Bloggers Block

In March, having some time on my hands, my daughter asked me to help her coach her high school womens lacrosse team. I said yes, having done quite a lot of spectating at womens lacrosse games, but no actual coaching. The season, behind the bench as it were, was a great experience and a lot of fun - the high school athletes at Wheaton HS had a great attitude - win or lose. We weren't that good - every win was a struggle but we got a couple of them which made the season.

What I learned during the lacrosse season is I can't coach and blog - my brain isn't wired to switch from thinking about defensive matchups and offensive techniques to then write a sailing blog. It wasn't happening when I sat down to the computer.

And that's my excuse.

Like daughter, like father.....

Way Back When

In the days before you had motors on sailboats, but still idiots on the helm.....from the Sept 10, 1900 issue of the newspaper, Toronto Daily Mail and Empire;

Sept 9, Rochester NY -

"Shortly after midnight Thursday night the schooner Fleetwing entered the river mouth and headed for the harbour. Something was evidently wrong on board, for before coming to anchor the schooner had created no small amount of damage to the yachts belonging to the Rochester and Royal Canadian Yacht Clubs. The local yacht Cinderella was tied up to the pier near the lighthouse, and although there was apparently no excuse for so doing, the stranger luffed wildly and before the crew of the yacht could protect themselves, the Cinderella's spreader was carried away. Then the schooner made for the steam launch attached to the yacht and punched a hole in her bottom and otherwise damaged the craft. Continuing further up the river the stranger, which by this time had aroused several of the yachtsmen at the clubhouse by the noise she made, swung over  to the other side of the river and her jib boom made connections with the fore topmast of the Canadian yacht Clorita. There was a snap and the topmast went by the board. At last evidently satisfied with the damage done, and after yawning about the river a bit more and narrowly missing several more yachts anchored nearer inshore, she passed the bridge and made for her berth at Charlotte. The Clorita was anchored almost directly opposite the clubhouse and but for her presence some of the smaller craft astern of her might have suffered severely."

As an aside, Tillerman added this comment which got me laughing;

"Clorita has 3 vowels and 4 consonants,"

Curse of the Tillerman and Wrapup of the Wordsmith Boat Name

The Curse: Tillerman mentioned that when he bestows kudos upon another blog, that blog eventually goes silent. I didn't pay it much mind at the time, but doggone it, when March rolled around, just as predicted, Earwigoagin fell silent. I'll detail the reason in a following post but, now for unfinished business; the final tally of the boat naming exercise called forth in the last post before Earwigoagin went on hiatus (I hate to name it a contest because it really wasn't). There was some real humdingers. I liked the weirdness of the Captcha - computer generated - names but, and this is only my personal preference, my two favorites were:

1. Bilious from Tillerman - which sounds sort of nautical (derived from "billowing" as in "billowing" sails) unless you know the definition of bilious.
2. Seaboob from O'Docker - which has the odd characteristic of sounding dumb and naughty and nautical, all at the same time.

Below is the table of all the boat names listed in alphabetical order, followed by their contributor. Tillerman leads the way in entries, as would be expected for, as a shark is drawn to blood, Tillerman pounces on all things related to word play. O'Docker, My2Fish and Baydog end up with about an equal number of multiple boat-names. And to fill it out there is a smattering of individual contributors. Thanks to all the entrants! If anyone out in the digital morass decides to name their boat "Elopygu", please let me know.

