INFORMAL FORMAL NIGHT

October 16, 2017

You may surmise from the title that this was formal night and we did not dress up.  If that was your surmising, you surmised correctly.  Bonnie looked at the menu on the TV and found nothing she wanted, so we agreed to stay in our non-gala attire and go to the buffet.  They had lobster on the buffet, anyway, and I had one – Bonnie doesn’t like them.  There was a great variety of vegetables and steak every bit as good as what we had the first night.  We had a table for two and enjoyed ourselves.  Then we went to the World Stage, got great seats, and enjoyed the show.  Now we are back in the room, obviously, with our clocks set back one more hour – tomorrow we will be only one hour ahead of you with one more to go the last night of the cruise.

Believe it or not, last night I lowered the temperature in our room twice.  I called Guest Relations today and said the AC wasn’t putting out as cold as it had been.  A very tall young woman came down with a thermometer to check the air coming out of the vent (she didn’t even have to stretch) and then the air in the room.  She pronounced it very cold.  I told her the air wasn’t coming out with as much force as it had earlier in the cruise.  She said she would get someone to come and look.  If someone came while we were at supper and the show I can tell no difference in the airflow, but the room is comfortable, so what’s to complain about.  As someone remarked about an earlier blog, if that complaint is at the top of the world’s problems, it is small potatoes indeed, and especially from someone on their third cruise of the year.  Amen!

Our disembarkation packet was in our mail slot outside our room this morning.  We will be getting off Wednesday between 8 and 830 and taking a ship’s shuttle to the airport.  We fly from Fort Lauderdale to Charlotte NC and then to Augusta, scheduled to get in at 7:15 p.m.  I will sleep in my bed two nights and then go to a men’s retreat for a local UMC, bringing four talks – “Conversations with Jesus” – before I am back at 233 Sunday afternoon.  One of my ordination counselors asked me to do it for the church she pastors, and since she was such a big help through the process I said yes.  Anyone else, I would have asked for a rain check.  I am such a wonderful person.

Well, it is time for Blogging Bonnie.

TTFN

Well, no sleeping pills last night. I slept a total of 7 hours, arising at 4:30 and playing on my phone till he woke at 7:30.  He was strange last night. At one o’clock he hit me on the shoulder and said what are you doing. I was sound asleep and that rap woke me. I told him I was sleeping. He vows and declares he did not do it. So maybe he did it in his sleep.

I have walked 3 miles today.

He showered and dressed and I dressed and then we went to breakfast. For a change of food, I had a piece of french toast with a mixed berry topping and sausage patty. Very good. After breakfast I was off for my walk while he went to study. It was humid and a little windy but I enjoyed my walk. The crew were on deck opening all the cabinets that contain extra life vests and counting and cleaning them. I passed them as I walked. When my walk was done, I headed back to the cabin for a shower. It was really warm in the cabin, in spite of what the girl said it has been warmer in our room. Tonight seems to be better. After dressing I headed to deck 9 to find a seat and crochet. It was warm and humid outside on the deck, the cover was mostly closed because of the threat of rain showers. So I went into the tables in the buffet, found an empty one in the window and sat down to crochet. I called your Dad in the room to tell him where I was sitting, but nobody answered the phone. I left a message. When he came up he said the phone never rang and since the phone sits on the floor he didn’t notice there was a message. But he found me.

After lunch I headed to the theater, which wasn’t open because the singers and dancers were practicing. They opened late today about 1:45 for the 2 o’clock talk. The Georgetown professor has been talking about art, way above my head, reminds me of the art class I had to take in college. But at least I don’t have to remember all this stuff. He talks so fast and uses so many high fluting words and about artists I have never heard of before. Today he ran about 10 minutes long. Tomorrow his talk is at 11 so I won’t see his final talk. Your Dad is still at 3, followed of course by Bingo! 

We did indeed slum it to night and eat in the Lido. Besides the lobster, which I didn’t eat, they had rib eye steaks and they were excellent. There were vegetables, sweet potatoes, purple rice, yes I said purple, and apple sauce (and mushrooms which your Dad ate and enjoyed). There were lots of other choices but I only took what I would eat. We sat in the window and watched the ocean go by.

Each day the Captain gives a report at about 12:30. Today he was telling us about the young man who is in training on this cruise. He has mentioned him before. His job this cruise has been to plot the position of the ship using the sextant, the stars , the sun, charts etc. as we cruise back to Ft Lauderdale. The first day he was off by 100 miles from our position at the end of the day, so he got some more instructions and yesterday he was only off my 9 miles. He is in training I assume to be a captain or a navigator.

Well, tomorrow it is pack and get ready to get off on Wednesday. We are scheduled to get off at 8:30 and take a shuttle to the airport. David has to go and get our passports from the desk in the morning tomorrow. We are scheduled to dock early and before anyone can get off the entire crew has to be cleared by immigration. They will come on board and inspect each crew members documents. This can take a while especially if some of them forget to go. This happened on another ship we were on. This is supposed to start at 5:30am. So here is hoping all goes smoothly. Any ship coming for the first time into port has to do this in America.

Well, he probably thinks I am never going to get done. So I had better say good night. I have finished two of my crocheting projects with the yarn I bought. They aren’t completely done but getting there.  

Love you all, Mom, Granny and Bonnie