Walk away

I just got the best advice I've had in like five years.  June told me to walk away.  I think it went, "lol...walk away".  Friggin abaracadabara hocus pocus it worked.  This little problem wasn't by any means insurmountable.  It was one of those sneaky, doesn't seem like a big deal until you're too deep in the quick sand deals.  You lay in the weeds for a good twenty minutes and find yourself fully entrenched in Dr. Suess hour.  Just stories.  I mean...Stories.  Like you read about.  Library of congress type word output.

There is another guy on the boat with a high word output too.  And I think this advice is somewhat applicable to that situation as well.  I was hesitant to talk about it because I like these guys.  I for sure wouldn't say this to them so free of tact.  But third time's a charm.  Sometimes the best way to deal with this stuff is let it fix itself and complain to no one except the lonely blinking cursor.

It isn't the words in themselves that make it tough to swallow.  I am, by all accounts, the most conversational person in existence.  That may be overstating it a bit, but I challenge anyone to think of someone they know that is more so.  The problem here is that there is no exchange of ideas. 

The conversational side of me is more about curiosity than hearing mine or someone else's voice.  I want to hear cool stuff and talk about relevant cool stuff.  But being the recipient of monologue after monologue is tough.  It takes a pretty sweet soliloquy to keep me engaged for hours on end.  Even old Bill Shakespeare himself loses me after about an hour and a half.  T.S. Elliot can keep me going for about 45 minutes.  But stories about the drama on deck of another boat?  That's like a twenty minute max for me.  To his credit, the other guy's whimsical whining about electrical duties on yet another boat has around ten minutes of appeal.

Again, these are cool guys who I enjoy working with.  But when it comes to twelve hours of nightshift and having company imposed on me?  I'd rather talk to myself.  I actually enjoy that from time to time.  The stuff I say to myself is easily funnier than most of what I hear around here.  Except for one of the stories was decent.  Long story short it goes like this.  And imagine being told in somewhat broken english with an occasional bandito laugh.  On one of the other boats there was a love triangle.  It got ugly.  When they got back to Seattle, one of the triangle's participants introduced the gang to his wife and kids.  The chick had a meltdown and the other guy...I didn't catch that part.  But when they came back for next season, my buddy on the boat who has this penchant for stories said, "There go the three stooges".  That's pretty funny.  I'll give him that one.

But sometimes you gotta walk away.  Another funny one I heard from the commodore was a Polish joke.  How many Poles does it take to change a lightbulb?  Ten.  One to hold the bulb and nine to spin the ladder.  Decent.  This fishing business is not for the faint of heart.  Just eats away at your soul until any bit of entertainment is like freakin David Copperfield.  Just oohing and ahhing over Polack jokes.  Just walk away.