cruise

DON'S HOLIDAY CRUISE - 2009 / 2010 Thanks to the generosity of my friends at Applied Trust, in Boulder, I won a contest that rewarded me with an all-expenses paid vacation. The prize was a week at a Cozumel, Mexico resort that was \"all- inclusive.\" Which means everything, including the alcohol, was covered. I had to re-think that plan. Instead of staying in one spot and drinking for a week, I felt that taking a cruise to the Mexican Riviera (and drinking for a week) sounded more interesting. Plus, I'd never been on a cruise before. I booked passage on the magnificent and luxurious Sapphire Princess. THE SAPPHIRE PRINCESS Gross Tonnage: 115875 Total Fuel: 4300 Tons Fresh Water: 3500 Tons Normal Passenger Capacity: 2670CHRISTMAS DAY – 2009 (email to Bob Cohen)I'm sitting in Lomita, \"The FriendlyCity!\" in a run-down motel run by Hindus.I swear I'm not making this up, there werefresh droplets of blood on the outsidestairs this morning…(I doubt somebody cuthimself shaving).I feel certain peoplehave died in my room. I can sense it.But choosing a motel on the Internet byits photo is kind of like trying to find agood-looking woman in her 50s onMatch.com. The picture is probably from anearlier decade and happier time. It wasn'tall that bad, if you put the rubber matover the rust spot in the bathtub.

CHRISTMAS DAY – 2009 - continued (email to Bob Cohen) Dear god...try eating Christmas dinner at the Norms on Pacific Coast Highway. I got so depressed by the people sitting around me that I asked for mine to go. I fell to sleep to the gentle wail of police sirens. Jesus Bob. I don't know how I lasted 13 years in this city. Or maybe I've just gotten spoiled by what I left back in Boulder. In a couple of hours I'm off to the cruise ship at Pier 93, and stateroom with a balcony. There is only one stateroom ahead of me and for the week-long journey to various tourist traps in Mexico. Peace and Love, Don the World Traveler On Christmas Eve, Peggy the Patient Travel Agent had called to inform me that I had been bumped up to an incredible balcony stateroom. It was really unbelievable.Since I \"won\" the trip by taking a picture of a piece of Applied Trust promotional material in a uniquelocation (The Boulder Land Grab Rally), I figured it would be nice to take a piece of their promo along onthis journey as my \"traveling companion.\"

THIS HAS RUINED IT FOR ME With the sliding glass door of my stateroom open to the sea, the fresh air blowing in and all of my worldly cares blowing out, I felt as close to heaven as I think I'm going to get. It was sundown on the second day at sea when it hit me. It wouldn't ever be this good again. My reverie almost reversed, but I caught it in time. I focused instead, on how grateful I was that I was here at all, due to the good graces of my friends at Boulder's, Applied Trust. My friend Bryan was right. He had urged me to upgrade my ticket to a balcony room, which I resisted because of the obscene cost. It was luck and my demographic that got me the Christmas Eve upgrade to this balcony room, and it will be difficult for me to leave it to mill about the boat. The source of my anxiety, is that I will never see such accommodations again.If I were to cruise again, I'd enter into some horrible helpless lottery where I pay a lot of money and wait for the wheel to stop spinning and my stateroom designated \"by the computer.\" I decided to enjoy it while I could, and I did.FIRST SUNSET FIRST IN-ROOM BREAKFAST

I showed up at the second night'sdinner seating ahead of schedule soI could get in right at 8:15 - mydesignated seating time. I didn'twant to miss \"Piano Man,\" the bigproduction show happening at10:15. that features the tunes offamous piano players like BillyJoel, Elton John, Gershwin, etc..Reed warned me the shows wouldbe a tad gay, thus the inclusion ofLiberace and Barry Manilow aspillars of piano perfection.At least they included a lot of hot young female dancers, and one in particular struck my fancy.I watched her all evening. By the end of it, I'm sure her dancing partners were referring to me as\"the creepy guy in the third row\" because I had nothing else better to do but to lock in on her,in hopes that I'd dream of her that evening. Hey, that's entertainment. Later, I would take theBackstage Tour of the theater operation and marvel at what a cramped environment theperformers have to work in. I also found out that the staff has their own dining room andnightclub, so they don’t have to mingle with the tourists. And you can’t blame them a bit.BACKSTAGE TOUR - MAIN THEATER THE INTERNATIONAL DINING ROOM

