Cabin Karma Strikes!

Cloudy skies, occasionally drizzly, calm seas.

My cabin karma has taken a strange turn today. This morning, as I was
quietly reading, I was invaded by the engineering department. It looks
like good ole cabin C-8 will be out of commission for a while.
Apparently, part of the ongoing problem which can originate to the leak on
my bed has now grown to such a magnitude that welding in my cabin shall be
required.

This precipitated a mid-morning move to my new abode, cabin M-12, with the
‘M’ standing for Main Deck. My main concern was that I would not have to
share a cabin (sorry, but I lack a certain spirit of community). Aside
from the crazed move I did this morning, I have rather mixed feelings
about my new home.

First I shall list the positives: 1) I have a real porthole. 2) I have
bunk beds 3) I have a shorter commute (by about 40 stairs) 4) there is
less rocking on the maindeck than the cabin deck in case of rough weather..

Now I shall list the negatives: 1) I have a real porthole as opposed to my
expansive view of the lifeboats 2) I have bunk beds 3) I share a bathroom
(luckily it isn’t like a bed and breakfast where I have to go out in the
hall to use it).

Bunkbeds were always a childish dream I had in the supposition that if you
were on the top bunk you therefore had a position of dominance. For one
semester in college, I slept on the top of a bunk bed, and through
experience I have gained the wisdom to choose the lower bunk. As an
added bonus, both beds are affixed with a protective rail to guard me from
spilling out. A very ingenious device.

There is something very plebian about coming down from my ivory tower on
the cabin deck to mingle with the stalwarts of the main deck. I feel like
I am with the “regular folks” now. However, please rest assured that my
inner hubris is still alive and well.

Aside from my move downtown, the Dublin buzz has started already with
people already asking me for the guidebooks. I have yet to construct my
guides for the students yet (which I shall have to include a reference to
Pacino’s restaurant) since I am in the middle of a cataloging project.

To give you a taste of my woe, and to give you another eye into the
peculiar world of the librarian, I have been deleting hundreds of records
in our database today. These are blank, spurious records that some
jokester thought would be funny to create in order to torment me. Since I
am a librarian, and as you are aware we are all imparted with the gene of
neurotic order (at least in terms of books, don’t ask about personal
effects or offices), I have been cleaning them up one by one by one by
one….

Anyway, not wishing to bore you with details of that part of my life, we
are now cruising toward Sardinia and Corsica so we are somewhere in the
Tyrrhenian Sea. The ship has settled back into its routine and tomorrow
shall be a regular day for all 567 hands of the “Empire State VI.”

As a side note, it has come to my attention that our inbound email seems
to be backed up and we are not receiving messages at the time of this
writing. However, our outbound email seems to be working fine, so I am
going to assume (bad word), that this post, as well as my other ones have
been getting to you in one piece.

Fair Winds and Following Seas,
Joe