The last few days have been trying to brainstorm something different to blog about. After all - you, our readers, often get several different versions of the same story each day. I, of course, read most of the blogs as they pass through my cabin on the way off to the sat phone link up - so I get a sense of the repetition we put you through. So - As I was thinking about it all and contemplating what on earth I could write about that might be somewhat different from our usual fare - I found myself standing out on deck enjoying every minute of the view, the activity on board, the spirit of what we are doing - and trying to figure out something that was worth me diving into the darkness of the cabin below to write about. 

You see - we have this policy that all of the computers are to remain below - out of the spray and salt  - and in safer places than out on deck where a good lurch of the boat could send them flying off cabin tops and through the scuppers into the deep blue sea. That is, of course, only to say that down below when Amistad lurches - the computers have more of a finite space in which to catapult themselves. That said, of course, reading and focusing on things is always a challenge underway - and can be exasperating for those prone to seasickness. Which I would argue is almost anyone given the right conditions... So you see - as we stand there looking thoughtfully off into the horizon - we are composing in a subtle form of self preservation.... "If I have my blog all figured out before I go down below to write it then I might have a chance of not ending up feeling like hell at the end of it." - So it is like - compose, compose, compose.... on deck... until your idea is fully formed... then you dive below and write as fast as you can.....

Which is only to say - SLOWLY..... As I sit here typing away the ship is carrying on doing her gentle, percussive rolling - off to port... then off to starboard.... then oooopps a more extreme roll to port.... and a rebounding roll off to starboard..... over and over again... with a lurch here and there for good measure - as the stool I am sitting on rises up on two legs to one side then stumbles back onto four legs... then my hand slips and hits the wrong key, then the backspace has moved and I have a worddddd===== that is impossoble to decipher and which certainly you would rather not have to dwciphwer as my stools slams me into the bulkhead on my right then bounces me back into the bunk on the left.... and the keys keep right on gooooooooiiiiinnnngggggg....... The there is the question of the mouse - a tailless one (wireless for obvious reasons) but its freedom is also its greatest escape..... When I write, sitting in the captain's cabin - the mouse has my entire bunk, a queen sized mattress with ample pillows and junk thrown around - to go hide in. So as I type and make endless mistakes, as the key board stays put and my stool and I go careening off to starboard
- the mouse flies off the desk and disappears into the ever growing collection of stuff that finds its way off the desk, and the shelves, and the sole... onto my bunk..... Every five or so good lurches, my right hand has a choice: catch the mouse, or stop me from toppling over..... then the left side gets to be subjected to banging into the bulkhead or catching the mouse as it heads scroll bar first inot the bulkhead and repositions my cursor somewhere where I am not intending to write... Then we all crash back to starboard again - wrist first, stool on two legs - mouse on the fly...... bunk! Bulkhead! Bunk! Bulkhead! Mouse! Stool! Keyboard! Bulkhead! Backs[pace.... Bunk! Mouse.....

You get the picture... ouch - that was a good one.... Hannah's watch is flying along.... and so here you have one more blog.... one I hope captures alittle bit of the back story nehind the funny little blogs we send out each day... Bulkhead! Stool on two legs.... Bunk! Mouse..... Eliza


 

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