Out Standing In The Field

Well, if you are a hardcore Flying W Thinger you may see this before I get back. I'm in an internet cafe - well, maybe cubicle is a better description - about 100 yards from our cruise ship in Puerto Vallarta. $4 for 30 minutes, hey, I couldn't resist. They have connectivity onboard but I'm afraid to even ask what they charge.

The cruise has been a lot of fun so far - I guess we have a couple days left at this point. Very relaxing, and the kids have done pretty well all in all. The sit-down four course dinners have been a little tough on the little ones, but we are seated by a window which gives them something to do (look for dolphins, of course) while we work through our main courses and dessert. If we're lucky, we even get coffee!

Cabo San Lucas was hot. It's the one port too shallow for the ship to dock so we got to take tenders in to the marina. From the boat, the place looks like Joshua Tree with some ocean front - very much the desert. Mazatlan was hot (are you sensing a theme here?) but a bigger place - Katy and her mom set up an impromptu tour yesterday while I stayed onboard with the kids, so she could tell you more about the place.

Tomorrow and Saturday we'll be at sea, steaming back to San Diego. And there's your summary.

Katy will not be surprised when I tell her that I stopped in here to make an entry. She believes me obsessed. It could be worse.

On the way to Katy's folks last Saturday we stopped to see an old friend of mine (and his family). He was showing us some pictures of a trip he took recently with a percussion group to New York City. He conducts the group and they got invited to participate in a concert at Carnegie Hall. (Carnegie Hall! Good Lord!) One of the pictures is of him, in a tux, conducting at Carnegie Hall. Whoa.

I mean, we used to sit around and drink beers all weekend with this guy. He's an average guy, hail-fellow-well-met sort - not some big-hair crazy European orchestra conductor type. He was in my wedding party. I was in his wedding party. We signed the Declaration of Independence together (a long story). And he's conducted at Carnegie Hall. I was (and am) impressed.

Let's see - I have some more time, what else can I tell you?

1. People who work on cruise ships work their asses off. The guy that is our waiter also works breakfast and lunch in addition to two seatings for dinner. The guy that is our second waiter busses tables in the casual restaurant during breakfast and lunch. Our room steward cleans our room twice a day - along with about 40 others. They all say it's a good job - but our waiter admits that after three years of it he's ready to cash it in.

2. The food may be free but the drinks aren't. I mean, I'm not complaining - it didn't cost me a nickel to get onboard the boat - but 5 or 6 bucks for a beer is painful. And they generally won't take cash, so you just put it on your ship's account without thinking too much about it. Booze will be a big percentage of our charges.

3. Mexico is hot this time of year.

4. Maybe I am obsessed with this weblogging business.

More when I get home...