Mike’s middle-of-the-night battle is not with a cockroach today, it’s with the toilet. I get up to use it and he notices that the cistern didn’t sound like it is going to stop filling up – a stuck ballcock probably. When he tries to turn the water off at the cistern, the valve suddenly sprays water round the whole bathroom, flooding the floor and soaking everything around. Eventually he gets it turned off and we mop everything up with towels. Thank goodness it was clean water! We resort to filling the cistern using the sink tap and a bottle – a long and boring task each time you want to use the loo, which of course, once it is inconvenient to do so, is all you want to do!!
Whilst enjoying our morning cups of tea, Mike is joined at his PC by a local cat. He/she lies there in full enormous glory, mewing at Mike to give it some attention. Why do they always go straight for the cat haters? When eventually it is bored with Mike’s continual utterances of ‘sod off’, it comes into the bedroom to join me. I am allergic to cats and quickly shoo it out.
We report the naughty cistern before getting our morning left to the boatyard. Remember, we had to be early because radio man was arriving. Well of course, he didn’t. Apparently he will be here tomorrow. Where have I heard this before?
The scraping and stripping is still continuing and Mike goes beneath the hulls to join them – he needs to rub down the boom before it is primed. I decide to wash down the underneath of the bimini which has a nice crust of tiny dead flies brought down from more northerly islands. Armed with nothing more that a nice soapy sponge I get to work. Some of the flies just melt into a greyish brown gunk on my sponge; the others drop off. Unfortunately as I am looking up at the bimini to wash it, they drop off on me. Not very pleasant. In fact I think I absorbed more protein through my eyes than I did from the tuna in my lunch today. The ones that didn’t actually hit my eyeballs got stuck to my eyelashes as I have taken to wearing mascara to the boatyard in defiance of the generally slovenly and unkempt look of most of the people wandering around. A girl has to keep up appearances, although today might not have been the day to do it!
Just before lunch, and with all the rubbing down complete, Mike announces that it is time for me to help him with the priming. He takes the roller to do the large areas and I do the fiddly bits.
Photo: Just look at that concentration
At least it’s shady under the hull for me and all the mosquitoes or whatever the little biting things are that hang around under there waiting for unsuspecting bare flesh.
Almost immediately we start painting, the little stripper boys decide to hose down the outside of the hull with water and manage to cover me and my fresh painting. I shriek, they apologise but carry on. Actually one of them does come over to see what damage he has done to my paintwork and dabs at it gently with a dirty rag. Obviously this doesn’t help at all - hopefully the rubbing down between coats will sort it out. I decide to go down to the other end of the boom to carry on and then watch , incredulously, as the hosepipe is dragged down there. I switch ends again and this time stay dry.
Various people arrive during the day with bits of equipment for jobs we are having done, leaving them all in the cockpit which soon begins to look like a chandlers, and better stocked than some we have been in! I feel like I am never going to get this boat tidy again.
I manage to get another coat of primer on the boom – everything dries so quickly – which means that Mike can rub it down in the morning and we can then put the first coat of paint on. Later than we meant to, we call for a lift. I intend taking pictures on the beach but leave it a few minutes too late and the light fades just a bit too much. Pity. The beach has a subtle golden glow which the camera just can’t capture, but I try anyway.
Another early start tomorrow. Apparently the radio man really is coming this time! As I take my makeup off, I try not to think of squashed flies!
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