SUDDENLY IT's YACHT RACING SEASON AGAIN FOR EYC RACE COMMITTEE

Howdy from Bob Duff,

I am back here again for this 2010 sailing season! The focus will be THE PEOPLE WHO SERVE ON THE WATER FOR THE EASTERN YACHT CLUB RACE COMMITTEE. We invite you to come out with us. How to proceed to that end/beginning is described herein. You can always call me, Bob Duff at 1.781.631.0033 for questions/hints.

Each race day needs 10 or more race crew people with a variety of skills out on the water. BEGINNERS ARE WELCOME TO VOLUNTEER. We have fun, but recruiting people to sign-up for race jobs seems a major challenge.

Some new things are in place to, hopefully, improve on past procedures and spread recruiting tasks to people other than the Chairman of the Race Committee. I will describe some of these below.

We did several race days earlier with the following race days to do this 2010 season:

06/19-Sat-MRA#1 Day 3of4 @ TINKERS-Jack Cochrane as PRO

06/26-Sat-MRA#1 Day 40f4 @ BRIMBLES-Jim McCully as PRO

07/03-Sat-MRA#2 Day 1of4 @ MIDDLE-Jack Cochrane as PRO

07/04-Sun-EYC ANNUAL REGATTA-John Koopman as PRO

07/10-Sat-MRA#2 Day 2of4 @ TINKERS-Jim McCully as PRO

07/17-Sat-MRA#2 Day 3of4 @ TINKERS

07/19-Mon-JUNIOR RACE WEEK 1of3-Toby Reiley as PRO

07/20-Tue-JUNIOR RACE WEEK 2of3-Toby Reiley as PRO

07/21-Wed-JUNIOR RACE WEEK 3of3-Toby Reiley as PRO

07/22-Thu-NOOD Race Week 1of4 @ TINKERS (no BYC)

07/23-Fri-NOOD Race Week 2of4 @ TINKERS

07/24-Sat-NOOD Race Week 3of4 @ TINKERS

07/25-Sun-NOOD Race Week 4of4 @ TINKERS

07/31-Sat-MRA#2 Day 4of4 @MIDWAY

08/07-Sat-MRA#3 DAY 1of3 ONLY EYC

08/09-Mon-PYC Junior Olympics Day 1of2

08/10-Tue-PYC Junior Olympics Day 2of2

08/14-Sat-MRA#3 Day 2of3 @BRIMBLES

08/15-Sun-EYC CHANDLER HOVEY RACES-John Koopman as PRO

08/21-Sat-MRA#3 Day 3of3 -NO EYC shown at MIDWAY?

08/27-Fri-PHRF New England Championship Day 1of3-NO EYC

08/28-Sat-PHRF New England Championship Day 2of3

08/29-Sun-PHRF New England Championship Day 3of3

09/04-Sat-MRA#4 Labor Day Regatta Day 1of2 at Line 3

09/05-Sun-MRA#4 Labor Day Regatta Day 2of2 at Line 3

09/11-Sat-No EYC-MRA Fall One Design Day 1of 3 CYC No EYC

09/12-Sun-EYC-IODs-David J. Smith Trophy

09/18-Sat-MRA Fall One Design Day 2of3 ONLY EYC

09/24-Fri-EYC Sonar N.A. Championship Day 1of3

09/25-Sat-No EYC-MRA Fall One Design Day 2of3 CYC No EYC

09/25-Sat-EYC Sonar N.A. Championship Day 2of3

09/26-Sun-EYC Sonar N.A. Championship Day 3of3

Just for the record, we use three lines/areas for MRA: MIDDLE Line, TINKERS Line and BRIMBLES Line which are designated areas mostly out to sea. For NOOD Race Week the areas are called Outside, Halfway Rock and Tinkers. This year EYC will be at TINKERS for NOOD. For other events, we usually find an area out beyond the neck where we do not interfere with other club regattas.

MRA is the Marblehead Racing Association, a collaborative approach to keeping order. We do these many yacht races coordinated by MRA using committees and equipment from EASTERN, BOSTON and CORINTHIAN YACHT CLUBS. Pleon (PYC), Jubilee (JYC), Manchester (MYC) and Palmer's Cove (PCYC) participate in many events.