.	Aerious	Tillerman
.	Aileron	Tillerman
.	Automat	My2Fish
.	Avocado	My2Fish
.	Bazooka	Tillerman
.	Beastie	O'Docker
.	Beefily	My2Fish
.	Beguine	O'Docker
.	Bilious	Tillerman
.	Boobies	Tillerman
.	Bootees	Tillerman
.	Ciriole	Tillerman
.	Elopygu	O'Docker
.	Emotion	Baydog
.	Fatuous	Tillerman
.	Hideous	Tillerman
.	IBluByU	O'Docker
.	Iceboat	Tillerman
.	Karaoke	O'Docker
.	Leonara	IOWlen
.	Manatee	Tillerman
.	Meatier	Tillerman
.	MyInuit	Baydog
.	Nauseas	Tillerman
.	OBanana	My2Fish
.	Oceanic	Boat Insurance
.	OohLaLa	George A
.	OWoisme	O'Docker
.	QuePasa	O'Docker
.	Ravioli	Baydog
.	Scoobie	IOWlen
.	Seaboob	O'Docker
.	SoNauti	Baydog
.	Sunapee	Tillerman
.	Teatime	Tillerman
.	Ualimes	My2Fish
.	Ukulele	My2Fish
.	Vacuous	O'Docker
.	Wearier	Tillerman
.	Wipeout	Tillerman
.	YokoOno	My2Fish
.	Youtube	Tillerman

Tillerman and O'Docker have reminded me in the comments section that the following words were also submitted; Alabama, Arizona, Arugula, Indiana, and Romaine.

What? A Wordsmith Competition on Earwigoagin!

I'm not a wordsmith sort of guy, never have been (crossword puzzles are not my thing). But I have noticed that wordsmithing attracts lots of attention in the bloggosphere. When blogger 'Sweet Bluesette'; put up a post titled Syzygy (a straight line between two celestial bodies), the excitement among certain bloggers in the discovery of this word was almost palpable; the post garnered 17 comments.

So here is Earwigoagin's wordsmith competition: In conversation with Stuart Walker, he mentioned that, in the early 1950's, International 14 sailors considered the following format as lucky when naming International 14's (he thinks this may originally be a Portuguese tradition):

 Seven Letters with Four Vowels

Here are some of the International 14 boat names from that period (1950's) that follow this convention;

• Joyeuse - Charlamagne's sword
• Bacalao - Codfish
• Rio Nina - (which probably isn't a proper Spanish usage - but who cares)
• Barilea- (I think this may have Scottish origins - not sure)

So have at it, boat names real, or imagined using the format, Seven Letters with Four Vowels. No real prize, just a tip of the hat to the authors wit, wordly knowledge, and intellectual prowess in wordsmithing.

Cowboys and Winter Sailing

Here's one strange sailing video. Two bull riders (boy, that's got to rank as the toughest sport going!) show up at the Baltimore Downtown Sailing Center to do a little winter sailing. And as the cowboys said, good thing they had a Ford F-150 with heated seats because cowboys don't need wetsuits, or drysuits, just a good hat and a trusty tanned leather jacket.

Header Photo: Bermuda Fitted Dinghy

I threw a side view of the Bermuda Fitted Dinghy up as a header photo but it took a while for me to get around to posting about the Bermuda Fitted Dinghy.

Here is a beautiful shot of a Bermuda Fitted Dinghy storming upwind in full glory.

Midwinter Sailing in Florida in the 1930's

I have posted occasional links to some of the British sailing video shorts (under the name British Pathe', can someone elucidate on this unusual name?) put together, most likely as news reels that they would use to lead into the actual main-attraction movie, common practice circa 1930's and 1940's.

Below is a link to a midwinter sailboat race, sailed on Biscayne Bay, Florida in 1933 while those in the northern U.S (and England) froze their butts off. A Classic Moth appears at about the 45 second mark, almost getting T-boned by a larger sloop at the leeward mark.

Midwinter Sailing in Biscayne Bay, 1933

Update: Tillerman, with his first hand knowledge of English history, answers my question about the odd name British Pathe'. I've dragged his following comment over to the main post:

"Charles Pathé was a Frenchman who was one of the pioneers of the motion picture industry. When I was a boy, one of the companies he founded, Pathé News, used to make newsreels, short films covering current news that were shown in British cinemas. As I recall in those days on your trip to the cinema you would see a main feature, a B-movie (usually starring Ronald Reagan) and a Pathé newsreel.

Apparently, at some point more recently, Pathé News changed their name to British Pathé. I gather their main role theses days is in managing the newsreel archives which have been digitized and put online."