Alaskan Cruise’26 Days First Days

Day 2

8:30 AM

   Doing my standard walk about, my legs have told me to avoid going upstairs at all costs. I’m thinking this is a result of 17k steps from yesterday: the majority while carrying my carry-ons and backpack. And eventually Wendi’s backpack as well.    Those suckers got mighty heavy. They eventually became “drag-ons” but we survived.

  Anyway, just doing a scan of my 2019 Cruise Write Up, so far on this trip, we have become slightly more savvy cruisers.

-Magnetic hooks. The walls in this small cabin may not look it but are actually metal. So, bringing along 8 or 10 strong magnetic hooks gives us instant storage. Same with the shoe organizer hanging by the door. 

  Unlike 2019, I now have plenty of convenient places for my coat, hoodie, USCG ball cap, and ukulele. (I read Norwegian Cruise Line’s Prohibited Items list very carefully and as long as my uke doesn’t heat up, explode, or get me stoned, it’s fine. 

-Last night, we went to a preview of all the shows we could see on this trip. We’ve already got one, maybe two on our schedule. Last time, we managed Bingo. And got a shirt. So, that won’t  change much. 

-Dude Wipes: Winter Mint style. We all know what lifesaver these little boys can be in the right sticky situation, boys?

  To clean your hands before and after dinner. You boneheads. 

-The space age collapsible coat hangers were a bit of a bust. Yes, they fold up to the size of your palm but we have all these magnetic hooks, you see.

-Plenty of clothes!  Okay, bringing ONE non-Black or Grey t-shirt would have been nice. And perhaps a less holy pair of jeans. 

  But it’s Alaska, am I right, folks?!?

-Finally, the ship seems a lot wavier this time around. Same ship. Weather’s similar, if a tad colder. Our cabin is on the port side this time but still amidship and about the same deck. So either my balance has gone to shit in the last 7 years or the Norwegian Joy is caught is some sort of freakish current. 

  Enough commentary.

  Day  2 Continued 

  As is my curse; up too early. Since my wife doesn’t suffer this affliction, I decided to go on a walk about. Weight room, light breakfast, more exploring and back to the cabin to pick up Wendi. Another trip to the buffet: let’s call this one brunch. Some shopping. It being a large ship, we used the top screen map our path. 

Editor’s Note: Mansplagony (n) The deep anguish: on average 1.25 seconds, that a husband feels when he has the solution yet knows he. must. not. say. which. button.

   Then a couple of hours at the spa where everything was heated, steamed or frozen (on purpose but not all at once). The spa was right at the stern and where the swaying was most noticeable. Practically rocked me to sleep but then an extremely rare cruiser feeling hit me; hunger. 

  Off to the very entertaining but very very loud restaurant. The restaurant: Teppanyaki, was similar to Benihana (?). Everyone sits around the cooking surface watching the food being prepared The food was good but holy smokes, it was loud. Our cook (chef?) and the other cook (performance artist?) right behind him were singing non-stop while using their spatulas to keep the beat.    

  Can’t fault them for their amazing showmanship and cooking skills. The food was great but sensory overload.

  After that, we returned to the cabin to treasure the silence and then treasure the sleep.

Alaskan Cruise’26 Day 3

Day 3

Ketchikan. Our first stop. It was nice. We paid $90 for a ride into town with a tour. And a ride back to a boat. (About a 3 mile journey from pier [not dock!] to downtown. 

   We got some of what we asked for. During the trip to town, which was through a lot of road construction, a rock bounced up and shattered the driver’s windshield.  Honestly sounded like a gunshot and it sprayed (thankfully small) shards of all over the front of the bus: including the driver. Fortunately, while the glass was cracked all to hell, it stayed together. The fact that we were only going about 35 mph also helped. 

  So, we made it to town but Cameron the Driver said the trolley would be out of commission for the rest of the day. Someone with a new bus might be by in two hours but the city shuttle. Nobody came. We ended up standing line for about 20 minutes to take the city bus back. 

  Not a tragedy but I certainly wouldn’t say we got our money’s worth. 

  Ketchikan was cool. Reminded me of Winthrop. If four huge cruise liners sailed up the Methow River. (Which is a totally cool image!)

   What I don’t get is why someone, anyone  thought the very tail end of the Alaskan Panhandle would be a great place to sell high end gems and jewelry. 

   Selling animals and their fur makes sense. As does the local tribes’ art work. Even gold but who goes to the Great White North to buy opals, tanzanite, or jade? Baffling. 

  We didn’t see anything we HAD to have besides two delicious coffees. 

  But the ride back to was very interesting. Our bus driver was a retired school bus teacher who flies up from Utah every summer for the work. And she told really interesting factoids about the local area. 

  The most fascinating was that in the small town of Skagway (our Day 6 stop), it’s illegal for a woman to give birth. Any woman doing so is given $500 fine. 

  WTF? I hear you say? Well, it’s because the tiny town has only one paramedic and the only way to get to a hospital is by plane or boat. 

  So, what they do is when a soon to be mother is within a month of her due date, said mother is flown to Juneau, where she stays at the hospital; given all the creature comforts till the baby arrives. And it costs Mom $1 day to do so. 

  The women around me started out with How Dare They? to eventually “A month long vacation away from the family? Sign me up!” 

  Sorry to inject a bit of political cometary but this SURE seems like socialism for such a libertarian state as Alaska. 

   Reminds me of the old adage that a conservative is a liberal who got mugged. 

  So it was back to the boat where we had a delightful dinner and then we did this. 

   $.25 to the first person who can say what the hell it going on. And no, the Norwegian Joy doesn’t have an optometrist onboard. 

  After that, we went to a magic show. She was fine. It was fine. 

  Guess every magician and illusionist I see will be compared to Mac King on Las Vegas. And they’re all found wanting.

  Having toured, spent, seen, and eaten, we decided it was time for bed.

Alaskan Cruise’26 Day 4

    Day 4 

  Thanks to Wendi’s generous donation of 1/4 a trazodone, I was able to sleep in till nearly 7:00. It was glorious. 

  There were two things we wanted to check out before disembarking; both of which were in the ship’s Atrium. The first was a large, group version of Boggle. Due to my need to eat some sort of breakfast, we got there just as that game was wrapping up and the Ship Trivia Game was about to begin. 

   I really hated it. It was slowly paced; which is kryptonite to a 1.15xBrain like myself. What’s worse, Wendi and I didn’t do that well: 11 out of 20. 

  Not to toot my own horn but I expected to CRUSH the competition because I’m…well: ME. 

  No such luck. Divine Justice meets out a hard lesson. 

  The final twist of the knife was that everyone sitting around us was really old. No doubt this was the result of our having docked at Sitka 90 minutes previous. Least that’s my story.

  So we went into Sitka. Having given up on out-fabulous fashioning Mrs. Hardy (who is up to 15 wardrobe-related compliments), I decided play dirty and wore my USCG ball cap.

   The day garnered me no compliments, but  I was thanked for my service three separate times; which I’m ruling as equivalent. 

  There is a USCG base south of town and since most Sitka..ites(?)’spend at least a some time on the deadly cold North Pacific waters, I imagine Coasties are well regarded. Unlike cops and prostitutes, they ARE around when you really need them. 

  Plus, somebody’s got to fly all those procrastinating delinquent pregnant people to Juneau. 

  Much of our Sitka day was spent combing the beach for all those interesting Alaskan rocks. This was a high point for Wendi. Really one of her main reasons for wanting to come on this cruise.  

   After maybe two hours, we (she)  got the small shopping bag filled with  cool rocks. Nothing amazing but a solid 15 lbs. hanging on my shoulder.   

  We returned to the ship early as we wanted to beat the last minute rush as well as have time to pick up some gifts for our much appreciated cat sitters. Back to the ship. 

  NCL takes security pretty seriously.  They don’t care what you take OFF the ship but getting back on requires a security screening; which includes checking your ship ID card, photo ID and a metal detector. 

   You’re not allowed to bring on any food which could spoil, any undeclared booze, (which is declared once you pay an “uncorking fee”), or anything hazardous like explosives or weapons. 

   Also hazardous: 

Local. 

Effing. 

Rocks. 

   I shit you not. I was carrying 15 pounds of biohazard. Wendi was crushed. Okay, “disappointed” as I dumped all the contraband out. As I said earlier: the collection was interesting but not amazing. (It will get increasingly impressive in memory.) 

  Wendi, ever the law abiding citizen, told me later that if she to finds a cool rock in Skagway, Icy Strait Point, or Victoria, she would just put it into her pocket when returning to the ship. 

  And thus, a life of crime begins. 

  All through today’s trip, I kept sneaking quick looks at my phone to see if I had a strong enough signal to download new YouTube videos. 

  I am not proud of proud of this junkie-ish behavior. But it’s who I am. 

   Though we paid for (my) phone to have “high” speed internet, it only seems high speed when checking the NCL app. Any sort of streaming is blocked. Everything else is dogshit slow. So, when in port, I’ve turned off wi-fi in hopes of getting a clear enough signal strength. With only a couple brief glorious moments, I’ve been unsuccessful. 

  Stupid untouched natural beauty. 

  So, I’ve had to survive on whatever I’ve previously downloaded “Watch Later” YouTube videos.    

   Boy, Previous Me really wants me to practice a shit ton of songs for the ukulele. 

   So, I am now laboriously making my way through what I thought I would one future day be interested in. 

  (Minus 100 points for House Hardy! Flagrant verb tense abuse.) 

Imposed Digital Purging

When your circumstances force you to rely exclusively on your downloaded material. 

  So, yeah, slowly winnowing down my previously save material. Probably a good thing. 

   I’ve definitely dropped off on my consumption of national news. Absolutely a good thing. 

  Despite the crushing rock disappointment, a good day.

Alaskan Cruise: Day 5

July 3 

  Today was Icy Point Straight. Eventually, I got over mentally arguing with its grammar: a point is land but a straight is water but decided to stop the pondering. Sometimes, even I think my brain’s a wanker.

