Spring Break Conquest - Page 2

Tony&Cheri · 04-10-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by jtm1631

Last year I planned our summer vacation to Walt Disney World and it was a near perfect experience.

Anyone who uses "Disney" and "near perfect experience" in the same sentence is A-OK in our book. If we could live in Disneyland/World, we wouldn't be in Playa del Carmen. It's the Happiest Place on Earth.

Tony&Cheri · 04-10-2006

JT,
I'm loving this and crying at the same time. Every time you say "can you feel the tension rising," I take another hit out of the tequila bottle. I'm not sure whether the bottle or the story is going to finish first, but I'm hoping they both last a long time. This is great.
Tony

Nerak936 · 04-10-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tony&Cheri

JT,
I'm loving this and crying at the same time. Every time you say "can you feel the tension rising," I take another hit out of the tequila bottle. I'm not sure whether the bottle or the story is going to finish first, but I'm hoping they both last a long time. This is great.
Tony

Aha!!!! A variation on the "Bob" theme, huh!! When I read that "can you feell the tension rising", I picture JT with pursed lips, teeth clenched, and his face growing steadily more red. He'll either blow before the end of this trip report or have one helluva nose bleed!!!

James A. · 04-10-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by jtm1631

You all know this is true because we have been to Playa several times, but none of you know who I am.

That's what you think. "We" are just very discrete.

Great report.

travmagic · 04-10-2006

I am having as much reading your trip report as I did reading Krazy4playa's. Keep it coming!

Rissask · 04-10-2006

Great trip report!

What a way with words.
I have NEVER wanted to go on a cruise

...this is only serving to confirm I was right....I am curious as to whether you ended up loving it , hating it as expected, or something in between...

beachluver2 · 04-10-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tony&Cheri

Anyone who uses "Disney" and "near perfect experience" in the same sentence is A-OK in our book. If we could live in Disneyland/World, we wouldn't be in Playa del Carmen. It's the Happiest Place on Earth.

I feel the same way

we'll get along just fine in Nov. I would love to retire and work at Disney . I do think you guys have it pretty good from what I can see

bufante · 04-10-2006

Your descriptions are great...keep it up, enjoying every moment of it, since someone stole the book I was reading.

MikeW · 04-10-2006

I'm feeling your pain.
I absolutely hate cruises, all 2 that I've been on.
I'll wait until you're done, before I start comparing notes.

jtm1631 · 04-10-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tony&Cheri

Anyone who uses "Disney" and "near perfect experience" in the same sentence is A-OK in our book. If we could live in Disneyland/World, we wouldn't be in Playa del Carmen. It's the Happiest Place on Earth.

Remind me to stop at your hotel in November and have a few shots of tequila with you. I always love any opportunity to drink good tequila and discuss Disney.

Well I'm home from the office and work begins. I just got out for a beautiful 18 mile bike ride in near perfect conditions. It is sunny and about 70 degrees. It is now time to shower, have dinner with the kids and fire up the tivo to watch 24.

I hope to get at least one more installment posted for you tonight. I'll try and do it before 24 starts.

cuffedlinks · 04-10-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by jtm1631

I hope to get at least one more installment posted for you tonight. I'll try and do it before 24 starts.

Can't decide WHICH I'm MORE looking forward to....

jtm1631 · 04-10-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by cuffedlinks

Can't decide WHICH I'm MORE looking forward to....

You are two kind Cuffed, but please there is no comparison. This is only my first season of 24 addiction but I would cut off one of my fingers in order to see the next installment of 24.

And with out further ado, the next installment of my Spring Break Conquest...

jtm1631 · 04-10-2006

Day 3 – Monday - How Many more Days?

Monday is our first full day at sea. Unfortunately, it is not our last.

