July 22, 2023 – Get To The Choppah!

My favourite time of the day has always been the morning. And my favourite kind of morning is being at Andrew’s place. I am always the first person up on the boat, and no matter what time I get up, I will walk up to the house and Andrew will be there making coffee. We will sit down on the comfy chairs on his deck overlooking the water and talk and laugh. We never run out of things to talk about. And that is exactly what we do this morning.

After breakfast on the boat we head townward in two vehicles on two missions – Andrew and I to get boat stuff and everybody else to explore downtown Kingson. Between Marine Outfitters and two Canadian Tire stores we find everything we need, except for a Ninja CREAMi Ice Cream, Sorbet, and Milkshake maker which Victoria asked him to pick up. Well, I learn that Ninja makes about a hundred different models of blenders, most of which seem to me to be indistinguishable, but what do I know? I just use a fork to mix stuff up.

We make it back to the house sometime around 2 and get settled on the top level of the dock house with drinks and snacks. It is a perfect day – sunny, warm, and just a touch of wind. Daryl and Lydia were on their way to Kingston and Andrew offered for them to stop by and see the property. By 3 they are tied up at the dock and join us on the deck. Other people start arriving too. My brother Marty and my two nephews Leif and William, then a bunch of Andrew and Victoria’s friends - Adrian and Sara, Terri and Bob, and Don and Jan. Soon the top deck is full and everybody is goofing around royally.

I asked Adrian, who is a boat broker, to come down and have a look at our keel bolts. He checks it out and doesn’t think the damage is too bad at all but does think it’s worthwhile to put in a claim and get it fully inspected and repaired if necessary. This is a relief.

People spread out. William and I go for a little snorkeling adventure in the waters surrounding the dock. Some jump on Sea Light for drinks. Andrew gets out the Sea Doo rocket death machines and takes people for high speed rides. The kids bounce back and forth between the house, dock, and yard. At one point Leif loses his ring in the grass and when I hear about this I race to the deck and scream, “Daryl! Ana! We have a metal detector emergency!”

Ana’s eyes light up and Daryl races to his boat and gets the metal detector. This is the moment she’s been waiting for, fine tuning her skills back on the Rochester beach, all leading up to this. A test. A mission. Her destiny. Well, after 45 minutes of scanning, digging, combing, recalibrating, and witness interrogation they come up with a beer can tab, a washer, an electrical box knockout, but no ring. Leif is scared for his safety as his girlfriend gave him the ring, but after more intense questioning he’s not 100% that he dropped the ring, or that he had a ring in the first place, or if he does indeed have a girlfriend. Crazy kids.

Back on the deck we are debating the magical properties of the case of Yuengling Daryl bought back in Wilson.

“Is the case still full?” I ask.

“No man, there’s only a few tins left. What the hell? I thought you said it was a magic case?”

“I said mine was a magic case and hopefully yours would be. But to be honest, I started having doubts after that case broke open and fell apart in the mud puddle in Wilson. That didn’t seem like magic.”

“You know, I do seem to have a never ending supply of whiskey on the boat. You could say I have whiskey coming out the Yuengling.”

Uproarious laughter ensues. I keep the liquor puns going.

“Well Marty, let’s get Kraken!” I say and we head back to SeaLight for Kraken and cokes.

This party is really humming now. Back on the dock we formulate a plan that involves the use of Bob’s helicopter and a couple of Don’s classic Corvettes. These are Andrew’s neighbours and they are mostly crazy and hopefully drunk enough to sacrifice their vehicles.

This plan is this: we need six to eight of the party goers to get their cameras rolling from all different angles of the property. I am going to climb on top of the roof of the dock house, run across the span of it and jump off. Bob will be hovering in his helicopter just close enough so I can latch onto the landing gear. Running behind me will be Marty, who will also jump, but as the helicopter is starting to leave he only manages to reach my legs so there will be two of us hanging off the chopper. As Bob starts to spin it to try and shake us off I will pull Marty up with one hand and swing him into the cockpit where he will punch Bob in the face then fling him out into the water then take over the controls. As all of this is happening, Magnus and William will come speeding down the yard in a red Corvette, spinning grass and dirt everywhere, and in hot pursuit will be Leif and Stella in the yellow Corvette, which will be on fire. Magnus and William will hit the shoreline retaining wall at full speed and launch the car into the air, probably doing a high five or saying something clever as they are at maximum altitude, then they will land right onto the dock and come to a screeching halt just before it reaches the end. Stella and Leif in pursuit will also launch off the retaining wall but they will both jump out of the sunroof and latch onto the helicopter landing gear with me as the flaming car explodes in mid-air then crashes into the lake and sinks. Then we’ll all climb into the helicopter cockpit and fly off into the distance.

