Carinval Glory - NYC to New England... A Memoir

It's still dark out, and my eyelids spring open as if they were mouse-traps being triggered. I can't see anything but the blurry red numbers on the alarm clock, which is not going off. It's not going off because it's too early. The Ambien wore off at 3:34AM and apparently my body reverted to its auto-awake mode instead of the default "stay asleep if nothing wakes you up" mode that I had expected. I'm awake now. Trying to sleep when the alarm goes off at 4:00AM would just be a waste of time. It's time to get up and get on the road... the road to New York.

We left from Maryland, just south of Baltimore. It's expected to be about a 4 hour drive, and the Manhattan cruise port opens at 9AM; boarding for the Carnival Glory begins at 12PM. The plan was to get up at 4AM, be on the road by 5AM, be at the port by 10AM, and be among the first ones on the ship. Since I stated my plan in this manner, you’re probably guessing that it didn’t go according to plan – you’d be [mostly] wrong! With the exception of waking up a little earlier than expected, most of the morning went very well. We got on the road and headed north up I-95. By the way, has anyone else noticed that although I-95 runs from Maine to Florida… only the northern states (DE, NJ, NY, CT, etc…) make you pay tolls to use it? What’s up with that anyway? I have my own suspicions about why that is, but I’ll save that for another day.

I have two daughters. One is age 5, and the other one is 8. The 5 year old is smaller than average, still wearing mostly 3T clothing, but she’s mentally and developmentally right on target. I still think of my 8 year old as a little girl, but with each passing week, it seems more and more like it’s just wishful thinking on my part. In only 8-10 years, she’ll probably be saying something to the tune of “you just don’t understand me at all!” and I’ll be kicking her out of the house… oh how the time flies. By the way, those two events aren’t necessarily related, it’s not like I would kick her out of the house for saying something like that, but I’m going to leave my options open for now.

At one point as we’re driving toward New York in the early morning while it’s still a little dark out, my youngest daughter wakes up and says sleepily, “Daddy, what’s that smell?”.

To which I replied “New Jersey, Dear. New Jersey.”

Now I know that some of you reading this may be from NJ, live in NJ, have family in NJ, or maybe just a coffee mug proclaiming your love and devotion for NJ, but the New Jersey Turnpike does have a smell. As a child, my family traveled from Maryland to Connecticut on a regular basis. “Regular basis” doesn’t even really convey how often we made that trip – it was more like a commute. I have every Rest Area on I-95 and the various Turnpikes committed to my long-term core memory. Ever since I was a kid, I could be playing in the back cargo area of the minivan (car seats weren’t mandatory) in the dark, stop playing with my toys, and with a blank stare – say “…we’re in New Jersey again, aren’t we.” It sounds like it should have been a question, but I wasn’t really asking anyone… I just knew.

The driving part of this trip was pretty smooth. We hit a few rest stops on the Turnpikes for potty-breaks and the occasional Red Bull for me. The tolls alone to get from Maryland to Manhattan were about $32, one way. A couple of the tolls were one-way tolls that we didn’t need to pay going back, like the Lincoln Tunnel. Getting to the Lincoln Tunnel was easy using the GPS and some printed directions from the internet, and coming out the other side proved to be rather simple, as well. This is where the fun starts. Although the tunnel lets out on the edge of the island of Manhattan, and you can almost smell the Lido Deck from the tunnel opening… you can’t just hang a left hand turn and get there. I’m an adventurous driver, and I’ve spent enough years on the D.C. Beltway and downtown to be comfortable with city driving, so I wasn’t too concerned. Once we entered the city and the buildings got taller, my GPS didn’t work as well anymore. It got really spotty signals, and jumped from street to street, and began to become unreliable. It was mostly only useful for general-location and to be used as an “electronic map”. We ended up on Broadway for a while, which seems to happen every time I’m driving in Manhattan. It doesn’t seem to matter where I’m coming from, or going to – I always end up on Broadway. After making a few unintended detours, and doing some inadvertent sight-seeing, we ended up at the cruise port. By the way, if you’re planning on driving to the port, and you’re using a GPS – the cruise port address alone won’t get you into the parking area. In order to get to the parking area, you’ll need to come out of the tunnel, turn left onto 9th Avenue, turn left onto 55th Street, and that will take you straight to the cruise port parking area. You don’t need to do the extra sight-seeing that I did, unless you want to. If you do get turned around – remember that you want to be on 55th Street, and you want to go UP in Avenue numbers… not down.

