped the membership of Grandad's Gang by one with the happy arrival of Ben and Hannah's first, Freddie.

We spent 62 hours underway with Petrella over 235 nautical miles, which is to say, not nearly enough. This is high on my list of "must do better" for next year.

With fewer gigs in the diary, and little appetite for booking many more for the year to come, that might actually be achievable.

Ashore, I spent 682 hours in the dojo practicing karate. Ironically, after a bit of a slump in the third quarter of the year due to ill health, I appear to have got back to where I started.

Back on the water, I've spent 688 hours racing the Albacore with Amanda and, as her occasional sub, Alex, during which we've covered 166 nautical miles. The last race was with Alex on Boxing Day, where we took third place. The photo below was taken by William from his Wayfarer, the winning boat, just ahead. Alex and I are on frame-right, being neatly match-raced into the oblivion of third in the closing couple of minutes of the race by Vernon and his Solo, who took a well deserved second.

Sans crew, I spent 407 hours racing the Laser, over 65 nautical miles. So most of my time racing was spent being sociable in the double-hander, but I do love the convenience and freedom of single-handed sailing. Across both boats in total, that was 1095 hours and 231 nautical miles spent racing around the cans on Lake 16 at South Cerney.

I don't track the hours spent walking the dogs, but there have been more than a few statute miles passed underfoot, always in good company, if not always the most pleasant of weather. Both Lottie and Boo have seen in the new year both in good health, and looking forward to many more walks. This is the German Shepherd version of a turtle on a post.

After more than thirty years together (I think it was thirty-five as of November, but don't hold me to that) Nikki and I finally managed a holiday aboard together, with a week in Sharm El Sheik. I think she's gotten a taste for it.

So clocking out the old year, it has had its ups and its downs, but on reflection, mostly ups. It's been busy, perhaps a little too busy, but we've had song and sun and sand and sea and dolphins and dogs and children and grandchildren, and good friends, old and new.

And clocking in the new, in a few days time on the 6th Jan, Nikki and I will see in our thirtieth anniversary. Thirty years ago, pecuniary constraints and family commitments meant that our honeymoon was not really a lavish affair. Family friends gave us a room in their home in Norwich, and we spent a week exploring the town and surrounds. I'll always be grateful, but thought as she's managed to put up with me under contract for thirty years now, it was about time I did something better.

So tomorrow morning we're catching a plane out of Birmingham, to spend ten days in Jamaica.

Happy New Year everybody.

SCSC: end of season

Not all Sundays are created equal. A photo of Amanda and I sailing the Albacore, taken earlier today by William Gardiner. It was the last race of the Club's Sunday Swift Pursuit series. We missed out on taking the trophy by, I would guess, about six seconds. 

I find it hard to mind too much. 15 knots of wind, spiced up with some very lively gusts into the mid twenties, a lovely day's sailing on the lake. We were, in the end, beaten on those six seconds by a gentleman sailing a Flying Fifteen, our friend John, who at a guess, is close to thirty years my senior.

It was a very well deserved win, and we've had great fun over the last six weeks trying to deny it to him.

Just the Boxing Day race left now before the year's end. 

Metrological winter

These days everyone's a photographer.

That's not such a bad thing, in my opinion. I like photos. 

My Pentax DSLR hasn't actually been out of it's bag for about a decade now, I would guess. I loved that camera, but it was rendered (mostly) obsolete by the little cameras we nearly all just carry around in our pockets these days.

A few friends that are die hard photographers and talented with it occasionally demonstrate how much better a picture you can get with a good camera, so the DSLR isn't actually technically obsolete. But I find the best camera is always the one you have in your hand when you need it.

These pictures were taken last Friday night, on a wet and stormy walk with the dogs and friends in the park out the back of my house. Quite remarkable how well the little communications gadget in your pocket deals with an almost near absent of light. It was a black night, at least so far as my own eyes could see.

This morning I was reminded that in two weeks time we have the winter's solstice, after which the days will once again begin to gradually lengthen. This I needed to hear. Whilst metrological winter has hardly started, having arrived 1st December for my daughter's birthday, and, apparently, the astronomical winter doesn't actually start until the 21st of this month, I'm quite done with this whole winter thing.

Of trivial things, apps and a little over-sharing

Bottom line up top: I'm fine, fit and well. But back in the middle of August I awoke to find I'd picked up a UTI. Not a common thing for a fella, but not unheard of. Sometimes it "just happens" said the urologist, some months later.

A course of antibiotics seemed to clear it, but then it hit me again like an express train a week or two later, and because I'd been peeing blood, the GP put me onto an NHS "two week referral" programme to check for cancer. 

There followed a couple more courses of antibiotics, and two weeks after the doc's referral, a CT scan. About a month later that was followed by an appointment with a urologist to discover the results. 