THIRD DAY AT SEAIt's the first time that we've encountered anythingother than perfect weather. I kept the stateroombalcony door open to the outside as I slept the firstnight, and it was like returning to the womb. Theboat gently rocked me to sleep - tilting to and froon the surface, and the deep currents underneathmoving us slowly, gently, but with incredibleforce, slowly side to side. The wind rose and felland sounded after a while like the Earth breathing.THE CRUSTY CURMUDGEONMy favorite character toshare a meal with so farhas been Raymond, theCrusty Curmudgeon.He doesn't haveanything good to sayingabout anything.Example:Someone trying tomake small talk: \"I hearNew York is going toget hit with a stormtomorrow.\"Raymond: \"Serve's 'emright.\"At another point, Grumpy Raymond and the Joisey guy start talking about buying jewelryon cruises, and disagreeing on every point. Because that's what Raymond does. TheJoisey guy, a bald, self-described \"chronic pipe smoker,\" corrected Raymond's assertionthat the cruise line owned the Mexican jewelry stores that the ship's presentationrecommended for the tourists who will be driven there in cruise line vans. \"No they don't- It just looks like multiple companies. All of the cruise lines' jewelry operations are runby one family out of New Jersey. I know 'em.\"Getting elderly women to purchase jewelry made from the “one generation gem,”tanzanite, seemed to be a side industry of the cruise operation.

THE RUSSIANSThe only reason I think the fat, loud ones are Russian, is because their chatter sounds likethe bad Russian accents I've heard in James Bond movies and the like. They seem to bevisiting this world, and oblivious to others, as they babble amongst themselves and takelarge portions of the weirdest components of the buffet lines. (They seem to be obsessedwith melba toast, for example.) The old ones are round, and it's difficult to tell the malefrom the female except for hairstyles and clothes. The young ones, on the other hand,(like the ones directly across the passageway from my stateroom) also live in their ownworld. They simply do not have any Western social graces to speak of, and when theyspeak, it is at the volume level of a shout. Wild and crazy Cossacks.I could research it, but remember roughly that Russia / former Soviet Union, since its\"fall\" (read: transformation into a more cabalistic society) has spawned its share ofoligarchs, but the world's largestnumber of new millionaires firstleading, and now just trailingChina. As communist countriesbecome more capitalistic (andprosper because of it), the UnitedStates is now being transformedinto a shackled form of state-controlled collectivism (read:socialism) with its predictabledeleterious economicramifications. So as the Eastrises; the West's sun sets. It'salmost by design. (And if you're ENCLOSED PADDLE BALL COURT AT REAR OF SHIPcurious what the Design is, I have (PERFECT FOR DOWNPLAY, BY THE WAY)some DVDs for you.)The old ones are loud, round, fat and look like Kruschov. The young ones are male, loud,fit, and tough - like America's early tough guys, be they Italian mafia or Westernmotorcycle gangs. You just don't want to fuck with them, and part of their being loud isthat pronouncement to the world.On check-in day, there was a lot of shouting right outside my door. It was a group ofyoung Russian men who, as I listened to them talk to our floor steward, were here for abachelor party. They mentioned girls, and \"some room - we'll need some room,\" and \"Ifyou help us with what we need, we will make sure you are very happy at the end of thistrip, my friend.\" Soon after, I saw some maintenance men move in another safe. I couldn'tmake up my mind if these were people to know or avoid. I didn't particularly come onthis cruise to make friends, but they're technically neighbors. Especially when they comehome from the casino at 2am, shouting to one another, inches apart, then turn on theirboom box. Wild and crazy Cossacks.

