Great Vacation Getaway - Day 4

This was the big day.  Our 20^th anniversary! The whole reason that we came on this cruise.

To say that the evening before seemed inauspicious is an understatement.  Angela went to bed with her stomach in total disarray, and I not only had no plan whatsoever for the next day, I hadn’t even read anything to have a half-assed plan with which to wing it.

The only fixed thing for the day of our anniversary was breakfast in bed.  I had ordered this to come at 7:30, so imagine my surprise when there was a knock at the door at 7:05.  I was, thankfully, awake, and I was also pretty pleased that Angela wasn’t green or pale or doubled over any more.  So I had that going for me.

Unfortunately, we couldn’t remember who had ordered what, and apparently we’d both ordered eggs.  I originally gave her my eggs, and we had to switch, and I found myself facing eggs that had been cut open with a fork that had been in Angela’s mouth.  Was she contagious?  Would I get ill if I ate the eggs?  Could I get by without eating?

I decided to risk it and eat the eggs.  Hopefully the cup of scalding hot coffee that I washed them down with would prove too much for any germs to survive.

While we ate breakfast, we broke out William’s card.  I had already been yelled at once for stumbling across it and almost reading it, so was curious to see what he’d made for us.  In fact, he wrote us a cute little poem, and had a nice little cartoon on it, and generally celebrated our love.  It was terribly sweet and we were touched by his thoughtfulness.

I was just finishing the coffee when Angela, recuperated from her descent into illness, made an announcement:

“Let’s go,” she said.  “I want to go do something.”

She looked at me impatiently, fully dressed, tapping her foot, ready to go.

I sat in bed wearing nothing but the sheets and looking longingly at the two carafes of coffee they’d brought me by mistake.  “Uh,” I said.  “In a minute?”

“Now,” she said.  It was as if, having cheated death, she had decided to seize every moment that lasted in our vacation.  “The boat’s docked.  Let’s get going, anniversary boy.”

Sighing, I got up.  “I gotta shower,” I said.

“Do it fast,” she said.  “I’m ready to go.”

I took my shower fast, and shaved fast, and then she chop-chopped me off the boat like she was the Green Hornet and I was Kato. 

On our way out of the boat, we ran into one of our trivia/scavenger hunt buddies from yesterday.  “Hey!” she said.  “How are my favorite newlyweds!”

“Morning,” I said. 

“Have a great day!” she sloshed her bloody mary at me.  It was eight in the morning.  Some people start vacation early.

Once we’d de-barked, and gotten down the pier, she turned and looked at me expectantly.  “What are going to do?” she asked.

I simply stared at her, perplexed.  How was I supposed to know?  I certainly hadn’t planned anything!  But then I reflected that this wasn’t a totally illegitimate question.  After all, I’m the one who always reads the books and does the planning and makes up the itineraries.  All she ever does is come along.

And then I got mad.  Who was she to expect me to come up with a plan?  On my anniversary, no less!  The nerve of some people!

And then I got even madder.  I mean, she practically frog marched me out of the room and the dragged me down the gang-plank, and now she expected me to have a plan on what we were gonna do?

So while I’m getting even madder and madder, you know what she says?

“The one thing I want to do is go to the Red Onion and get a sweatshirt.”

What the heck?  Did she say red onion, like the vegetable, or Red Onion, like some place I should know about?  Or Red Onion, like a flatulent teary-eyed superhero?  Now I wasn’t mad, but I was confused.

“So?” She looks at me expectantly.

“Well,” I finally said.  “Ketchikan is the kind of place where-“

“We’re in Skagway,” she said.

“Would you let me finish?”

“Sorry.”

“As I was saying, Skagway is a long thin district full of shopping and stuff, with a railway to the Yukon, the highlight of which is, as you noted, the Red Onion.”  Note how smoothly I just made some BS up on the spot.  This, boys and girls, is why I’m in management.  “I propose that we just take a stroll and see what happens.”

“Are we going on a train ride?”

“If you recall, we haven’t had much luck with trains,” I said.  “What with the whole ‘broken down grand canyon railway’ trip in our past.  I thought I’d not push it.”

“Okay,” she said.  “I can live with that.”

We headed off up into Skagway, which I thought was Ketchikan.  I was really curious to see what the Red Onion was, too.  Was it like a big giant onion or something?  Kind of like Idaho and potatoes, only without the cultish religious overtones?

We made our way up the street, stopping in every little store that we came to.  Again, I was strongly reminded of Gatlinburg.  And whenever something caught Angela’s eye, I would buy it for her, hoping that this display of gentlemanly spending would take her attention off of the fact that I had planned absolutely bupkus for us today.

As we neared the end of historic Skagway, she spied a street hawker for a show.  “That looks interesting,” she said.  “Let’s go see the show.”

Inwardly, I groaned.  As a lifelong fan of outdoor drama, if this had been KETCHIKAN: The Musical Story of the Suppression of Eskimos!  I would have been all over it.  But this looked like a decidedly indoor drama.  And the signboard outside didn’t fill me with excitement:  “The Story of Soapy Smith.”

