I have been busy I swear!

So, it has been a couple of weeks since I have updated the blog. Well, I have a number of excuses, would you like to hear them? Most people have little tolerance for excuses, including myself, but there really has not been alot to report. We had a solid week of rain when Tropical Storm Lee was active. I did do some stuff, some I am quite proud of. Because I am ill with the flu right now, I am going to cruise through this picture and comment style because I feel like shit.

Here you can see that I finally won the battle with the icebox which was on the right in this picture. It is gone. This took nearly all day last Saturday and I can honestly say that this was never meant to be removed. It was in there solid.

It was war! Here is the cockpit filled with the remains of the icebox.

And the now defeated husk of my enemy ready for the garbage man. I consider this a milestone because it really was that hard to remove.

On Sunday I thoroughly pissed off all of my neighbors by wearing my carpenter hat all day! I needed a set of saw horses for the mast and to re-do the engine dolly. I did not trust the ability of the first dolly I built to hold the weight of the nearly 500 pound engine.

Here is what I came up with. A dolly that I am proud of.

And here are my over engineered saw horses. I wanted them to stack and be able to hold 400 pounds each.

When I got done with those I spent the rest of the day removing the engine controls and gauges in the cockpit. This was a nasty job because the old oil gauge was apparently spraying oil all over the place inside the locker. It was a mess and so was I by the time I got done. I do not have pictures because I didnt want to get my phone oily. But I do have a pic of the boat as I was walking out to it late in the day.

Now for some really good news! Yesterday at about noon the crane man called and said that he is finally able to come by and lift out the engine! The only problem was that I came home from work that morning with a 101.5° temperature and felt like I was gonna die. Honestly, I didnt feel like doing it but I dragged my ass off the couch and went outside to get ready. I carried the ladder out. I carried the saw horses out. I carried the dolly out. I climbed up top and cut loose the mast. I then sat and waited for about an hour thinking the whole time that the crane man is going to stand me up a third time. He did arrive but only after missing a turn that I clearly explained to him that he would miss if he wasnt careful lol. Anyway, here are some pictures of this exciting moment.

T minus 9 and counting, the crowd sits silently......

And we have lift off! The flight of Atomic 4 is underway!

The mast actually came off first. I was not able to get pictures of the operation because I was too busy helping them lift something they had never seen before. It went smooth though. In this picture we have the mast off to the left and the engine sitting on the dolly to the right. Mission complete!

After taking some pictures of the engine for a future ebay sale, I rolled it to its final resting place on my porch.

I then went to bed and slept for 20 hours straight. I have three days off and I am sicker than a hillbilly who is doing his sister. FML :(