I can’t remember the last time I have been so sore from laughing.

Today was a miraculous adventure. As I write these words, giggles burble up in my chest as I think of our afternoon. It all started simply enough: some time ago, my workplace decided that as a “team building” exercise everyone would participate in an afternoon of paintball. I rejected the idea on the basis that it was a waste of paint, and along with four other gladness~warriors declared that none of our hands would hold guns.
So the call went out: let’s do something different.
We considered the pub. A picnic. Something nagged me however to search further.
Let’s not just do something different. Let’s do something MIRACULOUS.
Dave gets kudos for the idea, and I am overjoyed that it encapsulated an item from my Things to Do this Life list.

We went a~sailing on the lake that our building looks over. Miraculous indeed, especially since only one out of the five had any sailing experience. {I giggle at this}

So we drove there, madly screeching in a tiny car, as Nick’s head stuck out of the sun roof. We get two boats ~ a yacht and a catamaran. Captain Dave {of the sailing experience} gets the yacht, along with Lile and Diana, the Ladies of the Lake. Nick and I take on the catamaran, deciding in our infinite wisdom that as we had both vaguely been on a boat before, our two half~experiences must make for one whole captain. Besides, we had matching Croc shoes which we felt gave us superhero powers.

First point of business was naming our catamaran. We settled on H.G.L.S. Tobias {Her Goddess Leonie’s Ship}. We spent the next hour drifting in the breeze, extreme sailing and re-enacting the Sydney-to-Hobart Yacht Race with Captain Dave’s jolly yacht. We also decided pirating might be amusing, and managed to sidle up to Dave’s yacht.

Extreme sailing consists of behaving in an uproarious manner. I feel I have successfully comandeered this skills, so to assist you in your sailing endeavours, I have compiled the following list:
1. Even when the wind dies down {ESPECIALLY when the wind dies down}, lean backwards out of the boat at outrageous angles, yelling wildly technical yachty terms out.
2. At regular intervals, call SWAP SIDES! and dive to the other side of the boat like your life depends on it.
3. Regularly change your goal of direction. Decide that going backwards is actually the way you wanted to go anyway.
4. Windless? No problem. Turn on the turbo charge. The turbo charge switch is hidden from regular view. It exists only in the realms of the infinitely creative. Sit at the back of the boat, put your feet in the water, and kick like mad. Not only will you get an excellent leg workout, you’ll get deliciously wet and forget you’re not actually moving anywhere.
5. Make up secret hand signals for EXTREME. Extreme means you get to lie on your back and look at the sky, asking the Goddess to bless you with wind. Now, THAT’s extreme.
6. When all else fails in managing to secure a wind, ignore the rudder thingy and sail string {highly technical instruments} and sit on the side of the boat playing Japanese Paper-Rock-Scissors.
7. If you laugh loud enough, you MAY sail faster. Even if you don’t… you’ll still be laughing.

So there you are. The secrets of Team Extreme.

Label everything as being extreme… and you start seeing as being EXTREME… and life will be an adventure.

Afterwards,
we went to HIGH TEA at the Hyatt. The Hyatt is an ancient five star hotel that puts on pricey but devishly good banquets of cakes. We walked in all wet and soggy, put on our best English accents, and incredible desserts until we could no more. Then Oompa Loompas rolled us out to our car, and we squeeled back over the bridge again.

I feel like I just had a big fat miracle afternoon.
An EXTREME adventure.

{I’m so glad we chose the miraculous option over the pub}