We arrived at the parking garage around 9:30AM, and easily found a parking spot on the 3rd level, right next to the ship. There are port parking attendants to help direct you, and on our visit, there was even a very nice man in a black uniform with a “welcome to the cruise port of Manhattan” dog… which seemed to enjoy smelling the luggage in the back of our SUV. We parked, unloaded our luggage, locked up the car, and headed across the top of the parking deck to the elevators which would take us to the terminal. Getting into the terminal was easy and quick. The luggage porters were just inside the door with their carts, and quickly took our luggage, and even showed something that would pass for a smile. We moved forward to a temporary waiting area with no chairs. We would have moved into the Carnival check-in area, but a very assertive woman with a loud voice told us that the check-in lines weren’t open yet, and we had to wait “on the other side”, but it wasn’t clear what that meant… so everyone just stood in the middle of the mostly open area, waiting for further instructions.

Around 11am, the Assertive Woman announced that we were able to begin the check-in process. By then, the randomly scattered group of people that showed up after us had formed what appeared like a very unofficial and disorderly “line” preparing to head into the check-in area. When I noticed this, I thought to myself “oh this should be good. We were among the first ones here, and then at the last minute, a make-shift line appears out of nowhere… and we’re off to the side of it.” Which meant that I was preparing to politely explain to someone in “the line” how we were there 30 minutes ago before there was any formation of a line… but I didn’t need to. Assertive Woman opened the tape to allow the crowd into the zigzag chute of retractable barriers when we were beginning to merge into “the line”. Assertive Woman noticed that my youngest daughter was in a stroller, and pointed at us, then gestured for us to go into another line, parallel to the main line. Our group hurried down the cattle chute to the first available check-in desks.

Check-in was quick and painless. My wife had all of the documents, passports, and secret handshakes ready. I stood there blankly waiting for instruction; I didn’t get any until it was time to move on with our boarding-zone number, which was Zone 1. Next, we were herded to another waiting area, but at least this area had chairs. Here, we waited until 12PM for the boarding process to begin. While sitting in this area, I overheard several amusing and interesting conversations. One couple were upset because a wedding party was allowed to board first, children and all! The nerve of them. Another couple were reading something that apparently mentioned VIP embarkation, and the man noted to the woman “What’s VIP? What do you have to do to be VIP? I could be VIP, too.” Even though they were relatively close, I didn’t bother to share the details of the VIP system. I figured, if he really wanted to know for next time, it’s not hard to find out. There was also a little Asian boy in a stroller that was missing a shoe across the walk-way. My wife noticed him first; we assumed that the parents knew where the shoe was, or had already given up looking for it. It would seem awkward to walk across the room and say “Excuse me, did you know that your son’s shoe is missing?” Because of the design of this terminal, our waiting-to-board area was parallel to the get-off-the-boat disembarkation line, separated only by a large glass wall, where we could beam with the glorious pride of knowing that we would be the ones to win the hearts and attention of the ship’s crew this week, and the poor schmucks on the other side of the glass had to hang their heads as they dragged their own luggage back to their miserable little lives, and re-concern themselves with the volume-of-food/monetary-value ratio of the real world. Oh, and don’t forget that they have to make their own beds! Wait… who makes their own bed at home, anyway? You’re just going to sleep in it again the next afternoon anyway! I’m sure there are some of you OCD people out there that make your own beds at home, either that or perhaps you were raised with “good habits” that actually stuck.