  IPS is an island that… As far as I can tell, we tourists stopped there because there were tourist attractions; which were built to bring in tourists. A bit of snake eating its own tail. Very mythological.

  There was a cannery on the other side of the island but I think it’s been converted into shops and restaurants. 

  We disembarked midmorning. We had purchased an all day pass to the gondola up to the top of the island and wanted to get our money’s worth. 

  You know that feeling when you’re on a trip and you strongly suspect you’ve forgotten something? Yeah, that’s was me immediately after stepping off the boat. Yeah, that was me. What was it? 

   Once we got to the gondola base; it came to me. 

   I fucking hate gondola rides. 

   Not the boat kind but the ones hundreds of feet up in even a mild breeze. 

  According to the photos, it was a lovely view. 

     We we got up top, it really was nice. There was a lovely trail: very relaxing. 

   Didn’t see any bears but that just proves they are a particularly devious species.    

   Fortunately, the park staff were on patrol. 

  Again, very calming. I wasn’t too worried. The trail was pretty crowded and I remembered Mr. Steed’s wise words about not having to outrun the bear…

Yet another warning that death is ever present. 

   It really was gorgeous up there; we took scads of non-“You’re probably  gonna die” photos. Wendi also took the opportunity to pick up several interesting rocks. And snuck them onto the ship. 

  Way to stick to The Man, Sweetie!! Nobody suspects the short woman of such deviancy. Me? I practically stripped down to the skivvies to go through the pier security. 

  (Sorry ladies. No photos. 

          Or ARE there?!?)

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, Exhibit A.

    After returning, we lounged around till dinner at a steak house. Which was excellent. 

  We’d planned on going to the 80s Party at the Insane Time of 9:30 but we poopped out and went to bed. Like most GenX’ers would. 

   Last note on Day 5. After D4’s kind comments from wearing my USCG ball cap, I decided to wear my Kodiak hoodie. However, as it was under my jacket for most of the day, nobody commented on it.   

   Too bad as I really hoping to explain the I served there Thirty-Five Year Ago. And still rocking it. Okay, truth be told,the diameter of my skull seems to have doubled since the late 80s. 

   Or, more likely, the fabric had stretched out . 

    I know I have.

Goodnight.

Alaskan Cruise: Day 6

Happy 250th, America! Hope we make it to 251.

   Today, we are back to Skagway. The little town that lives off the cruise ship visits. We were here back in 2919 so we had a good idea what to expect. 

   Instead of the White Pass train ride, this time we went on the Historical City, Gold Panning, and Salmon Bake. It was an enjoyable recreation of what life was like during the Yukon Gold Rush. 

(Spoilers: It Sucked.) 

   The gold panning was fun and both Wendi and I got a few (microscopic) flakes. I was certainly more successful than my gold panning attempts as a teenager in desperate hopes of coming up with a Mother’s Day gift. 

(Poverty: It just sucks.) 

   We ended our tour at an old timey cemetery chock-full of folks who died over a century ago and usually very young. 

  A few minutes hike from there was a picturesque falls where we took pictures.

  (Grey, black, army green. You’re not even trying at this point, are you?)

Even more impressive than the falls was the sand along the banks. We both immediately saw gold flecks. Lots of gold flecks. 

   In the 5 or 6 minutes before we had to run back to the tour bus, we each picked out a couple of good sizes (.0002 gram) flakes just with our hands. Why did we waste all that time learning history, looking at decrepit grave markers, and eating salmon?? (Sigh) C’est la Vie. 

  Or as the French say, C’est La Vie.

  In town, we (mostly Wendi) did some shopping and picked up some nice jewelry. She also pick up some other local treasures. 

  Fish gotta swim, a rock hound’s gotta..uh.. hound rocks. 

  This being Skagway, we were both on the lookout for any pregnant-looking ladies. Fortunately, we didn’t see any. 

  (Author’s Note: The above bizarre statement was explained in a previous post. Let’s &$!¥€ing hope the %#*+€ing Wi-Fi stops being so €#%+ing awful.) 

  The rest of tonight could be busy going to shows. Or chilling in the cabin. The next two days will be at sea so we have plenty of time to see the 8-10 items on our to do list. 

   We shall sea.

Alaska 2026 Day 7

 THIS time, we weren’t having a couples massage while in Glacier Bay so we actually got to see a bunch of glaciers.

  They were cool. Most impressive. Took a zillion photos. 

  One less than awesome part was that a Glacier National Park ranger came aboard to narrate what we would see. And mention Global Warming’s effect on glaciers (bad), mountain goats (bad), the weather (bad). Bad, bad, bad. 

  Yeah, Ranger Ruinous, we get it. Global Warming = Bad. This isn’t exactly news. 

  But as I said, it was an impressive sight. 

  After taking the hours long slow tour of the bay, the ship started southward. 

   One really unpleasant aspect of our trip so far? Children/teens. Who were pretty feral : running around and being very loud.       

   Yes, there must have been quiet, well-behaved [non-American] children. We didn’t notice them. As is Right and Proper.

  But the running up and down the halls, banging on walls and decks, and the loud screaming really got under Wendi’s skin.

She was positive the source of the childish yowling was the cabin directly above ours and finally threw her hiking boot at the ceiling. 

   The memory of said boot bouncing off the ceiling and smacking her in the face?      

   Priceless. 

  And one she laughed about so it’s safe to record in this digital form. 

  We are both in agreement that our next cruise: when and wherever it may be, will be an adult’s only. I hear that’s a Virgin option.

   Virgin Cruise Lines. 

  After laying down the (facial) smack down, we decided to go gambling. Which involved waiting till the ship got a certain distance away from shore. Neither of us won big or small at the slot machines but we can say we did it. 

   After some downtime in the cabin, we enjoyed a wonderful dinner at La Bistro. It was Wendi’s second lobster dinner of trip so Alaska Cruise’26 is officially successful. I also enjoyed my pork chop. ( baiseur de porcs, maybe?) 

  An excellent dinner can make up for a whole lot of little of obnoxious little shits so we went to bed happy.

Alaskan Cruise’26: The Final Day

We slept in. After my morning ablutions (a fancy word for taking a shit), we had a quick room service breakfast. Room service being a requirement for all vacations. 

   Then, Wendi went back to the Spa Doc to make sure her facial was progressing nicely. And upsell more products and/or procedures. 

  I remember our 2019 couples massage being rather stressful from all the upselling. File that under ironic. 

  A lazy day. The ship seems empty. At least the spa does. I’m mentally starting the Final Departure Protocol. 

    •    This means starting to mental catalog where all our stuff is. 

    •    Taking a visual inventory of everything we’ve bought (artwork), was given (more art work), panned for (gold) or stolen and smuggled aboard (rocks). 

    •    Deciding what entertainments we still have time for (Beatles). 

    •    Attempting to consume all the consumables in the fridge. (2 yogurts, a banana, an orange, and maybe 5 half liter bottles of water. We very foolishly got a 24 case on our first day and have been desperately chugging as much as possible these last couple days. Yesterday was a personal record of 5. 

    •    And starting to plan how to get everything, including the new stuff into the same luggage that was filled to bursting last Monday. 

  But this spa bed is so nice. And there’s the sauna, steam room, and cool room…

12:13 Wednesday Morning 

   My packing is done and now I am helpfully staying out of Mrs. Hardy’s way. Hers is the more involved process. 

  The final meal at Cagney’s Steakhouse was delicious. I went for the seafood. Wendi the steak. We’ve both sworn off rich foods till the high school reunion in 5 weeks. Just over a month to get back to at least our pre-cruise bodies. 

  The Beatles show was okay. We both agreed that last night’s Cavern Club seemed more like a..an actual performance you might see in a dingy little club. (Like we’re speaking from experience.) 

  We’ll be in Seattle in just over six hours and home in maybe eight, depending on the Bremerton Ferry schedule. Also depending on how fast I can move with 3 layers of clothing. 

   We’re both relieved we can just walk off the boat and to the ferry. No worrying about checked luggage or making it to the airport on time. 

   It’s been a fun trip; hands down the best cruise we’ve ever had*  but as with every trip, we’re very eager to come home to the house, cats, good internet, and a more healthy routine. And never spending any money. Hope Xander wants some art for his upcoming birthday. Or maybe some contraband Alaskan rocks. 🪨 

   Especially a more healthy routine. We have our high school reunion in a month and we’re hoping for smugness. Wendi did a reasonably good job at not going nuts at the Garden Buffet. We certainly followed NCL health and safety guidelines. The man stationed at the buffet’s entrance screaming “WASHY!! WASHY!!” while hitting a tambourine helped remind us.   

   And with adequate Dude Wipes for all the young dudes. For cleaning your hands before and after eating. Are you all taking a piss?

    Still, as an added personal prophylactic, I continued use of my “Reverse Bedouin” Anti-Bacterial/Viral Protocol. Worked like a charm. 

   (Definition of the above term can be found in the author’s previous Alaskan Travelogue at the foolhardy.com. Be advised: It’s possible some of my more sensitive readers may find the a tad offensive. [Be More Advised; It’s probably that most of you will.])

   I may have some final notes tomorrow but I’ve already got plenty written down. At least some of it should be intelligible so perhaps a spot of editing. 

Brian, the 

Whirled Traveler 

Signing Off. 

*This is a joke. 

 PS:  crap. Seems it just means cleaning your body. That might explain the puzzled looks..

  One language error I’ve just had corrected this trip: a multi-decade mistake is a favorite phrase of both Tina Wendi: “Drop Trow”. 

  A couple days ago, Wendi explained it was short for “Drop Trousers”. An informal way to explain you need to use the bathroom. 

  For decades, I thought the Heath Women were saying an abbreviated version of “Drop Trout”. As in dropping a fish-shaped douce into the toilet.

….

   Upon long overdue reflection, it really would be out of character for my elegant mother-in-law to announce a description of her fecal matter before excusing herself. Waaay out of character. That seems a more Hardy thing. 

Live and learn.

AlasCruis Afterthought

Couple 3 final thoughts about Our Recent Odyssey North.

