We got the monster up and when the wind fills in it really cooks. We are now heading down on our down-wind polars.  Not too hard to manage and everyone is pretty good on the helm.

Last night we had Capt'n America up all night. It started out as a glorious night surfing down waves imagining that we were rolling in the competition. The wind was pretty high and we spend much of the time finding nice surfs and pulling the strings. Once the moon went down, it became much harder in the lulls. It is an odd thing that the boat is almost always easier to sail in the higher winds. I'd guess the reason is that the wind provides more drive the control te boat vs's the waves. Anyway, fun stuff.

The crew is still doing great. There have been a remarkablly few ouchies. No one has even banged their head on the companionway too badly. We did have a nice case of a crew member with sudden onset vision difficulties, with some loss of visual acuity and almost complete loss of accommodation. It's all fixed now, but do any of you medical types have an idea what could have happened (hint: it is a reasonable board question).

Alright, signing off. I've got to return to the head and do something with that pound cake.

7/23/2012 1200