THE TOILETA true story from the news is that of a littlegirl, who thought it would be fun to try toswim to the very bottom of the pool and siton the drain. It was a goal, and one sheaccomplished with dire consequences. Yousee, little did the little girl know, that as thewater bubbles into the pool up top, it isdrained out of the pool at the bottom, andput through purifying filters, pumps andwhat-not in the recycling process. Well,she made it all the way down there, andshe dutifully sat on the drain, and thepower of the suction ripped her insides outand she died.This is the kind of story that you read andtend to forget. On purpose. It's so horriblethat you can understand how it happened,but you just didn't want to think about it.But it was brought to mind the first time Iflushed the stateroom toilet - a toilet thathad a warning on it that the device tookfull advantage of the latest vacuum technology for my safety and comfort. When I sawthe notice as I inspected my room for the first time, I pushed the button to test the flush.While I've never ridden with The Blue Angels air force squad, I know what their jetssound like passing overhead, and this toilet was only half as loud in it's final WHOOSH!My first thought was of that unfortunate little girl, and her bowels being sucked from herbody by an unknowing and uncaring natural force. This toilet was obviously a menace tobe dealt with.Being a double-flusher myself, this presented a problem. As my ass would still be on thethrone, as the switch is thrown, I could imagine my better half being sucked into theship’s belly as I sat screaming in horror and pain. So I devised a clever means why whichto relieve the bowl of any possible suction, by strategically lifting my left cheek before Iengaged the mechanism. The WHOOSH! created a pleasant draft of cabin air southward,while I folded sheets of the sandpaper-consistency toilet paper provided by the Princessline. My innards, safe, I resolved to bring a roll or two of Charmin along if I ever cruiseagain. Eating five meals a day has its price, and my system was getting an uncommonworkout. The toilet paper they provided may dissolve satisfactorily in their holding tanks,but it didn't meet my sensitive standards, as it turned out. In fact, the toilet paper suckedworse than the toilet.

THE FAMILYMy dinner partners were late. I waited five minutes. No sign of them. It became apparent that the staffdidn't want to begin service until the entire table had arrived and I started to get nervous about the time.I had no idea if I'd pissed them off the night before with my ranting and raving - perhaps they'drequested to be moved? I couldn't risk missing \"Piano Man\" and asked the waiter if I could place myorder. I requested it be brought out piece at a time slowly, in hopes they'd show up.Their party comprised a 30+ish tall Italian female looking uncomfortable, a heavy-set 33 year-oldyoung man named Bart with a goatee, his obese mother (and I say this lovingly - she's a very nicewoman) whose face is so puffed up from poundage that her slightly buck-toothed smile makes her looklike a Disney chipmunk. And lastly, the psychologist woman who reminds me of Chris Lee in drag. Isay this lovingly too, because she's a charming and intelligent woman who also brings to mind theMuppets' Miss Piggie. In a nice way, of course.After some tortured false starts at describing it obliquely, it became obvious that he was attending theporno industry event, which is held concurrently in Vegas (to siphon off some out-of-towners alreadythere for COMDEX and, after all, it's all about videos and computers too, in a way). Turns out Barthelps his divorced dad sell video production equipment, specifically to porn producers.I can't adequately describe the sick nature of themother/son relationship that sat across from me eachevening. They insisted on sitting side-by-sidebecause, as far as I can tell, the cord has yet to be cut- certainly in any meaningful way. Although Barthad a lovely, intelligent woman to his right, heplayed to his mother on the left. All of his quips, hisfirst responses are aimed at her. He throws his headback in a satisfied smile when she responds.Watching it puts my appetite at risk.The Psychologist, Miss Piggy, is full of great information about this cruise and cruising in general.She gets my obscure jokes, and takes them to the next level. By the second night she was trying toseduce me, but I took it as a complement. Bart said twice during the meal that the two old gals werequite pleased with having a \"cute young man\" at the table.

Miss Piggy's son, who was not on the cruise, is atelevision psychologist I was told, and the show iscalled \"Quarters,\" and it concerns OCD patientswho are obsessive collectors who, over the courseof three episodes, are either cured or simplyhumiliated. I told her of my friend Ed Toutant, whowon $1.86 million on \"Who Wants to be aMillionaire,\" and uses an entire wing of his Austinestate simply to store his back-copies of the freeAustin weekly entertainment tabloid. He doesn'treally know why he does it anymore, but he's doneit for so long it makes him uncomfortable to thinkof stopping. So he stacks them week after week. (Ireally should give Miss Piggy Ed's contact info.)Bart's girlfriend is in a Masters program for adegree in Psychology as well. During the course ofpolite conversation (I had mentioned how the French have a curious sense of personal hygiene) Bart's Mom chimed in with, \"They don't have ice in Italy!\" This triggered some sort of mental tripwire in my head and I had to say, \"And she (meaning Bart's girlfriend) probably knows why!\" (pointing to the her). \"What is the psychology behind chewing ice?\" I asked her, \"why do people do it?\" She paused for only a couple of seconds, then answered correctly that chewing ice was a sign of sexual anxiety. I knew this odd factoidbecause I typed all my ex-wife's papers for her Psychology degree, and that this poor girlhad probably been taught the same thing, right or wrong.\"Right!\" I exclaimed,\"The Italians may smellbad, but they'reapparently sexuallysatisfied - they don'tNEED ice!\"The girl laughed, Bartlooked depressed, hismother lookedmomentarily stunned,and Miss Piggie thePsychologist giggled.I had 'em.

