Saturday 1 January 2011

Picton Castle at sea; Saturday 1 January 2011 סב"ד

Woke up at 0630, wrote my logs, breakfast, work. Jobs today included:

- greasing the following: rudder post thrust bearings; lower topsl sheet turning blocks; lift blocks; course yokes; capstan pawls; airport hinges

- daily greasing of the town pump and oiling its parts

- painting the stepladder stone

- penetrolling the stepladder rungs

- painting a coat of buff on both starboard davits

- painting propane tanks E and F tropical blue

- painting first coat of white in the headrig wire seizings

- a coat of stone on the sponge hotel bolts

- painting the folding chairs white

- spot sanding and penetrolling the unpainted jibboom wood

I had been trying to make a sea foam green color for one of the oxyfuel bottle jobs, and for the past few days I was trying to rehabilitate the one can of mistint green that seemed to have potential of the three I found. The cans were obviously quite old and forgotten, and probably had been frozen once because the paint was absolute foam and skin shit in the two cans and the third had actually rusted its bottom off, so that the bottom was just metal fragments bound together in dried paint. Interestingly, the paint never leaked through, so the fragments looked like they were just glued to a dry paint blob. The one can I spent days shaking, leaving upside down, etc etc and tried to use it today when it actually looked like paint. I poured some, and when I mixed it with thinner, I saw that it was still not paint at all. It was like a lava lamp waxy substance. Oh well. Worked until noon, and left only a few things out for the 12-4s to clean after the finished the last fifteen minutes of work. Lunch, then watched the Brothers Bloom and then Run Fatboy Run (the other day Shawn let me access his digital movie collection, something I've not been big on during the voyage since I have so many books to read, but I've been reading a lot anyway, so why not?). Got into a great conversation with Astrid and Odrun about languages, and the New Years ball, and life back ashore. Dinner, then read more World According to Garp for a while. Bracken found me later in the evening and told me I should read the final chapter of the “Handbook of Seaman's Ropework” by Sam Svenson, which is an excellent guide to ship maintenance and the treatment of metal and wood and the paints, oils, and tools, etc, that you should use and mix and which works best and which works worst for different jobs and the like. It is far better material than the paint guides I've been reading so far, which are just really basic product guides from International and talk only of their own products and their uses on high-end yacht-type boats. There are things to learn from them, for sure, but not like real shipwork things. So I read that and took down two full pages of notes. Then continued reading until 2300. Tonight we retard the clocks to ZD-4.

Friday 31 December 2010

Picton Castle at sea; Friday 31 December 2010 בס"ד

Woke up at 0715, breakfast, and work. Jobs today were:

- paint a coat of buff on the primed jibboom parrils

- scuff entire jibboom and paint buff

- primer on starboard forward davit

- scuff, clean, corroseal, and prime starboard aft davit

- scuff the stepladder, penetrol wood, and repaint the stone parts

- assist riggers in rigging up the fish tackle

- primer on propane tank F and tropical blue its bottom

- primer on sponge hotel bolts

- ospho the bulwarks and tgallant rail from for royal backstays to main royal backstays

- scuff and varnish flyrail spindles B and C

- assemble town pump and touch up black paint

Today was another good day, and I cleaned and organized a great deal of the paint locker while the on watch mostly osphoed in the afternoon. Workshop at 1615, where we learned we would not be going to Maputo, Mozambique due to reports of piracy in the north Mozambique channel. We will sail from Reunion directly to Cape Town, RSA. Then we did our practical ratline seizings before dinner. A big wirey New Years ball was made by the engineers. After dinner, hung out on the aloha deck and talked about various history topics with the galley crew once they'd finished. Read some paint literature that I had found inside the paint locker, then watched Taking of Pelham 123 before the New Years festivities. Dressed up in a Tony Montana-like white suit and tropical shirt, and got ready to bust a move. On the hatch after 2300, but the music was delayed for a moment due to a suspect ship nearby, but once it was sorted out, we got on with the party. I was charged with lowering the ball, which was rigged up over the hatch, since I'm the New Yorker, and that's how we do (none of the non-Americans had any idea why we'd have a ball drop for New Years. Guess it's just our thing?) Partied until about 0030, then passed out. Happy 2011 and Shabbat Shalom.