We wake up and all pile in the balcony cabin. We had preordered some muffins and toast, etc. to be delivered at 6:00 to the room. Think of this as a pre-breakfast breakfast. This is a routine we will repeat every day of the cruise with varying degrees of success. We eat some food, put a movie in for the girls and my wife and I head up to the gym to exercise at about 6:30 – 7:00. The gym is so crowded that there is not a single piece of available equipment. Can you feel the tension rising? We move out to the sport deck to start walking around the track. Let me describe this for you in case you have never been on a cruise (you lucky bastard), imagine walking around a moving ship in gale force winds. Half way around the track the wind is at your back and you are trying to keep up with your own momentum. The other half of the track you are struggling to make any progress at all. After two laps I see no point in this exercise and I have impure thoughts about my bicycle back home. I really do miss my bike and I don’t understand why I can’t bring it with me where ever I travel. My wife continues on as I head back to the cabin and the girls.

We shower and decide to eat breakfast in the dining room. Now the Conquest has two main dining rooms. The Renoir and the Monet. Both the Renoir and the Monet have seatings for dinner and we are in the Renoir dinning room which is in the middle of the ship. The Monet is in the back of the ship and in addition to the dinner seating is where you have breakfast and lunch. Being in the back of the ship the Monet dining room seems to have more movement to it and has the unmistakable vibration of enormous diesel engines. We don’t particularly like the Monet dining room and think we will try the buffet fore breakfast the next morning. Breakfast is just OK. I will say this about the Carnival, food is available 24 hours a day and when you order room service or at one of the dining rooms, the portions are reasonable. They do not give you huge portions and I really like that.

After breakfast we decide to dump the kids in day care, errr I mean take the kids to Camp C for their first fun filled day. Jillian especially has been asking to go to Camp C (don’t worry, this won’t last). Overnight my wife had studied the detailed schedule for what each age group does for the day at camp. She decided that Casey would have a hard time in the older group because not surprisingly most of the activities require the use of speech. We inform the conselor signing in the younger kids that we want Casey to be in the younger group. “Oh, OK, let me just go next door and get her paperwork” She leaves and comes back in a couple of minutes “Well, I checked Casey’s paperwork and there are no notes about Casey being allowed to stay with the 2 - 5 year olds. We think it would be better for Casey if she stayed with her age group” They think it would be better. I can only assume this is based on their extensive observation of Casey as we have been standing here for the past 5 minutes. I calmly inform the counselor “We don’t” Casey was immediately allowed to stay with her sister. Did I mention that her sister Jillian was crying at this point and begging us not to make her stay at Camp C? Yes, the kids are having a wonderful time. We extract Jillian from my wife’s leg and move on to take Hayley to her camp. For the little ones, whoever drops them off has to be the one to pick them up. Also, they gave us a beeper in case there are any problems. Hayley on the other hand can sign herself in and out and is free to do as she pleases. We have discussed this with Hayley and she is only allowed to sign herself out with one of her other friends. We don’t want her roaming the ship alone. I watch Prime Time, there is no need for her to be by herself on this ship.

Spring Break 2006, family vacation, first day at sea and here’s my wife and I alone with the kids in day care. “what should we do?” “I don’t know, what do you want to do?” “It’s seems kind of windy to sit out on deck” “yeah, but should we grab some chairs anyway?” “I guess” Wow, exciting times. It is soon after this that we see for the first time with our own eyes the deck chair game. Now we have heard about this many times, but never actually seen it. All of the deck chairs are taken at this point (it being only 10:30) but I would say only about 30 percent of them are actually being used. The rest have assorted sundry items on them saving the deck chairs. I just don’t understand the concept here. I find the behavior of claiming a seat you don’t plan to use until hours later rude and inconsiderate. Part of the self entitled mind set that makes me sick. It also reminds me that I have never wanted to vacation any place the deck chair game takes place. These are just the kind of people I don’t want to vacation with. My wife and I shrug, decide the deck is too windy anyway and head back to the cabin. We sit staring at each other wondering what we are doing spending all this money on a family vacation and sticking the kids in day care. Shortly there after Hayley shows up at our door and moments later the beeper goes off. We all go up to Camp C where Casey is busy playing with all the other kids with a pair of Blue’s Clues ears she made on her head and Jillian is sitting off by herself looking pissed. That’s my girl. Can you feel the tension rising? We gather the kids and Jillian is cranky as hell and is disagreeing with everything anybody says just for the pure joy of being disagreeable.