Further, PRO stands for Principal Race Officer: the person in charge who makes major decisions on the water to provide the best possible races for all the boats/people participating. A very good explanation of what PROs and committee members do is available on the EYC web WITHOUT PASSWORDS. This is buried along with a FORM for signing-up to experience a most interesting day on the water as follows:

1. sign on to easternyc.org HOME page
2. move cursor to touch “SAILING”
3. click “RACING” in the pop-down
4. click “Race Committee” buried with other things in the blue column on the left
5. select “Race Committee” pop-down to see options then:
6. click “Volunteer Schedule” (this is the FORM for sign-up)
7. then click “here” to really get to the FORM
8. or click “Join the Race Committee Team” ( the name of these two options is confusing)

Please take a look at #8 which is a good promotional piece. I feel that it should be available closer to readers rather than buried way down there on the web. The chance is small that an uninformed reader will find it buried down so low.

While there you might want to put "Join the Race Committee Team" into your "FAVORITES"

or "BOOKMARKS".

Then consider putting either/both of the following things there also.

For a look at how the EYC Sign-Up System works, click this YouTube presentation I modified for just this purpose. Click:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUiLbbjw1zM

Then if you are inspired to register for time with us on the water, fill out the FORM seen on YouTube (#6 above) by clicking:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?hl=en&formkey=dGRvOEViMWpOY0N4dTk0ZFBqNEFCWlE6MA

Soon after sign-up you will hear from us showing who plans to be there on the water with you

The schedule for this Saturday shows (as of Thursday pm) the need for two more crew but we could use four. Jack Cochrane is making phone calls as I write this! NOTE-DOUBLE CLICK TO THE RIGHT OF THIS LITTLE SPREADSHEET IF WRITING IS WHITE--A SOFTWARE BUG!

06/19-Sat-MRA#1 Day 3of4 ```````````` C*/E/BYC 1000hrs
Race	Person	Position
	Byrne, Cheryl	Any Job
	Smith, Liz Blodgett	Any Job
	Soule, David	MARK Boat
	~	need mark2?
	~	need pin1?
	~	need pin2?
	~	need recorder?
	Cochrane, Jack	PRO
	Duff, Bob	Signaler
06/19-Sat-MRA#1 Day 3of4 ```````````` C*/E/BYC 1000hr	Marvin, Bradford	Timer

Though not listed, Faxon Michaud is the EYC club employee who drives the ETO signal boat, sets/pulls anchors and fires cannon on direction of the PRO and Timer. Last year he was listed along with Rebecca Bennett for this very important job. The Chairman of our committee objected; so I removed them from the system. Our Dock Master Michael Smith schedules these people from the Doc Staff. Rebecca did the first several race daysthis spring and has moved on to other summer work. A new person will be joining us soon to rotate with Fax.

Last Sunday we ran a special Spring Regatta for high performance 505 racing machines. The scheduled Saturday racing did not happen due to the absence of wind. You can read a nice review of the ten boat series/four races on Sunday written by Greg Wilkinson in the regular Monday EYC Sailing News. I do not know its distribution. I tried copying and pasting Greg's report, but this Google blogger software goes crazy with the full page size. There may be a "trick", but I do not have it tonight.

Race committee was NOT OVERSTAFFED Sunday. We did okay using the automated horn for 3 minute dinghy starts. The wind was so light that we used a regular LINE START rather than the traditional 505 RABBIT START. Ask me about RABBITS if you are interested. I did my first series of RABBITS for the 505 North American Championship in 1985 where I drove the ''chase boat" which was quite enjoyable. That was on a big fresh water lake near Ogallala, Nebraska. I have helped with many others since then. Anyway, here was the very short handed crew for 505s on Sunday: NOTE-DOUBLE CLICK TO THE RIGHT OF THESE LITTLE SPREADSHEET IF WRITING IS WHITE--A SOFTWARE BUG!

06/13-Sun-EYC-505 SPRING `````` REGATTA 2of2 1000hrs
Race	Person	Position
	Sides, Richard	ETO Signal Boat
	Gring, Frank "Questie"	Mark/Pin
	Schneider, Susie Oliver	Mark/Pin
	McCully, Jim	Mark/Pin
	Brennan, Tom	PRO
	Duff, Bob	Timer

Going back in time, here is the nearly full crew for the 06/06 LAMBERT OCEAN RACE.

06/06-Sun-EYC-LAMBERT `````````` OCEAN RACE 0900hrs
Race	Person	Position
06/06-Sun-EYC-LAMBERT `````````` OCEAN RACE 0900hrs	Duff, Bob	Signaler
	Marvin, Bradford	Timer
	Koopman, John	PRO
	Sides, Richard	ETO Signal Boat
	Byrne, Cheryl	PIN Boat
	Ducharme. Sarah	UTILITY player
	Koopman, Fritz	MARK Boat

Since the LAMBERT is an EYC event, the results are posted on easternyc.org and (I think) nowhere else. I thought I could give you a direct link to results, but the only thing I can find on the site is the sailing instructions.

