So it was onto day #2, counting full cruise days anyway. There were no excursions, it's just a full day of sailing to Barcelona. I decided I would do as little as possible on this day. In my day to day life, I'm so driven by the clock that I wanted to spend as little time as possible thinking about the current time or where I had to be at any given moment.
After what happened the previous evening in Schooner's, I had no desire to say anything to my mother. I dressed for the gym and left quietly. I did thirty minutes on the elliptical before lifting weights for maybe 20. I was especially pleased to see that the gym had an assisted chin up/dip machine, it's one of my favorite machines because it works so many muscles in the upper body. Unfortunately, they can be hard to find, even at a decent gym.
I then headed down to the main dining room for breakfast. The reason I went there is because I had access to fresh orange juice with my beverage package and I was not going to let another morning pass by without it. The omelet station was running and I ordered one with spinach, mushrooms, tomatoes, and cheese. I also got an extra cheese omelet, regular bacon, English bacon, breakfast potatoes, and a small waffle.
When I returned to the room, my mother had left. I guess she had a nail appointment that morning and had already began that. So I made my way to the pool. Even though it was mostly sunny outside, the wind was howling, resulting in the upper deck getting closed. The other consequence was most every chair had been taken. So I had to take this one chair that didn't fold down and only tanned my front side. I sat in the sun for several hours drinking a pina colada and mojito before grabbing lunch.
Those crazy winds didn't really ever let up. I stayed for the World's Sexiest Man contest, but I was really there for the pool volleyball afterwards. By the end of the contest, water was blowing out of the pool and coming towards me. I don't mean spray in the air, I'm talking about the entire deck getting soaked. I didn't even stick around for pool volleyball, there just wouldn't have been any way to play.
So with no shoes and no shirt on, I rushed back to the room, showered, and went to dinner with mom. More strawberry cheesecake! Plus a rice ball and long prawns with spinach and crab mashed potatoes. We also snuck in a game of Scrabble, which I hadn't played in maybe ten years.
Not sure what event to check out, we returned to the room, but I quickly grew restless and left. I went up to the outdoor Central Park section on the eighth floor and heard a trio playing smooth jazz. Keyboard, electric guitar, and saxophone. One guy from Texas, one from Argentina, and one from the Ukraine, how random is that?!
While I was listening to the music, a couple walked by me that I can't get out of my mind. The girl was completely made up like a Hollywood starlet, elegant red dress, white lace laying over her shoulders, her make up took plenty of time, hair up and carefully styled. Her man/boy, on the other hand, he didn't take as long to get ready. He had on a blue oxford shirt. which was hardly long enough to reach his belt. The sleeves were rolled up to his elbows. His shoes were beach shoes, the pull on kind. And the kicker... he was not wearing pants. He was wearing dark boxer shorts with little white sailboats printed all over them. I mean... did he lose a bet? Did he forget all his pants? And did she even care?
I would have stayed longer, but it was getting pretty cold out, so I decided to venture inside. Then I went to a stand up comedy show, which was pretty good. Not outstanding, but there were a few good laughs. That got me out at ten pm, just in time for the informal singles meet up. I walked over to the Rising Tide, which is a bar that sits on an elevator, it literally goes up and down between the fifth and eighth floors. There were maybe 15 people inside... all of them at least 45-50 years old, except maybe one guy around my age. I checked the schedule, thinking maybe I'd stumbled into the AARP event. In fact, if I closed my eyes, I'm pretty sure I could smell Ben Gay. Not worth hanging around so, it was off to Copper and Fiddle for a beer. Finally it was back to Schooner's for another piano night till 1 am. I requested "Bad Bad Leroy Brown" and "Tired of Being Alone," as it turned out Andrew kind of knew the latter. "Amazing Grace," "She Believes In Me," and "Piano Man" were some of the other favorites.
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