Gollum

You may not be aware, but we own a cat. Many people in our marina who have been there for three years don't know this.

Gollum came to us about 4 1/2 years ago as a strange, nearly hairless beast living under my car in Michigan. I love animals, so I instantly began feeding her, giving her water, and slowly gaining her trust. The last one took awhile, and even when I felt I could trust her, she still scared the crap out of me with the noises that came out of her. She sounds similar to Chewbaka or Gollum from the Lord of the Rings movies.

Gollum decided on Monday night to wander out of the boat - a very rare occurrence. Because she is often in hiding and sleeps her days away, we didn't realize. It wasn't until the next day when I realized she hadn't touched her food that I knew something was wrong. I looked all over the boat, but she was nowhere to be found.

I ventured further and started looking in the water, expecting to find a fuzzball floating in the water. There were a couple other people who noticed me looking and after explaining that yes, we have a cat, they started looking too.

I was just about to give up when suddenly I caught site of her, next to a dinghy stored on the dock less than 20 feet from our boat.

I'm sure she had a COLD night, but she seemed happy to be back home and I'm sure she'll never venture out again.

Pirates of Halifax invade Boston!

Or something similar to that anyhow. Pirate themed tour ship Liana's Ransom usually tours Halifax, Nova Scotia. She is on her way south to warmer climates to give tours over the winter, and she has decided to stop here in Boston for a few days. We met a couple of the crew members and they were very nice. Must be quite an adventure, sailing south a pirate ship for the winter!!

employment, self

In January 2008, Justin and I began Jigsaw Indexing, as a way of living a bit more simply and being a bit more self sufficient with our lives. Also, I love indexing, so it has been a wonderful experience for me and I've been grateful for all the work that has come our way.

Since living aboard, we have come across many people that work out of their own boats. There is something about moving on a boat that gets a person obsessed about working for him/herself and when it goes into motion, the person will do whatever it takes to make it happen.

We know a lot of people who work for computer companies and can do most/all of their work from home.

Others have started their own businesses doing boat related things. One person at our marina sews flags, and another has a fuel polishing business.

A couple of weeks ago, we came across the most interesting business ever - boat acrobats.

Justin met me partway on my commute home. He started talking about the boat that had arrived in our marina all the way from France, and how he wanted to show it to me. "La Loupiote" is beautiful! One of my favorite things about her was the fact that the owners very clearly found ways around spending $500 for this part or $1000 for that. With a little thought, they were able to craft a lot of things on their own and save money in the meantime. It made for a better looking boat, too.

The next day, Justin met Franck and his wife Delphine. Franck needed to get to a marine store to pick up some bottom paint and Justin was on his way there anyway. This is where Justin learned of their profession, and we found out that in a couple of days they would be performing their show for us all at the marina!

No one quite knew what to expect out of this couple - they and their two children were very intriguing, but spoke more French than English and we weren't quite sure what the show was going to entail.

The show was spectacular, and it made me so proud to be among a community of people who dare to break the rules of living a normal life, of going to a 9-5 job, and finding a way to make their performance work, even with raising two kids aboard all the while.

This way of living is all about simplicity and self reliance to both me and Justin, and a lot of things that once meant so much to us now seem quite silly. We know for certain that we want to be more like the French acrobats and less like all the people we see bustling about the city streets, rushing to make it to their jobs they don't really enjoy, working too many hours out of their day and not getting any time to do things that matter most to them or be with the people they love.

So, many thanks to La Loupiote for putting on an amazing show and living life to the fullest.

Here is a link to a video of them performing a different show on YouTube - I taped them but the videos aren't yet ready to go online.