Dustyn Skyler

What do you do when you cant afford to work on the boat? Garden...Some

Update: Boat still dry docked for the foreseeable future. Yep, it sucks, but it is what it is. (I've always wanted to say that!) Was it in the correct context? Who knows? Will I spend this entire post asking myself questions and then answering? Maybe, maybe not.

OK, its not.

Todays post is just about our yard and my lack of landscaping energy this year so far. We started out ok and quickly nosedived. Now to be fair, the boat repairs did take up a lot of my energy early on but what can I blame on the last month? The boat of course. I mean why not? It’s not like it can defend itself.

But we got a decent start I think. And I DID get some grass seed down on the Brisket and Jake damaged portions of the yard. We also planted a Banana tree and an Apple tree. Ann transplanted some roses and I planted a rose tree and a wisteria tree. So I havn’t been a complete bum. I also trimmed the peach tree and thinned out a lot of growth so were hoping to get some good peaches this year.

But I still have to do something to the front corner garden. I have been planting purple fountain grass each year and it grows well there but it also dies each year and it is a pain to remove so I need ideas. I was thinking possible cactus garden but it does get watered fairly regular with the grass. Maybe a succulent garden? Do I bring back the ornamental grass? Talk to me; let me know what you think.

Oh yeah, I did build what could possibly be the ugliest quasi-pyramid shaped stand to possibly grow vines on. Think that would look ok?

And before anyone comments, I KNOW I need to do all the little things too, like cleaning all the little junk, weeds, hose, etc out of the yard and gardens, especially in the Tree garden. It is particularly ugly right now…

And finally…. Any ideas on what I can do to help the apple tree would be much appreciated. It is finally starting to leaf out but needs help.

Dangit, I almost forgot. Figs. They are kinda tasty but we will have a ton again and no idea what to do with them so……

Our first weekend on the water...sorta

Well last weekend had more ups and downs than, well I was gonna say gas prices but that would imply a whole lotta ups.

The day started beautifully. We backed the boat in slowly.  There was a slight “mist” over the water. You could hear the last songs of the crickets and frogs. I looked out over the water and saw a bird skimming across the water. The only other sound was the tires on the boat ramp as we backed into the water. The sounds of the water as it moved against the boat. It was magical as I turned the engine over and it started to purr…….

Ok, none of the above was true. We backed in the boat to the sound of kids bickering, a horn honking  and the engine in my boat struggling to turn on. Vrooommmmm (shoot, it’s in gear, luckily reverse) sputter and die, start, sputter, die…holy crap its gonna be a long day, vrooooom, vroom, sputter, sputter, slowly making my way to the dock. ….

OK, at the dock, sputtering a bit more, load up and lets go. Maybe it’s the bad gas. Attempt to make it past the “no wake zone” and open it up. Past the NWZ, here we go. Throttle forward, throttle forward, throttle forward, ok NOW we are starting to move, finally floor it. We move up from 5mph to 10mph in about 45 seconds, lol…now it’s moving faster and after about 2 minutes it planes and we are zooming at a whopping 30!

We get to the damn which is maybe a ¼ mile away. Kevin says hold on a second, raised the engine cover and water is pouring out. I ask stupidly, is it supposed to do that? He tells me, “Nope. Don’t think so”. Turn the boat around and make it back to the dock, load it up and start diagnosing it. Looks to be one of the pipes coming from the water pump. He pulls it off and sure enough the gaskets are ate up. Well we drive BACK to Killeen and go to Texas Boat world and luckily they have 2 left. We install and head back to the lake. We put her in and this time it starts the first time.  We get everyone loaded up and life vests on we take off. We get to a fairly likely spot and stop, tie off to some trees and begin to fish.

A dozen casts later I pull in a bass and it’s a lunker! I decide to throw him back though (cough, cough). We fish for awhile with no luck and decide to try another spot.

Side note: Have you ever had 4 people try to fish at the same time on a 17 ft boat? Its fun!

As we move we decide to try and troll. It wasn’t easy so we pull lines in and just move. We get to another spot, Kevin ties us off again and we start fishing. At some point Cody actually gets a fish on. He gets it to the boat and I try to grab it, it flops off and back into the water which is fine as it wasn’t legal length. He does get credit for the catch though…We continue fishing and at some point Kevin makes the astute observation that we are moving. Seem the “tree” we tied off to is a low floater (that sounds a bit Seinfeldish doesn’t it..) well we decide to move again.

