Friday, March 27, 2020

December 30, 2019 – At Sea – Pacific Ocean – Mostly Cloudy – 67F

A terribly bumpy night – in the middle of the night, the booms and movement were enough to wake us up.  We did wind up sleeping through most of it but it was more than moderate seas during the night.  This is the view of the Pacific Ocean from our stateroom.


I was up in Horizon Court around 7 AM and found a seat by the window – almost immediately, someone, without asking, started to sit down at my table.  I don’t see breakfast as a time to share tables especially since there were plenty of other tables available so I told him that my wife was coming.  The same thing happened yesterday and my server told me that, while I was getting another cup of coffee, a couple tried to take my table, even though my food and magazine were still there.  What is going on here?

My breakfast was an exercise in trial and error.  I checked out the waffles and asked the server if he could toast my waffle (they are soggy).  He couldn’t but volunteered to make me a fresh one.  I also tried a plain pancake (not bad) along with a fried egg.  I put cottage cheese on the waffle.  I wound up eating most of the pancake and egg and a little bit of the waffle.  The biscuits were better today.  Tomorrow, I will need to find a more secluded table.  Breakfast is my favorite meal on board but not so far on this ship.

At 10 AM, I went to the Piazza and bought a coffee (Decaf skinny mocha latte iced) from New Grounds.  I found a nice table in the seating area near the bar and worked on my talk for tomorrow.  


The coffee was good and I topped it off with some milk and more ice cubes.  I took the drink with me to the Princess Theater.

My second talk, “Forensics and History: The Search for the Unknown Titanic Child”, is scheduled for the Princess Theater at 11:30 AM – there was no one in front of me so I went to set up.  Again, I am using the theater’s laptop and my jump drive and clicker – so much easier.  This time, the image was a little off on the screen and the AV guys worked a few minutes to get it just about right. 

The attendance increased substantially – I estimated that more than half of the theater was filled – perhaps 400 folks or so.  The talk went well – it did run over a few minutes – and I spent a few minutes talking with guests afterwards.

Today’s lunch options were the “Pub Lunch” and the Mexican Buffet up in Horizon Court. We instead went to the Da Vinci Dining Room, where Ellen has the Pan Fried Sole and I had two bowls of gazpacho, a green salad, and nibbled at my veggie stuffed pepper.  The soup was really good so I will be looking for it when it comes around again.

Our afternoon place today was One5, which had no music and just a few passengers present. I am still reading “Dark Sacred Night”.  We had nice seats by the window and the seas are considerably calmer.

When the staff started setting up for an Elite Event, we went to the cabin to rest up before dinner. 

We had already seen the dinner menu and determined that no options would work for us, so our next step was to see the offerings on the buffet.  That didn’t come close so we ended up with a wonderful window seat in Alfredo’s Pizzeria.  My Vegetariana Pizza today was made with extra sauce (my request) and it was wonderful – I almost ate the whole pizza.  Along with the pizza, I had the Baked Potato Soup and the Caprese Salad (both good) (I have been getting these from the adjacent International Café).  The champagne pyramid was going on in the piazza so our waitress brought up some champagne (good) and mimosas.

Our first stop on the entertainment circuit was the Princess Theater at 7:30 AM to see Mike Wilson – comedian/impressionist.  We’ve seen him before and he was funny but he was going along at a superfast clip and some of his punchlines were mumbled into obscurity.  He did some new stuff and I will never understand why he does a Christian Slater impression (there's no way to tell if it's a good impression).  He needs to stick with Jack Nicholson, which is his best impression.

Mike’s show ran a little long for a Princess show so we had to jog to the Vista Theater to see Simon Cotter’s second show.  Simon seemed a little lifeless tonight and relied heavily on puns for jokes.  We stayed about 10 minutes before heading to the room to read and settle down.

The ocean is calm so far.

The clocks move back one hour tonight.

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