April 16
We went over to the town yesterday. There is nothing left of
the Straw Market but ashes and chair frames. Even the big shade tree is gone.
It’s so sad because those women worked there every day weaving beautiful
baskets and purses and made amazing jewelry. There have been three fundraising
accounts set up for them now and everyone is pitching in to help. They will at
least have tents for the regatta and Nassau is shipping in some products to
help them out. I get the impression that the straw market is part of an artist
co-operative.
The regatta is HUGE here. It’s a major undertaking: all the
boats are wooden boats made in the islands. They are looking for “volunteers”
from the boaters here to man the boats in a “pre-race” event. Rick is NOT going
to do it. You have to sit on a board that runs across the boat. When the boat
starts to heel you run up to the high side to keep the boat balanced. We are
looking forward to watching it!
So… my computer is toast. The mother board is gone. We can
get the drive out and put it in something else: the piss off is that I wasn’t
smart enough to load everything onto a flash drive! I was too confident that I had finally
mastered Windows 8 and the computer!
We went in town to pick up the computer so we had breakfast at
the Redboone. It’s an outside take-out place that makes a great omelet.
“Shadow” my dancing partner showed up and sat with us for awhile, talking. He
is 26 year old who lives here. He’s from Abacos but he finds it too busy and
likes the slowness of Exumas. [??] It was interesting because he has a very
different view of tourists and what he thinks we are. I need to have another
talk with him about assuming we are all rich!
We went outside the island yesterday after coming back to
the boat. We took the boat out just to run the engine and sail a bit. We have
gotten rid of some stuff off the boat but we still aren’t any faster.
We haven’t quite got the batteries up to peak but we had to
replace the pull start cord on Ross’s generator. What a pain!!! But now we know
how to take apart and put back together a Honda generator! So today is the day
we put on the new solar panels.
We are going to spend today doing little fix jobs that we
have been putting off. It’s a cloudy day and cooler. If we can get enough done maybe
I’ll play volleyball later. It has rained for about 3 minutes several times in
the last few days but never enough to do any good. Too bad it didn’t rain on
the Straw market!
So
if my hot spot is still ok I will post pictures; otherwise I’ll do it when we
go to town and use someone else’s Internet. Have a good day!
April 17
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, NATASHA, [tomorrow]we wish we could be there eating
cake with you! Hope you had a good time at Great Wolf Lodge!
So, SueBate, you
are right! The Universe never puts anything in front of you that you can’t
handle, and it always provides what you need.
Case in point: today we went back to the computer shop to
see if we could get a “backpack” for my hard drive, which Rick rescued from the
laptop, but the original store didn’t have one so he sent us down the street to
another store, which was closed. Not to be deterred, Rick wandered down to the
third PC store (3 – go figure!) who was open, while I went to the Tourist
Bureau to find out the schedule for the boat races tomorrow and next week. I
got back to the PC store in time to tell the clerk which files I wanted and he
was able to lift them off onto a stick. So all my work has been saved and the
only thing I can’t find is my access to the blog! But I’m working on that.
When we asked how much, he said, “Well, I’ll tell you what…
I am trying to start a YMCA here and you’re a writer and…”
So by the time we had finished talking two hours later, the
three of us had laid out practically a 5-year plan, and he wants me to write it
up for him. He will email me all of his notes and I will organize it into a
one-year plan to start with. He wanted it to contain a learn-to-swim program, a
community development program and “something like a boys and girls club”. So I
told him about Navy League and he said that was exactly the type of program he thought would be good for the kids
here. I left my NL files on his computer
so he could look through them and decide if he thought it would work. Before we left the store he said he was glad
my computer died and he would talk to his sister who is an immigration clerk to
see if we can arrange to stay longer than the standard cruising permit! He had
an uncle living in London Ontario and he was up in Toronto for awhile.
So …now I’ve got something else to do to keep my brain
working. Dominoes isn’t enough!
I also met up with m dance partner again, and found out his
name is not “Shadow”; it’s Rashad. And we are going to sit down one day and
he’s going to tell me all about himself. He is part of the Exuma Youth Talent
Expo next Friday so we are going to hear him sing. I’ll tape him and if he’s
good I’ll figure out how to get it on YouTube…Liz?
Today we installed two of the solar panels and we will
finish the installation tomorrow. I also greased all the window and screens
snaps. Not a big job, but it’s done. I also did some bits of laundry and washed
the floors. Not a lot of work but I’m exhausted! Yeah, I know, suck it up! It’s not easy swimming and having fun all day
either, y’know!
So as I was getting supper ready...making salad we got invited out to
dine again on the Lagoon, with the crew. Mahi-Mahi & Blackfin tuna.
I made salad but Ross made caesar dressing for it. Amazing Grace made
rice and veggies. Great food and great company ...again! G'nite
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