Where Does The Time Go?

Edenton being a small town is supposed to be a sleepy little place where time all but stands still. After all, Main Street could easily still be trapped in the 50's except for the cars and dates on the newspapers. I just noticed I had not posted here in way too long.

I anchored out in the bay for the annual Fireworks display....pretty good show for a small town....but not as dramatic as Ocracoke's. Seems their's lasted all of about four seconds when the truck unloading process went bad and the whole load detonated killing several people. Sad news that as July the Fourth is supposed to be a time of celebration and remembrance of our country's founding.

The next day when it came time to start engine and weigh anchor....I encountered a situation where it was more like cuss the engine and forget the anchor. I finally got the engine starter to do its thing and made my way back to the dock. The next few days were spent contemplating removing the engine starter and trying to figure out what was wrong. I finally declared it a solenoid problem and in a weak moment decided to replace the part with the starter mounted on the engine. Simple job right....disconnect two wires, one ground, remove two small bolts and remove the bad solenoid. Then reverse the process....simple...right?

Wrong!

It was a job....spelled J.O.B! You could see the thing....you could almost touch the thing...but getting your fat fingers and a tool into a postion you could do something...now that was another whole kettle of fish. A mere day later and the job was complete. Not to mention some blistered paint work from some very sailor like language. Frady even left me to it as he was afraid to be within earshot as his delicate young ears were being hurt.

Job done...up to the cockpit...hit the key...and.....Nothing!

Next step...remove the entire starter....no problem he says. Two days spent thinking how to get an eighteen inch long, seven inch diameter starter out of a twelve inch long, three inch hole.

I wimped out....called Thomas Grant. He looked at it a bit...said it would be a long process but he thought he could do it. Thirty minutes later he says open the hatch and lets take this thing to the overhaul shop! He is part magician I firmly believe!

On the way we stopped by his house and inspected his pool parlor named the "Dog House" located behind his wife's home. Evidently Thomas finds much need to hide out back for some reason thus the name of the place. He has a very nice hideout....a proper Pool Table of his own and a beautiful Snooker Table owned by a friend. I have been awarded local status based upon his invitation to join in the Wednesday night pool and bull shooting.

We tracked down Joe Alligood by phone....told us to drop the starter off at his house in Edenton and he would work on it on Saturday. Short version.....my faith in mankind, small towns, and good folks remains solid. Joe is one of those guys that make life so much more enjoyable.

I retrieved the starter on Sunday morning from Joe, installed the thing in the afternoon and Luna is now ready for sea.....after I clean the bilge, clean water strainers, and fuel filters.....and grow some more knuckles and hide on my hands. Next time I will exercise great wisdom and call Thomas again.

Saturday night I did a pub crawl....hit both Sean's and the Waterman's. Edenton is the only place I know of where you can hit every single bar in town, have a drink in every place, and still drive home legally sober. At the Waterman's....I spied three lovely ladies at the bar....and thought one of them was the Post Mistress of Edenton. I was half right....she is one of the two in town. The trio were good fun and exercised good judgement and gulped their drinks down and fled my company.

That seems to happen a lot these days for some reason. Perhaps I need to invest in either deodorant or plastic surgery!