I have been accused in the past of over-celebrating my birthday.

It all started about 10 years ago when I thought “why not take a couple of days out to party?”

Milestone birthdays for many people offer an excuse for an even bigger event. But to me, every birthday is literally another trip around the sun to be proud of, and the fact is, every year the number gets bigger, and the number of celebrations ahead gets smaller.

Some people say age is just a number, and I’m one of those folks, but the fact is, those numbers do get change inversely.

But like a fine wine, I like to think that we’re all getting better with age. My birthday plans are no exception for 2026. You may disagree with me on the celebration improving, but nobody can deny that they certainly got longer.

Back in October - a full four months ahead of the big day, I started thinking through it.

Without realizing it, the internal decision was made to supersize the 2026 event - and boy did it turn out to be a doozy!

From 27 January, when I boarded the first plane, to 1 March, when I landed back home - that turned out to be 34 days.

Epic, even by my standards.

The goal when I started thinking about it was to visit and spend time with the most important people in my life who are still on the planet.

England was the natural place to start - two people to see, one in the north and one in the south. So, on 27 January, I headed East.

Then back for time at home and the actual day itself.

Nine days later on a plane going West, this time to see my two sons who have both escaped the madness of South Florida and made their homes and careers closer to the International Dateline.

Six places, a bunch of planes and a few trains but no automobiles.

A sandwich with a slice of Europe on the bottom, a birthday filling, and a slice of the Western USA on the top.

34 days to reflect on what has passed, where we are now and what the future might hold.

In August 2020, I was invited to deliver a Fountaine Pajot Saba 50 catamaran from Fort Lauderdale to Newport. After meeting the owner (a relatively inexperienced offshore sailor), looking the boat over, and meeting the other 2 crew members (French, husband and wife), I decided to take the job

Sailing Good Vibrations up the Gulf Stream seemed like a great chance to get back to the legendary music of The Beach Boys

So, I created a playlist of classic Beach Boys tunes, looking forward to sharing my love of Bryan Wilson’s genius with Bill, the owner and the French couple. After all, surely only a Beach Boys fan would name their boat after that classic tune?

36 hours into the passage, Bill and I were on deck together and I said “shall I put on Good Vibrations and a few other classic Beach Boys tunes?”

“Beach Boys tunes?” replied a puzzled Bill

“Yeah, you know, Good Vibrations” I said

Bill responded “I don’t know what you’re talking about”

“You did name the boat after the tune?” I asked

“No” said Bill categorically

“So where does the boat name come from?” I inquired

Bill then explained…

As a career US Navy man, he was a submariner specializing in monitoring the things that spin - drive shafts on engines and the like. When something gets out of true, the vibrations can cause damage to the mechanics - the Vibration Engineer takes care of this

So, Bill ends his Navy career and finds himself with a niche consulting gig running vibration engineering seminars around the country for anyone who cares to listen

He was approached by a couple of tech wiz kids from California who had an idea for a product that would monitor vibrations in commercial applications. They had the tech know-how and finance but needed a subject matter expert, which is where Bill came in

The product was ingenious - a tiny vibration sensor with a wifi link that signals when vibrations might be going off true. Put these devices everywhere there might be something that could go wrong, and the diagnostic alerts will direct the maintenance staff to the area before anything gets bad - classic preventative maintenance

So, they cut a deal - Bill provides technical advice on things vibrational, and additionally gets 20% off the top for any sales that he introduces

This arrangement is working fine when Bill gets a call from one of his former seminar attendees who explains that he has a vibration issue in his job at a warehouse in Joliet, Illinois

Bill goes to visit the warehouse and its full of stuff moving around, with thousands of little wheels spinning underneath the moving products inside this palace of conveyors

Bill’s ex-student explained that as maintenance manager, any conveyor that breaks down has the potential to cause the whole distribution center to grind to a halt - a major problem for the ‘on time every time’ delivery ethos, and certainly not career enhancing for the maintenance manager

Bill explained that the vibration sensors strategically placed will provide key early warnings of potential issues in the conveyor system and provide essential preventative maintenance diagnostic data

“Lets do a pilot right away” says the maintenance manager

The pilot was a roaring success, and rapidly extended to the entire distribution center

A major South American river lent its name to the customer, and after the Joliet project it was extended…

…to ALL distribution centers worldwide

All of a sudden the startup was having to produce literally millions of these tiny wifi enabled vibration sensors, and Bill is regularly receiving huge commission checks

What was he going to do with all this money ?

Well, as a country music fan, Bill had this Chris Janson hit on heavy rotation

So, Bill bought his boat, and named it after the wealth created by the little wifi sensor that made sure that the vibrations were good

However, on the two 1,000nm+ passages I made on this vessel, my musical desires were satisfied (with the help of my headphones) by the late, great Bryan Wilson’s masterpiece

A consulting colleague of 20+ years ago, mentioned that he always tried to read authors from places you visit to get a sense of the culture that you will encounter. I’ve found that to be good advice, especially when I have time on the journey to think about where I’m going

So, in the summer of 2024, I found myself on an ocean passage to Portugal from North America. It’s customary for mariners to stop in the Azores - remote volcanic islands some 2,500 miles from new York and almost 900 miles from the coast of Portugal

Looking for literary works about the Azores I found Daniel Kastin

Born in California, but with an Azorian mother, he spent a lot of time in the islands as he was growing up and clearly is proud of his mid-Atlantic island heritage

Of the 18 short stories in this award winning 2012 collection, all but 2 are set in the 9 islands that make up the archipelago

Ronald Dahl’s Tales of the Unexpected, which I enjoyed reading back in the 1980’s is a similar collection of stories that have an unexpected twist in their tale. But there is a Kafkaesque element to Kastin’s efforts - think Metamorphosis, when Gregos Sansa wakes up to discover he’s become a giant insect. The ‘out there’ premise upon which some of these stories are based is marvelous

It’s a good read, but 1 tale in particular jumped out at me

Dona Leonor’s Dress is a whimsical tale about a young man’s obsession with a local girl’s dress. It’s not so much about what’s in the dress, more the dress itself that attracts our nameless protagonist

The opening sentence offers a hint of what’s to come:

“Dona Leonor’s irrepressible dress swept down the Avenida Diogo de Teive”

The dress conveys a language to him and his heart, “fanned by this language of articulate gestures, grew delirious”, and urged him “to gallop in mad pursuit.”

He follows the dress, less interested in Dona, although he has admired this young lady from afar for many years.

Dona goes about her business in town, and, as she emerges from a doorway, our infatuated friend “…stood frozen, unable to breathe or think or move, but the dress, with an exaggerated gesture, boldly brushed against my leg as it swept past me.”

With Dona unaware, the pursuit continues to her home where the chaser keeps vigil all night long, in sight of the dress which is hung up in her bedroom. Through the night, imagination takes over, as he dreams of being shipwrecked with the dress, “afloat on some planks of timber, wherein the dress, in order to save me, formed itself into a taut sail.”

Morning comes and he continues his pursuit, becoming even more enamored with the dress, and that evening he makes his move. Peering over the fence of her home, he spies the newly washed dress hanging on the clothesline, “waving wildly, trying desperately to get my attention.”

He quickly goes into the yard and takes the dress from the line, and, unnoticed, he quickly folds it and makes his way home. Buying a dressmaker’s dummy, he displays the dress in his bedroom and declares the it is “obviously proud and happy” to be with him.

