My Hateful Vacation Diary, or Why I Will Never Go On a Cruise Again So Help Me God

Last week I went on a cruise I planned over a year ago. I hated the one I was on as a teen but that was a million years ago and besides, I wasn't with my BFF then. This would be a whole different experience, I thought.

Oh, how I thought wrong.

Some mildly horrifying cruise ship facts:

• It costs almost a billion dollars to build a modern cruise ship.
• The ship uses about a gallon a second of fuel. (Their calculations, not mine.)
• On board, there are (for a one-week journey): 1,500 gallons of ice cream; 55,000 lbs of fresh fruit; 49,000 lbs veggies; 18,000 lbs potatoes; and 70,000 bottles beer.
• It is possible to read a 300-page novel in one day (if you do nothing but read and eat)

Enter my cheerful trip diary:

Day 1:

Any self-consciousness I had about my body is COMPLETELY gone. Everyone on this cruise is fat as fuck. And I will be too in 7 days, seeing the delicious, never-ending buffet.

Day 2:

I hate everything. How did I not realize that a cruise is like a giant obnoxious steel jellyfish with 4,000 human tentacles insufferably stinging their way through the ocean? I'm never doing this again.

 Day 3:

I realize there are no noise ordinances in the middle of the sea, but MUST it be this loud? Seriously. Witness:


Obnoxious dance music is blaring from every deck. It is absolutely inescapable. Every hour, there's an announcement about bingo or the napkin-folding class. People do not know how to entertain themselves unless surrounded by a cacophony. Or fed bullshit manufactured recreation.

I read a 300 page novel in one day and it was the only reason I haven't jumped overboard yet.

I'm so fucking miserable.

Day 4: 

Lady in hall was queasy, I have a headache that won't go away and the people next door have been flushing their toilet notstop for the last hour. Norovirus? I'm doomed.

Day 5: 

Level of loathing has reached a new high. I've decided my main goal for this trip, in order to make the suffering worthwhile, is to save myself $7 on a bottle of self-tanning lotion so I won't have to wear pantyhose when I go back to work. So I have acquiesced to a deck chair.

However there is no place on this stupid ship where I can be alone. Hateful dance music is blaring from every crevice, causing a line of numbed and sweaty folk to sway dully and sip margaritas across the entire length of this 1,000 foot vessel. I have lost faith in humanity.

Day 6:

I'm ready to jump. Where are we? I don't give a shit what port this is, I'm not leaving the cabin. It's the only quiet place on the ship. The omniscient presence of people has reached absolutely unbearable levels.

I can't get a glass of water in the stupid cafeteria without someone pushing into me from behind. I can't walk to the elevator without oblivious forms darting into my path. No one is paying attention to anyone else because no one has had a deep thought for more than six days. The entire ship is bursting with hedonism. No one gives a shit about anyone but themselves.

The only people I want to be near (as long as I don't have to talk to them) are the recluses like me. At least the antisocial guy hulking over a book at the next table has a philosophical teeshirt.

Day 7:

Land! Thank GOD the ordeal is over. I need to spend a month on top of a mountain away from civilization. I hate everything and everybody. The only silver lining is that I can go back to work right away because I never got norovirus.

My idea of a good time now.

The Internet wormhole descending into truffle-making territory

I can't sleep. And somehow mild browsing has led to an Internet wormhole which devolved into learning how to replace the cream inside truffles, despite hating truffles, cream, cream substitutes and the idea of cooking homemade chocolates.

Twenty years ago I would have had no idea how to make these wretched sweets. Today, thanks to modern technology, I can absorb hated enterprises never leaving my pillow! Ain't the Internet grand.

When you find out your ex has a baby (for the third time)

It wasn't the first time I had spoken to this ex in 13 months but it was the first time they mentioned having a 6 month old baby.

Of course I did the math right away. How long after we broke up did "it" happen?? Leave some leeway for not knowing right away but seriously, how could he have JUST mentioned it? I guess it's weird to email an ex and say, "hey, I'm a dad now, hope you're good!" but it just took me off guard.

Three exes have now had babies with the person immediately after me.

Breakups must exude fertility vibes. I dunno.

The baby is super cute though and the awkward moment has mostly passed. I came home to my sweet love who hugged me tight and everything else melted away.

I got engaged, and then disappeared for a month!

Where did the month go? It was like 19 degrees out and I was in baggy sweater heaven (nothing is more comfortable) and now all of a sudden it's 80 degrees out. I want some winter back! Or at least a little spring.

I'm having a bit of an identity crisis. I'm not completely sure what to write about. Do I even bother writing? Or should I (continue) to pour my energy into the zillion other outlets? I started this new blog so I could leave behind a part of me I didn't really like, the transitory part that floundered after divorce. I'm not floundering anymore (at least not now) but I'm not unmarred enough to think this will always be the case. I think that's why old people are crotchety: the older you get, the more losses accumulate and maybe they make you weird and angry. I'm not weird or angry. At least not yet. But if I'm lucky enough to live another 50 years, I may have to move someplace that has a lawn so I can scream at people to get off it.

So, something exciting: I got engaged!!! I'm so crazy about this guy. That will have to be a whole other post.

Okay, that's enough for tonight.

There is no gentle way to tell an arachnophobe...

BF: [thrashing]

Me: Sweetie, are you having a bad dream?

BF: [Grunt.]

Me: What happened?

BF: I don't want to tell you because it's kind of unpleasant.

Me: I think I can handle it - was it about exes or a tragedy or something?

BF: No, I don't want to go into it.

Me: Why? Was it about us?

BF: No, I just don't want to talk about it.

Me: Why not? Is everything okay?

BF: [Sigh] Okay, well, it involved a spider...

Jersey girl charm, first hand

I'm staying at my boyfriend's house this week, to compensate for not being able to see him last weekend or next weekend. We're doing the mid-week compromise.

Only my Mondays suck.

I want so badly to say they suck balls but that is profoundly unladylike, and even though the Jersey girl in me wants to not give a damn, even that connotes a visual a bit too strong for my comfort. Not only do I not want to make anyone picture me sucking balls, I don't even want to picture it. But I digress.

So it fucking sucked.

My day starts at 7am and ends around 9pm because I like to torture myself. I voluntarily participate in a 2-hour women's group after work which I love but the sessions are usually so intense I'll spend the rest of the commute home with my head wrapped around the night's discussion.

My boyfriend greeted me in the parking lot, sweet guy that he is. I had asked him to help me bring some things in when I arrived.

"Here, hold this please? Oh and by the way no sex tonight. I'm ragged." I breezed past him with a new throw pillow. "Thanks! Oh and I'm hungry!"

Just kidding, I didn't say it exactly like that. I'm not THAT much of a bitch. But I did actually need a way to convey my needs. Half of life is expectation management.

Because I was wound up, I needed to unwind. Normal people unwind by watching TV or meditating or maybe taking a hot shower. Not me. I have to clean. Like, overhaul. I can't just rinse a few dishes and lightly dust. I need to tuck in like I'm leaving town for a year.

Mission finally accomplished, I sidled sweetly up to my honey. Once calm, I can be good company. I just have to have a long and rigid set of needs met first. Jersey girls know how to charm!

Overheard

"They say you'll spend all year doing what you were doing at midnight on New Year's Eve."

"Trying not to have sex because there are too many people around?"