There are many ways to fall overboard.  Once the shock and embarrassment is over, and you are in dry clothes and properly influenced by alcohol, there is usually something to laugh about.  My good friend Bob was having a cigarette while we were cocktailing it up and he was sitting on the stern rail when simultaneously he stretched and a wake hit the boat; he did a perfect back flip, one full turn and entered Newport harbor feet (expensive boat shoes) first.  He emerged to very high marks from the diving judges in boats all around.

  Rich, a power boater, decided to take on fuel at the end of a day of bird watching in late October (when the water was nice and cold) found that the "Slippery when Wet" swim platform on his Sea Ray 30 was indeed slippery when wet.  When he broke the surface of the icy water, he looked straight at me and said "don't you say a word".  Me take advantage of an opportunity like that?  HA!  He has never found it as funny as the rest of us did.

  My dear wife Polly made a splash in Dutch Harbor, RI when on a gorgeous Sunday we had gassed up and she pushed the bow of our little O'Day 22 off the dock and when the bow was sufficiently out of her jumping range, she jumped.  There wasn't a ladder nearby so she had to swim fully clothed to the shore, climb onto the dock and walk through a large group on onlookers, squishing all the way.  Ever since I have become the bow pusher and she now steers our boats whenever we dock or depart a dock.

  My favorite Splash was done by a friend, the man who preceded me as Commodore of the Edgewood Yacht Club.  John was a high powered lawyer, and a highly regarded member of the Governor of RI's transition team.  He and I had a late night closing up a local pub in Newport and both of us staggered to our boats for some recuperative sleep.  The next morning, we left somewhat early having a lengthy sail ahead of us.  As we passed John's boat, John was in the process of handing up his dinghy motor from his dinghy.  Motor held as high as he could hold it, he attempted to wave to me and fell over backward into the drink.  He later told me that when he went underwater a few feet, he sobered up quickly, let go of the motor and watched it sink into the 20 feet of salt water.

  EYC had a tradition for "Fallers In" dubbed LOONS.  Our last social of the year was Awards Night the Saturday after Thanksgiving.  All the year's Loons were required to get up on stage and sing a chorus of "How Dry I Am".