As noon approached, and some people noticed the staff in the terminal beginning to move signs and chairs around, they began to “sneak” over to the area where boarding would start. This seemed very strange to everyone else, because their “sneaking” was in the middle of a large walkway in the middle of the waiting area. They would then set their luggage in the middle of the floor, stand next to it looking around at the ceiling like it was just more comfortable there. The other part of this maneuver that seemed strange was that these people were holding Zone numbers that weren’t Zone-1. A few of the port staff would then shoo them back to their seats and say “we’re not ready to board yet”. Once the people went back to their seats… they began boarding. Boarding the ship was smooth and simple. The NYC port uses one of the nicer enclosed gangways that I’ve seen for cruise ports. I’m used to the tube-steel gangway with what amounts to an advertisement-laden tarp lashed over it. As usual, everyone was herded up to Lido by way of make-shift cattle-chutes, mostly made of locked hallway doors, chairs lined up shoulder-to-shoulder, and a team of red-and-blue clad Pacific Islanders with their arms locked, all of which were smiling, though.

One of the more entertaining things to do when boarding is to quickly and quietly scan your fellow passengers looking for “the good ones”. For me, selecting these people is a bit of a game – like picking roulette numbers, trying to pick out which kid in the pool will pee next, or trying to guess the gender of someone driving a car ahead of you based on their driving style… you know, that kind of game. As I wheel my carry-on around the ship, trying to avoid the most densely packed areas, I enjoy taking note of the various types of people and families that are also on the ship. I’m not just looking for the entertaining people or the misbehaving children, I also enjoy noticing the elderly couples that still appear to be in love, or the young family with the baby or inquisitive young child. By the way, “inquisitive” does not mean running wildly around the room or ship trying to test the stability of every structure within reach.

I always have a carry-on with me, even though it’s normally only half full, and my one suitcase is also only half full when boarding. My carry-on normally contains my camera (Nikon D300s for you camera people), my camera lenses and accessories, my primary laptop that I use for work, my secondary laptop that I use in case my primary laptop fails for some reason… and I have to work, and my small tablet PC which is my absolute last-resort option in case my primary dies, and my secondary also dies. I also carry a set of 5 Watt personal radios (walkie talkies) for use with my family through the ship and on land. I noticed one of our first cruises that these radios will cut through the ship easily. I remember testing the range on the Norwegian Pearl, and was able to clearly speak to my wife across the entire ship, through 3 decks. Also, most personal walkie talkies only go to channel 18 or so, and these go to 22, so I get to avoid the chatter from most other people and groups. In port, they have a 2-4 mile range over land, so we use them like cell phones when our cell phones don’t work in-port. They’re not always convenient, but I’d rather have the option… and they don’t take up much space. Oh, and I always bring my trusty 6-outlet strip for plugging in my various electronics, chargers, batteries, etc…

On the Glory, we were advised by some great cruising buddies (this would be you, James ;-) ) to check out the Fish-N-Chips place above the buffet. We kicked and elbowed our way through the crowd in the buffet area to find the stairs-only entrance to the upper level. The Fish-N-Chips bar is one deck above the buffet, and can only be accessed by a set of stairs near the beginning of the buffet area (midship). There is no elevator access to this area, and it’s fairly secluded as a result of its location and lack of elevator access. This Fish-N-Chips bar makes a really great bouillabaisse and has these little Ahi Tuna chunks on top of watermelon slices in a very sushi style presentation. The Ahi Tuna was great, but I preferred the tuna without the watermelon embellishment.

A small mind on a huge boat... One man's unorganized opinion

 

 

I know it's a ship. This review is based on true events. Beware of hidden sarcasm.

 

***** Please Read *****

 

You are about to begin a journey through a highly detailed account of one person’s cruise experience. This journey will take you to levels of minutia which most people don’t care to reach. If you’re not fond of reading long passages or hearing the inner-workings of another person’s mind and thoughts, you should not read this. If you still think that you might want to read this, just keep in mind that you’re entering an at-will contract between yourself and pages of text, which you may choose to terminate at any time without fear of consequence. However, you may experience a temporary feeling of wasted time, or thoughts similar to “wow, that guy’s really messed up”. You have been warned.