Other than the CT scan picking up a herniated disc in my lower spine that I didn't know about, there was nothing else. I do occasionally suffer with a bad back. Now knowing its cause, rather than simply assuming I've slept awkward and taking a couple of ibuprofen to deal with it, hasn't actually helped. Colour me ungrateful.

However, he also wanted to do something he euphemistically called a "camera test", just to be sure. We can do it now, he said, though you've recently had a UTI so we probably won't see much through the inflammation so I might have to do it again in a few weeks. I asked him to explain exactly what it entailed. Then wished I hadn't, and pointedly remarked that if he was sure he was going to have to do it, I'd much, much rather he only had to do it once.

I never wish to repeat the experience and it still sends me into a cold sweat to recall. But happily, at the beginning of November, said camera confirmed I was clear of cancer, at least so far as my kidneys, bladder and prostrate were concerned.

Some point in the middle of all this, one afternoon in September I found myself limping, and the following morning the heel of my left foot was in such burning pain that I couldn't put any weight on it. I spent most of the rest of the month on crutches, deeply anxious of what impact this, and the impending appointment with the consultant following the CT scan, might have on our planned holiday at the beginning of October.

The foot slowly recovered. The holiday, a much needed, welcome break, came and went without impact from either my mobility or bladder. Although I did take a collapsible walking stick in my hand-luggage, just in case.

The "camera test" out the way and, for the most part, off my mind, the foot flared back up in November and put me on crutches again, but it cleared itself within a couple of weeks this time. Unable to get a "non urgent" appointment with my GP I ended up with a telephone appointment with a doc via the NHS 111 service, which confirmed my own Google diagnosis that the foot was "probably" Achilles tendonitis or plantar fasciitis. Her suggestion was that I could self refer to Gloucester's physio service, and that I could find the website to do this via a Google search. 

I did that, and about a week or two later got a letter back from the hospital inviting me to call to make an appointment. I'd meant to, but as the foot sorted itself out again so quickly, never got around to it.

So, all of this retrospective navel gazing was triggered by my reading an article in the Guardian this morning by Adrian Chiles; https://www.theguardian.com/.../letters-text-messages-passwords-why-cant-nhs-just-give-me-someone-to-talk-to 

I'm fifty-four years of age and fortunate to be active, fit and able and free of the need for any regular medications or otherwise requiring the attentions of our NHS. With the notable exception of the last three months or so, when my bladder and my foot have conspired to have a massive impact on my usual activities. The sailing, the karate, even on occasion, walking the dog all had to be put on hold. The only thing I managed to not let it affect was my day-job through a need to keep paying the bills, and my gigs with the band; after all, the show must go on.

The observations of Mr Chiles in his article seemed to sum up concisely and entirely my own experiences with the NHS, the fears and the frustrations of the last few months, so I thought I'd share the link.

Although on reflection, his piece is as much an expression of frustration at the modern trend of reducing all our interactions to the use of an app on your phone. A frustration that I share, despite my arguable technical literacy. Even when trying to order a McDonalds from the drive-through, these days the first thing they'll ask is "Have you ordered via our app today?" and I have to bite back a sharp retort. It's not like it's the fault of the guy in the McDonalds uniform who's been told to ask the question.

Anyway, these fears and frustrations regarding my health and the NHS are in fact now mute. Last Tuesday evening Sensei asked in passing how the foot was doing, and I couldn't help but smile. It's now fine. 

And, I thought even though I didn't say it as there is such a thing as over-sharing, I can once more pee with confidence and walk without pain. These seem like such trivial things, so easy to take for granted. But they are a gift.

And it's such a gift that we can.

SCSC: Albacore Sunday

photo: mark nailer

Spent a lovely day on the water with Amanda and the Albacore yesterday. Three races, chilly but bright winter sun, and a light south-westerly averaging about 8 knots. More than enough to keep the boats moving and the racing interesting. The usual good turnout for the first couple of handicap races in the morning, then a slightly more relaxed pursuit race in the afternoon.

Not many more races now before the end of the season.

Freefall: a Saturday night Wurzel

Mum used to play guitar. Dad used to sing. For a while when I was a kid, I guess about 7 or 8 years old, whilst we were living in Kuwait they were involved in a local folk club. Scarborough Fair, House of the Rising Sun, Blowing in the Wind, that sort of thing. 

Lots of lyric sheets handwritten out by Mum with the chords noted over the top were left around our house. Pretty straight forward stuff. A few of Dad’s favourite covers were by Adge Cutler and the Wurzels or Fred Wedlock. Sat out in the dust of the Middle East, I guess the West Country accents let him feel closer to home. And besides, the content of the songs was, in the case of the Wurzels frequently, and in the case of Wedlock always, hilarious. 

