Marine Biology is Hard Sometimes

Last time I was in Lubec, Maine for fieldwork it was snowy and frozen. This time it's not... quite. Rather, it's 37 degrees and raining with 25 mph winds blasting frigid Bay of Fundy waves against the seaweed covered rocks that we're surveying.

Instead of insulated survival suits we're wearing rubber rainsuits over many many layers. Between low tides we're retreating to a little cabin at an old coast guard station. In the closed space we can smell every note of each other's musty socks and hear our annoying cereal-chewing and tea-slurping noises as loud as bombs going off. But we're professional marine biologists, so we can deal.

Adding a Center Fin to a SUP for Better Windsurfing

Last summer I bought a standup paddleboard- a 10'4" Angulo Surfa. The Surfa has a mast track, and it's big and wide enough to use as a beginner windsurf board. The only thing is that, unlike a real beginner windsurf board, it doesn't have a daggerboard or center fin. As a result, a beginner windsurfer would have trouble getting it to sail in a straight line without drifting downwind.

I mentioned that to Josh Angulo, and he offered to help me with an "experiment" to install a second fin box on the board, in the center where a daggerboard would go. We chose to use a "US Box" (aka "A Box") because it's the most simple to install and it gives some forward - backward adjustability to the fin. Anyway, after a long time fiddling around starting and stopping the project this winter, I finally installed the box. For the fin to go with it, I found a biggest, oldest, fattest US box fin I could get.

This appalling picture shows the new fin in place. It also shows the self-destruction of my wetsuit. After this day I cut it completely into two pieces and I've just been wearing the "pants" with a neoprene top because it's warm enough now to do that.



Anyway, the maiden voyage with the new fin took place last weekend at Lake Quannapowitt in Wakefield, MA. (My designated board tester, Lady Notorious, had requested the lake to avoid the choppy water and offshore winds that we might have encountered at Nahant.) Wind conditions were typical lake conditions: shifty, gusty, 0 - 15 mph. We rigged a 4.2. While her bulldog and I watched from shore, Lady Notorious went out there and kicked butt. In contrast with her previous outing at Nahant, she had no trouble staying upwind, and she even managed to return to where she'd started after the wind shifted to put the launch directly upwind.



In paddleboard mode on flat water, I can't tell much difference with the center fin in or out. Of course when sailing in waves on the ocean I remove the center fin.

You Know It Has Been Too Long Since You Windsurfed...

... when you are entering numbers in a spreadsheet and you wistfully linger on all the ones that might be a sail size in meters squared or a board volume in liters.

"4.0, 6.1, 10.9, ooh! 77, 130, 111, yippee!"

I have to get on the water this weekend before I go even more nuts. :)

Discussion Question: How do YOU know it has been too long since you windsurfed?

It has definitely been too long since this guy windsurfed.

"Subscript out of range?" My Ass, MS Access

I HATE Microsoft Access. It should be like a logical extension of Microsoft Excel that can help you organize more complex types of interrelated data. Instead it's just a mess that's really hard to use, and it's a super pain to troubleshoot when you get some really unhelpful error message like,

"Subscript out of range"

when you're trying to import an apparently perfectly formatted and matching set of data from an Excel worksheet into an existing table in your Access database. Oh, there are suggestions in the online help forums and stuff for what to do in that case. E.g., "Go into the Excel worksheet and make sure there aren't any funny formattings or hidden values in cells outside the range of data that you want to import." But sometimes you try everything and still keep getting the horrible error message.

Here's one stupid trick that works for me sometimes when all else fails:

1. Forget trying to import the data into the table you want to append. Just import it into it's own fresh table, which you can give a name like, "deleteme."

2. After importing, highlight and copy the data in the "deleteme" table and paste it into a pristine new Excel worksheet.

3. Delete the "ID" column from the data you just pasted into the Excel worksheet. Now that Excel worksheet probably looks exactly like the one you were originally trying to import, but somehow, in some secret, arcane way, it's different, and Access won't balk at it.

4. Import it to Access. If you're lucky, it works and you have successful outwitted that @#$% "Subscript out of range" message.

5. Delete the "deleteme" table because you don't need it anymore.

Congrats to Farrah and Bob - Olympics Bound!

Here's something to inspire your patriotism: After a grueling, high-wind regatta in Spain, fighting against the best windsurfers in the world, Farrah Hall from Annapolis, Maryland pulled off an epic final race to guarantee the USA a berth in the 2012 Summer Olympics in England.

(Photo by Dale Thompson)


Farrah will represent the USA along with Chicagoan Bob Willis, who qualified for the men's berth earlier in the year. You can read the whole story on Farrah's website, "Off the Wind."

Flag Care or Don't Care?

A few Saturdays ago I was catching up on work at the office- the Northeastern University Marine Science Center on the tip of the Nahant peninsula. Outside it was cold and ferociously windy. I heard a surprising knock at the front door and walked around to check it. There was a distraught man holding a loosely folded American Flag. He said,

"This was on the pole, ripped. You shouldn't let it get like that, it's shameful. I took it down for you."

I was thinking, "Chill out, dude. The thing probably just ripped today because it's so windy, and nobody has noticed yet because the office is closed for the weekend." But I tried to be contrite and thankful. I said,

"Oh, um, thanks. I'm sorry about that. I actually don't know who maintains our flag but I'll, uh, take it in and put it on our secretary's desk, I guess, until we can dispose of it right on Monday."

It was a reasonably polite exchange, but awkward nevertheless, on account of our different levels of concern for the flag. My level of concern was on par with how I'd feel about a tipped over address post at the end of someone's driveway. I.e., "That's kind of tacky, but it can probably wait until the owners notice and fix it." Whereas his level of concern was like if there was a gushing fire hydrant at the end of the driveway. I.e., "This is a very serious problem that I must address now."

I have a strong patriotic feeling for the USA, which I think is a beautiful country with wonderful people, freedom and fairness worth fighting for, and a good-looking, star-spangled flag. I just don't make a very tight connection between caring for the flag and caring for the country. Should I? What do y'all think?

New England Windsurfing Season Opener

It was too warm and windy to pass up the chance to get on the water in Nahant this afternoon. I had a blast riding at Dog Beach with Scott McKay, both of us on 4.2 meter squared sails. I filmed with my GoPro camera. The song in the video is Alec Eiffel by the Pixes.