 

 

Carnival Glory – New England/Canada from New York

 

Like a review, except without the useful information

 

 

 

 

It's still dark out, and my eyelids spring open as if they were mouse-traps being triggered. I can't see anything but the blurry red numbers on the alarm clock, which is not going off. It's not going off because it's too early. The Ambien wore off at 3:34AM and apparently my body reverted to its auto-awake mode instead of the default "stay asleep if nothing wakes you up" mode that I had expected. I'm awake now. Trying to sleep when the alarm goes off at 4:00AM would just be a waste of time. It's time to get up and get on the road... the road to New York.

 

We left from Maryland, just south of Baltimore. It's expected to be about a 4 hour drive, and the Manhattan cruise port opens at 9AM; boarding for the Carnival Glory begins at 12PM. The plan was to get up at 4AM, be on the road by 5AM, be at the port by 10AM, and be among the first ones on the ship. Since I stated my plan in this manner, you’re probably guessing that it didn’t go according to plan – you’d be [mostly] wrong! With the exception of waking up a little earlier than expected, most of the morning went very well. We got on the road and headed north up I-95. By the way, has anyone else noticed that although I-95 runs from Maine to Florida… only the northern states (DE, NJ, NY, CT, etc…) make you pay tolls to use it? What’s up with that anyway? I have my own suspicions about why that is, but I’ll save that for another day.

 

I have two daughters. One is age 5, and the other one is 8. The 5 year old is smaller than average, still wearing mostly 3T clothing, but she’s mentally and developmentally right on target. I still think of my 8 year old as a little girl, but with each passing week, it seems more and more like it’s just wishful thinking on my part. In only 8-10 years, she’ll probably be saying something to the tune of “you just don’t understand me at all!” and I’ll be kicking her out of the house… oh how the time flies. By the way, those two events aren’t necessarily related, it’s not like I would kick her out of the house for saying something like that, but I’m going to leave my options open for now.

 

At one point as we’re driving toward New York in the early morning while it’s still a little dark out, my youngest daughter wakes up and says sleepily, “Daddy, what’s that smell?”.

 

To which I replied “New Jersey, Dear. New Jersey.”

 

Now I know that some of you reading this may be from NJ, live in NJ, have family in NJ, or maybe just a coffee mug proclaiming your love and devotion for NJ, but the New Jersey Turnpike does have a smell. As a child, my family traveled from Maryland to Connecticut on a regular basis. “Regular basis” doesn’t even really convey how often we made that trip – it was more like a commute. I have every Rest Area on I-95 and the various Turnpikes committed to my long-term core memory. Ever since I was a kid, I could be playing in the back cargo area of the minivan (car seats weren’t mandatory) in the dark, stop playing with my toys, and with a blank stare – say “…we’re in New Jersey again, aren’t we.” It sounds like it should have been a question, but I wasn’t really asking anyone… I just knew.

 

The driving part of this trip was pretty smooth. We hit a few rest stops on the Turnpikes for potty-breaks and the occasional Red Bull for me. The tolls alone to get from Maryland to Manhattan were about $32, one way. A couple of the tolls were one-way tolls that we didn’t need to pay going back, like the Lincoln Tunnel. Getting to the Lincoln Tunnel was easy using the GPS and some printed directions from the internet, and coming out the other side proved to be rather simple, as well. This is where the fun starts. Although the tunnel lets out on the edge of the island of Manhattan, and you can almost smell the Lido Deck from the tunnel opening… you can’t just hang a left hand turn and get there. I’m an adventurous driver, and I’ve spent enough years on the D.C. Beltway and downtown to be comfortable with city driving, so I wasn’t too concerned. Once we entered the city and the buildings got taller, my GPS didn’t work as well anymore. It got really spotty signals, and jumped from street to street, and began to become unreliable. It was mostly only useful for general-location and to be used as an “electronic map”. We ended up on Broadway for a while, which seems to happen every time I’m driving in Manhattan. It doesn’t seem to matter where I’m coming from, or going to – I always end up on Broadway. After making a few unintended detours, and doing some inadvertent sight-seeing, we ended up at the cruise port. By the way, if you’re planning on driving to the port, and you’re using a GPS – the cruise port address alone won’t get you into the parking area. In order to get to the parking area, you’ll need to come out of the tunnel, turn left onto 9th Avenue, turn left onto 55th Street, and that will take you straight to the cruise port parking area. You don’t need to do the extra sight-seeing that I did, unless you want to. If you do get turned around – remember that you want to be on 55th Street, and you want to go UP in Avenue numbers… not down.

