Derek Daisey's Cruise Adventures!

My last 3 days on the Carnival Spirit.

2010-01-06T04:54:00.000-08:00

Well... it’s 4:09 am right now, on the day I leave as I write this and I have to catch up the last 4 days!
Manzanillo day, I woke up at 1:45 and went up to eat on lido. I worked on more 3d generated pictures and didn’t do a whole lot else until my gig. The first part of my gig was on lido for an hour. It was an OK crowd... but nothing to get me excited about. As I was leaving, a waiter offered me 30 dollars to copy all my tabs onto his external hard drive, which I agreed too. Really.. it’s just a matter of grabbing the files and moving them over. Took like 3 seconds, and it was an easy buck.
When I was at dinner, Noochie came over and talked with me for a little bit, and gave me her flash drive and she asked me for some of my pictures. So I spent the time in my room doing all that until I had to play at 9. The group of guys that were there the night before were waiting for me. So, I kicked it off with rock song after rock song, and kept it going until 12... and then it died. It was very busy though for most of it and the guys were very active.
After the gig, and I got some food in the staff mess and sat with Jess and Pat and talked about various things.. Came back to my room and was up for awhile before falling asleep.

Next day, I got up at around 12, and I just browsed the internet until I was hungry. Then I went up on lido for my last good meal, and chowed down. Came back to my room and watched some family guy, and packed a lot of my stuff. I managed to get a lot of it put away. But couldn’t really finish the process until the next day.
I had an orientation about signing off to go to, so I went to that at 3:30. They collected my VISA and gave me my medical papers back, and we went over the whole process. I would collect my last pay the next day, and I had to fill out a couple forms. As the meeting was over, I asked the MSA guys if they knew anything about my ticket. So I went to their office and they had one for me. Unfortunately it had me leaving at 10:40 at night and I wouldn’t arrive in Baltimore until 9:12 am the next day. I was willing to accept that, but then I looked at the luggage prices, and it would have cost me 340 dollars to get all my luggage home. So I went on Southwest.com and looked to see if I could find a better deal. Sure enough, I got a ticket and baggage cover for 260 dollars. And I get to fly out at 2.. and be at the airport by 11 pm.
I went to dinner and Marcus sat with me. He told me he loved the album, but really felt I should write more songs like Where to Begin. He loved that style.
I got to my gig at 8 pm, and played to a relatively quiet crowd. But by the end of my first break.. 9:30, it was slammed again and I sang straight til 12. It was hard to want to leave, because it was just such a good time. I got 100 dollars in tips, and it was just a rocking time. Eventually everyone just got up and quickly ran to the comedian at 12. So I finished up early and went down to the crew mess and got a quick bite to eat.
I came back to my room and put on Die Hard 2 and continued packing. Noochie called about picking up her flashdrive, so she came over and we talked for a few minutes, and then she left and I finished up the movie and fell asleep.

Today I got up at 11. I got online and checked all that stuff. Then I took a shower and got some lunch. I packed some more things like my razor. I called Felicia for a few minutes and then after that, did more internet stuff. Around 2, Jessica called and asked if I was ready to do my Contract Review. So I went over, and she told me I did an excellent job and I get a perfect score, and anytime I want to come out, ask for her and she’ll find a way for me to work for her.
At 4, I collected my last pay, which ended up being more than I anticipated by a couple hundred dollars. So that was nice. I donated some stuff to the CTC, and went to dinner. I sat with Peter and Randy and talked about my arrangements. Then I came back to my room and got ready to work.
I went up to restring my guitar at 7:30. I played 8-9 and took a break. At 9:30 I played for a small crowd until 10:30, then I took a break. I sat and talked with Casey for a bit. Apparently she has a thing for me. So.. At least I know I can make attractive 27 year olds like me.
At 11, I got up to play again, and it got slammed again and I played until 1:10, with encore after encore. I made another 140 dollars in tips. Many people came up to me and told me I was the best entertainment on the ship. Some people were surprised about how I could sing so hard for so long multiple days in a row. Towards the end of the night, Thom (keyboard player for high rise) and the guitar player came out and watched. He came up after the show and said he was so amazed at how I sang the rock songs like rock songs but with an acoustic guitar, and he gave me kudos.
I packed up everything, and sold my digitech harmonizer. I gave Lewis my laptop stand, since I wouldn’t need it for awhile. Lewis and Elizabeth wished me good luck. I broke down everything, and went down to drop the stuff off in my room. When I got to the door, there was a letter on the handle. It read:

“Hi Stu,

As Derek is signing off tomorrow I just wanted to say once again what a pleasure it has been having him as the entertainment in the casino for the past five months.

He has a huge selection of songs and tailors what he plays depending on the crowd in the casino, changing his playlist to suit the age of the guests at the bar or how busy the casino is. He has also been extremely cooperative with the casino department, which is so important on this class of ship where the singer is located inside the casino. His music is never too loud or invasive, which is often a problem with this set up.

I would appreciate if you would pass along my comments to his supervisor in the office so they know what a great job he has done and hopefully we will see him back out on another ship once he finishes college.

He will be greatly missed by all of us in the casino.

Best Regards,
Gareth
“

Gareth is the Casino Manager. So that was a pretty awesome email to receive. It’s being sent to corporate, and Jessica thought I should see it.
I went to the crew bar, and saw Claire. She told me she left me a message on my phone to come down and say goodbye to her. So I sat and talked with her until I felt I needed to say good bye to the rest of the dealers. So I went up and said goodbye to everyone. A few told me they would come down and buy my cd before I left.
I came downstairs and called Claire, and asked if she would mail the remainder of my CDs home, which she said she would.
I dropped them off in her room and said my goodbyes and came back to my room to get a phone call from those individuals of the casino, and they wanted 3 cds signed. So I opened up three and signed them, and they came buy and picked them up.
I took a shower then, and then packed up the rest of my junk, and here I am.. 4:47... One hour and 13 minutes, and the moving out process begins... Next time I update, I should be home. But I will say this.. it feels so surreal that I’m leaving. I’m really going to miss it out here. Miss my friends and the great times I’ve had. This place was my home for nearly 6 months.. and I wouldn’t trade it for the world. If I can’t get any band stuff going on land, I would easily come back out here because it really is a great job. I loved it and I’m going to miss it.

So... that’s it for the cruise adventures on the Carnival Spirit! I’ll do a follow up update, after I get a few days away from the ship. But I want this blog only to reflect my cruise ship experience.. So I won’t be updating much after the next couple entires.

Another busy night.

2010-01-03T02:21:00.001-08:00

Well tonight was definitely slow starting. It seemed like a totally different cruise. Towards the end of my first set, Casie and Amy came and watched me play. On break I talked with Casie while Amy gambled in the casino. After about a half hour, I saw my Gyseppi (spelling is off terribly), and he gave me the other 400 dollars for the 12 string guitar. So now I’m all paid off. That money will be put into food lion gift cards for myself. That way I can’t spend it on stuff I don’t need, and I’ll have 3 months of food money. When I got up to play more, within 10 minutes my bar was slammed busy and everyone was singing along and screaming. I felt famous again! So I played 3 hours straight. Then I ended. It was rather funny, because I saw a guy hitting on Casie, and I didn’t know what she was like when she likes or dislikes someone, or shows interest in someone, but a guy sat beside her and ordered a drink, and tried some small talk to her. She answered... but then turned her back to him to limit the conversation. She’s very talkative to me.. So I guess she doesn’t dislike me.
After I finished, I went down to get some food and sat with Stu, and Pat. Randy joined, and the keyboardist from High Rise did. Then the rest of the band.. and our boss, Jess joined. I talked with the keyboardist about recording and school and such. He seemed very interested in all the stuff I had going.
On my way back to my room, I saw Pat talking with Jess, so I joined the little convo. Then talked with her about my plane ticket, in which there is no word yet when I’m leaving. But she said she’d let me know by Monday night, or ask them.
Now I’m in my room. Tired... worn out. Got work 4:45 and 9. I’m afraid a lot of the same people will be back, and I’ll be out of popular songs to listen too, since I played 80% of them last night. Oh well!

New Years!

2010-01-02T18:27:00.001-08:00

New Years dinner was pretty freaking awesome, if I do say so myself. I got there at 5:55, which is usually the best time to show up, because they open at 6, but that way you beat the lines. And boy am I ever glad I did that on this day. They had shrimp, crab cakes, filet mignon, and some other wonderful delicious things.
Claire came and sat with me, and then we were visited by Sarah. Though at first I was a little bummed. A little less than an hour before that, I had gotten an email from my ex-girlfriend, Mary. It had been about 6 months since we talked and since our relationship kind of flurried out into nothing. She apologized and wished me well. I wrote her back a non-fighting email, and just left it at that. But honestly.. I’d prefer never to hear from her again. Leave that in the past.. Chances are I’ll never run into her again, unless for some reason I’m in Nashville and she happens to be at a show. But honestly, I think she’d avoid that, so I wouldn’t have any problems with that.
So dinner got my spirits high again, and before I left, I saw my boss, Jessica who said she had no word yet on when I’m flying out, and that I probably won’t know until Monday or Tuesday... which kind of blows, just because I’d like to let my dad know ahead of time. I asked her about dress code tonight, and of course no one told us earlier, but it was formal. So.. I had 20 minutes to shower and get dressed in my suit and be up on deck to string up my guitar.
Sure enough I was ready by then. I strung up my guitar. Casie, and Amy came by and watched a bit. The crowd was OK... but nothing ecstatic like I was told it would be. I played through until about 11:40. I then took a break and went into the atrium where it was slammed busy, and the jazz band was playing. Then I went up on lido. When I got up there, my God, it was slammed busy. The band High Rise was playing and everyone was dancing and going crazy. Casie and Amy saw me immediately and pulled me over to dance until count down. Amy was pretty drunk. She was dancing with a 11 year old... I’m sure he felt like a lucky son of a @#%#@$. She’s a real pretty girl. Anyways, Weasley (assistant Cruise Director) got on the mic and got everyone up and excited. It felt like I was Time Square or something. People were standing all over the place.
The countdown was loud as hell, and everyone gave each other kisses. After which, I had to run back down to the casino to play again.
When I got down there, all the casino dealers and workers were walking around giving each other hugs, and kisses. I shook hands, gave hugs, and gave cheek kisses to a bunch of them. Really just a great group.
I got up on stage ready to play for an audience of 0. So I played a song, and when nobody showed up, I broke down and packed up.
I then went back up on lido and ran into Tagger. He told me he listened to my CD and loved it, and said I inspired him to really take the guitar seriously and just do it.
I ran into Clair and Sara and they wanted me to come down to the crew party. So we did. I saw Sopemla, Noochie, Nina, and many others. I didn’t stick around too much. I was pretty tired. So I went to my room and went to bed.

The next day, I woke up at 1:34. I went and got some food up on lido, and decided to just get online for the day. So I talked with Felicia for the majority of it, as I downloaded an update to a program of mine. I did a lot of stuff like that for probably 6 hours. Then I went to dinner for a quick bowl of cereal and went back to my room and watched some of the Office, and packed some more stuff. I hit the sack around 2.
This morning I woke up at 11:30 to a phone call from Noochie. She apologized for not being able to hang out this week, which really at this point is fine.. I’m more focused on going home. So I told her no worries. I then got up and worked on some 3d photos of some scenery things. Did a little internet, and watched more of the office. I then went to dinner and talked with Sara for a bit until I went to take a shower. Now I’m anticipating work. 4 gigs left.. Less than 4 days left!!

3 Sea days with a Port Manning San Diego Day...

2009-12-31T09:22:00.000-08:00

I know, it’s been awhile since the last update. But so little has happened that I can probably sum up the last 4 days in a page or two. The 3rd sea day was just a quiet day for me. I got up around 11, and watched movies, called my dad and apologized for not calling on Christmas for it was out of my power, and didn’t do much until the night. When I got to playing, it started off slow. Then it grew to be about 100 people at my bar screaming, dancing, singing along with me, girls screaming they loved me, and just having a great time. Unfortunately, because there were so many people from 10 o clock on, I didn’t stop to break, so I ended up playing 3 and a half hours straight.
I went to bed after so that I could rest my voice up. The next morning my voice was slightly sore, but not unusable, and it didn’t feel like I would have troubles that night. The day was quiet, and not much went on until the show. It never got as busy as the night before, but it was still active enough to keep me singing late. I went to bed soon after because the next day was San Diego day... even though I can’t get off, I can still make some phone calls.

