Ever hear the story of the U.S.S. Yorktown back in WWII? During the battle of the Coral Sea the carrier Yorktown was badly damaged – so badly damaged the Japanese scored her as “sunk” and American experts figured she needed at least three months in dry dock in Pearl Harbor before she could even consider being combat ready.
However the work crews in Pearl, under intense pressure from the Navy because of the knowledge of the impending Japanese attack on Midway pulled of a miracle in the yard and turned her out for combat in three days and she made it to Midway in time to play a pivotal role before finally being sunk by multiple hits from bombs and torpedoes.
Slackers.
If they had seen the shape Evenstar was in in when she hit the water last Tuesday they might have been impressed that we managed to whip her into shape in time for a Memorial Day jaunt to Block Island.
OK, maybe I’m exaggerating just a little. But to see the boat on Tuesday morning go in the water with no mast, ceiling panels down, chairs removed from their mountings, doors off their cabinets, holes in the deck, binnacle, and cockpit, wires hanging everywhere, tools, crud, dust, baking soda, wire snippings, wire insulation, boxes and uninstalled electronics on every flat surface – well the transformation to a functional boat with mostly functional systems in time to leave before 0800 on Saturday morning was quite a feat. With thanks to Chris (of “Teak Project from Hell” fame) for his assistance on a couple of long days, and a sterling organizational and cleaning effort by the whole crew Friday night we got it together and had a nice time.
Even if the boat was still too cruddy for company and we left port with an empty booze locker anyway…
