As I near the completion of my project on the 1962 Lone Star Malibu and this boating season looms on the horizon, I'm thinking it might be time to christen her with a name. I’ve never actually had the opportunity to name any of my previous boats, though there were a couple that came to me with names already. My first boat, the 20-ft Yukon Delta houseboat that I converted into a deck boat, had the name Molly Brown (as in the unsinkable) when I bought her, which seemed apropos given her tan color and the amount of flotation foam I put into her hull. Of course I have the Serenity, which I did consider changing to “Serenity Now!” for a time, but ultimately thought better of, since my wife and I enjoy Firefly and the name seemed to fit the boat. I’m not superstitious (someone once told me it was unlucky to be superstitious), but it is supposed to be bad luck to rename a boat. There is a ritual that you can perform to the god Poseidon in order to strike the old name from his rolls and then re-christen the boat, but that sounded like too much work and I liked the names anyway. My parents never named any of their boats either…at least not officially. There is the Pimp Boat, which was their 16-ft Baja. It was a very low slung, cool looking black boat with silver metallic flake. One day my uncle, who looks about like you would expect a 60-year old farmer/heavy equipment mechanic to look like, was standing on the dock waiting for my dad to walk back from parking the truck and trailer. There were a couple of guys in a fishing boat tied up on the other side of the dock and one of them derisively commented about the Baja, “Looks like something a pimp would drive.” So, that kind of became its unofficial name, though it was never lettered on the stern. They also owned a 1/6th hare of a Holiday Mansion that was named Magic Dragon, but didn’t have any input into that naming decision. I think the Lone Star deserves a name and I have several top contenders, but have been having trouble deciding on the best one…so as with all important decisions, I figured I’d leave this up to the internet (what could possibly go wrong?). So, here in a very specific, but undisclosed order, are the contenders (feel free to suggest your own in, but I’ll probably ignore them):
2. My son loves him some rubber duckies, so this one would float his boat, so to speak. 3. I like this one, but think it might be a little on the nose. 4. This one has a practical purpose and promotes safety. 5. Well it’s a tin boat with fins out of fifties car design, so this would be descriptive. 6. I’m going to be using it as kind of a tender for Serenity, so this word play on the popular social dating app (not sure that’s a good thing) might be fitting. 7. And of course, no online boat naming poll would be complete without this entry, which is also my wife’s personal favorite. So there are your candidates, now go forth and cast an informed vote for your favorite. Voting will close at the end of this month (May-2017). Until next time, here’s wishing you fair winds and following seas.
5 Comments
Joette humphrey
5/1/2017 11:46:54
I'll go for anything that Calvin wants
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Alicia Raebel
5/1/2017 17:28:24
Lol Boaty is my favorite!
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Eric Flickinger
5/1/2017 18:05:02
I was the ripe old age of 3 when I named one of my dad's boats, Motor Boat. So I'm partial to letting your kid name the boat. It will make a great story when he grows up.
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Brent Pounds
6/2/2017 09:45:34
I agree and Calvin will have the final say on the boat name.
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Brent Pounds
6/2/2017 10:05:41
And for the exciting results of the poll, we have a three way tie between Boaty McBoatface, Tin Fin, and Ducky. Posing all the name options to my son resulted in him enthusiastically endorsing...Boaty McBoatface, which makes sense since his first word was in fact Boat.
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AuthorBrent Pounds has over a decade of experience in the maritime industry and has been involved in recreations boating since he was a child. See the About section for more detailed information. Archives
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