What to do when Not Underway

Anchorage. Not underway, not making way. On the hook. Swinging in the
wind. It sounds like a great time to do nothing, but when you're working on
a ship you're working on a ship. We just rebuilt our anchor windlasses (I
posted a video a couple of months ago of "let-go" if you want some
perspective of what I'm talking about). Why did we rebuild it? Because
last time we used it the brake failed and all 13 shots of chain ran out, out
of control, and slammed up against the sacrificial link with enough force to
scare the hell out of everyone aboard, particularly those on the bow
dropping it into the water.

Aside from the ungodly din and racket of the thing, the asbestos dust from
the brakes mixes with the rust and mud and you can't see your hand in front
of your face. If you're counting shots while paying the rode out - a shot
is 15 fathoms, or 90 feet, marked on the chain itself with paint or seizing
- it makes things challenging to see. If you're holding the servo switch
to let go the anchor you're standing right next to the windlass as the chain
gains speed and the failed brake spits out dust and fire, the proscribed
reaction to which is "run like hell." Not pleasant.

When the wind swings the ship around the hook and points us eastward I have
great cell service on my phone, but when we swing around to the west my
phone goes into roaming on a Malaysian service and my data disappears. Bye
bye internets. Add the wind and tide cycles (very consistent here) to the
time difference from home (-7 Z.D., or 14 hours in Seattle's future) and you
have a communications nightmare.

We're cleaning cargo holds- they're half a football field wide, 120 feet
long, and as tall as a 5 story building. "Cavernous" is a good description.
I like it when I find big chunks of metal (usually broken cones, which links
containers together at the corners) - I toss them to the foot of the ladder-
the sound is huge! But it is hot work, and it is so hot here that I had a
heat stroke on the stern, yesterday... the first and only heat stroke I've
ever had. Apparently, you don't get any minerals whatsoever from water made
with a water-maker, so 6 months of pure, uncontaminated h2o turns out to be
problematic when you're 1 degree north of the equator. I've been eating
salt tablets and drinking a special Chinese herbal tea ever since, and if I
could I'd load up on coconut water. My shirts are soaking wet within 5
minutes of being out of the AC, and I am reminded (by someone very special)
that it is still winter in Seattle and I can't bitch and expect any
sympathy. She didn't use those exact words, but I know what she meant... I
will, however, cry myself a river.

And the deck games continue. My latest game is to harass the bosun. I do
two things: First, a game I call "squelch." I stand near him with my radio
turned all the way up so that when he attempts to call anyone with his
radio, the feedback is so bad nothing comes through but a horrible squeal.
After two days of this my favorite deck-mate, the "Fisherman," figured out
what I'm doing and he started doing it, too... so now every time I hear the
radio squeal I cannot help but laugh. And it does, indeed, make the days go
by faster. The second thing I do is question everything he wants us to do,
and justify my line of reasoning with "...because that's the way it's done."
As it turns out, there is almost no verbal defense against the claim of
"because that's the way it's done," and he flounders around for a few
minutes until he gives in.

And another game is called "Throw _________ under the bus," where
___________ is the person who has most recently earned my ire. As it turns
out, this person is almost always the Wrestler- a man I genuinely like but
about whom I have no misconceptions. He is a shameless back-biter, renown
for his simultaneous laziness and skill at stirring up shit wherever he
goes. He creates a maelstrom of discontent in his wake as he plays people
against each other, and he proudly claims the ship could not function
without his hard work, even though he spends his days wandering around the
ship expending incredible amounts of energy avoiding work altogether. And
stirring up shit, of course. After being thrown under the bus a number of
times, I figured out the rules to his game and now I offer him the face of
reasonableness, jocularity, and conspiratorial brotherhood while I slander
him to anyone who will listen behind his back. Today, after slandering him
heinously, I then put on my headphones and pretended not to hear anything he
said. It was very satisfying.