Busy days teaching ASA courses with Florida Sailing

The fleet of charter yachts - downtown St Petersburg.

Sailing lessons on Tampa Bay

                                                       
                                                 Student's textbook square/reef knot.

Full and busy week

Cathy's been away since Sunday morning.  That evening in Moblie she began a week that has been busy with a long list of meetings that include state and city officials, businessmen, fishermen, and others who have been deeply affected by the BP oil spill and who are deeply unhappy with BP's response to their needs. 

I think it's shameful that the talking heads of the media are not all over their stories rather than a mosque in New York City.

In Cathy's absence I've been fully occupied with lesson planning for my six days of sailing instruction that begins Saturday.  There's a large volume of material to cover in that time.  I need to be well organised.  These days spent preparing have been vital.  I'm feeling confidence that this will be a success. 

But not over-confidence.  There are a variety of things that can go wrong when sailing with novices.  I must not allow any of them can happen on my watch.   

Celebrity pile-on!

I pass these items along without comment.

Spike Lee Blasts President Obama on Oil Spill Response
http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2010/08/23/spike-lee-blasts-president-obama-oil-spill-response/?test=faces

Brad Pitt to BP Oil Execs: Give 'Em the Death Penalty
http://www.hollyscoop.com/brad-pitt/brad-pitt-to-bp-oil-execs-give-em-the-death-penalty_24870.aspx

Where's Cathy this week?

Alabama.  She's in Mobile with about a dozen other federal officials on an tour of economic issues.  She didn't have much information about what to expect, where they'll go, or who they'll meet.  Of course, I know even less.  What I do know is that she will be there all week. 

As for me

I'm holding down the fort in St Petersburg, two cats for company, lesson planning for the six days of sailing lessons that I'll give beginning on Saturday.

SkipperRoy gets to work even sooner!

I've been offered, and have accepted, a 6 day gig teaching sailing for Florida Sailing.  It will start Saturday the 28th on a Beneteau 323 and run consecutive days through Thursday migrating up through a Catalina 350 to a Hunter 44. 

That's a big chunk of work all of a sudden and a whole lot of messing around in some very nice boats! 

   

SkipperRoy gets to work

I’ve written about my efforts to introduce myself and network in the St Petersburg sailing community with the hope of finding opportunities to pick up freelance gigs. A couple weeks ago I wrote that August was the dead center of slow season for yacht charters and sailing schools, but that I had reason to think I’d start getting some work around the time of the Tampa Boat Show.

Yesterday I got a call from the Director of Development for the Recreational Powerboating Association (RPBA). He’d gotten my name from Dave Amann, proprietor of Florida Sailing, with whom I’d met and talked charter and sailing school business a few weeks ago. The RPBA is inaugurating a new boat show program to introduce the public to boating with opportunities to participate in on-the-water boat handling clinics. This program is the result of a partnership with National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA) and Discover Boating.

The bottom line is, I will spend the three days of the Tampa Boat Show (Sept 10, 11, and 12) conducting mini on-the-water power boat handling clinics.

That should be fun!

SkipperRoy does chick-flick

Since I was out sailing on Tampa Bay with an ASA class the entire weekend before, I wanted to spend this past weekend with Cathy and do things she would enjoy.  That got us to the movies to see "Eat Love, Pray".

It was, as expected, a chick flick, but I was pleased to find that it's not just a check flick.  I enjoyed the travelogue photography of Rome, India, and and Bali.  But, more than that, I was engaged by the story.  The spiritual quest that the movie portrayed.  The universal themes.  The "physics of the quest" as the narrator put it.  Finding mentors along the path.  Acceptance, and forgiveness, and embracing all aspects of life.

After the movie Cathy and I talked about what we thought of it.  Both of us found that it provoked thoughts and comparisons to our own lives.  We're both been on our own spiritual quest, as everyone is - or should be.  And each quest is different.  We don't all need to go to Rome, India and Bali to fulfill our spiritual needs.  Everyone's needs and means are different, hence our paths and destinations are different. Some go to the Caribbean Islands. Some to Lawrence Kansas.  Others go to a trailer park in Mesa Arizona.  The important thing is, when the call for the quest is heard - GO.  I'm sorry to think that so many refuse the quest and stay in their stunted, unexamined existence. 

Now Cathy and I both want to read the book.
 

Florida politics

I thought politicians in Oregon were ethically challenged.  Then we came to Florida and I began to learn about candidates for political offices here.  This place is a Ripley's "Believe It or Not" quagmire of slime and dreck. 

Carl Hiaasen doesn't have to make up sleazy politicians for his novels.  They're found in newspapers here every morning.  The stories of corruption and bizarre behavior make for reading that is every bit as bewildering and entertaining as a Hiaasen novel.

