The Westlake Pirates

As mentioned in a previous post, I purchased a dandy little personal weather station (The Vantage Pro 2 Plus) from Davis Instruments. It does all sorts of nifty things like measure temperature (inside and outside), humidity, barometric pressure, rain, wind speed/direction, solar radiation, UV radiation, and probably a bunch of other things that I haven't figured out yet. I also got an add-on that lets me measure the lake temperature (which not surprisingly doesn't change nearly as much as the air temperature), and a cable that sends all the data to the computer for further processing into shiny graphs and charts.

I mounted the station this morning on the radar arch, so I can tell you that right now it's 46F outside and there's very little breeze, without even needing to step outside. What's cooler, though, is that now you can see all the data we see in nearly real-time! Check it out here. That's the permanent link to the weather at the boat (it's also now included in our link list in the left column, so don't worry when this post eventually leaves the main page.) At the moment I'm using one of the default templates included with the software, but in the near future I'm going to spruce that page up quite a bit, so it will include all sorts of historical data on the conditions here. Stay tuned!

Posted by Steve at 11:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The weather has been dry (though foggy) for many days now, and the camera was successfully dried out and returned to service. It's back on the roof for the time being, although still lacking a weatherproof enclosure... so it'll be back inside when the raindrops start falling again.

Meanwhile, there have been numerous construction adventures to report about. Primarily, the DC electrical distribution system was rebuilt this weekend (more to follow on that in a future entry), and I've just obtained a weather station so there will be real-time weather reports from the boat in the near future, as well.

Oh, and I've heard rumors that there's going to be a Thanksgiving feast of epic proportions coming this Thursday...

Posted by Steve at 12:43 PM | Permalink

My Dad took this photo when my parents were here visiting in August. You can pretend we live here, if it makes you feel better. It's actually the "gated houseboat community" next door. Our community is gated, too, but the gate's usually open during business hours.

Posted by Kristin at 1:42 PM | Permalink

If you're looking for the Octopus Cam right now and you're noticing there's no video feed, it's probably because the web camera came in the house to be hung upside down and drained of the five gallons of water currently floating around inside of it. We kind of forgot about it on the upper deck. And it's kind of raining. A lot. Hopefully we'll have it up and running again soon.

For now, see if this wets your whistle:

Posted by Kristin at 11:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So it's been a bit rainy lately. Actually, that doesn't do the precipitation justice - we've had more than half our normal cold November rain already, and we're only five days into the month. It's been cold, breezy and above all, damp. There's been a few adjustments needed: windows need to be mopped down hourly, the bilge needs regular pumping (though that's mostly due to a clogged drain hose that I simply haven't been able to get out and clear yet), and the outside plants need their overflow pans dumped every four or five hours. Plus, the webcam got a little over-precipitated on, so it's unplugged and inside for now to dry out (it was working fine yesterday, but today apparently put things over the top!) We may need to find some alternate accomidations for it during the winter.

On top of all of this, the forecast calls for quite a bit more rain through at least mid-week. It looks like winter weather has arrived with a vengeance. There's already lots of snow in the mountains (and the ski resorts are open for their earliest season in 28 years!) and we're at least ten degrees below normal temperatures. This is more like what we should be seeing in January, not early November. At least we now know we can handle the cold temperatures with a space heater and a nice warm comforter!

Continue reading "Nothing lasts forever..." »

Posted by Steve at 11:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

We took the dinghy out for a spin recently. I wanted to write this entry mainly so I could say the word "dinghy" repeatedly. After this manually-propelled excursion, Steve traded his electric guitar for a trolling motor. You can click on the thumbnails to see bigger photos.

Steve rows us towards downtown. I rowed A LOT too, there's just no pictures. I'm serious.

We're going out for Lake Union Crew Team. You can see the Space Needle all tiny over Steve's shoulder.

This is a houseboat at the marina next to ours that I totally have a crush on. It's the cutest thing ever and I want to draw daisies all over it with crayons. It looks like a cake or something.

The Hot Fudge, a houseboat in our marina that was for sale for the lowly sum of $580,000 or some such nonsense. We think the marina manager might have bought it cause we see him over there all the time on the balcony eating dinner. He's like that opponent in Monopoly who suddenly makes the game no fun, because they have more money than anyone else and they just start buying stuff and putting hotels on it for the hell of it. Well, I can't blame him. It's a gorgeous houseboat. No Octopus of Love, clearly, but still a real looker.

Heading back home, you can see Gasworks Park over Steve's shoulder.

We return to China Sun after an exhausting tour of Lake Union. My arms are killing me! (from holding the camera while Steve rows.) You can't see our boat in this picture, but you can see the big green floating home next to us called The Salsa with the big American flag and seahorse windsock, and to the left of that is Barry's Boat. The Cruise-a-Home from hell. Although I guess it's not Barry's Boat anymore cause he finally sold it. But it will always be Barry's Boat to us. Shelly's floating home, The Salsa, is really gorgeous, and they have a clawfoot porcelain bathtub with hands and mermaids painted on it. Next time we pass go and collect $2 million dollars, we're going to buy that one, too.

Posted by Kristin at 3:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Nevadelia Lotus Blossom went in the lake. I mean, she went IN. I imagine she landed on all fours, as cats are supposed to, but I wasn't there to see it. I was washing dishes when Steve came home and said, "Do you realize that your cat is a drowned rat?" I had no idea what he was talking about so I ran outside, and there on the dock, leaving a cat-shaped puddle everywhere she went, was Delia. She looked like... well, a drowned rat. She's long-haired, and her fluffy plush coat was flat against her and dark. Steve thought she was another cat until she started meowing her head off at him as he came down the dock.

I think what may have happened is that she was out on the dock box, where she's not supposed to be (and she knows it), and when she went to jump back onto the boat, it had moved since she last left it, as boats in water tend to do. And belly flop. I feel so terrible about this, but since she's okay, I don't feel quite as bad. I dried her off and it took her three or four days to recover, but we knew it would have to happen eventually. She tried to dry herself off, but fell asleep partially wet so her fur the next day was stuck to her in weird shapes. I can guarantee you she won't be visiting the dock box again. She must have braced herself in the corner of the slip, where there's a little ledge, and pulled herself out of the lake. Cats can swim. It's just a matter of how long they can swim for. Well, Delia survived her first swimming lesson and she won't have another.

Posted by Kristin at 5:27 PM | Permalink