Here are a couple of photos of Mogi's recovery and aftermath of eye removal survey. If you are eating, stop now. The first picture was taken Monday, after two full days. The 2nd was taken today, Tuesday, after 3 days. It's hard to imagine that he will recover from this disaster, but he already is. Tough little guy, for his age.
In happier news, here is a morning shot (today) of our bird feeding area beside the house.
Turkeys at the bird feeders.
Now on to the tugboat story. Not many of my friends know that I worked one summer on the Detroit River, towing barges filled with railway cars between Windsor and Detroit. Our boat, the Prescotont, was a beauty of a ship. It was crewed by two deckhands, an engineer, and Captain Sandy. As a deckhand, one of my most important jobs was ensuring that Sandy had a beer in his hand at all times. Seriously. He was an awesome captain, and could handle that boat with his eyes closed. He never messed up a landing, despite rough waters and high winds and the strong current, and gently placed the gigantic barges (there were two of them, one a disused paddlewheeler!) into their docking positions several times a day.
Of course I had other jobs, too. When we were underway (each journey took about 30 minutes from dock to dock), we had to make sure the ropes were in good shape, and that the barges did not break free (one did once, but we caught it and used our backup safety rope). When departing and landing we had to release or secure the barge and the tug, jumping to shore or back onto the boat as needed. There were often long waits ashore as the captain took the papers to the customs office at the docks, so we were set to painting and polishing the old boat. Sadly, I have no pictures from those days. It was the late 1970s, and I was in university when I got the summer job, thanks to a friend who worked as a deckhand. One day he was a man short and came and got me out of bed. Away I went.
It was a very hot summer, too, but it was so much cooler out on the river. Deb had knee surgery that summer, and was nearly helpless at home for much of the day. There were no TV remotes back then, but she rigged her own with string and her crutch. She got to go on the boat one evening during the Freedom Festival, when the boat was commandeered by the owner for a cruise for his friends. Deb was welcomed aboard, with crutches. My brother Steve, 13 or 14 at the time, came down from Sudbury for a week, mostly to help Deb out at the apartment. But he also came aboard a few times, and Sandy put him to work, and paid him, too!
A few memorable events.... Sandy had elbow surgery, and was off work for about ten days. A substitute captain, whose name I forget, was hired. He was good, but no Sandy. One time on approaching the Windsor dock he came in too fast, and we crashed hard into it. There was damage, and the customs agent, awaiting the boat, had to turn and run for his life.... Another time I was hauling up some water over the side when my eyeglasses fell off and went splashing into the Detroit River. I had to work a few days with no glasses. When we docked in Detroit, Sandy let me go downtown to a one hour eyeglass place and get fitted. It still took 24 hours, so I had to make two trips downtown.... We rescued a ship once, a salty flagged under Yugoslavia. They had been attempting to leave the Detroit dock, facing upriver, and trying to turn to face downriver and home. Unfortunately, the strong wind and current proved too much for the ship, and it was unable to turn. It was drifting far downriver and heading for a crash landing when we got the call. Luckily we were free at the time, or that ship would have smashed into the shore. They threw ropes down to us when we arrived (from very, very high above us), we secured them to our tug, and after about twenty minutes of tugging their ship finally began to turn. Once halfway around the wind and current did the rest. We released their ropes, and their crew was cheering and whistling and waving at us as they departed for home.
I still have my inland sea papers. I had wanted to work the following summer on a big inland ship, but I got a year round job as a security guard in Windsor instead, which helped pay our way through our B. Ed. year. That was also a fantastic job. But that's for another day.
The Prescotont, centre, in a tugboat race. It wasn't very fast, but it was strong as an ox.
Mapman Mike
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