G started sending me pics early today, and we FaceTimed while he was finishing up breakfast. He admitted he’s been too busy to miss me, but was a bit sad that I wouldn’t be able to accompany him the Most Traveled Guest luncheon on Monday. We’ve been joking that he needs a robot with an iPad as the face, and I could just FaceTime my way through the cruise at his side (there was a Modern Family episode about this that was harious). Oh well. As I told friends, I was going to feel badly about something whether I was on the cruise or not, but Hawaii and cruises will be around for awhile. McGuy’s Senior Night and Wish Week and these games won’t be.
At his table by the window again.
That’s Baileys for his coffee. I’m surprised he didn’t opt
for a mimosa too!
Through the Medallion app, G reserved a table by himself every night at 5pm in the DaVinci Dining Room. That’s where he was seated last night, though it wasn’t clear to him yet if that was going to be his table every night.
It was chilly and overcast today.
Hope that weather improves before Sunday’s Super Bowl!
Phenomenal WiFi speed on the Ruby Princess this morning
I didn’t hear from G most of the day, but knew he likely had Cruise Critic and Veterans get togethers. He rarely misses the former and never the latter. The snow, as predicted, started to fall here at home, but much more heavily than had been forecasted. I needed 4WD when I left for tonight’s game at 4:30pm and knew I’d be driving home in a mess.
I was in the final minutes of the exciting JV game when cruise friend Paige messaged me. She HAD to talk to me RIGHT NOW! Was I available? I typed back that I was in a game and couldn’t even hear myself think because the students were blowing the roof off the gym, and that the varsity game was starting immediately afterward. Paige said she was dying of laughter, so I told her to message it to me so I could laugh too. At the same moment, G texted me. He had asked someone named Sherita to accompany him to the MTG luncheon on Monday.
Let me back up a for a second. A week or two ago, G had posted on the Cruise Critic roll call for this cruise, asking if anyone wanted to climb Diamond Head with him the day the Ruby Princess is in Honolulu. Someone named Sherita immediately responded that she wanted to, and had booked the ship’s excursion since she didn’t want to do it alone. She’d cancel that excursion and accompany G instead. At the same moment G told me this and commented that Sherita was an unusual name, I was looking at Paige’s Facebook page on my iPad and someone named Sherita had replied to one of her posts. And I said, “Well, it can’t be that unusual, here’s another Sherita”, thinking that was the end of the coincidence.
Yesterday, G texted me that he had met Sherita on board and thought he might ask her to accompany him to the Most Traveled Guest (MTG) luncheon and did I think that was a good idea? Knowing he wasn’t looking forward to going alone, I thought it was a great idea. Meanwhile, Paige’s friend Sherita messaged Paige that she was on her first Princess cruise ever (though she has over 800 days on Holland America) and was going to get to go to the Most Traveled Guest luncheon with the most traveled passenger onboard (yes, G is #1 this cruise). Paige quickly connected the dots and couldn’t wait to tell me.
What, my friends, are the odds of that? What a small, small, SMALL world it is!
Sitting in a seriously overcrowded gym (when the game sold out, students figured out how to sneak in through the wrestling room), a COVID super spreader event if ever there was one, G continued to send me texts and pics and it really did feel like the best of both worlds, and like I had one foot at home and the other on the Ruby Princess.
Day 3 dinner menu
And at home…leftovers with a different dressing
Coast Guard helicopter hovering to pick up patient
The Dolly Parton Tribute Show in the Princess Theater
A 1-point loss in the final second to their biggest rival couldn’t dampen my enthusiasm about being at the game. The snow was still falling heavily when I walked out to my SUV, and I’ll admit that having to brush 5” of snow off of it and get home in the most atrocious conditions I’ve driven in in quite awhile made me wish- just for a second- that I was on the Ruby Princess en route to Hawaii.
Thank God tomorrow’s going to be a relaxing day…at least until the Michigan v. Ohio State game in the evening. 😉
Day 2 Princess Patter