So I woke up 8:45 and went up on deck two and called Nick, who got a promotion at work. So that’s great news. Then I called Dad, and talked to him for a bit. Christmas at home was good from what I hear. Everyone liked the calendars I had made from what I hear. I did a lot of browsing on the internet. I called Felicia and talked to her for a bit. In the middle of the conversation, I had remembered a song I had heard on CSI: NY when Train was performing on it, and the lead singer was a suspect. The song’s called “Hey, Soul Sister”. I had lunch with my boss, Jessica, Pat and Randy. Pat left soon after I got there, but then Jess, Randy and I had a big talk about working musicians on cruise ships and our reasons for wanting 4 hours over 5. So, Jessica said that we need to start clocking in every time we practice, look for music, setting up, boat drills and everything else. I suggested we get a sheet together for each person and write down exactly what we’re doing during those clock-ins so it doesn’t look like we’re just inflating hours. She said she had thought of that but was afraid we’d think it was too much. If the cause can possibly get us down to 4 hours again, then it’d be worth it. 4 hours is a lot more doable that 5.
Boat drill was the same ol’ routine, but it is my last drill which is very exciting! At our meeting, we had a powwow over things we liked and didn’t like on the ship. Then I went to my room and relaxed until I went to set up at 7. Within’ a few minutes my bar was busy and the casino was slammed. A couple girls sat in front of me and watched. Then a couple guys sat beside them. One of the guys yelled out I was really awesome. Then one of the girls told him to tell me I was cute too. Then I said over the mic.. it might be less gay if she just said it. That got the laughs going. I found out the girls’ names were Kasie (or Casie) and Amy. The guy that yelled out I was awesome was from Colorado. His name was Tag (short for Tagger.)
Amy bought a CD. She was pretty drunk. Kasie wasn’t as drunk as her by far. But I went and talked to them for a bit. They said they were going to the disco, after I finished, so I suggested that Amy “doesn’t fall down”. Then she turned around and said I was kind of a smart ass and she didn’t know if she liked that, and Casie said she really likes that. Then they left, and I went to eat in the staff mess and sat with Sopemla.
Afterwards, I went to my room to sleep!

The next day, I woke up at 1:40. I didn’t set any alarms so I could get exactly what sleep I needed, which was great because I didn’t feel tired at all, all day. I went up to eat on lido deck at 2. I got a phone card to exchange an order at Musiciansfriend. I had ordered a keyboard from them, but it wasn’t going to be in stock until after I went to college, so I called to exchange it for a bigger keyboard. The guy was real cool. He lowered the price by 10% and gave me free 2 day shipping. So that went well.
I must mention that I listened to “Hey, Soul Sister” 55 times since I’ve gotten it. I learned to play it yesterday. Took a couple hours to get down and comfortable with it (and for sure, I clocked in.) Apparently that song is on the radio or something, because a lot of people seem to know it.
I played that night for a bunch of people again, and Casie and Amy showed up about ten minutes before my break. On my way to talk to them, 4 people from San Diego asked me why I’m not playing in CA. They said I could easily sustain myself with gigs out here because I have so many songs and am such a good performer. I told them it’d have to be more of a guarantee of gigs, then just a few every once in awhile.
So I talked to the girls about last night. Amy didn’t seem to remember a lot of went down, which I predicted yesterday. I told her about the smart ass comment and the girls laughed. Casie went on to tell me she liked that because she always judges guys on how they react to Amy, and I guess I passed some sort of test? But regardless, I found out that Amy is an xray tech, and Casie waits tables... BUT she does have a couple degrees and a masters. She just can’t decide what she wants to do. Oh and the girls are 27, and 28.
I finished up around 12:15 last night. Which I needed to rest my voice because it was very sore. So I came back to my room and watched some family guy and was searching the internet. I did a Google search on myself to see if anything I didn’t know about had transpired with my music, and sure enough 24 pages in, I found a Yahoo question of someone asking what the music was on the Frank Frost Photography commercial. The lyrics are “You got your hair pulled back and a book in your hand.” Someone posted the answer “Where to Begin” by Derek Daisey. Which was neat all the same. THEN, I did more searching and apparently there were a few people looking for it. So I found the site for the company, and sure enough, my song was the main song playing on the site. So I thought that was interesting! And exciting. I also pray that I’m getting royalties on that song. It would be a nice surprise to get some come January from ASCAP and Pump Audio.
So I went to bed after... And I slept like crap. So bad, that I woke up at 9:30... and that’s really early. But I kept tossing and turning... So.. I decided to write this. So, now I’m caught up. 6 more days and I’m free! Looking forward to getting home.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Christmas

2009-12-26T10:55:00.001-08:00

Christmas morning, I got up at about 9:20 to a phone call from Noochie. She asked me to meet her outside of the crew mess with her two friends at 10. So I got my batteries and put them in my camera and put on some sun screen and made my way to the waiting area. I was first in line to wait for a tender, but naturally no one is ever on time, so when the 10 people behind me showed up, I let them ahead to get on the tender.
As they left, Noochie showed up. Then we waited for her friends, who took another 15 minutes. Once they showed up, we took the tender into Ixtapa.
Once set foot on land, we got a taxi to a beautiful beach. Once we got there, we found a restaurant to eat at. We ordered some guacamole, fish, shrimp.
Then we rode on a sailboat for an hour around the water. It was absolutely gorgeous.
Afterwards, we came back to the ship, and I went to call my family for Christmas... And of course... of all the days, the phones were down... and won’t be fixed until at least the next day. So I got online and talked with Felicia.
I went to dinner soon after, which had a fancy set up, much like thanks giving. Though the food wasn’t as good, there was fried shrimp, and free wine, and soft drinks. As I was eating, Aaron came and sat with me. Then Kerry, then Clair, and then Rebecca (a singer from Raleigh, NC.) I’ve seen her a bit but never really talked to her. She was pretty cool. So I talked with everyone until about 7:30. Then I ran quickly to get strings and restring my guitar.
I played as many known songs as I could, but unfortunately.. no one sat at the bar. I know a lot of people were interested because I heard claps all over the casino and lots of the people giving me thumbs up. Just no straight bar sitters.
I finished up around 12 and decided to go to the christmas party. I wasn’t going too but since the phones weren’t working, I figured, I might as well get some good food. I was the second person to arrive. So I waited for some people. Eventually all the entertainment staff showed up and it ended up being a good time. I got some sushi and stuff. Very delicious. At one point during the night, Stu brought my CD with him, and he made the announcement that I had had one, and that it was awesome, and he played it. Lots of people were rather shocked. I guess not many people knew what I was capable of. So lots of people told me they wanted to buy it before I leave.
While I was sitting and talking with Sara and Claire, Claire told me Sara asked her secret santa to get her a Derek Daisey CD, which I thought was neat. The person got her a book... But still.
After the party, which I will admit was fun, and I’m glad I went, I came to my room and went to bed.

9 am, I woke up and went up to get a hair cut. Rebecca, another girl by the same name, was there waiting for me. She was in my SCC class. As she was cutting it, she was trying to get rid of all the blotched blonde in my hair. She asked if she could recolor it darker a little later in the day, so she cut it and got it really thin for me. I’m very pleased this time around. I got to play at 4:45 to 5:45... So, until then!!

Christmas Eve.. Alone..

2009-12-25T00:38:00.000-08:00

Last night was better than the last couple days. People seemed to care I was there. And I got a bit of requests. I managed to do “Best of You” by the Foo Fighters... which was hard... and it hurt. I’ll probably play it one more time next week. Stu came by around 11 and watched and talked with some people. He talked about my album a lot hinting if they tipped 10 dollars, they could get one for free (at least he’s trying to help me out.)
After my gig, I went to get some yogurt, and I sat with Sopemla. She asked me about my siblings and what they’re doing for christmas. She told me about hers. Then she went to call them for Christmas. I went to my room and got ready to lay down and I got a phone call from Noochie. She asked how I was and wanted to know if I wanted to come along with her and a couple friends to Ixtapa. I said sure, since I hadn’t step foot there and most people tell me it’s the best of the three ports. So we talked about her job and mine and all that. She had a headache but she said she wish we talked more when class started versus the end of class. Which, we really didn’t start talking until the last week because that’s when I really started noticing her fall asleep in class. After we hung up, I watched the Bucketlist and went to bed.

Today, I got up at around 11. On my own. That’s pretty early for me. So I sat up and checked the internet stuff. Then I got dressed and ready and went out for lunch. I was pretty determined to not be hassled by taxi drivers so I walked intently through them ignoring most of them. A couple were quite abrasive. I just kept going. But the guy, Epi, who took me to the flea market a couple weeks ago caught up, and even though I said I knew where I was going, and I only had enough money for lunch, he walked along anyways... and sat at my table...and ordered a beer on my tab... And expected a tip for coming along. Which was kind of annoying because I made it relatively clear I didn’t need any help. I gotta say I’m quite happy I’m leaving Mexico... It’s just too abrasive for me.. And I don’t like the fact the most places don’t have set prices. Everything is designed to be haggled for... and I hate that crap.
So I came back to the ship, and and started playing Civilization 4.... and I pretty much played that, and went to a small dinner, and came back and played more and more and more... until 12 am. So roughly 8 hours of the game. It sucks you in like you wouldn’t believe. But after I beat my game, I won’t want to play it anymore.
I went to get some yogurt and came back to my room... And that’s about all that’s going on.Gotta wait on Noochie’s call tomorrow.

Tomorrow’s Christmas! So Merry Christmas! This will be my first away from my family.. but I guess I should get used to that. Especially if I’m going to be a rock star. ;-)

My Last San Diego Day... and two more sea days

2009-12-23T16:51:00.000-08:00

San Diego day was about as eventful as last weeks. I got up early and got showered and dressed to go into town. I lifted my very heavy boxes and took them to the crew bar as I waited for the others that were leaving. After a few minutes, Glenn showed, a couple other guys, and Marcus. I gave Marcus a CD to listen to and show around to people in San Francisco. Never know when I need to find my way over there. He told us we didn’t have to wait in the crew bar, so he walked us up right outside the gate. He explained they really only have us go in the crew bar to get our passports. But American’s get to hold their passports, so there’s no point in waiting.
I balanced the boxes on top of a poll against the wall. I waited. Marcus offered to hold one of the boxes for me as we were getting off, so I handed it to him. Unfortunately they asked for people only shipping stuff to come forward first, so I had to take the very heavy box back. But I was first in line for xray, so I went by really fast, and found myself a taxi. As I was about to get in, I heard someone yell my name, and I saw Kelly with Leah as they were coming out of the terminal. I waved, and got in the car, and took the ride to the UPS store.
When I got in, I plopped the boxes on the counter, and they were weighed and re-taped a bit. But it only cost 95 dollars to ship everything. Significantly less than shipping the 491 dollars worth of stuff last week.
I got my phone out to call Nick, who didn’t answer, so I called my dad and talked to him for a bit about christmas. He received my guitars safe, and my other stuff, so that was good to hear. Unfortunately, the transmission in the explorer went out again (which proves Ford just sucks at making vehicles,) so that makes christmas a little tight. Not a lot of room to get the girls in the other truck and stuff. Hopefully they can get it fixed soon.
After I talked to him, Nick called back we talked. Talked about the band thing, and how him working at this store wasn’t really putting him up for manager and he was getting quite frustrated with them.
After that talk, I did my internet stuff at Starbucks, and updated a ton of things. I talked to Marina about what she was doing in Russia, and what I need to get going on my side o things. But with me going back to school, it’s hard to do a lot of the things I NEED to do. So my plan of action now is to just get a band together and try to play out, while getting an internet presence together. She suggests I go to NYC, which is a good idea, but with no money after college, that will be hard to do.
When I left Starbucks, I got a quick lunch, and saw a girl was playing guitar and piano outside in the mall. So I sat and watched her. She had a great voice and a cute look to her. So I went up and bought her CD, and gave her mine, and I talked to her mom for a bit. The girl’s name was Jessica Lerner. Jessica came over and talked to me, and signed her CD and asked if I’d sign mine, which I did. They asked what I was doing all the way out there, and I told them about the ship and stuff.. And college.
I wished her luck, and went to the music store to get guitar strings. Luke gave me a call back from when I called him earlier. We talked about the living situation. As far as he knew, we wouldn’t need couches, and all that. I would just need the bare necessities. We plan on making the third bedroom a studio. He’s got a girlfriend now, which is cool. He also said he likes to cook, so we’ll be definitely buying groceries for the house. I’d prefer to get a lot of good foods versus the fatty stuff. He said he’d take some pictures and give me everything I need to know in the coming days. I also talked to him about the project album, and doing the band thing with Nick and I. He said he was into the idea, so we’ll just need to get a drummer and a keyboardist and we should be good to go.
When I got to the music store, I bought 7 packs which gives me 12 boxes for the rest of my contract. As long as each box lasts a minimum of 2 nights, I’ll be fine and won’t have to buy anymore.
On my way back to the ship, I called Felicia and talked with her for an hour and a half or so combined. I got a phone call from Matt, a passenger from our first rivera cruise, who wanted to come pick up a couple CDs, so I met him outside the ship at around 3 and passed ‘em off. He’s the cop who used to be a drill sergeant and lost a lot of his voice.
I got on the ship and prepared for boat drill. We were given new vests to wear instead of the flaming gay green hats. Lots of kids running around, that’s for sure.
I had a meeting afterwards, which just went over the christmas stuff. Jessica passed us all a schedule. Something I hadn’t seen since my 2nd week on the ship. She’s really doing a good job as MD. She takes her job very seriously and really helps out.
I went up to the third floor, and browsed more internet stuff on my iphone. Then I called up Nick and had an idea for him and Katrina to move in the house with us, and then it could be like a band house, and we could work together most nights and stuff. Nick was very intrigued with the idea. He could easily transfer to Radio Shack, and right now Katrina doesn’t have a job. He called her to talk, but they’re going to have a more in depth conversation.
After the convo, I went and got some strings and restrung my guitar for the gig. I started playing for a few onlookers. But after the first set, I didn’t really have anyone the rest of the night and was very much dead.
I went to my room to see I had a message. It was from Jessica sending out a group message to all the musicians that we had cabin inspections in the morning. All my surge protector stuff was mailed home, so that was fine by me.

