An Introductory Note
By Dave and Jaja

October 18, 2002

I would like to apologize to those of you who read this page from week to week, and expect more than a few garbled emails--such as we've been submitting since July. Jaja and I were a bit slack this summer. That's not to say we ignored writing. Far from it. Every morning I woke up the the best intentions, "...have to get a web story off to Elyse..." But that's where it stopped. For us, churning out the words, while churning out the miles, are two things that do not cohabitate well.

This is why. When we are cruising offshore all of our faculties are swamped. Our focus is on the weather, the kids, food preparation, the kids, recovering lost Legos from the bilge, the weather, cleaning up after food, and making repairs (both to toys and to DRIVER). Since DRIVER is our life support system, I feel it is paramount to use every ounce of my energy anticipating what might go wrong, then come up with hypothetical solutions. If a real emergency arises, the hope is my mind has already skirted the precipices of probable outcomes. I don't think the worst, I just plan for it. Writing involves a spatial view of events, past and present. When cruising, Jaja and I become so focused on the Now and the What's to Come, that combing over yesterday's events and committing them to paper seems superfluous. Using our concentration to organize, and write about what has already occurred doesn't perpetuate our safety.

Of course, we didn't spend all summer mid-ocean. We spent a lot of time ashore visiting, hiking, and waiting for good weather for the next passage. During these times, there never seemed to be the RIGHT time to sit still for a couple hours and hammer out a ditty for the web page. This state of affairs is usually know as PROCRASTINATION.

It's different now. The summer is over, DRIVER is parked dockside in Newfoundland for the winter, and I can enjoy sitting in front of a blank computer screen reliving the recent past. From a distance I am able to see correlations that appeared routine at the time, and I can piece together the often insignificant threads of humor that were spread out over many days, or weeks.

So much for justifications.