Is that like Snuffy Smith?  Because I hate that guy.

But we went inside anyways.  When Angela saw the price, she suddenly balked at it.  “Twenty bucks?” she asks.  “No way!”

Now I’m on the offense, though.  Not only do I see an opportunity to break out some money and win points, but if this thing is as bad as I think it is (and boy, does it look bad), it’s a double win for me: a bloggortunity combined with a waste of cash that was her idea!  I haven’t made out this good since she decided to have children!

Plus, I can see a poster on the wall that has women flashing their butts at the audience.  If this show is raunchy, it’s a triple-play!

“We’ll pay!” I said as I knocked her aside.  I looked down at her sprawled on the floor.  “Uh, happy anniversary?”

Once we’d paid, and bought popcorn (which was stale, another good sign of impending bad show), we entered into the theater.  Sitting on the stage was a little old man poorly playing guitar and reciting bad poetry.

It’s worth noting that the poetry he was reciting came from Ketchikan, I mean Skagway’s, most famous poet ever, some dude you never heard of.  And the guy reciting it made sure to note that he wasn’t nearly as good as the guy you never heard of.  I didn’t know about that other guy, the one you never heard of, but I was sure that the guy on stage was right.

On the up side, that five minutes of my life felt like about five hours.

Only right at the end, when the dude freelanced, did he ever do anything good, a poem about triangles and squares and cubes.  But that could have been the nerd in me coming out.

Then the play started, and I settled in for a good piece of schadenfreude that I could use to ride out the next five years.

But you know what?  It really was pretty good, for a play centering about a con man and three hookers.  And the piano player was really good!

Quick aside: Soapy Smith was a con man who ruled Ketchikan (I mean Skagway) for about seven months, until he was shot to death in an argument over a prospector who was robbed of $2800.  He was portrayed as a villain at the time, but the play has him portrayed sympathetically, which is an interesting choice.

But the best part was the audience participation, featuring Doug.  Now, you might think that Doug would seize his part of the limelight and ham it up a little, since he was featured pretty prominently on stage. 

You’d think wrong.

Once, many years ago, I got the chance to do some audience participation theater at Disneyworld, and when my chance came, boy did I ham it up.  That’s what they want you to do, you know? 

Not Doug.  If you’d replaced him with any inanimate object (chair, light post, totem pole, Egyptian mummy…) it would have done a better acting job than this guy.  You’d think he was afraid that these were actual harlots accosting him, instead of actresses.  Dude, they’re not really gonna take you upstairs and rob you.  Your wife’s not really gonna be mad (well, I dunno, maybe she is). 

At any rate, it was a good show, and we had a good laugh. 

After that, we went down the other side of the street.  Somehow we’d missed the building made of antlers as we walked up Ketchikan (I mean Skagway’s) only street, so we marveled at it as we passed.

And then, just as lunchtime came upon us, we encountered it.  The Red Onion Saloon and Brothel.

To say that this is the finest eating establishment in all of Alaska is an understatement.  It is quite possibly the finest eating establishment in the entire Northern Hemisphere.

Okay, I kid.

What it is is a turn-of-the-century saloon and brothel that has survived by converting itself into a restaurant that gives tours of the upstairs former brothel.  But what really sells the place is the period atmosphere, the old-timey décor and the band playing downstairs, and the waitresses in period costume.

By which I mean figure-enhancing bustiers and low-cut tops.

Angela and I came inside and immediately got seated.  “Would you guys mind sharing your table?” the waitress asked.

“No,” I said.  “That’s okay.”

So we were seated with a very nice couple from another boat, retirees who were out enjoying a day in Ketchikan (or Skagway or wherever the heck we were).  We had a nice chat with them, and they both congratulated us on our anniversary.

One of the funny things about this place was the brothel-themed dishes, like the Sloppy John or the Harlot Sandwich or whatever.  And our waitress was really selling it, too, referring to herself as a whore and generally having a good time with it. Plus, she had a good saucy English accent, which was good for a laugh.

Now you gotta understand something for this next part: all of these waitresses are wearing corsets, the tops of which are stuffed with bills.  All of the corsets display a generous amount of cleavage. 

She comes with the bill.  “Do I pay you or up front?” I asked.

“You better not give another whore my money!” she says.

“Okay,” I said and I gave her my credit card.

“Here,” Angela gives me a five dollar bill.  “Give her this as a tip.”

“I’m gonna put it on the card,” I said.

“But then you can’t stick it in her bustier!” Angela says.

“I thought we weren’t getting each other anything for our anniversary this year?” I asked.

So the waitress comes back, and I’ve got my $5.  “I’m trying to figure out how to do the tip,” I said.

“Nothing smaller than a tenner goes down the front,” she says.  “Anything less goes in the side.”

“Quick!  Get me a tenner!” I said to Angela.

“Here,” she says. “Let me get the camera.”

As Angela is digging out the camera, the waitress announces to the whole restaurant: “Take a good look, everybody, and see a real man put a tip down the front!”