So I went to bed around 2 and woke up at 12. I went and got lunch, which ended up being Raisin Bran. It was good. Came back to my room and I started fooling with some song ideas, and clearing up my hard drive, and deleting unneeded stuff until cabin inspection which was a total of ten seconds. Since all my stuff was gone they didn’t have to look real hard for stuff. Then I got a set list together to send to Luke. Just an idea of some stuff. Maybe get some more input.
Had dinner, which was decent, and then got ready and dressed in my suit. Went up to play my gig. Though some people were watching, I got nearly 0 claps. It was quite dead. I was done by 12:30, and I went and ate with Randy in the crew mess. Pat joined, and soon after, Peter, the piano bar guy joined. We talked about the music business a bit. Randy suggested I went to NYC for the rock scene. Pat said Austin, Texas is great for original stuff and can really get stuff going with live. So... there’s some more ideas. From what I’m told, the new Hotel Director is kind of mean and picky. Our last one, Keith was a nice guy. I throughly enjoyed having him as a HD.
I came back to my room and watched some family guy until I fell asleep.

I woke up this afternoon at about 12:45 (but in all fairness, clocks went forward and hour.) I got online and checked some stuff. Amanda’s been entering me in a bunch of different things, from North by Northeast, songwriting competitions, and others.
I watched some more Family Guy until about 2 and then I went and ate on Lido Deck. The food was good. Enjoyed the Banana Creme pie. I came down and started work on another song. I have a horrible case of writers block write now. Nothing seems relevant to me, and nothing’s inspiring me so I’m stuck. I write 2 or 3 versus and then I don’t like where it’s going and get demotivated with it, and put it away. So.. that kinda sucks.
Anyways, tomorrow’s my day off. I intend to take full advantage of it. So.. until then!

5 month overview... oh and the my daily things..

2009-12-20T15:55:00.000-08:00

(Finishing yesterday's post

Dinner was essentially a cheeseburger and fries for me. I came back to my room and got showered up and got in my suit and went to work. I played a lot of oldies early on, but it was rather dead. At about 11, I had a full bar for about a half hour, with people dancing and such. It was a good time. Then it died at around 12:15 and that was it. Kelly was going to sneak me some lobster.. but they didn’t have any today. We were supposed to hang out but they never came back after I was done.
Some drunk woman started hitting on me. She was 35 and married. Her husband was sick on the ship, so he was sleeping. She was absolutely drunk. She kept telling me how cute I was, and how my name tag didn’t mean anything to her.... Which I guess she was referring to doing something. I wouldn’t break the rules for a drunk woman. Nor a married woman... So, I told the bar tender to stop serving her drinks. She was beyond drunk, and I snuck out of there.
I went to the crew mess and sat with Pat and Randy and it turned out that woman was hitting on Pat earlier in the night. Someone should let her husband know...
After dinner, I came to my room and passed out.

I woke up at 12, and went to lunch which ended up being frosted flakes for me. On my way out, I saw Noochie. I didn’t see her last night at the crew mess, and I asked where she was. She said she was there, and she saw my suit and blue shirt... She told me she’s trying to get promoted to MSA, so she’s been taking a class. I told her we had to finish our movie soon, and then I went to the CTC office and browsed Wikipedia. I looked up Foo Fighters, Jewel, Glen Ballard, Alannis Morisette and others just to check out where they got started and stuff. Glenn saw me and came in and talked for a bit.
Then I got online, and Felicia was on, so I tried to talk to her through the glichy internet. I’ll get to see her in 25 days! She’s going on tour with the singers from the 7th to the 14th.. So, she won’t be back until the second day of classes... or third day..
Looking forward to getting home! 17 more days!

I hadn’t done my 4th month review of the job.. and since we’re coming on the 5th month, I’ll just do my summary thus far. Well, it is still a great job, to do what I like to do, and have little responsibilities outside of what I do. I do understand what the last casino soloist, Doug meant. He told me he was too a point where he really didn’t care about the people he was playing for anymore. He just wanted to do his job and go home. Over the last month, I almost look forward to not having people, because I can relax a little bit. But when I do have a lot of people, I also swing into that state of mind and thoroughly enjoy having people. I might just be checked out because it’s so close to Christmas. I could do this job again for sure with no problems, but I do want to try to get everything going on land. Get a band and just start playing out. Another reason I feel I’m kinda checked out is, that I can’t call home every time I’m in any port. I have to wait until San Diego. In Alaska, I could call more days than not, and Hawaii, I could call every day. That seclusion can take its toll and make ya feel a little alienated. So I think, if I’m to get on another ship, I’ll shoot for an itenerary where there are more days in the US. I was told about the Paradise and how it does 4 day booze cruises in America.. So, that might be something to shoot for if I were to come back.
Anyways, I gotta go to the MSA and get a shipping piece of paper for my boxes. Tomorrow is San Diego day, which will be the last day I get to enjoy it. The following week, I have Port Manning. So I’ll be making phone calls off the ship. Luckily, I have my iphone to browse the internet for free*. So... until next time!

*I pay a monthly payment... so it’s not free in the least.

An Orignal Hour of Derek Daisey?

2009-12-19T16:08:00.001-08:00

Yesterday was... eh. I woke up at 10 for the little boat drill thing. The 4th week in a row, which kinda sucks. I went to my room afterward and worked more on the cartoon. Around 2, I decided I needed to go out and get a big cardboard box for my speakers and recording equipment. So I got off the ship. As I was leaving, I saw Glenn coming back. So I told him what I was doing and he said I should just pick some up at garbage at the ship.
So I got back on the ship and went to the garbage room and picked up a couple smaller boxes... I took them back to my room and combined them to make a larger box, and started packaging the speakers, my portabooth thing, microphones, and a couple more movies.
I didn’t have any tape, so I had to put the box down on the floor so the bottom wouldn’t fall out. I got ready and went up to play for Lido Deck. It was fairly dead and unresponsive. I went down to eat some dinner, and sat with the comedian for the day, Marcus Raymond. He’s a nice guy. He told me he really enjoyed my songs earlier, and told me he was from San Francisco. He told me if I ever come out there to get in touch with him, and he’ll introduce me to some people. So that was cool.
I went and saw his show, and it was real funny. Prop comedy. But he did a good job with it. Stu saw me in the audience (in the back) and he came over and told me he loved my album, especially “Words You Bleed.”
As I was leaving I saw my bartender, Elizabeth serving drinks, and I went over and said hi, and she told me she heard some of my songs from a woman that bought my CD (the woman who worked for Bon Jovi’s guitar player). She told me I was unbelievable and never gives compliments unless they’re deserving, and we ended up talking about what I’m planning on doing.
Afterwards, I went back to my room for a few minutes. Then headed back up to my 9 o clock gig and played for about an hour and a half for Kelly, Leah, Jason and some others. Then I took my break. When I came back, it was DEAD... I fooled with the guitar for 45 minutes... No one was really paying attention, so I took another break.. and waited for 40 minutes for people to show... But no one did, so I left early. As I was waiting though, I talked with Elizabeth a bit. She’s almost 34, and has quite a mouth on her (cuss word wise..) But real nice, none the less.
I went to the crew mess, and got some yams... I think... and sat with Sopemla. Noochie came over and said hi. She was having a bad day she said.. Not sure why. But afterwards, I went back to my room and started looking at my SNES games on my backup hard drive. A knock came at the door.. I was in my underwear... but afraid the person would leave quickly, I grabbed my shorts and ran to the door and opened it half way. It was Noochie. Unfortunately I had the pants in the hand the door was open over, so she saw them. She told me to put my pants on. So I did and let her in. We ended up watching half of “Yes Man,” and she was suddenly tired, and got up and left. So I went back to the game thing, until I was tired, and I went to bed.

I woke up this morning at 11:50. I went to eat lunch. Stu was there, and he came and sat with me. He told me he had an idea of giving me like an original’s hour in the piano bar, where I do all of my songs and it’s promoted in the capper. I agreed to it, but I only have 2 cruises left. A shame we didn’t think of it earlier.
I came back to my room and saw my room steward, and I asked if I could borrow some tape to tape my package. He gave me duct tape. So I went to town wrapping this stuff up. I probably used half the tape given to me. Because it take a lot of tape to tape two boxes together and shut.
Afterwards I went to put money on my sail and sign card so I could get some coffee. Apparently I owed 1.70 and the only way to unlock my card was if I put 30 dollars on it plus pay 1.70... So... I just paid the 1.70, and I won’t be getting anymore snack foods.
As I came back to my room, I realized I didn’t have my room card, so I called room service. I waited nearly 20 minutes... and they still hadn’t come. My room steward saw me and let me in. 10 minutes later, room service showed up, slightly annoyed I was already in my room.
I just listened to music and have been anticipating dinner. I only had yogurt for lunch... so I’m STARVING!!!!!!

Massages and Paradise

2009-12-17T23:29:00.001-08:00

Today, I got up at 8:30. My body was very confused why I was doing such a thing, but I forced myself too, and I got my sunscreen on, and set my phone clock to the right time. I made my way outside, and met up with Kelly and Leah. Jason had to hang with his family for awhile. So we all got a little van that took us to the Paradise Beach. We got a table with chairs for 6 bucks. Immediately, I ordered a coke and guacamole.
One of the thousand people that was trying to sell us stuff sold me some cool sunglasses. I ate up the guacamole. Then I ordered some lobster and steak, which was pretty delicious.
Then I got a massage from a girl that came by. She was 22.. that’s about all I learned. But she did the whole body for me. I laid down on a lawn chair and she went about it for about 40 minutes.
Afterwards, I got some oysters and eventually got more guacamole. Jason and his family showed up a little later and they hung out with us at the beach until about 2. Then Kelly, Leah and I took a taxi back to the ship. I separated from them, and went back to my room and wrote a song for a customer.
After I recorded it, I took a nap for about an hour, and then went and got dinner. Then I started work on another song order, and finished that up by about 12. Now I’m going to do a template order real quick and go to bed. I have some stupid boat drill tomorrow...

Late nights, cartoons, Bon Jovi assistants...

2009-12-17T01:13:00.000-08:00

1 am, December 16th

Today, after writing the blog, I went to lido deck and got some japanese food. Then got some banana creme pie. Afterwards, I spent more time on recording my voice parts for the cartoon, and put together a couple scenes. I went to eat dinner, which was steak and fried cheese. I was feeling kind of sick so I didn’t eat too much. Came back to my room and took a shower and went to work.
As I played, a lady called me over and told me used to be the personal assistant of the guitar player for Bon Jovi. She said she scouts for musicians for some of her friends that are in record labels and stuff. She bought an album and said she would send my stuff to her people.
After playing, went to eat pizza with Kelly, Leah, and Jason. Afterwards, came back to my room to go to sleep!

December 17th
Today, I woke up at 12, and found that my financial aid should cover all my schooling, and I should be set on that front. I went up and got lunch on Lido with Glenn and we talked about the things he could be doing, and things I'd be doing. Then I went to my room to work on my cartoon until 6. I had dinner and then came back to my room and took a shower. Then I went up to meet the friends for sushi at 7. Except they didn't show up. So.. a little annoyed, I went and restrung my guitar.
Before the start of my second set, Kelly came with Jason and she apologized saying she got so drunk in Ixtapa that she was just too sick to come, and she was going back to sleep. But we made plans to meet as a group tomorrow at 9 in Acapulco.
I got a terrible migraine, but I played through. Stu came by and watched me play and brought some people.
After my set, I went over and talked with him about the commercial thing on my album. He said he figured I didn't have it, and he didn't want to say anything unless corporate really forced.. Which since they were... He apologized for the whole mess.. and then bought a cd. Ha.
He told me if I EVER want to come back, to email him and he'll get me on his ship. He said it would be a sad day when I left. So, that was real cool of him. I asked him if he'd be willing to fill out an internship paper for me, if my school allowed it, and he said he would write me anything I needed for that.
After the gig, I went down to the crew mess and saw Noochie. There was no good food so she made me some thai food. Very spicy, but very good. Then she told me the song I wrote for her always makes her smile and puts her in a good mood. Which was nice to hear. She said she'd be coming to NC in April, so I said she'd definitely have to keep in touch.
Now I'm in my room!! Getting up in 6 hours!