Good luck with your search. I personally find the EYC web very hard to navigate for things related to sailing. If you can find REGATTAS/RACING RESULTS you will find nothing posted about the LAMBERT. Another pop-down is so cluttered with undated races that I gave up trying to find the thing which brought me to sign-on.

A classic thing which never seems to get changed is the RACE COMMITTEE page which has little or nothing there of much interest. Then after gushing words about our FANTASTIC race committee, it says "Visit our Race Committee's page and learn about our all-star team!

". Please! Please! We are reading that suggestions right there ON THE RACE COMMITTEE PAGE!

For our MRA races, results are posted elsewhere in great detail by clicking:

http://www.mheadrace.org/

Copy and paste this http.... to your internet browser if the click does not work.

Jim Whipple does an outstanding job as MRA Scorer. It is a shame that MRA does not carry scores for the big club regattas like our LAMBERT, EYC ANNUAL, CHANDLER HOVEY and big events at the other clubs.

Going back further, we started the EYC 2010 season by running the Spring One-Design Regatta on Memorial Day weekend as follows: NOTE-DOUBLE CLICK TO THE RIGHT OF THIS LITTLE SPREADSHEET IF WRITING IS WHITE--A SOFTWARE BUG!

05/30-Sun-EYC-MRA Spring ```````1 Dsgn Day 1of2 1000hrs
Race	Person	Position
05/30-Sun-EYC-MRA Spring ```````1 Dsgn Day 1of2 1000hrs	Duff, Bob	Signaler
	Marvin, Bradford	Timer
	Koopman, John	PRO
	Shea, Kevin	Mark/Pin
	Byrne, Cheryl	Mark/Pin
	Schneider, Susie Oliver	Mark/Pin
	Ducharme, Sarah	Utility

05/31-Mon-EYC-MRA Spring `````` 1 Dsgn Day 2of2 1000hrs
Race	Person	Position
05/31-Mon-EYC-MRA Spring `````` 1 Dsgn Day 2of2 1000hrs	Duff, Bob	Signaler
	Marvin, Bradford	Timer
	Koopman, John	PRO
	Shea, Kevin	Mark/Pin
	Byrne, Cheryl	Mark/Pin
	Reiley, Toby	MARK Boat
	Piper, Mike	Mark/Pin

Now that seems enough for a start this week. I am certain that one or more of my friends on the race committee will find something about this blog which is wrong or should have been different or, most likely, that I should not have done it at all. However, the nice thing about a blog is that you can do most anything short of slander.

PLEASE USE THE COMMENT FACILITY BELOW JUST FOR FUN! THAT WOULD PLEASE ME! IT WILL BE DIRECT WITHOUT A POSTAGE STAMP. TELL ME WHAT YOU THINK--BAD OR GOOD.

See you next week with views of the race committee stuff---maybe!

RICH WILSON (MBA '82) SAILS HIS WAY ONTO A COVER STORY IN THE HARVARD BUSINESS SCHOOL ALUMNI BULLETIN-Sept. 2009

Howdy from Bob Duff - 9/24/2009,

I was delighted to see Rich Wilson's familiar face on the cover of my HBS ALUMNI BULLETIN when it arrived this evening. I hasten to copy the cover story for those who many not see it otherwise. For ENLARGED TYPE (readable) send an email request to rduff19@comcast.net.

Three New Leighton O'Connor Photographs Plus a Personal "Flick" for My TEXAS Friends

Howdy from Bob Duff,

A small group of  'headers attended a Leighton O'Connor photo exhibition last night in Beverly, Mass. We had fun despite FALSE claims expressed there by Beverly's Mayor, a Justice of the Peace and several others.  They boast that the U.S. Navy originated in Beverly when we all know that the navy started right here with General Glover and his men of Marblehead!

In my blog "movie" of January 23rd,  I used several of Leighton's still shots for reporting on a winning sailboat.  She was yacht RUN from Great Britain racing in Florida last month at KEY WEST 2009.  We ran that "flick" yesterday at Leighton's show where the mayor and his friends misspoke. 

