A lot can happen in 3 days

The last 3 days have been a real adventure. But first, let me pick up where I left off.

The long day in Brisbane this week was a godsend. I found the cigars I was after, I putzed around a did a little shopping, hung out with a few people, and generally had a relaxing day. Toward the end of my time off, I met up with a few other crew members for a beer at a pub not far from the wharf. We discovered that this pub also made a pretty good steak dinner so we ordered. Fantastic! My medium rare New York Strip was a little more medium than rare, but the meal was still great. I pretty much devoured the whole thing and sampled about 5 or 6 Aussie beers I'd never had in the process. Not bad, but the honey wheat was a disappointment.

Needless to say, I was feeling pretty good by the time I got back to the ship, and since all the passengers had already boarded, I cruised right through the terminal without having to play dodgem with a thousand tourists. The passenger boat drill was a joke as most of the pax had been aboard and drinking since about 3. After that, the trio was supposed to play dance music in the nightclub. This is usually giant frustration for us and 3hours of it could have been a disaster, but I was playing really well and the cruise director pulled us off early to open the room as a night club with a DJ as the party in the other bar was overflowing. Fine by me, so Rich and I went out back and smoked the first of our cigars. Arturo Fuente's from the Dominican Republic. Great flavor, and a 2-hour smoke. We have 2 cruises left and have 2 each of the Fuentes remaing for each of those cruises. Should be pretty sweet. (the spacebar on this computer sucks. I'm not on my laptop, in case you hadn't guessed.) So by the end of the night when we finally headed down for bed, I realized that the only thing that could have made it any better was having someone to cuddle with. This was not to be, but oh well.

The next day, we played for Jackie Love's cabaret. Jackie is somewhat famous in Australia and a true professional. Easily the best Guest E we've played for in many many respects. Once again, it was Richard and I holding it together and Jerry screwing things up, but that's nothing new and a badge of honor for Rich and I as other crew members can see and hear what's happening so Jerry isn't fooling anyone. Even passengers pick up on it. We celebrated with a beer, a pizza, and a smaller, cheaper Fuente that was surprisingly quite good. Another good day.

The next day would bring a surprise. Richard woke early with a migraine and was vomitting all day because of it. He wasn't able to play our noon pool set, so Jerry and I played a duet. It went OK. Time was a little wide but we held it together and were more than civil toward each other, so that's good. Come dinner time, we were scheduled to play the steak house, but Richard was quarantined just beforehand, so we had to punt. Jerry decided to play the gig himself on the grand piano so I got the night off. I watched a movie, worked on Kalida's show a bit, then headed up to watch the second sitting of the production show. Now the fun begins.

The house lights above one of the aisles were flickering and I called the production manager over to check it out. He said, "Oh no, those are the emergency lights!" Sure enough, two seconds later, complete power loss to the entire ship. So the passengers are laughing, and most of them drunk as this really was just a booze cruise. (you wouldn't believe all the extra security we brought on for 3 friggin days) Finally the cruise director comes into the showroom and as he does, I'm standing at the edge of the crew stair entrance and hear the GES. ***For those unfamiliar with ships, the GES is the General Emergency Signal which summons all passengers to their lifeboat muster stations. Usually, this signal is proceeded by a crew alert signal to get the crew in place to deal with the passengers before the pax actually are called to action. But not tonight. I said to the Cruise Director that the GES was going off, and he said now it's not. But it turns out, I was right, though it had only sounded in the crew areas. Since the CD is one of the 3 officers on the muster control party, he has to swing into even more action now as crew are scrambling up from the dark with lifejackets and muster hats in hand.

Thankfully, this was a false alarm, triggered by the power loss. Richard, meanwhile, was down in the depths of deck 2 forward in the isolation cabin (vomitting and diaherria are serious threats to the health of the ship, its crew and pax) even though he was not contagious. He had to crawl up from the depths to our room, in the dark as the emergency evacuation lights did not come on, and get his life jacket and what not. I'm sure that was fun.

Meanwhile, they managed to restart the show, which they had to do 2 more times as the captian's announcements killed all the PA equipment on all decks. The cast perservered though. Points for recovery.

Glen, the production manager, is about to have a coronary though, as his phone starts ringing off the hook and he got about 10 pages in these few minutes. You see, the power reset the systems in the night club and the pool deck and no one could get them up and running again. But Glen can't leave the show lounge til the show ends. So that was a bit of a mess.

Then, I walk up and deck and remember that Captain Rivera has returned to take over tomorrow for Captain Paoletti. Sure enough, there sits Rivera, eating a pizza on the open deck while all hell is breaking loose elsewhere. Welcome back!

The rest of the evening passed fairly uneventfully. Just swapping stories of where were you when.....? I found out that several of the dancers were heading to an open audition for Tokyo Disney in the morning and they were also auditioning male musicians/percussionists. Unfortunately, the muso auditions are in the afternoon after we are set to sail, but I sent a resume down with one of the dancers who had worked there before and knew one of the production directors. He said he'd put in a good word for me and see if he couldn't get them to take a look at me. I'm waiting for a phone call regarding that. Not expecting much, but Japan could be fun. My phone is actually on right now....for the first time in over 3 months. It's on Roaming and I don't want to know what a call will cost, but it does actually work.