4 days passed... still going!

2009-12-15T12:49:00.000-08:00

Ugh, I’ve been getting behind on updating this thing. Not because I don’t care. Just lack of time. I’m working on a couple little projects, and I devote a lot of my free time to them. OK! So, a bit has come to play since I last updated in Manzinillo.
The third sea day, I woke up late like I have been lately, and tried writing lyrics to the rock song. I really fought hard to do that and get it done. I finished a set, but just wasn’t happy with it, so I put it aside, and decided to start packing my ps3, movies, cds, and miscellaneous things. So I got the Beatles Rockband Box, and pulled it out and started packing. Didn’t take too long. Got everything packed in there and put away.
After I finished that, I called Rosetta Stone about getting a refund. Luckily it was a no hassle kind of phone call, and they just gave me an address to send it to, and that was about it.
I found out I was “reentered” into Catawba, and Financial Aid would send me a packet early next week.
I called Felicia, and talked to her with the rest of the phone card. Afterwards, I went to dinner, and played a rather quiet night, and finished up a little after 12. I saw Glenn walking around all dressed up. Apparently he was meeting up with someone who ended up not coming cuz her kid was sick, so he and I talked and went to the crew mess until bed. Then we went our separate ways.

Last sea day, I woke up late, and managed to find my room steward, and asked for some tape, which he supplied and I taped up my box and such. I continued to look over my rock song.. Just hitting blanks left and right. No real subject to talk about. I did a lot of loungin’ around until dinner. When I was there, I was eating with Chris and asked him about the process of shipping a big box. He said I needed to fill out a form i got from MSA (Which closed for the day) and go through customs. Also.. we’d be in town sunday, I felt there was almost no hope to send the box home. Next week is my last chance to do so because the following week.. my last week.. I have port manning.
So slightly defeated I started walking back towards my room, but as I walked by CTC, I saw one of the head MSA people. So I asked him what I could do. He questioned how I would mail something home on a sunday, but he told me to just come in the morning and he’ll get me a form.
I went back to my room and got online to see if there were any places in the immediate area that might be open. I saw there was a UPS Store three blocks away. So I check online, and sure enough they were open 9-3 on sundays.
So I showered and got ready for my last night of playing. The crowd was really still until about 12, when people decided to show up because I was the last real performer working. It was fun. I sold 3 CDs, and I sat with a group that had been to see me times before. They all said I was the best on the ship by far, and I deserve to be in a better place. They were all real nice. One guy gave me a $15 giftcard to starbucks, which for those that have been reading, I go there once a week, so that should take care of the rest of my purchases there.
After all that, I went back to my room to sleep for the busy morning.

San Diego Day! I woke up at 8 and got dressed, and walked around impatiently until 8:30. The guy was there, and he printed off my form and told me to bring my stuff to the crew bar. When I got there, there were a bunch of people signing off. Chris and his girlfriend, Gabe, Sasima, Marina (the first girl I met on the ship) and a few others. We were supposed to be there at 9, but of course 9 means 9:25 on the ship. No one seems to have any time discipline. The handle to my box broke, so I had to put my es-335 on top of it and pick the box up from the floor horizontally. And it was heavy. When I got off the ship, I put it on the ground and just slid it to the xrays. Everything went through quick and painless, and I managed to find a taxi. The guy took me 3 blocks to the store, and dropped me off (like most taxis do.) As I was walking towards the door, I heard a voice hassling me about buying the Beatles rockband. I just thought it was some homeless guy who wanted money (which really wouldn’t be hard to believe, if you look around town. It was Glenn though. He helped me get into the place and told me another idea he had for our cartoon.
So, I filled out the paper work and got everything weighed and shipped, and I was reminded why I never want to pay to package something at a UPS Store. It cost me 491 dollars to mail 2 guitars, a box of stuff, and Rosetta Stone. The guitars cost 200 each to package and ship. I’m debating taking my Les Paul Robot on the plane with me, because even overages would only be 125 to get it on the plane. I’d save 75 bucks just like that. The guy told me it wouldn’t cost less than 200 to ship it... So... what’s the point.
Afterwards, I called Nick and we talked about the band thing, life and all that. He’s doing well. He really wants to be promoted to manager by January. Hopefully he achieves that.
Went to Starbucks, and got online and did my updating and all that. Nick called back and I got lunch and finished up that convo. Afterwards, I called my Dad, and told him what to be expecting in the mail. He told me Jenn and Him would drive down with me and bring some furniture so I wouldn’t have to go out and buy any for Christmas, which would be just fine for me. Giving me a bed and a couple couches and a futon would save me close to a thousand bucks.
Afterwards, I called Felicia and we talked for a good hour or so. I got on the ship to drop some stuff off. As I was coming down my hall, I saw Peter talking with a red head woman. Her name is Jessica, and she is my new MD. She seemed nice enough.
After boat drill and the meeting, I came upstairs to do more iphone internet before it’s out of use for another 8 days. Glenn walked by with his drums to set up. He told me this real nasty Music Director that everyone hates finally quit, in necessity because he probably would have been fired. My boss Jessica became MD just so she didn’t have to work for this man again. So at least I’m safe of that, in case I ever come back.
Went to my room and got dressed up and went to dinner. Sat and ate with Glenn. As I was leaving, bumped into Jessica, and she asked if the food was any good. So I told her the truth, and she didn’t seem surprised.
I started playing for a small but interested crowd. Eventually my return friend, Kelly showed up with her friend, Lea. They watched for a bit and went to dinner. They came back after my break and requested a few songs off the album. When they left for the show, the audience all quietly said she liked me a lot. To which I replied, nothing was going to happen. I don’t want to lose my job. And other things are developing on land, and I’d rather not complicate that.
It was DEAD by 12, so I broke down and went to my room and started messing with some lyric ideas. Eventually fell asleep.

The next morning, I was woken up by 10 announcements.. first quiet, then very loud in repeat every five minutes. Guest Services kept paging someone who apparently was missing. Turns out the guy was passed out in a girls room. He didn’t hear any of the announcements. A lot of crew and I would have liked to have dumped him overboard...
I started working on my cartoon. Went to lunch and talked with Randy about computers. Then went back to the cartoon, watching Seinfeld until 6ish, then went to dinner. Glenn and I started eating, then Jessica and Peter joined us. Jess has sort of a New Jersian accent, but she’s from Rhode Island. I kinda made the little nudge that her and I are from the 2 smallest states in the country. She has to play finger bass on the keyboard for the band since there is no bass player on the ship.. or guitar player... for the big band. She’s a trombone player for her main instrument.
After dinner, got dressed up in the suit and went played my set. There was a good hour where my bar was full, and people were diggin’ the music. Sold a CD to these brothers, Jason and Cody. Kelly and Lea watched as well. We ended up all chatting and going up for pizza and talking about various young adult things until 4:30 am (with the clock 1 hour forward change.)
I came back to my room and passed out.

This morning, I woke up at 12, and started writing this. I got a knock at the door at about 1:35, and it was Peter. He asked if he could talk to me for a second. He told me that word came in from the office in Miami that people without approved CDs,(CD’s without a commercial) must seize to sell CDs. He asked if I had my papers, and I told him no, and he said I had to stop. But then he asked had I tried, which I told him, I mailed in my CD, to get approved and was told I’d be given a commercial, but never got one and after awhile, it proved to be unprofitable to go make CDs that late in my contract, so I just started selling these. He said they really dropped the ball on the and he’d go see what he can do. But honestly... this late in the contract.. it’s what ever.. I’ll stop putting it out, but if people tip me high enough, I’ll give them one. So then I’m never really selling them. It’s like a gift.

Anyways... I’m going to go eat on Lido deck.

27 days to go

2009-12-11T01:15:00.000-08:00

Today was ok. I was woken up for the punishment boat drill since so many people missed the last one. I hadn’t slept very much, so I had a headache and felt sick. After the drill, I went to my room, and just went back to sleep until 3:30. Then I got up and took a shower, and went and got set up on Lido deck for my “sail-away concert.” Randy, one of the other soloists, came over and we talked for a few minutes just about the gig itself, and then Cha-Cha showed up to help for soundcheck.
As she was setting up, I learned that she was signing off in 10 days. Since she’s pregnant she’s only allowed to work until then. Which kinda blows, because she, like the rest of my friends will be leaving and I’ll really have no one left, except the occasional conversation with Sopemla (Cafe’ barista), Noochie, Katerina and Claire. All my guy friends will be gone. Most of these girls I see in passing. So it’s going to be a lonely 27 days.
So I did my show to a pretty awesome receptive crowd. My voice was feeling great, and I was hitting everything with ease. I can only hope that my voice stays this way. I’m not sure why it’s doing so well. I switched teas that I’ve been drinking, and since then things have been getting better. But we’ll see.
After the show, I ate dinner with Glenn and Chris (whose leaving for another ship to be Music Director. Lucky for him, his girlfriend gets to go along too, and since he has the big bed room, she gets to live with him, no questions asked.) Glenn told me some more ideas he had about getting off the ship. He has a lot of options in the air, but he doesn’t really have a clue which one’s actually going to work for him,
After dinner, I came to my room and watched Beavis and Butthead, while I worked on the cartoon a bit.
Then I went upstairs to get set up in the casino. It was a very quiet crowd all night. During breaks I played darts with other casino dealers... Lost two very close games. But I’m holding my own for playing only a second time.
During the gig, I saw Iryna, who seemed very cold and didn’t want to talk to me in the least. So I came up behind her and told her goodbye, and then she very defensively said why should she say bye when I haven’t said hello when I passed her or made any attempts to talk to her. Which was true. But only because I thought she was mad at me from the other day when I asked her if she was in a bad mood and she snapped at me. When people snap, I give up trying to be nice for a few days. But to be fair, she never said hello or anything to me when I passed either, so I feel this is mutually our faults. But regardless, I said “I’m Sorry, and Hello”. She said “it’s too late for hello” and walked away. The bartender Solvia was listening, and he said she’s been in a bad mood tonight. I really hate drama. This will be the first I’ve experienced it out here. But she transfers to another ship in two days to be with her boyfriend, so it won’t really weigh on me much longer.
Now I’m in my room. Gonna check tomorrows capper to see when I’m playing!

Under a month left to go!

2009-12-10T00:43:00.001-08:00

The last couple of days have been somewhat uneventful. This cruise has a few people that care about the music I play but most of them are gone by 12:30. The last sea day before Acapulco, I had strange dreams and ended up sleeping away most of the day. I played my music, and messed with my loop pedal a lot. There were a lot of dead spots through out the performance, so I decided to stop singing to save my voice. I can’t get in trouble for it or anything. All the other guys do that. They just have full on tracks. The night ended at 12:45, and I went down to my room and got to sleep because I had a radio interview in the morning. Though I did check my facebook and found my dearest friend, Marina was denied a visa to come stateside for a year...

The alarm goes off at 8:30, and I just start watching The Office while I wait for my phone call. At around 9:45 I was concerned because there was no call, so I got online, and sure enough three emails from Amanda were waiting for me about how they couldn’t get through and they needed me to call them. So I did, but unfortunately the signal was so bad, that we had to postpone it until the next day. So, I hung out for awhile, and eventually called Felicia and talked with her for a bit.
After the conversation, I went out to Acapulco for some food. Got a couple gifts along the way. Went to a flea market where they give you free coke,beer, water, and other drinks. This guy Epi, showed me around.
After getting what I got, I went to the restaurant I ate at when I had lunch with Eric, Thomas and Claire last. I got some guacamole dip and some steak tacos. Very delicious.
Then I came back to the ship and got online and talked with a few friends for awhile.
Once I got off the internet, I decided to be productive, so I picked up the elctric guitar and started fooling around, coming up with a pretty neat guitar riff. 5 hours later, i had the whole song tracked minus words. I was very pleased with it. Couldn’t write lyrics so I went to bed since I had an interview the next morning... again.

I woke up at 8:30 and listened to the song again and started writing lyrics. I checked the internet several times to make sure there were no problems. Turns out it would be too expensive for them to call me, so I called them. The interview went over well, and it should be played soon. We talked about my album, crusin’, and other various things.
Then I continued working on the song.. until I was getting used to everything, so I turned it off and played some Sims 3 until a knock came at my door. It was Glenn ready to track his voice parts for our cartoon, so we did that. Went over well.
Then I ordered personal desk calendars for my family with some of my pictures in them.
During one of my breaks at my gig, I played darts with someone for the first time in my life, and I started off terribly. But sure enough it was neck and neck at the end, and I hit a bullseye and won!
After the gig, which was awesome, until after my last break. No one was there... I made 55 bucks in tips though. Neat stuff. I went to the crew party upstairs and talked with some friends like my boss Peter, Aaron, Noochie, Natalia, and Carrie.
Now I’m here! In my room! Watching the office!

