Getting Used to Doing Nothing

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Geo: 24.7566, 36.6835

This is the third sea day in row with two more before the next port. We are very good at doing mostly nothing. Breakfast in the dining room, a bit of organizing all the papers I've collected, catching up on writing some, reading, lunch in the Colonnade and listening to a talk by one of the on-board experts took up the daytime hours.

There are three on-board experts on this trip. We have listened to two of them several times. The first we heard was Terry Ellis who is a manager for musical groups including Led Zeppelin and Jethro Tull and was co-founder of Chrysalis Records. He was active in the industry from the late 1960s until today and has given several talks about his career, the music business, and the record industry. The expert on the history and culture of this area is Colonel Gerald McCormack, a retired (Australian, I think) military man. He has spoken on Lawrence of Arabia, Cleopatra, and the Crusades. Today, he spoke about Lawrence after Arabia, his later years of influence on British politics with countries of the Middle East and Africa.

The third expert is Christopher Croxson who speaks about oceanography and marine biology. We haven't seen him live yet, but can watch any of his or the other experts "conversations" on the in-room TV later.

We had dinner delivered to the suite again, but went to the Grand Salon for the after dinner entertainment. It was a game show called The Liar's Club where four of the ship's entertainers played what I know as the Dictionary Game, and the audience, divided into thirteen teams, guessed who was telling the truth. At the end of the evening, our team of four couples came out the winners. Words were ablewhackers, galumph, omphalasepsis (I don't have that one spelled right), deglutition, and finally lilipoop which we got right to break a tie with one other team. Prizes were small Seabourn teddy bears for the women and black Seabourn visors for the men.

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