we didn’t think the boat was working, but then kevin twisted a connector from the gas tank to the motor and suddenly we had power!  yay!  i alerted erica and mom, who were very excited to join us for a pre-dinner cruise, the first of the season.

at about 4:30 we headed out and the weather was simply beautiful, a slight breeze, a tiny bit cool, but a sunny, fabulous day.  we sailed along and all was good…

but, this being our very very old motor attached to our refurbished boat, it suddenly died.

we were near the motor boat club, not very far away, and we started to slowly drift in towards it.

kevin kept trying to start the motor, i tried to start the motor, but it wasn’t going to happen.

kevin came up with the strategy of putting up the cloth roof, having it vertical and acting like a sail.  this sounded like the best idea that anybody had, but come to think of it, nobody had any other ideas.  we had seen almost no other boats out on the water, and at the moment there were none.

janice has always maintained that if we got stranded we should call 911, but i somehow think this would be for naught.

here’s mom, keeping the sail from blowing up.  mollie is helping, of course.

kevin decided we could pick up speed a little if we rowed, so he and erica started in, with mollie’s help again.

they were only rowing a very short time, and we were making very slow but not horrible progress, when a fast boat whooshed by.  erica and kevin were perfectly content to keep rowing but mom didn’t like being stranded.  she is BETTE GO, after all, and clearly we weren’t making good enough time for her.  she waved the boat down, and they slowed and turned around, creating a huge tidal wave that rocked us a lot.

here they are, getting into position to tow us.

kevin and mollie, happy to be towed.  it was funny to speed along so quietly for a change, cause our crappy old motor is also incredibly noisy.

mom and erica also enjoyed themselves.

the nice people waving.  mom explained to erica that us boat people always help each other out by coming to each other’s assistance and towing them, but i pointed out that we’re always the ones being towed.

the last time the boat died, last summer when mom and i ran out of gas, i had no time to take any photos of the occasion because i was too busy being hysterical, calling kevin and almost dropping my phone overboard.  that time we got so close to the rocks that we almost brushed up against the monsterous poison ivy growing there, plus there was the risk of hitting the motor on the rocks and destroying it, so you can understand my hysteria.

this was a much more mellow easter tow, and erica says it’s the best easter she’s ever had.

kevin says it wouldn’t have taken us an hour to row home, but hopefully we’ll never know for sure.

ok then,

mrs. tuesday hughes.