BeagleOne

We simply don't get "souvenirs ! So easy! If you need a photo or trinket to remember your trip, the trip probably wasn't worth it!

Maybe true for you, but not true for everyone. I have some souvenirs and hundreds of photos from Omaha Beach and Iwo Jima that are priceless to me, and I certainly remember the trips very well, and they were certainly worth it.

I do as the OP did, and have done for years. If the souvenir is something like a magnet, I just buy it. If it's something big, like a camera or expensive jewelry, I either price things before I go, or while I am on the cruise, or both.

Cruelty to animals.

Thanks for the reminder. Will try to be there although have an ANZAC day service to attend tomorrow morning.

Oh, thanks for the reminder! Going to try to find a livestream from Turkey online.

Ah the grammar police too ;)

But, isn't that like saying iPhone isn't a real word and therefore a grammatical error??

 

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Nope!

If you are flying it the day of the cruise departure, I would HIGHLY recommend changing that. It can take hours to get through customs and immigration at Heathrow, and some of the gates are a 10-15 minute walk from immigration. Your flight might be delayed. There might be a lot of other flights coming in around the same time. And then you still have to get to Southampton which takes a couple of hours.

The product name is a grammatical error. That alone would keep me from buying it! ;)

 

By the way, Fox "News" is not news at all but a Political Advertising Channel, but I'm sure you already knew that;)

So are the other "news" networks, both in the U.S. and in many other countries.

That looks like fun! I could do the tattoo bit but I sure couldn't walk in some of those women's shoes...and I'm a woman!

OMG, when will people learn that they do NOT have to quote an entire lengthy post in order to leave a short reply!

Great review as always, SailorJack.

It has been a while since your most recent CPR course. The single person or lay rescuer no longer gives breaths. It was found that the delay in circulation by stopping to give breaths was more harmful than the inevitable decrease in oxygen in the blood. Also, people are less concerned about infection from mouth to mouth, so are more likely to intervene.

Compression-only CPR, sometimes known as CCR, is now taught for a witnessed arrest of an adult or adult-sized person, with only one rescuer available. Those victims are fully oxygenated so chest compressions will circulate the oxygenated blood and the compression action also inflates and deflates the lungs to a certain extent. Once rescuers arrive with oxygen, or even if a second person volunteers to help out, ventilation can be started.

The same is not true of smaller children, since the most common cause of cardiac arrest in those victims is respiratory issues. So ventilations need to be done along with compressions from the very beginning.

I'd encourage everyone who's physically capable of doing CPR, to take a class and keep the certification up-to-date. It doesn't take that long to learn and it could save a life.

I'd like to sign up for the hors-d'oeuvre home delivery.

I turned off signatures years ago. Some of them are just ridiculous. If I want to see someone's upcoming cruises, I turn signatures back on for a few minutes to check.

Now if someone could just make people realize that they don't have to quote long posts in their entirety...or at all.

I do think that's exactly what happens and it happens often! I never understand when someone sees there are already a dozen responses to a somewhat simple question that they don't even read the posts and just answer the question as if they're the first one to respond. One of my pet peeves as well.:p

Along with the people who hit the "quote" button for incredibly long posts, so that you have to scroll and scroll to get to the reply. You can quote just part of the post, people!

I would suggest that everyone in your family have passports just in case your daughter (or anyone in the family) has some medical issue that can't be treated on board. If you end up with someone hospitalized outside the U.S., you will most likely need passports to fly home, and you might not be able to get them on certain islands.

I was thinking the same thing about the EMS response. One article said the lady was killed instantly, but the medics worked on her, so I wonder if she was still alive on the scene and perhaps died on the way to the hospital. Too bad they didn't have enough personnel to help the man at the same time. And while I did watch the video, I have to wonder about posting it...especially set to music...I hope no family members or friends see it, but sadly, I suspect some will.

What an awful situation.

No. That is because licenses from some states may no longer be valid as those states refuse to conform to the REAL ID act. These are mostly red states that believe it is OK to tell people what to do with their bodies but how dare the Government tell us how to license. :rolleyes:

Yeah, Minnesota, Illinois, and Washington are really red states. :rolleyes:

Even New Mexico and Missouri are purple.

The parents, and only the parents, are responsible here, just as the parents, and only the parents, were responsible for the Disney near-drowning. Apparently the Azzia boy is recovering much better than the boy on Disney, who will be severely impaired for life because his parents somehow managed to keep track of their two older kids, who could swim, but not the youngest one, who somehow got away from them and ended up in the pool.

If you can't or won't keep track of your kids, then stay away from attractive nuisances like pools.

no I am not looking for refund, simply take the expenses out of my money for this trip and allow me to use remaining on another cruise. Come on that's reasonable!

What exactly does this mean? RCI doesn't owe you anything. You planned poorly, including not researching your daughter's passport renewal, and got stuck. RCI offered you two alternative options, neither of which was acceptable to you. They weren't able to resell the cabins your party would have occupied. What exactly do you want them to do?

You can board a plane leaving the US without a passport. Just need other accepted id. You can't come back by plane without one.

Not true. The airlines face heavy fines if someone boards without a passport for a flight out of the U.S., and has to transport the person back to the U.S. at the airline's expense.

Another good reason to fly in the night before: luggage. Years ago some Canadian friends of mine met me in Florida for our cruise. I flew in the night before. They took a red-eye that got in about 0600 the day of the cruise, and came to my hotel.

Their flight from Vancouver to Dallas was delayed, but they made the connecting flight after sprinting through the Dallas airport. Their luggage did not make it. Fortunately for them the airline did a great job getting their luggage on the next flight and to my hotel, or they would have been doing some last-minute shopping.

Two lessons learned here, I hope.

I'd say three. Get travel insurance, fly in the day before, and have passports.

I'm not sure the OP has any recourse here. RCI offered an option, meeting the ship in the first port, that would have worked for five of the seven...those with passports. They chose to turn that down, and they also chose to turn down sailing on Allure today, when at least part of the group could have gone.

From your description of the kids, I would be tempted to leave the younger one at home with MIL. If he wakes up so easily and gets grumpy if not in bed at a certain time, that is going to have a huge impact on what you and your husband can do. Of course his sleep habits might change in the next few months, but then again, they might not. He's not going to remember the cruise and it might be better for him just to stick to a routine in a familiar place.

As for the older boy, I can see both sides. It might be fun to have a vacation with just him. He can do some kids' club stuff so you and your husband have some time by yourselves, and you can do some activities with him. It would also be fun for you and your husband to have a "just us" vacation. Tough call...but I guess I would be more tempted by the latter option...you will have plenty of years to vacation with both boys.

But whatever you choose, have fun!

What about doing some sort of countdown, since you have about a year to go? Have some kind of countdown board in the kitchen with the number of days on it, and every month on the date, do something special that's cruise-related.

Have them research things to do in the ports, and as others have said, have them each pick an excursion if that's within the budget.

What an idiot. And a very lucky one.

I believe that the only crew member whose presence is required for the ship to sail is the ship's doctor. If the doctor is not allowed to examine a patient with a known, witnessed medical problem, the severity of which could be life-threatening, the doctor has good cause to notify the captain, who then has good cause to deny sailing to that passenger.

Sounds like the doctor here did her duty. She might or might not have been rude to the patient and her father, but while any rudeness is unfortunate, it is immaterial.