So in front of everybody with Angela snapping pictures I put a ten dollar bill down the cleavage of the busty waitress, and then there was applause all around, and Angela snapped a picture of  me with my arm around the waitress, and everybody wins.

Now here’s the funny part: I sat back down, and the lady at the table with us was offended that this all happened on our anniversary!

“On your anniversary!” she harrumphed.  “Of all things!”

Wait, did you miss the part where it was my wife’s idea?  Did you not get the whole brothel-themed eatery thing?  When you ordered the Harlot Sandwich, did you think it was just a funny name for ham?

On the way out, I bought Angela two shirts, since she was such a good sport.  And I tipped the barmaid and the gift shop girl, just to be nice.  I’d have tipped the owner and the other waitresses and a few patrons waiting, but Angela started to lose patience, and I was out of tenners.

After that, we went back to the boat to get some rest, having been on our feet for quite a while.  As we waited for the elevator, it happened.

“Hey!” these people said.  “You two were on TV!  You were on the Newlywed game.”

“Thank you,” I said.  “Would you like me to sign something?”

“I still can’t believe how bad you honked it,” Angela said.

“Well, it’s hard,” one of the ladies said.  “Those questions are just completely unexpected.”

“No, he spent all day drilling me on the answers,” Angela said.  “Then he got them wrong.”

I’d have argued, but it was true.

After plenty of rest and relaxation, it was time for us to head back out to explore the boat some more and find our dinner.  As we went, who did we pass but our good friend from the trivia?

“Hey!”  She said.  “It’s my two favorite newlyweds!”  Once again, she was following a cup, this time filled with beer. 

“Hey,” we said as we passed.

At dinner, we went to a fancy steakhouse.  We’d booked it kind of last minute, but owing to us still being in port it was almost completely empty.  Not only did we get a good meal, but they sang to us because it was our anniversary!

But you have to understand who sang to us: the head chef.  Of the whole boat!  And this is a big deal, because he’s this German guy with a mustache like Salvador Dali.  And he is also a fantastic yodeler.  And him and his accompanists sang “Will You Call Me Sweetheart” and brought us a cake and everything.  It was great.

I tell you what, Norwegian really goes all-out!

After dinner we were prevented from going to our room by the room valet guy, so we headed over to the bowling alley and bowled a couple of games.  There was a special going on, two games for the price of one, so we bowled two games.  Typically, this means we do better in the second game than in the first.

Tonight?  Not so much.  But at least we didn’t have to put the bumpers up like the group next to us!

After bowling we headed back to our room to get a little rest before the White Hot Dance Party.  In the hall, who did we pass but:

“If it isn’t my two favorite Newlyweds!” she slurred as she tried not to spill the wine she carried all over the floor.

“Hey,” we both said.  I marveled at her stamina.  She had to have downed about six barrels of booze today.

She then said something, mostly intelligible, which I think was about how she hoped we had a good night.

When we opened the door, what greeted us but, to our delight, the room made up with balloons and streamers and a big HAPPY ANNIVERSARY banner. 

How nice!

After some time in the room, we were ready to head for the White Hot Dance Party.  What is that, you ask?

Well, it’s a room with a smog machine, loud music, and people dancing.  After watching in a mixture of fear and mild amusement, Angela turned to me and asked:

“When did we get so old?”

“I don’t know,” I said.  “But I want to leave.”

So leave we did.

On our way we passed by the hot tubs, and it happened again.

“Hey!  I know you!” a lady yelled.

Bear in mind, I’ve seen this lady around the boat.  I have come to think of her as the woman who doesn’t realize she’s not a schoolgirl any more, but wears her hair in pigtails anyways. 

“You two were on TV!” she says.

Now, bear in mind, I never turn away the fans.  It’s really all for them.  So I have to go back to talk to them.

“Yeah,” I said.  “That’s us.  Sorry I don’t have any 8x10s.”

So these two ladies are in the hot tub, and we have a nice chat with them, and three things become readily apparent:

-Pigtail Lady is drunk as a skunk

-Pigtail Lady is an old maid (she said it, not me)

-Pigtail Lady is drunk as a skunk

Listen, I’m not one to judge, and at least it’s the end of the day and not the beginning.  But this lady has more sheets to the wind than a laundry line.

Finally, teeth chattering, Angela says it’s time for us to go.

“Go!” Pigtail Lady announces.  “Go to the nuptual bed!”

“That’s good advice,” I said.  “We should take it.”

We made a quick turn through the café, pausing to speak with more fans, and then it was back to the room and to bed.

An altogether good day.  Particularly since we didn’t see Mr. Grumpy a single time.  Imagine that!

Great Vacation Getaway – Day 3

Today dawned bright and clear and full of promise.  And we were headed for the highlight of our trip: the Helicopter Dog Sled Adventure Ride!