PUERTA VALLARTAThe only place I'd been in Mexico, and it was back in 1991, was Puerta Vallarta. I was excited tosee it was on the list along with Mazatlan and Cabo San Lucas as our ports of call. Even backthen, the sanitation standards in PV were . . . okay, there didn't seem to be any. Well, it's gottenworse along the way, but hey, there are more places to shop and even a Hard Rock Cafe!It's very socialistic down there. Here's a shot of what I believe to be the Puerta Vallarta PublicUrinal.(At least it smelled like it...) The whole place is beautiful if you hold your nose.And here's a shot of a sacred shrine: the Cathedral of Our Lady of Guacamole, or something likethat. I was distracted by the 24-hour Burger King in front of it and got hungry.From what I could tell watching the families onboard the ship, a hell of a lot of people worshiphamburgers, so there might be a tie-in here.

EL SETMy goal in Puerta Vallarta was to revisit the only place where I was able to take a break when Idid a three-day gig for General Electric in '91. During that busy job, I got to have one relaxingmeal in a little restaurant way up the hillside called El Set. I was delighted to find that theyhaven't really changed it that much at all. In '91 we were told that because of Mexico's lax environmental protection laws, the major hotels simply ran their raw sewage lines out 500 yards. The General Electric people were told not to swim off the beach, but to take the boats out a mile or so. From El Set I remembered the brown surf back then, and it's still there. This picture just hints at it.But all was not fun and games. I intended to smuggle some spiritsback onto the ship like the old farts talked about at dinner. Most ofthe people I met were experienced cruisers—I was a virgin.Apparently they all do it, and I wanted to fit in. You know, gowith the flow and give it a try. I bought what looked like anauthentic bottle of vodka with a label I recognized, and poured itinto BluBot.Little did I know, however, that BluBot couldn't hold his liquor.When I went through the line to board the ship, the security guardhad the nerve to pop his top and smell his breath and it was alldownhill from there. But I tried to look on the bright side. Therewas one of two things I dared myself to try on this cruise: eithertry to sneak liquor onto the ship, or learn to line dance. I chose totry to sneak on liquor and I don't regret it.

CAPTAIN'S COMMENT DURING SAFETY GREETING:The service crew was Filipino, but the folks running the boat were British. I especiallyenjoyed the occasional general announcement, which would be prefaced by a \"BONG!\"sound over the public address system. My favorite bit was from the captain during thesafety announcement. (In a wonderful British accent) \"…and if you happen to seesomeone go over the side, shout 'Man overboard,'' and do please tell us about it\"SHIP’S LIBRARY SHIP’S LIBRARY WITH MY BOOK IN ITI discovered that the ship’s library has a shelf where passengers can leave a book forothers. Since I always travel with a few copies of “My Year as Ozzy” just in case, I askedthe librarian if I could donate a copy. He, being English, looked at the cover and yelled,“Ozzy! Well of course!”OLD FOLKS DANCINGThe women can still move. The men are stilluncomfortable. Except for The Graceful Slider.He would slide, skate and twirl to the music inhis stocking feet, both hands in his pantspockets, without having to deal with any cooldance arm movements. I remember Grandpaused to be a smooth slider sometimes when hewas showing off, his hands in his pockets. LATE NIGHT COMEDY SHOWGLOBAL WARMINGThis ship is Al Gore's nightmare. This one voyage must have the carbon footprint ofVermont. But spending a few days on the open ocean, with no land in site, reinforces thenotion that the ocean is a pretty big heat sink, and how insane the whole global-warming-climate-change debate really is.