This time we tie off to a real tree.  Doesn’t do much good though as we catch nothing. We know that it’s probably because of the time of day and decide to just cruise for awhile. Kevin wants to adjust the carburetors and throttle so he does so while we putter around. He finally gets it to where it idles correctly and the throttle actually works closer to the way it should and we begin our trek back to the other side of the lake.

We are cruising along, just enjoying life, wondering what the poor people are doing, when suddenly “CLUNK”.  The boat stops like we have hit a wall. We try and try to get it restarted but even I , as dumb as I am about motors, realize it ain’t happening. Blake and Sydney pick up the paddles, which I remembered to buy but was hoping never to use, unlike an anchor that we could have used but I hadn’t bought, duh…. We make it to the side and tie off. I get on the phone and eventually get a hold of the Bell County Sheriff’s office. They send a deputy and she makes it to the Cedar Gap boat ramp and finds two guys willing to tow us. They come out and I will be Double Dog D*&^%ED if they don’t have the boat I WANTED TO BUY back in the day.  They tie off to us and tow us back in defeat. We get loaded up and head back home.

I find a boat forum and am currently trying to work with them to find out what needs to be repaired. Hopefully with the help from the guys at www.marineengine.com, we will get this problem diagnosed and get this boat back in the water soon. Cross your fingers.

P.S. Did Ann make the right decision not to go out today or what!?

P.P.S. The front yard and pool are both looking good so the weekend wasn’t completely bad…..

Das Boot - Light at the end of the tunnel

Today’s big newsflash! While waiting for Clan Travis to come over, I decided to put all the rails, along with the ladder and cleats, back on.  Using both a screwdriver AND a drill and a total of 76 screws I was able to accomplish this task and I am happy to report that I did it accident free…that’s right, history was made….. Quietly….. :)

Ok, So I am down to getting the “captains” chairs installed. They were screwed into a rectangular piece of plywood which was then bolted down to the original deck. The problem is that the original deck was composed of 10% wood and 90% water for quite a while so every screw that wasn’t bent was broken and all were rusty. We made the command decision to bolt the chair directly into the new deck.

KT arrived and I discovered that both him and Blake both ignored my text messages to bring a good drill in order to remove those big @$$ rusted screws so when they arrived Kevin sent Blake back to get drill. Meanwhile we went to Home Depot to get some replacement screws.

We got back, placed the seats in the boat, measured and installed. We were going to put the jump seats in but I forgot to get hinges while we were at HD. Is forgetting something as bad as getting the wrong ones? I don’t think so..lol. Tonight after work I am going to make a run to Wally world to get some stuff and will pick up the hinges then, so the opportunity to get the wrong ones is still there, never fear….

Also tonight we have to put the bow seat together and install. We were putting it off in order to make a speaker box but since we didn’t get THAT done and I can’t afford a radio now anyway, we are going to try fixing the seat. I have cut out the two back pieces so hopefully it will work.

Tonight’s shopping list also includes 2 life preservers and fishing licenses…which explains why I ain’t getting a radio or fish finder anytime soon…lol

After that the only thing left to do is paint it and well, that ain’t happening for awhile either. It may not look like much on the trailer but the scarred hull won’t be seen in the water so that’s ok. We did get the black stripe scraped off and sanded but the hull also needs that and the bank account just ain’t up for it.

Its been a lot of fun watching it transform from when I bought it to now. Kinda going to be a bit sad not working on it, but it is springtime which means hitting the yard. While I was planting some stuff in the tree garden a lady was walking her kids around the block. She stopped and told Bernard (our neighbor) that he has the best grass in the neighborhood. Then she saw me and said, but they have the best landscaping…lol. Of course she was lying but not for long. I will admit he has nice grass but hopefully that will get remedied soon, as far as landscaping, he ain’t got a chance….

Scraping, Sanding, Buffing, Polishing, will the fun NEVER end???

After this last week, I now have a new wish list:

Electric Scraper 

Wet/Dry Sander 

Power buffer     

Orbital polisher

4 People to use them J

There is light at the end of the tunnel.....we're just about at the end of the job.......The end is near...... Oh who am I kidding? It’s not near, but getting it on the lake IS. We have the black paint scraped off and the first level of sanding complete on the upper red stripe. Tonight I am hoping to at least get stage 2 “1500 grit” complete tonight.

Probably could have gotten more done but it got dark too soon. Here is a couple of pictures to show you before and after wet sanding. Tonight I am going to continue to sand while Kevin finishes out the seats?