But the boat didn’t dock until 2:30, though.  And once we’d read the daily digest, it was clear what we must do: attend the trivia contest!  After all, I needed some measure of redemption following my failure at the stupid Newlywed Game last night, and so far every time I caught the tail end of the trivia games it was clear that I was in a whole different league than these other crew passengers.

It probably helps that I’m not swilling down Bloody Marys at 9 in the morning, and also that about 32% of my brain is dedicated to remembering useless trivia tidbits, like which country is jointly ruled by a Bishop and by France (it’s Andorra, by the way, which I knew).

Angela, wanting me to feel like I’m not totally useless, managed to get me down there well in time to make the trivia contest.  It took us some doing, since the breakfast restaurant was packed (including by a fairly hungover-looking Mr. Grumpy, which made him look grumpier than usual).  But make it we did. 

The instructions were to form teams, so we teamed up with a couple and with a nice lady who shall remain nameless, but who had a cup full of Bloody Mary at 9 in the morning.  We’d seen her yesterday, with the same cup, but full of beer.

There were 20 questions, and a possible of 24 points.  I felt pretty bad at the beginning – after all, I have no idea about Beach Boys album covers or Beatles records – but I came through in the end when they asked for a bonus question about “what animal is catgut made from?”

It’s Sheep, by the way.  I know, strange.  But it’s sheep.

We ended up scoring 16 points, one off of the winning score of 17, so I felt vindicated by the time it was all over.

Once that was over, we wandered into a scavenger hunt, and again found ourselves paired with Mrs. “I like to drink a lot.”  That was a lot of fun, but we ended up also losing that one, mostly because one of the other teams cheated.  How did they cheat in a scavenger hunt?

I don’t want to talk about it, that’s how.

Then it was off to lunch.  Once again, the restaurant was packed, and this time we found ourselves sharing a table with two nice older ladies who asked us very politely if they could sit with us.  I happily agreed, and Angela wasn’t there to stop me.

Now, I don’t want to sound cruel – and I’m not trying to be funny here – but we’re fairly sure that one of the ladies isn’t quite there.  Nice ladies, really good conversationalists, but one of them – not all there. 

They were both very jealous about our upcoming Helicopter Dog Sled Glacier Adventure.

And then, finally, painfully, we were in Juneau.  Hooray!  Helicopter Dog Sled Glacier Adventure here we come!

We de-boated and made our way up the gangplank, eager to be on our way.

At least, I was eager.  Angela, as you may know, hates heights, is always freezing (even in an oven), and gets motion sick sitting on a waterbed.  So her idea of fun is not “let’s get in a helicopter and fly up high and then go on a dogsled on a glacier with the wind whipping around us while in Alaska.”  But it’s the only thing I ever accidentally showed her the price of, and she for sure wasn’t going to miss this after I paid all that money for it, so she had to come.

Advantage:  Kurt!

First, though, we had to get to the helicopter base camp.  Which was more of an adventure than we could ever have imagined.

Finding our group fairly easily, we noticed that there were two fairly obvious groups together: one, a group of somewhat disgruntled out-of-shape people who were angrily waiting.  Two: a calmer, more relaxed group that seemed to be younger and somewhat fitter.

The leader of the disgruntled people was Dr. Butthead.  While we waited for the whole group to arrive from the boat, he decided to pepper the tour lady with helpful questions like:

“We paid for this, didn’t we?  Why aren’t we going?”

And

“Is there going to be a bus?”

And

“What’s wrong with you people that you can’t be more organized?”

Now, to be fair, they were disorganized.  But I don’t know how organized they can be when 2,500 people get off of a ship over a one-hour period and they all ask the same questions to the first person they meet holding a clipboard.  Things like:

“Are you the glacier dogsled group?”

And

“Are you the dogsled glacier group?”

And

“Are you the one-legged pirate performer who rides the unicycle that we’re supposed to meet?”

You might think I’m kidding, but it’s true.  And I have no idea what they’re thinking, because often it’s obvious that the person holding the clipboard that says KAYAKING ADVNETURE is probably not the person who is supposed to meet you for the SNOWMOBILING REPAIR COURSE, so you might not ask them if they’re that person.

Eventually, she says “Okay, everybody follow me!”

So we followed, with Dr. Butthead saying helpful things like “it’s about time” or “why didn’t you get started already?” or “I have another excursion so it’s about time for you to get started!”

She took us and put us on the bus.  But suddenly, I heard from outside “No, sir, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to bring you over here.  You’re the dog sledding group so you have to go back and wait for the next bus.”

Wait, what?

I looked around the bus.  I’m not going to say that I was surrounded by pasty people whose idea of exercise was tying their shoes on a windy day.  But we were easily well younger than the rest of this crowd.

“Are we on the right bus?” I asked Angela.

“They took our tickets, didn’t they?” she said. 

“But they turned that guy away,” I said.

“If they want to turn us away, they’ll come get us,” she said.  “Just let them do their job.”

Just then, the lady got on the bus:  “Is anybody on here a dogsledder?”

I sighed.  “I was right,” I said as they de-bussed us.  “We weren’t supposed to be on that bus.”

