Kristin Reporting!
April 14th:
Today I went to the craft class to make a mandala. It was really just scratch off paper, which is basically a pre-made version of the thing we all did as kids which is color black crayon over colored penciled paper and then scratch it back off to make shapes. It was really silly and I am torn between finding it fun and relaxing and feeling like it was a real waste of time!
Lunch was unimpressive today with nothing appealing to me. I had some chicken noodle soup (which was okay) and a ham and cheese sandwich (bad). I found out that the meat they use at the sandwich making station is the flavorless cheap crap that we never buy, so my sandwich tasted like margarine and Swiss cheese. Also, my potato chips (which the Brits call 'crisps' which answers the question: "If French Fries are 'chips' what do they call Potato Chips to prevent confusion?") were stale! Hmm. But, I had a slice of D's $29.00 chocolate-chocolate birthday cake which is delicious as long as you eat around the nasty cherry filling!
Next was choir, and I sung a lot and my voice is out of practice, so now my throat is a bit raw, but it was fun. Singing is always fun. I'm trying to sing better, by listening to my recordings and hearing how not-full my voice is. I can't change my voice– it is what it is– but I'm trying to practice techniques to fill it out as much as I can. It's actually a lot harder to sing if you try to make yourself sound better! It goes from easy and fun to difficult and a bit frustrating, but I won't over do it and will mostly just enjoy myself.
We also determined how much to send to the IRS and CA-FTB to over-pay our taxes so we don't get into trouble. Woohoo! To wrap up the day I am going online to upload pics to the craigslist ads, and to pay the tax money. Then it's practically time for bed, so either a little B5 watching or a very short bit of Coop playing.
I told D that we will start tomorrow with 2-3 hours of Cooping so that it gets done. I just have this bad habit of once I start working, I just can't stop! So, we say, “later, later, later” about the Cooping, which gets D's hopes up, and then I end up working and not stopping with enough time to play, which is disappointing to him.
April 15th:
I skipped craft today as it was making a pearl charm bracelet– not something I was interested in.
Instead, I went to the photo class in order to see the other photo contest entries and to get my 10 photo prints back at the end. (We submitted our photos a few days ago.)
Turns out we won one of the categories! Woo! That's awesome. We left our 10 photos on the wall in the Photo Gallery all day so people could enjoy them with the other entries. We collected them this evening around 6pm. We are going to send one photo to our Dad of his three kids in Hong Kong, and one to Andy and Nik of them and Erich enjoying a glass of champagne!
We then did our coop playing first instead of last. We are having a lot of fun playing Saints Row 2.
We went to the sit down lunch today for breakfast at 12:30pm. The restaurant literally opened the doors when we got there, so we were one of the first groups seated. We skipped appetizers and ordered 3 entrees instead. I got a teriyaki salmon which was actually REALLY good. D got a thai vegetable green curry and we split a bland pasta dish. We were out of there by 1:05PM, so we decided that if you get there right when it opens and skip the appetizer then you get fast service. We also got dessert which was a Lemon Meringue pie piece. It was very strong, but still good.
We did laundry this evening while we did our weight lifting. We went up to 16kg on the deadlift, and I definitely felt the difference. I also went up to 8kg (per hand) on the overhead press, and I did it with good form, but barely. My body definitely wanted to crumble under the weight. I'm stuck at 12kg on the bench press because the next weight is 14kg (per hand). I'm doing 4-5 extras on set 5. I'm pretty sure the jump of 5lbs per hand to go up would not work out though... Today, my legs rebelled a bit on taking stairs after the workout. This always happens after cardio, but today it was thanks to going up in weight on the deadlift!
Dinner was actually filling and tasted good. What a relief. We got a pasta bolognese and pizza. My pepperoni and bell pepper pizza was delicious, and D got his usual favorite of pepperoni and pineapple but had salami on it in addition.
We are going to the show which is a combo of the ventriloquist we missed and the female vocalist that we skipped last night. After that it will be bed time.
Tomorrow is a busy day for me as I want to go to the craft, then at 12pm is the final choir rehearsal, and 3pm is the choir concert. Plus, I'll need to finish postcards and letters for mailing in Dubai, and I hope we get some time to play the Coop. And the blog? Might just have to wait til the next day. Even on vacation I remain too busy!
April 16th:
My day today was so busy that I didn’t write about it on time! That means I’ve more or less forgotten what happened.
BUT! A few things could not be forgotten.
We are getting close to our next port of Dubai, and there are some British Naval ships in the area. So, the special event of today was that the Queen Elizabeth was asked to participate in a “naval exercise” with a destroyer class ship that is in the area. This was scheduled to occur around 3:00PM which is also when the choir concert was scheduled.
I went to the noon final practice and I have to say that this time around the songs were rather difficult, and we did not get enough practices in to perfect them. Ever since we left Hong Kong the entertainment department has had a “staff shortage” so we’ve only practiced every other sea day. Anyway, it was clear that this concert was going to be rough.
We made it through the concert but it wasn’t great. The group of singers is too small to sing in the theater too. So, we were set up on the grand staircase in the lobby. (The last leg had sung here as well, and I watched that concert instead of participating because I had been touring Japan.) Despite the fact that we pretty much sucked, I went ahead and bought a DVD and photo of the choir as a memento!
The rendevous with the destroyer ship was delayed slightly which was good for me because I didn’t want to miss it. D and I gathered outside with everyone else around 4:00PM. The beginning was the most impressive moment, because a military helicopter tore around the front of the ship coming out of a dive. We must have missed the beginning of that maneuver so its appearance was quite a surprise!
The destroyer itself was in front of us but it did a tight turn and passed by really quick. It is quite impressive how tightly it could turn!
However, this whole “participation in a training exercise” seemed suspiciously like just an excuse to show off a British Navy ship to some of its citizens. The majority of passengers are British. There seemed no actual redeeming value of this “exercise”. The helicopter flew around the Queen Elizabeth and the destroyer went around back and took up a position. I guess that is theoretically “practicing”. It really seemed to be mostly a publicity stunt.
We did a cardio work out today on the Trixter bikes, and I was totally beat afterwards! That biking kicks my butt! D got his heart rate up to 180! That is sort of his goal because he can get it up a bit higher than that with DDR. He is never as tired of me though despite his heart rate getting much higher than mine. He is in such great cardio shape!!
I prepared several cards for mailing to Mom, Scott, Dad and our Australian friends. We also got several postcards ready to go, but we will have to finish some of them tomorrow! It was a busy day and we ran out of time!
We are looking forward to exploring Dubai tomorrow!
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