It is now Friday, June 9th, and we are still in Mobile, but it looks like we will head north in the morning. We took the boat out for a brief trial run this afternoon and are back at the fuel dock this afternoon for our final evening at Dog River Marina. The people here really are great, and we sincerely appreciate all they have done for us.

After several days' delay, we got our Cingular AirCard on Wednesday, but when I tried to install it I discovered (with the assistance of Cingular's Customer Support) that it won't work in our new laptop because our card slot (Dell's "latest and greatest" technology) is not compatible with what Cingular offers. So, we returned the card and will now be without Internet access unless we're in an area where we can access free Wi-Fi or at a marina that offers Wi-Fi as part of it's dockage fee.

At any rate, our posting opportunities will be limited, at best, afer we leave here until we can resolve the problem with the AirCard. Looks like we'll have to purchase another laptop that has the type of card slot we need before we'll have any kind of regular access, and I have no idea how soon that may be.

We denamed and christened (renamed) the boat this evening in accordance with a ceremony on the "Commander Bob" web site, so the Gods of the wind and the sea should be with us as we begin our journey north. We plan to leave early in the morning and hope to make some good progress up the Tenn-Tom before spending our first night on the hook since we brought the boat to Mobile more than a month ago.

Since we won't have Internet access, please don't expect a prompt response to any e-mails you send, but rest assured that we will respond as soon as we are able to do so. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers are we begin our journey aboard "Life's2Short."