Umbilical cords keep Simba alive.

SIMBA LOG  DEC. 15, 2010  ST. MARYS,GA

I woke up to the sound of the small space heater bravely huffin' and puffin' away in the stateroom, trying to keep the space above freezing.  Although the portlights had been covered with cardboard and duck tape by glassblaster/painter Craig, I could still see a faint glimmer of daylight and guessed it had to be time to rise and ...shiver.  I rose, tugged on my Port Huron, Michigan slippers, (purchased on another cold winter day almost exactly seven years before, as Simba waited for a least unfavorable weather window at this small town at the foot of Lake Huron, before running a day and a half up to the top of the lake in hopes there would be some place there to tuck in for shelter.)  I opened the engine room fire door to unplug the heater from an extension cord.  I then plugged in another cord that ran up to the saloon and carried the heater up there where I plugged it in to this extension of the extension cord so it could join the second heater I had left up there running through the night.   It was 41 degrees in the saloon and 24 outside.  The night before I had burned a faux log in the brass and tile fireplace to make the room warm and cheery, but the second heater would suffice during the day.

Extension cords are truly umbilical here at St. Marys Boat Services as every boat that has owners living aboard or working on it must rely on the 15 amperes of power the cords carry to power tools and space heaters.  Down and just abaft of Simba's stern there are four electrical outlet boxes and a breaker panel.  Each box has four outlets so a maximum of four cords can be plugged in.  Six cords run to other boats.  I use three cords to power the boat.   It has been a bit of a challenge to find a way to bring them into the boat.  To reduce the amount of ground glass, dirt, and paint chips entering the boat, all windows and doors must be kept tightly closed.  So how else to get them in?  Well, I snaked the engine room cord through the ventilation scoop way up on the promenade deck and down the air shaft to that space.  I tore a hole in the plastic screen I had over the galley stove blower vent and ran two cords through it.  One of those cords powers the saloon heater and the other, through two plug-in strips, runs the fridge, microwave, tv¸computer, etc.  A fourth cord runs into the lazarette workroom to power the needle gun's air compressor, the grinding wheel arbor, vacuum, etc.  This cord is easily removed.  It drops through the lazarette overhead deck hatch which I only open if they are not glass-blasting and if the wind is down and can't blow nasty stuff off the deck down into my workroom.

Yep, those cords are truly umbilical as I couldn't live and work here without them.