All I want for Christmas

As you might all ready know I have a soft spot for the hardy lasses of the merchant fleet whether they sail on harbor launches, schooners or super tankers. I'm sure it stems from a news paper article written when I was a toddler about my mother taking me with her to work in Los Angeles.

Those black and white photos taken by a local reporter showed her steering the STAR, a double decked passenger ferry, with her feet as she tried to shove a bottle in my face and are among my most treasured possessions. I didn't know it then but later in life I would be proud to relate to friends that at the time my mother was the only licensed female captain working the harbor in Long Beach.

She was well known around the waterfront for not only her prowess at scuba diving and good looks but also having a baby on board while giving tours to the public. My crib was situated in the back of the pilot house and I frequently wound up on the laps of old ladies while she docked the STAR. One of my earliest memories is of that harbor, going under the bridges and watching trains pass overhead.

So it is not with too much surprise that the second edition of Jack Tar Magazine's Sexy Girls of Maritime Calendar is at the top of my wish list for Christmas. Featuring twelve pages of the West Coast's "Sexy, strong and accomplished women who live, play and work on boats" it is the ideal gift for a lonely sailor at sea.

Hopefully next year Kim will fill a few months with the ample seafaring talent we have on the East Coast as well. Until then check it out on Cafepress and stick one in a bottle for me while your at it.