A Silver Lining

7 April – Newport Harbor, California

We’ve been delayed here in Newport well past our original scheduled departure date of 8 April, but that has turned out to be a good thing for me.  The day before Lori and I flew to California I noticed what I thought was a wart on the back of my left hand.  No big deal, I have skin imperfections like that all over my body.  But after a few days on the mainland I noticed that the wart was starting to get bothersome when I bumped it and seemed to be growing in size.  After a week here I was concerned that it might be more than a wart, and Rob and Renee were talking about seeing their dermatologist, so I got contact information from them and called to make an appointment.  Good thing I did.  On Monday the dermatologist did biopsies of the spot on my hand and another on my chin that was also concerning me.  On Tuesday I learned that both were cancerous with the one on my hand being an aggressive type that doubles in size every 2 weeks.  Yikes!  I don’t want to imagine what I would have done if this thing had started growing when I was 1000 miles from the nearest land.  I had surgery to remove the growth on my hand on Wednesday, and will have the growth on my face removed next Tuesday.  I have six stitches in the back of my hand which will limit its use for a week or so but afterwards I should be fine.

My lifelong failure to adequately protect myself from the sun’s harmful rays by using sunscreen, protective clothing, and hats has come back to haunt me.  Learn from my mistakes.  Wear sunscreen, hats, and long sleeves.

Work progresses on Van Diemen.  Deck painting was completed on Thursday so deck fitting and stanchion reinstallation are underway.  On Wednesday  I swaged on some hydraulic fittings, played with the new instruments to figure out how to use them, and helped Simon drill a hole through the deck to install a new electric winch.  I’ve installed a hawse pipe, water maker, pad eyes, boom vang, and all of the boom fittings.  We can see the light at the end of the tunnel, but we’ve got a long way to go.