The main problem is that the closer we get to being finished I can really see how bad everything is on the bottom. That’s coming someday, maybe even a paint job….HAHAHAHAAAAAA right, have you seen how much they charge?

The bottom line is everything below the waterline can wait, lol, hopefully we will be on the water this weekend!

Sticks and Plants, Uncles and Aunts

So this weekend we took a break from scraping and sanding on the boat and headed out to East Texas, the Piney Woods, where men are men and Scotty is…..well, Scotty. (If you have to ask you wouldn’t understand).

Now normally we stop in Cameron at M&M Feed to buy a couple of plants, they have a nice selection and normally some pretty good prices. We did stop on the way down, but Anns arm was hurting and I wasn’t really in a plant mood so we decided to press on. Now I am really and truly not a superstitious person. I am not afraid of ladders, broken mirrors or black cats. But all I know is I ALWAYS get a hat at Loves Truck Stop on the way to Arkansas and I ALWAYS get a plant at M&M and usually a pot at a roadside place in Madisonville.  After we got on the road I remembered that the pottery place owner had closed and I did get a little worried. More on this later.

Well the rest of the drive was uneventful. We arrived at their house and my Dad, Joyce, Roy, Scotty and Alisha was already there. (hope I spelled her named right, lol). We visited for a few minutes then was told we had to go visit my Aunt Wanda (Which by the way, we had already planned on doing, lol). But first we had to wait for ChiAnne (Definitely had to check spelling) to show up so she could show off her Prom Dress. WHAT? PROM? I still think of her as that gangly girl who couldn’t get her legs a-movin right when she was woken up…J Anyway, she arrived and looked very nice in her dress. Pictures were taken (Scotty even allowed her to take some with her date) then we went to see my Aunt Wanda. We had a very nice visit and it was nice seeing her as always. We talked about planting season and she said we should stop by the nursery on the way back. Joyce had always told us that the guy had a nice selection and good prices so we jumped at the chance.

We ended up spending more than I would normally have but after missing M&M and the possible bad luck associated I wasn’t taking any chances. Ann picked out a very nice Rose “tree” a geranium and something whose name escapes me. (This is a perfect opportunity for my Dad or Joyce to actually leave a comment, hint, hint). Then right before we were fixin to pay, I asked about Wisteria trees. He pointed my to a place around the corner and I saw one I had to have and it was a great prices. So we paid, went back and got my truck, came back and loaded up. We had to put the Wisteria inside the truck so it didn’t lose any blooms (But trust me, it did). I don’t know if you have ever smelled a wisteria but trust me it is very fragrant. Unfortunately so is the fertilizer he uses…I’m thinking heavy on some kind of farm animal plop…and it made for a long trip home.

It was a nice weekend, Danae stayed for a while on Saturday and we were able to catch up a bit and talk some American Idol, we had a great dinner, even if it had too much celery and no Saturday night would be complete without the requisite Saturday night boxing and a trip to dads library. All in all, very enjoyable. J

On the way home we decided to stop at, you guessed it, M&Ms (not the candy, the aforementioned feed store).  We picked up a Bottle brush tree (that didn’t do so good in a pot last year so we have it in the ground now), some Mexican Heather,  a couple of Elephant ears for either side of my Bamboo that somehow didn’t make it that far and some miscellaneous stuff for the tree planter. We made it home in time to see Taylor and still managed to get almost everything in the ground.

The funny part is, somehow Kevin managed to get over to the house RIGHT as we were finished planting and were watering the plants. I’m not saying he was parked at the corner watching, just saying it was incredible timing….lol. He also had good news. Taylor has decided to come back to Texas. Welcome back Tator….now tonight make sure you bring some gloves, we have more plants to plant….:)

Just adding a couple of pics of some of our plants. Will be updating as things grow.

P.S. Got some more wood for our sticks.  I will add pics later for visual interest. By the way, stick and canes are available for purchase from K2, Sticks and Stones …J

If wishes and buts were candy and nuts, every day would be Christmas

Ok, Today’s post is about Boat Toys. Not just toys but possible life saving equipment. And can you really put a price tag on safety? Yes, yes you can.....on with the list:

Radio- Gotta Have Tunes. The bottom line is how can you consider a boat complete without a radio. I don’t mean one of those cheesy two way radios that you can get on and say Mayday, mayday, blah blah…. I’m talking about a marine radio CD player that can connect to your iPod/iPhone and handle MP3’s on a thumb drive. Now THAT’S boating…Besides if I don’t get a radio that is going to make my hand made speaker box look stupid…J

Fish Finder - How did they find fish without them? Ok. It IS possible to fish without one, no one here will deny that, BUT, fish finders also show water depth and if you hit the bottom it can both damage the boat and possibly cause injury. So passenger safety seems to be the appropriate buzzwords here…yeah, that’s it, I need one for safety.

