What’s the big deal about owning a boat?

As much as sailors love sailing, we must accept that not everyone may understand what drives our passion. Comedian Jim Gaffigan has some thoughts on that:

Summer is here, and so are the boats. I’m not a boat person. I’m not anti-boat. I’m not afraid of the water. I don’t get seasick. I just don’t understand what the big deal of being on a boat is.

“We’re floating on water. How exciting.”

I’m aware boats have and remain an important form of transportation. I appreciate some people make a living using a boat. I even understand that some musicians and celebrities enjoy cavorting on boats to impress fans.

It’s the other boat owners that I don’t understand — the seemingly normal people who own boats. Those wierdos.

If you’re not using your boat for work, as a place of residence, or to impress shallow friends, why do you own a boat?

Paying insane amounts of money so you can float around in open water, drinking beer in direct sunlight, and eating soggy sandwiches from a cooler has very little appeal to me.

My sister, Pam, has a boat on Lake Michigan, and from what I can tell there are roughly seven days during a Chicago summer she can use it. It seems like Macy’s Thanksgiving floats are used more often annually.

Some people enjoy “taking their boat out,” whatever that means, then eating in a marina. If you are unaware what a marina is, it’s a boat parking lot, filled with other weirdos who shovel hundreds of dollars into docking fees and boat maintenance while the polar ice caps melt.

Anyway, did I mention I’m not outdoorsy?