10/13/2010 - Happy Birthday U.S. Navy- and random food related comments

First and foremost….Congratulations to the U.S. Navy on it’s 235^th Birthday!  Thanks to all of the Sailors who do what you do to keep our seas and shores safe.  And a special heartfelt thanks to all the families left at home while they do it.  Hoo Yah!

It’s the little things in life that make you happy on a boat.  After stocking up at Costco, Walmart and the local grocery store, I was really struggling to figure out where to put everything.  Especially the fruit and vegetables.  I read all kinds of sailing books that tell you how to best store these things for optimum life time but I can’t for the life of me figure out where they put them all (particularly in the tiny little boats they claim to have).  For example, you have to separate your onions from your potatoes, but don’t put the citrus too close to your vegetables.  Make sure they have plenty of room to breath.  I didn’t have enough room to accommodate all of these rules in my kitchen in my house, much less on a boat.  But today, we made a giant leap forward.  I begged Andy (throwing in that it was a preparatory act for our trip across the Pacific) and he used some left over netting we had to hang me two new, separate hammocks.  Next I’m going to put some netting over the onions on the counter so I don’t have to pick them up off the floor when we hit a big wave.  Prior to this, I just put things in bowls and spread them all over the counter (which is the fridge/freezer so you can imagine what a pain it is to move everything every time you want to get something to drink).  Or worse yet, they went in a bag in the scuba locker and I totally forgot about them until I started to smell something.

So today, I’m happy J

We also went back under the bed (remember me getting that can of mushrooms?) and rearranged things (mainly Andy’s large supply of clothing – seriously) and made room for all the dry good stuff.  We even have room for this…

...Jake’s 5 lb bag of pancake mix.  We thought about putting a pillowcase over it and putting in his bunk, but lucky for him, I found room under our bed.

It’s not like we’re going to be gone for months, but when you have the opportunity to stock up, you do.  So we did.  I’m considering this my first major practice run for longer passages.

Food makes or breaks the moral of the boat so it’s important that everyone feels they have a little something special on board.  For example, tonight we’re all partaking in those delicious bacon wrapped hotdogs I showcased while in Santa Rosalia!  We found the hotdogs already wrapped AND the mouthwatering buns they serve them on in the Soriana’s shopping market today.  We bought more shrimp from our buddy Alejondro in front of the bank.  And we bought a giant bag of cheesy poofs for Jake and Andy when they get the munchies.  No losing weight on this boat!