A call from an old friend

2009-12-07T15:23:00.000-08:00

San Diego day was a good day. I got up around 8 to see if I could get off earlier than 9, which I could.. but not quite as early as 8. As I waited, I got a phone call from Nick. We hadn’t talked since before black friday, so he had a lot to fill me in on.
Afterwards, I went to Starbucks and caught up with Amanda about the radio interview, got the rest of the office season. After a bit of that, I went up and got some lunch (sushi) and called my dad.
Afterwards, I went to Sam Goody, and called Felicia while I browsed the good prices. I managed to get The Beavis and Butthead collection for free for getting the Office season two. I also got the Kings of Leon album.
As I went to the music store to get some strings, I got a phone call from my old high school friend, Jimmie Allen. He called to ask to see if I wanted to fill his opening slot on his radio tour. Unfortunately I’m on the ship so I had to decline. But as we talked, he filled me in on what’s going on in his life, and he invited me to his place in Nashville to meet some of the people he knows. He’s also a songwriter. He just released his new single on the radio which just cracked the top 200 on the radio.
After I got off the phone, went back to the ship, and did the boat drill, watched some B & BH and got ready for the show.
When I got up to the casino, it was EMPTY.. I was quite confused. But found it was because someone got really sick and the ship had to turn around and drop someone off back at San Diego. So people didn’t really start showing up until 9:30ish.
After a quiet night, I went to my room and went to sleep.

THE PHONE RINGS, and I jump up scared I over slept or something terrible happened. As I answer the phone, I hear a girl’s voice and it was Noochie. She was just calling to say goodnight. She appologised for waking me up, but it was nice of her all the same. I went back to sleep and I was out.

I woke up at 11, and decided I needed to really work on the next song order, so I got working on it, wrote and recorded it. Afterwards, I went and got dinner, then came back to my room to shower. Afterwards, I went up and played my set. Not too many people, so I did a lot of loop pedaling.
Once the gig was over, I came back to the room to watch Beavis and Butthead Do America. And then sleep.

Not much going on.

2009-12-04T13:57:00.000-08:00

The last few days have been rather dull. The gigs have been rather dead, though I have managed to meet a few cool fans. A couple days ago, I ended up playing probably over an hour of my music straight. I gave a lot of my new stuff a chance, and wanted to test out the songs. I tested out stuff I hadn’t played in a few months, to stuff I’ve never tried live. I played “Fall”, “Fly Away Girl”, “Save My Life” “Day-Dreaming”, “Scissors and Razors”, “Unforgotten Memory”, “Film” “Ivy Tree” “Words of Love” and “Grounded”. I also managed to throw in a song I wrote when I was 15 called ‘Fell For Her Whisper’ just to demonstrate where the songwriting has come from.
The ladies listening really couldn’t wait to get their hands on the next CD. They came back the next night asking for some of the same songs which is cool. “Fly Away Girl” and “Grounded” were requested a bit, for their feel-goodness...
But aside from that, the last couple days consisted of writing a song for a customer, and getting two more orders I gotta work on. Last night after I got done playing, Noochie came over to hang for a bit. Put on “10 things I hate about you” and talked about lots of stuff about her. She lived in North Carolina for 2 years in Chappel hill as a nanny, and went to college on the side. She’s traveled a lot over the world. I asked her what she wanted to be, in which she had no idea. She pretty much said nothing. I just conveyed she hasn’t found what she’s passionate for yet.
After she left, I watched some of “Pay It Forward” and went to sleep. Now I’m gonna start working another order. Got a massive headache... San Diego Day tomorrow! And an apparent radio interview early next week!

Acapulco day!

2009-11-30T23:36:00.000-08:00

This morning, I got up around 10ish, and did a couple template order recordings, and then took a shower, and watched “Foo Fighters Live”. At about 12:10, Cha-Cha called me and told me to meet her in the I-95.
We met up with a couple other techies, Wes and Brad. We got off the ship together. I went to get money out of the ATM, but of course there was a problem, and the working ATM was out of money. So.. Cha-Cha lent me some money for the day.
We caught a taxi which was a VW Beetle. This car, I wanted VERY badly as a middle schooler. And riding in it made me want it just to have it. Ran real smooth, and it was small.. But you have a better feel for how it can move. The taxi guy tried to get 15 dollars out of us, but Cha-Cha stuck to her guns and said she wouldn’t pay more than 10, which he agreed too. So we were taken to Paradise, a club/outside restaurant.
We got a table out on the beach for 6 bucks with an umbrella. So we sat down, and just like any other place in Mexico, we were approached hundreds of times by people trying to sell necklaces, cigarettes, gum, kids belly dancing and singing, rings, masks, ice cream, massages, bracelets, jet-ski riding, bung-jee jumping salesman, and a lot more. We rarely went 5 minutes without having to say no to someone.
Two ladies came over to our table and offered me and Cha-Cha a massage. We both said no at first, but then they said the first 2 minutes are free, so they gave us a back massage, which was truly amazing, since I haven’t had one since I last had a girlfriend (and because I’m cheap.) After she gave it, I needed more, so I got a 30 minute massage for 15 bucks. So as I ate chips with guacamole, I was getting a back, arm, neck, and head massage, which was just so great. Cha-Cha told the lady to come back in an hour and she’d have one.
After my lady finished, we ordered food. I got orange juice, and a romanian mixture of seafood which included octopus, shrimp and scallops. Then Jon, me and Cha-Cha just hung out and talked, while Wes went over to hang out with some of the dancers. This was most of the entertainers’ night off so a lot of them were on the beach getting drunk. At some point some guy came over and asked for our names to write down. So Cha-Cha made up names for us. Wes was “Sloth”, She was Sarah, Brad was “Steve” and I was “Frank.” Turns out the guy painted shells with our names in it. Looked neat.
As I was talking to Cha-Cha, the massager came back and offered to let her lay omn her stomach in which she said she couldn’t. So, smartass wise, I asked if she was pregnant, in which she said yes. I first thought she was joking.. Turns out she wasn’t. She was pregnant. So we talked about all that. She’ll have her baby in May.
So we hung and talked through out the day. The sun seemed to just stay in front of us all day. Being that close to the equator makes sense for that reason.
Brad told me a bit about what he’s done in the past, which included running lights for Leigh Anne Rhymes, Brian Johnson, and WWE.
At the end of the day, we caught a taxi who also quoted us 15 dollars, and Cha-Cha talked him down to 10. That guy drove crazy fast, maneuvering through the roads. No cops pulled him over... It was insane...
We got back to the ship, and then I got ready to go to supper club. Dinner was pretty delicious. I got Surf and turf which was plenty for me.
Afterwards, we made our way down to the crew bar which was relatively empty. But after about an hour, karaoke was set up and it was packed full of terrible singers. I talked with Glenn, Aaron, Irynia (bar waitress in the casino this week), Katerina and her boyfriend Manuel. After I heard the terrible singing for a few minutes and got burned out and went back to my room, and here I am! So, I’ll work on some music things until I get tired and do more tomorrow.

Black Friday and practicing..

2009-11-30T09:09:00.000-08:00

San Diego day started off with SCC class.. or rather, the test. Marco told us to be there at 9 sharp. So I got there at 8:45 because I’m punctual like that. 9 o’clock comes around, and it’s a ton of people who are leaving the ship that show up. Class doesn’t start until 10ish because the instructor didn’t get on the ship until roughly. Which really sucks because that’s another hour we have to stay on the ship. My one day off a week is San Diego and I like to enjoy it.
The instructor comes in, and tells us we’re taking a written test, and then some f us randomly will be asked questions, and then we’d demonstrate an evacuation drill.
He gave us the tests, and it was actually the exact same test we had for the practice test.. Just in a different order. So I breezed through it. He asked 6 people random questions, that were actually pretty tough. Luckily I wasn’t called on. We then made our way up to 3rd deck, and did the demonstration. He picked four people to be the evacuators, and the rest of us were “passengers.” So it went over well. Then he asked a couple people some questions about the liferafts. But we didn’t finish ‘til 11:30 am, and with it being Black Friday, I had to make my way out there!
So I grabbed my computer and phones and got going. Called Nick, but he was working I imagined.. Then called my Dad, and filled him in on stuff. Went up and got my usual sushi, and teriyaki chicken. Then went down to Starbucks, got a carmel latte and worked on some internet stuff.
Afterwards, I went into Sam Goody to see if they had any good deals. They had a lot of good movies for 4 dollars, so I got “Evan Almighty”, “Man of the Year”, “Something’s gotta give” “Borat” “Watchmen Motion Comic”, “Foo Fighters Live,” “Kings of Leon Live”, “Pay it Forward” and “Once.” Also got a guitar techniques book. Really wanting to teach myself to do leads better.
Talked with Felicia on the way back to the ship. Then got on the ship, dropped my stuff off, went to boat drill. Afterwards, we had a quick meeting. I got a positive comment card that Stu read aloud which was cool. Then I went back to my room and put on Evan Almighty. I practiced some scales. Over and over and over again. Then got cleaned up and played.
I had a few people that were very interested in what I’m doing, but overall it was a very dead night. I went to my room and finished Evan Almighty and continued practicing. Then I went to sleep to have a pretty bad nightmare. The ship sank in it so fast, I didn’t have time to help anybody, and I was nearly sucked under water. It was really intense and insane.
I woke up the next morning at 12. I put on the Watchmen Comic, and practiced a ton until Gabe came over and we went over some guitar stuff. Then Dinner, and then had work. Work was dead again, and I finished early. I went back to my room and watched more of the Watchmen, and practiced more.. Then fell asleep after taking my pain meds. That knocked my out until 2 pm today. I got up and did some laundry, and finished Watchmen. Then I put on Man of the Year, and kept practicing guitar. Cleaned my room at some point.
Then went to work, and it again was very VERY dead. I feel like it’s Alaska all over again. Now I’m in my room watching Kings of Leon live. So far, they are really REALLY awesome live. I’m very impressed. Tomorrow, I’m going to the beach with some friends in Acupulco, and then going to see “2010” and THEN have that thanksgiving dinner with all my friends up in the supper club! So it will be a good day tomorrow! I’m excited. Got two template orders and an original song order to write. So, I’ll get to it!

Scc training... Back spasms, and "To The Echo"

2009-11-27T01:49:00.000-08:00

Wow... 7 days have passed pretty quick. And surprisingly there’s not a lot to talk about. The first three days were very good gigs. Except that my voice was terribly squeaky. I met a couple couples. One of which had been to a lot of concerts, and they loved all the 90’s stuff I did. We talked about a lot of career stuff, and all that. On the 2nd sea day, Another couple came to see me play, but at that point my voice was gone, so I just did instrumentals. I ended up talking to them for a bit. They were scientists for pharmaceuticals. They lived in San Diego. They were really cool.
Acapulco day, I got up pretty late for I had class at 2 for SCC. That day we were going to inflate a life raft in the pool. I got to lido deck about a half hour early, and got a cheeseburger, then saw Nina and the other spa girls so went over and chatted with them. Marco, the instructor showed up with the safety officer, and after a few moments of standing around, we all took off our shirts and put on our lifejackets. Every commented on how white I was. Lots of comments like “get a tan” were heard.
We got in the shallow part of the pool and Marco instructed what would be done. He asked me to help another person lift the life raft shell and put it in the deep end of the pool. As I lifted, I felt my lower back muscle strain. Luckily it was only a second I had the thing, before it was dropped in the pool. Marco called Noochie over to pull the painter line, which inflates the life raft. She tugged it hard, and the shells popped off and the life raft inflated. It was a lot smaller than I pictured. Noochie nudged my shoulder and pointed at the max capacity saying 12 persons. The ship has 35 person life rafts... being why it was a lot smaller.
We all got in the water, and marco capsized the life raft, and he called on me to right it. In the instructions, it tells you to stand on the CO2 tank and use your weight to flip it over. But because the life raft was so small, that wasn’t the case. I tried anyways, and the CO2 tank almost broke off... So... I just backed up, and three other guys just pulled some cables over. Then they got in and had to practice pulling people in. I was # 2 in line. As they pulled me, one got my arm, and the other grabbed my lifejacket... which was really choking me. So I just got myself in.. I sat in the back and we went through all the discussions of the life raft.
We got a group picture, and then said our goodbyes.
Before I left, I asked Aaron about the supper club, and if we were still going. Apparently, the Supper Club won’t open if they only have reservations for crew members... So I didn’t get to have that meal. As the day went on, my back started to hurt horribly. Sitting in the chair was painful, laying down in one position was comfortable, but everything else hurt. I had no desire to want to go to the bathroom. I tried to get up and walk, but the pain almost made me pass out. So I just went to sleep.
The next morning, I got up early and went to the infirmary. Turns out I got back spasms.. The doctor signed me off, gave me IBUPROFEN and tylenol. I went to my room and really just laid down all day. Got up to eat and suffered the walk. Towards the end of the day I started feeling a bit better. I went to sleep pretty late, since I kept taking naps all day.
The next day, I got up and went again, and found the pain was worse than the day before, so the doctor signed me off again. Which meant I couldn’t drive the lifeboat... which blows because that was the whole reason I signed up for the class. So I stayed in my room all day... But instead of feeling useless, I picked up my guitar and wrote a new song called “To the Echo (Here I Am)”. Then I took it easy.
The next day, I went again to the doctor, and I was signed off again. I didn’t want to miss another SCC class since I only had two classes left, so I went. It was a mere review. At some point I was having a conversation with Noochie, and I was joking about writing songs for girls, but a lot of them don’t like it, and she said she did, and asked me to write her a song. So I took her up on her dare.
I went to lunch and met up with Glenn to discuss our show. He wants to shorten it to a few minutes just to see if we can do it. If people like it, we’ll make more.
I went back to my room, and pulled out the ES-335 and started hacking away at Noochie’s song. Within a half hour, I had written it, and then I went and demoed it which took about three hours. Once I was satisfied, I started a new project in logic, and started on “To The Echo”. The song was originally a driving electric guitar song, but I experimented with electric pianos, and various effects, and came up with a cool idea. So, that became my mission and I recorded and mixed it until it was done. At about midnight, I took a muscle relaxer.. but got hungry so I went to get a quick bite to eat. Noochie was working behind the buffet. I told her her song was done, and she wanted to hear it, but I said I’d show her in the morning.
I went back to my room, and the medicine kicked in and I got very tired and dizzy. So I went to bed. At some point in the middle of the night, I remember being confused and I threw my shirt across the room in a fit of anger... But I don’t know why..