They live happily ever after, “just the two of us, Dona Leonor’s dress and me dancing on air.”

Quite simply this is an absurd tale about an obsessive, thieving, peeping Tom.

However Kastin delightfully relates the story with such skill that it is easy to overcome one’s natural reaction to what many might describe as the perverted behavior of our protagonist

I smiled at the happily ever after…

On August 6, 2025, I was on the Seattle monorail going to the Paul Simon concert with my son Liam. A stop at the Armory at Seattle Center for a bite to eat before the show was in order since the concert venue is a short walk from there

As we were eating, I noticed an alarming number of millennials dressed up in extreme party gear - feathers, glittery jackets, and too many sequins for a man of my age to witness

I was puzzled…were these folks also going to take the walk to McCaw Hall to see the Paul Simon Show? There were clearly 2 generations eating in the food court that night - my generation (who grew up in the 1960s and 1970s) and millennials who came of age after 2000

By some strange coincidence I was reading The Who’s lead singer Roger Daltrey’s biography entitled My Generation at that time - pretty spooky, eh?

The sequined feathered partygoers were not destined for McCaw Hall. Their destination was ANOTHER venue pretty much equidistant from the Armory - this was the first night of Lady Gaga’s stop in town at the Climate Pledge Arena

A prodigious talent and destined to be the voice of her generation, Lady Gaga has literally spanned generations with her musical talents

Tony Bennet, born as one of the last of the Greatest Generation, was my one of mother’s heartthrobs. Along with her fellow Silent Generation colleagues, I remember her swooning over Bennet’s romantic ballads and claiming to leave his heart in Northern California

Tony Bennet and Lady Gaga collaborated on a number of projects, their first being their 2014 US chart topping collection of jazz standards which was followed up in 2021 by their Grammy award winning follow up Love For Sale record

So we have Tony Bennet from the Greatest Generation, my mum from the Silent Generation, me as a Baby Boomer and Lady Gaga as a Millennial

By my count, that’s 4 generations

Oh yeah - before I forget, I caught my Millennial son Liam quietly listening to Frank Sinatra tunes when he was a teenager…

Lets celebrate the musical mastery of Lady Gaga and Tony Bennet with their recording of one of Cole Porter’s classics…

In a career spanning over 50 years, Paul Simon is acknowledged as one of the foremost singer songwriters of the popular music genre

I have had the pleasure of seeing him perform several times, including the Graceland Tour in April 1987 at the Royal Albert Hall in London with the full cast of 24 South African musicians that he recorded that amazing album with

I was also able to witness the silky smooth voice of his former partner Art Garfunkel in Toronto when Art did a solo tour back in the 1990s

So, it's fair to say that I am a Paul Simon fan in pretty much every sense of the word

At 83 years of age, he has suffered hearing loss and hadn’t performed live since 2018, although he released his 15th studio album Seven Psalms to critical acclaim and a Grammy nomination in 2023

He announced what many consider could be his last full scale tour, starting in April 2025

Watch the video trailer for the tour

Lasting 4 months, the tour was scheduled with a final date in Seattle on August 3rd. The dates and venues didn’t coincide with any place I was expecting to be near so I resigned myself to not seeing this master of his craft in person again

However, in mid-July, it was announced that 2 additional nights would be presented in Seattle on August 5 and 6 - and be filmed for archive purposes and possible future broadcast

What if…

…I was able to get to the other side of the continent to visit my son AND see Paul Simon ?

Well, it all worked out, and I flew to Seattle for a wonderful mid-week break and was able to spend some quality time with son Liam AND take him to see the final show of the tour on August 6th. The relatively intimate McCaw Hall, home of the Seattle Opera and Pacific Northwest Ballet was the perfect venue for what would prove to be an amazing performance

I was certainly not disappointed… stay tuned for more about a truly memorable evening

As businesses grow, what worked for a startup tends to not be what’s needed for the next phase for an enterprise that has become established and proven its profitability

The name of the game shifts to growth from surviving the startup phase

I’ve been working with a small, but highly profitable company (let’s call it Company Q), helping to get them organized for their next phase of growth. Part of my work involves putting in place checks and balances, and controls and guardrails (known in the finance business as internal controls) so that things don’t go wrong in the normal course of events

Of course a bad actor who is determined to do harm will find a way to circumvent the controls, but that’s a different issue

One of Company Q’s trusted and long serving employees (let’s call him Steve) who has been with the business since it started made a bad call

Steve had previously asked the owner for permission to do something out of the ordinary with the payroll and the owner reluctantly agreed. A couple of months later, Steve made the same request which again was reluctantly approved. I asked the owner if he was aware of any problems in Steve’s personal life which might have led to these requests, but he was not aware of anything

The same unusual payroll matter popped up again, but this time without any discussion with the owner, who was very angry and clearly felt the trust he had placed in Steve had been betrayed. The owner mentioned that he was worried that if Steve had done this without permission, what else might be going on?

My advice was “let’s suspend Steve on full pay while we do a quick investigation into the areas of concern”. So, a suspension letter was issued, clearly stating the cause for the suspension

36 hours later no further irregularities were apparent and on the face of it, this was an isolated transgression. The owner and I decided to invite Steve\ to discuss the issue and share his version of events. Monday at 9:00am was the appointed time

When we set this meeting up, the owner was 50-50 on whether to keep Steve on board or let him go. Its tough to let someone go who had worked so hard to build the business

At 6:30am on Monday, the owner received a text message declining to meet

Here’s the text message Steve sent to Company Q’s owner:

I recognize the importance of being fully informed to address the current situation appropriately, given the circumstances surrounding my formal notice of suspension and complaint.

Could you please send me the details of the complaint before we speak?

We will need to reschedule our conversation as I will need to review what is provided prior to speaking. We can utilize Google Meet to maintain privacy and ensure a comfortable and structured conversation.

My email is Steve@Iamsomewherepanicking.com

Thank you for your understanding.

At 8:30 when I got to the office for the now cancelled meeting the owner was furious

“That’s it! Steve can’t stay. I can’t handle any more of this b*l$h!t” he exclaimed

The decision was made

Things moved fast; Steve’s access to the company bank account and payroll system was blocked, his email account was shut down and the locks to the office were changed

Apart from assuaging the owner’s rage, the goal was to protect the company from any fraud that we may not have already discovered to ensure that no damage could be inflicted on the business by Steve going forward

Steve was formerly terminated later that same day

After the dust settled, I reflected on the events

Following the suspension, it seems clear that Steve was worried about his future with the firm and he understood how upset the owner was

He turned to ChatGPT or some other AI agent for advice, and was provided with the text message that he used to blow up his one chance to save his job

Steve blindly used the AI response without running it through his own human intelligence system, which we normally call a brain. The complaint the AI agent was requesting information about was clearly and unambiguously stated in Steve’s suspension letter

Unfortunately, Steve didn’t have the presence of mind to share that with the AI agent

Steve (and I fear many others) really don’t understand that any answer from an AI large language model should be used with caution, and very often need a human touch

He failed to grasp one of the key issues associated with AI, namely that it’s a tool to help with a problem, rather than the whole answer itself

It’s very clear that results from AI agents need to be verified before being trusted (thanks to President Reagan for that prescient advice)

sadly, people who haven’t grasped AI’s current limitations are being emboldened - and in this case with disastrous results

Steve is now on the job market without a favorable reference from his employer of almost 5 years

“You can’t fix stupid” is an old saying

In 2025, we might be seeing the emergence of a complimentary idiom

“Artificial Intelligence + Natural Stupidity = Potential Disaster”

Position: 34 17’ N 063 25’ W

24 hour run: 132nm

Total distance: 132nm

Avg 2kts wind in 1st 24 hrs, outlook similar for next 24 hrs then wind building

Under engine on a flat calm sea

Heading 040 degrees with 3 other boats in a Northerly track, anticipating pressure gradient between Azores High and Low forming off the American NE coast; hoping this will pay off on the 1,800nm passage

Highlights:

• Pretty sunset

• Amazing moon

• Unusual cloud formation

As the Christmas holiday approaches, I could not resist sharing a piece written by Dan Rather and Eliot Kirschner on their Steady Substack

So, here are their wonderful words about a classic piece of music, just as they published it on December 22, 2023

‘Tis the season for many things, and one of those is music. Christmas carols fill the air. Even those who do not celebrate the holiday often find resonance in the beauty the music can evoke. The songs speak of many things: the story of Christmas, its celebration, and the sights and sounds of winter. There are words of peace, contemplation, and goodwill. 