  Hearing “I’ve had the Time of My Life” sung by two of the lounge singiest of lounge singers on our last night on the cruise? The cheesiest thing I have ever encountered. 

No complaints here.

  Been thinking about the Scagway mentality. Scagway, AK, has about 1,000 year-round residents. During cruise ship season (Mayish-Octoberish), the town can double or triple that. 

  Food comes in on a barge every Monday. It’s a snooze/lose situation. Sarah, our tour bus driver explained in her first week in town, she waited until Friday to go shopping and went home with ramen and okra. 

  One interesting factoid I learned on the tour was that the Scagway River’s light green color is from the river being mostly glacier right off; which has lots of crushed rock where the color comes from. Lovely color but salmon can’t breathe in such water. No salmon means no bear. (Families to the south in Sitka can take out 90 salmon per person per day.)

  Health care is..there. Anything the nurse practitioner can’t handle means flying out on the weekly run or a VERY expensive helicopter ride. (There was a slight difference between what we heard from our Sitka and Skagway tour drivers.) 

  As mentioned earlier, the No Deliveries Allowed rule is simply a very heavy handed way of dealing with very problem. Heavy handed yes, but they’re not wrong. And the women on the bus at least understood the reason for the law. And many expressed the idea that a month without any family duties while being catered to might not be the worst thing in the world.

  The town’s isolation also means a “Someday, I’m gonna be my own 9-1-1.” attitude is the wisest. If I don’t do a good job hunting, fishing, gardening, getting firewood, and grocery shopping, my family will go without. Pretty sure most, if not all, are really good at hunting and fishing. Also pretty sure nobody there would call them hobbies. 

   I think most Americans; especially of the dude kind, think of themselves as potential Scaggers. I could and should chuck all these suburban amenities and go live on my own. Live off the land.    

   That was certainly my Mom’s thinking when she packed up four boys and moved to the country (Twisp, WA) in the late 70s. 

   And she hadn’t a clue what to expect. We were not prepared. I got my own Junior Edition version of Scagway Life at an early age. And have since taken The Softer Road More Traveled. 

  Right now, my biggest concern is that this afternoon’s Safeway delivery won’t substitute honey crisps with cosmic crisps. Pretty much the antithesis my friends to the Far North. 

  And yet. 

  And yet, there’s this tiny yet indestructible part of me that thinks I could. I should. Probably the reason each one of my  fall apple and potatoe “crop” will end up costing me about $10 per unit. A gentleman farmer, seeing over a productive estate, I am not. 

 I respect those northern folks. They don’t let “But what if..?” get in the way of living. A type of bravery. 

 Another type of bravery? Walking passed the cruise ship house band: C-Sharps playing “Pretty Woman” and deciding, “I MUST Dance!”and doing so on stage right up front. 

No, Dear Reader, it wasn’t me but instead Wendi! She followed her bliss. 

Guess you could say Wendi had the time of her life. 

End Seen

And in answer to the question so many of you have been asking,

Wendi-17 fashion compliments 

Brian-3 Thank yous. 

Wendi was looking into that machine to get this. 

Achievement Unlocked🎉🎉🎉

Dc Trip Day 5 2025

Thursday-Day..5.  The Final Day 5 Day

   So, really wanted to end our trip on a positive note so it was off to Museum of Illusions! 

  Which was a hoot. Brilliant stuff.

These two shapes are exactly the same length. I kid you not. 

  Afterwards?Afterwords? (Thanks for nothing, SpellChecker)

  After that thing that happened before now, we walked to the Museum of American Portraits.

  It was nice. A lot more of those textbook paintings I tend to geek out over. We spent the rest of the day there; heading back to the hotel about 4:30ish.  

(One final UBJ: this one looking exceedingly Anglo-Saxon.) 

 Then our final dinner at the Club. The macaroons? To die for. A bit of prepacking and then hit the hay. 

…

On the plane heading home. 

 We should hit Seattle a little after noon. Early by local time but we’ll be pretty wiped out. 

  Couple of takeaways. 

A) Besides the lack of shirts, things went pretty well. I thing I haven’t mentioned was that our first two nights, the was an unpleasant order in the bedroom. 

   We both thought we were imagining it on night one and then shared notes the second evening. 

  D.3 morning, we mentioned it to the concierge who immediately sent a crew to do a deep clean. It must have been the pillows. And the sheets. Anyway, they fixed the problem right quick. And gave us $50 comp at the hotel’s restaurant. 

B) Eating breakfast and dinner at the Club and/or grabbing snacks (Kind bars and chips) and drinks (Perrier) for later saved us a ton of money. We averaged buying just one meal a day and those were mostly at our then current museum’s cafe. 

  We went out to eat only twice and one of those was the comped meal mentioned above. 

  Pretty sure our largest expenditure was for Lyft: which I estimate at $200 for the week. 

C) Wendi didn’t complain much but she spent much of this trip feeling very cold. All those big official buildings love their A\C. Wendi just got into the habit of wearing 2 or 3 layers when we went out for the morning.   

  If we had any travel time out in the 80 plus degree high humidity outdoors, she would just strip down to her tank-top once we left the building. I wish there was some sort of heating device she could have which wouldn’t set off the security checks. 

  Also, Wendi’s height did become the occasional bother. I mean look at how tiny she is! 

C) Having access to delicious food, snacks, and drinks 24/7? This may have saved us plenty of money but I definitely consumed for than was necessary. Abundance is often too much for me. Over abundance? Game over. 

  The one upside was that we didn’t end up throwing much away. Just some fries and a couple of mostly empty Perriers. 

D) Finally, if you look really closely, you might be able to see the hidden appliance. 

Can you see it? 

Okay, let me go all CSI on this mystery.

   You see it, right? There is a microwave oven. For the first five days of our stay, I was (somehow) sure we didn’t have one in our room. So, either A) they snuck one in while we were out on Wednesday or B) I’m a complete-

  There is no B. They must have snuck it in. 

E) On last summer’s trip to DC, we had a well-meaning, old man in the White House. 

   Right now, we have an evil man running our country and all the “What If”s gave us a constant low level anxiety that was hard to escape. 

   We’ll take a day or two to recover then plan something for to have you all over. Gotta pass out all the amazing gift for  Becky, Rebekah, and Janet 1. (J2, until you return to the Left Coast, you get nothing! I say good day to you, madam!) 

Service cart almost to my row. Do I dare another Bloody Mary Mix? 

  Stay tuned. 

B&W 

Wendi’s favorite moment when traveling. 

(Not sure about Tanith’s opinion.)

DC Trip Day 4 2025

Day 4: We Like It Well-Hung

  Today was all the National Gallery. We didn’t even get to half of it yesterday so this turned out to be our only event for the day. 

   As far as we could tell, we managed almost all the gallery over the two days. At about 4:00, it was a very fast walk to the East Wing, then to the Tower where the 20th Century art was. To be honest, Picasso was the motivation. I can now say I’ve seen multiple Picasso paintings. 

  Actually, with the exception of Frank Frazetta and Bob Ross, I think we saw all The Greats. 

   Many thanks to Mr. Hottell, my high school humanities teacher and Knowledge Bowl coach for giving me just a light sprinkling of knowledge over a wide range of topics. An understanding a mile wide and 2 mm deep. 

  As with yesterday, it was just cool seeing all the paintings that shaped history for me.    

  The paintings that ended up on the $1 and $2 bills? Saw them. Japanese Foot Bridge. A poster in Tina’s office. Jackson Pollock’s “Painting Number 1”? Never saw it and that’s fine by me. 

  So, it was an okay day. And on the ride home, Wendi pointed out yet another Kinko’s She been pointing them out to me ever since we got here. Though I didn’t pay great attention to what she was saying, I did wonder about the plethora of copier services in the downtown area. 

 That, and Wendi’s constant need to point them out. 

…

Turns out she was pointing out Ginkgo trees.  Makes a bit more sense. 

On that note.

Bye!

The God coming through the clouds is very reminiscent of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. 

Justin Timberlake is The Anointed One? 

Seriously. It’s like, “Oh, crap! Who dropped Our Lord and Savior into the dirt?”

Our Lord and Savior Mandrake. 

Once I noticed my first “Pooping Pup”, I saw them everywhere.

Dc Trip Day 3 2025

Day 3: THAT Is A Jacque Louis David? So cool!!

   The US Mint Headquarters and Coin Shop? Not worth your time. I got Becky some super great quarters. 

   The National Archive? Yeah, pretty cool. Who doesn’t want to gaze upon the O.G. Of Constitutions: The Magna Carta. 

   Then off to the National Gallery of Art. Now that’s what we’re talking about. There are so many “As Seen In History and/Art High School Textbooks” paintings there.    

  And it is HUGE! So that Wendi and I going back tomorrow. 

    The first big fancy door we went through took us to “Furniture From the 17th, 18th, and 19th Century”. The sad part of me went away when I saw excited Wendi got. She happily went down hall taking photos of designs she liked. 

   My biggest takeaways? I have got to learn more about all the saints: not just top ten. (Maybe more like five.) Some of those four century old paintings look friggin’ amazing. I know, right? 

   Also, most of the paintings show a very unfortunate saint or a hero from classic mythology. The third largest category was Nativity. 

   And, Oh My, all the Baby Jesuses… They were just laughably awful. As a way to keep myself amused, I started recording every UBJ (Ugly Baby Jesus) I came across.

   Finally, they had a 1920 St. Guaden’s (sp). Obviously, it was in mint condition. This is the exact same coin that Harold soldered on a little loop and kept it his pocket for years. 

    Harold!! Why, man, why?! 

“Chopped” has started. Best wrap this up.

Go Away Now!!

   In spirit of “radical honesty” I saw a tic-tock on, figure I should tell you it was I who actually uttered the title sentence to Wendi as we were being shooed out at closing time.

Here are other possibles. What connects these classic paintings? 

DC Trip Day 2: Electric Boogaloo 2025

Day 2: We Rock!

Late Sunday. 