“Where was that keen sense last night?” Angela asked as we hiked back over to the waiting area.

Finally after a long wait, we were put on another bus.  A bus driven by…

MR. CRAZY!

And that’s exactly what his name was.  Okay, maybe not: it might have been Clowny McClownicus.

But he was, in fact, Mr. Crazy.

First, he was completely befuddled by the tickets. Did he rip them?  Not rip them?  Did we keep part of them?  Did he need to rip them both at the same time, or rip them singly?  To answer this dilemma, he needed to call in to HQ to find out (no, really).

After he’d loaded us all in, he came inside to give us a safety talk and hit his head on the door of the bus, making him woozy.  I thought it also made him less coherent, but unless that lasted for about 4 hours, I think that wasn’t the issue.

Once he’d given us the safety talk, he finally took the driver’s side and got ready to go.  But apparently it’s a safety rule that he needs somebody to wave him out as he backs up, and despite his best efforts nobody would come over to wave him out.

Eventually, tired and ready to go, he just threw it in reverse and hit the gas, and WHUMP!

He hit his wheel chocks.

Chagrined, he climbed out, pulled the out from under his tires, and then the moment he got back in someone appeared to wave him out.

It’s like, seeing wheel chocks on his vehicle, they assumed he wouldn’t be backing up.  Probably because he couldn’t.

After some time we arrived at helicopter base camp.  Angela was handling the whole thing rather well, only breaking one of my knuckles grasping my hand in utter terror at what was to come.

After much running around crazily, they finally found us a safety “instructor.”  And I put in quotes because this is the first thing he said to us:

“Okay, dudes, I’m going to give you the safety talk.  Wow, I’m like, totally disorganized.  Wow.  Just let me have  a second to get my head together, man.  Wow.  Totally.  Okay, I’m like totally ready to do this now.  Just, wow.  Dude.”

I began to have second thoughts myself, and hoped sincerely that the helicopter pilot and mechanic were significantly less half-baked than everyone else I’d met with this company so far.

Once we’d seen the safety demonstration, we put on our gear:  a life jacket and big rubber booties to keep our feet dry.  I was putting mine on when the woman came to help me and did it in about ten seconds.  Then she went to help the woman next to me, who yelled:

“DON’T TOUCH MY TOE IT’S BROKEN!”

Turns out, this limping woman who’s been with us has a broken toe (or three, she doesn’t know).  I really admired her bravery: if it were me, I’d be laying in bed with my foot up, but here she is out here, determined to make the best of her vacation.  Yikes!  She did really good, too, all things considered.

Once this is all done, and we’re suited up, it’s time for the helicopter ride.  Thankfully, this is not one of those vintage 1960s-era ‘copters at a state fair, but rather a modern helicopter piloted by a pretty competent-looking pilot.  I felt reassured the whole time.

Our pilot was a woman, who had 9 years of experience, who was really sensitive to the fact that two of our flyers were completely not excited about flying, and did her best to keep us stable and comfortable the whole flight.  I tell you, in one trip she did more to make me feel better about the half-bakedness of the other employees.

(Side note: I never did see the goats she pointed out, although Angela claimed that she did see them).

Once at the dogsled camp, I had to give Angela an apology.  See, I’d been sweating out my ears all day at how hot I was in my coat.  Up on the glacier, though, it was colder than a mammer-jammer, and I quickly found myself freezing in the wind.  Thankfully, I had my big heavy coat and my Wyoming constitution to make me feel better, so I was okay.

The Californians, though, were not doing okay.  They were not doing okay at all.

Once we’d gotten the basics of dogsled mushing (don’t fall off, basically), we met up with our team and we started. 

Let’s get two things clear right away:  it’s not fast, and the dogs do poop as they run.

But it is a singularly impressive way to travel.  Yeah, it’s not terribly fast – about 7 to 10 miles an hour – but the dogs make it look so easy, over such horrible terrain, that it’s amazing they go anywhere at all!  And they let you ride the back sled and put the brakes on, which is fun.

At our first stop, I saw something on the ground, so I went to grab it (being ecologically conscious).  I saw that it was a dog bootie.  I’d just picked it up when the dogs, who were terribly amped up during their first run of the day, started going again.

While I was standing in front of the back sled.

For a few moments, I was terribly concerned that I was about to be run over by a dogsled.  It kept whacking me in the shins as the musher tried to get the dogs back under control and stopped, and I just continued to stagger backwards and hope that I didn’t fall and get under the treds of the sled.

Angela helped me by laughing.

With nothing bruised but my ego and my shins, soon we were off again, this time with Angela of the Yukon mushing and me sitting.  And I discovered, not for the first time, that sitting is much better than almost anything else.

Once back at dog camp, we were ready to go.  We’d ridden the sled and petted the dogs and were pretty much ready to wind down this great adventure.

Only, the helicopters weren’t back.  So we waited.

And waited.

And waited.

While waiting, I sat down on a box because sitting is much better than almost anything else.  And I discovered that the box was very wet, and I now had wet pants.

Sigh.