CRUISE LINE RECOMMENDATION - HIGH MARKSCelebrity Cruises, specifically the M-class ('M' for \"Millennium\") brought the highestraves from the veteran cruisers I dined with at lunch on the third day.NOTE: The Cruise Junkies tend to talk first and foremost about the food. I hear littleabout the rooms, the activities, or the amenities, beyond the length of wait in the diningareas. These are old people with old wealth, who are addicted to stuffing themselveswhile they think they're getting a good deal doing so. I guess if eating yourself to deathrepresents a good deal. But it's an all-out Fat Fest, and I was warned it would be. I wasprepared for, but still disturbed by, the sight of obese parents watching with pride as theirportly precious snowflakes loaded their plates with fattening foods. Then finish, and goback for more.CASINO I NEVER GAMBLED IN GOLF SEMINARS THAT CHANGED MY GAMECULINARY DEMONSTRATION GALLEY TOURThe head chef oversees 150+ cooks who are constantly churning out meals for thethousands on board. He demonstrated a couple of dishes and then took the group on atour through the galley, which had just been cleaned. It was huge and spotless and veryimpressive.On a whim I sat in on the first golf seminar, taught by the ship pro (who plays roundswith folks who wish to pay two hundred a loop when they hit land). His approach is tovastly simply everything, which appealed to me. Last time I played with the brothers, Idid miserably, and this ship pro’s demonstration explained why. It blew my mind, and Ican’t wait for Spring, when I can try out what I’ve learned.

MAZATLANI mistakenly booked a trip into the Sierra Madres from Mazatlan. The Southern PovertyTour. The amount of poverty I saw, and the number of young men standing around withnothing to do, helped me make sense of our current open borders policy. The UnitedStates provides not only a reliable source of income (estimated at over 9 billion a year inthe mid-2000s) but a pressure valve, almost assuring that any young man with thegumption, the individual drive and ambition to revolt - would choose an easier and morepractical path north. If there was nowhere to go, things might be different.Every male must serve in the Mexican military. However, it only involves showing up onSaturdays for one year (so they won’t have to quit their jobs). What you end up with, isan impoverished population of pissed off young men, who have been trained to operateautomatic weapons. You’d better damn well let ‘em migrate north. The Power Elite who control American policy, have deals with the Power Elite in Mexico. Mainly pale Europeans, of Spanish decent, who never really relinquished their control after the all- show revolution of Zapata and Pancho Villa. Supposedly, each peasant family was given a parcel of land, and provided socialized medicine (which translates into a \"clinic\" in each major village - whatever that means) where people can go to, from what I could gather, have more children. I saw a docile people. The tour bus stopped for a second, so wecould see a group of four piglets climbing the side of theroad, their mother and father across the street in the frontyard of the family. (The most recent \"Swine Flu\" originatedin a southern Mexican town with no environmental controls,on a factory farm owned by ConAgra where the people livewith their pigs. And when you think about it, so does Reed.

I learned that a 23 year-old Spanish conquistador brought a bunch of men over and TALKED their way into a deal with the indigenous people. He was a great guy from what I gathered from Eleazar, our smiling tour guide. The gentle \"conquerer\" painted, and wrote about the various traditions he saw, and promptly died at 37. Some bastard after him fucked with Montezuma and it all went to hell. So here we are. Not a Pepsi machine in the whole depressing scene, but plenty of Coca-Cola machines. (See: Vincente Fox)Miles from civilization that we would recognize, miles up twisting mountain roads, pastnew highway construction and people living in shanty shacks with their animals, is thetiny mountain town where the cruise line drags its tourists for a walk among the peasants,and to visit a couple of gift shops. There was a fellow there, an older gentleman whodescribed himself as a former economics professors, whose god had been so very good tohim, he came to live in this hell hole and help the town by selling T-shirts and carvedbark by the side of the road. He was probably 60 or so. In good shape. There was a youngLatina sitting on a stool beside him, very quiet, but with subtly searching eyes. His eyes.His god has been very good to him. He just didn't get around to telling us exactly whichgod that might be.I love this cruise for some things, and othersoffend me deeply. Like the profiteering at everyturn. Whether it's .75 a minute for an Internetconnection, to charging you $80 to be put in abus and confronted with shopping opportunitiesthinly disguised as educational experiences. Asif these people gave a shit about the mud bricks- they wanted trinkets. Fine. Give the peoplewhat they want. \"Oooh we learned so much, andhow do you like my bracelet?\"I learned that everything, all the crap that I would want, started at $15, \"but for you\" $13.Seven bucks was their break point. I watched the old ladies play hard ball. I got a newpanama hat using the technique. THE MEXICAN GOVERNMENT DETERMINES WHAT A BRICK CAN BE SOLD FOR, HAND-MADE OR MANUFACTURED