 

We arrived at the parking garage around 9:30AM, and easily found a parking spot on the 3rd level, right next to the ship. There are port parking attendants to help direct you, and on our visit, there was even a very nice man in a black uniform with a “welcome to the cruise port of Manhattan” dog… which seemed to enjoy smelling the luggage in the back of our SUV. We parked, unloaded our luggage, locked up the car, and headed across the top of the parking deck to the elevators which would take us to the terminal. Getting into the terminal was easy and quick. The luggage porters were just inside the door with their carts, and quickly took our luggage, and even showed something that would pass for a smile. We moved forward to a temporary waiting area with no chairs. We would have moved into the Carnival check-in area, but a very assertive woman with a loud voice told us that the check-in lines weren’t open yet, and we had to wait “on the other side”, but it wasn’t clear what that meant… so everyone just stood in the middle of the mostly open area, waiting for further instructions.

Not done reading the thread...still on your first post, but I have a question. What time did you leave your house? We are doing the 5 day Glory to Canada out of NY and also live south of Baltimore (AA county). I would like to get to port between 10 and 11 am, but I don't want to get up at 4 AM.

Now I'm done reading...can't wait for more. Thanks for posting.

Not done reading the thread...still on your first post, but I have a question. What time did you leave your house? We are doing the 5 day Glory to Canada out of NY and also live south of Baltimore (AA county). I would like to get to port between 10 and 11 am, but I don't want to get up at 4 AM.

We left our house around 5AM, give or take 10 minutes... but we did get there an hour or two before your target, so you could probably sleep until 5 or 5:30, I guess.

Loving your review. You have a great writing style. Can't wait to read more!

Oh my, you did post it after all!:eek: Where are the pictures you were going to insert?;)

Oh my, you did post it after all!:eek: Where are the pictures you were going to insert?;)

Haven't gotten there yet. Be patient, my dear.

“Daddy, what’s that smell?”. To which I replied “New Jersey, Dear. New Jersey.”

I think those words have been uttered by many... many a family LOL

The bouillabaisse was really good, and freshly made. As we stood in line waiting, I noticed a sign/label on the glass which said “Soup Spoon”. Directly behind the “Soup Spoon” label on the other side of the glass was a very large spoon. Most people might call it a ladle, but I suppose that one would have a hard time arguing with the rather large label declaring that it was in fact, a spoon.

After getting the chef/cook/attendant’s attention and requesting some of the bouillabaisse, he said that he had to make a new batch, and it would take 6-8 minutes, and that we should come back. My wife went back a few minutes later and returned with a bowl of it – I could have eaten this as an appetizer for every meal for 5 days.

After a couple of hours of the obligatory “stuff your face with food because you have nothing else to do until your room is available” period, we worked our way down to the atrium lobby on Deck 3 to find some seats and ambient music while we waited for our room. My two girls pulled out some toys and began to play quietly on the round tables which were surrounded by the circular seats. While sitting, I watched them play with their toys, occasionally stealing one or two and posing them to take pictures.

As an added bonus to my review-like memoir, I'll insert pictures that may or may not be amusing, or useful for anyone that's actually trying to extract something that vaguely resembles information or knowledge from this string of posts.

For example, this is out of place, but if anyone would like to get an idea of how close the parking area of the NYC port is in relation to the actual ship - here it is...

Pretty darn close! Eh? Ya like that? I picked that little souvenier up in Canada!

I am lovng this!! Can't wait for the next chapter!

During this time, my lovely wife takes a trip down to our room with some of the luggage. Normally, the whole family would enter the hotel room or cabin, and no one is allowed to touch anything. The kids and I stand in the room until my wife “clears” the chair or couch. Once the chair or couch are declared bed-bug free and a reasonable level of clean, the kids sit down and wait while the rest of the room is cleared. During this time, I’m dragging luggage into the room and also trying not to touch anything. I assist with the “clearing” process, but I don’t think that I have the authority to actually declare anything as being clean… I don’t have a great eye for telling the difference between “clean” and “not clean”. I can normally manage the difference between “clean” and “absolutely disgusting”, but the more subtle shades of cleanliness are difficult for me. Like I said, normally, we’d be in the room during the clearing process. This time, I waited with the girls in the atrium lounge area while my wife cleared the room. This way, she’s able to work more effectively in the room, we’re sitting comfortably in the atrium, and everyone’s happy.