And that is about it. Amazing what can happen in 3 days. At any rate, just two 7-day cruises remaining and I head home, with considerably less debt and plenty to keep me busy through the end of April. Thinking about a Meditteranean contract starting in early May and ending late July. Just a though for now though.

Man.....long post. Have fun reading that one. See you all soon.

cheers

I'm getting paid for this

It's a couple days later now, but the other day I hopped off the ship in Champagne Bay. Amazing. We took a little ride up into the hills a little bit and entered the Blue Lagoon. I'm told there was a movie by the same name filmed here but who knows. What I do know, is that it was really amazing. After we paddled around in the lagoon for a while, we headed back to the beach.....the ride in the back of the truck just about did in my kidneys, but that's another story....and swam in the crystal clear waters and sunbathed on the pristine, white sand.

I spent most of that day with Dave and Kiwi Stef from the new cast and we all still can't get over the fact that we were being paid to be there. Beats working for a living.

I'm back in Brisbane for the moment. We're about to embark on a 3-night cruise that will be mainly full of industry people and people just looking for a booze cruise. We don't go anywhere, just out and around and back in with no ports to call. It's pretty silly but we've got 6 extra hours in Brisbane today as we won't sail until 8pm instead of the usual 2pm, so that's nice.

In the meantime, I just sent a box full of unnecessary clothes home in the hopes of getting the weight of my suitcase back under the limit for the return home. Going shopping for a box of cigars for Rich and I to split these last few weeks a little later on.

Finally got the materials to start writing Kalida's show. My brain is mush at the moment, but I need to find a way to buckle down and get at least a lead sheet sketch done before I go home. I'll also be writing Bellefountaine's show, so I'm excited to meet with them when I return home in a few weeks. Anybody else need an arranger?

I think I'll sign off for now. Too many IM windows open. I can't IM from the ship so it's nice to chat when I have some time....especiallly since I'm not rushed today.

peace
steve-o

I'm comin' home!

My pardon has been granted! I'm coming home, boys and girls!

And I'm not coming home on March 17. I'm coming home on the 10th. Only 3 weeks to go and the current Pacific Star Trio will be gone forever.

I found out just this morning that my contract was shortened one week, without any warning by the powers that be in LA. I suspect that, as the other two guys in the trio were already set to leave on the 10th, that it makes more sense and may ultimately be easier to bring on a complete trio rather than piecing one together on the ship. Considering the fact that we spend better than 90% of our working time as a trio and not as the show band we thought we were hired to be, this makes a lot of sense.

Ironically, I was about to volunteer to extend one week to help smooth the transition with the two new guys that would have just come on for my last week. It also happens that the added week would have been a Cairns cruise and a nice way to end my contract, but we'll not mention that.

Oh well!

I'M COMIN' HOME!

See you all in 3 weeks.

Happy Valentine's Day

Well, the stars and planets and what not aligned somehow yesterday to make for one of the weirdest days I've had in a long time. First, the sea has been a real adventure around here lately. We've had beautiful, warm, sunny days with huge sea swells rocking the boat all over the place. Actually rocked all the food off our breakfast buffet the other day. Sometime you really must try running on a treadmill aboard a ship that is pitching in all directions. I've gotten used to it in calmer seas but the last two days were an adventure. So yesterday began with that as we coasted into Noumea.

Once there, I went for a walk, as I often do, and turned down a road I had never been down before. This was fortuitous. I found a host of things I'd not seen before, including a monument to the US armed forces who helped keep New Caledonia free during the Pacific campaigns of WWII. So that was nice and refreshing, despite sweating my ass off.

I got back to the ship, where my roomy was running about 3 hours early for our usual dinner set. He had an interesting day himself, but that is for another blog. I grabbed dinner and sucked down one of the bottles of (warm) Gatorade I picked up in Noumea and headed up to the dinner sets in the steakhouse. Jerry was in a particularly good mood this night. He completely threw me during the first tune when he gave me a completely unsolicited compliment regarding my solo. I was dumbfounded. Especially since I was playing softer than I usually do, which is often a problem for him.

Meanwhile, during dinner, a passenger came into the steakhouse who is just about a dead ringer for my last girlfriend....the one who dumped me when I told her I was leaving for four months to play on a cruise ship. That completely threw me, especially when you consider that it was Valentine's Day.

Add to that, I had just read an email from home that, among other things, informed me that they are experiencing blizzard conditions back home. As I was walking down the deck with the sun setting out the window, I was noting all the women holding roses and thought, "isn't it odd to see people wearing shorts on Valentine's Day when I'm used to freezing my butt off on that day."