The very act of caroling is itself an expression of art and a symbol of the bonds that hold us together. The merging of voices in song, with or without accompanying instrumentation, is a profoundly human endeavor present in cultures in every part of the world. And while professional musicians certainly have put their stamp on the season (hello, Mariah Carey), this is also a time for amateur voices — from street corners to holiday parties to church sanctuaries — to shine. 

There is so much beautiful talent in this world, especially when we can come together in peace. The melding voices of a choir offers a particularly precious sign of hope at a time that is all too fractured and discordant. 

We wanted to celebrate Christmas in song as A Reason To Smile, while also acknowledging that this holiday is not a religious tradition of many of our readers. We have chosen what has been dubbed the most recorded Christmas song of all time, “Silent Night.” The words come from an 1816 poem — “Stille Nacht” — written by Austrian priest Joseph Mohr. The story goes that he was inspired by an evening walk amid a quiet snow-filled landscape. An era of violent conflict had recently convulsed Europe with the Napoleonic Wars. A silent night was something to cherish. 

The music came a few years later, a collaboration with a local teacher and organist, Franz Xaver Gruber. The original melody evolved slightly over the years to what we know today. A song with more than 137,000 recordings offers a lot of options to feature. We chose a few from different musical genres, proving there are many ways to honor a classic and celebrate the season. 

Merry Christmas to those who celebrate, and a restful and reflective time to all. 

We start with the wonderful opera star Jessye Norman accompanied by a boys choir: 

Here is country superstar Brad Paisley’s version:

And we close with a jazzy rendition, courtesy of the Jazz At Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis:

There’s an area in South Eastern Pennsylvania where town names have a biblical ring to them; Bethlehem, Zionsville, Emmaus, and Nazareth. Hold that thought…

In August 1973, I took a bus from Manchester to the Ivor Mairants Music Centre, in Rathbone Place London W1 to pick up a guitar that I had ordered by mail (the old old fashioned paper type) a couple of months before

Ivor Mairaints was the sole UK distributor of Martin guitars at the time

I picked up my guitar, then went to the Royal Festival Hall to see the Kinks play a concert. I checked my new toy into the cloakroom during the show, and then scooted over to Victoria Bus Station to take the night bus back to my home in Manchester

I played the life out of that D-18 for the best part of 10 years as I was famously unsuccessful in my quest to become England’s answer to James Taylor

Fast forward 50 years to October 2023 and I still own that guitar. Here’s a memory that I’ve carried with me for half a century

In 1833, a German craftsman named Christian Frederick Martin moved to New York from Germany. Using the skills he learned back in Europe, CF Martin started a business making stringed instruments, principally mandolins and guitars

Martin moved his workshop to Nazareth, Pennsylvania in 1838 where it remains today. Over the last 190 years, The CF Martin Company has gained a reputation for producing some of the finest guitars in the world

This is a true family business, and through six generation, is now being led by Chris Martin (who is no relation to the Coldplay lead singer who coincidentally has often been seen brandishing a custom Martin guitar). Additionally, many of the craftsman employed in the Nazareth plant today are 2nd and 3rd generation employees

Founder CF Martin Sr developed a new technique to strengthen a guitar’s body and generate a richer tone when he invented X-bracing in the mid-19th century. This revolutionized guitar making at the time, as the company evolved the shape and sound of today’s popular American flat-top acoustic guitar

Between 1915 and 1930, the Frank Henry Martin-led company produced the Dreadnought model, in response to demand from Hawaiian guitarists who needed an instrument with volume that could be heard in live performances. Of course, this was way before microphones and amplification were used

Named after the world’s biggest battleship of the time, the “D” model became a mainstay of the American performing musician. Arguably, the Dreadnought, with its larger and deeper body style, is the most important and influential guitar body ever built

As the proud original owner of that 1972 D-18, the letter I received signed by Frank H Martin III welcoming me as a Martin owner after I registered my purchase has pride of place on the wall of my small home music studio

These guitars have a unique role in American history, and major figures in the history of American music have played Martins, including the father of country music Jimmie Rogers, the singing cowboy Gene Autry, and the king of rock and roll Elvis Presley as well as more recent icons like Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, the Beatles and Ed Sherrin

So, on a brisk and chilly weekend in October I found myself in Allentown, just a stone’s throw from Nazareth in Pennsylvania’s Lehigh alley. This was my opportunity for a side trip to the Martin factory

With a flight leaving Allentown on Monday at 12:30pm, the only available 1 hour factory tour was 10:00am. That allowed for 30 mins to get back to the airport, return the rental car and check in for the flight…it would be tight, but I decided to give it a go

Going online I learned that each tour was limited to perhaps 10 people, and only the 10:00am tour on that Monday had availability. Could this be a sign from above telling me to lock in my pilgrimage?

I booked the tour…feeling like one of Geoffrey Chaucer’s 14th century century pilgrims on their journey to Canterbury

The tour was simply amazing

Our guide walked us around the factory, keeping us between the yellow lines on the floor which mark the safe area for visitors. We were shown every stage in the manufacturing process, from raw pieces of wood right through to the finished product

The process starts with the flat piece of (often) spruce which forms the top of the guitar. The blank piece of wood is cut using a laser cutting machine. A sound hole is cut out of the top before it moves on to the next stage. I’ve always wondered “Where do all those holes go?”

