travel orders

Alright, so it's been about two months since I've posted. The blog was a pleasant distraction and a lifeline of sorts to home from the ship. After I got back to the States, I didn't care much about posting any more, but I'm regaining interest. So....the stories of my final cruise aboard the Pacific Star.

In a previous post, I mentioned that we had our travel details but there was more to the story. Here it is: Around noon or one on the day we'd ultimately get our travel orders, we were called into the cruise director's office. (keep in mind, this is CD Chris who was on our first week as a fill in and now our last week as a full timer) Turns out, L.A. didn't have anyone to replace us yet so they called Chris and told him to ask us to stay and extra week. He'd already told Jerry this, but Rich and I got a separate call. Rich was actually in the mess at the time I got the call so I just popped into the office to see what was up. To be honest, I had a hard time remaining professional when Chris asked me, but I told him I'd consider it and talk it over with Rich, without whom I would definitely not stay. Jerry however, had already told Chris yes.

Bear in mind, LA had already called a few weeks prior and cut my contract short by this same week, so I really wasn't all that inclined to stay when they'd had the foresight to send me home with the other two guys (who's contracts were a week shorter than mine....long story) but not to have somebody lined up to replace us first. In addition, I'd set up three appointments for various things during that week and told everyone back home I was coming. I caught up to Rich and told him the news and we just started laughing. He had every reason to go home as well. He needed to get off the ship and get healthy, he already had a new gig lined up, his wife had dinner reservations for the second night back. But most of all, we didn't want to put up with Jerry any longer or do a favor for a company that did us no favors. But wait, there's more.

Jerry comes in minutes later as we're laughing hysterically and relaying the story to DJ's Bass and Dets. Jerry's all excited about getting asked to stay, tells us the situation (like we didn't already know what was up) and says, "so we'll stay on and play another week." Containing laughter at this point was painful....for us and the DJ's. (Everybody on the ship knew what a jerk Jerry was, from the servers and stewards to the shoppies to the officers. It was almost funny.) We managed to explain our situations politely and tell Jerry that our decision would be a no. We went into Chris' office later and told him this. He gave us a minor guilt trip but we didn't care.

Then, at 4 when the crew office opened and we could pick up our travel orders (Adam had told us they'd come in earlier in the day, but the office wasn't open at the time) we were dancing around singing like a bunch of little kids. Everybody was laughing and smiling at us and all we could do was sing our song and shout "See ya!" Good times. Hopefully that makes the tone of the earlier post make a little more sense.

But that's just part of the story. More coming when next I need a break from writing Kalida's show.