  Okay, so horrible night of sleeping. Wendi is always cold so the heat was slightly on. Bad choice. This room is humid as shit. The A\C will be A\C’ing tonight. 

  The other bad item was Holly texted us both saying she had Important News about Tina. Against our (no, Wendi’s) better judgment, we called her. Another bad choice.

  The “important thing” was just a short, funny but not urgent story about taking Tina out for lunch. Amusing anecdote, sis, but you remember when I told you any Tina news bums Wendi out so only call her if it’s Life or Death (or money)? Apparently, Holly did not remember. 

  So Wendi spent the night stewing. Really wish I hadn’t encouraged her to call. Epic Husband Fail. 

  This morning, we go up and out the door only just behind our self-imposed schedule: 8:30. 

  And must toot my own horn a smidge. I walked out that door with:

-My wallet 

-My phone 

-Room card

-Kind Bar

-Banana (W got a breakfast. [Sticking it Hilton!])

-A map

-My Travel Pharmacy 

-Eye Drops

-A couple “Local Attractions” sheets. 

-One DudeWipe, Lens Wipes, Anti-Fog Wipes

(Janet, that was three separate items.)

-A pen 

-Chocolate Caffeine bar

   And I STILL had four free pockets. Cargo Shorts-FTW! 

  After a wonderful (free) breakfast, we took a Lyft to the Natural History Museum. Half a day last year was just not enough. We remained there the whole day. Wonderful time. 

There were lots of fossils there. 

Wendi never misses an opportunity.

To Wendi’s delight and my horror, we came upon this.

  Wendi is delighted because the Gift Shop had great things.(A couple of which we bought.)

  Why my horror? Because, quite recently, I’d somehow spilled my drink onto two people.     

   And the shop was crowded. I soon gave trying to keep up and just tried to keep my hands in my pocket. 

  I mean look at this doofus. All you could say about him is that he’s pretty sure he can safely go another day wearing that shirt. (Not like he has any options.) 

   Well, great time. We came back to a delicious dinner in The Club. (Holy Crap. This feels SO boss saying that!) and back to the room.   

   Knowing it would help her sleep, I ventured to order something very legal Weedish online and we could have it delivered. Yes, ladies I Am The Prize! 

   So, order I did and they would deliver it to me and I had to pay in cash… Yup, this is just as sketchy as it sounds. 

  So, I waited in front of my resort. A waited.    

  Checking my phone every five minutes. This product is legal in both DC and Maryland but that was a long 45 minutes. Dude drove up, I handed some dude a lot of cash and he handed a small paper bag. 

   Again, everything was legal but..

Someone needs to arrest me!! 

   The rest of the evening went well. 

   Tomorrow, it’s the African-American History Museum and then, if we’re up to it: The Holocaust Museum. I must admit. I’m morbidly curious about kind of merch they have for sale in the gift shop. 

   Oh, one last thing. If I were a small or XL, I would had had no trouble finding that elusive third shirt. I did find an acceptable Smithsonian T in a medium  and happily showed it to Wendi. Who gave me another The Look; one that quietly screamed, 

  “Oh, you lovable yet delusional dope.” 

The Search continues.

DC Trip Day 1 2025

A Quick Recap of Day 1. (A recap anyway.)

The Importance of Reading the Fine Print. Hold Onto that Drink. Why aren’t I Moving? Maybe a Fifth Count will Yield A Better Result 

Made it here with little fuss.

  Except the fact that I gave Wendi the wrong address to our Sea-Tac park and ride. 

  I’ll admit; I was pretty blasé about checking as ALL the Sea-Tac area motels have shuttles to the airport. 

Correction: All but one. We’ll be paying plenty for that SeaTac parking. 

  Spilling my Bloody Mary mix on the flight? Not great. Thank goodness most of it landed on MY pants. But a few molecules managed to make it onto Ms. Wendi’s shirt, pants, shoe and sock. Really, I’m lucky she didn’t get the plane to turn around right then over the Great Plains. 

  Once we got to Dulles, I was reminded of a strange but true fact. It is difficult to walk down an escalator that isn’t..escalating. 

Well, I at least it is for moi. 

  We’re at the top; I step on and nothing happens. After an embarrassing 1.5 seconds of confusion, I start to gingerly walk down the steps. 

  My decades of muscle memory make each step down feel just a tad..perilous. Stairs are unmoving and uniform. It’s all on you to make it work. An escalator is a wild ride. Your only job is to just hold on and the magic whisks you to the bottom. 

  Fortunately, while my feet were confused, my hand knows to Hold Onto The Rail and so I managed to not go flying at the bottom when my stupid feet missed the bottom step. 

  After checking in, we had a delicious dinner at the Exclusive Members Club. After gorging ourselves (this being the first real meal either of us have had today), we each grabbed another drink and small snack and headed back to our room to unpack and relax. 

  And that’s when I discovered my error. I packed 3 pairs of earbuds, two pajama bottoms, four different chargers (Finally am getting use out of a Teacher’s

Union gift!), a small pharmacy’s worth of pills and ointments (for my eyes, you sickos) and enough socks and undies to last a month. 

  Yet, I did not pack a third t-shirt. Just two shirts. That’s all I managed. And one has a big green dinosaur on it so pretty sure Ms. W will notice if I wear it every other day. 

  Guess I’ll be picking up a lot of “I Went to DC and had to buy this stupid T-shirt” shirts. 

  If (when) my Beloved finds out, she may be tempted to remind me that I forgot to bring pajama bottoms last summer and so had to take a Lyft to a nearby Target. It’s like I’m cursed or something. (Can being moronic count as a curse? Discuss amongst yourselves.) 

  Tomorrow, we’re back to the Natural History Museum as we managed less than half the exhibits last summer. After

that? Hard to say. 

Piece Out!

Senior (Citizen) Class Trip - Summer 2024

Important Travel Tips.

A) Even IF you do have your boarding pass printed out beforehand AND you’re not checking any bags, you still should give yourself more than 30 minutes to get to the plane. 

B) Yes, my Clear Creek T-shirt and cargo shorts wouldn’t generally scream “One way ticket to Heaven”, but my knee brace was a definite Red Flag. I got the full treatment. Okay, not the, you know, THAT search but my knee brace got a wipe down. I can now say with pride, confidence, and puzzlement that this piece of foam rubber and cloth isn’t harboring any drugs, explosives, or anything else on the “Don’t Even Think About It” TSA list. Just an old wobbly knee joint. 

C) As you can imagine, all that wand waving and wiping got me a tad bit anxious to get out of there. I grabbed my shoes, phone, and computer bag and went to find Wendi; who was also getting eager to get to our now boarding plane. For some reason, the boarding pass I printed off at home had everything on it except a gate number. We trundled up to an Alaska Airlines desk and asked. That’s when Wendi looked down and asked a very important question.

    “Brian, where’s your luggage?”

D) Losing your luggage on a very busy Sunday? Not fun. Scrambling around that airport trying to retrace my steps? Also, not fun. Wendi asked me if I could have left it at security.

  Once I found the correct security station,  (after having checked two other ones nearby) they did have the bag. Of course, it had to go through the scanner again but this was a small price to pay for clean underwear and socks. (Thank the Lord none of these Team TSA noticed my suspicious knee!) 

E)  Before going on my quick and frantic walk about, I handed Wendi our boarding passes and hotel confirmation. She promptly left everything on the seat next to her. 

F) Gate 3 was a shuttle away. Not knowing what would happen when we got there, we took the shuttle.  

G) As the Alaska Airlines employee at the boarding gate was doing a last call for flight 402, two sweaty frantic looking folks showed up and breathlessly started telling their sad story The nice lady just told us to get on the plane. We were the last ones to board. 

  So, it was a rough start to our D.C. Adventure. Couple of notes before signing off for the night. First, only I was sweating. Wendi remained calm and collected the entire time. And just a bit perturbed through much of it. 

  Also, that 2 seconds between Wendi asking about my luggage and me looking down at the empty space where it should have been? 

  Yeah, THAT moment is forever etched into my brain. And, because my brain hates me, I will be re-seeing that moment at inopportune times for the rest of my life. Thanks, Brain! 

  I’m sure others have experienced the phenomena described above: your brain flashing stupid and/or dangerous events in your life at you just for the hell of it. I’ll need to figure out a term for when your brain just. won’t. let. it. go. Stay tuned. 

(The view from our condo’s door.)

—————

Day 2

So, here is our living situation. We’re staying at the Hilton Grand Vacation: The District. Yes, that is confusing. Anyone can stay here but us Hilton Grand Vacation members get to stay on the top three floors. Basically, we’re extra special: discounts at the restaurant, our own concierge, and they set out cookies for us. Take that, huddled masses! 

  The rooms have windows looking outside and windows that look out into the atrium. (That’s the photo above.) The three elevators all are completely glass so folks who don’t like heights (like me) can stare at the elevator door. 

  As part of our HGV awesomeness, we get free breakfast and two drinks during the bar’s happy hour. Thus far, we haven’t made it to either. A great tragedy. Wendi didn’t sleep at all last night and so slept in till mid-morning. And we were starving come early evening and so passed on four (4!) virgin Bloody Mary’s.

  I should be a better person.

…

  Today was all about The Mall. We walked there and to a bunch of monuments and memorials. 

  And now I know the difference between those two words. According to my phone’s pedometer, we logged about 16K steps. 

  All this while enjoying very humid 90 degree weather. Tomorrow should be slightly cooler. And our destination shall be two, maybe three of the Smithsonian museums. 

  The Vietnam Memorial did its job well. Lincoln and Washingtons’ edifices were awe inspiring: like the men themselves. Inspiring but the Vietnam Memorial was very moving. Wendi asked if I wanted a photo but it didn’t seem…right. Wouldn’t capture serious vibe. Didn’t know any of those men and women on that wall but every one of them raised their right hands and took the same oath as I did back in the 80s. 

As Harold did in the 40s. 

Tom and Gordon in the 60s.

And my cousin Adam in the 2000s. 

