Asymmetrical sailboat

 Really, sea otter aside, this is an interesting sailboat. It’s a nice sized boat; 36 feet long.  It’s kind of a catamaran, but with the mast on one side.  Or a mono-hull with an outrigger, but only on one side.  I had to go home and google it.  Its name is Jzerro.  It’s a design called a proa and is taken from early Polynesian sailing craft.  (not my photo) It is such a strange boat, it is always sailed with the outrigger upwind.  In order to tack, you have to exchange bow for stern!  Proas have two bows and can sail in either direction.  You can sail it with yourself out on the outrigger providing ballast like a catamaran, or I think you can take on water in the outrigger to provide ballast against the sail power and ride in the cockpit.  It would probably suck in a tacking dual, what with having to douse a jib, then raise one on the other side every time, but I read it is well suited for ocean cruising. 

Henry went for a swim

 That’s noteworthy because he has never had any interest in going in the water.  This trip, he played along the stream at the family reunion, collecting sticks out of the shallow water and dragging them back into a pile onshore.  Periodically he would come back to the pile and chew off some bark; perfecting his beaver skills.  He did everything but make a mud dam, and not only got his paws wet, but his entire legs too! This time he played at the shallow edge of a lake and got his legs wet again but there were no sticks in the water.  We tossed one out a little bit.  He splashed out to get it and brought it back.  No problem.  It wasn’t long before he was bounding out to get thrown sticks, retrieving them, and swimming back with them.     At five years old, Henry is now a swimmer.  He doesn’t come from a long line of swimmers.  I’m told his parents won’t even go on the grass if it’s wet! 

Unintended consequences

 Judy ate those bonbons to see if they would help her sleep.  They did.  But when you start messing around with drugs, no telling what else will happen.  Something else did. You’ve heard of Irritable Bowel Syndrome?  Well in 1991, Judy got struck with a bout of what I call Unpredictable Bowel Syndrome.  We attributed it to the stress of helping Mom during her battle with cancer, but it never resolved.  It has been her constant companion for twenty-four years.  We have not been able to figure out a direct correlation with anything; it strikes without warning, maybe once a day, maybe ten times a day. Until now. Judy has moved on from bonbons to a liquid solution infused with THC (tetrahydrocannabinol, the principal psychoactive constituent in cannabis).  It’s easier to control the dose that way.  She doesn’t need very much, and you can only halve a bonbon so many times.  She doesn’t take it every night, but if she has trouble sleeping one night, she uses it the next.  The unintended consequence of imbibing THC?  Her unpredictable symptoms have totally gone away.  This is strictly anecdotal, we don’t *know* that there is a direct connection, but maybe all her colon needed all these years was to get slightly stoned once in a while.