So we waited some more, and finally the helicopters came over the hill and we were out of there.

This time Angela sat up front and got some great pictures of the flight, for which I was grateful.  This was particularly nice since she isn’t particularly fond of heights, but she was willing to sit up in the glass front and look down and still shoot all kinds of pictures. 

Once back in Juneau, we were ready to head back to the boat.  After all, it’d been a long day, and as exciting as Gatlinburg of the North was, we were pretty much ready to retire. 

Arriving back in our cabin, Angela’s stomach decided to revolt – it was not at all pretty – and so we spent the rest of the night in our cabin resting.

Great Vacation Getaway – Day 2

It didn’t last. 

Sometime during the night, the sea became angry, and much like the Minnow our ship found itself tossed.  By morning, everything in our room had moved around some, and the bottles of Vodka in the fridge were clanking and clattering like there was no tomorrow.

Argh!

Tired, queasy, and somewhat discontented we awoke and headed off to begin our exciting day.  Or at least, a day that we hoped would be exciting.  What would it hold for us?

After some wandering about we ended up in the breakfast nook, a delightful area where they had all sorts of stuff out to eat.  Since it’s a cruise, there is a lot more on offer than you should ever even think about eating, but we dug in nonetheless.  We didn’t have quite the luck that we’d experienced earlier in the day, and ended up eating away from the window, but it was a good breakfast anyways.

Just as we finished, Angela poked me.  “Hey, look who it is!”

Sure enough, here came Mr. Grumpy, his miserable kindred trailing along behind him, like Snow White leading the Seven Dwarves to the gallows.  They were too far away to hear (thankfully), but the whole lot of them looked decidedly unhappy to be going about whatever they were doing.

“It’s like Where’s Waldo,” I said.  “Only a lot more unhappier.”

For the rest of the day we made that our game: Spot the Grump.

After breakfast the ship was pitching and heaving, so in order to kill time we indulged ourselves in the fine shipboard sport, Shuffleboard.  And thanks to the crashing and tossing of the ship, Angela just barely eked out a victory of 25-0.  I would have scored more, but just when I had all my discs in scoring position a big wave swept them off, plus dropped a crab on my head that pinched me.

Once that was out of the way, it was time for us to go play Bingo.  Like a dutiful husband, I bought the “couples fun” package that included 7 scratch-off lottery tickets, 9 cards, and a T-shirt. 

Angela and I each opened one of the lottery tickets waiting for Bingo to start.

“I won a dollar!” she said happily.

“I got a rock.”

“I won another dollar!”

“I got another rock,” I said.

“Wow!  I won five bucks!”

“Nothing but lemons in mine,” I said.

“I won another buck!” She said.  “That’s eight bucks!”

“I won nothing,” I said.  “Plus this card is making fun of me.”

Eight dollars richer, we began Bingo.  How did we do?  Well, when it was over, we were still only up $8.

“What do you want to do now?” she asked once we’d cashed out her winnings from the shipboard casino.

“I saw a game show,” I said.  “It’s Let’s Make a Deal.  Why don’t we go check it out?”

Up we ran, to participate in this game.  Only it’s not really like you imagine it.  It’s totally different.  It’s really more of a scavenger hunt, where we had to make teams and then bring in items to score points.  We were on Team 5, and quickly I’d forged an alliance with two other couples who looked like they’d be useful in the upcoming battle.

Let me say: one of the dudes, not so much.  He was about as useful as an anchor.  His wife, though, was another story.  She was in it to win it!  Thanks to our quick thinking and fast feet, we managed to come in second.

What did we win, you ask?  Five signatures on our “activity card.”  Until that exact moment, none of us even knew such a thing existed.

“Let’s go bowling,” I said.  “On those super-special hydro-lanes that they have here.  They resist the pitch and swell of the ship!  It’ll be great!”

When we arrived at the bowling lanes, madness reigned.  There were four lanes, see, all of which were full.  Two of them had the biggest, loudest, shriekingest family every, about 9 children and two very frazzled-looking parents.  Milling around in front of the thing were this group of people, and the guy in charge was running around.

His relief arrived at the same time as us and started trying to sort it out.

“Who’s next?” she asked.

“Some people,” he said.  “They’re somewhere.”

“What are their names?” she asked.

“I don’t know the names,” he said.  “I didn’t ask them.”

This carried on for about five more minutes, like an Abbott and Costello routine done by a particularly dumb person.  Apparently he’d promised the lane, but didn’t know to who.

“These children aren’t with me!” the mother in the crazy lane shrieked.  It was weird – if they weren’t with her, why were they all over her?  It was bizarre.

Finally some order was restored, and we ended up on a list. 

“Wanna play some slots while we wait?” I asked.

“Sure,” she said.

We each put in a dollar.  I had lost mine in about ten seconds.  Angela, though, was up at $2.45 when I ran out of cash and started ‘helping’ her. 

I had her broke soon thereafter.

We wandered around then, stumbling across a Galaga machine.  “Go for it!” I said as I started a game for her.  She’d blew up during the first wave, and I chuckled.