We happy few…✋

  By late afternoon, we were beat but spent at least 20 minutes trying to get a Lyft. Our first driver managed to park on the opposite side of Pennsylvania Avenue. By the time we got across this busy street, he had decided to move on. Really wish Lyft had a way for me to write a review of THAT fucking idiot. 

  A second driver eventually showed and took us home. Only two miles but took us almost twenty minutes. It would have been quicker to walk but Wahid had the A\C cranked up and so we tipped him well. 

  New discovery made at Chef Geoff’s restaurant: putting a light misting of hot honey on your pepperoni pizza makes it even more delicious(er).

  With Hurricane Debby meandering her way up the east coast, we have some rainy days coming up. Since the Hardys packed exclusively for hot, sunny weather, we’re wondering if we should buy any foul weather gear. The one complimentary umbrella in this condo might be enough. 

—————

Day 3

Yeah, we made it to one: The Smithsonian Natural History Museum. Wendi could not get to sleep so we got a very late start to our day. This was the case throughout the entire trip though she did get up a bit earlier each morning. Anyway, the museum rocked. Our favorite by far. Sadly, due to our late start and it closing at 5:30, we maybe saw half of it? What might we have learned about mammals, oceans, and insects? Who knows? We managed the dinosaur and gem wings.

(No thanks!)

(You can just make out the look of longing on Wendi’s face.) 

—————

Day 4 

 A slightly earlier start. As we headed out to the curb to meet our Lyft, we saw this beautiful sight.

(Suck it, Rich Man!) 

 Because we weren’t sure about our start time, we (I) had more of a play it by ear plan for the day. We stopped by the Air&Space Museum first. Like all things Smithsonian, there was no entrance fee but you are required to register an entrance time by 8:30 each morning. 11:30 is well past 8:30 so we just decided to amble down street to see what perked our interest. The first one we came to was the Hirshorn Museum of Modern. We weren’t that excited at the prospect of seeing a bunch of toilet seats and paper mache rocks but it was free and air conditioned. Glad we took the chance. Yes, there were a few “What the hell?” displays.

 And yeah, thanks to a lot of studying for quiz bowl back in high school (Thanks, Mr. HOTELL!), I know the above is a Jackson Pollock “masterpiece”, but in my (non)humble opinion, it is a Jackson Pollock Masterpiece of Crap. Art, especially the visual arts can either 

 A) Look like a thing, This painting looks like Lady Twattlesworth. or… 

B) Promote or Disparage a thing, Note how magnificent the young Henry the VIII looked in his armor. or… 

C) Evoke some sort of feeling. See how evil the Germans were to bomb this poor little Spanish village?!! 

Or any combination of the three. 

A whole lot of what was on display fit into a fourth category: Convincing some rich wanker to part with some money. 

 And then.. 

 We entered a huge room that was all one piece of art by Laurie Anderson. It was stunning. Both Wendi and I were just gobsmacked and easily could have spent an hour in that room.

Some portions made me laugh out loud.

While other parts made me wipe away a tear.

When we finally went on to the next exhibits, Wendi and I both agreed that this was the best single thing we saw at any museum. So, I’m glad we decided to go. 

We had a little bit more time and so went to Freer Museum of Asian Art next door. It had Asian Art. Lots and lots of Asian Art. And not to be dismissive; it was all very impressive but we got to Art Overload after an hour or so. After a quick dinner, we took a three hour bus tour of DC. Had we had more time, each one of these monuments would have been worth a separate trip but we didn’t and so whirlwind it was. It hit all the Biggies:

 The first two filled me with patriotic fervor. Jefferson? Mixed bag. Intellectually brilliant? Check. Wise? Less so. It’s this country’s great fortune that our first president was his polar opposite. Then it was onto MLK and the Marine Corps. Impressive both but we were pretty knackered by tour’s end. Every time you stay at a Hilton, they’ll ask you if you want to hear about all the new awesome things Hilton has to offer. It’s a sales pitch but it had been four years since our last one and it was only going to be an hour and they’d pay us $200, we figured it was worth it. Since we’ve always been quite happy with our Silver Club Status, it’s not like we were going to spend any money. 

 ————— 

Day 5

So, we’re now Gold Status. Darn you, Troy!! Yeah, they got us and we missed the complimentary breakfast (Wendi was really jonesing for some scrambled eggs) but, even with a day to ponder it, we think it is and will be worth it. I’ve been talking about wanting to travel; especially once retirement kicks in and this change will make that easier. One new perk was that we could use the Owner’s Club at that Hilton. It’s a lounge with breakfast and dinner buffets and evening drinks. A bit like what the masses enjoy down on the ground floor of the Hilton only, you know, better. We got a lot of use out of it in the remaining day and a half. Hindsight being… hindsightful, we really should have signed up on day one and saved a crapton on restaurant bills. Then it was off to American History. It was impressive. Any place where you can see both this:

And this:

is worth an afternoon. So, it was back to our Exclusive Owner’s Club for dinner and then back to our room. 

 ————— 

 Day 6 

 Our last day in D.C. started with a bang. Or rather, a loud buzz coming from our cell phones.

 And then this text from Hilton. 

 Greetings! We just received a national weather service alert for Tornado warning until 8:45am EDT & Flash flood until 11:10am EDT. Kindly stay away from windows 

Huh. 

Did NOT plan for this eventuality. We just stayed in our room, chillaxing till noon. 

Then had lunch at “our” club. Having actually reserved a time at Air and Space, we went there. 

The first thing you saw upon entering was a huge hit with the parents and grandparents but much less so with the children.

 While there, we saw all the Big Attractions: the Wright Brothers plane, the space capsules from the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs, the (ha-ha) “Waste Management” devices worn while in said capsules (Below)Also there were Leonard Nimoy’s ears. (Well, the ones he wore in the show).

Our two biggest takeaways from this trip were that Orville and Wilber have really gotten a bum rap from the history books. They weren’t just clever bicycle makers who tinkered around with airplanes in their spare time. They did science; going through what was then known about aerodynamics, testing that knowledge, using their own home built wind tunnel and then improving upon it. Next, they used that knowledge and their engineering skills to build, test, improve. 

Finally, the brothers used their business and marketing skills to basically start a whole new industry. The only comparable figure I can think of is Edison. Hats off to you Bros! 

The other takeaway? Take a look at this thing.

When you get up close, the first thought that comes to mind is: “What a piece of junk.” 

The second thought: “Two men lived in this for two weeks.” 

Finally: “However did they fit into those space suits with the Massive Balls they must have had?!?” So, like with The Brothers, my trip to the museum made me even more appreciative of our past American Heroes. Good job, Smithsonian. 

 After that, it was back to the Hilton for dinner and a relaxing evening. 

 This morning,I started with time honored tradition of “Brian Tries to Eat All The Leftovers in the Fridge”. Actually, I just tossed out the one hard boiled eggs and returned yesterday’s untouched banana to the breakfast buffet downstairs. We both got up early enough to have breakfast downstairs; Wendi finally getting her longed-for scrambled eggs.

Because of our previous experience, we got to Dulles plenty early. It was pretty empty so we buzzed right though. And we both kept a very sharp eye on all of our bags. 

And now, we’re flying back home. Since the pilot just announced that we’re at the midpoint, I seem to have a bit of extra time to jot down some reflections on this trip. 

A) This was our first vacation where we used Lyft to get around. Even though some of the trips were a bit more… thrilling than we’re used to, and a couple times, I clicked on the wrong destination, the convenience outweighed the downside. 

B) This was a first for my using Apple Wallet also. Like last year at Disneyland, if you don’t have a modern mobile; don’t even bother coming. 

C) As part of our Hilton Grand Vacation status, we could have each gotten two free drinks at the downstairs bar each evening. In addition, as platinum people, we could have had free beer and wine at the Club. In years past we would have used these perks to their maximum effect. This trip, we didn’t do either. To say that I didn’t miss it would be untrue but I am positive we got more out of our trip without it. 

D) On an even more personal note (aren’t you glad you made it this far?), due to a medical procedure last month, I’m currently taking a large dose of Pyridium every day. One of the side effects of this medication is that I now have bright orange urine. Like orange paint pee. Physiology and hydrodynamics being what they are, I and more embarrassingly Wendi, have gotten a good look at my (to borrow a Dungeons and Dragons term) “splash damage”. Basically, I’m walking around with my own C.S.I. Looking forward to finishing this regimen and going back to the Land of Ignorance. Plus, tired of having to do a two-flush at the urinal. 

E) As was the case for last year’s Disney trip, Wendi continued in her role as Seeing Eye Spouse. While out and about, I took note of “everything around” and “whatever is coming up next”. Wendi focused on our “in front of and happening right now”. Despite some near misses with my elbows and her nose, I think we make a good team. And on that happy note, I think it’s time to wrap this up. Thanks for making it to the end. 

The end.

Disneyland 2023

Summer 2023 

Preface  

(The trip had an even earlier Bad Omen from a week before the vacation. As you can see, Wendi’s brand new travel sun hat wasn’t really built for a petite woman.)

AND SO THE ADVENTURE BEGINS!

Friday

Ah, you perhaps see the fatal flaw in our vacation plans for this summer. 

(We didn't until the very sympathetic concierge  pointed it out.) 

The Peacock had one night free but are kicking us out at 10:00 AM. 

Fortunately, we found an even nicer place nearby with a vacancy. We can even use our Hilton Honors points.  

Great for us but it bodes ill for the local economy.  

Saturday

Day 1 

 Well, at least the Anaheim Hilton is much nicer than the Peacock. We Lyfted (“Lyft: Why Not Go With The Slightly Lesser Evil?”) over here at 9:55 and they  checked us right in. At an extra $60 Early Check in Fee. Worth it.  

 After dropping off our bags, we zipped down  to the gift shop and bought a big tub of Albino Brand Sun Screen and then went back up stairs and troweled on at least $6’s worth. We did not  want our trip ruined by sunburn. I further  protected myself by wearing my Coastie hat. (No, Janet, it was more than just a hat.) 