There was also a party in the crew bar after hours. The crew bar is not a great venue for much of anything and last night's party was strange. Lots of people possibly looking for love but no one actually loving, just lots of drinking. And when I came home, a little drunk, my 58 year old roommate was not in bed asleep as I'd expected. Strange again. (He's just fine, don't worry) So I finally gave up and went to sleep....after I helped the girls across the hall hang chasing Christmas lights from their ceiling and checked out all their photos of friends and family....but not without putting in a movie; V for Vendetta (or crazy Valentine's Day....you pick)

ps. Less than one month til I fly home. Couldn't get local leave and can't really afford to pay for the flight myself, nor can I extend my contract as I have too many obligations back home. So on March 17, Steve-o will come marching home. Miller, if you're reading this, I think I'm in for NCAA if that happens. Keep me posted.

Something old, something new

This has been an interesting cruise. It has been the last for our current cast of singers and dancers and therefor, the handover to the new cast who joined last Brisbane. The old cast has been here 7 months now which includes my entire contract to date. If you count the 6 weeks of rehearsals prior to that, they've been at it over 8 months for this one contract. That's an eternity to me right now. They have been a great bunch of people though and they've helped make our corridor an interesting place to live.

I've met the new cast, and talked to both of the singers, Nicole and Dave, at some length and they're all pretty cool. Looking forward to having them around. It'll be a challenge for the new cast this cruise as they'll be finally performing all the shows that they've been learning and rehearsing all this cruise in addition to doing all their cruise staff duties for the first time. I suspect there will be alot of naps taken next cruise.

As the old cast leaves, so with them go our other teen staffer and Roxy, one of the 2 JACD's, leaving about 6 of us from the entertainment staff that I began my contract with. They whole staff have been a fantastic group of people. They've really made this place what it is. Of the 6 remaining, I'll be the second last to leave in just over a month now.

In other news, they installed five industrial Maytag Washer/Dryer units in the crew laundry about a month ago. These are identical to the ones in the laundries in all the dorms at Miami and in my last two apartment complexes. I thought they were completey idiot proof as I'd never actually seen one broken down. I was wrong. Between the idiots using them and the repair men who can't read the manual, only the schematic, 3 of the 5 washers are now out of order. What a friggin disaster. I'm giving them one more shot but I'm probably just sending my stuff the other laundry and paying the couple dollars to have it done. This sucks cuz I finally got some dryer sheets. Oh well.

I'm on IPM tomorrow so no internet time for me. After next cruise we have a 3-day cruise which is just a cheapo to get us back starting 7-days on Saturdays. We don't even stop anywhere. It's just a get drunk and use the casino cruise and it won't leave til 8pm or something so we'll have almost a full day in Brisbane. YAY!

Also had a bit of fun this week. Because of the Norwalk virus and what not, it is a disciplinary offense not to report vomitting or diaherrea if you're a crew member. Something I ate the other day didn't agree with me and I got written up for not reporting it til 12 hours later. Ask me sometime about the lock down procedures for people with stomach flus on ships.

That's all for now. Time for dinner and a string of shows.

peace

Sex, Drugs and Rock-n-Roll (relax Mom, just read)

Well this last cruise has been quite the adventure. We had a little sexual misconduct among the pax last cruise so there was some fall-out from that incident which made it to the Aussie news media. Not such good press, especially since (I'm told anyway) there was a suspicious death on one of our sister ships last year. Not to be outdone, some other lady came forward later in the week with allegations about some voyeauristic predator stealing her camera and photographing himself while she slept. Then they brought on some ex-security guy saying how the security is told to turn a blind eye to the rampant drug use, something something, that's going on on the ships. My only reaction to all that is.....why the hell wasn't the crew invited. Load of BS that is. Anyway, P&O Australia still took a beating in the press this week. And that covers sex and drugs.

On to rock-n-roll. Rich and I now hold the upper hand in the battle of Jerry-co. (Bad pun. Sorry, couldn't resist) We were playing Stella Webb's cabaret show the other night in place of one of the production shows (the male lead singer fell ill so we made a few changes in the entertainment plan for the cruise) and we were bringing her back on for her encore tune. Generally speaking, the Ike&Tina Turner version of Proud Mary starts pretty slow. Not in Jerry's world though. He launches into it at Mach-2 and Rich and I just stare at him, shaking our heads and saying "It's too fast". (tempos that are too fast are a recurring theme with Jerry, but this was an extreme) Finally, Stella very calmly interjects, "Let's try it a little slower, JERRY!" Game, set and match to the rhythm section. Jerry stopped playing and started looking around for help so I started the tune. Rich joined and Stella was soon to follow and Jerry just sat there for a few bars. There was great jubilation and dancing on tables later in the evening. Needless to say, the Cruise Director now has Jerry by the balls and he also has the authority quash anything negative Jerry might say about me in my final evaluation. Check-mate! And that, my friends, is all rock-n-roll to me.

Today begins the first of 2 9-day cruises. If it's raining on Isle of Pines, I'm gonna cry cuz I was on IPM the first time we went there and this will be my only other opportunity to visit what I'm told is one of the most pristine beaches and snorkeling spots around.

6 more weeks on the Star. Still working on local leave so I can see a little more of Australia before I go.

Happy Wombat.....er.....Groundhog Day!