I woke up at 7:30 and got dressed and went to the doctor. She gave me the option to take the day off but in doing so, I wouldn’t be able to get off in San Diego. So I said I was ready to go back to work. I wasn’t 100% if that was true, but I didn’t want to be stuck.
I went to my last day of class, and of course the first person there was Noochie, waiting for her song. So I gave her the CD, and moments later class started. We went over our practice test. I got an 87%. Afterwards, we were given a break, so I took Noochie back to my room to show her her song on my speakers. Before I started it, the phone rang, and it was Stu checkin in on me. He told me I wasn’t in the Capper because they weren’t sure if I was playing. He told me not to worry about taking it easy, or not play as long.
So I showed Noochie her song and she laughed a lot and really enjoyed it. Then we went back to class.
After class, I went to my room and then lunch. Came back to room and checked my email to find I had two template orders, so I did those up real quick and sent them in for a quick 80 bucks. Afterwards, I watched some of The Office until dinner, which I went too. And it was a thanksgiving feast! Turkey, Lamb chops, shrimp, salmon, beef, desserts of all sorts. So I ate a bunch of good food.
Afterwards, I got my computer, and went to get set up in the Casino. A lot of people seemed excited I was back. My large crowd came back to listen to me, and I ended up playing most of the night, with one break in the middle. A lot of people told me they missed me a lot because I was the only one who doesn’t play Country on the account the most of the soloists do country. So, I had a great time, made some good tips and sold some CDs. I had a great time, and my back didn’t give me any problems.
Now I’m in my room, getting ready to sleep, and then have my SCC test tomorrow... then SAN DIEGO!!!!! I can’t wait! Black Friday.. which means nothing to me... because I have everything I could want. So.. yep! And on another note, I was talking to Kelly, the girl from the last cruise on Facebook, and it turns out she got another cruise to come back out on the spirit during Christmas. She asked if would be weird, because she didn’t want to look like a stalker. I told her she has to worry about that social host more than me.. Sooo.. yeah.

Last day of an awesome cruise

2009-11-20T14:57:00.000-08:00

The last day of the cruise started off with me being 20 minutes late for class, which ultimately started at that moment, so everything was fine. My alarm turned off instead of snoozing... After class, I slept from 11- nearly 3. I was very tired. Afterwards, I played games until it was time to get ready for work.
I went to play at 8 and it was pretty dead until about 9:30 then from there on it picked up and was busy and fun until 1 am where I finished with the week favorite “Wonderwall.”
I gave out business cards to everyone, and thanked them all. Kelly and I hung out for a bit and I showed her my two gibson guitars which she fell in love with. She told me one of the social hosts was extremely flirty with her, but beyond just talk. He was very forward with wanting to bring her below decks, or meet her outside to get together, which she said no to both. At one point as she was getting on an elevator he went out of his way to jump on, put his arm around her chest the other hand on her butt... Which is EXTREME sexual harassment. She didn’t know what to do. I suggested she told someone, because if he’s doing that in his 1st two weeks on the ship, he will do it more, and make that many more people uncomfortable.
I made up some funny songs and all that, and she said she liked me a lot more than him because I was easy to talk too and was in no way pushy about getting together.. Which really wasn’t the goal. Just being cool and friendly.
Afterwards, I walked her to her hallway, she hugged me goodbye and I went to bed.
My alarm went off at 9 AM, where I got up quickly and went for a walk, calling Nick. Then went to Starbucks and did the online thing. Continued downloading the office episodes I bought last week. Then I got situated with the site Sellaband.com which gives regular people a chance to donate money to a band to record an album, and they get royalties, a CD and perks in return.
After that, I went and got some Japanese food which was delicious. Text talked with my friend Monica in Texas. She’s busy doing her little projects. For those who don’t remember, she was the girl who went to the Whittier bar with me before Whittier's revenge.
Then went to Sam Goody and got John Mayer’s new cd, Foo Fighters concert DVD, and Star Trek on blu ray. Then I went to the music store to get 5 packs of strings, and a new capo, since mine has been buzzing strings.
Called and talked with Felicia for a bit, and my dad. Had kind of a bathroom problem from something I ate.
Watched the new episodes of The Office I got, listened to some of John Mayer’s new album, which sounded cool. Then I fooled around on my guitar until boat drill. There were a LOT of kids running around. SOOO many...
After drill, we had a quick meeting, then I went to my room to practice some new songs until dinner. I went and ate and got ready for work, and went and played. The crowd was pretty laid back, but it is only the first night. A lot of teenagers on the ship too.
I got out around 12, and came back to the room and now I’m debating sleep. Got class tomorrow, and work at 7:30 tomorrow night!

Attack of the Cougar

2009-11-17T16:35:00.001-08:00

Yesterday was quite an interesting day. Especially towards the end. After boat drill, and playing Madden, and hanging out in my room, I eventually took a nap. Which became a very very weird dream saga.
In the dream, it started off with three dancers from the ship in three cars trying to run me over. But like a joke. But they were cramming me against walls and such. Afterwards, one of them took me to a building I was looking to go to because they felt bad. When I got to the top of the building, it was night time and people started jumping off the building to kill themselves. Very confused, I just stood there. But after a few more people jumped, the first person that jumped came up the stairs broken and cut up and angry. He then accused me of taking something that kept them from dying. And they all came after me, eventually throwing me off the building.. but I lived. So I got up running from the area, and bumped into some girl who was in love with me, and wanted a kid. I didn’t know how to escape that, but it eventually I found myself going back to my room to sleep, and someone knocks on the door. I open it, and it’s just two guys who want to see the bathroom. Then they inform me the ship is sinking because we were in a terrible storm. I turn around and notice my room is abnormally huge, with a couch and access to other rooms in the ship. I open the door up, and look out and there’s hundreds of people walking in this large tunnel. I go out, and there are hundreds of thousands of people cheering for me to play. But the place I would be playing is in front of this little restaurant in what looked like Paris for 2 old ladies. Then I woke up. Definitely freaked me out.
I took a shower and got dressed in my clothes and I went up to Lido deck at 5 for the sail away concert. That went over pretty well. Only 3 interruptions.
Afterwards, I went to dinner, and sat with Glenn, Chris and Aaron. Talked more about the cartoon. Showed Aaron his cartoon self. After I ate, I went to get tea, and sat and talked with Natalia (CTC girl) and the new CTC girl, Kerrie. She’s pretty cool too, which is good. Simon was a pretty awesome guy. But she’ll do for a replacement I suppose.
After that I went to my room and played some Madden until 8:30, and then went up and got an iced mocha to wake myself up. Then set up all my stuff in the Casino and started playing for NO ONE. It was pretty dead the whole night (which I credit to the party on lido deck under the stars with all you can eat mexican food.) At 12:10 this girl Kelly and her mom came and watched. Kelly stands out quite a bit from the rest of the passengers because on her left arm she has a lot of highly detailed tattoos. Very pretty then. A tattoo of her grandfather and grandmother were there as well.
Then a woman showed up at around 12:45 who I’ve seen the last two or three nights I’ve played. She was very drunk, and kept calling out to ask if I wanted a drink, which I did not. When I finished up I sat at the bar to talk to some of the people. The woman who I found out was named Thoa, (pronounced Twah) put her arm around mine and kept asking me if I wanted a drink. I kept refusing and then she leaned in close to whisper but she was so drunk she was practically saying it out loud, that she never buys drinks for guys unless she plans on sleeping with them. Trying to find a nice way to respond to that, I thanked her for the compliment but told her I would be fired if I did anything like that. She kept pushing and offering. She asked a couple people to take a picture of the both of us, and she kissed me on the cheek during one of them. That made me slightly nervous, and I was looking around to make sure security wasn’t there, because I could see them blaming me for being in the situation. Kelly asked the bartender to pour me a glass of water in shot glasses, so that Thoa thought I was drinking, but that only made her want me to drink more. Eventually I got caught in conversation with Kelly, the Thoa walked off and went to bed. Though, I did find out Thoa was a pharmacist manager for all the Pharmacist in her city for a particular company. So that was my first real attempt from a cougar to get me.
Now as I’ve written, I got my hair cut and highlighted... Either that has caused the sudden interest in me from people.. Or it’s the Axe deodorant, Axe spray, and Axe body wash that’s doing it (for those who don’t know, AXE promotes that their products will make girls fall for you and lead to late nights). Next time I’ll have to do a controlled variable, and figure out my hypothesis.
Kelly and I got to talking the rest of the night. She’s in cosmetology school. She’s from Orange county. She plays some guitar, and all that. She’s 21. So after we got talking I went to bed, to sleep in for the first time since I was sick. I slept in until 1:30, which was great!
Then I worked on a template song order, and sent that off. Then I played more games, took a shower, got dressed in my nice clothes for formal night, and am writing this now. Got dinner, and my show from 8-1. I’m the most popular musician with the younger crowd by far. I’m the only one doing new music, so that’s cool! Hopefully tonight’s a good night!

Hair Cut, Loud Crowds and Cartoon

2009-11-16T12:13:00.000-08:00

The last few days have been pretty decent! My day off in Acapulco was fairly laid back after class. I got my hair cut, dyed darker and highlighted. Then I worked more on the cartoon. At 3, I met up with Glenn and we discussed the details of the cartoon, and characters.
Afterwards, I went to my room and continued working on the cartoon until late at night, where I went and ate a bowl of noodles… Since I missed dinner.

The following day, went to class, and a lot of people liked my hair. I worked more on the cartoon for a few more hours, watching the office in the process. I had dinner, talked more with Glenn about the cartoon, and then I got ready for work.
I played my set to a small group of people the first set. Sold a CD. THEN every set after that was very busy and I had a big group screaming for me the rest of the night. I mean.. they were LOUD. Lot of fun though. More compliments on the hair.
Afterwards, I went to my room and played some Madden '10 until I fell asleep.

I woke up this morning to boat drill. Afterwards, I went to lunch and now the rest of the day I'll be working on the cartoon, and play tonight! Checked my email, and Robby Takac of the goo goo dolls said I could send him my CD to listen too. Cool stuff!!

San Diego, New Cruise Director, and song on the Today Show!