The innovative Martin cross bracing is added on the inside of the top…

After the sides are shaped, they are prepared for attaching to the top and back. Despite the manufacturing process using many modern automated techniques, simple clothes pins are used to secure the shaped sides to the internal components as the glue cures to its full bonding strength

Binding is inserted between the finished sides, top and back and glued. Pink tape is used for the same purpose the clothes pegs in the previous stage, namely to ensure that the glue bonds to the components correctly

Sides are stained, the scratch plate is added and a varnish is added to the complete body

The varnished body is polished using a robotic system before the final assembly where the neck is added

The whole manufacturing process takes around 2 weeks for each guitar. The 500,000 square foot Nazareth Factory along with a similarly sized plant in Northern Mexico produce 180,000 complete guitars annually…a far cry from the volumes CF Martin could ever have conceived

For a musician this was a fascinating hour, and as a 50 year Martin owner, I learned so much about the craftsmanship which goes into what is acknowledged as one of the world’s finest stringed musical instruments

As we left, the answer to the eternal question about the sound holes was answered…most of them are recycled, as is much of the wood trimmed from the various components

However, an amazing keepsake is given to everyone who has the privilege of a Martin factory tour. I doubt if Chaucer’s pilgrims had such a keepsake from their journey to Canterbury…

Leaving, I noticed a really nice touch outside the entrance to the factory walking over a larger than life fretted guitar neck set into the paving

This piece contains links to a number of musical performances. If you have limited time, it might be best to read first, then go back to the music later. However, if you have the luxury of 10 minutes or more to spend on Words & Music at one sitting, be my guest…

I was asked to deliver a new sailboat from Palm Beach to Houston a couple of years ago. Building my playlist for the ride I saw that we would pass Galveston in the final stage of the journey

The obvious tune jumped into my head - Glen Campbell’s smash hit Galveston from 1969. Before leaving I grabbed a few other versions of the song to listen to in my quiet hours alone during the passage

Composed by the prolific Jimmy Webb, this was written at the height of the Vietnam War, and takes the point of view of a soldier desperate to overcome his fear of death in combat by reminiscing on romantic encounters back in Southeast Texas

Glen Campbell, switched up Webb’s original arrangement of Galveston with a rousing anthem-style chorus. In a 2016 interview, Webb explains

“I play it for the audience the way I wrote it, which is kind of elegiac and more subdued than Glen’s rip-roaring, uptempo version of the song”

Over the 1,047nm, 174hr passage I got to appreciate the slower ballad approach that Webb speaks of. Listen to his 2010 commentary and live performance of the song from WFUV radio in New York

My personal favorite version of Galveston is by David Nail from his 2014 album I’m A Fire with Lee Anne Womak singing a wonderfully sensitive vocal harmony, that amazing Nashville country pedal steel guitar and Glen Campbell-style guitar solo toward the end of the piece

But of course, its the original Glen Campbell hit that everybody knows…recorded live with orchestra some 32 years after the original hit featuring his virtuoso guitar playing

Not surprisingly, the cruiser USS Galveston adopted the song as its own. According to Webb, when the USS Galveston was based in the South China Sea, it was supported by the oil replenishment vessel USS Wichita. he sailors aboard two U.S. Navy warships As it awaited refueling, the USS Galveston would play Galveston over its PA system to the approaching USS Wichita, which responded by blasting Webb’s Wichita Lineman back across the open water

A great story about a great song…

Poetry figured in my early literature education

This was one of the first poems I was exposed to as a young child as I was learning the power of words to delight. We recited it as a class when learning to read at 5 or 6 years old. I can’t remember the rest of the poem but those lines from the opening stanza still bring a smile to my face.

Edward Lear, as well as being an accomplished artist wrote The Owl and the Pussycat

I challenge you to show me any five year old child who doesn’t smile at the image of a those 2 protagonists in a boat

Lear was born in London in 1812. As an artist, he is perhaps best known for his work as an ornithological draughtsman for the Zoological Society. His first book was published in 1830, and included the parrot illustration above. Lear is acknowledged as being the first to draw from live birds rather than skins, and many compare his work to that of John James Audubon

In 1832, Lear entered the service of The Earl of Derby who had his own private menagerie, where he produced illustrations of Derby’s birds and animals. Later in life, he also illustrated some of Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s poems

His 1846 book was a collection of 109 delightfully nonsensical limericks, and Lear popularized what has become know as the genre of literary nonsense

The limerick has emerged to be a popular (especially with children) poetic form, with a standard structure, meter and the A-A-B-B A rhyming pattern, as in the example below (author unknown):

I was delighted to learn recently of Fred Hornaday, the self-proclaimed King of Limericks whose web site greets us with a delightful proclamation in the troubling times of 2023:

The Owl & the Pussycat was written for the Earl of Derby’s children as a song, and Lear, wearing his musician’s hat, often accompanied his literary works in private social gatherings, playing the piano, flute, accordion or guitar. It seems fitting to close with the final lines

The Poetry Foundation has the whole poem on line here

The New York Times runs their Metropolitan Diary feature every Sunday in the New York section. Occupying a quarter of a broadsheet page, it comprises readers’ short diary entries related to life in New York City. I enjoy reading it each week

There was a piece on Sunday, October 29, 2023 that resonated with me:

In early May 2023, I just had to be in London

There was a new king

This does not happen often

I felt the need to be in my home country to experience the collective national euphoria of the coronation of King Charles III

After a few days with my family in the North of England it was then the train ride down to London for the big event. This was to be followed by a train ride under the waters of the English Channel for a week in my favorite European city, Paris

The plan was not to actually stay in Paris, but an apartment in Versailles, which is a short ride (on a train) from the Arc de Triomphe and La Tour Eiffel and all the other pleasures center of Paris offers

Several months earlier, after realizing that there would be some rare live opera performance in the magnificently restored Royal Opera inside the Chateau de Versailles (Louis XIV’s magnificently ostentatious palace), tickets were booked. Just 3 performances of Lully’s Armide during the week was too good to pass up

Our connected world meant that it was super easy to book the tickets (in the Royal Box, no less) online. Electronic tickets arrived by email moments after my Visa card was hammered for significantly fewer Euros than Ticketmaster might charge for any North American concert

On Monday May 8, with King Charles recovering from a his coming out party at which over 50 million delirious citizens took joy in, the Eurostar was boarded in London. In next to no time, after stepping out into the concourse of the Gare du Nord, it was a rapid transfer to the commuter train and onward to Versailles and the apartment for the final week of the trip. Less than a mile from the gates of the Chateau, was a cozy and wonderfully modern living space which began its life perhaps 250 years ago as a a stable off the courtyard of a large house owned by some aristocrat member of the King’s court

I was eagerly awaiting the performance of Jean-Baptiste Lully’s 5 act 17th century musical tragedy based on a book by Phillipe Quinault. This work was first performed at the Theatre de Palais Royale in Paris in 1686, and subsequently presented to Louis XIV in the Royal Opera. I was particularly looking forward to the period costumes of the 17th Century

Saturday May 13th arrived and it was important to be on time at the gates of Versailles in good time for the 7:30 performance. All tickets for the Royal Box included a pre-show reception with Champagne…

The courtyard of the Chateau was almost deserted around 6:45pm. It also seemed a little strange that there was nobody in the lobby of the Royal Opera, save a few ushers dressed smartly in black suits

“Vous avez billets?” (Do you have tickets) we were asked

“Oui” I replied and presented the printed copy of the tickets that were emailed all those months ago

My heart sunk when I saw that the show started at 7:00pm. That explained why nobody else was in the lobby. Damn, I thought, there goes the champagne reception.

