Norfolk and Computer Headaches

Norfolk, VA

The “Sweetest Thing” is docked at Waterside Marina in Norfolk, VA waiting on a weather window (tomorrow we hope) to leave for ST Thomas.

Norfolk, VA is a great place to stop, and Waterside is right downtown so if you have guests aboard they can see MacArthur’s tomb and museum, The USS Wisconsin and a Naval museum are within walking distance of the marina on the upper floor of Nauticus.  Just a couple of blocks away is the MacArthur Center mall where you can do serious shopping or just catch a movie.  The marina also has a shuttle van which will run you to the grocery store or whatever.  (We are happy for this service as we somehow forgot to buy Toilet Paper in Annapolis even though it was on our list... I know you are wondering so... we had plenty of paper towels.)

Today we are trying to locate a diver crazy enough to get in the water and clean the hulls and props... Bob has all of his dive gear and has decided to do it if no one else will... I guess someone is crazy enough after all.

On a side note... computers on boats.... arggggggg  You cannot live without them nowdays and for all of my deliveries I need one not only for blogging but to stay in touch with owners when I am offshore with their boats.  I use Ocens Mail service and an Iridium phone to connect but have had a terrible time with computers.  A couple of years ago, after having to replace our third expensive laptop due to one sort of failure or another I decided that, at least for my traveling delivery laptop, to buy a little “disposable” netbook.  My first netbook was one of the little Acer Aspires and lasted just over a year, the next one was a Sony which lasted just under a year.  My thought was that if I don’t have a lot of money tied up in a computer it wouldn’t hurt so bad when it inevitably failed... that isn’t true though... when it fails I am suddenly out of contact and loose a lot of info, pictures etc as well as the frustration of setting up a new one.  What I really needed was a laptop that was reliable.  Throughout this entire process the Mac users around me just shook their heads and kept telling me to buy one.  My friend Richard who went with me on 3 deliveries last year even works for Apple.  I was resistant really only because I didn’t want to shell out the $$$$ for one.  I LOVE every Apple product I have ever had and was already sold on the company but $$$$ is short in our lifestyle so it was hard to bite the bullet.

I was in the airport getting ready to work on my sailing resume for the insurance company that handles the “Sweetest Thing” when my latest little netbook failed.  There I was at the beginning of a long offshore passage with no computer and forced to ask the owners if I could borrow their laptop in order to finish what they had asked me to arrive at the boat with!  The long and the short of it is that I am typing this on a new Macbook Air.  You Mac users can now send some comments to help me deal with the WIFE AGRO!  So far I love it... not sure about this PAGES software... who wrote this anyway?  (Just kidding... it’s great Richard... good work!)

I will blog in the morning and let you all know what it looks like for weather and our departure time.

Bloggin’ on a MAC

Captain Tofer