The boat is now at the stage where there are many small details to take care of, and Big Boat Man has many tasks going at once.  Above he has laid out the rudder, the lee boards, mast, boom, hatch and tiller.  Each can only be painted on one side at a time. So, he painted in red lead, waited for them to dry, turned them over,  painted the other side in red lead …… then repeated the entire process through three more coats including the top coats of white. In between the drying periods he did other small tasks like permanently fixing the brass runners and putting the final touches on the inside of the cabin paint.

Just as an aside, we weren’t sure whether it was funny or sad the other day when BBM said he was painting the wings that day.  It appears a wife’s influence extends to the language used around the boat.

As another aside for those who would understand, Brynn has BBM referring to the tiller as the tiller-Johnson.  He can no longer say the word tiller without adding the suffix.

Another task has been liaising with the engineer to have the custom trailer built.  It has confused things a bit to have the flat bottom. In the end, talking and word descriptions were not enough to ensure BBM and the engineer were on the same page.  So BBM has built a fully working model of what he envisions the custom trailer to be.  It took some time involving scaling, graph paper, and sketches, and finding materials such as little wheels and making rollers. The model trailer has clarified things considerably, and hopefully the trailer will be ready shortly – otherwise BBM could be practising throwing his fishing lines to the boat shed floor in the next couple of weeks.

BBM says every time he goes to the boat shed there are more small details he wants to take care of.  I expect that will continue even after the boat in is the water.  An hour yesterday was spent sharpening tools.  There is ‘bogging’ to go into the holes from the screws. It dries and then has to be sanded.  Brackets, and other small fixings are either needed or simply wanted.

One of the finer details I have taken a keen interest in has been the pump(s) for the boat. At the ‘roof shout’ some weeks ago, I overheard someone say something about baling.  So I speak up and say we have a water pump to take care of that.  The response was something along the line of a bucket is ALWAYS faster than any pump.  The whole group laughed.  I take it for gospel, and immediately start mentally planning where we will put buckets around the boat for ease of grabbing when the time comes.  But I was also trying to figure out why baling by hand would be faster – was it the volume, or perhaps the little engine can’t keep up?  I give up trying, and ask ‘Why is baling faster than the water pump?’  Hilarity ensues as the answer is loudly called out across their heads.  ‘Because the pump doesn’t know what will happen if the boat goes down!’

I’m back to planning where the buckets will go.