Ah well, at least we had the show, with those amazing costumes

“Oh Dear” I said out loud when I realized that not only did I have the time of the performance wrong, but our tickets were for a different day, Thursday May 11. I was engulfed by a wave of utter and complete embarrassment as well as the feeling of a hole in my wallet as a couple of hundred Euros drifted down the suwannee river

Saying nothing, the usher said “Venez, vitement” (come, quickly)

Since there are no elevators in the Royal Opera (Mr Otis did his invention stuff in the 1800s), she led a brisk march up a number of ornate tiled staircases, and through some dusty old corridors of the magnificently restored 17th Century Royal Opera

She opened a door and the instruction was to “Asseyez la” (sit there) on an empty bench at the back of the what I later discovered was the actual Royal Box. She then disappeared

Every seat in the box, including the cheap seats on the bench at the back had a great view of the stage

The purchased tickets were for 2 of the 12 seats in the Royal Box. There was clearly no grounds to ask the couple sitting in our seats to move … we were in the right theater … in the right box … but on the wrong day

Seated just as the prologue was concluding, allowed Armide’s 5 acts to be observed from the very seats where king Louis XIV’s servants sat as they waited on him over 300 years ago. That felt pretty cool

The set and costumes were contemporary but any possible disappointment at not seeing the traditional costumes quickly evaporated

However, I was shocked (pleasantly so) to see the orchestra playing the original score on instruments faithful to the 17th century - including 3 different sizes of lute

The performance ended with several curtain calls

As the Royal Opera emptied, one could only marvel at the stunning architecture and decor of the ceiling…

…and the boxes where members of Louis’ court indulged their love of music and cake in the 17th Century

Walking home after the show, I couldn’t help imagining how all those candles would have been lit…

Elon Musk, entrepreneur billionaire and serial attention seeker is well known for businesses whose names start with S or T and perhaps even X; Space-X, Starlink, Tesla and X (the business formerly known as Twitter)

Space-X rockets regularly lift off from Cape Canaveral. On a number of occasions I’ve been sailing along Florida’s Space Coast to hear the Coast Guard broadcast the warning on VHF channel 16 of a scheduled launch and to observe the exclusion zone under the rocket flight path

It’s clearly good to be away from any falling debris in the event of an incident just after takeoff, but this invariably causes a course correction on the boat and adds to the Southbound journey

I heard of a cruise ship that DID NOT get out of the Cape Canaveral exclusion zone at the required time. This led to the launch being scrubbed and a multi-million dollar law suit against the cruise line. That was probably not a career enhancing event for the ship’s captain…

A large number of those launches have payloads of 30 or more satellites as Starlink builds a constellation of low orbit satellites that form the backbone of its global internet access system

(If you didn’t know, this is the communication system helping the Ukrainians maintain connectivity despite Russia’s attempt to destroy the country’s land-based telecommunication infrastructure)

It’s also enabling sailors to stay in touch

I wrote this on a long distance boat delivery more than 1,000nm from the nearest land. It was the first time I had used Starlink and it gives full internet connectivity at pretty good bandwidth. Starlink even has its own app that shows the current connectivity speed

As a sailor, its absolutely marvelous for getting up to date weather GRIBs and other passage information

I thought I might also be able to check my bank account balance BUT the IP address  that showed up was in Ecuador (that trip was across the Pacific) and my bank blocked access, probably thinking someone was tying to hack my account. No problem…just fire up the VPN that shows a US IP address and off you go!

Musk purchased Twitter in 2022 and subsequently renamed it X. In the last 10 years or so, X along with the likes of the Facebook, TicToc and Instagram, social media platforms have come to dominate our culture

In 2016 when I joined a boat on the Miami to Nassau race, I was shocked that the predominantly younger (25 - 40 years old) crew didn’t seem to be able to survive without social media connections through their smart phones. They were posting pictures and swiping through their news feeds ALL the time, it seemed.  One girl seemed positively distraught when we lost cell phone coverage about 15 miles offshore…but then she came back to life when a Bahamas Telecom signal was picked up when we got across the Gulf Stream

Facebook, Twitter, it’s all the same meaningless nonsense to me and sadly, fertile ground for gossip, half truths rumors and conspiracy theories

I always loved getting away from the media when I went sailing offshore, but not any more - at least when we have cell phone coverage

On the upside, ocean cruisers who used to keep in touch with daily SSB radio nets now have FaceBook groups

In March 2023, Raindancer, a 44ft monohull en route from the Galápagos Islands to the Marquesas in French Polynesia, was sunk after being hit by a whale

4 people in a life raft sent a text message, a contact posted to their cruiser FaceBook group and then someone ashore co-ordinated the rescue efforts. They were picked up after 10 hours by another cruiser on the same passage who was also a member of the same social media group

Read about the incident here

The growth of electric vehicles, of which Tesla had first mover advantage has also impacted sailing. Lithium Ion batteries are integral to e-cars and a few years ago Musk built the largest battery factory in the world to meet Tesla’s demand. The Chinese have started mass-producing Li-ion battery systems and of course economics 101 tells us that prices will fall when supply is increased

Gone are the days when the electrical power on a sailboat was a few deep cycle lead acid batteries. We now have a bank of high efficiency Lithium batteries and increasingly some form of solar recharging capability and a compact generator

So conservation of electricity becomes much less of an issue on board. I’ve recently worked on boats with no propane gas - induction cooktops, microwave and convection ovens are now replacing the gimbaled 2-burner stove

So, we’re now in a new connected world powered by electricity when we go out there on the ocean, and Elon Musk has been a major contributor

Traveling on the highway is a recurring theme in American culture and pop songs. Apparently you’ve been able to get your kicks on Route 66 since 1946

Let’s look at how 2 consummate masters of the craft of songwriting converge on the same subject

Joni Mitchell received a lot of attention in 2018 on the occasion of her 75th birthday. An all-star tribute concert led by Rufus Wainwright (the son of one of Mitchell’s contemporaries from the ‘70s) commemorated the innovative songstress whose back catalogue includes Blue, which sits in the upper echelons of Rolling Stones top 500 albums of all time. The renewed interest occasioned by her birthday celebrations drew me back to her 1976 album Hejira, with its experimental collaborations with jazz musicians

When I first heard Coyote I was grabbed by the highly unusual rhythmic counterpoint between the guitar chords and Jaco Pastorius’ haunting bass line with Mitchell’s voice floating over the top; but I never really paid attention to the lyrics. However, Glen Hansard’s faithful live rendition of the tune in the 2018 concert drew me into the words lurking behind that music

Coyote is about a predator but not one of the wolf-like variety you might think

Mitchell wrote the song during her time with Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Review in 1976. It tells the story of a mildly predatory older man interacting with a younger woman in a bar. She’s traveling alone across the USA, always 1 step ahead of the people she meets and the situations she encounters

But what is so haunting in the tune for me are words in the chorus as our protagonist sings of being a prisoner of the white lines on the freeway

Mitchell mocks the Coyote lyrically as she observes him staring a hole in his scrambled eggs

And as the song closes, our traveler looks behind and moves on from the encounter with the Coyote, declaring she is a …hitcher…prisoner.. of the fine white lines…of the free freeway in the final iteration of the chorus

Listen to a few bars of the original recording of the song while reading the lyrics to truly appreciate the wonderful words which were for me hidden for so long behind a haunting mystical musical sound characteristic of Mitchell’s extensive body of work

The Last Waltz, Martin Scorcese’s 1976 movie of the final live performance by The Band, features a masterly live performance of Coyote beginning at 1:50 in this video clip from the film

In Hansard’s 2018 version, the emphasis is initially on the lyrics, with a bold vocal delivery from an artist with the privilege of performing the song in the presence of Joni at 75. The way he aggressively launches into the song seems almost like he’s saying “you didn’t think I could pull this tricky vocal piece off, did you?”… Well he certainly does

You could consider this essentially a vocal performance with a reimagined hint of country instrumental accompaniment. However, the performance retains the percussion and rhythm from Mitchell’s original arrangement, underpinning the drawl of the fiddle. This performance showcases the instrumental elements in an almost 2 minute close to the performance music after delivering the Coyote story in the lyrics