We decide Jillian needs a nap (something she never does at home). I draw the short stick and take Jillian to the dark inside cabin for the nap. It is now 11:30 and lunch starts at noon. As I am walking out the cabin door my wife’s parting shot is “If you’re not back by noon, I’m going to take the other girls to lunch.” Double bonus, I get to sit in the dark and miss lunch. As Jillian is relaxing about ready to drift off to sleep I ask her why she was sitting by herself and why she didn’t make Blue’s clues ears. “Dad, did you see them? They were kind of stupid looking. I didn’t want to wear those things.“ That’s my girl. As I’m sitting there in the dark with Jillian sound asleep I realize that the other three should have been booted to the inside cabin so that at least while Jillian is asleep, I could have been on the balcony enjoying the endless ocean.

Jillian awakes we order some room service and the others return just as our food arrives. We convince the girls to give Camp C another try. We drop them off, minor extraction of Jillian from my wife and Hayley walks herself to sign in for her camp. “Well what should we do” “I don’t know what do you want to do?” We end up at the casino bar because they have a margarita on the rocks drink special. I order one, my wife orders a mango daiquiri and we go sit on a couch by a giant window. As I taste the margarita I quickly realize it is the most disgusting thing I have ever had. I’m quite sure if SCTX had been served this drink, there would be one less Carnival bartender in this world. Forget Mariachis, I hate Carnival Cruise bartenders. This is just cruel and unusual punishment for tequila. Even low end crappy tequila. From here on out I will stick to beer and wine. Can you feel the tension rising?

So my wife and I are sitting there with a drink in our hand, a view of the ocean on one side and a view of the ships casino on the other side. After about 15 minutes I decide to test the waters. “So, you having fun?” I get no response so I wade out a little further. “I wanted to wait until after the cruise to see if I liked it, but I just have to say that THIS SUCKS!” Well the flood gates were open then. “Oh my God, I have been thinking the same thing for the past 12 hours” That’s my wife. We than spend the next 45 minutes complaining about why we spent all this money on a family vacation and stuck the kids in day care and how if we didn’t have them in day care there would be nothing to do with them. We’re bitter, but at least we have each other.

I think now would be a good time to discuss my take on Carnival Cruise Lines, The Fun Ships. Carnival defines an activity as fun as long as it means it will cost you money. I’m not lying when I say that 70% of the activities would either cost you money to partake in or were about extracting cash from your bank account. Let me give you some examples. Spin class in the gym. Once a day for 2,000 plus passengers, maximum of 7 people and an additional $10 bucks per class. Why the extra charge. Keep in mind if you did not sign up the first day for any of the classes they were full through the end of the cruise. No different for the limited exercise classes they offered. You could also sign up for the teeth whitening seminar. This was all about how they could sell you a $150 teeth whitening session. That’s one heck of a fun activity isn’t it? My favorite were the big ticket items like the art auction and the carnival vacation club seminars. These ones included free alcohol because we all know drunk people are more likely to part with bigger sums of cash for things they really don’t need or want. It was like being stuck in a 7 day time share presentation. Every announcement from Malcolm our cruise director was about something that would cost you money to be involved in. Woo Hoo!

We go get the little ones and decide to head for the pool. My wife and I are not thinking too clearly on this trip and as we get to the pool we realize that we did not bring any sunscreen. Not a problem, there are no chairs anywhere around and we don’t plan on staying long. We do notice that surprisingly the pools are practically empty. Surprising because to get near the pool you have to climb over all the people laying on the deck because there are no deck chairs available. We get in the pool and immediately understand why the pools are empty. IT’S FREEZING. That gale force wind is really taking a toll on our enjoyment of the pool. We tell the kids that we won’t be staying long and after about 10 minutes in the water you jump out, dry off and head back to the cabin. Can you feel the tension rising?

Hayley is in the cabin waiting for us and wondering where we have been. “I’ve been alone here waiting for you for 10 minutes” The hardships our children face. To soothe the savage beasts we order cookies, brownies and hot tea to enjoy while we are getting ready for our first Formal Night. I open a bottle of wine. My wife has determined that this cruise will be much better if she has a nice buzz going 24 hours a day. Formal night is an interesting event. There is a lively discussion about formal night on the cruise critic discussion boards. In one corner you have the “how dare people not wear suits to formal night. If they don’t want to dress up, they should eat somewhere other than the dinning rooms.” In the other corner there is the “who cares what the person at the table next to you is wearing, if you want to dress up go ahead. My clothes should have no effect on your enjoyment of a meal.” Imagine a discussion of George W. Bush between Rissask and Stogey. Now imagine that conversation is based on what people are wearing. Get a hobby people.

