Boy Scout   I've said how helpful people tend to be, but I often think of the little old lady who didn't really want to cross the street, but did so just to make the boy scout happy. I kept on saying I would never do that, but I did do it the other day. We had just met a gentleman who is an actor and is a very large, bald man. He’s played Daddy Warbucks in "Annie", and when you see him, you know why he got the role. He is Daddy Warbucks. Well, we had been chatting with him and later went down to get a bite to eat. When we got to the Pavillion Grill to eat I paused; he was sitting outside, where it was a bit chilly, and I wasn't planning to go outside. But when Daddy Warbucks jumps up outside and runs to get the door for the wheelchair---you go outside. We had another nice chat and ate later. So much for the boy scout syndrome.

Language   I picked up a hairdryer in London and read "This appliance must be earthed." Well, the earth is the ground--grounded, earthed. They both make sense. I just love to see the variety.

My Solo   After dinner last night we went to the Yacht Club for the first time. It seems more night-clubbier than the dancing in the Queen's Room. After a while they announced the Electric Slide, and I got up, and it came back to me. But there weren't more than 7-8 people on the floor, many having trouble, and they played it for a long time. Towards the end, I was the only one left. The rocking of the ship didn't help, and I wasn't great, but I wasn't too bad, either.

Le Havre   At the stop in Le Havre we went for a walk around the dock area and in the shed there were some things for sale, like French wine and sailing memorabilia. Le Havre and Cherbourg have a long history of transatlantic passenger shipping, and I was very interested in seeing a small (unmanned) booth of an organization called the Association Havraise des amis des paquebots (Le Havre Association of the Friends of Ocean Liners). There was an explanation of what it was, and I liked the first line:

Notre Association a pour but de conserver le souvenir de tous navires, témoins d'une grande aventure humaine...

Our Association has as its goal keeping up the memory of all ships, witnesses of a grand human adventure...

Merkins   The numbers just came out, and once again the majority of the 1696 passengers are Merkins, travelling from Yurp back to Merka, but not nearly so high as on the trip over, 675 (40%), and again the Brits are second in number, 614 (36%). There are 28 nationalities represented; the others over 100 are French 137 (8%) and Germans 111 (7%).

Germans   For the first time in my experience they have a German lecturer on board, a specialist on film. Today we caught the tail end of a 1930's film telling about the image of New York. In his first lecture he talked about sailing in the 1920's and '30's, and showed a silent film from the early '20's telling about the different classes on a German ship called the Bellin. Second class actually had an outdoor movie screen. He also told about an issue of the New York Herald Tribune from August 8, 1939 (three weeks before I was born, by the way), that showed a map of the Atlantic with the positions of all 39 ships doing crossings on that day. Just imagine, thirty-nine.

Crossings   At the Captain's reception before dinner the other night, the Master of the QE2, Captain Paul Wright, who's very amiable, gave a nice talk, and then ended by telling everyone to make sure to keep up the distinction between crossings and cruises. I was so glad to hear that that I went up to him afterward and congratulated him for saying so. Even Cunard advertises all crossings together with its cruises and calls everything a cruise. Ships that can do ocean crossings, as well as cruises, are more streamlined, more powerful, and thicker-hulled than ships that can only do cruises between local ports, and I think the distinction should be maintained.

Cunard   The cruise director gave a history of Cunard since 1840. I had known that Samuel Cunard came from Halifax, but was interested to find that he won from the British government in that year the right to carry the mails between Britain, Canada (Halifax), and the US (Boston) on the first Cunard ship, the Britannia, which was the first regularly scheduled passenger crossing service. An early Cunard passenger was Charles Dickens. I was also interested to find out that the Cunard family were German quakers and the name was originally Kunders, later Kunrad. So in a sense, Cunard is related to "Conrad". I also got the answer to the question I've asked several times of people who might know and didn't: why is the main control area called the bridge? It seems that the early paddle wheelers started with one paddle, later two, and a plank was set up between the two wheels, named the bridge, and this developed into what it is today.

The speaker mentioned stupid questions. The most frequent one is: Does the crew sleep on board? Followed by: Does the ship generate its own electricity? She said she once had this question and thought the speaker was kidding, so she said, no, there are two long extension cords, one to Southampton for 240V power, and one to New York for 110V. Shortly afterwards the captain called her in saying the passenger had asked him what security measures were being taken to be sure no one pulls out either plug.

Handkiss   One of the cast members of the Broadway Bound show had a show-tune singalong today, which was just what Bev needed. She sang along for the 45 minutes: I Could Have Danced All Night, Tomorrow, My Favorite Things. I had mentioned to him earlier that she rarely speaks now, but does sing, which he duly noted during the session. He came over at the end and kissed her hand.

We went back to the Yacht Club this evening and did a dance or two, but it's a Jamaican band with the kind of music there is less amenable to Bev dancing. Then the vocalist announced the Electric Slide again, and pulled me up front to help demonstrate. (!!) But most of the people just weren't enough used to doing patterned steps and just did freeform, so it was pretty much a shambles. Bev and I did another dance, and when Francesca, the vocalist, and the band were leaving for their break, she came over and kissed Bev's hand. So that happened twice in one day.

Pounds   Someone at table said "I heard we have forty-five thousand pounds of caviar on board!" I said that's impossible. Where could they keep that much and why would they want to? Then we realized I was talking weight and she was talking currency. In Britain kilos are slowly replacing pounds in weight, and if Britain ever adopts the Euro, the monetary pound will disappear, and the word pound would become historical in both senses.

Home   It's Tuesday afternoon and we're all unpacked. Just saw the ship leaving outbound on the river.

Some days later, the first time back home in New York from Britain and Ireland that I drove my car, I did three things on a 20-minute drive, honestly. I turned into a quiet, one-way side street and had a moment of panic as to whether I should keep to the left or right; I looked at the sky out my left window to see behind me, and there was no rear-view mirror in the sky; and when I tried to put the automatic shift into reverse to park, I grabbed the left door handle. Go figure.