Listen to all 6 minutes and 36 seconds of Glen Hansard’s live recording…

The prose in Coyote would cause any self-respecting poet to glow with pride. The song is a masterpiece of creative words and innovative music from a massively talented artist

Lets now turn to a Bruce Springsteen song originally recorded in the studio in 2019

The Boss as he is affectionately known came to fame in the 1970s with his brand of music we have come to know as heartland rock - hard driving tunes with socially conscious poetic lyrics touching the heart of American blue collar culture. He has taken to adding commentary on his words and music and producing companion works in a documentary movie-like format

Two of Springsteen‘s films, Western Stars (2019) and Letters From You (2021), combine musical performances with his commentary to great effect

The Western Stars film is a live performance of a collection of songs previously recorded in the studio. It was filmed in the intimate setting of the converted barn of Springsteen’s New Jersey farm. Accompanied not by the East Street Band, the supporting musical cast includes a small string section which gives a wonderful broad musical perspective on this selection of poignant songs

The Wayfarer opens with a delicate hook played by the string section - a far cry from the crashing electric Fender guitar chords and Max Weinberg’s powerhouse drums we all love about Springsteen’s East Street brand of stadium rock

The song tells the story of a traveling man, roaming across the country. I get the image of a hitch hiker meeting truck drivers - creatures of the road who I’m sure are grateful for company in the cab as they pilot their 18-wheelers along the Interstate highways

We hear in the chorus that the wheels are hissin’ and the highways’s spinning round and round as Springsteen paints an evocative picture of his character wandering across the continent

There is a feeling of triumph in the instrumental interlude, then the tune comes down to the reality of life as the vocal chorus line repeats. Watch all 4 minutes and 42 seconds of the live performance…

Coyote and The Wayfarer, written almost 50 years apart share the same subject and quality of storytelling. They demonstrate the power of the pop song art form to transmit the mind to another place with words and music

Its easy to see why the Swedish Academy recognizes the contribution songwriters and pop music lyrics make to literature. To the surprise of many, Bob Dylan was awarded the Nobel Literature prize in 2016 “"for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition"

Joni Mitchell and Bruce Springsteen are not far behind

The world was shocked by the news from the Middle East this week

An established organization named Hamas was acting upon its stated intentions with respect to the State of Israel

In 2023, people get their news from a variety of places - many more sources than in the past

Who would have thought that a social media site might become the primary news source for some people ?

The BBC, a bastion of balanced and fair reporting has declined to call Hamas militants terrorists

Read why here

“Our business is to present our audiences with the facts, and let them make up their own minds….We don’t take sides.”

John Simpson’s eloquence and the principals that the BBC seeks to uphold can only be admired

April 8, 2023 view of our anchorage in the Marquesas

In January 2023 I learned of an opportunity to help move a sailing boat across the Pacific to the Marquesa Islands, the Easternmost archipelago of French Polynesia

The owner specified a recent transoceanic passage as a requirement, and as luck would have it, my second Transatlantic voyage ended in December 2022

I got the ride, eager to knock a few things off my bucket list; a transit of the Panama Canal, crossing the equator and sailing in the Southern Hemisphere, as well as a Pacific crossing

A quick survey of potential literature to take on the trip uncovered more than the usual swashbuckling suspects Treasure Island and Mutiny On The Bounty. Robert Louis Stevenson’s quote above from his In The South Seas led me to Herman Melville

Stuck in Panama City for a week waiting for a boat part to be shipped in from Miami enabled me to get a copy of Typee, Melville’s first published work

We all know Melville for his classic Moby Dick. Indeed, a few years earlier I packed that novel on a sailing trip between Massachusetts and Nova Scotia, crossing the very waters where Captain Ahab started his search for the monster white whale. However, I have to admit to being unable to finish reading the book while afloat due to a combination of Melville’s writing style, my lack of warm clothing in the chilly waters of the the Labrador Current, and a difficult watch rotation as a member of a small crew

I was not aware Melville’s first published works were based on his adventures on board whaling ships in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. We associate him with Massachusetts and indeed he boarded the whaler Acushnet in New Bedford before setting out into Buzzards Bay on his first voyage in early January 1841

Typee is his autobiographical record of abandoning that ship in the Marquesa islands. Falling sick, he was nursed back to health by the native islanders only to find that he was a captive of one of the Nuka Hiva island tribes. He escaped onto another ship and continued Westward to Tahiti and the Society islands

It’s a great read, and Melville set me up perfectly for stepping ashore on the island of Hiva Oa, some 32 days after leaving Panama City. His descriptions of the lush tropical islands are incredibly accurate, and the lack of development there makes it easy to imagine his experiences around 180 years so ago

However, getting to the Marquesas in the 1840s was significantly more perilous than my month-long passage on a luxury cruising catamaran in the 21st century

With no Panama Canal, the Acushnet sailed down the Eastern side of North and South America, around Cape Horn and Northward past Chile to Polynesia which lies just South of the equator. The passage was almost 4 months to Cape Horn after a brief stop in Rio de Janeiro. Several months later, after searching for the planet’s biggest mammals, Melville made the decision to abandon the ship. Squalid conditions on board and with Captain Valentine Pease not knowing the meaning of health and safety regulations, it’s easy to see why Melville felt the need to escape

Reading about a historical journey to Polynesia while sailing to the exact same destination is an exhilarating experience. Witnessing locations that have remained virtually unaltered for over 180 years provides a rich backdrop for appreciating Melville’s descriptive talents

Talented writers possess the ability to immerse readers in the era and setting of their stories, a feat Melville accomplishes effortlessly. Yet, it’s rare to be both figuratively and literally situated in a nearly unaltered location

Absorbing the written words while simultaneously experiencing the actual place truly highlights Melville’s brilliance in capturing the essence of the South Seas

April 8, 2023 sunset at anchor in the Marquesas

The “Beeb”, as we know the national broadcaster in Britain, produces some great TV and Radio programmes (oops- I’ve lapsed into English English…)

It is a pure coincidence that the name of this publication has also been used by the Beeb for both a TV AND a radio program

Here’s a 5 minute snippet of one of my all-time fave musicians James Taylor from an April 1994 episode of the Words & Music TV show describing and performing one of his more memorable songs, recorded unplugged and live at the BBC studio in Maida Vale…

The Words And Music radio show is a wonderful blend of words and music and is aired every Sunday evening on the classical music oriented Radio 3. At more than 1 hour in length, it’s an old fashioned long form radio show, produced to the exacting standards of the Beeb. Episodes are available for a few weeks after they are broadcast on the Beeb web site

Only the Brits could produce a single program with the title Fruits and Vegetables that combines readings from:

• Beatrix Potter

• Milton’s Paradise Lost

• Emily Dickinson

• Shakespeare

• the King James Bible

with music from

• Nina Simone

• Scott Joplin

• Handle

• The Beach Boys

• Ravi Shankar

The episode that was first broadcast in January 2021, and repeated in August 2023

Perhaps this is a little challenging for the attention span of the podcast generation of the 2020s, but it’s absolutely wonderful stuff, and your humble narrator can only dream of putting something like this together. I hate to think of the effort involved in clearing the rights for all that literature and music…

Try it for yourself - you can always press the stop button on the player

BBC Radio 3 - Words and Music

My first ever trip to the US was in 1986 as a guest of an up and coming software company called Microsoft. Along with 11 others from the UK, I was flown to Seattle as a European guest at the first of Microsoft's international developer conferences

