Fret not Dear Reader (in case you might have been), I haven’t dropped off the face of the earth! No, it’s just been a tad manic here on the very wet and blowy Isle.
The play (you’ll remember this if you’ve been concentrating) went ok. Not well, that would be a gross overstatement, and not really badly – well that’s if you don’t count the opening night which I think travesty would be too mild a word to describe it as. Imagine, if you will, a group of people who are reasonably dedicated to turning up to rehearsals, learning their lines and generally playing the game. Factor into the equation a leading man who, by his own admission, knew 60% of his lines (60% was an exaggeration of at least 20%) and a director who faffed and fart arsed around so much that we not only didn’t have the two dress rehearsals that we should have done, but who was still adding props that we had never seen to the stage on the last night… A recipe for certain disaster if ever there was one. I felt for the poor audience on Thursday night as the LM skipped back and forth through the dialogue (in some cases making it up as he went along) much to the bemusement of the prompt who had no idea what (if anything) was coming next and the poor props ladies who tried valiantly to cope with more and more items which were ‘essential’ to the plot… Suffice to say, we were none of us sorry to see the back of it by the end of Saturday night (which was another whole exercise for our LM in forgetting entirely different parts of the script!).
I had a lovely Sunday with TG and the Smallest Baby Girl and we went out and about, had a spot of breakfast, a spot of coffee, some colouring was done, stories were read and the ACL’s newest cute Silke was duly stroked. A sumptuous roast and then flaked fatly in front of Strictly and X you know what and that was us. The sort of Sunday I haven’t had due to work in blooming ages.
So Monday hove into view and off I went for day one of new job. Oh my!! There is SO MUCH for me to get my head around not least the geographical locations of the ship’s routes. I may come to know more about Venezuela and Cameroon that I realised there was to know. There is much terminology, technical stuff that I may never understand and more deadlines than you can shake a stick at but I think that once I settle in it’ll be fine (I said I think). The highlight of day one was an unexpected visit to one of the ships that happened to be docked at Southampton picking up cargo (you see, I sound like I know what I’m talking about already!). It was brilliant to actually go onto the ship and meet the (entirely foreign ) crew and see just how big these cargo ships are – even though this was one of the smaller ones. They were having a captain swop over when we arrived so I got to meet not one but two Russians who were fairly dour and unsmiling but friendly none the less. Their chief complaint was about the Romanian chef who had insisted on serving the same soup every night for weeks – cow stomach poached in milk and garlic. Well no wonder they looked miserable!! The captain who was leaving had been with the ship since June, so I can only imagine he was a more rotund and happy fellow before the advent of the soup!
Well that’s it so far. I have no photos to show you because *curses* I forgot to take my camera yesterday and because these days I am leaving home in the dark and returning in the dark, so that would be a bit boring photo wise! So, Dear Reader, I shall keep you updated with progress and endeavour to get out and about at lunchtime (should the rain ever cease) and take a few snaps.
Amberlife 