 And in finest Semper Paratus fashion, I loaded  up all 27 of my pockets with more sunscreen,  aspirin, Tylenol, glasses cleaner, a mask, Dude wipes, hand sanitizer, my mid-day Rx medications, charging cable and, of course wallet and phone. Pretty sure I could have  lasted at least a week without too much  difficulty. 

 Wendi decidedthat Fabulousness was worth the extra risk and so wore her brand new duds. 

 This is a photo of us (her) on the Mark Twain riverboat. You can see why at least $5 of that sunscreen money was lavished on her. 

 And she’s well worth it!  

One of my few attempts at a selfie occurred right after the above photo. I’m sure you can see Mrs. Hardy’s Great Displeasure at her hubbie’s idea of holding his brand new phone over the railing to get the  shot. 

 I thought thought the phone never really  cleared the plane of the railing but am wise  enough not argue the point.  

 For the five-ish hours we were there today, we  road the train that goes (went?) all around the  park, Winnie the Pooh’s Great Adventure, Haunted Mansion. In addition to the riverboat.  The train gave us a reasonable picture of the  park’s layout. Wendi wanted to go on the Great Adventure and, well, it was a very short line.   HM was one of our “Must Go Ons” and in order to not spend 30+ minutes in line, slowly broiling, we used that day’s Genie+ Fast Pass. Totally worth it.  

 The Mansion was enjoyable but if we had been forced to wait in the standby line forever, with  the Common People, I don’t think we would  have enjoyed it as much.  

 Pretty much every use of the Fast (or  Lightning) Pass was like that. The ride was great  but No Stinking Way would we have waited 45 minutes for it.  

 By mid-afternoon, we were feeling a might bit  peckish, really sticky, and one of us wanted to  use a familiar bathroom so we headed back to  our room with the idea that we would regroup/refresh (and poop) and return back to the park  when it wasn’t so hot and crowded.  

 Yeah, once we peeled off our icky clothing, got clean (and again: pooped), Wendi started  feeling tired and so we decided to just have a nice dinner here at the hotel and chill. We  picked the first restaurant we came to and had some very good burgers. The one downside was that  for most of the meal, we were the ONLY diners. It was a bit uncomfortable. Second dinner out in a row with lots of boding.    

 After dinner, Wendi was too cold to go on so we spent the next hour or so cuddling in bed.  Can I balance a checkbook? Not a chance! Can I make cargo shorts and a Star Wars tee-shirt look anything but shlubbly? As if! Will I ever be able to satis- 

 OKAY! Okay! We get your point! But what I AM good at is being warm. Top 99th percentile in giving off heat so I am an excellent mobile hot water bottle for my usually cold wife.   Mrs. Hardy got just warm enough to brave a  short tour of the hotel where we discovered the  pool, the lanai, what a lanai is, the laundromat,  the workout room, several additional eateries,  and picked up some makeup remover.  

 We got big plans for tomorrow but they all  start with getting a good nights sleep.   I am putting the phone down…now. 

Sunday 

Day 2: Hitting the Groove  

First of all, we slept in. Both of us. It’s amazing  what an absence of hungry cats at 6:00 AM will  do.  

Then, it was a quick trip down to the Starbucks  for $30 worth of product. Since we’re using our Hilton points for this trip, we get that amount covered at any of the eateries on the property. I missed this detail our first day here and the loss  of that “free” trip to Starbucks will haunt me for  decades. 

 Once caffeinated and dressed, we headed out.  One thing of note was that I carried a whole lot  less on me this day: couple Dude Wipes,  Tylenol, sanitizer, and eye drops. I’m sure this  list will continue to pare down each day.   We decided to be a lot more strategic about  rides today; actually planning out rides to get  the most out of our fast passes; which at $35 a  day per person, allows holders to go to the front  of the line for certain rides. Here’s a rundown of  what we managed in a 12 hour period; sticking  mostly to Disney’s California Adventure before  our break and Disney Land after.  

-Ariel’s Undersea Adventure. 

It was a very short line. Understandably so. 

-Guardians of the Galaxy 

This was highly rated by EVERYONE and we used the Fast Pass to skip the 45 minute wait.  Granted, we still ended up waiting, maybe  twenty minutes. (Wendi and I couldn’t agree on how the Disney Land app calculated wait times:  whether it counted from the moment you’re past the gate or from when your ass is actually  in the seat.)  

 Anyway, GotG was a drop type ride where the whole 18 seat section went screaming up and  down 3 or 4 times. Something like a 1000  feet* each time. 

 And it scared the Ever Loving Living (and unliving) Crap out of me.  Wendi was not sitting next to me on this one; probably for the best as my crushing all the bones in her right hand and wrist would have been unfortunate. 

* (No need for Wendi’s corroboration on that fact. As you can see, I was sitting much closer to the ground.)

-Pixar Pal Around (Swinging) 

 Okay, this was a Ferris Wheel, with the added  delight of the baskets swinging back  independently back and forth on their own rails,  in addition to rotating like a normal FW.   You know what I keep forgetting about Ferris  Wheels? That they take friggin’ forever to load  and unload. Lotta time in line, watching those  baskets flail about. Even more time to watch a  Disney employee (Sorry, Disney “Cast  Member”) clean up some sort of…effluence out  of one of the baskets.  

 Once we finally got on, the first spin was  unnerving. I’m glad I was wearing my dark,  wrap-around sunglasses as that meant nobody;  especially those young fearless children sitting  right across from us, could see my firmly  shut eyes.  

 I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is  the little-death that brings total (Aaah, it’s not  working!!)

 At this point, we had been trudging about in  the upper 80ish weather for about 3 hours so  we decided to head back to the hotel for relief/ recover/reapply. 

-Soarin’  

 We returned to the park about 6:00 or so and  our next ride was a flight simulator called (sigh)  Soarin’ Around the World. Another use of the  fast pass. Despite its grammatical shortcomings, it was a very cool ride: about ten  minutes of zooming over various landmarks  while sitting in a chair which pivoted and  rotated with the POV. 

 And, it had Smello-Vision!! (Though Disney  probably has another, less awesome name for  it.)  

 At this point, we hadn’t eaten anything for  about six hours so it was time for dinner.  Thanks to an ad lib by RDJr. in the first  Avengers movie, Shwarma is now a Marvel  related food. We had some. Pretty good. 

 Having enjoyed our delicious and relatively inexpensive dinner, we went to go see California Adventure’s World of Color Light show. We managed to delete our reservation for the primo viewing sections so had to watch from the sidewalk but  it was still mighty impressive.  

 I was amused to note Disney spent most of  the show reminding us of their legacy  productions and very little on their pathetic output from the past five years.  

-Pirates of Caribbean  

 Between waiting around for the show to start  and actually watching it, the time was about 9:30 and the Disney App was saying that the  wait times for just about everything was 15  minutes or less so we boogied back to DL. 

So, Pirates. As seen in about 40 movies.  Another one of those “Glad We’ve Seen It and Never Have to Again” situations.  

-Jungle Cruise  

 This was one of Wendi’s picks and, again, at  10:30 on a Sunday, the line wasn’t too long. We enjoyed it and this was a case of the dark of night time actually adding to the experience.  

 It was past 11:00 at this point so, despite the  park being open other hour, we decided to stagger back home. Us and 12,000 other  attendees. The shuttle delivered us back to the  Hilton at nearly midnight and, after quick  showers, we collapsed into bed.  

 A fine if tiring day. Today (I write this Monday  morning.) we’re getting a very late start, will take a mid-afternoon siesta, and return to park  in the early evening. Again, our goal is to maximize the use of our Lightning  Passes. It’s a Small World, Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad are all high on the list. Plus, whatever miscellaneous 5 minute wait activities  we happen to come across.  

 Oh, and a candy apple. I want one of those.  It’s been decades.  

Wish us luck with #3. 

Monday

Day 3 

 We (I, really) enjoyed our $31.11 of Starbucks food and we got the park about noon. The App wouldn’t allow us to use the Extra Super  Swanky Lightning Pass for SW: Rise of Resistance. We worked waaay too long trying and failing to make it work.  

-Mr. Lincoln  

 Yeah, one of the O.G. Disney exhibits. Very patriotic. Honest Abe looked…almost human.  At least more so than Gov. Desantis.  

-Thunder Mountain Roller Coaster 

 I faced the danger. A most awesome 3 minutes. And that’s all you really need. (Am I right, girls?!?) 

-SW: Rise of the Resistance

 This one continued to vex. Finally, found a park information station, where the fresh faced young man tried valiantly to get the %#*£$@ app to work.  

No dice. He ended up just pressing a button on his terminal and told us we now had fast  passes. On the house.  

 The ride? Amazing. Disney has finally done  something cool with the Star Wars brand.  

-Siesta 

 Though we’d only seen three attractions, we  decided to take a break in the late afternoon  and so back to the hotel for a quick rinse and room service dinner. The bonus for this plan  was that we didn’t need to worry about sun block when we returned to the park at 6:00ish. 

-It’s a Small World 

 Falling hundreds of feet as part of an “amusement” park ride is scary. 15 minutes of endless hordes of spooky dolls screaming the same song at you over and over is unnerving. I was to the breaking point two minutes in. 

 This experience shall haunt my dreams.  Forever.

-Train (again) 

 Our one final Must Do was the Indiana Jones  ride, which remained extremely popular. We  kept waiting for either the standby lines to get under 30 minutes or more fast pass slots to  open up. (Disney only allows a certain number of FPs per ride per day.) Neither happened so we ended up taking the around the park train again. 

-Haunted Mansion (Again) 

 The line was short (20ish minutes) and Wendi  wanted to see it again. Sadly, once we got into  the inner foyer, the ride had technical difficulties  so we had another 30 minutes of standing  around. Actually, about half the original group  got tired of waiting and eventually left giving us remainders a lot more elbow room. Not to be denied this opportunity, Wendi practiced her dance steps. I just did my Asian Squat. Less showy, perhaps but impressive in its own way.  One of the groups that did leave was a family with maybe a three year old girl. Thank God they did. What the hell were they thinking? I’ll have plenty more to say on the subject of  Disney Land Parents, believe it. 

