I always wanted to sail. But, now that I'm so old any boat I go one needs to have a bathroom.

Class racing series often use locally designed boats. In Virginia, one of these little racing boats is the 17' Mobjack.

A friend of mine and his girlfriend had a job mansion sitting. The historic waterfront estate was for sale, and selling houses like that often takes a long time. They were required to keep the place up, and then really spruce everything up when a prospective buyer was coming. His next door neighbor designed the Mobjack boat, something he did to pay the bills after he was kicked out of USNA for getting a girl pregnant. He had Mobjack 0001 tied up at his dock. My friend had an open invitation to take 0001 out any time he wanted.

My friend got a call from the real estate agent saying some prospective buyers were coming to see the property. He didn't want to get stuck showing them around the estate all day. So, he went sailing. His girlfriend got stuck showing the prospective buyers and the real estate agent around. When my friend got back, his girlfriend said she had some good news and bad news. The bad news it was the prospective buyers said they'd buy the place, so they'd have to move soon. The good news was that she got to meet John and Yoko and spend several hours with them. Lennon was murdered a few months later.

Another friend of mine in college was an avid sailor. He was bringing his sail dingy back to the yacht club when the wind picked up and put the boat out of control and heading for the docks. He got the sails down just in time to gently nudge right up to the dock without crashing into one of the yachts tired up, as if he'd planned the whole thing. Some of the wealthy club members saw what happened, not realizing that the positive outcome was pure dumb luck, and asked him to crew on their racing yachts.

My bro-in-law used to race sailboats, once from Fort Lauderdale to Virginia Beach. He also has an airplane to go back and forth from Miami to his house in the Bahamas. I always expect the next family gathering on Frau Putzer's side will be his funeral or memorial service, depending if the USCG recovers his body.

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