Our dinners in the dining room become something we all look forward to. We enjoy getting all dressed up for formal night and sitting down to a nice meal. Casey enjoys knowing that the evening will end with yet another banana split. At one point during the cruise I bribe Casey to do something by telling her if she doesn’t argue with me she can have two banana splits. I’ve never seen this kid move so fast to do what I asked her. Oh how I wish I could pay her off in banana splits for the rest of her life. Her 4 year old sister on the other hand has already figured out that cash is the only worth while bribe and that the same activity goes up in price with every passing day. Mini Me has it all figured out.

One quick note. Towards the end of dinner and after a couple of bottle’s of wine, one of our fellow cruisers brings up the deck chair situation. She declares that tomorrow she is going to get out there early and lay claim to the chairs she wants for later that day. My wife looks and me and asks if I will sit out with here and the kids if she gets some chairs. “NO! I will not be that person. If we go to sit out and there are no chairs when we look, than that is life. I will not stake out chairs at 6:00 in the morning in case I want to lay out for a couple hours around 10:00 or 11:00. Not me, not you, no way” I see the look in my wifes eyes and suddenly I am thinking the cabin situation is not so bad. It’s a workable divorce mind you, civil, for the kid’s sake.

After dinner we decide the entire family will go watch the Las Vegas style show that night. What could be better than a reticular vegas style show with dancers that could not even make it in Vegas. Which brings us to an interesting point. You aspire your entire life to be a Vegas show girl. You discover that you can’t cut it in Vegas. Where do you go? What is the pecking order of show girls? Vegas is tops, than Reno? Move down the line to Atlantic City, than Branson, Missouri. Maybe than one of the Disney theme parks. And a distant last is a cruise line. I’m not expecting much from the show. As we are sitting waiting for the show to start, Casey decides she wants to go back to the room and go to sleep. I gladly volunteer this time, get Casey in bed and she is snoring within 5 seconds and I begin this journal. I find it very therapeutic to write all this down. My wife returns shortly since nobody liked the show and the other girls were getting tired. We get all the kids to sleep in their cabin and my wife and I lay there awake worrying about them.

My wife and I jokingly discuss the possibility of flying home from Montego Bay (our first port of call). At least I think we were joking. Cruising is definitely not for us. After a couple hours laying there we go get Casey, put her in the balcony cabin with me and my wife goes to sleep with the other two girls. I really think this divorce is for the best. Can you feel the tension rising?

jtm1631 · 04-10-2006

Wow that was a long installment. Sorry folks. I'll try and break them up more in the future. Good luck getting through that one.

sctx · 04-10-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by jtm1631

Side note here for those Texans living in the Houston area. I don’t know that I have seen a more depressing landscape than that which can be seen from the freeway between Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston and the Galveston port. Seems to me there was a mixture of burned out buildings, adult book stores, strip clubs and the occasional car dealer ship and mall thrown in. .

yep, you were in Houston.......amazing what a lack of zoning laws will do for a city as it sprawls 60 miles in each direction!!!

04-10-2006	#21 (permalink)
Rissask Canada Dry Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Saskatchewan, Canada Posts: 49,644	Great trip report! What a way with words. I have NEVER wanted to go on a cruise ...this is only serving to confirm I was right....I am curious as to whether you ended up loving it , hating it as expected, or something in between... Last edited by Rissask; 04-10-2006 at 03:23 PM..