I have used some of Leighton's great shots in the past.  Yesterday I purchased several new things from him.   The first at the top shows a small fleet of "frostbite" Sonar sailboats racing in the cold, cold winter water in Marblehead Harbor with the Corinthian Yacht Club in the foreground.  CYC is closed each fall and reopens in the Spring.

Following that, I show Leighton's picture of midshipman standing on spars all the way to the top of a square rigger.  We are fairly sure that this is the United States Coast Guard Ship EAGLE.  Notice the four jibs hoisted in place.  She was taken from the Germans as reparations after WW II. Serving as a midshipman training ship,  she sails here from time to time and will join a fleet of "TALL SHIPS" at Boston in the second week of July.  They will then leave to sail "down East" to Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.

That colorful picture is Redd's pond where ducks compete with racing model sailboats for "water rights" in the warmer months.  Originally, Redd's pond was the source of water for people without good wells.

Down below I sneak in a little flick of friends from a party "down home in TEXAS" this Christmas.  I tried sending this to friends via e-mail and am told that no one succeeded in opening the iMOVIE.  So, I am trying it here.  I extracted each person's head shot from digital "snap shots" created by several people.  My friend Maurice Tunnell and wife Liz hosted the wonderful party and sent a DVD of everyone's pictures to all of us.   Many thanks to the Tunnells.

Turn up your volume now to hear Tom Lehrer sing "MY HOME TOWN" for this is what the iMOVIE is about --sort-of.  Tom was teaching math at Harvard College when I found him there. He and his many funny "sarcastic" songs fit nicely with my old home town group.  Several of us studied high school math under "Brother" R. N. Smith who conducted classes like a Sunday School session with roll call and selections from "the blue book of happiness" (Trigonometry). He applied special names for each of us which appear in that small type in the movie.   His humor reminds me of Tom Lehrer.

Click the small triangle to play.  I had to click it a couple of times to make it go.  Turn up your speakers.  It can be replayed.

Pictured folks are associated in one way or other with the same graduating class at Adamson High School-Dallas, Texas in June 1947.  The guys were all in Junior ROTC starting at about age thirteen  and continuing until we got through with college.  I jokingly refer to us as "the Hitler Youth of the U.S.A."  because we were similar to what we read of the Germans being trained as "Hitler Youth" youngsters to kill the enemy, whoever that might be.  In retrospect,  it has been interesting to discover that none of these "cadets", with all that training in ROTC, will admit to ever having killed anybody. 

See you again soon,

Bob Robert Bobby Olin Junior Duff

US Junior ROTC-Cadet Colonel-commission dated April 1, 1947 

LEIGHTON O'CONNOR "FLICKS" of the 1st of many wins for Yacht RUN at Acura KEY WEST 2009 REGATTA with CATHERINE ZENNSTROM as Crew.

HOWDY FROM BOB DUFF,

The photo/"FLICKS"(sort-of) below show action pictures by LEIGHTON O'CONNOR from January 19th on the first day of  the KEY WEST 2009 REGATTA - Division 1, IRC-1. Shots feature the British yacht RAN, a TP52 owned by NIKLAS ZENNSTROM of Hamble, GBR.  She won in that first race and continued with high performances to win  her division after 10 races.

These plus many other stills may be viewed  on:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=14355&l=ed13b&l=ed13b&id=1034710764

or     http://leightonoc.smugmug.com/sports/605075

RAN's owner had TIM POWELL on the helm, JEREMY ROBINSON doing tactics  and what looks like a total crew of twelve including  CATHERINE ZENNSTROM, the only woman.  She scrambles to the high rail among many male elbows during three O'CONNOR  pictures of a single tack.

When seeing Catherine performing this way, I recalled the 1966 CHICAGO to MACKINAC race years ago when my young bride, DEBORAH COLLINS DUFF,  joined us on JACK KEARN's yacht KAREN  as the ONLY WOMEN CREW in a very big fleet. We thought nothing of it until the CHICAGO TRIBUNE  grabbed the story  for a combined society page/sports page spread. DEBBIE was a sailor but had formerly been a Chicago Debutante which seemed to interest the news people.  

This did not end with that one story!  A week or so later after sailing home from a great race, a call came from the adoption agency saying that a new infant son had been born for us.  The TRIB printed a routine birth announcement for DEBBIE and me leaving some readers to ponder how we managed the birth on a yacht racing far out on Lake Michigan.  Thus,  I always notice women racing yachts as does my grown son ROB III.  Perhaps all men do!

