Willis is up to his old tricks

Today dawned earlier than usual, as I heard Captain Ray giving instructions to a rowdy group of men renting a fishing boat for the day...funny thing is, when they returned the boat before sundown this evening, they all looked sunburnt, a bit inebriated, and without one fish!  I'm guessing they still had a good time :P

Donnie and Matt got some numbers from Larry to punch in the GPS.
Rather than looking for the mysterious boiler, there are some bomb
craters out in the Gulf, where jets had practiced bombing years ago.
Rumor has it, there are shelves in the holes, where lobsters like to hang out.

Back home, Danny and I were hard at work. The scrubbing job I did on
Marquesa yesterday must have shamed him into giving Biddi & The Beast
 a good scrubbin' today.  It's that keeping up with the Jones's thing... :) 

My boat project of the day was bleaching everything in sight down below,
and then tackling oiling the teak on the topside of the boat.  The harsh
summer sun had bleached it all to a dull gray.  Many people leave their
teaks gray, but I like the rich, wood color.  You can see the before and after.

Marquesa looks beautiful, all nice and clean.  She needs a good waxing
and polishing, but that will take d.a.y.s.  See Willis in the windshield
of the dodger?  He was contemplating a trip to town today...

Sadly the boys came back empty handed...Willis was eager to see their
catch...there was none :(  Looks like it'll be Taco Tuesday for dinner tonite!

Matt wore Donnie out, dragging him behind the dinghy in
only 68 degree water...the man headed straight for the hot tub.

While dad was at the hot tub...Willis was planning his great escape. Here he's
like, "Mom, why do ya keep looking at me? I'm not doing anything!" (yet)

Willis is only 'pretending' to be relaxing in the fresh air...

Within minutes, he popped up and was looking longingly at the
mangroves through the side window on the dodger.

Sure enough, he slinked to the cockpit, and then slinked across the dock.  He stopped briefly at the garden, and looked back at me as if to say, "I only wanted to have a look at your plants, Mom."  I no sooner turned my head, and he was gone.  Such a sassafras.  By the time the gang left for Taco Tuesday at The Hurricane, sure enough, we caught a glimpse of him hunkered down in the mangroves just off the docks. Boys will be boys...

After dinner, Matt & Karie, and Donnie & I went for a walk down to the theater to see what movie is coming this Friday.  As we turned back into Banana Bay, we headed down the back alley.  You wouldn't believe what we saw.  There was the feral cats of the island, the local riff raff, shooting dice in a corner by the dumpster.  One had a peg leg, another one had a patch on his eye.  This got mom very upset.  Willis took off into the bushes as soon as he heard my voice, as he knew he was busted.  If I don't keep him on a shorter leash, hard telling what might happen.  I told him, "You are by the company you keep."  He swears that isn't true, that they were just some new 'friends' he met.  He said he started out at the Kit Kat GoGo Lounge, but his favorite dancer is no longer employed there.  She got a high class job dancing at a new joint in New Orleans.  He said he had nothing but time and a little pocket money on his hands, so he thought he'd try his paws at shooting dice, the players seemed liked 'cool cats' to him.  Of course, these new 'friends' immediately confiscated his quarters...Willis knows nothing about shooting dice.  Well, he's now broken the circle of trust, I explained.  I can't have Willis running with the local riff raff.  If I do, before you know it he'll come slinking home in the middle of the night, with a tongue stud and his nipple pierced.  No way, not on my watch.  NEVER bite the hand that feeds you, I told him.  He's a smart cat. I'm sure he'll eventually come around.  In the meantime, his world just got a whole lot smaller.  It's back to watching Animal Planet for him.