welcome back to the tropics
it’s rainy & warm & humid outside again. When did that happen?? I was inside for lunch today because I sat down at a table with inside-sitting-folks, but I didn’t really pay attention. When I went up for a mid-afternoon snack of Diet 7-Up and popcorn, the pool-deck was flooded-wet. Water, water, everywhere. Somehow, it’s possible to be on a boat and not even notice it’s pouring …
Today, we spent a lot of the day watching the crew fix the fire door that slammed the other afternoon when the ship lurched. A whole bunch of crew climbing on ladders, taking apart the ceiling, the mechanical apparatus that operates the door, etc. etc. It was a very big operation. After it was all reassembled and the ceiling panels were put back together and the lights were all turned on again, a higher-ranking crew member walked through (the rest were already gone) and he was clearly not satisfied. I dunno, it all looked pretty perfect to me. (But, then again I hadn't noticed it was raining either ...) As I was leaving the library, he was back with the other crew looking again at the ceiling and the lights. You can’t imagine how meticulously the crew cares for this ship. Everything is immaculate always. If a piece of paper or a tissue drops to the floor, there’s a crew member appearing out of nowhere to pick it up. There are crew who are -- everyday -- polishing the hand-rails. A lot of it is for health concern (disinfecting), because they don’t want anything contagious going around the ship, but the general level of cleanliness & shine far out-ranks any 5-star hotel. They are big into perfection!
Aside from watching the crew fix the fire-door … I did quite a bit of catalog data-cleanup today. Felt good, I accomplished a lot and (aside from the very un-ergonomic desk conditions), it functions a bit for me as mindfulness meditation! I hope, when I bring these records back to my staff at UVA, that they are kind. We did a lot of work this voyage, but there is still much to be done. There are still a bunch of brief records here-and-there for books and I still have a last stack of original VHS cataloging that I haven’t had time to get through. The only VCRs are in the classrooms, which are hard to come-by. I could try to finish them off during finals week. Or, I’m trying to decide whether they are worth shipping back to UVA or whether we should just leave the brief records in there …
David & Phoebe hosted a “clean-up” party tonight. To finish up the snacks (both crunchy & liquid) that we have all accumulated over the course of this voyage. Every time we found a supermarket, it was so exciting that we bought all we could. I contributed bagel chips & granola bars that I bought I-can’t-even-remember-now-when-or-where. Phoebe & David have a cabin that is much nicer than many, but still much too small to comfortably seat the 18 people that were there tonight. We were on the sofa and on the bed and on the floor and standing all over the place. I wanted my photos to give you the perspective of all those people in a very small space, but I’m not sure I succeeded. Here are a few photos from the evening:
Joyce, Kate, Dawn, Bob:
Vladdy, Gene, Arnie:
Phoebe & Gloria (I love this photo!):
Bob, Monty, Michael:
Robin, Mary, Joyce, Kate, Dawn:
Here are a few scrunched photos. Standing are David, Giles, Phoebe, and Gloria. In front of the sliding glass door is Joyce. What you can’t see is that Robin is seated to the left next to Joyce, Mary in between them on the floor, and Kate, Dawn, and Bob are on the sofa. Pretend that last photo was behind this photo. What you see at the front of this photo is the bed. There were A LOT of us in that space between the bed and the sliding glass door. And again, Phoebe & David have a VERY nice cabin. To give you some perspective of living quarters on the ship …
In this one, standing are Giles, Gene, Arnie, Phoebe and Gloria, and behind them blocked by Gloria and Phoebe are Robin, Mary, Joyce, Kate, Dawn, and Bob. Between Phoebe and the door. Crazy, but fun.
The night ended with a performance by more of Judyie’s theatre classes. For their finals, the students in the directing class directed a play, Stop-Kiss, with each student responsible for directing a scene. The scenes were then voted on by the class and the winning scenes were performed publicly. One of my nieces, Jen, was directing a scene and one of the faculty spouses was one of her actors (the actors were taken from all over the community). But, unfortunately their scene didn’t make the cut. The playwriting class also did readings tonight. They were all fabulous and it was very fun to watch.
Today was the last A-class-day and tomorrow is the last B-class-day. Monday, we'll be in Honolulu. We're all a bit sappy and sickeningly overly-reflective.