Skis – Because watching people wiping out and getting dragged through the water because they forgot to let go of the rope is fun and that’s good enough for me

Wakeboard - Kneeboard – See also Skis.

Underwater LED lighting – Ok, finding a way to justify this is not going to be easy. The fact that they look B.A is just not going to hack it as justification. Do they attract fish? Anyone, anyone? After some searching I found a website that sells these and upon further review, I don’t think so Tim. The cheapest was $210.00. For those of you not following this blog, which, from the lack of comments is just about everyone, that is $10.00 more than I paid for the boat.

Trolling motor - Cause everyone else has one. I’m thinking that if we can get the engine running just right, we can have it stall at trolling speeds. Or if it anything like my truck, the gas it guzzles while trolling would be cost prohibitive, heck it would SAVE money having a trolling motor….yes? No?

P.S. I am not now, nor have I ever been the primary boat engine mechanic so if it really does stall, its not my fault, I wasn’t even working on it that day. As a matter of fact I am pleading the 5^th and NOT self incriminating myself. I watch Law and order and I know these things…

Paint and Body - OMG

Those of you who know me, know my thoughts on painting. Me no likey.  I would have said that extends to boats but so far I have enjoyed turning the Red ,White and Black boat back to Red and Tan. On Monday Ann and I almost completed the back and last night was especially productive when Kevin, Blake and Sydney came over and joined in. Well Sydney not so much…I figure another couple of nights and we will have it complete. Now I just need to get a wet/dry sander.  Anyone have one I can rent/borrow? J I found a buffer and swear I am going to get that thing shining just like all the boats in the ads for boat detailers.

Well damn, that was short and sweet and not at all funny. I didn’t break anything or measure anything wrong. Heck,  I didn’t even buy the wrong part. Of course I also have to bondo some holes and there is an opportunity to fail as I have never Bondo’d anything before in my life. I also have to build a box for the speakers I will someday buy. I am sure Kevin will take the lead but I will definitely  get involved…for comic effect if nothing else. You are welcome.

Todays pictures are just random ones of the boat before and after scraping, one of where the box will be and one of what we WANT it to look like.

After that it is just cleaning up the Bimini cover and adding shi....stuff from our wish list (our list, my list,  whatever...lol)

Das Boot - Part 2

Now on to one of my favorite parts…..seating. Oh wait, that’s sitting! Well never mind, ya gotta have seating for sitting, Indian style was great when I was 8, 40 years later, not so much.

So, I knew from the previous inspection that some of the seats needed to be replaced . Little did I know they ALL would have to be replaced. Are ya’ll getting the idea that maybe I didn’t inspect the boat close enough? Partially true, I knew stuff could have to be done, just underestimated it some. <-----woop woop, understatement of the YEAR!

Oh, before I go any further, I would like to add something that someone so subtly pointed out to me. I AM HAVING FUN DOING THIS, dang near as much fun as I am having complaining about it. OK, fine, it’s a tie…lol (Is that better Kevin?)


So where was I. Oh yeah, replacing seats and cushions. Well I said replace, what I ended up meaning was redoing. Have you ever tried to do a search on a 1981 boat and tried to get replacement items? Yeah, not happening. Somehow when he said it was a “1981” I thought, well dang, I was already in the Air Force (donning denial helmet) it isn’t THAT old…well I beg to differ with myself. Its dang near impossible. I could not find a thing for an Emerson Sea Raider, circa 1981, heck I couldn’t find anything about an Emerson boat period.

(BTW, if any of you internet gurus CAN find something, ANYTHING, send me the link, it would be so very much appreciated)

So we decided to just repair the backs. Nothing very exciting about this process though.

Fun Fact: there are 3,987, 456 staples in the back of each cushion.

Basically it was remove staples, vacuum what was left of the wood back, trace cushion, cut wood, refit and re-staple. And yes, we put dang near that many staples back in. I never said they used too many staples, I was just giving you a count of them.

We cleaned the vinyl and for the most part they look pretty good. I did find two cheap jump seats to save on having to build them since we only had enough jump seat cushions for one anyway. I really lucked out when I ordered them as they seemed to match the existing ones pretty good.