Ten minutes later, she was still playing on her second life.  D’oh!

“Allen?” the lady called.  “Allen?”

“Honey, we gotta go!” I said.  “Our lane is ready!”

“Go ahead,” she said.  “I have to save the universe from destruction!”

So I went, and rented shoes, and signed a waiver, and whatnot.

“Come on,” I said when I got back over to Galaga.  “You gotta go sign a waiver!”

“Okay,” she gave me the game.  “Just be careful.”

BOOM!  I was dead almost immediately.  Really sad. 

At bowling, I dominated, throwing almost 140.  Not great, but not bad at all, particularly since the pitching and heaving of the ship threw my game off.  Angela didn’t do too bad, either, and if we’d had another few games we’d have been up to our usuals.

Just as we were about to leave, who did we spot?

If you guessed “Mr. Grumpy” give yourself five points.  Ding ding!  He still looked grumpy, too, just for the record.

We had lunch in there, too, by the way, but it was nothing special.

Then it was time for afternoon Bingo.  I think I understand the draw of Bingo: it’s like horse racing without the cruelty to animals, and old people can do it without having to exert any physical effort at all and yet still be competitive.

We found ourselves sitting next to the Aussie ladies we’d been near that morning, and so the five of us chatted and laughed our way through the Bingo games.  Particularly at the little old lady who was the first Bingo.  They had you standing up when you were one number away, and she was the first one to stand up.

“What latter do you need?” the proctor asked.

“I ain’t telling you!” she bawled.

Somebody else stood up after the next letter.

“What letter do you need?” he asked.

“DON’T TELL HIM!” the old lady yelled.  “IT’LL JINX YOU!”

When she finally did get Bingo, she was happy, although I found that her dancing left something to be desired. 

Once again, by the way, Angela won $4 on scratch-off lottery cards.  And one of the Aussie ladies won the biggest jackpot of the day.  I won diddly.  And squat.

For Dinner, we had lots of choices about where to eat, so we of course chose The Summer Palace.  And yes, when you say its name, you have to speak in italics.  Because it’s just that kind of place.  While we were waiting in line, we saw a dude get ejected for wearing shorts.

“Uh oh,” I said.  “I better run and change.”

“Let’s just eat somewhere else,” Angela said.  “This place looks too froo-froo anyways.”

“Naw,” I said.  “I want to eat here.  I want to eat at every comp restaurant on the boat!”

So I ran off.  I rode in the elevator with the dude who got ejected, who complained and moaned and whined all the way up to the 11^th deck about how unfair it was that he couldn’t eat there in shorts.

Then I ran back down to the restaurant to find Angela waiting inside.

“What do you think?” I asked.

“This all looks terrible,” she said.  “I can’t eat any of this.”

“No, see, there’s chicken in there.  Chicken!  You like chicken. Cluck cluck!”

“What would you like?” the waiter asks.

“I guess I’ll take the chicken,” Angela says.

“Nothing else?”

“Nothing else,” she says.  “Just the chicken.”

“And for you sir?”

“I’ll take the pork spring rolls, the special of the day, and the bread pudding.  Oh, and a glass of wine.”

After he’s gone, she looks at me.  “Do you even know what the special of the day is?”

“No,” I said.  “That’s what makes it so special.”

“It was crab and salmon cakes.  If I remember, you don’t like crab.”

“Oh,” I said.  “Oh, dear.”

After a long time (and my starter of pork spring rolls, which were tasty), the food finally comes.  I was relieved to see that the special was apparently tasty Salmon, which I began wolfing down.  I had about half of it down when Angela says this:

“What the heck are shrimp doing on my plate?”

I looked up, pieces of salmon running down my chin, to see that she’s received some kind of crud-coated chicken thing on a bed of rice with shrimp and a very strange vegetable.  Having thoroughly reviewed the menu before deciding to take my chances on the special, I knew exactly what she had.

“That’s the Thai Chicken,” I said.  “With coconut shrimp.  You should try some.”

“I don’t want to try some,” she said.  “I didn’t even want to eat here.”

“Just push the shrimp off to the side,” I said.  “I’ll give them a good home.”

“Did you get the Thai Chicken?” the nice old lady at the table next to us asked.  “Because that’s what I ordered, but I got this instead.”

“See!” I said.  “That looks really tasty.  You would have enjoyed that.”

“I ordered the Cod,” the guy with the old lady said.  “This isn’t the cod.” 

He had what looked like a burned-out hockey puck on his place. 

Suddenly the waiter arrived.  “Oh, I am very sorry, there has been a terrible mistake!  I will fix this right away!”

He bustled around and took the old people’s plates, and replaced them with something else.  Then he took Angela’s plate away, promised to bring her food to her, and promptly vanished.

I, however, got to keep my Salmon.  I don’t know if it was because I was half done with it, or that I had smeared it all over my face, or that I stabbed him with the fork, but whatever it was, I got to finish the salmon.