1986 was 15 years after Starbucks was started by Zev Siegl, Jerry Baldwin and Gordon Bowker as a coffee shop down by Pike Place Market close to the waterfront in Seattle. By that time, they were well on their way to convincing the world that it was OK to pay $5 or more for a cup of designer coffee

By the 2000's Starbucks had truly revolutionized the global market for coffee, with even McDonalds and Dunkin Donuts capitulating. We now routinely see Mac Cafes and buy flavored lattes to go with our morning donut

So, in December 2018, I find myself back in Seattle with my son Louis on our Great Pacific Northwest Road Trip. Lou lived in San Francisco at the time and wanted to see Northern California's Lost Coast, Portland and Seattle. That seemed like an ambitious itinerary to squeeze in between my flight in from Palm Beach on Tuesday and the Saturday return trip from Seattle. But, since that was the kind of crazy stuff I did when I was younger, and the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, I embraced the suggestion

Lou loves his coffee, choosing to drink it cold – and often iced. Before we reached Seattle we had stopped a couple of times on the road at hipster West Coast coffee shop chains. He wanted to visit a coffee roaster in Seattle, and I was happy to go along with that. Despite not drinking the stuff much these days, I still love the smell and the whole coffee culture

Pike Place Market is a Seattle landmark, and the original Starbucks at 200 Pike St is now closed. Pilgrims of the bean now have to be content with the 10 block hike up to 1124 Pike St in order to worship at a new Starbucks shrine. It was a typically grey Seattle afternoon and in light rain we trudged up the hill from an excellent lunch down at the Market. Lou was on a mission, so I had to keep up.

Earlier in our trip, Lou was explaining the regional coffee vendors, including Dutch Brothers on the West Coast. I even succumbed and had a small latte with oat milk at La Luna cafe on SE Ash St in Portland with an amazing New American cuisine breakfast. But more of the Irish Benny and Smashed Roasted Red Potatoes some other time

I stopped drinking lattes regularly about 10 years ago, having been seduced by Starbucks during my days in London in the 1980s. Discovering my lactose intolerance as I reached my 50s and recognizing the adverse effects of acidic coffee mean I have forgone at least 6 daily expresso shots for the healing qualities of herb teas

As we climbed Pike St, the cover of the Seattle Convention Center over the road gave welcome shelter from the persistent rain

“Its just up there, on the left, the red building” I was told, which looked to be the Victoria Coffee Roasters becoming visible through the damp, grey mist of the afternoon

I trudge over the high bridge across the I-5 interstate as it snakes its way through the downtown core as we continued in the rain. For someone with mild agoraphobia, this Saturday afternoon stroll was proving to be more of a challenge that I had bargained for

Lou became more animated and I was shocked to see a less conspicuous location on the left side of the street

“We've walked all this way for Starbucks?” I thought.

Greeters at the door like Walmart? What is going on here?

The helpful “you can order coffee to my right” was met with derisory thoughts in my mind. Its only Starbucks, after all, and I've been in hundreds of these stores around the world over the last 30 years

“I know how your shops work, young lady”, my antagonized mind continued in an unspoken response

Then we entered Pandora's Box...my eyes opened wide...

The Light – warm

The Wood – reddish hues, and lots of it

The Copper – highly polished

The Industry – staff scurrying around like worker bees in this 21^st century coffee hive

The Customers – hundreds of them worshipping at this shrine of the bean

The Product – coffee-related concoctions I have never seen nor heard of before

The Bakery – wafting the smell of freshly baked bread and pastries

The Cocktail Bar – the intersection of liquor and coffee where barista meets mixologist

The Staff – hip, confident and all wearing identical signature aprons

This was clearly no ordinary Starbucks

Lou made his way to place an order and soon found himself in deep conversation with a hipster guy behind the counter after asking “what would you recommend?”

The order was placed and as we wait I notice customers carrying their drinks on funky-looking wooden trays. I suppose they don't break when they get dropped on the polished concrete floor, I thought

The order arrives and the desperate search for a place to set down the tray and savor the concoction in the crowded space begins

We notice an area with a stool open up at one of the many bars and make a beeline for it. The wooden tray finds its place on the bar and I examine its contents:

A large, heavy whisky glass containing one large square ice cube

A small wine carafe filled with a dark brown liquid

A brightly colored card describing the Knob Creek Bourbon Whiskey Barrel Aged Guatemala Roast Coffee

Lou pours a small amount of coffee over the ice cube. Wait a few minutes while the ice chills it - but doesn't dilute it as more regular-sized ice cubes would

This is how high end Scotch is served, I think

With the panache of a seasoned taster, Lou smells it, then takes a sip

“Dad – you've got to try this”

So I did. Wow! Coffee-flavored whiskey assaulted my palette....

My attention moves away from the liquid and I see the library area up the stairs, with some tourist-types taking selfies in front of the rows of books. We move towards an enclosed area with Heath Robinson-like pipes and machinery which is huffing and puffing and vibrating. Disneyworld comes to mind before I realized that this contraption is a working coffee roaster churning over the beans as they are roasting

Two worker bees oversee the machine, dressed identically in hats and leather aprons straight out of a European artisan's workshop. Their hands uniformly in their apron pockets, Perhaps the safety glasses mitigate the threat of a stray hot coffee bean hurtling through the air. I wonder is this potential danger to optic nerves an insurance requirement or has it been triggered by the attention of the Federal Occupational Health and Safety Administration...

Highly polished copper tanks, pipes and machinery...”This is Wily Wonka's Coffee Factory” exclaimed Lou

We move slowly by what is clearly the working production area to see a different roaster compete its work as it disgorges its hot beans. They cascade into an industrial-strength wheelbarrow to be whisked away for cooling and eventual consumption.

Overhead, signs like we used to see in airports and railway stations before the advent of video monitors announce the origin of the bean being subjected to the heat treatment. Brazil, Jamaica and Guatemala are on today's menu

Moving along, we find a perch on a counter by the cocktail bar and marvel at the spiraled copper pipes cascading into glass carafes where cold brew is waiting to be dispensed with hard liquor

I see an aggressive man dressed all in white challenge a young-looking Chinese guy who had stopped to speak with his friend on the bar side of the counter where we were stood

“You can only stand there if you are over 21” he barked

The target of this Gestapo-like order meekly replied that he was only going to the restroom and hurriedly moved along. My 6ft something, 26-year old bearded son was asked for his ID at lunch earlier as we waited at the bar for our table at the Atheneum Restaurant overlooking the water at Pike Street Market. Apparently, despite the liberal attitudes of the Western States, they're clearly pretty hot on enforcing licensing laws

I observed the aggressive man completely in white, with shirt, pants, hat and apron and realized he was a baker – and clearly in charge of the 20 or so bakery workers at the artisanal bakery close by. Real baking on show –with breads, pastries and savory pizza-like delicacies wafting their infectious smell over all of us in the vicinity

Lou leaves me to make a purchase. He returns with a small paper bag containing 2 packets of coffee

“How much for this?” he asks, holding one of the packets up for my inspection

Realizing this place is a far cry from the Dollar store and figuring that there was perhaps 8 oz of coffee being presented to me, I reply:

“$20?”

“No”

“$30??”

“No”

“$40????”