The whole plan falls apart when I’m unable to climb onto the dock house roof. I even have Marty boosting me but there’s nothing to grab and anyways I’m already tired. Bob, however, does get the chopper and lands it on Andrew’s lawn. Then he offers to take me for a ride so I jump in and get a glorious tour of Howe Island from the sky. And yes, as I was climbing into the cockpit somebody did say, “Get to the choppah!”

The shenanigans continue until late into the night. Bob and Daryl have struck up an intense bromance and as they are standing on the swim platform of SeaLight, having a smoke and a vape, the few of us remaining in the cockpit are watching as they slowly inch closer to each other then we see their pinkies touch and curl. It is a magic moment. Daryl then offers to give Bob a dinghy ride back to his place and they take off. We hear the dinghy engine stop. Then a long silence.

“Do you think they’re okay?” Lydia asks.

“Oh yeah, they’ll be fine. Daryl’s one eye was still partially open and Bob only had 27 beers, and Coors Light at that,” I reply.

“They seem to be getting along very well,” Lydia says as she tops up her wine. “Can you see them over there?”

I step off the boat onto the dock and look over to Bob’s place.

“Well, I can see two men making passionate love on Bob’s dock, but I’m pretty sure it’s not them.”

“Ok, that’s good. Another beer?”

Rainy Day in K-Town

The rain and gloom forecasted for today arrived right on time. After a lengthy coffee session with Andrew and Victoria we drove into downtown Kingston to meet Marty and gang for breakfast at the Four Points Sheraton where they were staying, then we went for a walk downtown and avoided the intermittent showers by ducking into shops. In a moment of complete misdirection I bought a pair of $90 boating shoes, which were marked down from an even higher price. My bar for shopping value is high as the majority of my fashions come from Value Village or consignment stores thanks to my good lady wife who is constantly on the search for deals. But this purchase used up five years worth of footwear budget so I’ll likely be wearing them all winter too.

The day passed entirely too quickly, as it always does when we are here. We all assembled back at Andrew’s in the afternoon and visited, goofed around, drank beer, told stories, and smoked a big prime rib and a few racks of ribs in his smoker, which turned out magnificently. At some point during the day their neighbour Bob fired up his chopper and buzzed us in the yard. I thought it would be cool to leap up, grab onto one of the skids, and go flying through the air like an action movie hero. I’d then climb heroically into the cockpit, punch Bob in the face, throw him out into the lake far below, then pilot the bird back to Andrews and land it on the dock, to my cheering and adoring family who would shower me with confetti and gummy worms as I raised my arms in victory then took them all for helicopter rides. But all that seemed like it might be bad for my back so instead I just took a photo and waved to Bob.

Towards the end of the night, Andrew decided to demonstrate one of his home automation features. Every time we visit there is a new piece of technology in his house: auto-tinting glass on the front door, automated blinds throughout the house, voice controlled temperature and stereo, high resolution and motion activitated security cameras. One feels very much like Captain Jean-Luc Picard on the bridge of the Enterprise, without the tight-fitting bodysuit.

After dinner, most of us were at  the dining room table and Magnus was at the sink running the tap to rinse off some dishes. Andrew grabbed his phone and said, “Watch this.” As Magnus turned off the tap and began to walk away, Andrew pressed the screen and the tap came back on. Magnus heard the water running, looked a bit confused, then went back and turned off the tap. As he walked away Andrew turned it on again, totally confusing the boy. This ruse held up for at least four rounds until Magnus finally noticed us laughing wildly, flipped us the bird, and seeked safety from further embarrassment by joining his cousins playing Mario Cart on the giant screen in the lower level.

“You have internet enabled taps? Why the hell would you need internet enabled taps?” Marty asked.

“The money I spent on those just paid for itself right now!” Andrew replied, with Marty nodding in agreement.

We said goodbye to Marty and Jen and the boys at the end of the night as they had to head home early the next day, which was holiday Monday of the August long weekend, which really sucked as the weather forecast was finally looking decent. We said goodbye and I really hoped we’d be able to get together again soon.

With that, we too packed it in for the night and had a beautiful dingy ride back to the boat. The wind had died, the clouds had disappeared, the moon was bright and beaming, and the moonlight shone down upon SeaLight, guiding our path.