As a sailor you should know about local winds. The cause of these winds is difference in temperature; cold air is heavier than warm air. The most popular of these local winds is sea breeze. Warm air over land rises...And is replaced by cooler air sinking over ocean. At night opposite happens. The land quickly loses its heat at night and oftenfalls to a lower temperature than water. This results in a light offshore evening wind. On a lake or river, warm air can rise at edges to be replaced by cool air over water. This can result in a nice breeze for sailing.

Forcast for a Typical Sea Breeze Day: Morning Very Light Winds -No Weather Systems Near -Clear Sky -High Temperatures But Cooler Near Shore

Afternoon: Wind coming from water starting Midday -Cumulus Clouds over land -Clear over water- Winds Speeds 8 - 12 knots

Evening: Winds Decreasing as sun slips over horizon.

Sailing Terms

Amidships- middle of boat.

Backwind- wind flowing off sail.

Close Hauled- one of points of sail; sailing as close to wind as possible.

Dead Astern- straight behind

Flaking- Folding sail.

Glide Zone- distance it take a boat to stop after turningb head to wind.

Heave To- to head boat into wind in order to slow it down or stop it.

Seeing as how I’m bombing out like Perry Como at a punk rock concert, I decide to get down to brass tacks, “So, what we have here is basically some blatant pandering for a graduation gift. These people, who we knew for all of two months, have managed to remember us just long enough to hit us up for a gift.”

The acid toned response I received said it all, “We get a Christmas letter from them each year telling us how well they’re doing, and they even include a picture so that we can see how fast little Roscoe is growing.”

I sagely reply, “Well, little Roscoe means nothing to me, so let’s get out as light as we can on gift - maybe a gift box of assorted socks?”

With ice dripping off each and every word, she frozenly replies, “Edward, my God, that’s so crass, we will certainly do better than that for little Roscoe. I was thinking maybe we’d give him a subscription to Wall Street Journal - he‘s going to take business in college, you know.”

“Hell, I don’t even get Wall Street Journal! And this little two month old drooler will?”

At this point, I size up her facial expression and figure that shutting up and quietly absorbing my impending financial wound was best. So, I slunk off into den, pulled out my Stevie Ray Vaughan biography, plopped down into a chair, and started reading. And one thing I discovered about Stevie Ray while reading about his life made me smile - we all know he was a great guitar player, we all know he was a great performer, but one of best things about Stevie Ray was that he never graduated from high school, which means that he didn’t force a bunch of his distant friends and relatives to buy him cuff links, dorm refrigerators, or watches far nicer than this 1986 Timex that I currently have on my wrist!