“Yep – this is the whiskey blend”

He produced the other packet and with a broad grin said that he never thought he would spend $60 on 2 bags of coffee

Perhaps he was expecting some admonishment from his dad, but I replied “Good for you”!. This seemed just the same as that $100 bottle of White Burgundy wine I have bought – a liquid delicacy to be enjoyed on special occasions with good friends

So, we pack up and stroll out, picking up a booklet on the way out. On the red-eye flight back home later that night I learned he official story of the Starbucks Reserve Roasting and Tasting Room

I prefer to remember it as Willy Wonka's Coffee factory with my mind stuck on an image of a grinning Gene Wilder as the protagonist in the wonderful 1971 film of Roald Dahl’s delightful children’s book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

John Searjeant was about twice my age when we found ourselves as watch buddies on Innovation, a Doug Peterson designed 34ft racing sailboat, during my first classic offshore race in August 1979

As a novice ocean racer, I wanted to understand the motivation of the other members of the of crew of seven aboard Innovation. Why were we all crazy enough to want to get cold, wet and hungry on a small boat for days on end?

Of our crew, 2 of us were new to the RORC Fastnet race, although Steve Tattersall and I had both done shorter races of up to 250 miles earlier in the season. However, the 600+ miles we were facing was a totally different ball game. Sailing to the South East coast of Ireland and around that lighthouse on a craggy rock is the legendary classic ocean racing

On the first night out, the weather was typical for the English channel in August; light to moderate South West wind. Due to the relatively small 34 foot waterline length of our boat, we were not fast enough from the Cowes start line to make the tidal gate at Portland Bill. So we dropped the kedge anchor on the Eastern side of the headland to wait for the tide to become favorable. This gave John and I some anchor watch time to chat

The owner, Peter Johnson, had completed every one of these biennial races for over 20 years, and I learned later that John had done 5 of them with him on various boats. As a newcomer, I felt confident that I would learn a lot from the experienced guys aboard

Peter was a maritime publisher, writer and journalist. His Nautical Books publishing house would later be acquired by Macmillan, a leading UK publisher. As well as being a prolific author (The Guinness Book Of Yachting Facts and Feats was one of his best sellers), he also penned a column in Yachting Monthly, the go-to monthly publication for sailors in England. One of my favorite pieces in the magazine were Mike Peyton's witty cartoons on subjects around sailing, sailors, and their boats

John's reply to my question “so why do you go ocean racing?” that Saturday night surprised me. After thinking for a few moments, he said quite calmly “to get away from my wife”

With no serious girlfriend, and being some 11 years away from getting married myself, I had no concept of what he meant. However, his reply stuck with me

Sunday saw the wind die to a whisper in the afternoon, and it backed to the South East. We set up the lightweight spinnaker (that big colorful sail at the front of the boat) and even played with a funky sail called a blooper for a while

In the wee hours of Monday morning we were all getting a little frustrated at the lack of wind and our slow progress along the race course. We had just made the tidal gate at Lizard point, and then jubilantly let our guard down

Around 7:00 there was a “pop”...the light spinnaker had blown out. We sailed over it and were left with just three white tapes attached to a halliard, a sheet, and a guy

The wind velocity had creeped up and we had not been paying attention

The BBC radio shipping forecast was the only weather information we had in those days. It was way before weather faxes, GRIBS and all the fabulous technology and communications stuff we have today. Tuning in to that BBC radio 4 broadcast the synopsis included “...deepening low pressure system West of Shannon moving rapidly East...”. The forecast for the Scillies and Fastnet areas told us to expect freshening wind with the direction becoming South West then veering West

Great, I thought, headwinds for a 100 mile sail to the SW coast of Ireland...

With the medium weight spinnaker now set we were picking up speed and approaching Lands End. Right on cue, the wind shifted to the SW, we dropped the spinnaker and set the #1 Genoa headsail on a tight reach

The wind velocity increased

10 knots apparent wind speed, then 15, then up to 20 knots over the space of a few hours

It was heavy duty sail change time – peel to the #2 Genoa, then 1st reef in the main, then the #3 genoa goes up. After almost 48 hours on the boat this was getting challenging, especially after we were now sailing in the deeper water West of Lands End and met those long rolling waves, leaving the short chop of the English Channel in our wake

I came back on watch late on Monday evening and we were down to 2 reefs with the wind up at 25 knots, about 30 degrees off the bow, as we pounded through the swell

As darkness fell, the working jib goes up...then reef 3 goes in and we were seeing gale force 35 knot winds across the deck

The boat was handling this really well, riding through the long rollers, thanks to Doug Peterson' expert hand at the drawing board

Cooking was impossible with 40 degrees of heel and the violent motion of the boat dropping off the waves, so I was glad of my secret stash of mini Marathon bars (branded as Snickers in the US)

Shortly after dawn on Tuesday I was on deck and we were down to the storm jib and 3 reefs. The analogue wind indicator dial was consistently showing over 40 knots, regularly gusting to 55 with the needle occasionally hitting the maximum reading of 70 knots. The spendthrift was streaking across the deep blue water. The waves were getting bigger

We were all following the 3 basic golden safety rules of ocean sailing

#1 – “don't fall off the boat”. Harnesses were firmly attached to the jack lines on the deck; #2 “clip on and don't fall off the boat”; #3 “don't fall off the boat”

Then boom!

Out of nowhere, a massive rogue wave hits us on the port quarter. The boat goes over. I get thrown from the windward side of the cockpit into the water and the boat is vertical above me. My harness held and within a few seconds, the keel did its job and the boat rights itself. I clamber back into the cockpit from the leeward side and the boat picks up speed

Doing a visual inspection for damage, I notice that the instruments above the companionway were not working after we went over. I called below, thinking that perhaps the batteries had become dislodged by the impact

The batteries were fine, and all the electrical systems checked out. So, why no wind speed, wind direction, or wind angle? Boat speed was working just fine, though. Very curious...

The guys below continue to troubleshoot this problem, and with the exception of boat speed, the instrumentation readouts in the navigator station down below showed the same as the repeaters on deck. Zippo. Nothing. Nada. Zilch

I look up at the heavily reefed mainsail and notice that there is nothing on the top of the mast. When we took the hit, we had gone over beyond 90 degrees and the mast was under the water. The masthead instrumentation cluster must have been wiped off by the seas. I later learned from the Fastnet '79 inquiry report that this type of incident is termed a B-2 knockdown

We had 2 more B-2 knockdowns, and at that point Peter made the smart call to bear away from our race course, and keep the big waves on our quarter, rather than continue to beat into these punishing seas. With about 100 miles of sea room to the South Wales coast this made a whole load of sense

Our watch routine now became 1 person on the helm looking forward, and the 2^nd person looking astern and calling the waves. The trick was to steer the boat for minimum damage down these monster waves.

We were riding a 34 foot surf board with a cabin

When the helmsman got it right, there was an amazing shudder that came up through the helm, spray more than 30 feet up in the air from both sides of the boat, and the most incredible surge of speed through the water. This was truly white knuckle stuff

Later on Tuesday, still running before these huge seas, John and I were back on watch

“Your wife can't be that bad” I said

John smiled

When we were back in Plymouth on Thursday, we swapped our individual stories from the ordeal. I related my little interchange with John

6 months later, Yachting Monthly carried a cartoon. Peter later confessed that he had shared the story with Mike Peyton over a beer following an editorial meeting…

A baby boomer from England, my career in finance and management consulting took me to every almost country in Europe as well as North America and the Far East

(That’s a publicity shot up there with me looking very serious in my business career)

However, all bad things come to an end, and I now have the luxury of spending my time on boats, writing, and making music from my home in Palm Beach County, Florida