Lake-Geneva-Bound

I'm a terrible person. One of my pet peeves is when people start blogs and then don't keep up with them, and LOOK WHAT I DID!!!!!!!

Oh well.

Anyways, right now I am preparing for the Melges 24 Nationals on Lake Geneva next week, and I am fucking PUMPED. I'm sailing with Rob Britts and the Florida crew on USA-118 named "Hot Mess". (I better not hear anything about how appropriate this boat name is for me, either! I'll make that joke on my own terms, thanks.)

I've never been to Wisconsin and for the longest time I thought we were going to Michigan (not gonna lie), but I am really excited to get out and experience a whole new venue for sailing. There is nothing I like better than going to new places, especially when I'm fully expecting the breeze to be on-point at this time of year. And I just looked at the weather and it's not even going to be below freezing, which I thought Wisconsin was pretty much all year long. So, bonus!

I'm particularly happy to get back on a one-design circuit before 2011 is over. I have been sailing PHRF all summer long (really don't have a choice with some of the boats I sail on), but nothing beats one-design high-performance boats when you are looking for true competition on a W/L course. I am going to love every minute of 40-boat fleet starts and downwind drag racing, I'll tell you that much.

BUT, I can tell you one thing I hate about this whole thing: the weigh-ins. Ugh!! It has been SUCH a struggle for me to lose weight. I only have to lose 4 pounds, which sounded easy but it sure ain't. Let me just say that the stomach virus I had on Monday was MORE than welcome. I've never been so happy to be hurling my guts out into a trash can on the side of a busy street in DC, that's for sure.

Okay ... so ... it actually might not have been as much of a stomach virus as it was a godawful hangover ... I mean ... I had a wedding on Sunday night ... if that tells you anything. It was hella fun, though! ... I think.

Other than my bout with the "virus", I've had to come up with a few other creative ways to lose weight quickly. Today, I did a shitload of jumping jacks in the driveway like a crazy person. The other night, I had a dance-off against myself to some old school Coolio. I've quit drinking until after the weigh-ins, which will be very trying but I am very committed. And, I am counting calories for the first time in my life. Seriously, I haven't done this much math since before I started skipping trig class in the 10th grade. I might not be adding right, actually.

So today, I called up my old Army unit to see if they could weigh me on their super accurate tactical-combat-weaponized-mechanized-indestructible-infantry-calvary scale. Just kidding, there's no such thing. But I thought their scale would be more accurate than the one in the bathroom that I trip over every morning. No such luck. Apparently, soldiers are not very gentle creatures by nature, so the Army scales do not stay calibrated for very long after getting moved and banged around from place to place. That's kind of a depressing thought, seeing as how those scales can make or break a soldier's career, but I digress.

So, there's that. I'm trying to lose weight, just like every other Melges sailor in the United States right now. Not very interesting, but I just managed to write a bunch of paragraphs about it. Honestly, I've just had some really bad insomnia lately, so I guess tonight I decided to combat it by staying up to write about weight loss. Fucking awesome.

Stay tuned for some actually interesting stories about the Melges 24 Nationals as we trek out to Wisconsin and battle it out against 40 other boats in a very tough, but fun, fleet. I, for one, can't wait to get out on that lake.

Earthquakes and ... wait, what? AN EARTHQUAKE??!

1. I live alone.
2. I've never, ever experienced an earthquake.
3. I have access to a few firearms.

That being said, guess who lived through her first earthquake today?

Okay, the term "lived through" is a bit dramatic. The earthquake wasn't at all violent or scary, but I really had absolutely NO CLUE what was going on. And I was completely alone, so my stream-of-consciousness had zero other minds to bounce ideas off of to gauge what a normal reaction should be like.

I was all like ... "Is that ... is that an earthquake?? Nooooo ... it can't be. We're totally just getting bombed. Yeah, that makes more sense in Northern Virginia. Let me get my assault rifle, it'll be aight ... HOLY SHIT, THIS IS AN EARTHQUAKE!!!!"