After a very long delay, he returned with the Rosemary Chicken, which to me looked very much like boiled chicken.  But Angela said it was okay.  And then, a few seconds later, with great fanfare he placed a burned-out hockey puck in front of me.

“Your dinner, sir!”

“I already ate dinner,” I said.

“No, that was wrong.  This is what you ordered.”

“Oh,” I said.  “What is it?”

“Crab and salmon cake, sir.”

“Oh,” I said.  “Why is it on mashed potatoes?  Does the chef hate me?”

He just left.  And you know what?  I think the chef did hate me, because that was pretty gross.  On the upside, though, the outer coat of the hockey puck was definitely burned.  So it had that going for it.

As we were eating, Angela nudges me.  “Hey, look,” she says.  “It’s Mr. Grumpy!”

Sure enough, there he is, stumping his grumpy way through the crowd, his family trailing after him.  He’s wearing a red T-Shirt and suspenders and his ball cap and limping along, angrily complaining.  Trailing behind him is his clan, all of them dressed like they’re going to a ball, about 5-6 people in all.  It was the strangest thing.  He must have money, I decided, to be so unhappy and underdressed and yet accompanied by a cast of extras from Cinderella.

Then they got to the stairs, and he began limping up the stairs.  The rest of them went around the stairs and towards the side exit, where the elevators are.

He stopped on the stairs and shook his fist angrily at them.  They mocked him from the ground and left, and he continued on up the stairs alone.

Okay, so not so much money that they want to suck up for an inheritance…

After dinner, I got my dessert, which was pretty good, and which I would have eaten except I had two dinners and a starter plate. 

After dinner, we went to the highlight of our cruise: the Not So Newlywed Game.  Ever since I read about this, I’d been hoping to be on this thing.  And I’d spent the whole dinner grilling Angela on our answers so we’d be as prepared as possible to win: where did we meet?  What’s my biggest flaw?  What was our best vacation?  Are you going to finish that chicken?

I’d also been greasing the skids a little bit to get us picked.  There are these ship hosts, see, who set up games and stuff, and in the Bingo games and the Let’s Make a Deal Scavenger Hunt I’d been buttering them up.  And every time I saw one, I’d pump them for inside information about how to get picked for the Newlywed game.

When the time came, I knew what to do: when they call your anniversary range (like ten to twenty five years) be loud and obnoxious.

It’s the part I was born to play, baby!

Needless to say, nobody is more loud and obnoxious than me, so we got picked, along with a pair of newlyweds and two 35-year married people.  We sat down, and I leaned over to Angela before it began. “Just remember what we talked about!” I hissed.

“Shut up,” she said.  “You owe me.”

I was the first to be sequestered, while Angela and the other wives answered questions.  They got us whatever drink we wanted, so I took the opportunity to get a free beer from the cruise line.  Hoorah!  I might be the only free beer drinker on board!

Well, except the other four husbands.

When they called us back out, we had to answer five questions.  Of the five, I would say that three of them had nothing to do with the stuff Angela and I had talked about, so I was left to guess what to answer.  I got one of those right.

The other two?  Stuff we’d clearly talked about and identified and for which the answer was clear.  So I, of course, totally honked it and got them both wrong. 

You should have seen the look Angela gave me.  “Are you kidding me?” she rolled her eyes.  “That’s the best you can do?”

So then the wives left, and the husbands stayed behind and answered.  Of those five questions, I would say three were ones that we’d discussed.  I knew what answer I should give, and how I should respond.

AND I SCREWED IT UP ANYWAYS!

I mean, really, what is that?  I go all out to get primed up to cheat at this stupid game show, and I screwed it up.  Really?  Idiot!

She came back, and of course answered the two that were guesses easily, and then gave the “correct” prompted answer to the other three, and then got them wrong, and then looked at me like I was the stupidest person on earth.

As a consolation prize, we won two t-shirts and a water bottle.  The big “winner” got a huge bottle of champagne, which is good, because neither of us like champagne. But I think the entire thing was well summed up by Angela:

“I don’t know how you ever got to be a manager, because you fold under pressure.”

“I know,” I said.

“You spent all dinner grilling ME on MY answers, and then you totally screwed up YOURS!”

“I know,” I said.

“How stupid can you be?  You’ve been talking about this for, like, ten days, and then on your big chance, you’re all like ‘duh, I don’t know!’”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said.

“I mean, at breakfast you’re all like ‘best vacation was Italy!  Worst was Egypt!  You don’t have shoes!  I like to eat tuna!’”

“Hey, look, the four seasons!” I said.  “Let’s go listen!”

I dragged her, still mocking me, into the Four Seasons tribute band.  And oh, what a night it was (see what I did there?).  For a tribute band to a group that had their heyday forty years ago, they were surprisingly good.  I was very pleased.  And also surprised at how many of the songs I knew.

Tired, we went to bed after that, and turned in.  The day was a complete success, and a great first day of cruising.  And since the time turned back, we got another hour of sleep in.  Yay!

Well, except for the game show.  How could I honk it that badly?