Premium Pontoon

I rented a boat yesterday on a lake close by – I was pretty proud of myself and my surprise!  It wasn’t a yacht or catamaran and according to my wife she questioned the “premiumness” of my pontoon rental.

It started a couple of weekends ago when we had a Murphy’s Law couple of days and in my short-sighted brilliance I decided to take the family to the lake and go fishing.  Now mind you none of us fish but we all swim so that’s close enough, right?  We all woke up on another COVID shut-in Sunday and I said “surprise we’re going to the lake.”  By 10 am I’m out the door sulking and running errands because I had no takers on the offer.  My teacher wife rattled off all the planning and preps that had to be completed before Monday, and my two boys retreated quickly from the offer.  I was mad and planned to go it alone and then wised up briefly enough to call and reschedule.  The beauty of rescheduling something like this is the surcharge you agree to pay – I was no longer winning on this deal.  It keeps getting better…

So we get to the next Saturday which is when I had rescheduled and we’re well on our way, just short of donning the sunblock.  My phone rings and it’s the boat rental place; winds are too strong so they need to cancel.  The rental place reassures me I’m not paying another reschedule fee so I should be happy right?!

The original date I booked was a record hot one for October – high was just shy of 90.  In the end my wife and I went out yesterday, and still experienced a fair amount of sun.  In the fiasco of it all, I negotiated down on rental time and up on rental quality – I secured the Premium Pontoon!  After the intro course and general questions over boat operations (a five minute exercise), I was given the green light with no idea of what I was doing.  I qualified twice that up on the gear shift was forward and down was reverse.  After that, we were cruising, premium-style. 

It turned out to be a great day by my estimates at least.  The boat wasn’t brag worthy but it felt like you were driving your dad’s big, old, fancy Cadillac (from 1990).  My negotiated rental had us on the lake for 3 hours and we spent a fair amount of that time talking about teacher/parent conferences that are coming up.  So even though plenty may judge the brain break my wife and I took mid-week, educators know exactly what our conversations covered. 

We had some fun on Lake NearUs and I can now remember the last time I drove a boat.  It unfortunately was an escape from it all; not life or living or topics that deep.  Maybe just a nice simple boat detour from the daily grind.  Even when we’re on vacation my wife always notices it takes me few days to get with the program and fully check-out so I can check-in.  A premium pontoon isn’t for everyone but it’s a great conversation starter.  If you live near us and rent one this weekend, be sure to take a jacket and a poncho!