Last night very late, I bought a boat. It’s a Sea Eagle 9 , the Fisherman’s Dream Package. We got the last used unit they had, which saved us $50, so I added a few accessories to the order. The expected delivery date we were given by the automated system is July 9th.

We plan to pick up an anchor and a trolling motor after we do some research. It’s looking like Minn Kota is probably the motor brand we’ll be after, but I want to really delve into it. If anyone has some recommendations and the information to back them up, let me know. The little I’ve found from poking around a couple of sporting goods stores tells me that boating is a HUGE world of stuff and accessories. I’m looking into the idea of a cheap fish finder, too.

Although we do realize it’s slightly silly to christen a rubber raft, we believe that she needs a name. We are even going to see what we can do about breaking a bottle of cream soda for the event. The small and flimsy rubber raft that we already own has been christened “Flubber” by our youngest. We would like opinions from everyone on what her name should be. Some ideas we’ve thought of so far:

• Puddle Jumper
• Firefly
• Minnow
• Little Dipper
• Tardis
• Bloat

A fun idea might be a play on words involving inflatable, blow or something like that … as long as the word “doll” doesn’t also come into it. Yes, Chuck, I am speaking to you! There are some names we don’t plan on using because we feel the boat is not majestic enough. Some of them are too reverent for us to ever use. These include Serenity, Enterprise, and Surprise.