There’s nothing like a few uneventful sea days to get you caught up on your sleep.
That sounds terrible doesn’t it? But it’s true. Sea days are draining, they’re either draining because they’re crazy and hectic, or they’re draining because they’re so quiet that you really don’t have anything left to do but sleep. You can only do so much laundry, only restock and re-alpha the shelves so many times…heck, you can even only do so much embroidery, and for me that’s saying something.
So a few of the cast members and I have been whiling away countless hours playing Killer Bunnies (read: the most ridiculous and therefore entertaining card game every created) in the crew mess down on A-deck. Best game ever I swear. The perk is that it the game runs so long that it eats up a lot of time you would otherwise be spending staring at the wall, or the television, both of which are equally uninteresting sometimes.
As you can probably tell, the Grand Voyage is winding to a close. It’s gone surprisingly quickly, and once the team adjusted to the (somewhat drastic) changes in programming we’ve run quite smoothly together. There are always little bumps along the way, personalities will clash, policies will be altered and passengers – bless their hearts –will find something to complain about no matter what. And when they do, you’ll fantasize that on your last contract? Personalities meshed, policies were adhered to and passengers respected their crew…
To blatantly parody Baz Lurhman 
At any rate, we’re almost finished. Sometime this week I’ll be moving cabins, from my current space to one almost identical across the hall. The why behind this is something to do with having to be in the “assigned” cabin for the Christmas cruise; as if anyone really cares where anyone else is once you’re on board, but whatever. In reality I’m moving up as well as over, since I’m moving to a cabin that has a fridge. I’m pretty sure the trade off for that is that the air conditioning is still broken (which is a royal pain as I keep my cabin freezing these days), but you take what you can get.
You may be able to tell that I’m in an odd place right now. For most of the crew, this is the end of their contract. A lot of them are going home for Christmas and then coming back and rejoining for the World Cruise in the New Year. I’m not. I’m one of the few that’s staying on straight through, so while I’m dealing with a lot of the same end-of-voyage-wind-down everyone else is, I have to pick up and move on again as soon as December 5th hits and we launch into the Christmas cruise. I’ve done this before of course, the last World Cruise I was one of the ones left behind (er, feel free to read backwards and find out all about how that went down if you so wish) to work the relocation cruise through the Panama Canal…it’s a major adjustment in mindset, and those of us that are left are usually found staring at each other in bewilderment with a sense of “what just happened?”
I’ve found the only way to deal with it is to break it into manageable pieces. One piece a time. Set a goal for each month and work towards that goal, that day, that port, that show, that get together, whatever you need to tell yourself to get through all the valleys to the next peak. And yes, shameful as it is to admit, in 10 months, there are a lot of valleys.
And way too many sea days…