while you were out

This afternoon I had one of my library tech classes over at Palomar. I was really looking forward to it as it is something that is very useful having a toddler around the house: book repair! While I was out at the class, Jed and Nathaniel joined up with my parents down in San Diego to go on the boat to go whale watching. I got home from my class (which did turn out to be great) and the phone was ringing:

me: Hello?
jed: Hey, how's it going?
me: Good, I just got back from the class and grocery shopping. What are you guys doing?
jed: We just had the craziest thing happen. It was insane. I just have to tell you about it....

At which point Jed goes on to tell me this incredible tale that involved a sharp knife, hooked fishing gaff, 100s of feet of lobster rope, commandeering a vessel and ultimately saving the life of a California gray whale. There were lots of nuances and different parts to the story. All I know is that a few minutes before he got home my mom had emailed me pictures that involved Jed hanging off the bow of the boat and my dad waving a giant knife while at the bow of a stranger's dinghy. Supposedly Nathaniel just sat in the captain's chair while my mom was busy driving the boat behind this whale.

After a bit more time, the story became clear: they were out whale watching and came upon a whale who was stranded on the surface. It had more than one lobster buoy attached to its tail. Worrying that the whale would eventually get so tired from pulling all that weight, while forgetting that there are professionals who take care of these things, my family (read: dad) took matters into their own hands, cutting off hundreds of feet of rope and a couple of the buoys while the Coast Guard and eventually the Sea World crew came and took care of the problem. There were quite a few other boats that were 'watching' the whale as well and, as the story goes, when they got some of the lines off the tail there were cheers and boats honking and a general happiness and relief followed. Once the Coast Guard arrived, their vigilante efforts had to stop and they headed back towards shore.

They spent the rest of the afternoon swimming in the pool. Man, and I thought I had had a good morning...clearly I miss all the real fun :)