Our room on this cruise was an Ocean View, starboard, Deck 1, cabin 1-241. We’ve never had a cabin on Deck 1 before, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. As it turns out, I never noticed a difference other than we had to wait a few seconds longer on the elevator when going from Lido to our cabin. Again, I’m not terribly observant in most things, so there may actually be a large difference from Deck 1 to Deck 6, but I don’t think I noticed. The most interesting thing about being on Deck 1 occurred on our Saint John, New Brunswick port-day, which I’ll try to mention later.

When Wifey comes back to the atrium to fetch us, we quickly pack up our toys and head down to cabin. I personally like the long and straight hallways on many ships. Carnival Glory has straight hallways for guest cabins so you can almost see from one end of the ship to the other. We’ve cruised on the Pride a couple of times and I don’t particularly care for the zigzag hallways. I find the little jogs in the hallway annoying and disorienting. When navigating the hallways on the Pride, it always feels like you’re about to run into someone coming around the corner, so I have a constant (albeit low-level) anxiety about walking through those halls, never knowing who you might run into around the next corner. On the Glory, when you step out of the elevator lobbies into the guest hallways, you glance down the hall, and after the first day or so, you know exactly how far till your cabin, or how much traffic you’ll encounter getting there. Anyway, I like the long and straight hallways… and Glory has them.

We find our cabin, enter, and begin to uncompress our luggage which was painstakingly packed in order to get all of our junk into them. My suitcase works a little differently than the girls’ bags. The girls had their bags packed over the course of weeks, allowing gravity to press out every cubic millimeter of air before packing the next layer in. My suitcase has the ability to expand by a couple of inches like many suitcases, but I consider it a small defeat to have to use that expansion zipper. I would like to think that I could pack everything I need into my suitcase without having to unzip that extra space. For me, it’s akin to loosening your belt or unbuttoning your pants after you’ve clearly eaten too much. Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not on any moral high-horse; I find myself unbuttoning my pants after dinner more and more frequently these days… and I’ve used that expansion zipper a few times. I still consider it a small defeat. Usually, I pack for a cruise the night before we leave. I think this used to stress my wife a little, but she’s gotten used to it by now. Either that, or she’s just stopped making audible mention of it. I start packing from the ground up. I was taught by my uncle when I was a teenager to pack light, and to start from the ground up so you don’t miss anything.

I bring two pairs of shoes – my black dressy shoes and my sneakers. I pack the sneakers, and wear the black shoes onto the ship. Next comes my socks. I take the number of cruise days, multiply by 2.5, add the travel days to and from the port which includes hotel days if we’re staying overnight, add 2, and then divide by 10% of the average predicted temperature of the originating port for that week. Once I’ve done all of that, then I pack 8 pairs of white tube socks, 5 pairs of black socks. Next is underwear, then pants, then one nice black belt, undershirts (half as many V-necks as crew-necks), polo shirts, T-shirts, and button-down shirts. Then I throw in my bath-bag, a couple of handkerchiefs, and my black suit neatly folded in half, on top. Usually by now, my suitcase is about 80% full. This is where I smile, breathe a sigh of success, and zip it up. This also happens to be the moment that Wifey says something like “do you have extra room in there?” To which my reply is a quick “No, it’s full.” Then we stare at each other for a few seconds, and she hands me the overflow from the other bags to fill mine. See? A perfectly refined system.

