Ugly Betty

Here's a little story about a boat we call "Ugly Betty".

One day, my dad and Scott were driving down the road and saw an old "fixer-upper" on the side of the road with a "For Sale" sign on it. Without thinking twice, they pulled over and bought it right then and there. After a little TLC and several hours, days, and even weeks at the shop (it needed quite the tune-up), the S.S. Minnow was ready to hit the open water. They took it out fishing a few times last year and according to them it's a "sweet ride".

A few weeks ago, Skipper (my dad) and his faithful side kick, Gilligan (Scott) decided to take "Ugly Betty" out. The girls and I thought it would be fun to go for a ride on Bob's boat (as Annie calls it) too. We packed up the kids, some snacks, lots of water and my dad... sorry, Skipper, stopped and got a little KFC to eat out on the lake.

After getting car sick on the way up, I was glad when we finally got there. We loaded the boat with all the necessities; chicken, water and kids, and the Skipper backed the boat into the water. We get the motor roaring, my dad gets ready to pull forward to park the truck, and I notice Scott is yanking on the stirring wheel to turn so we don’t run into other boats. When I say yanking, I mean his whole 125lb. body was trying to get the wheel to move. I kept saying, don’t break it.” “Did you guys unhook everything” (they were quite excited to get "Ugly Betty" into the water)? Needless to say, he was quite stressed. He kept saying, “it's stuck, what do you want me to do”? My dad is out of the truck looking at us like 'what the heck are they doing'. Keep in mind; we are at the lake on a Saturday afternoon with tons of people all around. Scott, not knowing, had kept the boat in reverse so we are kind of coasting backwards in a huge circle. My dad yells at him to take it out of reverse. Needless to say we had quite a bit of looks.

My dad goes and parks the truck while Scott continues to yanking on the wheel and I'm trying to handle both kids cause I'm freaked that Annie, not being the best listener that she is, will jump off the edge of the boat. I've got Emma in one arm, while directing traffic with the other boats, explaining why we almost hit them. Several times other boats had to push us away from them. This, my friends, was quite embarrassing. My dad was waiting for us to pick him up at the dock, with his water socks on and a 44oz. in hand. He kept yelling, "get your butt over here". At this point I was laughing while Scott was beyond stressed. We were all drenched with sweat. Scott had to gauge his reverse and forward motion along with the constant giant circle we were going in as well as taking into consideration the wake from the other boats and wind factors in order to get us safely (meaning, without hitting other boats) to the dock to pick my dad up.

Just when we thought things couldn’t get any worse, I noticed we were taking on quite a bit of water. I yell to Scott, "hey captain, we are taking on water". Out of the corner of my eye I see the bucket of chicken floating towards the back of the boat. I couldn’t hold it in any longer, I was dying laughing, the girls were both red faced with sweat filled hair, Scott was pissed and my dad kept throwing his arms in the air. I yelled to my dad, "just a minute pa, we're a comin'". We couldn’t quite possibly get more redneck then we already were. Finally after the proper wind and coasting technique, Scott was able to get us over to the dock (it only took about 45 minutes or so).

Needless to say, we never got "Ugly Betty" out on the open water that day, but we were able to enjoy a whole lot of laughs and some soggy chicken in the parking lot of the lake. Like the Skipper said, if it weren’t disastrous we wouldn’t have remembered it. I do have to say that we did have a good time despite all that took place. The Skipper and Gilligan are so funny together, they just feed off of each other. I’m glad that they are such good friends.
I know you are dying to hear what happened with "Ugly Betty". She has since been in the shop for more work. Hopefully she'll be ready to ride again soon. The next fishing trip is planned for October at Lake Powell. May the legend of "Ugly Betty" live on!

Here are a few pictures from our adventure.

Annie thought a 'life jacket' meant her normal jacket (sweat shirt).

Notice the red face and sweaty hair

Chug-a-lug!

Again... notice the red face

Do I really need to say anything?

I said a beef hot link!