My second reaction was to start drinking. Woohoo, earthquake day!

Anyways, it was really no big deal, but here is a great post-earthquake song from my new favorite band AWOLNATION:

I promise to have some good content soon. I've been really busy writing for other people. Which kind of sucks.

Also, now I have to clear out the damage from this earthquake, which is going to be a real headache. I'm going to have to get someone out here to pick up the broom it knocked down in the hallway. Thank you, Mother Nature. You've been a real help here today.

Much love.

♥ Some SA/OTWA Love

 Here is the link to the most recent piece I wrote for Sailing Anarchy. It's about the Screwpile Lighthouse Challenge, where we scored a 2nd Place in our fleet. I wrote a sister piece about the Solomon's Island Invitational - it's further down on this blog, titled "Serenity NOW".

Pool Party - Screwpile Lighthouse Challenge

You know you want to give SA some love - they have given me a lot of support over the past couple of years, and I love writing for them and I especially love sailing in events when the OTWA team is on the water. And there was that one time they gave me the microphone and all hell broke loose, but we don't have to talk about that. Let's just say that I'm hella proud to be OTWA alumna, and I can't wait to see them on the water again.

Here are two of my fave recent On-The-Water-Anarchy productions for you to check out:

2011 Charleston Race Week 

                                                  

Little AC!!! Newport was off the chain for this event.

By the way, yes I see what time it is on a Friday night. This is not lame at all. I just got back from Philly for the USA vs. Mexico soccer game and I'm still recovering (and I'm a little rejoicing over not being in jail). So let me recover from my hangover by watching my little sailing videos, and I'll stay out of your face. But first here's a picture from the game:

That's my BFF.

  

» I'm Ready!

I haven't posted in over a week, and I'm kind of busy right meow, so here is a funny picture.

My crewmates Chris and Jermaine were working hard to pack all of our gear, sails, coolers and whatnot into the truck so we could haul ass down to Chucktown ... and I was upstairs playing dress-up.

Yes, that is my shirt. My friend Jon sent it me when I was in Iraq. It was the best care package I ever got.

♦ America's Cup Uncovered

Eat your hearts out, sailing enthusiasts. There are going to be 90 of these:

Wait ... What?

There are going to eighty-nine MORE of these???

Woof. Where is the hype?!

Okay, okay, okayyyyyyy. I know a lot of you are going to hate me for not being ecstatic about this video. But, come on. I know people who can make more interesting shows using stuff they found in a 7-11 parking lot. Not to mention, my generation is all about extreme sports and challenges, and we want that same energy to come through in our media; the AC is really going to have to step its game up if it wants to compete for our attention.

I'll give them this: a lot of the visuals in this video are quite unparalleled. But, the show is still pretty "meh" for me. It's missing something ... or maybe it has too much something ...

And is that Randall from the Crazy Nastyass Honey Badger video doing the narrating?

Okay, I'm projecting a little. It wasn't all that bad. But, it wasn't all that great either, and this stuff NEEDS to be tops in order to get the non-sailing community interested. Shouldn't that be a priority?

Anyways, here is some quick commentary on my favorite parts (in pictures!):

I fucking love helicopters. I had to include this shot. 

I always secretly laugh at the little people clinging to the tramp when I see a catamaran capsize. And then I hope that they're okay.

Another shot I loved because I'm REALLY into spy movies. These shots of San Fran definitely had that edgy feel to them.

America! Fuck yeah.

Can't really make jokes here. This was a pretty cool rendering of the AC-72.

Hey Paul! You should check out San Francisco based Paul Oliva's column here. (Paul has informed me that the above rendering of the AC72 shows the seabreeze coming from the wrong direction. Woops!)

More capsize footage. It never gets old. They did a cool thing here by integrating actual news coverage into the show. The last time I saw sailing on the news was when the whole Abby Sunderland thing happened. Er, didn't happen, I should say.

America's Cup history. Lots of math. Before I watched the episode, I expected there to be more history/foundation than anything. I hope they go more in-depth in one of the upcoming 89 episodes.