2009-11-13T16:12:00.001-08:00

San Diego day.. well.. it started off with waking up after an hour of sleep. I got up quickly and ran up to where I would need to be standing to get through immigration. Sure enough there were already 30 people there. But that was fine. At least I had a good spot. As I stood in line, I turned my iphone on and it worked just fine, I had internet access and all that, so I diddled with the for a bit. But at some point a terrible smell hit my nose and made me want to gag... The smell was unbearable. I came to the conclusion that it was one of the philopinos around me. Hadn’t showered or something, but it was absolutely terrible. I didn’t do much to hide my reaction. Just put my nose in my shirt, and prayed the smell wouldn’t eat through that.
After about 30 minutes, the line behind me was 150 people long. Growing by the second. Because the line was going into guest areas, the head people “moved the line” in the crew stairwell. I was in the line facing out, and the line behind me wrapped around where they were beside us. And for the few minutes I was worried because it seemed like, it would be easy for them all to just cram and butt all of us. And sure enough, that’s exactly what they did. So I went from being 30th to around 80th, because of a bunch of immature assholes can’t be patient and wait their turn. Fortunately, a girl from china was very stern to make sure I was in front of her, so she grabbed my shirt and pulled me in front of her. The crowd eventually bottle necked into a line, and within a few minutes I was out of there.
The night before I had seen the day’s capper, and it said Marky Mark would be the cruise director this week. Confused, I asked Stu what that was about. Stu’s going out of town in Acapulco for a Cruise Director conference, so Marky Mark would be cruise director for two weeks. I was slightly confused because Marky Mark signed off like 3 weeks ago, and we have another assistant cruise director. But I guess the reason for bringing MM back to the ship was that he had been here so long and he knew the ropes a lot better than the assistant. Which is fine by me. I personally like Mark a lot. Good guy, and he’s funny and informative.
So I went to my room and showered up and got my phone and Iphone and went up to deck B and waited patiently until the ship would let us off. I emailed some people, and texted a few friends.
Then I went down to Deck A to see the line to get off was already crowded. I thought it would only be a matter of minutes before I got off.. But alas... it took 45 minutes. Time I could have been sleeping. I saw Eric walk by, so did the handshake good bye again. I saw Nunik, the bar waitress from when I worked in the piano bar. She was signing off today too. Which reminds me, the night before, Agnes stopped by and gave me a huge hug goodbye because she was leaving. So I gave her my info, and told her to stay in touch.
After the 45 minutes went by, I got off the ship and called Nick, and talked with him about his wedding, a funny commercial skit idea he had “Don-Don”. Um, Christmas, and some other various things. When we finished up, I went into starbucks, got a Eggnog, and got online and started downloading updates for my computer and such, and talked with some friends.
Afterwards, I went up to the sushi place and got some sushi... Which was delicious. Then I went to gamestop and traded in 3 games to get Modern Warfare 2. THEN I went to Sam Goodys to get Switchfoot’s new album. As I paid for it, the lady asked me if I saw them in concert yesterday. I told her no. She said they set up right in the store I was at and played for a couple hours. DAMNIT. I missed it by ONE DAY! The band is from San Diego, so, it’s pretty crazy that I was that CLOSE!
After that, called Dad, and went back to the ship. I was delayed a bit by a veterans day parade. I made it back to the ship, played my game for a little bit, and took a nap until boat drill. Had boat drill, and went to our meeting, where Stu explained the situation of the cruise director stuff to everyone.
Then we split up and I went and played more of the game until 7ish, and went and restrung my guitar. At 7:30, I got playing, and within moments it was a busy bar, and I was having the best time I’ve had since the large group my first rivera run. A couple girls Anna and Megan were watching me and they said I was the best on the ship from what they gathered, so I played lots of new songs and got a good reaction. I talked to them during the break. Anna’s birthday was the reason they were here on the ship. She was turning 18.
After my gig, I went to my room and watched the Switchfoot dvd, and fell asleep.

My alarm went off at 8 AM. I felt fine, but decided I didn’t need an hour to get ready so I went back to sleep until what I hoped would be 8:30.. But was 9:02, so I jumped up and quickly got dressed, and ran to class. We went to the bow of the ship and practiced some techniques one of the release cables for the lifeboats. We also examined the shell of the life rafts.
I went back to my room, and started working on a song recording for a special event I can’t mention here.
Then I got dressed up and had to play 5-6, 7-8, and 9:30 to 12ish. The crowd was off and on, but still better than the last 3 cruises. Megan and Anna bumped into me while I was at the Cafe, and I asked what they did for the day. They said not much of anything. There wasn’t much to do during the day. Which is kind of true...
They came back and watched me play for a bit, and then they went to see the jazz hot show. Then came back and asked if I wanted to see the comedian. I said if I wasn’t busy, I would. Sure enough, the business had died so I was able to go. On another note, ANOTHER person won 25k or the BMW. She took the car. That’s two 25k prizes and and 14k in 4 days. That’s insane!
I went to the comedian and sat with them. Tom was funny. I’d seen him before but he’s a funny guy.
Afterwards I talked with the girls and Anna’s brother for a bit. Showed them some pictures of my travel thus far, and clips of my album. Which they both really wanted afterwards. So, that’s neat!
They went to bed, and on my way to my room I bumped into Jackob, the trombone player, who was pretty tanked... And Anna, the room service waitress. I talked with them for a bit, then made my way to bed, where I eventually fell asleep.

I got up this morning at 8:30 and took a shower and got ready for class. When we got there, we had a few test questions. I think I got all mine right. We discussed them in class, and we were free. I then went to my room to work on the song more. Had lunch, and went and got an internet card, since I hadn’t been online in a couple days. Wanted to see what I missed. Turns out my song Stay or Leave was used on the Today show for one of their segments. Though it was just the intro, that’s still really cool! I continued working on the song, and now I’m a break from it to clear my ears. Then I’ll go back to it, eat dinner, work 8-1, and catch some zzzs for class, and my day off!!

A few days... Eric's last night

2009-11-11T04:16:00.001-08:00

When I started playing at 8, some drunk ladies were hassling me about not knowing songs they requested. They requested a lot of older country music, which isn’t my style at all.. So I didn’t feel bad saying I didn’t have them. They eventually left and I just did my set until 9, where I went and sat and talked with Maria for a bit. Then some future car show on the Discovery channel in the break room.
My second set was quiet, and uneventful. I went down to the mess and ate some noodles, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (Haven’t had one of those since Delaware,) and a tiny bit of icecream. I went back up and played another set. Stu stopped by and asked for me to play “Say it Ain’t So” by Weezer. Afterwards he told me he wasn’t coming up to check on me just to check on me. He really liked my music and thinks I’m really awesome.He said he’d buy a couple CDs in the coming days.
I took a break and talked with a couple that had been out to see me a couple times. We talked about my career choices and school and all that stuff.
Afterwards, I went to my room to drop off my computer. I bumped into Eric, who was looking to get the girl he liked down to his room. I told him I was going to the party to tell Michelle happy birthday.
I went to the crew bar because she said that’s where they’d be, and sure enough, Michelle, Rezalee, and Michael were there. As the night progressed the whole casino staff was there. Lots of pictures were taken. Michelle was turning 35. I couldn’t believe it! She doesn’t look a day over 25! I talked with Ruxandra and Rezalee the most.
After a couple hours, I was getting tired and decided to go to bed.. Got class in the morning!

The next day, we had class out on deck. We witnessed the lowering of a lifeboat. At one point there was a technical difficulty and the boat jerked back and forth throwing the guy inside around, and the guy outside lost his hard hat. Pretty crazy stuff. Made it a little more real for me.
I went back to my room and worked more on the cartoon. I had my meals and kept low until 4:30. I went up on Lido and set up and got playing for my hour. The crowd was very receptive and I had a great time. I played mostly 60’s and 70’s music. An older lady came to me and told me she knew all the songs but could never understand the words but I sang so clearly she could understand everything and she thanked me for that.
After playing I dropped my stuff off and ate dinner with Eric, Thomas and Claire... then it was just Eric and I. He and I talked about the stuff that went on the night before. Which apparently nothing did. He went to her (Lauren) room, but lots of little things went down where nothing but making out happened.
After dinner, I went and played 9-1. I had a good time, thought it was kind of dead. I’ve been feeling kind of out of it lately. Not much of an audience...
When I was done with my gig, I went to my room to go to sleep, but a knock at the door came. It was Eric, who needed my assistance with his girl.
So we all went up for some pizza. We talked about lots of stuff. We decided that Lauren was the girl version of me. She’s real down to earth, and had Eric’s and my personality. Lots of “that’s what she said” jokes. Cool girl. We were up late and I helped get them to their destination.

The next morning we had an hour and a half of class. I was very VERY tired. So when I got back to my room, I planned to take an hour and a half nap and meet Glenn for lunch to talk about our show. Unfortunately I was so tired, I slept until 3. I felt great for it though. I just worked on the show more. Drew more characters and sets. Played 8-1 and then Eric,Lauren and I did the same tango as the night before. Though, my steelers played the Broncos last night, and the Steelers KICKED ASS. We won 28-10. I managed to watch the first half before work, and finish the 4th quarter during my break.

Today, I woke up at 8:50 and went to class. We finished the book, and I came back to my room and continued more on the cartoon and watched more of The Office. I managed to talk with Eric, and he called to tell me he did the practical joke I asked him to do to Lauren. He called her by my name.. Haha... In the right context it’s funny. It’s sad because this is his last night on the ship. So I told him we had to hang out during breaks and at the end of the night.
I did my first hour, which I felt very upbeat and into the music, which showed because people got into it. On my break I went up to see Eric in the piano bar. His bar was pretty busy. I sat with Lauren and her friend. Her and I talked about some various things, my album, and such. Eric announced over the mic he would come hang out with me in a moment. Everyone assumed we were gay. But believe me.. that’s not the case. Not after what I helped him through yesterday for Lauren.
I played my second hour and it was a bit better. Then I made my way back to the Piano bar, and sat with Lauren again. Then Eric came over and we chatted about various stuff.
Then I did my last couple sets. At the end of my last set, Eric and Lauren came to watch me. I sold 3 CDs tonight. I did all of Eric’s requests, since he’s leaving. Then we all went up and ate pizza, and I showed Lauren some of the cartoon, and stuff.
We all said our goodbyes on the 1st floor. I announced it was kind of sad, because it’s all like this is a dream, because tomorrow, they’ll both be gone, and I’ll be on my own again. I won’t be up to meeting new people at this point because I have school to focus on in the coming months.
Eric came to the room and we said our goodbyes, and got the business cards, and we both said we’d stay in touch. I’d definitely call him for a tour.
And now... I’m going to get an hour sleep before Immigration. San Diego day!

New guitar and 2 months to go!

2009-11-07T16:02:00.000-08:00

What a busy few days. It’s been a week since I updated! So, remembering certain days in exact detail will be harder. After the halloween party, the rest of the cruise was just laid back and boring. Not much going on the last few days.
SAN DIEGO DAY, which was Tuesday, I was VERY excited about getting my guitar. I didn’t know when it would be delivered the day but I was going to get it no matter what.
I went into town to Starbucks, called Nick, and downloaded some updates for my software I’d been meaning to update. Got the very first Eggnog of the season from Starbucks they said. So, that was a neat fun fact. After being there for an hour and a half of updating and catching up with friends, I went to the music store to get more strap locks, and strings. The guy said he had a bunch of ES-335s coming in and If I wanted to check them out to come by later in the day. But I explained I have no more cash for huge purchases like that. I’ve bought all the guitars I could want for the next couple years.
As I was walking back I decided to get some lunch from the Japanese place with Sushi. On my way over, I saw a Fed Ex Ground truck (which my guitar should be on.) As I walked up to it, I saw Aaron, the trumpet player (whose also in my SCC class.) I told him the situation. He didn’t think I should ask the driver because it might seem too pushy. But alas, I did anyways. The driver said he didn’t deliver in that particular area of the ship, but he tried calling the driver who did, who didn’t pick up unfortunately.
He told me to keep an eye out for a smaller Fed Ex truck in the area. So, I went and ate my quick lunch. On my way out I called Felicia and talked with her for a few minutes as I made my way down towards the ship. When she hung up, I bumped into Chris, the new Bass player, I talked with him for a bit. Chris is a real funny guy. At various times at dinner when I’ve sat with him, I laugh to tears almost every time.
I dropped my computer and strings off at the ship, and went back outside in search of my guitar! I kept checking the FED EX website to see if it had been delivered, which it had not been. So, I flagged down a taxi, and had him drop me off at the place where they accept our deliveries. I went inside and asked if they had it, and they searched for a few moments and let me know they did not. I asked the taxi driver for his number so I could call him back when it had gotten there. So he drove off, and I went outside and called my dad and filled him in on everything. I hadn’t talked with him in a couple weeks, but there wasn’t that much to fill him in on. Just the guitars, and work.
Then, mid-conversation, the Fedex ground truck came driving down the street. I quickly got excited. Then he kept going. I was a little bummed, but then he turned around and came back to the building and sure enough had my gibson ES-335 guitar.
So, I called up the taxi guy, whom came and picked me up, and dropped me off at the ship. Midway there though, Don, the salesman from Sweetwater that sold me the guitar, called and told me it had been delivered and asked if I had received it. I informed him I did, and he asked how I liked it. I let him know I hadn’t seen it yet, but he asked me to drop him an email and let him know what I thought of it. He said it was a wonderful guitar.
I ran to my room and tore that box open and saw it. It had one of the case covers that keeps dust off of the guitar. I removed that, and I looked at the new guitar. Absolutely gorgeous. Great playability.
I went up stairs, and talked to my dad a little longer, then I had boat-drill. So I went and did that. Then we had a meeting (the entertainment staff). Stu told us about a new head of Entertainment department of the cooperation, and said we really had to give 100% at each show. Then he asked for the musicians and I to stay behind.
He told us that we really need to start doing the 5 hours fully. We had a little pow wow of questions and comments. A lot of people seemed upset they have to do 5 hours, but honestly, I’ve been doing 5 hours most nights as it is already, as I was told by Chuck and Gerhard when I first came on the ship. So nothing’s really changing for me.
I ran to my room and got my guitar and went to work at 5:30 pm. I did ask Stu and Peter if I could not play that early during the day because it truly is a waste of my time. Nobody can gamble that early and most people don’t unless it’s a sea day. Night time is where I belong in there.
On breaks I would take my guitar to the break room in the Casino and just play along. I actually came up with a cool riff on it. So I recorded it on my Iphone to keep.
Maria, one of the Casino dealers had nobody at her table when I started so I played all her favorite songs, which made her very grateful. She would wink at me and smile and do little silent claps. She asked me for some lyrics to the songs she likes, which I still need to do.
I finished up at 10:30, and I went back to my room and took it easy.

