Selene - Scatalogical humour

It is not surprising when 5 people are cooped up together that the oddest things become funny and we are all living in such close proximity we share the most intimate and more private aspects of daily life.

4 days in and using water sparingly in case we have a problem with the water maker later - which touch wood is working fine for now - we are all beginning to feel the less pleasant effects of heat and have been pleased to pay a little more attention to our hygiene than has been possible up until now in the conditions of the first few days. It is amazing how refreshing a wet wipe bath can feel. We have all become rather blase about throwing our used wet wipes out of the companion way hatch towards the leeward side to be consumed by the deep, without necessarily coming on deck.

This morning was a perfect clear blue sky with 25 Kts from just north of East we were cantering along at our normal 8-10 kts relatively effortlessly and most of us had had time to spruce a little. The student body was sleeping after a strenuous night on watch. In the cockpit were Kevin Lily and Adrian on the helm. The heads had been locked for a while and it was clear Bob was taking plenty of care about his personal hygeine - at least we hope there was nothing more going on. Anyway, after what seemed like quite a long time to those of us on deck chewing the breeze, a small cluster of wet wipes and tissue flew in a perfect arc out of the companionway scoring a direct hit on the end of the boom where they stuck. As you can imagine this was met with a certain amount of laughter especially when Bob's head shot up shortly afterwards like a meer cat to discover the unfortunate accuracy of his trajectory. So, now the dilemma. How to remove the tissue. True they are biodegradable, but unlikely to degrade totally before our arrival in St Lucia. So Bob had the bright idea of gently easing and pulling on the main sheet. Sadly the tissues demonstrated a rather concerning adhesion to the main sheet and this manouevre only succeeded in running the tissues backwards and forwards through the block at the end of the boom, and there they stay. We shall have wait for some up wind sailing when the boom will come in reach of the cockpit again. This may not be until we round Pigeon Island and head up to Rodney Bay. Meanwhile we are all anxiously awaiting our next gybe and there have been 4 volunteers so far to assist the student body on the foredeck.

So if you see Bob standing in the cockpit as we make the final upwind leg towards the finish line, he may not be waving, but clearing our latest and least prestigious racing burgee