Mary,

Your post reminds me of this crazy guy who had this nervous disorder about his boat getting hit on the line. Not altogether unreasonable with me out there but what was funny is that he'd have this huge telescoping pole that he'd switch back and forth to leward while racing. It annoyed the hell outta us, but he wouldn't remove it despite our promises that we wouldn't get near his boat. He finally was forced to get rid of it halfway through the day when he poked it through someone's sail