to describe how I felt tonight watching the news about the devastation wreaked by Hurricane Katrina. It’s just incredible that this storm grew so quickly and destroyed so much. Our thoughts are with those who survived.
The family that went sailing as Hurricane Katrina was coming ashore in Florida last week was found safe in Florida on Friday.
That and the fact that New Orleans is avoiding a direct hit are about the only good news about this monstrous hurricane.
We crewed on our friends Laura and Steve’s boat, the Laura J, in a race called the Barnacle Regatta on the Elizabeth River on Aug. 12, and again last night. This photo is from the start of the race on Aug. 12:
Some related links:
We made sixth place last night out of 10 boats that finished the race; 18 started it - I don’t know what happened to the others. Maybe they got couldn’t figure out the course :-/
… what people are thinking. With Hurricane Katrina bearing down, a family goes boating off of Florida’s Gulf Coast, and now - surprise - they’re missing. If I don’t sound sympathetic, it’s because many people in my family have been sailors for at least 30 years. My Uncle George sailed around the world; my mom and her husband, and my Aunt Betty and Uncle Ray sail (each couple in their own boat, of course) up and down the Intracoastal Waterway from Virginia to Florida almost every year; they generally wait till hurricane season is over to go, but during the summer they’re constantly sailing the Chesapeake Bay.
Someone asked my mom once what they do when a hurricane is coming. “We get out of the way,” she said. They certainly don’t go sailing for pleasure in its path!
I do hope they’re all okay. But people really need to understand that boats are *dangerous* and you need to learn about good seamanship as well as about how the boat works.
I came across this wonderful quote today:
Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
~ Mark Twain ~
This is pretty funny: When the Graphic Artists Get Bored
Dan and I went skydiving on my birthday in June. We showed the DVD of our adventure to some friends Saturday night, some of whom want to go with us next time. However, Paul’s wife Terry doesn’t want him to go before their two children are grown 
To ease her mind, here are some stats that I’m sure most people don’t know about: In 2002, the U.S. Parachute Association had 33,664 members (this is a PDF file), who completed a combined total of 2,151,228 jumps.
That year, “Only 1,275 USPA members reported having injuries requiring medical attention,” according to the USPA, and there were 33 fatalities.
So, skydiving is really much safer than driving, but since most of us drive every day, and most have never gone skydiving, it seems more dangerous than it really is.
Also, several people in the room are science teachers, so they’re thinking more about the physics of the thing than I am 
I can’t wait to go again.
Portsmouth has changed a lot since we first moved here in 1992. The downtown area in particular has become a popular destination for food and shopping - not just for locals, but busloads of antique hounds come to town to check out the shops.
So here’s my entry for the Is My Blog Burning? site’s Be Rachael Ray for a Day blog contest mimicking Rachael Ray’s TV program where she finds places for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, all for $40.
Breakfast
For the last year or so, we’ve been going to Waffle World on Western Branch Blvd. frequently; it’s actually in neighboring Chesapeake, but it’s our favorite, so here it is. Interestingly, the current owner of Waffle World used to operate a diner in the location now occupied by our lunch location, below
This is our exchange student for the year 2004-2005, Hannah Gutdeutsch, after her last breakfast at Waffle World before returning home to Germany in June:
Waffle World is one of those great local places with good food, great service, and reasonable prices, so it’s quite popular. There are lots of choices, such as egg combos, French toast with a variety of toppings, and frittatas, as well as lunch staples like BLTs, tuna or chicken salad, melts, etc.
I like to get the Denver omelet, toast included, $4.95, with a cup of coffee, $1. So there’s $5.95 for breakfast.
Lunch
My friends and former neighbors Shannon and Tim Woodland own The Daily Grind of Portsmouth, a great coffee house on Portsmouth’s main drag, High Street. They renovated this historic building and live in the three floors above the coffee house.
