G’s been sending me a lot of sunrise and sunset pics to heighten my anticipation.
Here he is already drinking a mimosa before sunrise over the Pacific Ocean.
(I have no idea who took this pic, because it was clearly very early.)
For further explanation about why he was cruising and I…was not, please see the first post I published from his first cruise. Yes, I blogged from a cruise I wasn’t on. My motivation was that I didn’t want to have an undocumented cruise that was lost to our memories years from now, but apparently that wasn’t enough incentive to write blog posts for the two Panama Canal cruises. I started but ran out of steam, probably from all the SNOW SHOVELING I’ve had to do since my husband was enjoying himself on a cruise ship. We don’t get spring showers; we get spring snow.
The early weeks of G’s cruising for me largely centered around high school basketball games and medical appointments, mostly physical therapy. When I last left you, I had really messed up my knee getting my suitcase downstairs just before leaving on our Panama Canal cruise. The MRI revealed a torn meniscus, torn MCL and osteoarthritis. I can’t say I did all that damage that morning; I had dislocated that patella skiing 30 years ago, and, with my need to catch a flight the next morning to Miami where I was living for work, never really got any medical attention. It’s been tetchy ever since, and a decade on crutches made it worse. The only surgery that will help is knee replacement, and I’m a long way from that. So I’ve begun the (common, I’ve found out) cycle of PT, cortisone shots and hyaluronic shots. I’ll admit, it’s been pretty demoralizing, especially since “that foot” is the best it’s been in years. Such is life.
When McGuy’s team lost by one point in their Sweet 16 game for the state championship, we all felt like we’d had the wind knocked out of our sails. I’ve watched this kid- and many of his teammates- play basketball for 13 years. Now what do we all do? It just about did me in when he walked out of the gym after that game and came over to me with a small smile on his face and tears in his eyes to give a big hug (a huge breach of teenage protocol when around teammates, don’t you know, which made it all the more emotional). I drove home in tears that night, but it’s the wonderful memories that have stayed with me now. Luckily McGee’s track season was just starting up. Onward!
I thought I was in for smooth sailing this week in my cruise preparations until I woke up last Saturday with a fever, sore throat and cough. Gosh darn it. I went to all those games (masked, when no one else was) without catching a thing except an occasional wayward basketball just to have this happen? I know exactly who I caught it from, and his name starts with Mc (but that’s as specific as I’ll get), when I took them to lunch last week. I took an at home COVID test and wasn’t shocked to get a positive result; as you might remember, I do sometimes with antigen tests. I tried a different brand and it was negative. I tried the original brand and it was again positive. This concerned me enough to run up to Walgreens for a PCR test that same day. Unfortunately, because it was a weekend, I didn’t get the results until Tuesday morning, nearly 72 hours later. By then, my symptoms were much more cold-like and I wasn’t surprised it was negative. Time to start packing.
I offer up my Wednesday experiences to prove that being married to me is not for the faint of heart. G can run, but he can’t hide, not with Princess’s MedallionNet internet. I left early for an appointment only to find that the battery in my SUV was dead. This was a surprise, because it’s a nearly new, expensive battery. I moved over to G’s vehicle but first had to reconnect his battery (which, thankfully, he’d shown me how to do) and made it to my appointment just in time. But I sent G’s several HELP! texts while I was waiting for the doctor. When I got home, he walked me through hooking up the battery charger to get my SUV started. That worked, I disconnected the battery on his vehicle and thought that was the day’s excitement.
But I had already started thinking about leaving the house early tomorrow morning, and decided it might be prudent to make sure I had a key to the front door. These are the sorts of things I never worry about when I leave with G. I just know he’s got them covered. We lock the garage doors, and have to exit through the front door when we leave on vacation. The front door has a key pad on it…we never use a key for the deadbolt. Except one time we returned home after months away and the battery in the key pad was dead. G had had to unlock the door with his key. In case that happens again, where was MY key to the front door? I couldn’t find it on my key ring. This stressed me out enough to actually call G on the ship.
Me: Where is my key to the front door?
G: We went through this last year. It’s on your key ring.
Me: No, it isn’t. There are two strange keys but neither one of them works.
G: That’s not possible.
(I do some more finagling. Eventually…)
Me: One of them kind of fits but it won’t turn.
G: That’s it.
Me: NO, IT ISN’T. It WON’T turn the deadbolt.
G: What is the name on the lock?
(I go off in search of reading glasses.)
Me: Kwikset
G: What is the name on the key?
Me: um….Kwikset.
G: Bingo.
Me: But it doesn’t work!
G: Find the can of dry lubricant, spray it in the lock and on the key, and see if it turns.
(Thank God for unlimited free internet on the ship, because this all took awhile.)
Me: Oh yeah, it turns now.
G: Amazing.
Me: So what is this other weird key on my key ring?
G: Hard to know, since I’m THOUSANDS OF MILES AWAY, but try the storm door.
Me: It fits but it won’t turn.
G: And repeat.
And every day since then, I’ve used the keys in both those doors just to prove they still work. And even if I don’t have to go anywhere, I open the door to the garage from the house and lock and unlock my SUV doors using my remote, just to prove the battery still works. Momma didn’t raise no fools. And my husband, at times, is a saint.
My COVID test from Thursday morning came back Thursday night and I’ve never been so happy to be negative. If G was on the cruise and I wasn’t…too sad! I’ve filled the last two evenings watching March Madness games. And let me just say this: watching these games (I watched at least twenty last weekend) without G around to make comments has been possibly the best part of being home alone. As much as he loves football (it would be a deal breaker if he didn’t), basketball is anathema to him. The squeaky shoes, the horns, the hour long last sixty seconds of the games…these are not his thing. So I watched the first round of March Madness on as many as three screens simultaneously, and the second and third rounds on two screens. I controlled the remote, and that’s a rare thing in this house.
The only hitch in my packing was that today I decided to move enough things to survive until Honolulu into a roll aboard. I started thinking about the fact that I’m flying in the morning of the cruise (don’t start) and it would be a real pity if my checked bag doesn’t make it. I am now set for all possibilities. I used EZ Air as my insurance that I will get to the ship in the event of a delay, but I even have a second, later flight booked on Southwest using points. (MUST remember to cancel that flight just before my EZ Air flight takes off!).
Things heated up today with reports that there are enough COVID cases on the Ruby Princess that masks are again mandatory for all passengers and crew. As they always should have been (just saying). G has remained masked even when the requirement was dropped at the start of the current cruise, and tested negative when in transit guests went through testing today. We are continuing on with our plan to cruise tomorrow. If masks kept me safe at crowded basketball games, I have to have some level of trust in them keeping me safe on the Ruby Princess. My only fear (and it’s not insignificant) is that testing at the pier will be reinstated and I’ll be tested using an antigen test that will again yield a false positive result. I’m taking four antigen test kits that I know return an accurate result and will re-test myself in the terminal if that is what is required to get them to give me a PCR test.
Crazy times.
My morning pickup is arriving at 5am. I’m not sure I’ll make it through the second game tonight. Or maybe I will. I’m really too keyed up to sleep anyway.
With all the uncertainty, it’s nice to know that, in the event of a last minute keypad battery failure, I can at least lock the door after myself when I leave.
Life is never dull.