The penitentiary is referred to as the \"Rehabilitation Center.\" One of the nicer hotels I saw, was being built right across the two-lane \"highway.\" There was armed military personnel at the ports. Camo, helmets, shoulder arms. As we threaded through the Sierra Madres, our stops would be by the side of a road, usually near the town square, and somewhere nearby would be a few gentlemen, in regularclothes, that if you looked closely enough, you could see they had rifles too. Severalarmored cars passed us with the Spanish for \"PRIVATE SECURITY.\"THE POISON OF THE SIERRA MADRESI missed the data point in the tour brochure about an hour and forty-minute bus ride (airconditioned!) during the 7-hour Sierra Madre tour I chose for eighty bucks. It included alunch on a mountaintop that I had doubts about, but if I've learned anything aboutcapitalism, it would behoove the cruise line to assure the place was safe. So I had thatreassurance going in.I was trying to sleep, at the tour guide's suggestion: “There’s nothing to see for about anhour and forty minutes, why don't you take a siesta?\" he said. I wanted to shout out,\"Because I paid eighty bucks to be entertained,” but he had already slumped back into hisseat with his cap pulled down to shade his eyes so he could snooze.

Time clicked away, the bus rumbled through thecountryside and I didn't have my camera readywhen we were diverted off the main road to anofficial Department of Agriculture checkpoint,inspecting trucks traveling from state to state.As we were held back, a fellow rose from hisseat on a rock on the left, pulling the rope onwhat I thought at first was a 2-cycle leaf blower,the type I've lived with in Los Angeles. Itsmoked a lot. \"Man, that thing needs to be tuned up,\" was my first thought, but then the\"smoke\" got thicker. And then he blasted the living hell out of the underside of the trucknext to us. Turns out this guy sprays DDT all day, without a face mask, and it's animmense amount of DDT, let me tell ya (the truck pulled forward, and for another 45seconds, clouds of DDT wafted from the wheel wells.It wasn't until about six hours later that the pollution from the two rural centers wevisited, and this blast of industrial strength pesticide, long banned in the United States,that I developed a sore throat like none other. Because of the warning paragraphs in the ship's newsletter already making me paranoid, I figured I had a fatal case of Legionairres' Disease or worse. The ship’s doctor said it was probably pharyngitis, or something like that. He prescribed some lozenges, no antibiotics. Good for him. The young British (but American educated at Stanford) doctor impressed me as much as anything on this impressive trip. First class treatment. I asked him if the gassing at the border would eventually kill me. \"I'm going to get lung cancer and die from this,right?\" I asked the ship doctor. \"Prolonged exposure will cause damage,” he said, “but aone-time incident will work itself through\" Or something to that effect.For all I know, it wasn't the DDT outside, but the pure pollution blowing out of the backsof all the vehicles in the tight city squares we walked around in. I haven't encounteredsuch thick oily air ever. That's a rich mix they're burning. LOCALS, WITH AUTOMATIC WEAPONS, FULL DRESS MILITARY MEN, WITHGUARDED THE BUS WHEN WE STOPPED WEAPONS, GUARDED THE SHIP AT PORT

NEW YEAR'S EVE - CABO SAN LUCAS - CABO WABOThe only reason I had for going ashore in Cabo was Sammy Hagar's Cabo Wabo cantinaand tequilaria. Sammy Hagar replaced David Lee Roth in one of the most successfulheavy metal bands in history: Van Halen.I didn't need another Mazatlan dusting but it would be nice to see his place if they wereserving lunch, and they were. I looked around and took pictures, and ordered a couple ofshots of Sammy's good stuff. Being that this is a bar owned by a rock and roll star, itmade sense that the architectural highlight of the structure would look like a penis.The military cruiser that has been traveling with us,alongside as we exited the harbor, just hit the gas and tooka trip completely around the boat, speeding out in front,turning and heading back. A final inspection as we leavethis quiet town. A guess you can't be too safe with thesource of income.I developed a new philosophy: New Year's Eve doesn't necessarily happen at midnight. Ithappens all day long. And if you experience joy, you can try to lock in on it, andremember it, and reference it from then on.The joy I felt in my stateroom on that trip, I carry with me as best I can. And it continuesto put a smile on my face when I think about it.