For lunch, I’d recommend one of the wrap combos for $7.25, which comes with a bag of gourmet chips. A couple of the options are:
Add a cup of coffee for $1.40 and you’re set - lunch for $8.65. If you want to splurge on a specialty coffee, you’ll still have plenty left for dinner, so go for it - $3.60 for a mocha cafe. Now you’ve spent $10.85 for lunch, for a total of $16.80.
Dinner
I’m going to give you a couple of options for dinner, depending on how you want to spend your evening.
You can go to Roger Brown’s Restaurant and Sports Bar, owned by former professional football player Roger Brown, who played for the Detroit Lions and the Los Angeles Rams in the ’60s. With its huge menu and variety of seating options, everyone will find something pleasing. You can sit at a sidewalk table if it’s nice outside, or in a cozy dining room with a fireplace. Or you can sit at one of the hundred or so seats around the 90-foot bar, or at a booth facing the four large screens showing various sporting events, each with its own sound box.
A couple of choices for a great dinner at Roger Brown’s are the Home-Style Fried Chicken, with garlic mashed potatoes, bourbon gravy, and braised greens or sauteed vegetables, for $10.95, or the Barbecued Chicken, topped with Monterey Jack and Cheddar cheeses, bacon, tomatoes, and scallions, with mashed potatoes and greens or veggies, also $10.95. Add a glass of wine for $3.50 and you’ve got dinner for $14.45. Add that to the $16.80 you spent for lunch and you’ve eaten well for $31.25. So splurge and have dessert and coffee. You’re in the South, so try the Sweet Southern Bread Pudding for $4.95. With coffee at $1.50, you’re now up to $37.70.
Or you can catch a movie along with dinner at the Commodore Theater, a restored 1940 Art Deco-style movie house. Adult admission is $6 for a dining floor seat at a table equipped with a phone you use to order dinner (balcony seating is also available, but you can only order snacks such as popcorn and candy there). You can also use it to call your babysitter, or another table, since they’re all numbered
I like to start off with a small salad for $2.75, then savor the fish n’ chips - two large pieces of expertly fried cod with a generous portion of crispy-on-the-outside, tender-on-the-inside potato wedges on the side, for $6.75. Add a glass of blush (yes, I like pink wine ) for $3.15 and you’ve spent $12.65; add $6 for your admission and you’re up to $18.65 for dinner and a movie - a total of $35.45 for the day. Hey! You’ve got just enough left to get the absolutely decadent hot cinnamon loaf with raisins and icing for dessert. Yum! It’s $3.75, so you’ve spent all but 80 cents of your $40. Cool!
Forgot to mention, about our dinner at Azar’s:
We’re thinking of replacing my Taurus with a hybrid car, so, after hearing about a tax credit available in the energy bill passed a couple of weeks ago, I did a little research.
Hybrid cars
The energy bill also includes a new tax credit for buyers of hybrid cars, which combine an electric motor with an internal-combustion engine.
Starting next year, hybrid-car buyers will be eligible for tax credits ranging from $1,700 to $3,000. The credit will be tied to two components: hybrids that save the most fuel compared with 2002 models, and the vehicle’s estimated lifetime fuel savings.
The credit will take effect Jan. 1, replacing the existing $2,000 tax deduction for hybrid vehicles. That deduction was scheduled to fall to $500 next year.
Because a tax credit is worth more than a deduction, the law provides a greater incentive to buy a hybrid after Jan. 1, according to an analysis by CCH, the tax publishing company.
But there’s a potential penalty for waiting too long to buy. The law limits the tax credits to 60,000 vehicles from each automaker, so credits on popular models could disappear well before the tax break expires at the end of 2009.
So, is it better to buy one now, with the $2,000 deduction, or wait till January, hoping you can be one of the first 60,000 buyers and get the $3,000 credit? Why can’t this administration ever make something simple? This is as bad as senior citizens having to pick a drug supplier for Medicare based on the drugs they’re taking, not knowing what drugs they might need in the future. Ridiculous.