04-10-2006	#28 (permalink)
jtm1631 añejo Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Denver, CO and loving it Posts: 2,490	Day 3 – Monday - How Many more Days? Monday is our first full day at sea. Unfortunately, it is not our last. We wake up and all pile in the balcony cabin. We had preordered some muffins and toast, etc. to be delivered at 6:00 to the room. Think of this as a pre-breakfast breakfast. This is a routine we will repeat every day of the cruise with varying degrees of success. We eat some food, put a movie in for the girls and my wife and I head up to the gym to exercise at about 6:30 – 7:00. The gym is so crowded that there is not a single piece of available equipment. Can you feel the tension rising? We move out to the sport deck to start walking around the track. Let me describe this for you in case you have never been on a cruise (you lucky bastard), imagine walking around a moving ship in gale force winds. Half way around the track the wind is at your back and you are trying to keep up with your own momentum. The other half of the track you are struggling to make any progress at all. After two laps I see no point in this exercise and I have impure thoughts about my bicycle back home. I really do miss my bike and I don’t understand why I can’t bring it with me where ever I travel. My wife continues on as I head back to the cabin and the girls. We shower and decide to eat breakfast in the dining room. Now the Conquest has two main dining rooms. The Renoir and the Monet. Both the Renoir and the Monet have seatings for dinner and we are in the Renoir dinning room which is in the middle of the ship. The Monet is in the back of the ship and in addition to the dinner seating is where you have breakfast and lunch. Being in the back of the ship the Monet dining room seems to have more movement to it and has the unmistakable vibration of enormous diesel engines. We don’t particularly like the Monet dining room and think we will try the buffet fore breakfast the next morning. Breakfast is just OK. I will say this about the Carnival, food is available 24 hours a day and when you order room service or at one of the dining rooms, the portions are reasonable. They do not give you huge portions and I really like that. After breakfast we decide to dump the kids in day care, errr I mean take the kids to Camp C for their first fun filled day. Jillian especially has been asking to go to Camp C (don’t worry, this won’t last). Overnight my wife had studied the detailed schedule for what each age group does for the day at camp. She decided that Casey would have a hard time in the older group because not surprisingly most of the activities require the use of speech. We inform the conselor signing in the younger kids that we want Casey to be in the younger group. “Oh, OK, let me just go next door and get her paperwork” She leaves and comes back in a couple of minutes “Well, I checked Casey’s paperwork and there are no notes about Casey being allowed to stay with the 2 - 5 year olds. We think it would be better for Casey if she stayed with her age group” They think it would be better. I can only assume this is based on their extensive observation of Casey as we have been standing here for the past 5 minutes. I calmly inform the counselor “We don’t” Casey was immediately allowed to stay with her sister. Did I mention that her sister Jillian was crying at this point and begging us not to make her stay at Camp C? Yes, the kids are having a wonderful time. We extract Jillian from my wife’s leg and move on to take Hayley to her camp. For the little ones, whoever drops them off has to be the one to pick them up. Also, they gave us a beeper in case there are any problems. Hayley on the other hand can sign herself in and out and is free to do as she pleases. We have discussed this with Hayley and she is only allowed to sign herself out with one of her other friends. We don’t want her roaming the ship alone. I watch Prime Time, there is no need for her to be by herself on this ship. Spring Break 2006, family vacation, first day at sea and here’s my wife and I alone with the kids in day care. “what should we do?” “I don’t know, what do you want to do?” “It’s seems kind of windy to sit out on deck” “yeah, but should we grab some chairs anyway?” “I guess” Wow, exciting times. It is soon after this that we see for the first time with our own eyes the deck chair game. Now we have heard about this many times, but never actually seen it. All of the deck chairs are taken at this point (it being only 10:30) but I would say only about 30 percent of them are actually being used. The rest have assorted sundry items on them saving the deck chairs. I just don’t understand the concept here. I find the behavior of claiming a seat you don’t plan to use until hours later rude and inconsiderate. Part of the self entitled mind set that makes me sick. It also reminds me that I have never wanted to vacation any place the deck chair game takes place. These are just the kind of people I don’t want to vacation with. My wife and I shrug, decide the deck is too windy anyway and head back to the cabin. We sit staring at each other wondering what we are doing spending all this money on a family vacation and sticking