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musings of mark since 2001

Almost have the Illusion ready to sail after the weekend. The inside is no longer green with algae but gleaming white, and the spinnaker and jib are here at the marina instead of storage. Working on a motor now, have an old British Seagull that still has compression, just getting a bracket cleaned up for it to mount on the engine backboard. Rain is coming later today, so next few days are looking good for staying off the water and getting ready.

People are starting to come out of the woodwork asking to go along for a sail now that it’s actually looking like it will. My coach was a no-show, the first to offer but I heard she did stop by, so maybe saw there was no engine mounted yet and passed.

I suppose if you are going to live at the house of the people that own the first marina on Bowen Island, it’s inevitable that you are going to spend at least some time in a boat. Which I have, but only the aluminum 16 foot work skiff at the other marina I work at so far. That’s all about to change, as my landlords have taken to the idea of cleaning off their own boat and getting it going again and I’m the one to do it. This just isn’t any boat though, it’s the one that should win the ‘Round Bowen Race this year in it’s class, if we can get enough training time and trips around under our belts in the next couple months or so.

From the original brochure of the Ranger 22:

The new Ranger 22 is a brutally single-minded design: She’s built for speed. Pure and Simple. Everything on board contributes-or we wouldn’t have it on the boat.
We went to Gary Mull for the basic design, because he’s known for flat-out racing boats without an extra ounce of fat. Light, but powerful machines that keep on winning, in any weather, under any rule. Mull gave the Ranger 22 a lean, fine ended hull for speed to windward-with a flat run aft that helps her surf down wind. And he worked out a cleaver seven-eights rig that gives her a cloud of sail without a sky-high rating.

What a great way to learn how to sail!

Another Victoria Day long weekend drawing to a close with the usual assortment of accidents coming in from Harrison Lake partiers and road warriors with more time on their hands than they think. Even the experienced hands had problems with the weather, as our ferry was put into rescue mode to save a couple of crabbers that had swamped their boat.

The weather was typical, (9 times out of the last 15 years), and just before noon today the wind is rushing the clouds out of the sky and we’re looking at sunny warm summer weather again for the rest of the week. Enjoyable day off for me, a meeting with the Historians this afternoon to guide them with their content management system and not a whole lot else on the burner.

Elena has been busy writing, the Kidd of Speed has more talents than just riding a motorcycle fast through radioactive countries.

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I believe, for German army statistic must be similar as young people the same everywhere, do not know the value of life, have no fear and for their regimes it was easier to fool young.

Lest we forget this history, it has been done before, a few thousand years worth.

The Pentagon declined to comment. The US representative’s office at the UN referred inquiries to the state department, which fail to return calls. Reason: Kofi Annan wasn’t the only one getting kick backs from Saddam Hussein in the Oil for Food scam:

The United States administration turned a blind eye to extensive sanctions-busting in the prewar sale of Iraqi oil, according to a new Senate investigation.

A report released last night by Democratic staff on a Senate investigations committee presents documentary evidence that the Bush administration was made aware of illegal oil sales and kickbacks paid to the Saddam Hussein regime but did nothing to stop them.

The scale of the shipments involved dwarfs those previously alleged by the Senate committee against UN staff and European politicians like the British MP, George Galloway, and the former French minister, Charles Pasqua.

In fact, the Senate report found that US obq. il purchases accounted for 52% of the kickbacks paid to the regime in return for sales of cheap oil – more than the rest of the world put together.

“The United States was not only aware of Iraqi oil sales which violated UN sanctions and provided the bulk of the illicit money Saddam Hussein obtained from circumventing UN sanctions,” the report said. “On occasion, the United States actually facilitated the illicit oil sales.