Cups Gets Her Groove Back...And Her Name
/For several months now, Nine of Cups has been nameless. David removed the carved mahogany nameboards from her bow before we left for the USA. When the paint job began, her name was removed from the stern and she was a boat without a name. When we gave anyone directions to our boat, we said she was located north of the office, on the left, between whatever boats were our neighbors at the time. Poor girl!
Once the varnishing was done, David attached the bow nameboards once again. All varnished and newly gilded and shiny. They looked brilliant and Cups looked indeed happier.
Cups hadn't had a new name decal since we christened her back in 2000. It was definitely overdue. We contracted with a local sign maker to make a new vinyl decal for her stern with her name and hailing port. We thought we might want to put her seahorse logo on it, too, but it ended up being too busy. Instead, we went with a formal font in the same dark navy blue as the sheer stripe accented in gold. We watched as the sign maker unrolled the decal and applied it to her stern, providing input like anxious parents as to location … a little up, no a little down, maybe to the right or more left. He was a patient guy.
Standing on a wobbly scaffold, he applied the navy letters first. When everything was just right and we gave him the thumbs up, he overlaid them with the gold accents. The finished result was stunning, befitting our beautiful girl. Nine of Cups has her name back. Now if we can just get the rest of our chores done, we'll get OUR groove back, too, and be back on the water.