This is my very first  attempt at an IMOVIE (that's APPLE talk) in this DUFFSTUFF blog.  Many surprises came my way.   If  I do not find a bigger picture than what shows now in "edit mode" before "publishing", I will never try it again.  However, some folks say "never say never".  I started this over 10 days ago and the first movie "compile" took over 3 days before ending abnormally.  It got much faster when I was taught a few of the tricks by APPLE "Geniuses" in One to One training sessions.

I have bought an adapter from APPLE to hook this MacBook Pro to my ancient TV which should give me a somewhat larger view.  It cost about 20 bucks at APPLE plus $10 or so for cables at Radio Shack.  Even if I never publish another tiny slide-show/movie, I will have some fun playing with the "hugh" TV slave display for my computer.  I may talk about that in future blogs.  However, it is now late Sunday evening and the TV refuses to "mirror" my MAC as promised.  I am scheduled for another one to one session at APPLE tomorrow.  I have confidence---hope! 

"THE DEDICATION, or One of those Moments that makes Marblehead a very special town." -- THE MARBLEHEAD REPORTER story by Bob Triplett - May 27, 1976

Howdy from Bob Duff,

Marked pages 1 & 2 of this e-mail copy belong down behind the Thornton Clark picture from the newspaper micro film before its marked pages 3 & 4 .  This blog software keeps doing strange things to me.  SORRY!

This has been a  special week for me bringing forth happy little artifacts from past times with the International One Design yachts in Marblehead.  This article by Bob Triplett from the MARBLEHEAD REPORTER - May 1976 says it all quite nicely. 

THE EDWARD ADAMS DIXEY JUNIOR MEMORIAL TREE  belongs to Jill and Tom Hoffman of Franklin Street Marblehead.  Without them there would be no story. 

Click on the clipping to get bigger type.  You can almost recognize me in the dark picture leading the "ragtag parade" with my bagpipes and "the Guest of Honor, Ed Dixey (sic Dixie?) as Triplett wrote.  This and several other photos are dark with the ancient micro film technology of 30+ years ago.  I can send some better copies to you by e-mail, but they are dark.  Just write rduff19@comcast.net.

                             The microfilm is from Marblehead Abbott Public Library where the librarian Chris Evans was fantastic aiding my quest. I wrote the e-mail below (blog software has forced it ABOVE and then BELOW) late last night after we "found" the missing brass plaque.  My recollections were not too far off from what Bob Triplett wrote years ago.

I hasten to point out that I was NOT a "pie eyed piper" as Triplett implied; and though not a great bagpipe player as Tripett says "of questionable talent" , I was the best one around for the parade.  That is the story of my extensive bagpiping life.

ADDED NOTE IN GREEN

 of 11/05/2008---

I just learned from the MARBLEHEAD CEMETERY  DEPARTMENT at WATERSIDE CEMETERY  that Edward Adams Dixey Junior died on June 26, 2000.  Consequently, I am marking my 2009 calender for a REDEDICATION CEREMONY near that ninth anniversary of Ed's death and the thirty-third anniversary of the initial dedication of THE EDWARD ADAMS DIXEY JUNIOR MEMORIAL TREE  by The Little Harbor Historical Society.  

I have ordered TWO reproduction sets of the brass plaques.  One set will be re-placed on the tree exactly like the originals at the re-dedication ceremony.  The other set, along with the historic originals, will be presented to the Hoffman's friend, Judy Anderson,  for a proposed permanent display at THE MARBLEHEAD HISTORICAL SOCIETY.  Judy will be invited to attend the celebration to accept these treasures.   

 I  am asking here and will do so again in person, that THE REPORTER  newspaper cover this late May/early June 2009 event with a special re-printing of that May 27, 1976 article shown (poorly) above.  I would hope that, as a minimum, they could at least reprint the two pictures of Bob Duff that did not reproduce very well from micro film.   THE REPORTER should cover this re-dedication ceremony.  Maybe we should also invite some other North Shore papers to attend and report.  THE BOSTON GLOBE?  Perhaps these papers could invite the general public to this great occasion! 

 I am certain that Jill and Tom Hoffman will attend since they own the tree.  I will encourage Thornton and Pat Clark to journey to Marblehead from home in Alabama for this important occasion.  I promise dinner for them at the Eastern Yacht Club. 

 I will try to track down Dave Smith and Charlie Hamlin who both made memorable speeches that day.   Current owners of IOD #16 TANGO, Rachel and Ian Morrison and Mickael Best MUST be there so it cannot be on a race day.  Though it has eluded me so far, I will either find the old one or try to write anew the "epic poem" which Bob Tiplett seemed to like and which was received so enthusiastically on that wonderful day in 1976.  

