S… things happen.  A friends husband, just a few weeks ago, bought me a pint.  Now he is on a life support machine.  A few weeks ago I was working as usual, then my eye started playing up and refused to tolerate its scleral contact lens.  I am now off work waiting to see a consultant at Moorfields and a few days later I shall be taking part in a trial of a new type of lens.  Funny old world, in’it?

A mate of mine has a saying, ‘we are not here for long and its not a rehearsal’, how very true that seems to me at the moment.

The answer?

BOATS!

Since I took over Lady Jayne (aka Tangle) I have not really ‘got’ the name.  Somehow it just didnt seem to suit the old girl.  Now being a fan of Patrick O’Brian I have always liked the name Nutmeg (from the Nutmeg of Consolation).  I once had a dinghy of the same name but…  So a quick bribe of middle son later…  

In not time at all he had primed, painted and sign written a new nameboard for Lady J err, Nutmeg.

Finally settled on a name we can live with…

Middle son informs me he is open to commissions by the way (www.mawkin.co.uk)

So, that job finally out of the way, where are with the refit?  Now, my eyesight being very poor indeed at the moment I have had to rely on middle son and my poor old mum to keep things progressing.

The after deck and lockers are all finished in lovely marine ply and gallons of epoxy resin…

After lockers going back in.

The ever industrious chap has also started making really nice cockpit locker lids too.  Those horrible brown plastic things just had to go.

The forward decks have been treated to the first coat of deck paint and now look soooo much nicer.

The last owner of Nutmeg had a thing about brown paint.  One of the major tasks has been scraping the damn stuff off.  Even though I can not see at the moment, under supervision of my old mum, I set about scraping, scraping and scraping the rubbing strakes and gunwales.  Even without any varnish on, all agree that she is looking much smarter already…

Just removing the brown paint made the rubbing strake and gunwales look much better

At home, the gaff and bowsprit are finished, six coats of ‘Schooner’ and all fittings back in place.  The boom is waiting for one more coat and the mast for two, so weather and eyesight permitting I am getting optimistic about launching by the end of June.  Rats, I should never have said that, now we will find another thousand jobs to do!

More soon,  thanks for taking the time to read this rubbish.