The Boating Barrister

Here’s a lazarette’s worth of things boaters would do well to remember: Sailing isn’t a sport…not in the way most of the 50 states understand sports. Foiling hulls will never catch on en masse with the recreational boater. It’s not the cost of the boat. It’s the upkeep. The buoys are there for a reason. Sail because you love it, not for any other reason. Wearing a brand name is one thing; wearing a store’s brand name…

By John K. Fulweiler, Esq. The boat show was a hoot. I drank some beer, strolled the docks with the best looking woman in the show, and feigned interest in boats so expensive it made my eyelids hurt. It’s not that I don’t like goals, but to steal a Chris Hitchens sort of analysis – there’s probably a special place in the afterlife for anyone who pays somewhere near a million for a plastic boat with four…

By John K. Fulweiler, Esq. I’ll hold a sweaty beer in my hand and watch these runabouts tear around Narragansett Bay like they’re on PCP. My memory is the only things I used to see rip up waters like that were the Cigarette-style rigs throwing 100-foot rooster tails. Now, it seems even the simple-looking center console can travel at speeds of 50 miles an hour! Who cares whether it’s “advancements” in the manufacturing or powering technology, it’s…

By John K. Fulweiler, Esq. Jesse James likes him a lobster roll. You know him…ex-husband to Sandra Bullock, denim-wearing, flattop-rocking, chopper-making TV personality. I was slugging a Diet Coke and lobster roll when he sat down next to me, both of us with a Newport harbor view. I’m no fanboy and so I ate and ran, leaving him to perspire in his getup (he hadn’t yet broken out his Nantucket Reds). But what if Jesse decides to…

By John K. Fulweiler, Esq. Let me ask you a question. It’s a morals question, but not the kind that’s any fun. It’s a question lathered in maritime facts, but it’ll work just as good as if we were talking about forty acres and a dead mule in Minnesota. Maybe the question should give way to the narrative, ‘cause the narrative probably has the lesson and it’s the lesson I’m meaning to clear off the wharf and…

By John K. Fulweiler, Esq. I am not a gunslinger. I’m not a hired gun. But, if you’ve suffered an injury or a loss in the maritime setting and want or need someone to remedy the situation, I’m for hire. I won’t win the case for you, but I’ll help you win. You’ll supply the facts and I’ll supply the attention to detail, the organization and the forceful press of argument. And, damn, I’ll put the time…

By John K. Fulweiler, Esq. You can’t recreate your youth watching YouTube, but it’s fun to watch the adventures of some of the younger sailing couples. You have two groups. You’ve got the couple representing the kind of genetic fortitude and talent that settled the mighty West, and then you have everyone else. You see, Riley & Elayna of Sailing La Vagabonde can sail and dive and spearfish and make new friends at each port of call…

By John K. Fulweiler, Esq. At the diner where the spring wind comes whistles across an empty harbor and riffles the menus, the waitress called the guy seated catty-corner to me “Greg.” Problem was, and it turned out not to be, his work shirt was embroidered with “Nick.” It’d be hard to miss that red threadwork, making me muse the shirt was borrowed or he wasn’t the kind to take offense at being called the wrong name….

This parish hymnal that is my monthly missive should convey something helpful to the sailor. It’s not legal advice, but it aims at issue spotting and sparking a synapse. Nothing would make me smile more broadly (aside from watching my daughter snap her Opti around a mark like she’s on rails) than having this column light up a lively cockpit discussion. And so onward, Christian soldiers as we examine the murky world of picking up crew for…

A good story should start like Def Leppard’s 1987 album Hysteria, where the first song, “Women,” just drops into blazing chords making you think maybe you missed something. No progression, just round sound. Joe Elliot’s vocals shame today’s auto-tuned crooners. I ate another Quarter Pounder. We’d bought a bag of them and considered us provisioned. The grease was cold and hard. We were moving a Tartan up to Newport from a Connecticut harbor just commutable to Wall…