Our Glamorous Lifestyle

Our Glamorous Lifestyle    …   Monday 17th September 2012

Amongst the list of jobs we have to get done in the next week are a number of enhancements to our septic systems. These include putting in new hoses on the forward holding tank, installing a tank monitor on the aft system and replacing the overboard discharge pump. We have a number of parts on order, but today I got to drill a 1.5 inch hole in a stainless steel holding tank. How exciting is that! Believe it or not I was thrilled to accomplish this. I wasn't at all sure how to approach this job, but a quick call to the manufacturers of the tank gave me good advice. I bought and used a "bi-metallic hole saw" (a drill bit with a circular saw blade around it) and taking it fairly slowly the cutting went just fine. I also drilled holes to screw down the flange of the new monitor, but the stainless steel is so hard that I think I will have to tap these with a proper thread. I keep wondering how all my training and career experience helped prepare me for such glamorous work. I can't wait to get to those hoses! Earlier in the day our projects weren't going quite so well. We had bought some parts to mount our barbecue on the rail, but they didn't fit so well. We were debating whether we could adapt what we had or take it back to the store, when it became a moot point … I dropped the clamp plate overboard. The air was rich with choice phrases…

I can't sign off without mentioning the great time we had round at our friends Steve, Laura and Dan yesterday afternoon. We watched the Patriots and ate lots of food. The Patriots were really lame and lost … but the food and company were spectacular. Strawberry crapes with maple syrup and ice cream are the best!

Mike