Back to the cabin – we unpack for the next 30 minutes or so. Wifey unpacks the kids’ stuff, her stuff, organizes the bathroom, and whatever else she does. I unpack my big suitcase in a minute or two because all of my shirts, pants, and suit are already on hangers inside the suitcase. This way, I’m never short on hangers in the cabin, and my wife knows that she can have most or all of the hangers in the closets when she starts. I just unzip the suitcase, grab the bundle of hanger hooks, lift up, and place on the bar… voila! I then shove my 13 pairs of socks, underwear, undershirts, and my 3 pairs of emergency socks into the bottom of the closet and I’m done. Now I can move onto setting up my laptop, spare laptop, emergency-backup laptop, GPS receiver stuck to the window, wireless internet connection, and charging station for cameras and walkie talkies. All of which are connected to my Kill-A-Watt power meter which tells me how many Watts of power I’m drawing from the outlet; I would hate to use more than my fair share of electricity on the ship… I mean, think of the dolphins!

I am lovng this!! Can't wait for the next chapter!

You don't know what you're asking for... what you don't realize is that it's 8 pages before the boat even begins to MOVE! Really, I'm not joking this time... seriously, 8 pages.

But I'm glad you're enjoying it. When you decide that you've wasted enough time reading my trashy romance novel (sans the romance or novel), please don't tell me... it might damage what's left of my Canadian accent, and that would be a shame.

OMG Fantastic review can't wait for more.;)

You don't know what you're asking for... what you don't realize is that it's 8 pages before the boat even begins to MOVE! Really, I'm not joking this time... seriously, 8 pages.

 

But I'm glad you're enjoying it. When you decide that you've wasted enough time reading my trashy romance novel (sans the romance or novel), please don't tell me... it might damage what's left of my Canadian accent, and that would be a shame.

well, if it makes you feel better (or adds to your ego), my Anita Shreve novel is laying on the floor untouched as I anxiously await your next post!

well, if it makes you feel better (or adds to your ego), my Anita Shreve novel is laying on the floor untouched as I anxiously await your next post!

He doesn't read, so he can't really appreciate that.:rolleyes::p

DH: It's most likely a very engrossing book - I have had a hard time putting Anita Shreve books down. You should be flattered.;)

He doesn't read, so he can't really appreciate that.:rolleyes::p

 

DH: It's most likely a very engrossing book - I have had a hard time putting Anita Shreve books down. You should be flattered.;)

This is better than the soap opera "As The World Turns".:rolleyes:;)

You should be flattered.;)

Wifey tells me that I should be flattered. Therefore, I am... flattered. As usual, she's right. I don't read books. I really like the idea of them, and as tempting as it is to pick one up and read it - I just can't bring myself to do it.

Now it’s off to see the ship. This was our first time on Carnival Glory, so we began our aimless wandering through the ship which for some reason always ends us up at food or drink. I can’t prove it, but I suspect that this phenomenon may possibly be intentional. Again, I’ll leave my conspiracy theories for another day. One of our early stops on any cruise is now the casino. We’re not big gamblers, by any means. I’m only 5’ 7” and have never weighed more than 140lbs for any extended period of time, and Wifey’s even smaller than me. In the casino, I seek out what Wifey and I call the “Idiot Box”. You may have also seen this box. It’s not a slot machine, or a table game. It’s an enclosed glass box with gleaming, magnificent, and magical quarters. We’ve also called it “the quarter pushy machine” I don’t like the general concept of gambling; I don’t care that other people do it – that’s fine with me. What you do with your money is your business. However, for some reason, this Idiot Box calls to me, even as I sleep in the cabin, it calls… “sssshhhhhh….. whooooosssshhhhh…. Whhhoooosssshhhh”. Over and over again, it calls to me all night long. Oooohhh, that amazing shiny metal siren of the seas. More on that later.

