Something Different 44

I think I read this story right . . .  NYPD got called in for an unruly large group of champagne brunch passengers.  Excessive alcohol was involved . . .  BEFORE the champagne brunch.  What!@#!?

On youtube, there’s a whole series of these CRAZY Boating Fails . . . .

Then there are Darwin Award winners on the water . . . .

But I’m not immune from ignorance:  a personal story will demonstrate.  When I was about 7 or 8, I really wanted a canoe.  My father replaced the aluminum roofing sheets on a barn with asphalt shingles.  Seeing the sheets on the scrap pile, I imagined reshaping one as a canoe, filing any holes with tar.  I folded one over on itself lengthwise, closed up the ends.  It had no sweet lines but to me it was a canoe and time had come to float-test it.  I convinced my younger sister to get into it and shoved “canoe” and sister off into the farm pond.  I’ll stop the narrative here so that you have time to imagine what could possibly go wrong.

So how about . . .  the fishing hole showdowns . . .

Oh . . . and boat ramps can be drama settings.

Let’s reuse this photo from the East River almost a decade ago.  Click on the photo to get the post.  I recently passed that island . . . U Thant Island, and the fishy leftovers smell from the cormorants was quite overwhelming.

Back to my canoe story . . . The biggest thing that went wrong:  I had not considered water pressure.  No sooner had my sister gotten into the pond when water pressure closed the sides in on her;  I’d not thought to include internal structure to counter the external pressures.  My sister went for an unexpected swim and lives to this day to periodically remind me of my failure.  She can tell the story to raise the drama factor each time she tells it, and I’ve never designed another boat, although I’ve built a few kayaks.

Below, that’s not me, and I’ll admit some foreshortening is present, but

not where I’d put myself.

All turned out well, but be safe and smart out there.

And to end this post on some hallelujahs, click here for a story about good eats stopping a war.  Here’s to sharing our best food!