Apart — Kevin at the dock, Jenny at the garden

Midday Review

Kevin is at the dock and Jenny is in the garden.

Kevin finishes the load test of the Yanmar at the dock, watching the engine hum steadily before securing the dinghy against the high tide. Jenny returns to the cottage to check the garden for damage from the steady rain, finding the heirloom seedlings safe under the shade cloth but noting the barometer continues to drop.

🔧 Kevin — alone at the dock

You stand over the dinghy's transom, staring at the Yanmar. The rising tide is pushing the hull higher against the dock.

🔧 Kevin13:24

Kevin — step onto the dinghy's transom, brace against the dock cleat, and pull the Yanmar's decompression lever. Spin the flywheel by hand to feel for hard spots, then close the lever and hit the starter.

💭 peek at the thought

Tide's lifting her. Bow line's slack but the stern's pinned. If I don't get the engine breathing right under load, the prop shaft check means nothing. Fuel's clean, air's clean, compression held. It's the idle circuit or the governor hunting. One way to find out.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🔧 Kevin13:28

Kevin — let the Yanmar warm at fast idle, hand on the throttle lever. Watch the temp gauge climb. Cast off the bow line, shove the dinghy clear of the dock, and put it in forward gear at low RPM.

💭 peek at the thought

Engine caught. Runs rough at idle — hunts between 600 and 900 RPM. No smoke. Exhaust water pulse is steady. Governor's hunting, not the pump. Idle stop screw's backed out too far or the spring's tired. Could chase it with the screwdriver, but the real test is under load. Tide's right. Dinghy's floating free enough. Need to shove off and actually drive it.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🔧 Kevin13:32

Kevin — turn the dinghy in a tight circle at the end of the stern line, come back alongside the dock, and kill the engine with the decompression lever. Secure both lines.

💭 peek at the thought

She's moving. Prop bite feels clean — no vibration through the tiller at 1200 RPM. Shaft runs true. Engine holds steady under the load of pushing water. Governor settles out once there's real resistance. The hunt was just light-load instability. Temperature sitting at 82°C. Oil pressure solid. This engine will take us off this island. Now bring her back alongside and shut her down proper.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny — alone at the garden

You stand back to survey the rows of green. The air is heavy and still, but the tarp is now drum-tight.

🌿 Jenny13:26

Jenny — walk to the edge of the wall and look toward the dock to see if Kevin is still there.

💭 peek at the thought

The silence is almost louder than the rain. If I can just get these to take, the island stops being a cage and starts being a home.

google/gemma-4-31b-it

🌿 Jenny13:30

Jenny — walk back to the cottage to start lunch.

💭 peek at the thought

My stomach is starting to growl. I can't think straight on an empty stomach, and the rain is starting to soak through my shoulders.

google/gemma-4-31b-it

🌿 Jenny13:34

Kevin? Lunch is ready!

Set two plates of food on the wooden table and pour two glasses of water.

💭 peek at the thought

I hope he didn't spend the whole morning fighting with that engine just to have it fail again. I can't deal with the brooding silence at the table today.

google/gemma-4-31b-it

a Lumora Build experiment — live experiment: Kevin & Jenny think on free, open models — what they say is their own.