As we meander through the halls and decks we come across Sushi Salmon, the sushi bar. We get a little excited by the idea of ship sushi, and then move on. On Carnival Pride, the sushi bar was just a rolling cart outside of the Starry Night lounge that was open for about 2-3 hours each evening. The worst part of this was that the 2-3 hour window almost entirely overlapped with our dinner seating, so we had to get dressed for dinner, go to the sushi cart, get a couple pieces of mediocre sushi, and then run off to the MDR for dinner. We considered it our dinner-appetizer-number-one. As a side note, there’s a major loss of appeal when eating sushi from a wheely-cart. On the Celebrity Mercury, sushi was served daily in the buffet, and was really good for cruise-ship-sushi. Carnival Glory’s Sushi Salmon bar was a permanent structure, that’s a good start, but their sushi-like product wasn’t even as good as what comes off of the wheely-cart on the Pride. The plates were all identical, and consisted of 3 items – a roll with cucumber and huge chunk of cream cheese, and two other highly-non-memorable sushi-style blobs. Imagine if you took rice, sesame seeds, seaweed paper, cucumber, cream cheese, and some other random edible ingredients and made a quick lasagna out of them. Then, you took what appeared to be a half-sized ice-cream scoop and started carving out round balls and dropping them onto 6-inch plates. That’s the feeling I get when I think of the Sushi Salmon bar on Glory. Also, their wasabi isn’t firm, gritty, or pasty… it’s more like the consistency of gravy, but it’s green – bright green. So, you just take some of the green gravy and drizzle it on top of your Danny-DeVito-sushi balls.

Further down the hall, we encounter the teenager and tween club rooms like Circle-C, UltraViolet’s Arcade, Club O2, and the White Heat Dance Club which seemed to be reserved mostly for the pre-teen group activities. The White Heat Dance Club has a dance floor with a back wall. The back wall has a large glass window which looks out into the stairwell behind the club. This means that if you’re walking up or down that stairwell, you can look into the kiddie dance club and see them dancing or doing activities. One time, as I passed through this stairwell with my 5 year old, she stops to look in the window – clearly mesmerized by the older kids playing on the other side of the glass. A boy who seemed to be about 7-8 comes running over to the window and waves to my daughter. She, being shy, turns and walks away from the window which leaves me and the 8 year old boy. He looks at me and puts on his mean-looking “I’m a spoiled brat, and my parents aren’t around to curb my A.D.D. or violent tendancies” face, and holds a couple of fists up to the glass. Normally, I would continue to be the adult, and pretend that I was well above such simple taunting. However, I am on vacation. I glanced around to see who was around, turned back to the glass, and discretely stuck my tongue out at the boy. The boy came closer to the glass and stuck his tongue out as far as he could. I thought to myself “ah, yes… now I’ve got him, he’s just bacteria covered putty in my hands”. Again, I glanced around to see who was nearby – no one. My daughter is standing on the steps nearby, but facing away from me. I quickly lean toward the glass, pretend to lick the window in a quick movement. As planned, the boy couldn’t resist… he leaned forward and stuck his tongue on the glass and began to lick up and down on the window making slug trails as he moved along. As soon as the boy’s tongue touched the glass, I turned and walked away. Yes, yes, yes… I know that I was inciting the misbehavior of a child. Yes, I know that I shouldn’t feel proud in being able to trick an 8 year old into licking a window. Yes, I also know that I, for a brief moment, acted childish… I know you are, but what am I?

This is better than the soap opera "As The World Turns".:rolleyes:;)

I hope so... As The World Turns was cancelled!! :eek:

I hope so... As The World Turns was cancelled!! :eek:

Really, you can't really expect us guys to know this stuff, can you? I mean, was it really cancelled? or did the show just change names and Victor Newman get another house? You can't expect us to know this stuff...

Anxiously awaiting the 8 "still docked in NY" pages that will hopefully be a mere appetizer to what one can only hope is a long, thorough, well chewed main course with not one but two desserts worth of reading yet to come. In otherwords... please don't be one of those posters that grows so bored of their own review that they never finish and leave us all hanging. We're all on the edge of our seats.... to quote Oliver... Please sir, we want some more. ;)

Really, you can't really expect us guys to know this stuff, can you? I mean, was it really cancelled? or did the show just change names and Victor Newman get another house? You can't expect us to know this stuff...

Victor Newman is on Young and the Restless LOL

I hope you can finish this novel by Friday night...we're on the Glory Saturday!! LOL Love it so far!!

I hope you can finish this novel by Friday night...we're on the Glory Saturday!! LOL Love it so far!!

:pLOL! (literally, I'm laughing out loud at this) Not a prayer - sorry! He's been working on this much for a long time already (our cruise was June 18th - 23rd)! There's no way he'll be done by Friday.