the kids in day care. Shortly there after Hayley shows up at our door and moments later the beeper goes off. We all go up to Camp C where Casey is busy playing with all the other kids with a pair of Blue’s Clues ears she made on her head and Jillian is sitting off by herself looking pissed. That’s my girl. Can you feel the tension rising? We gather the kids and Jillian is cranky as hell and is disagreeing with everything anybody says just for the pure joy of being disagreeable. We decide Jillian needs a nap (something she never does at home). I draw the short stick and take Jillian to the dark inside cabin for the nap. It is now 11:30 and lunch starts at noon. As I am walking out the cabin door my wife’s parting shot is “If you’re not back by noon, I’m going to take the other girls to lunch.” Double bonus, I get to sit in the dark and miss lunch. As Jillian is relaxing about ready to drift off to sleep I ask her why she was sitting by herself and why she didn’t make Blue’s clues ears. “Dad, did you see them? They were kind of stupid looking. I didn’t want to wear those things.“ That’s my girl. As I’m sitting there in the dark with Jillian sound asleep I realize that the other three should have been booted to the inside cabin so that at least while Jillian is asleep, I could have been on the balcony enjoying the endless ocean. Jillian awakes we order some room service and the others return just as our food arrives. We convince the girls to give Camp C another try. We drop them off, minor extraction of Jillian from my wife and Hayley walks herself to sign in for her camp. “Well what should we do” “I don’t know what do you want to do?” We end up at the casino bar because they have a margarita on the rocks drink special. I order one, my wife orders a mango daiquiri and we go sit on a couch by a giant window. As I taste the margarita I quickly realize it is the most disgusting thing I have ever had. I’m quite sure if SCTX had been served this drink, there would be one less Carnival bartender in this world. Forget Mariachis, I hate Carnival Cruise bartenders. This is just cruel and unusual punishment for tequila. Even low end crappy tequila. From here on out I will stick to beer and wine. Can you feel the tension rising? So my wife and I are sitting there with a drink in our hand, a view of the ocean on one side and a view of the ships casino on the other side. After about 15 minutes I decide to test the waters. “So, you having fun?” I get no response so I wade out a little further. “I wanted to wait until after the cruise to see if I liked it, but I just have to say that THIS SUCKS!” Well the flood gates were open then. “Oh my God, I have been thinking the same thing for the past 12 hours” That’s my wife. We than spend the next 45 minutes complaining about why we spent all this money on a family vacation and stuck the kids in day care and how if we didn’t have them in day care there would be nothing to do with them. We’re bitter, but at least we have each other. I think now would be a good time to discuss my take on Carnival Cruise Lines, The Fun Ships. Carnival defines an activity as fun as long as it means it will cost you money. I’m not lying when I say that 70% of the activities would either cost you money to partake in or were about extracting cash from your bank account. Let me give you some examples. Spin class in the gym. Once a day for 2,000 plus passengers, maximum of 7 people and an additional $10 bucks per class. Why the extra charge. Keep in mind if you did not sign up the first day for any of the classes they were full through the end of the cruise. No different for the limited exercise classes they offered. You could also sign up for the teeth whitening seminar. This was all about how they could sell you a $150 teeth whitening session. That’s one heck of a fun activity isn’t it? My favorite were the big ticket items like the art auction and the carnival vacation club seminars. These ones included free alcohol because we all know drunk people are more likely to part with bigger sums of cash for things they really don’t need or want. It was like being stuck in a 7 day time share presentation. Every announcement from Malcolm our cruise director was about something that would cost you money to be involved in. Woo Hoo! We go get the little ones and decide to head for the pool. My wife and I are not thinking too clearly on this trip and as we get to the pool we realize that we did not bring any sunscreen. Not a problem, there are no chairs anywhere around and we don’t plan on staying long. We do notice that surprisingly the pools are practically empty. Surprising because to get near the pool you have to climb over all the people laying on the deck because there are no deck chairs available. We get in the pool and immediately understand why the pools are empty. IT’S FREEZING. That gale force wind is really taking a toll on our enjoyment of the pool. We tell the kids that we won’t be staying long and after about 10 minutes in the water you jump out, dry off and head back to the cabin. Can you feel the tension rising? Hayley is in the cabin waiting for us and wondering where we have been. “I’ve been alone here waiting for you for 10 minutes” The hardships our children face. To soothe