DINGHY DEFLATION and HOT WATER BOTTLES

Yes Bernadette's kitchen is built around a tree. The tree provides welcome shade and Bernadette does the ' most for the least ' as far as a boneless chicken roti is concerned. I was looking forward to mine.

Zipping back from lunch at Bernadettes I noticed one third of my dinghy was a bit soft. It normally holds air well and a few pumps every month does the job. Adding it to the mental to do list I headed in to Whisper cove to pick up a baguette and say good afternoon to my favorite iguana.

Jumping back in I see the 1/3rd that was soft is now very floppy. OH OH must have a BIG leak.

One of the trials suffered by dinghys in the Carib is the large nails and other sharp bits sticking out and under docks. Ah well it is a few years since I have had to do a patch so getting back to Elephants Child I lift the dinghy and decide to fix it first thing next morning.

I go to sleep thinking about patches and wake to dreams of hot water bottles. Hotties were part of Duncker family life when I was growing up as we did not have central heating.

I sometimes need a hot pack on my left shoulder and when I wake to dreams of hotties nowadays I know Dizzy is socketed in to his favorite sleep spot.


After breakfast, two mugs of coffee [ CURRENTLY THOUGHT TO BE GOOD FOR YOU shame about the aspartame ] and some due diligence on the forums I moderate, I can put things off no longer.

I dig out the repair kit hoping I have a patch big enough, find the two part flexible epoxy that I use instead of the useless supplied glue, find some sand paper, brush, soapy water and the air pump.

Step one find the leak. As it went down fast it must be big or perhaps a whole bunch of little ones caused by getting trapped under something with a nail sticking down. Anyway I pump it up, the cap was off the valve and as I pump I think there is just a faint hope that the valve was leaking because the cap had been knocked off.

Three hours later RESULT It is still hard, must have been that cap, or dinghy viagra.