So, when I set to picking up a guitar myself, I guess a couple of years or so later, I figured if folks were laughing along at the lyrics, they’d overlook the fact that the performer could neither sing nor really play. Amusingly, the double entendre in most of these songs was completely lost on my ten-year-old self. 

It kind of worked; at least I’m still doing it all these years later. 

Dad’s been a regular at almost every gig I’ve played over the last thirty-five years. These days, he’s mostly sat somewhere amongst the crowd with his camera, recording the set so that my brother Jay, our bassist, can pour over the footage in, I'm guessing, a funk of over-analysis and self-criticism into the early hours following the end of each gig. Hey, we all need our ways of bringing ourselves back down after a show, or we’d never sleep.

Last Saturday’s gig at The Railway in Fishponds, Bristol, was brilliant as always. We never take these things for granted, but it’s one of our favourite venues, so you can always be pretty certain it’s going to be a great one. So when Jay messaged me a little earlier in the week and asked if I fancied doing a Wurzels song for a bit of fun, it was pretty hard to resist.

So, ladies and gentlemen, this is my band’s cover of the Wurzel’s Twice Daily, featuring on lead vocals, Dad.

Guy Fawkes re-evaluation

This morning a friend related a conversation from yesterday they'd had with one of their children. I'm sure they wouldn't mind me repeating it here, but I've redacted names and genders for the sake of their anonymity: 

kid: "Are we doing anything for bonfire night?" 

Cue parent concern as we usually avoid doing anything, because the noise and smell are just too much for at least 2 of our kids.

parents: "No, nothing. You don't usually want to do anything."

kid: "Good! I hate bonfire night. I wish Guy Fawkes had been successful in blowing up the houses of parliament. Then we wouldn't have to put up with fireworks and we might not have a rubbish government!" 

Out of the mouth of babes. Although I'm not sure it's ever quite so simple, I'd never actually condone, sanction or encourage political violence in any form, and I'm certain Fawkes and his mob had their own sinister and malign political agenda. 

But still, it made me chuckle.

Which was needed this morning. In other news, I'm back on crutches. Could feel the tenderness growing in my left heel over the course of yesterday. By the time I went to bed the pain had increased to the point that it kept waking me through most of the night. 

This morning I couldn't put any weight on my foot again.

Exceptionally frustrating.

Photo at the top of this post is just an arbitrary snap of Lottie. Though she had that exact same expression on her face this morning when she saw me reach for the crutches again. 

Alpine MusicSafe Pro Earplugs: little disappointments

A few weeks ago, on holiday in Sharm, I learnt to scuba dive. I'd very much like to do it again, although after the first open water dive down to 18m in the Red Sea, we surfaced and climbed back ashore and I realised the instructor's lips were moving but I couldn't hear a thing he was saying. Or anything else, for that matter.

Oddly, my immediate reaction wasn't any real concern, but a profound feeling of peace.

"Swimmers ear" apparently. A build up of wax compressed by water-pressure up against the ear drum and blocking the ear canal. It did clear up, but not a lot, so for some weeks after I had to manage with considerably diminished hearing whilst I loaded my ears up with sterilised olive oil to loosen things and sought an appointment with a man that could fix it.

Which I duly did, and Tony Lawrence of Gloucester Ear Health Clinic made a fantastic, enthusiastic and cheerful job of the somewhat gruesome task of removing the wax from my ears.

I can hear again. Peace may be lost once more, but practicality outweighs the disturbance.

We concluded with a hearing test which, as expected, showed some significant "age related" degradation in my hearing around the higher frequencies. Aggravated, without a doubt, by the environment I work in.

We discussed the possibility of looking into hearing aids, but as those higher frequencies are mostly the register of my wife's voice, I figured we were so far managing to get along just fine as we were. We did agree I should be using ear plugs when performing with the band, however.

I did have some, but lent them to Dad at a gig after he'd forgotten his own, and never got them back.

I did some digging around on Google and concluded the best option was to buy a set of Alpine MusicSafe Pro High Fidelity Music Earplugs. Reasonably priced, recommended by the Internet hive mind, they came with three options of filter, of which the medium "silver" set would likely be the most useful to me as a vocalist and guitarist.

Unfortunately, when the arrived Saturday morning it was apparent that they'd sent me a package with only one of the medium filters, and and extra light filter. I followed the breadcrumb trail through Amazon's customer support, to find myself directed to the manufacturer, so emailed them.

I received a prompt and courteous email in reply essentially saying that as I'd bought through Amazon, I had to go back to them.

This I tried this morning, being the first time since Saturday I've really been back in front of a screen. I spent about an hour being quizzed by AI bots and directed down various rabbit holes, all of which seemed to end with just the option to return the product, which aside from the inconvenience for something that only cost a shade over £20, was probably now inappropriate, as I'd tried using them with the strong filter version on Saturday night.

Which felt a bit like singing under water, so I gave up on them and removed them for the second set.

