All at Sea at the Sales

Last sea day before we arrive at Madeira, spent an evening at the theatre on board and saw the Comedian Mick Miller, have seen him several times now still a genuinely funny man who knows how to work an audience with quick one liners and just as you have stopped laughing along comes another laugh. I recently saw him on TV in Peter Kay’s Car Share, so still hard working and current, looking forward to his next show on Thursday. I have also been attending lectures in the mornings about the work of the code breakers at Bletchley Park including Alan Turing during World War Two, delivered by a very knowledgeable chap called Michael Kushner who is also a guide at Bletchley. There are so many ways you can fill your day. I have passed on ice sculpting for the nervous, freestyle water skiing and make your own sequined dress for the Captains formal ball, quite a few chaps did sign up for it though and now sequins adorn everything. The sun is out and bodies adorn the deck as far as the eye can see, not as you might imagine a sea of sizzling flesh, dripping sun block, no it’s a sea of ink and not all possessed by youngsters, it might of seemed like a good idea at the time but time and diet has not been in some cases or over indulgence is responsible for an increase in the original canvas area that the artist used as his canvas and of course gravity is also a factor. This is most apparent in a lady who at one time what started out as a charming little robin red breast, now thanks to the vagaries of time and gravity is the proud owner of an Ostrich with a hiatus hernia. Some perfectly charming snakes have become Anacondas disappearing to some very strange places. Another predictable trait of the Brit is the love of a bargain, even if you don’t need it or want it, they have set up tables in the Atrium like the pioneers in the old west circled them against an Indian attack. The tables are loaded with tat all priced at £5~99 or buy 5 and get the 6th free which tells you something about the quality of the goods on sale,but does that stop the sharks circling the tables four deep and fighting one another over ownership of a gaudy pink purse that even Barbie would be ashamed to own, once the sale is made the sales assistant ducks under the table and chucks another half dozen of the “hardly any left madam” on the table for the next victims, scrub that discerning shoppers.