Happiness is a New Deck Brush….

As long as you didn’t get sucked into buying it at W#@$  Marine.

In fact, I did not buy a deck brush. I bought a roofing brush. What one normally uses a roofing brush for, I cannot say. I live under a deck, so roofing is alien to me. But this I do know. A “deck brush” will set the cruising budget back some $30 or more. A “roofing brush” will fly off the shelf at your neighborhood mom & pop hardware store for $4.50. I guess the concept is that if you take shelter under a deck, you must be rich and therefore ripe for the plucking, but if you need to fix your own roof, you deserve financial mercy. Actually. I don’t know that anyone has thought it through that way. I only know how it looks from my vantage point.

And please don’t take this the wrong way , but I have to admit that I feel pretty intense pity when I see the modern “well dressed” weekend crowd with the ubiquitous oval “W” logo on everything from the dinghy to the purse dog life vest. After you’ve been out a while, it really does sort of become the calling card of the sheep led to slaughter, except the sheep would be smart enough not to brag after being fleeced. Now I’m not rallying to boycott the mega stores. I’m just astounded that it’s taking so long for them to fall of their pedestal and I don’t think it speaks well of the overall awareness of the boating demographic.

Am I the only one who's noticed that the retail kingpins in both the general merchandise and marine retail markets start with "W"? At least general shopping public has been sucked in by the relatively honest tactic of selling low grade stuff for low prices. Baffling that the marine "W" has been so successful at selling lower grade for higher price.

Anyway, It’s not that I derive pleasure from swabbing the decks. It’s just that I feel a little less put upon doing so with a $4 brush than I would with a $30 one. So if you see me pause  my swabbing to watch the catalog poster dinghy go by, I’m not shaking my head in disapproval so much as true sympathy.