My Guitar

... is a Takamine AN10, the most beautiful guitar I have ever owned, bar none. Even for someone like me who doesn't play all that well, it's hard to make this guitar sound bad. Easy on the ears. Easy on the eyes. Easy on the hands. A gift from my darlin'. How cool is that.

There is a link to the Takamine website on the sidebar if you want to check out this line of musical miracles. They are popular with the famous guitar crowd, including Bruce Springsteen, who apparently owns several models.

I had a smaller acoustic cutaway Takamine some years back with electronic pickups. It was a replica of one designed for Paul McCartney. Alas, a calamity befell that little guitar and I lost it in a most unfortunate way. I haven't had a guitar for more than 10 years as a self imposed penance.

Last Christmas, having finally suffered enough, I asked if I could have another guitar. We went back to Takamine barely considering other models. This one came from "the upper rack" as the terminology goes in the music stores. The guitars that hang at higher levels are more expensive, but they are also of far better quality. So they hang them high - out of reach. The guitars on the lower rack get handled a lot more and tend to suffer a lot of bumps and scrapes.

Other Cat and I play together from time to time.

Beautiful

Here's a really pretty shot of an Etchells sweeping across the finish line. The young fellow at the helm is known as "Shark" Khan. At 16 years of age he has already won a handful of World Championships. Owned by his father, software magnate Phillipe Khan, Pegasus Racing Team is famous all over the world.

And this race day isn't over yet. See the black and yellow checkered flag on the committee boat? That means "Come Within Hail" and that means there is going to be another race this afternoon.

The Boat

Handsome Jack is an International Etchells, and built strictly for racing. Here is a shot of the Etchells fleet rounding the leeward mark at the 2005 World Championships in San Fransisco Harbour. (Handsome Jack was not there). Looks a bit chaotic but these guys know exactly what they're doing.

The boats are 30 feet long and 7 feet wide, sleek and fast. They carry a crew of 3 - sometimes 4 if the sailors are small.

Handsome Jack is in the refurbishing stage, back in the water this summer after several years up on the hard, with a new set of sails and lots of new rigging. I chose the colours on the blog site here to emulate HJ - white hull, grey decks, and burgundy waterline. She's a beauty. It's not likely that Handsome Jack will make the World races but that's okay. She'll make a fine sailing boat for the Bras d'Or Lakes one day.