Bill and Sheila At Sea - Day Two

Yesterday, (Day Two) was scheduled by the cruise director as a “Fun Day At Sea.” We spent the day grazing the buffets, wandering the boat and lying around on deck. It is strange but amazingly satisfying to have nothing to do but amuse yourself.

I haven't talked about our little cabin yet. It is a marvel of compact design. No more than 10 feet wide and twenty feet long, it has a king size bed, two more than adequate closets, a long built in dresser and a tiny head (bathroom for you landlubbers) that is a marvel of design of its own. I discovered that I could do my whole morning routine sitting on the surprisingly large and just right height toilet, even shower there with the hand shower had I had chosen to.

Our stateroom actually has more privacy in some ways than our home. The entire outboard wall is heavy tempered glass, with a sturdy glass door leading to the balcony. Once we were out to sea, we simply opened the drapes and did not shut them again. There was no one to see and we enjoyed the view of the ocean. Like many of the balconies on the Triumph, ours was designed to provide maximum privacy.

Last night was “formal night” for dinner. I had taken my cues from other resort experiences and brought a dark suit and tie, the commonly accepted minimum “dress down” uniform for after five. Sheila wore a short, black cocktail dress. I was the only person at our table in a tie. It was actually kind of amusing. You could look across the room and pick out the lawyers by their suits and their lady's cocktail dresses. A large group of Texas lawyers and judges were cruising together. The way we all dress is kind of uniform. Men in dark suits and ladies in little black dresses.  I felt kind of ridiculous looking at the casual dress of most of the other men. I was actually wearing my law school (aka old school) tie and a big gold “ring knocker” law school class ring. Everybody else looked like they were going out to a nice but informal restaurant in their home town. It left me feeling like a fish out of water but I am told that this informality is peculiar to Carnival and that the other cruise lines have more stringent expectations.

Dinner was good. It is kind of fun to just order what you want and not have to worry about the cost since all is included in the price of your ticket. I had two appetizers, surprisingly good Alligator fritters and an equally surprising strawberry bisque (strawberry cream soup.) My salmon fillet was again good but not great. The cherries jubilee for desert were enjoyable and they consistently serve a fine cup of coffee. One person at our table who does not need to watch his weight had two entrees, prime rib and a lobster. The other guys at our table had prime rib. They said it was great.

There was entertainment during the meal. A very good vocalist backed up by the wait staff sang “That's Amore” and invited the couples to stand up and dance where they were. One couple at our table did and gave us an over the top tango impression that was at once both charming and funny.

One of our friends brought a bottle of good champagne and we ended the meal with it. It was a very dry Moet and gave the meal an elegant finish. There is a ten dollar “corking fee” for having your own wine served at the at the table. I had forgotten why I don't drink champagne. In less than an hour, I was rewarded with a champagne headache almost beyond belief. For some reason known only to God, some people react badly to something in champagne, even in very small quantities, causing an almost blinding headache. I am one of them. I don't know how I could forget that but I will not forget it again.

We finished the evening by taking in a couple of comedy shows in one of the ships several night clubs. The first comic was a bland, Gen X type whose humor didn't really fit with a crowd of rowdy Texans. Most of the passengers on this cruise are Texans, many of them from the Houston area.  Gen X whining just did not cut it.

The second comic was highly talented but lost his crowd early. He did a really cute lead in by telling the crowd to go along with him for a few minutes and just laugh when he did. He then began doing his bit in Polish. As the crowd continued to walk into the club, they were greeted a comic speaking Polish and a crowd apparently laughing their heads off at him. Their confusion was highly amusing.

But, after that strong start, he told an anti-American joke that was dead on arrival before a crowd of patriotic Texans. Make no mistake.  This crowd was all Texan and the comic just did not understand them at all.  He then tried to work on a Latino angle with an obviously Mexican man who corrected him immediately and proudly proclaimed himself to be a Texican, an American born Texan of Mexican ancestry, a group whose Texas patriotic heritage dates back to the Alamo. The guy finally went to work on a group from Maine and Canada and one of the Canadians took a shot at America which the comic followed with a line about Canadians having free health care while Americans don't. Again, dead on arrival. The small group of Canadians and Easterners sitting together laughed.  Everyone else sat there stonily silent.  It was sad in a way. The guy is a gifted performer but his LA politically correct viewpoint killed what could have been a rolling in the aisles performance.

After the second show, we called it an evening. I went back to the stateroom, took a handful of aspirin and sat out in the dark quiet of the balcony wishing and waiting for the headache to subside. It soon did and we settled in for the night.