Parkinson's disease isn't slowing me down! Update from Sarasota, FL.

Greetings from Marina Jack Sarasota, FL.  To those who write and ask why I don't write/post more often, here ya go...

The past several days has presented some of the most difficult navigation and driving experiences of my life going just the 85 miles from FT Myers to Sarasota on the inside (not all out in the Gulf) in a boat that draws 4'.  One stretch was 16mi, my brother Bill was driving in the center of the so-called channel and the deepest the water beneath the propeller was 3', averaged about 2' and got down to skimming the bottom many many times.  BUT we did not touch bottom!  Then to get out of that waterway we cut thru one of those "LOCAL KNOWLEDGE ONLY" passes.  Those are are 50-75' cuts in the island usually made by a recent hurricane that are unmarked.  WHY TRY THAT you ask?  Many of you may differ in this but I'm NOT totally nuts. "I know what I know and I know what I don't know" and I knew this was not the time take any chances.  So I asked around and followed someone out that I had just met, had talked to and he seemed to know what he was doing.  In the space of bout 90 seconds and 300' length, while driving the boat in a pattern like that of an "S" the depth goes from 6' below the prop, to 28' then 5', then 3' across  the bar and then out.  Whew!
My brother Bill was with me and his comment was something like "and you call this relaxing"?  Yup, just living up to the carving on the wall of the pilothouse given to me by the guy who bought my last boat:  "Life Begins at the End of Your Comfort Zone".  If that is the case I must be re-born today.

We are here for a month and then down the W Coast of Fla to the Everglades, then the upper Keys about the last week of Feb to await a good weather window to make the jump to the Bahamas and then further South.

As many of you have asked me how I'm doing, I'm feeling "ok". Parkinson's disease had me pretty beat up 3 weeks ago but Dr F tweaked my meds ("high-five" Doc) and I am much better now.  Most important is the mindset, I'm 8 1/2 years into this insidious disease but remain assured, I would NOT change places with anyone in the world, PD be DAMNED!

BE WELL and remember, nobody ever went blind looking on the bright side.