Thursday 30 December 2010

Picton Castle at sea; Thursday 30 December 2010 בס"ד

Woke up at 0615, wrote my log, read and had breakfast. For work, jobs today included:

- paint two coats of black on town pump pieces

- paint two coats of white on bamboo brush holders

- coat of corroseal on a port freeing port (failed due to water washing through)

- putting two coats of primer on the jibboom parrils

- puttting two coats of aluminum primer on galvanized bolts in new sponge hotel (which is in place aft now)

- putting second coat of pink primer on the headrig seizings

- putting primer on corrosealed parts of propane tank E

- wirebrushing and corrosealing propane tank F (the big one)

- second coat of buff on port forward davit

- first coat of buff on port aft davit

- scuff and wirebrush clean starboard forward davit

- scuff and varnish port spindles B and C

- FOR ME: grease the exposed copper of the town pump daily

- FOR ME: organize and remove duplicate paints from the paint locker

- spot paint port bowsprit guy chains

Today was a much better day for work. Had everything cleaned up by 1615 for workshop on ratline seizings. We were still in the same small groups as before, although this was just a demo and tomorrow will be practice. I had been invited to the Captain's and Lorraine's dinner (she's leaving us in Reunion!), so right after workshop I showered, got cleaned up, and wore my nice new shirt the Captain got me. Dinner was a lot of fun, and we talked about a lot of things, from camels' feet to the Antigua Classics, in which we hope to go to in the Caribbean and be in the Concours d'Elegance. Dinner lasted two hours and was a great time. Then I went to the forepeak where the bros were readying a shotski. Shawn and I enjoyed a CBTh, and soon after I went to bed. Happy birthday Magic, you old sailor you.

Wednesday 29 December 2010

Picton Castle at sea; Wednesday 29 December 2010 בס"ד

Woke up tired and stiff at 0715. Breakfast, then work. Jobs today included:

- continuing to scrape the jibbom parrils

- putting pink primer on the head rig seizings

- another coat of black on the oxyfuel tank

- two coats of primer on town pump steel parts

- unlashing townpump, sanding under the lashing, greasing, and relashing

- overhauling the Captain's folding chairs by sanding, corrosealing, and priming the metal

- scuffing and varnishing the flyrail spindles A and B and the charthouse door

- painting the port forward davit buff to the bitt-cleat

- scuffing port aft davit to the bitt-cleat, spot scraping, corroseal, primer

- final coats of tropical blue on propane tanks started

- buff on fore lower topsl sheet cleats

- scrape and corroseal propane tank E

Today was a bit hectic for me. It started with a mistint green fiasco. I went to find mistint greens in the hold so I could make more seafoam green. The first can I opened actually foamed and overflowed like a shaken soda can, and so once I contained the mess I figured out it was 1/8 foam and 7/8 skin goop shit. The second can I brought out was actually rusted through the bottom, with only dried paint holding the broken fragments of can together. By the time I had this sorted out, people were swarming me for jobs, and I didnt' know what the new jobs for today were yet. Also, the carpenters spent the whole day power planing boards of espave wood, and so the paint locker was kept closed for the most part so the piles of wood shavings and sawdust stayed out. The highlight of the workday was when the Captain came by and told me to stop at the office. I thought I was in trouble for being a lousy and stressed out BM, but instead he gave me a book called “The Merchant Sailing Ship” and told me that it would be good for me to read. I saw Pania reading it before, calling it her “homework” from the Captain, and I know that she's trying to advance her maritime career, so I felt pretty good that the Captain loaned me his book. Finished cleaning up at 1614, then a 1615 workshop on seizings part III, where I did my nice round seizing and learned the cross turn seizing, which seizes two things together perpendicularly. Dinner, and then read the Captain's book for a while. Stole photos from Yo and Taia, then went to my bunk and read Garp a bit before bed. NOTE: I heard our ETA to Reunion is Sunday.

Tuesday 28 December 2010

Picton Castle at sea; Tuesday 28 December 2010 בס"ד

An extra hour because of time change to ZD-5. Woke up at 0530 and went to the quarterdeck, where Bracken was discussing Abandon Ship scenarios and protocols. Then laid in with soapy scrub-stoning the maindeck, using BBQ scrub pads, soapy water, and sand to scrub the deck, which was starting to become slick from algae. Wrote my log, now read and finished the Hunt for Red October. Breakfast, then work. Today's jobs included:

- final coat of stone on new sponge hotel

- paint starboard monkeyrail pads gray

- prime fore lower topsl sheet cleats

- two coats primer, oen coat tropical blue on propane tank D

- paint oxyfuel bottles black and seafoam green

- wash, scuff, spot scrape and wirebrush forward port davit from outboard in to the welding line above the bitt-cleat. Corroseal and prime exposed metal

- scrape the jibbbom parrils and the bowsprit to remove scale

- paint lower part of capstan and pawls red

- scuff and varnish flyrail spindles A and B and charthouse door

- sand and clean parts of town pump that wirewheel couldn't get, then corroseal

- sand town pup itself to remove layer of corrosion, then coat with grease

- corroseal steel part of town pump head

Work ended at 1600 for the seizings workshop part II. This time we broke into small groups and got a length of rope and some marline and worked on two types of seizings: the single flat seizings and the raking seizing. Our group also started the doubled round seizing, but we were told to save that for tomorrow and just practice these ones now. Dinner, then began to read The World According to Garp by John Irving and kept going until bed. Happy birthday Joe!