CAVEAT LECTOR!   See you next week.

BRAD MARVIN'S 80th BIRTHDAY PARTY & A VERY LITTLE BIT OF GOP POLITICS - October 26, 2008

                                                                

 Howdy from Bob Duff,   

                                    

The above is a rare smiling look at Bradford Marvin - 1928 - present - on the occasion of his 80th birthday celebration.  Most of this blog deals with that party.

I  published this Sunday night with some documents included toward the end.  I checked it today (Monday) and found that blog software had dumped them into cyberspace.  Here I am again reconstructing yesterday's masterpiece.  Hold your applause - please!

This first document ,"NORMAL POSITION - THE FINISH LINE",  will brief you on the racing rule or  the total absence of a current rule, and will outline my position versus my good friend and RC colleague Brad Marvin.  There is another RC member who persisted with him for some time.  They have both gone silent of late.  Click on this and any other image for an expanded view of a rather insignificant old argument.  RC members could see this at the celebration.

This  printed card with the "IC"was on the back of Brad Marvin's birthday portrait shown above.

Another (missing) piece of  "NORMAL POSITION" printing was on the back of  the beautiful glossy photo below of four International One Design yachts flying chutes on a downwind leg during the 2008 Marblehead NOOD Regatta.  It is the same Leighton O'Connor photograph shown above on the first document near Brad's portrait.  Their spinnaker poles are in "Normal Position"which is the whole point of this little exercise. 

 My friend Brad and another colleague objected to a winning IODs performance  because his/her SPINNAKER TACK WAS NOT IN CLOSE PROXIMITY TO THE FITTING ON THE END OF THE IOD POLE.  I immediately contested their stand.  They persisted in this argument for several weeks every time an IOD finished.  Fortunately, no "official protest action" was taken because they were both dead wrong.   These  documents present facts for this  esoteric dispute.  

As we approach election day it seems appropriate to note a little of that stuff endured here in Marblehead.  A good example happened just after Brad Marvin's part last night.  I had discussed some of those party plans with you last week.

You might understand  that we seldom talk politics at the Eastern Yacht Club. There would be no reason for such talk among yacht race friends! Along with several things for this celebration,  I printed 25  cards for each of the 25 dinner guests.  I planned on our playing  the little Japanese "business card"  game taught to us\by Alex Dearborn.  However, a very crowded table and much flowing wine made the game inappropriate for this lively bunch.

 I cautioned all party guests to hang onto their cards since I refuse to print more for Brad's 90th celebration.   Last night the rare smiling picture had been printed of this MIDDLE  CLASS (1950-ha! ha!) HARVARD COLLEGE GRADUATE  with "1928 - 2008" for the eighty years.  Brad pointed out immediately that this format is for a "tombstone" and not for a "living" eighty year old's portrait.  The proper syntax is "1928 to Present".  If  known,  I could have printed yesterday's portrait correctly and then used it again for Brad's ninetieth.  Anyway, the party was a great success for 25 dinner guests topped off by a big sparkler on a vanilla birthday cake. Wish you could all have been there!  

After it all,  I discovered this delightful bumper sticker on the trunk lid of my new golden VW convertible.  I would not have blemished that brand new finish myself, but I agree with its message.  I knew immediately that the lovely Mary Patricia "Pat" Ayer had done the deed. She had done the same for husband  Jim Ayer.  Readers know Jim's many photographs in my blogs and will recognize him as the maker of those remarkable wooden jigsaw puzzles mentioned here from time to time.

Pat sent a compatible political cartoon which defied my attempt to copy it to the blog.  Sorry about that.  Maybe I can figure out the process before election day when I may have some more TANGO memorabilia to share. 

The next piece of party art  was this lovely photo of 

my old International One Design TANGO #16 shown racing under red and white spinnaker with three others of her own kind.  I love this shot by Leighton O'Connor.  His web site is at the very top of my "FAVORITE YACHTING LINKS" above under Jim Ayer's photo of our race signal boat.  Take a look at Leighton's creative yachting photographs in that hyperlink, "AN EXCITING LOOK AT NOOD 2008.....". You cannot help but be amazed by the beauty which he captures.

Oh yes, I have almost forgotten Jim McCully's recommendation that I mark my writing with the warning CAVEAT LECTOR.   I have an old Texas friend now retired to Montana, Donald Lee Clark, who knows a bit about writing.  He tells me he feels the same  as Jim.

See you next week.