the savage beasts we order cookies, brownies and hot tea to enjoy while we are getting ready for our first Formal Night. I open a bottle of wine. My wife has determined that this cruise will be much better if she has a nice buzz going 24 hours a day. Formal night is an interesting event. There is a lively discussion about formal night on the cruise critic discussion boards. In one corner you have the “how dare people not wear suits to formal night. If they don’t want to dress up, they should eat somewhere other than the dinning rooms.” In the other corner there is the “who cares what the person at the table next to you is wearing, if you want to dress up go ahead. My clothes should have no effect on your enjoyment of a meal.” Imagine a discussion of George W. Bush between Rissask and Stogey. Now imagine that conversation is based on what people are wearing. Get a hobby people. Our dinners in the dining room become something we all look forward to. We enjoy getting all dressed up for formal night and sitting down to a nice meal. Casey enjoys knowing that the evening will end with yet another banana split. At one point during the cruise I bribe Casey to do something by telling her if she doesn’t argue with me she can have two banana splits. I’ve never seen this kid move so fast to do what I asked her. Oh how I wish I could pay her off in banana splits for the rest of her life. Her 4 year old sister on the other hand has already figured out that cash is the only worth while bribe and that the same activity goes up in price with every passing day. Mini Me has it all figured out. One quick note. Towards the end of dinner and after a couple of bottle’s of wine, one of our fellow cruisers brings up the deck chair situation. She declares that tomorrow she is going to get out there early and lay claim to the chairs she wants for later that day. My wife looks and me and asks if I will sit out with here and the kids if she gets some chairs. “NO! I will not be that person. If we go to sit out and there are no chairs when we look, than that is life. I will not stake out chairs at 6:00 in the morning in case I want to lay out for a couple hours around 10:00 or 11:00. Not me, not you, no way” I see the look in my wifes eyes and suddenly I am thinking the cabin situation is not so bad. It’s a workable divorce mind you, civil, for the kid’s sake. After dinner we decide the entire family will go watch the Las Vegas style show that night. What could be better than a reticular vegas style show with dancers that could not even make it in Vegas. Which brings us to an interesting point. You aspire your entire life to be a Vegas show girl. You discover that you can’t cut it in Vegas. Where do you go? What is the pecking order of show girls? Vegas is tops, than Reno? Move down the line to Atlantic City, than Branson, Missouri. Maybe than one of the Disney theme parks. And a distant last is a cruise line. I’m not expecting much from the show. As we are sitting waiting for the show to start, Casey decides she wants to go back to the room and go to sleep. I gladly volunteer this time, get Casey in bed and she is snoring within 5 seconds and I begin this journal. I find it very therapeutic to write all this down. My wife returns shortly since nobody liked the show and the other girls were getting tired. We get all the kids to sleep in their cabin and my wife and I lay there awake worrying about them. My wife and I jokingly discuss the possibility of flying home from Montego Bay (our first port of call). At least I think we were joking. Cruising is definitely not for us. After a couple hours laying there we go get Casey, put her in the balcony cabin with me and my wife goes to sleep with the other two girls. I really think this divorce is for the best. Can you feel the tension rising? __________________ JT

04-10-2006	#17 (permalink)
Tony&Cheri livin' the dream Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Playa del Carmen Posts: 2,226	JT, I'm loving this and crying at the same time. Every time you say "can you feel the tension rising," I take another hit out of the tequila bottle. I'm not sure whether the bottle or the story is going to finish first, but I'm hoping they both last a long time. This is great. Tony

04-10-2006	#20 (permalink)
travmagic añejo Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: New Jersey Posts: 1,824	I am having as much reading your trip report as I did reading Krazy4playa's. Keep it coming!

04-10-2006	#23 (permalink)
bufante minucker Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: Crop Dusting the IA Posts: 2,613	Your descriptions are great...keep it up, enjoying every moment of it, since someone stole the book I was reading.

04-10-2006	#24 (permalink)
MikeW añejo Join Date: Apr 2004 Location: Moorpark, CA Posts: 13,098	I'm feeling your pain. I absolutely hate cruises, all 2 that I've been on. I'll wait until you're done, before I start comparing notes.

04-10-2006	#29 (permalink)
jtm1631 añejo Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Denver, CO and loving it Posts: 2,490	Wow that was a long installment. Sorry folks. I'll try and break them up more in the future. Good luck getting through that one.

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