July 3, 2019

Its Official!!  Dale has retired.  We had a nice sailboat/pirate party attended by friends, family and colleagues last week and this week we’ve spent sitting in various Social Security/Medicare, Tricare and retirement planning offices making sure that all the I’s are dotted, T’s crossed and plans we’ve put into place are actually going to work so that we can once again, sail off into the sunset.  Quite literally as this time we’d like to make it to Australia before we’re too old to totter up and down the gang plank.  Time will tell.  Dale has been rather apprehensive about the idea of not having a job, or maybe I should say-not having a job he can escape the ‘honey-do’ list to.  Times Up!  You’re all mine (bruhaha) and the boat’s.

 

On other fronts, we’re heading to Ft. Lauderdale for the holiday weekend to meet a first cousin of his that we met through Ancestry.  Dale has never known any of his family outside of the tight little circle of his immediate family.  Although I’ve been curious over the years, he never felt it was necessary to explore further.  Of course, Ancestry came into our lives shortly after Christmas when, Robbie, his sister, shamed us into doing the spit test.  BEWARE:  If anyone tries to lure you into this endless pit, don’t do it!  You’ll be lucky if you can escape without your PJs rotting off your body because you couldn’t tear yourself away from a site so full of data, you couldn’t put it away for a few minutes of sleep for fear that you’d lose your train of thought and never find it again.  Of course you will find it again; at 2 am when your eyes are slamming shut.  So what’s another hour; or two.  Needless to say, here we are a few months later and we have more family than we know what to do with, thus the trip to Ft. Lauderdale.

 

Then, its boat time.  On this trip we’ll be sailing a 2006 42’ Manta catamaran.  Over the past 4 years, we’ve updated various systems, structures and equipment and will continue to prepare over the next 4 months with an eye toward dropping our lines the first of November, or the first weather window thereafter, for Australia.  If you’re game, we’ll try to share our preparations and trip in an honest but humorous manner.