They only hard part about this stage was the front two cushions. I saw a picture of someone else’s boat, where they had replaced the cushions with a custom speaker box. I think I want to do the same thing. So enter Kevin the Master Crafter….He already agreed to try. We’re going to build the box out of plywood and cover it with carpet. That’s the plan anyway

So what’s next?

March Project - Das Boot (The Boat)

The following story is real. No names were changed because I don’t need to change them.

Before I start I have to thank many people.
First and foremost, Ann who allowed me to get it and who believes I can actually get this thing "sea-worthy" and based on all my previous hobbies that never quite comes to fruition (understatement alert) that is an incredible leap of faith...
Secondly I have to thank Kevin Travis. He ain’t much to speak of when it comes to getting online and searching for parts, but he always knows what to do with them when I get them.
Blake Travis AKA I AM SO a Master Carpenter. He still insists that 3/4" to 1/2" is the same as 1/2" to 1/4" but as far as I am concerned, as long as I don’t have to do it, who am I to complain?
And Cody...Parts runner extraordinaire. If he ever remembers where everything is and what anything does, he's gonna be rockin.

On to the story.....

We bought a boat....finally....after waiting 6 years we bought a $200.00 boat....And if you think that it’s at all pitiful that it took me 6 years to do it, wait till you hear the rest of the story.

Fun fact #1 - Even when (or especially when) buying a boat from a friend and co-worker, don’t take their word for it that there is nothing wrong with the deck. Sub-fact 1 - "It's been reinforced" does not in anyway mean it has a good solid deck or that you can safely walk on it. When in doubt, walk it out.

The bottom line is we went and looked at it and decided to buy it. We go to pick it up and trailer it home. Once we get back to the house,  I get in it and discover the floor is a bit "soft" in spots, which quickly turns into one of the great understatements of all times. The floor is almost nonexistent. We pull up the carpet and discover that large amounts of the floor is actually still stuck to the carpet....just in case you can’t make that visual, the floor is still supposed to be on the floor.

Based on that fact, we quickly realize that flooring cannot wait "till the end of summer". Well that and seeing a few gallons of water pooled in the bottom of the boat between wads of foam. Demolition begins. Up comes the carpet and that takes care of about 40% of the decking. The rest is stuck to foam and fiberglass, but with the exception of the sides it all comes up really easy.

Insert "Montage"

The floor is up and sides are trimmed. We have decided that cutting 2 sheets of plywood to fit will be the best way to proceed....

Insert new "Montage"

The new deck is down and spray foam has been used to fill in the spots that previously did not have any as well as to shore up weak spots in the fiberglass. Now to let it dry.

Its dry, no montage needed. We trim out the spray foam which we have discovered has quite incredible expansion properties and is now ready for sealant. This actually takes several days because, as stated earlier, Kevin is not much on internet research. I go to I don’t know how many sites and call I dont know how many people, trying to find out what I will need as far as fiberglassing it. During this search I find a company called Sani Tred, which has a product called LRB (Liquid Rubber Base) that both seals and creates a hard rubber surface. We (I) really want carpet though so a serious email campaign begins. I don’t know how many emails I sent but each came back with an answer. Someone named "Salem" seriously earned their money answering emails and I finally make my decision and order what I think I need. It comes in and I am still worried that I didn’t get the right stuff and if I did I didn’t get enough. I was wrong on both accounts. According to their documentation the entire process which includes one layer of Perma Flex, filling gaps, holes and seams with LRB/TAV mix, laying the LRB and one final layer of Perma Flex can be done in one day. Of course we took 4, but that’s ok, it turned out great I think. I didn’t do a purty job but then again, I planned on putting carpet in. Speaking of which....its carpet time....

Not much I can say about the carpet installation except if there is one thing that comes close to my dislike of painting its carpet laying. You’ve heard the old saying about measure twice cut once? Well we measured 8 times per cut. Should have been 9. As we were laying in one side, I quickly realized that while the cut around the engine was perfect, I should have made sure we had enough carpet for the sides. I was way off to one side. But luckily we had plenty to spare so it did not become an issue. Although if I had not made the engine cut all the way to the stern we might have had enough to go all the way to the front. Then again, maybe not. I think I would have been a foot short anyway. Which of course was my mistake too since I ordered it. Dang-it Kevin (T)! lol

So as you can see by the pictures we have the floor re-done and carpeted. Coming up next...Cushions? We don’t need no stinking Cushions!