LaughAtlantis

(I know, this is slow going. I'm sorry. I'm a very bad person.)

Okay, so day two of my marvelous cruise dawned and we got up late and headed for the breakfast buffet. Rod decided he was going to race me up the two flights - don't ask me why, he was beign goofy - and so I was harassing him about the fact that it takes a lot to beat an asthmatic girl with only one lung. We were joking around, getting in the buffet line, and began chatting with a couple in front of us. Their names were Larry and Mary - never did get their last names - but since seats were somewhat at a premium, they invited us to share a table with them. They were just the nicest people - lived just outside Seattle and were taking the cruise to celebrate their 25th anniversary. We sat and chatted with them for probably 45 minutes - nice, nice people - and then there was an announcement that they were going to have Bingo in the Stardust Lounge - yes, they have a Stardust Lounge - so we headed for bingo madness.

Bingo madness, as it turns out, was really freakin' expensive, so we departed just about as quickly as we came. It was something like forty dollars for six bingo cards or some such thing - and we just weren't that invested in Bingo. We decided to head back to the room to pick up a card game, then we were going to go out on deck and play while we watched the ocean go by. On the way there, we passed through the Checkers Cabaret (aren't names for shipboard rooms amusing?) and they were setting up paintings for an art auction that would be happening that afternoon.

It was sorta funny... every day they leave a little newsletter-y thing for each stateroom - the Freestyle Daily - which highlights the fun activities of the day. We had seen the art auction when we looked through it and had sort of made fun of it; after all, who buys art onboard ships? But when we walked through, Rod's eyes lit up upon seeing a print called 'Where's Bart?' It was a limited series lithograph of about (I'm guesing here) 300 different Simpsons characters, many of which were obscure and had appeared in perhaps one episode. You could practically see Rod begin to salivate. We made plans to come back at two for the auction.

Sometime later, we found ourselves playing Phase Ten in the Sports Bar. They had a buffet set-up of nachos, salsa, and guacamole. It was sooo good. The salsa and guac were made fresh and were just, wow, so tasty. Hit the spot. Rather than have lunch, we had those as a snack and then headed off to the auction.

Auctions are interesting. We got a number and we sat and waited for our lots to come up. There were two animation cels that Rod was interested in (in addition to the Simpsons lithograph) and a Romanian lithograph that I really liked. As our lots came up we got to wave our number, and as stupid as it sounds, it was exciting. Nobody bid against us for anything except the Simpsons print, but we still got it. Yay!

That evening we went to dinner in one of the main dining rooms. The way things work on Norwegian Cruise Lines is this: you can eat whenever you want with whomever you want. I guess a lot of cruises make you sit with the same people at the same table and eat at the same time - sorta like prison, but with shore excursions. NCL allows for a lot more flexibility. So on Monday night we offered to share a table and wound up sitting with a couple of retirees from South Carolina, Mack and Becky. They were very... Southern. Nough said.

After a fabulous dinner we had baked Alaska for dessert and headed for the ship's casino. We had determined that we were going to spend $40, that's it. So we each got two rolls of quarters and scoped out the slot machines. We took about ten minutes to decide which ones had a good vibe and where we wanted to sit and this, that, and the other. Ultimately, we sat down, I put ONE quarter in a slot machine and won $45. First coin. Needless to say, we were hooked. We walked out that night with more than four times what we brought in there in the first place. Yeehaw!

To celebrate, we headed up to the Observation Lounge for a drink and to play Scrabble. We had established, before the trip, that I am a far better Scrabble player than Rod. He beats me at Phase Ten nearly every time, but I kick his ass at Scrabble. Well, we got up to the lounge and started to play. About halfway through the game, I started to feel awful. The ship was tossing back and forth quite a bit and my stomach was roiling. Churning, even. To make things worse, I started to lose at Scrabble. Clearly I was distracted. The motion was really getting to me and so we headed back to the room... and I JUST made it before, well, losing my dinner. Blech.

Thus I ended day two, with nothing in my stomach and just a dream of Juneau for the next day...