 Anyway, HM was enjoyable a second time. I’d  really like to watch a behind the scenes types video on how they managed those effects. 

-Thunder Mountain (again)  

 Used our final fast pass of the day to ride this a second time. I’ve become such an old pro at it  that I actually Loosened My Grip (slightly) on the  safety bar during the ride.

 I know, right?  

 At this point, it was 11:00, we knew we weren’t  going on Indy’s Big Adventure, and we wanted  to get an earlier start the next day so we called  it a night.  

Tuesday, August 1st

Day 4

 At this early time, exactly 25 years ago today,  a young Ms. Heath was starting the intricate and laborious process of turning herself into The Most Beautiful Bride.  

 A young Mr. Hardy was combing his hair.  

 Neither had any idea how their Flames of  Passion would continue to burn bright over the next quarter century.  

 For this most wonderful celebration of marriage, I have purchased Wendi a new circular saw so at least Mr. Hardy is still PLENTY flamey.  

 For this final day, we want to do a few more  rides, avoid getting burned, eat some actual Amusement Park Treats, and have a nice  dinner. Probably by room service.  

Wish us luck! 

 The minute we walked through the gate, we lightning passed a 5:00-6:00 window for Indiana Jones.  

-Radiator Springs Speedway.  

 This is a Cars related ride: basically a very fast roller coaster disguised as a racing game.  

 And no, Wendi isn’t wearing ears. Those are speakers behind her. Speaking of Mrs. Hardy’s  wonderful fashion sense, that Princess Leia  hoodie thing is designed for sun protection: very light UV blocking material. 

-Siesta  

 Though we’d only been at DL for a couple of  hours, we decided on an early siesta. The sun  was starting to get to me. That, coupled with my breakfast of coffee and a mid-late morning  World’s Most Sugary Drink meant I was feeling  a bit shaky. A couple hours of chilling while  watching “Chopped” and a protein bar and I  was good to go.  

 The Anaheim Regional Transit really let us down here. Despite an “every twenty minutes or so” target, we waited at least a half hour before calling a Lyft (Lyft: We’re not THAT bad!) 

-Indiana Jones Adventure. Kind of a lame name  but a fun ride. For some reason, we were driving a Jeep over very treacherous  underground roads.  

-Wendi Hardy and the Quest for a Pineapple Swirl. Okay, not really an amusement attraction  but more of a “I’ve been seeing those all week and I want one!” 

Because I refused to use my phone for an  online order, we had to look all over for the Dole Cafe where they have actual humans taking food orders. This journey was filled with thrills, heartache, but ultimate victory. Wendi loved her swirl and I my sundae.  

-Pirates of Caribbean (Again) 

 We were walking by and it had 10 minute  standby wait. We went. The only difference this  time was we were in the front row of the boat  and so got a bit splashed.  

Mostly satisfied, we started the long walk to the  gate. 

And then…

Finally, dreams do come true!  

 We got back to the room about 9:00ish and ordered a light room service dinner. The only Disney Day Disappointment being Wendi never got her siracha turkey leg.  … 

On the flight home.  

 Despite the rocky start, it was a good trip: our  first flying vacation since Hawaii in…2017 or  ‘18. We feel we got everything we wanted out of our trip to the Magic Kingdom. Will we return?  Maybe. Or maybe we’ll pick a more exotic  location.  

 I have a few more afterthoughts on the whole trip in general but this journal is already long enough. Find Disney Pt. 2 on the site if your  interested.  

 No, besides the great turkey leg tragedy, our only other disappointment is that we never figured out what that thing on the bathroom wall is.  

 Some mysteries are meant to stay…well, mysterious.  

This will probably be one of those times.  

 Home in two hours. No doubt the cats eagerly  await our return. And their dinner.  

Chow! 

B&W

Disney Afterthoughts

8/3/2023

  Here are some things: complaints, observations, and appreciations I’ve noted over the past six days in Disney Land/Southern California.

A) Infants at Disney. Whhhat, the hell? Exactly what is anyone getting out of that kid taking up two square feet of walkway?

B) Cell phones. If you don’t have a reasonably new smartphone, Disney don’t want ya. You use your phone to buy and use your tickets, reserve rides, find your location and they would REALLY rather you did all you food orders that way also. The Disney app will send you reminders and updates. And ask how things might be better for a future visit.
  This led to the sight of herds of adults: both sitting and walking, glued to their phones. Though this describes me in too much of my daily life, it was a bit much even for me.
The best (or worst) example of this was guy at the urinal next to me looking at his phone. I realize that past 3 or 4 years of age, the process doesn’t require too much concentration but Come On, Dude.
  This reliance on phones to navigate the park led me to coin yet another Mr. Hardy Phrase:
Seeing Eye Spouse. 

  The husband or wife directing the cellphone navigating spouse through the hordes of traffic via a firm yet loving grip on the arm or shoulder.

C) Family T-Shirts. This was completely new to me. Wherever we went, we’d pass groups of people all wearing matching shirts sporting messages like “Jones Disney Trip 2023!” Or “Disney Birthday Boy 2023” and then shirts like “Birthday Boy’s Dad” or “Older Brother”.
  We never really went on vacations as a family; much less went to the same place enough times to require its own one-time use wardrobe. Boggles the mind.
  The only theoretical analog for me growing up would be if we all wore matching “Hardy Trip to Goodwill 1978!” shirts.

D) No, seriously. Infants?!?

E) Coasters. This is an Anaheim Hilton issue. All the table/countertops were made of some sort of hard plastic. Probably not a stick a wood in the whole room but it was unnerving to both Wendi and me to leave unsightly puddles of water wherever a glass was put down. Maybe Amazon has a set of travel coasters for the OCD crowd. (We’re not the only ones, right?)

F) Besides D.Land, the other amusement park like place we are familiar with is Las Vegas. Where people dress up. Granted, the Vegas activities are mostly indoors and Disney more outdoors but Wendi felt folks could have gotten out a bit more bling for their trip to the Magic Kingdom.
  Basically, we came around to the idea that Disney wants Generic Tourists to visit and so everything is geared towards appealing to all: offending none. Vegas is somewhat the opposite of that.

G) I am so glad that all of American Super Models have a guaranteed second career as LA TV news anchors and meteorologists when they retire in their mid-twenties. About time hot women got a break in this country. On this same, not very enlightened soapbox…

H) Okay, I’ll come out and say it. Ladies, those extremely elongated eyelashes don’t give you an exotic, alluring look. They give you a “Late Fall Caterpillar” look.

I) The Importance of Holding a Good Hand.
So, here are some confessions.
• I am a fast walker.
• I get easily distracted by new and/or novel places or things.
• I think nothing of, at the spur of the moment, going over to investigate said new and/or novel places or things.
• I often have little awareness of where my body is in space: especially in new and/or novel places or things.
• Mrs. Hardy is none of the above.
• And finally, my elbows are right about nose height for Mrs. Hardy.
  This attention to all things NOT in front of me can lead to amusing little interactions all the time.
“Oh, you see the boats on the ride there? They don’t have any internal propulsion but depend on the water current to move forward.”
“Watch the curb, dear.”

  You can probably predict what Wendi laid down The Law over on Day 1. We would make a plan for the day. We would stop and sit down when consulting our phones. We would walk at a Wendi pace. And most of all, we would hold hands while traveling.

  On one hand, you could look at that last stipulation as simply the married version of the toddler harnesses you sometimes see.
  Also, when you’re a very petite woman going through crowds, having a Toweringly Tall Man (like me) nearby probably adds a bit of comfort.
  But now I have a different take. Holding onto Wendi’s hand allowed me to know where SHE was. That, in turn, allowed me to know where I was. At a near-unconscious level, I was subtly orienting myself based on her. She is here, going in this direction, and at this speed. I should redirect my course to match hers.
  In other words, Mrs. Hardy was, is, and (Lord Willing) shall continue to be my North Star. A fixed reference point allowing me to course correct as needed. 

  Find a hand, folks, and hold on firmly.

Alaskan Saga 2019 - Part 1

7/28/2019

Day 1: Going North, North To Alaska!

10:00PM

Bearing 292.9

Speed: 19.6 Nautical Miles

Distance to Ketchikan-our first port: 553km

I find the ship's navigation channel strangely calming.  We're going places. And perhaps it helps keep my focus from my very full belly. Good gravy that was some, well, good gravy.  And prime rib. And ice cream, etcetera, etcetera... Wendi has asked that I not disappear for 60-90 minutes to this ship's gym every day so I'll need to forgo that 3rd helping of whatever tomorrow. It's that or buy a whole new wardrobe from Juneau's Clothing by the Square Yard Emporium.

Barometer Trend: Steady

The trip to the ship went off relatively smoothly. We'd made it nearly to the end of the driveway before it hit me that a phone on Airplane Mode might mean no Bluetooth headphones.

Unacceptable. Therefore, it was a quick dash for our old iPod Touch; with its actual headphone jack.

Xander, as required by state law, asked me the "Back already?" question. as I dashed in and out.

Speaking of, you may be wondering why our Pride and Joy was on the couch watching the first of his five Mission Impossible movies. Funny story, that. On his many flights (2 to LV and 2 to Hawaii) and one international trip (Whistler, BC), he was required to have his birth certificate and a parent or two. We just didn't bother reading; REALLY comprehending, the fine print till roughly a week before the trip.

What we learned was the above-mentioned documentation worked fine for 15-year-olds but X turned an ancient 16 years of age 3 days before departure. A 16-year-old needed both his b.c. AND some form of state issued photo I.D.

Spelling it "Amerika", now, are we comrade??

So, despite our (my) best effort, X's photo I.D. did not arrive in time. For all I know, it's in our mailbox right now but more likely, it'll be another week at least

(When we return home, we're finally going to turn in our already filled out passport forms. We postponed this final step last summer when we learned of the $450 price tag.)

