April 22, Another Slow Day, But Things Are Looking Up

The title sums it up. I had a very restless night sleeping. It was as though my body was having a final fight with this respiratory infection that has been plaguing me for the past three days. I tossed and turned: sleeping on my right side, then on my back, then on my left side, then on my back, then back to my right side. And so it seemed to go, almost unceasingly, until at some unknown time, deep into the night, when at last I gained a sense of ease and being in only one position for the rest of the night. I woke up about 8am, when the room service waiter rang the suite doorbell with our breakfast order. I dragged myself out of bed. Patrise had already been up, alert, and reading. She said she had taken a shower already, but I had not heard a sound.

This morning, the seas were considerably smaller and the wind considerably less than yesterday’s conditions. Here are pictures from yesterday morning vs this morning’s ocean, as seen from different places on the ship.

(The ocean waves yesterday, as seen from the Guest Services area on deck 5)

(The ocean yesterday, as seen from our balcony.)

(The ocean this morning, as seen from our balcony)

(The ocean this morning, as seen from our balcony)

We ate breakfast, worked on Wordle – solved it in three steps today! – then got about the morning. Again, we went to different 10am activities: morning trivia for her, a lecture on the death of stars for me. I won’t bore you with details about the lecture, but the lecturer, Dr. Gary Kramer, has been doing a series of talks each day about different topics in astronomy and astrophysics. (You may find it hard to believe, but the Two70 theater has filled up for his talks each day, anywhere from 350-450 passengers coming to hear about our sun, the stars, the universe, and related topics.) His talk focused on the the life cycle of stars and the forces that have stars become white dwarfs, black dwarfs, nova, super novas, or black holes, and more. For a science geek like me, it was fascinating. Here are some slides from his talk.

(Dr. Gary Kramer prepares to talk about the death of stars.)

(The warrior looking creature to the left comes from a video game Dr. Kramer plays. He admitted he is an avid gamer; the one vice his wife puts up with. LOL)

(Slide about the lifecycle of a star)

(A partial view of the Two70 theater audience for Dr. Kramer's talk)

(Near the end of its life cycle, scientists believe the sun's radius will expand to subsume Mercury, Venus and Earth. Of course, none of us will be around to know whether any of their predictions are accurate.)

Unlike yesterday, this morning we planned our post activity rendezvous. I returned to the room before her and continued reading my book, Americanah, by the Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. (It is an excellent work about two young Nigerians wrestling with questions of identity, seeking love, and finding their places in the world.) Patrise returned about 11:15, then we went to lunch at the large, buffet-style restaurant, the Windjammer (imagine Golden Corral on a ship.)

We came back to the suite. Since we were experiencing a window of reliable internet service, we made several calls back to the States; we spoke with Patrise’s sister and her father; we called my sister and our close friends, John and Deborah, but could not reach any of the three. I was sleepy, so I took a nap and slept for about two hours. Patrise hung around for a while, then she left to go to the casino to play Blackjack. When I woke up, she had left me note, requesting that I go to the Concierge Lounge and consult with our Concierge, Danilo, about whether he was able to secure a reservation for us at a restaurant we had not yet gone to. This restaurant was one you had to have signed up for before the cruise; you would sit at the same table and have the same waiting team every night at the same time, although the menu changes each night. We had not known about this, so we had not been able to eat there before. I went to the Lounge, spoke with Danilo, and he was able to work with the head maître d, to get us a 5:45 reservation.

I returned to the room, met my bride, who was already there waiting for me, then we proceeded down to dinner. At dinner, we sat next to an interesting, older American couple, Chuck and Katie. We had a delightful conversation with them. They have been married for 67 years, have four children, several grandchildren and 33 great grandchildren. Chuck is a native American, had grown up in northwest Washington, and been forced to go to an “Indian” boarding school. He enrolled in the Army at age 15 – he lied about his age – and came out at 17. Moved to Michigan with his parents, continued his education by returning to high school there in his senior year, and that’s where he met Katie, who is white. Katie told us, “He was the only face of color in that school, and I thought he was beautiful.” Needless to say, both of their parents were against the marriage, but they hung in there together and eventually their love overcame both of their families’ objections.

We talked about being parents, being grandparents, about their retirement and travels – they spend half their year in Seattle and half in Matzilan, Mexico and they take a lot of cruises; and about the future of the country. We all agreed that the failure of our national leaders to get guns under control was a shame and likely to be the undoing of the country in many ways. Ages 87 and 86 and they were still traveling and being a strong loving couple: Chuck and Katie gave us inspiration for our own future.

After dinner, we returned to the suite. I made a quick run to the ship’s store to get some candy – I was in serious need of a sugar fix, not to mention that most of the ship’s desserts have been pitiful. We played two games of 500 gin rummy, winning one each. I worked on the blog for the day, and we both watched a bit of television.

(A view of the Le Grand restaurant, as seen from our seats)

(Chuck and Katie, our dinner conversation partners)

Tomorrow is our last full day of sailing before we reach French Polynesia. We are excited to see Tahiti and its sister island, Moorea. We are also excited to get off the boat for time and stretch our legs.