I guess this is the peril and inconvenience of buys something online. On the other hand, it's terribly convenient to  buy a different set of ear plugs in time for next weekend's gigs. But I feel somewhat disinclined to buy them from Alpine again. 

Although I should say that their own customer service has been nothing but prompt and courteous. 

But that's the trouble, I wanted something more than prompt and courteous. I wanted the problem resolved quickly and with minimal fuss. Just put a missing filter in the post. For the mere cost of a stamp the goodwill generated would have been significant and enduring.

I suppose the moral of the story is don't leave your customer service to a company like Amazon.

The photos are from my holiday in Sharm, most taken by a lovely guy and fellow diver called Mahmoud. There are only so many photos of ear plugs one can put in a post before the subject matter becomes a little tedious.

Petrella: odd jobs season

Gigs Friday and Saturday this last weekend, and a rubbish forecast for Monday meant it wasn't worth skipping work to extend the weekend for sailing. So Dad and I took a daytrip down and back to Plymouth on Sunday just to check on Petrella and catch up on a few jobs. 

I think I'm going to have to regretfully accept that the sailing season is all but done and odd jobs season is now upon us.

After a late night Saturday, crawling out of bed at 0800 Sunday morning to drive down to the boat felt like an unreasonably brutal start to the day, but as we pulled up into the marina carpark and got out the car, I could smell the salt on the autumnal air, and immediately remembered how much I've missed it.

My own jobs didn't extend much further than checking the lines, running the engine up to temperature, exercising the sea cocks and topping up the the diesel and coolant in the Webasto heater in preparation for the coming winter. I also fitted a bracket to the con for a tablet.

It's just a refurbished 10" Samsung tablet on a mount, running the Marine Navigator app with the raster charts from visitmyharbour.co.uk

It's a waterproof tablet (only IP68 - so I won't take it swimming!) in a waterproof case, should run all day off a battery pack in the cup holder beneath, and is independent of the boat's electrics and GPS so gives a nice bit of redundancy if anything goes wrong with the latter.

It's not as clever as the boat's Raymarine, but I like the familiarity, ease and simplicity of the route planning and tracking with the Android app, and the screen (and corresponding projected course over ground that tells me what we're going to hit within the next 10 minutes) is a bit bigger and clearer for my aging eyes 🤓

Only downside is the touchscreen probably won't enjoy having rain on it. But then, neither do I.

Dad spent the afternoon replacing a catch on the cupboard door underneath the galley sink. It's long been faulty, so the door has been prone to swinging open whilst we're underway. The static / receiving half of the catch was broken, possibly as a consequence of having been previously forced, so needed replacing. Unfortunately, finding replacement parts for the furnishings of a 36 year old boat isn't as straight forward as one might hope.

Happily, Dad's got a workshop, so he made a pattern from the catch on one of the other doors, and 

machined up a new one. After the requisite bit of fiddling and cursing to fit it, it works a treat.

The clocks having gone back, the sun was setting by the time we closed the boat back up and headed home, but it was a pretty sunset over the Barbican. The drive home was complicated by an accident just ahead of us on the motorway which added a delay of an hour or so but we got home safe in the end. 

The band is really busy between now and New Year, so unless I take a sneaky Monday off work, any more trips down to the boat will likely be another Sunday down and back, squeezed in between racing the dinghies on the lake. I really feel like we haven't used Petrella enough this last year, or the year previous. This year's diary has the band playing 62 gigs, which would go a long way to explaining why it feels like that.

I love playing with the band, but there have been other "internal" stresses with many of the gigs this year, nothing to do with the music or performance, that have made things much less than pleasant, and often made me (and at least one other member) question why we put up with it. 

But it's a very hard thing to walk away from, even when you know it's making you unhappy.

We have 33 bookings in the diary for next year, ending with NYE 2026/27 at The Railway Tavern in Bristol. The band's diary for 2026 is now essentially closed, and we'll see how we still feel towards the end of next year.

Perhaps having half the workload will remove or reduce some of the stresses that have been causing the friction. At the very least, it should give me a lot more time to go sailing.

As I write this, I can see a button to screen-right that offers to "Automatically insert Google Search links" for me. I've clicked it just out of curiosity, and deleted some of the more random or unnecessary hyperlinks Google has then obligingly made for me. I've left some of the others in place though; in case you were wondering why, so am I.

when Nikki met Freddie

Freddie and family came home last night. His mum and dad had obviously been quite distracted over the last few days and hadn't thought of feeding themselves or had a chance to get any food into the house so Nikki made a lasagne and we took a rescue trip down to Bristol to deliver them some food.

Of course, that also meant that Nanny Nikki got to finally meet her newest grandson. Granddad (oddly enough, that seems to be me?) had already taken a trip down to Southmead Hospital's maternity ward to meet him the evening before, but Nik had been stuck at work so missed visiting hours.