Read this about the front-running Republican gubernatorial candidate. http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/editorials/article1114933.ece

Or this about the front-running Democratic candidate for the Senate.

http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/national/article1114952.ece

And the thing is, the opponents in each of these races is not much better!

Where's Cathy this week?

Louisiana. 
Along with representatives from BP, the Coast Guard and EPA, she's on stage representing NOAA in front of town hall meetings and hearing from fishermen and other victims of the BP catastrophe.

Now that's courage.  I'd rather be on a small boat in a full gale than do what she is doing. 

Newest folk hero - Steven Slater.

When I heard the story of Jet Blue flight attendant Steven Slater's bad day on the job and his dramatic departure, I thought, now this is the nugget for the next Jimmy Buffett ballad. 

It could only have been better if Slater had made his escape on the airport tarmac of St Thomas in the US Virgin Islands.  Buffett's definitely going to pick up on this story. 

But then I learned that Jimmy Fallon beat Buffett to the punchline.  Check out his "Ballad of Steven Slater"
http://www.latenightwithjimmyfallon.com/video/jet-blue-song-the-ballad-of-steven-slater-81010/1243478/

"You got to get two beers and jump!" 

Perfect.

Weekend of sailing on Tampa Bay

I was invited to ride along on a Florida Sailing ASA Coastal Cruising class taught by one of the best ASA instructors I've ever had the pleasure of working with - Dapt Dan.  The teaching platform was a well equipped Beneteau 37 in excellent condition.  The two students, Peter and George, were good crew as well as good students.

Peter (at the helm) and George

Capt Dan caught napping (not really) and Peter.

On our second day of sailing, with the written exam and on the water exercises out of the way, we cruisied across Tampa Bay to Little Harbor Resort.  We didn't have time to stop, nonetheless, it was fun to cruise to a destination and arrive some place I've never been to before.  I think that is what I most enjoy about sailing.  One day soon I'll take Cathy on a day sail back there and stop in for lunch.    

 

Now, wait a minute!

With news all over the media yesterday of a report that most of the oil is gone from the Gulf, I can tell you that a lot of people around here are worried that media and government focus will move on leaving long term impacts unstudied and unremedied.


Read - Effects from gulf oil spill far from over, experts say.
http://www.tampabay.com/news/environment/water/effects-from-gulf-oil-spill-far-from-over-experts-say/1113163

Ray Mabus conducts public hearing in St Petersburg

Tuesday evening Navy Secretary and former Governor of Mississippi Ray Mabus came to St Petersburg for a public meeting about the Gulf oil catastrophe.  President Barack Obama appointed Mabus to head up a commission to write a long-range recovery plan for the gulf, so Mabus has been traveling around the gulf looking for suggestions. 

The meeting was held at a Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Institute auditorium.  I attended the meeting.  There was seating for about 300 people, and the auditorium was filled to capacity.

Read -   Obama's point man on oil spill recovery hears concerns, ideas in St. Pete
http://www.tampabay.com/news/environment/obamas-point-man-on-oil-spill-recovery-hears-concerns-ideas-in-st-pete/1112930

Mabus conducted the meeting himself.  He started by stating his commitment to science based answers founded on testing and good research as well as his commitment to long term recovery.  I was impressed by his patience and understanding for the concerns of the many people who waited in long lines to comment or ask questions.  The meeting ran much longer than scheduled.

Many issues were raised and several were repeated, but one issue that kept coming up was the dispersant BP used with EPA blessing.  What will its long term impact be on the health of the Gulf?  On the food chain and fish stocks?  Will it be safe for children to play in water along the beaches?  I sensed a deep distrust of EPA assurances.  Among the people who raised the issue was a Viet Nam veteran.  He spoke of Agent Orange and the assurances given then of its safety that later were shown to be wrong.

Where's Cathy this week?

Cathy left today for Biloxi where the Gulf of Mexico Alliance will conduct a series of workshops and meeting that will continue until Thursday afternoon.  Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus, former Governor of Mississippi, and the man President Obama's appointed to draw up the federal government's recovery plan for the Gulf, will speak at a plenary session on Wednesday. Cathy flies home (St Petersburg) on Friday.

http://gulfofmexicoalliance.org/welcome.html

As for me.

This is the dead center of slow season for yacht charters and sailing schools.  I don't expect opportunities for freelance work until the Tanpa Boat Show September 10 - 12.  Until then, I've got sailboats to get out on and build local knowledge of the cruising grounds.

   

Navigator

I know we're somewhere on this.

We visit Cathy's alma mater

Last Saturday we drove across Tampa Bay so Cathy could visit her old stomping grounds.

I think many people who visit a place they knew when young are surprised by how much smaller that place is than it was in their memory.  However with this campus, I can't imagine anyone thinking it is small.  It's huge!  

Her dorm room behind the window.

And her classroom buildings.