Well, it's done. I've told the office I'm not coming back to another ship (at least, not immediately, I'm not burning any bridges here). So I have two and a half weeks of glorious martinin nights and sunny days before it's back to the cold and grey of the Northwest winter. I'm actually pretty excited about it. I've already signed up for a 3 day Dreamweaver class in Portland, and we'll see where life takes me from there. If anyone has any brilliant ideas, I'm all ears. I'd like a job where I don't have to be nice to anyone I don't like....
Meanwhile, I'm back in St Thomas, frittering the day away in the internet bar again, along with all the musicians from the ship, who like it here because nobody hassles them about downloading music. The weather (despite what you might be hearing about hurricane Wilma) is glorious here, so I may find some time to go lie by the pool yet today. I just bought a new bikini (God only knows what I'll do with it in Seattle), in St Maarten, so I need to at least cut the tags off it and introduce it to the sun.
I have Dreamweaver now (thanks Tim!) and it's amazing. Once I got past the fact that hyperlinks on pictures are called Hot buttons, and once I discovered that I could map areas of one picture and link them to all different places, I was sold. Next thing I know, I have six programs running and I don't leave my cabin for ten hours. The cosmetic changes are minimal, but KB will no doubt be delighted to hear that I'm finally coming to terms with CSS (badly, no doubt, but those of you using Firefox will be delighted to know that the little brackets on my calendar have now disappeared). So watch for more changes. I'm afraid 10 hours only got me as far as the home page and calendar page, but the Louie pages are next.
Meanwhile, the Caribbean is lovely as always, though I wouldn't know, because I'm sitting in a dark cyber bar, updating my website.
Every week I have to get up on stage in the Princess Theater and introduce myself to everyone on the ship. This used to terrify me, and I'd leave the stage shaking, and be a complete wreck for the rest of the evening. Now I just think it's boring. I caught myself about to yawn last night while waiting for my turn. I guess it really is time to come home.
There is the cutest couple on board here this week. I have no idea how old they are, but my guess is, pushing 90. He rides one of those little scooters, and rather than hobble along beside him, his wife stands up in front, straight and proud like a figurehead. She, I think, steers ( because I don't see how he could see through her), and looks neither left nor right, and acknowledges no-one, but they're the delight of the ship.
I love flying fish. They appear suddenly out of thin air, like so many silver coins, then skitter frantically across the sea, only to disappear as abruptly as they arrived. Now that I'm in the Caribbean, I get to see them almsot every day. I can't imagine that anyone would want to eat them, but they must, since they're a feature of our Caribbean night menu. It seems to me that would be like choking down a kazoo, but what do I know?
Apparently I'm back to bringing the rain with me wherever I go, which is a bit of a disappointment now that I'm finally in the Caribbean. On the other hand, it's very good for business - everybody wants to take computer classes when it's raining outside - but it's not doing much for my tan.
One thing I love about the American runs is that we get TNT, intermittently, and I'm catching up on all the shows I never watched when I lived on land ( because, at the end of the day, everything beats watching the same episode of Everybody Loves Raymod for two years straight). What's a little more worrisome is that I have the schedule memorized, and now am structuring my day around catching reruns of "Charmed" at 4:00 and 5:00. In a weird quirk of ship life though, the second episode always cuts out at 5:57 and the screen turns to snow for the next two hours. I wouldn't mind, but without fail it cuts out just at the most climactic moment possible. I've learned to come to terms with it It's always my signal that it's time to go to the gym.
We've left the Western Caribbean now, and have begun the endless run to St Thomas, St Maarten and back again. Much to my surprise and delight, my cell phone works (as promised, but I didn't believe them) in St Thomas, and there's an internet cafe right across from the ship. I've already been here two hours, (it is raining outside, so it's not like I'm wasting valuable beach time, and I have all the diamonds I'll ever need... which is apparently not many...so I'm also not losing valuable shopping time, because I'm trying really really hard to stay out of the electronics stores). I actually had to work two whole days in a row, so I'm a bit tired, particularly because I threw a 5 mile run into the mix. Let me tell you, that has its own special challenges on a ship pitching around in the ocean, with really bad musice being pumped out across the gym, just loud enough that I can't drown it out with my MP3 player without risking permanent hearing loss. I went to the crew bar to get a cup of ice (since I had a funny sore spot on my foot) and apparently the bartender thought I was having a big party in my room, because he sent me off with a grocery bag full, which was enough ice for me to be fully encased from the knees down. It was fantastic.
Well, we almost picked up a boatload of Cubans yesterday on our way into Ft Lauderdale, but they declined our help ( and apparently also that of the Coast Guard, which we waited for) despite the fact that eight of them were sharing a leaky rubber raft with a very smoky engine. It certainly provided no end of excitement for our passengers, who all got out the video cameras to record every moment, and brought plates of food to sustain themselves through the drama. It's always nice when one person's tragedy can be someone else's entertainment.