Guy says "epic". I hate that word. I really had no idea that the next America's Cup is going to be a really long poem. 

Cool mock-up of the AC village in San Fran.

I can totally do that. In heels.

Jimmy eats a sandwich.

Jimmy drives a Camry.

Jimmy eats another sandwich.

4-minute spotlight on Sweden and the Challenger-of-Record. PSYCHE! It's a 4-minute spotlight on New Zealand. I'm a little confused.

Random Kiwi talks shit about Jimmy.

Teaser on the next episode about Sweden and the Challenger-of-Record. PSYCHE! It's a teaser about an episode about China and Korea. I'm a little confused.





Okay, so I'm clearly no expert. I liked the video, and I'm happy to share it. But I can't promise that any of my friends are going to be interested, or happy that I'm shoving yet another sailing video down their throats. (I'm totally going to, anyways.)

∞ Serenity NOW

A couple of weeks ago, I decided I wanted to go for a boat ride, so I sent out a few texts to see if I could find someone to race with. Except, I accidentally sent out this: 

"Hey, I'm going to be in Annapolis tomorrow night if you know anyone looking for screw." 

Woops. I'm really quite the dumbass sometimes. 

Anyways, my friend John Schlossberg invited me to race with him on Tim Lyons' Corsair 43 Triple Threat in the Solomon's Island Invitational, a fifty-ish mile race from Annapolis to Solomon's Island. I had done this race before and I needed to get to Solomon's anyways, so I immediately signed on for the race. I was totally stoked! I'd never sailed on a trimaran before, so I was excited to get out and see how it worked firsthand.

After meeting Tim, the owner, and Joe Ament and Harry Murphey, the two other crew, we got the boat ready and pushed off the dock to get to the starting line. After John and Tim guided us through a great start with Joe and I on the main traveler and Harry maintaining sight on the line, we set on down the bay with some decent wind and optimistic thoughts about our tactics. 

A rare calm and collected moment for KB

I'll tell you what, that race was the most refreshing sailing I've done all year. I told Harry that the only thing I could complain about was the wind direction (on the nose), and he said he couldn't even complain about that because then the sail would be over too soon. What a great perspective to have; sometimes it's nice to concentrate on the quality of an experience rather than how fast you're going. I rarely do that.

On top of the good breeze and cool air, the moon was full and there was not a cloud in the sky. We could see for days out there in the middle of the bay, and the feel of the trimaran gliding through the water at about nine knots all night was unparalleled to any sailing I've done in months.

The sunset shortly after the start.

As this race serves as a feeder race to the Screwpile Lighthouse Challenge, I usually try to take it a little easy, knowing full well that I'm going to have to get another race boat ready for a regatta once I get to Solomon's. 

I wholly failed to do that this year. Big time. 

Though the sail down was phenomenal and not very taxing at all, I cannot say the same for the way I treated my liver once we got to the dock at 5am. Poor liver; the rum-and-pineapples started flowing immediately, and they were strong. There was nothing I could do! And come on, when the tent party starts at sunrise after not sleeping all night, there really isn't much defense for sobriety after a certain point. 

In the end, we didn't do as well as we'd hoped, but sometimes even a loss can't take away from the good feeling you leave with after an event. I'm going to go ahead and chalk this experience up as a big win for myself, because it was fucking awesome, and also because I survived the worst daytime hangover I've ever had.

Photos by Joe Ament, Triple Threat crew.  

»» Safety First or Something

Skipper let me borrow these safety glasses in our last regatta because I broke my sailing sunglasses when I was h-h-h-HAMMERED. I was a hot piece in these!!

They're not polarized, but if anyone needed me to fire up the miter saw while we were out racing, I was definitely ready. (Actually, with the way I sail, that's not entirely out of the question.)

I can also weld, build furniture (kind of), and last month I helped my dad build a deck, so let me know if you'd like me to help with any of your construction projects.

I'm kind of over losing sailing sunglasses. I think I'm going to start super-gluing them on.