That Didn't Work

It's Always Something
Originally uploaded by toastfloats.

If Murphy owned a boat, he would have been considerably more pessimistic. Our haul out experience in San Francisco was not particularly successful.

PHASE 1: Select a Yard
Jason: You can haul a catamaran in Napa.
Napa Shipyard: That will be a jillion dollars, please.
Toast: Let’s go somewhere else. Ooo... Bay Marine will do it.
Don Quixote: Okay, whoppeeeee, I’ll take you to Bay Marine.
Bay Marine: What a beautiful boat! Tie up here. We’ll haul you as soon as you get done with our pricey and unhelpful electrician. (In fairness to Bay Marine, they were really helpful... except for their electrician.)
DrC: Where are the parts?
Toast: What parts?
DrC: The parts I ordered which are critical to us hauling out.
Toast: Oh. Those parts.
Seattle Parts Guy: OH! Those parts. You wanted THOSE parts. We back ordered those parts. They’ll be in Emeryville in two weeks. When did you want them?
DrC: I wanted them yesterday in Richmond.
Parts Guy: You can have them Thursday...
DrC: We’ll be gone by Wednesday.
Parts Guy: So sorry.
DrC: *deep sigh* Okay, send them to Sacramento. We’ll have our land contact forward them to a yard.
Bay Marine: Not hauling? Oh. Here’s your bill, what’s your hurry.

PHASE 2: Find a Mechanic
DrC: Let’s fix everything else over here at this yard where all the boats look like they dropped out of Sail magazine.
KKMI: Sure! Come on over! We’ve got your basic economy package. Tie up to this incredibly rickety dock with no water and power and we won’t even charge you! We also have expensive mechanics and electricians. But here’s the deal... ours know what they are talking about!
Don Quixote: Whoopppeee! I’ll move you 20 yards.
Girls: Why? What? Huh? Do we have to do school?
Ron the Electrical Guy: You wired the alternators wrong. See if you’d just followed these cryptic installation instructions you wouldn’t have burned out two alternators and 15 fuses. Yes those instructions -- the ones written by a complete dimwit possessing the IQ of a rock. The one Toast would have fired 15 minutes after delivering the first draft and that’s assuming she hired the illiterate to begin with.
DrC: Toast, I really think you should go into the business of rewriting boat gear manuals and selling them to cruisers on the side.
Toast: I’ll take that under consideration.

PHASE 3: Convince the Experts
DrC: So about this auto pilot... It’s the brain or the panel computer.
Toast: I think it’s a mechanical problem.
Kurt the Hydraulic Guy: It could be the pilot brain. Or an electrical problem.
Toast: No. It’s a mechanical problem.
DrC and Kurt in harmony: If we only had a brain.
Toast: NO. It’s. A. Mechanical. Problem.
Kurt: Hey! Look at this ball joint! It totally can’t move.
DrC: Oooo.....
Kurt: HEY! Look at these brushes in the motor. They are completely gone! The motor can’t operate.
DrC: Ooooo..... Toast, look at Kurt the Hydraulic Guy! He figured out our problem with the autopilot. You’re not going to believe this, but it’s a mechanical problem!

PHASE 4: Wait for the Mechanical Problem Parts
Toast: So how long to fix the brushes and the alternators?

KKMI Guys: Oh we can get you out of here by Thursday, maybe Friday.
Toast: Not Wednesday?
KKMI: Nope. Gotta build these babies from scratch. Love the French.
Toast: So we could have gotten the magic sail drive parts and hauled Thursday if we’d had them sent to Richmond?
DrC: Yep. Looks like it.
Toast: If we only had a brain.

PHASE 5: Find a New Yard
Toast: I’ll call every yard between here and the Mexican Border.
Long Beach: This boat’s too long.
Newport: This boat’s too tall.
Ventura: This boat’s too late.
Santa Barabara: This boat’s too fat.
San Diego: This boat is just right and we’re going to charge you three times more than the boat yard in San Francisco! And you’re just going to take it up the bank account because You Have No Choice! Isn’t that great! Aren’t you happy! We’ll throw in a paint job with really really bad paint for an extra $700 if you’d like. What day will you be here?

* *

The cure for the disease of Boat Envy is to spend a week trying to get one fixed. If you have a friend, relative, or spouse who needs a vaccination, just send them to live with us for awhile. We are highly contagious.