To my few and faithful:
I would like to take a moment to sincerely apologize for my hiatus from blogging this summer. Quite unfortunately the vocational engagement that I undertook from June to mid-August prevented me from being blogoliciously productive during the workday. However, by the grace of the glorious higher beings of bloggers, that situation has been rectified. So where to begin? My summer has been slightly less adventurous than usual because of my new life plan: to go back to school for a Masters' in Music Performance in Fall of 2009 in the UK or Ireland. So I've been practicing alot down at St. Mary's. Luckily, I have had time for a few adventures (though not up to my normal volume.) I will address the general highlights in the next few blogs in no particular order (just to mix it up) :-)
Sailing 
Since my emigration to DC a year and a half ago, I have not been able to participate in the same frequency of sailing adventures that I became accustomed to in southern Maryland. Fortunately, I was able to snag a ride for Gov Cup (Maryland Governor's Cup)- for non-Chesapeake sailing buffs, that's a 70-mile race from Annapolis (Maryland's current capital) to St. Mary's City (Maryland's first capital). This was my fourth Gov Cup race and because usual boat (Stitch-n-Glue) didn't go in the water, I hopped a ride on Seaduce led by the formidable Captain Bligh (a.k.a. my Uncle Ross).
<--Uncle Ross, Marty, Pete. Joan, Troy, Me -->
We sailed 5 hours or so from the boat's marina near Gibson Island to just make the 6pm (Fri Aug 1) start of the race. Unfortunately, the race turned out to be a typical Gov Cup with ABSOLUTELY NO WIND. It was a little "exciting" in the middle of the night while we tried to dodge the excessive tanker traffic. Tankers are not easily differentiated from sailboats in the middle of night- they only have one or two lights. Essentially, if they are coming towards you and you wait until you can tell what they are with the naked eye, give my regards to Davey Jones' Locker! 
<--Only good way to navigate the Bay Bridge!
<--Sailing Anarchy guy taking pics 
Start of the race. THATS a tanker.
One of my favorite parts of night sailing, when you aren't moving particularly fast, is to lie on my back and look up the mast at the stars; its very surreal to watch the mast move back and forth across a stationary sky- almost Magic Eye-esque. ALMOST makes me wish we still had to navigate by the stars. Almost.
Around 5 or 6 a.m., just as the sky was starting to lighten into its pre-dawn hue, the wind completely dropped to the point of nearly floating backwards (from the tide.) Given the context clues of the extremely overcast sky, it should not have come as a big surprise that this was merely the calm before the storm. Within 2 minutes, the three sleeping crew members were awoken by a sudden onset of gusting 30mph winds. This kept things exciting for a little while as the crew wrestled to keep the lurching vessel under control. 
Gotta love watching a front come in! 
After the wind died yet again, we came to the sad realization that there was no way we'd make it to the finish line before time ran out and that making it to the party was more important. SO we pulled into Solomon's and caught a ride in ye ol' Martin minivan service.
The infamous After-Party was alright, but I was EXHAUSTED after being up all night so turned in relatively early (8:30pm!!) in preparation for the next day's adventure: Bmore Marching Ravens gig at the Howard County Fair and the Black Crowes' Concert (AWESOME!!)
SMCM
<--SMCM Alumni Tent City. Random new friend-->
Fortuitously, through my randomly typical "Six Degrees of Separation Syndrome" my friend Anna's husband Josh owns thebaynet.com, who had a reporter that wanted to interview someone about Gov Cup. So I did a phone interview before and then wrote a lengthy post-race update. This translated into me getting a shared byline :-) http://www.thebaynet.com/news/index.cfm/fa/viewstory/story_ID/9367
Which has subsequently led to me doing an upcoming freelance article for them, and hopefully more in the future. W00T!
Gov Cup picture links: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2026765&l=bda62&id=115201684