So, since a refund wasn’t possible and postponement would cost an additional $2500, we decided upon abandoned.  He seemed quite sanguine about this possibility. I guess it's the bird in the hand phenomena. The theoretical enjoyment to be gained from a week long voyage in constant close proximity to his parents PALES in comparison to concrete enjoyment of wearing his jammies, watching movies and playing video games from dawn till dusk.

Despite his protestations that a 16-year-old is perfectly fine staying home alone for a week, our friend Janet is staying there with him. I have vague memories of what dullards 16-year-olds are and, well, we wouldn't want anything to happen to our cats.

So back to the trip. Our first hurdle happened when getting off the ferry in Seattle. We'd agreed that springing for a taxi ride for the 1 mile trip from the ferry terminal to Pier 66 was worth the expense. However, when we got to the street, all the awaiting taxis were facing southward while we needed to go north. So, we started meandering north, assuming we'd encounter a taxi going our way. About 10 minutes into our trek, we realized that A) there were no taxis going our way that didn't already have customers, B) the two bags I was carrying were getting heavier and heavier, and finally, C) attempting to chase down a ride would expend more energy than just continuing to slog northward.

In short, dumb-asses.

When we arrived at the terminal, I was drenched with sweat. Not an auspicious beginning. Never have I been so pleased to hand over my luggage to someone else. Unfortunately, the checking in process soon involved getting our photos taken.

In a panic, I turned to my Beloved and asked, "Can you do something with this?" while waving in the general vicinity of my sodden coiffure.

"Stop sweating," came her helpful reply.

Not sure where that pic went but it's not on my ship ID card, for which I'm ever grateful. So, we were aboard. That was good. Our rooms weren't ready, nor had our luggage been delivered yet. That was bad. Well, the least we could do was find said room (or "cabin" as we salty dogs say) and drop off our carry-on bags. At this point, they were more "drag behind" bags as my arms and shoulders were starting to seize up.

Our room, #11838 (Deck Heaven-snowman, handcuff, snowman) was open but hadn't been cleaned up yet. No biggie. We stored the wallet, purse and iPad in the safe, left the rest in the closet, and went off to explore our new home.

About 10 minutes into our exploration, an idea crossed my mind, which I shared. "Hey, funny thought.  What if that wasn't ACTUALLY our room?!? Ha ha"

While the mental sound of a record skipping bounced between my ears, Wendi unleashed "THE LOOK" upon me and I rushed to reassure her that it was in fact the correct room. No doubt. Take it to the bank.

The rest of the day was spent wandering around and scheduling activities. We've got a couples massage and a Klondike train ride coming up. (Though not at the same time.) We'll see what else. I think our number one activity is keeping Wendi from freezing. Turns out, she doesn't like being cold.

Huh. Who knew? It least we're going somewhere warm. Well, this trip was more for Xander's edification than ours....

Yeah, planning might not be my strong suit.

Speaking of the Spawn, about 5:00 PM, he started sending me texts asking if he could buy a sword at the mall. Seems he wanted to use his birthday money from Tutu to buy this totally awesome sword but there are these stupid rules about needing parental permission, yadda, yadda, and could I tell Janet that I'm totally down with it? Please?!

Well, those of you who read my previous write-up on the subject, "My Son The Moron" know, Alexander Eric, long blades, and Wendi's exquisite (and fragile) interior decorating don't really go together.

I used the tried and true "We'll talk when we get home." It worked.

It's actually Sunday morning now and I'm waiting for Wendi to wake up. She gets so little sleep that I don't want to disturb her.

Ketchikan 317.3 nautical miles. Talk at you later.

-Later-

10:23 PM actually.

Sea State: Large wavelets

UTC: 5:24 AM

Distance to Ketchikan: 138 miles

In fact, I was working so hard not to wake her while finishing up the above writing that all the lights were off and I was just sitting there quiet as a mouse on the couch; two feet away. I look over.

Still snoozing.

Type, type, type. I look again.

She's sitting up on the bed STARING RIGHT AT ME!! If you've seen any ghost movies; any Japanese horror, you know I had every right to scream.

But I am a very brave man therefore, I did not.

The rest of the day was somewhat anti-climactic after that. Our breakfast was actually our lunch. We did some shopping, some gambling and got a nice couples massage. Tomorrow, we reach our first port of call. Should be fun.

I managed to blow through my 125 minutes of internet time in... 125 minutes last night. Seems I should have logged out before going to sleep. I am being more careful with my second (and just as expensive) 125 minutes so I’ll just be online for just a bit tonight. Hopefully, X will have something exciting to report.

Adios!

Mr. Hardy

Alaskan Saga 2019 - Part 2

7/30/2019

6:37 AM

Wendi's still sleeping so the TV is staying off for now. Using my long dormant maritime skills, (AKA: looking out the window) I'd say we're currently just tying up at Juneau.

Speed: 0 nautical miles per hour. Distance to Next Port: Maybe 3 feet?

Let's see, what thrilling happenings have happened in the last two days? Our day at sea (Sunday) was nice and relaxing. Wendi and I got a nice couples massage. Well, the massage part was nice; the afterwards up-selling is getting tiresome. I think I'll claim complete and utter health before any future spa visits in an attempt to head off future hard sells.

Or I could just write down something ridiculous on the intake form like "too much dark humors”

Let's see what their expensive solution to that would be.

The high point afterwards was Wendi winning $600 at the slot machine. Yeah!

And me losing maybe $50ish; $2 at a time,

Trying.

To.

Maneuver. That.

%#!.

Key.

Into.

That.

^%#¥!.

Slot.

And coming so close each time. Think the "Claw" vending machines but with $100 bills instead of stuffed animals.

Pulled into Ketchikan the next morning. It was lovely... uh... Lovely adjacent. We purchased some nice trinkets. We're buying something for Xander at each stop. Trying our lamest to avoid him singing any Harry Chapin at our 50th anniversary party.

Wendi bought a very nice raincoat though as yet, it's been unneeded.

She also purchased a nice hat. Quite warm and if she were to

EVER get a gray hair, this chapeau would camouflage it nicely.

Speaking to the seller of said nice hat, he told us that the town had about 8,100 inhabitants but with 4 cruise ships in port, the town's population was easily double that. Just a whole lot of folks wandering around; getting amazing deals on furs, knives, gemstones, and knives.

Speaking of, I was a little confused how store after store could

offer the same "Unique Alaskan Crafts". Maybe they have a different definition of that word.

One thing that was a breath of fresh air was how many furriers there were. Don't get me wrong. I have NO interest in wearing a dead animal but.... It's refreshing to see an entire state giving PETA The Finger.

One slight hiccup was that we didn't bother eating breakfast beforehand and so were a might bit peckish upon returning to the boat. And not "cruise ship hunger" as defined by going longer than 45 minutes without visiting the all-you-can-(but really shouldn't)-eat buffet.

No, my total caloric intake thus far consisted of some black licorice (The candy you won't have to share!) with Wendi having not even that. So returning to the ship, we, and about 1,000 other cruisers made a be-line for the buffet. It was packed.

Since I'm a "This looks edible. Gimme some!" diner and Wendi refuses to settle for anything less than perfection (Exhibit 1: Her Hubby), I grabbed a seat quickly while the wife continued her quest for culinary bliss. However, about 2 minutes into my meal, a young... Chinese(?) boy was ordered to sit across from me by his grandmother(?).

I didn't understand the semantics of their conversation, but the meaning was crystal clear; that kid didn't want to sit next to the scary white guy behind the mound of food and that elderly lady didn't give a shit; he was to sit down and eat!

Okay, I had planned on sitting across from my beautiful wife and not an angry boy slurping soup but... it seemed rude to start making "go away" gestures but nearly as rude to just pick up and leave so he and I determinedly ignored each other while wolfing down our chow. He won that race.

My wife was initially annoyed when I found her but was mollified when I explained it was a mystery kid’s fault.

After that, we decided to just embrace our middle-aged cruise ship-ness and go do bingo. (Pause for vicious cat-calls from the hipster readers to die down.)

And to all you naysayers out there, (yes, Becky, I'm looking at you!) let me just explain that I ended up winning $120 dollars. The realization that we initially spent about $65 for the Bingo Card took a bit of the shine off the triumph. The further realization that Wendi's net was 10x that amount for just pushing a button on the slot machine removed still more of that shine.

Wendi and I just chilled in the room. She played on her iPad and I watched TV and the islands go by. It was slightly stunning, in a good way. I wasn't keeping an eagle-eyed vigil but didn't see any signs of human habitation FOR HOURS. Where else you going to experience this in America? The maybe 5-acre Puget Sound islet which would have 2 or 3 million dollar houses on it isn't even worth a name on the Alaskan Panhandle map. This is cool.

Last night, it was room service and a movie. (Peanut Butter and Jelly/Potato Chips off the Kids Menu and Ant Man and the Wasp.)

10:39 PM

Today (the 30th), we wandered around Juneau. It's amazing what passes for a state capital these days. Felt like we walked all of downtown in just a couple of hours. Would've made even better time had not Wendi felt compelled to stop at just about all the jewelry shops. Boy, they love their tanzanite here. They must grow it or something. Here's our Tally.

Juneau Excursion Haul Xander: Alaskan Knife-$120

Bear Claw Necklace-$70 Wendi: Topaz Pendant-$200

Me: Coffee Mug- $18

But I also got two beers at the Red Dog Saloon so I'm satisfied.

Yeah, Dad ordered us to go so we went. Nice place. The floor of sawdust and hundreds of signed dollars stapled to the wall really added to the ambiance. The waitresses wore uniforms which can only be described as...uh.... bosomy. No problem there but the one waiter's uniform just seemed to be wearing suspenders  with his street clothes. Suspenders that he wore with a belt.

Let me repeat that: a person in an Official Culinary Position of Authority, in the presence of women and children, chose to wear both a belt and suspenders! This may be Alaska but last I checked, we're still in America.

Sorry to end on such down note but it's already waaay too long and I can hardly keep my eyes open. Can we just all pretend I took the time to revise and edit? Thanks, you're too kind.

Adios Mr. B.