Detox, but for reals, yo.

Man, I kinda feel shitty.


   I've been back at HAWSEPIPER's Afloat Global HQ/ recovery clinic for about 48 hours, and I...feel...rough.

    This is what happens when a recovering fat guy goes off the wagon for a week, I guess. Last week at home, I ate like a king, drank like a fish, exercised not at all and slept... well, not much, really. I packed a lot of living into one week, and Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife and I were glued shoulder to shoulder most of that time, so she's feeling it as well. I'm logy, grumpy and my energy level is in the toilet.

 Awesome time, totally worth it.


 But, back to it. I dragged my ass through my Day One Aboard exercises last night, even though it was Day Two, and it was a simple shake-out-the-cobwebs routine- an hour's walk around the deck, interspersed with pushups, situps and some curls with 30lb dumbells- not even enough to get me sore, but enough to get the lead out, you know?  And sure, I feel OK, now that I'm on the far side of a 6-hour nap since then, but I'm still not energetic.

 I need another day or two I guess, but some of that is, of course, because even though I poisoned myself for a week at home, it WAS only a week, and for a Family Man, that's not enough time for the Man... or the Family, really. My kid was super-excited to have me home, and we only had limited time together, as he's already in school, and the wife and I had to use school hours to run errands and do the hundred things that must be done when the breadwinner is home to win bread. My bank account is a smoking hole, for certain, and it's probably a good time to buy stock in Home Depot. Seriously, considering my affinity for good scotch and bad beer, you'd think I'd have spent all my discretionary money on consumables, but nope, Home Depot's garden section kicked my ass. On the upside, my patio is well on the way to looking more like an oasis, and less like a concrete slab with a bug screen around it.



    Anyhow, I managed not to wake up with a hangover during the week, which I credit to my kid's presence, as I don't need him to see me like that, but it certainly wasn't for the lack of trying. Once he was in bed, I retreated to the patio to watch the bass jumping in my pond and enjoy the breeze through my small collection of palms and Bird-Of-Paradise plants with the Mrs, pretty much as a nightly ritual. If there's any moment more sweet and homesickness-inducing, I couldn't say. There was a decent moon most nights, no rain (some heat lightning and distant thunder), and my neighbors on the far side of the pond are older than Moses, so they seem to go to bed with the sun.
 Yup, altogether a great week, but not enough to recharge my batteries to 100% because it was only a week, and I've overworked myself this year. Still not recovered from that, mentally, I guess. When I go home next, I'm going home for my full allotted time, and I plan to cry havoc and let slip my personal dogs of war then, in an effort to come back here the fucking ray of sunshine that is my usual self.


 On the upside, it looks like upon completion of our next cargo, we might get a morning off and shore access, to boot, so yours truly can get a decent 6-7 mile walk in and hypercaffeinate in an effort to get my cobwebs cleared and undo the damage done by a week of good livin.'