First seaday, Wednesday, November 4th, my voice was rough from just lack of sleep I suppose. I went to SCC class. That was long... I started working on a song, and managed to write it and it’s called “Polar Opposite”. I tracked the song and got it about 80% finished, and the program froze and crashed... and I hadn’t saved anything.... So... very PISSED OFF, I laid down about 60% of it again, and took a break from it. I practiced some spanish. Eric came over and I gave him some suggestions on some recording equipment he should get while he’s out on the cruise ship.
He showed me some original songs that will be coming out on his new album. They were actually very impressive. I gave him my little critiques on the production stuff, but otherwise, very strong songs.
I had work at 5-6, 7-8, 9:30 to 12:30. So I did my sets. Around 10:30, I was starting to shake a little. Not too sure from what that was from. My voice hadn’t been able to do much of what I wanted. At 12, Stu and this other gentleman came up, and Stu asked for Foo Fighters. So I played “Times like these”, but he wanted “Everlong.” I had just played that song a couple songs before he walked in. But since it was kind of dead, I did, and he was overjoyed. He hung out until I was done. Then Eric came down and talked with me, and these two girls I had seen came over. They were from Chicago, but they asked if we wanted to go to disco. We did. One of the girls had a boyfriend back home. Her brother came along too. The other one was flirting heavy with Eric. The girl Eric has kind of had a thing for was in the Disco too, so he had me distract the girl while he snuck over and talked to the girl.
After about an hour of waiting, I decided to go to bed, since I had class at 9 am. Clocks were going forward too.. Soo.. I ran to my room and passed out.
At 8:45 I was sooo tired, but I got up and went to class. As 9 o clock came around, I noticed no one was there... Then a girl came in... And we waited until 9:05 then she said “Oh yeah! We don’t have class today!” I was a little aggravated because I don’t remember him telling us that. But I went to bed for another 3 hours and got awesome sleep. Some strange dreams, but otherwise good. I got up and worked on my recording and cartoon stuff. I had work at 8. It just wasn’t very busy. I played and played. At 12, Stu walked by with a couple people, and he saw me. I was just starting “Leaving on a Jetplane” and he did the cut it look. Which was fine.. It was dead. So I played “Everlong” again, and he was just really happy about it.
Then they made their way. NOONE was watching except dealers. So I just played songs they wanted to hear. Then I finished, and Peter came by. I guess they’re being more strict to see if we’re playing as much as we say we are. Luckily I do! I went to my room, and worked on more drawings and went to bed.
The next day, I went to class, and had two hours of that. Sasima asked me to massage her hand, so I did, and she did mine for like 5 seconds.. But my hands really need it!
After class, I went to my room, and just drew more characters, watched the Office and just took it easy on my voice. Started work on the rock version of “Scissors and Razors”. Experimented with that for a bit with the Robot Guitar. Went to dinner, and was there for about an hour and a half. Sat with three generations of eaters. First, myself, then Aaron, then Aaron and Glenn, Then Glenn and Chris.
I went back to my room and worked more and more on the cartoon and watched more of the Office.
At about 12 AM, Eric called and he told me about his date with the girl he liked. Afterwards, I went to bed because I wanted to be ready for class at 9 am.

At 8 AM, I got a phone call from the teacher of the SCC class. Class was cancelled! So, I slept until 12:30. Then worked on another scene for the cartoon and watched even MORE of the Office. I play tonight at 8! Soooo.. and also a day less than two months and I'm home!

Halloween!

2009-11-02T00:55:00.000-08:00

The night of being confined to my room was pretty unentertaining. I started messing with my cartoon program, and relearning it since I hadn’t used it since I got on the ship. The bread didn’t satisfy my stomach after a couple hours, and I became a slave to it. I wanted something real.... I then wanted someone to sneak me in some snicker bars to hold me over until I could eat real food the next day.
I tried calling Eric all through out the night (hoping to catch him on break). Unfortunately he never picked up... Strangely enough.. someone DID pick up and disconnected the phone. So I think someone got annoyed.
As I PANICKED in STARVATION (Which I know most of you are thinking.. Geez Derek.. Calm down... it’s one meal.) I hadn’t eaten anything that day but bread and bananas! So, I called room service, and they said they’d send me some more.
When room service showed up, they brought not only the bread, bananas, hot tea with various selections, and a cup of different sugar and sugar substitutes, but ALSO yogurt. But not just any yogurt. No... the kind of yogurt that has no sweet flavor. They brought two things worth. So as I sat in my room just wanting to get the food in my stomach to stop the hunger, I got an idea. I cut up one of the bananas in half and smashed it and mixed it with the yogurt. It was OK, but it could have been better.. so with the other cup of yogurt, I did the same thing BUT added brown sugar to get some more sweetness. That did the trick. Then I made two other banana and bread sandwiches.
My hunger was satisfied.... Then I went back with toying with a character I drew in the program and trying to get the bone system working. Eventually I got tired around 3:30 AM and went to bed.

I woke up to a phone call... It was the SCC teacher from class giving me a wake up (he’s a cool guy. He was just looking out for me.) I told him the situation and he said feel better and see ya tomorrow!
I passed back out, and got a phone call an hour later from Aaron asking if I want my ID back... Which I didn’t need. So I said no and passed back out. I woke up at 1... I needed the sleep. I hadn’t had any in awhile. I worked more on the cartoon.
At 3, I decided to sneak out of my room to get a capper to see when I played... Which to my guess, was 5-6 on lido, and 9-late in the Casino. I called Peter to ask what I should do since I couldn’t be signed off until 5.
He apparently wasn’t told I was sick, and had no idea I missed the night before. He said if I couldn’t be signed off ‘till then.. then that’s the way it had to be, but to still go up and play as long as I can.
I decided I didn’t want to rush to get set up and play. So I snuck out to get my microphone, and cables, and restrung my guitar. At 4:30 I went to the Infirmary to see if they could sign me off a little early. I felt fine so I didn’t see a point to be stuck. So they checked my temperature.. asked if I had cramps.. and then let me go.
I ran up to lido, to find a big table in front of the stage with 5 huge pumpkins and a bunch of chefs standing around. Turns out there was going to be a carving contest at the time I was playing. So I got set up, but I couldn’t figure out why my sound wasn’t coming out of the PA (this PA is set up SO different from anything I’ve used before.)
Jen, one of the social hosts showed up and was going to be hosting the contest. She helped me figure it out. Jen was the smart girl I met early on in the contract. We’ve talked a little more since all that. She was gone last week for a wedding. This is her last week, and then she has off for 2 months.
She called Cha-Cha (stage manager... who took James’ job when he left.) Cha-Cha helped me get my sound sounding good. Jen introduced the carvers, and as the people carved, I played music. Probably a good 200 people watching. Good crowd. Unfortunately, when the carving was over, most of the people left.
I broke down at 6, and dropped my stuff off at the stage, and went to eat a real meal. Since I haven’t had a REAL one in a couple days. I ordered a cheese burger and fries :)
Everyone was getting ready for halloween. We were allowed to wear costumes out in work. So as I saw everyone I decided I wanted to be something. So I got my dress shirt and rolled my sleeves up, pulled the shirt out, wore my dress pants baggy, my tennis shoes, gelled my hair up, and wore a neck tie half tied... and wore my purple les paul. I was a punk rocker!
So I did my gig, and then made my way to the party in the Versailles lounge. The philipino band was playing. They were doing a medley of Queen song... but really WELL! Bohemian Rhapsody was brilliant!
Mariya, the new casino dealer was a Gladiator... She was GORGEOUS. Good God. My friend Ruxandra was a Sailor.. with heavy eye shadow. Eric was one of the Dick in a box dudes. Ruxandra and Mariya got me to dance with them a bit. Then I made my way around, and all the musicians were admiring my new guitar. Some of the girls told me to gel my hair the way I have it every day. My friend Scott was Jesus. He poured water on the floor and walked on it. Pretty funny dude.
Afterwards, went up to the lido deck and hung out with Eric and another dude.

Went to bed... I’ll update about today’s tomorrow!

Acapulco... and confinement..

2009-10-30T18:57:00.000-07:00

Another couple days have gone by, and since I’m contained to my room for 24 hours (ate some bad food in Mexico, and they want to make sure I don’t have something contagious,) I have time to get caught up!
So, the 28th, or Wednesday, was a pretty laid back day. It started off with class at 9 AM, which really didn’t start to nearly 9:30 because no one seems to understand that the quicker we get started, the quicker we can leave. I got showered and ready for it, but I was definitely feeling tired. The class went over more stuff that most of us should know off hand. It went by pretty painlessly.
I went lunch afterwards, and ended up only having some soup to eat. I drank some tea, and talked with Anton (One of the casino managers) Ruxandra (Dealer) and a couple other guys from there. Afterwards, I went to my room, and laid down and ended up falling asleep for a couple hours. In middle of some of the strangest dreams I’ve had in awhile, a loud knock came at the door, which sent my flying out of my bed in panic to go open the door. It was some orange shirt guys. I thought it was security doing cabin inspections again, (which didn’t make sense, because we just had them last week,) but it turned out they were having a lot of problems with some piping of hot and cold water, which I knew because all of last week, every time I went to take a shower it was FREAKING FREEZING... But some people have it completely opposite.. like scolding hot...
They told me I could go back to sleep while they worked on it. They were in there for about a half hour. Then they left, and I slept more. I woke up at 5, and went to the bathroom to see I had a completely new set up of how to turn on my water. Made a lot more sense to me than the last system.
I went to dinner, and then practiced more spanish until I had to go to work upstairs. I ran up and did my set until 12:30, where I then had to go to rehearse with the Christian band I agreed to help. Afterwards, Eric wanted to get some food, but we realized it was too late for the mess, so we went up to the pizza shop on lido deck. When we got there, Eric thought he saw the guy who threatened him, so he told me to keep walking. I was about to be mad because I walked all that way for nothing, but we passed the back door of the pizzeria, and we leaned in and told them our situation and asked if they could make us a mushroom with goat cheese pizza. They said come back in ten minutes, and they’ll have it for us. So we went outside and sat at the fantail bar and chatted for the 10 minutes.
We then went back to get our pizza, and at first Eric didn’t seem too keen on eating it (which would-a been fine because I wanted all to myself!) but after he took a bite, he agreed it was delicious. So we finished our pizza as we talked about random things, and then I was feeling hungry again, so we checked to see if the coast was clear in front of the pizzeria, which it was, and we got another slice each of pepperoni pizza.
We sat near security just in case, and talked for more. I told him about my stalker experiences, and some of my background which I credit for giving me the ability to write the way I do. He grew up a lot different from me. His parents rarely drank, and he didn’t have cable, was always a good kid. Until he came out to ships. Ha, but regardless, he didn’t have the experiences I’ve had.
Afterwards, I brought him back to my room and showed him a couple Weird Al Songs he hadn’t heard of. He loved them, of course, and then he left, and I went to bed.

The 29th, I woke up at 8:45, and threw a shirt and hat on and went to class. Same deal as the day before.. We waited nearly a half hour to start, but LUCKILY it’s a busy port day, so class only lasted ‘till 10. At 10:30, I went to rehearsal with the band and we practiced for about 40 minutes, before being interrupted by some higher up people, who said they needed the room for immigration. So we left, and I went to my room and got my rain coat, ID and wallet, and met up with Eric, Claire and Thomas to go out for lunch in Acapulco.
As we made our way of the ship, I understood exactly what Eric meant... We were bombarded by taxi drivers, Tour Guides, and children asking us if we wanted to go to the market, go see the cliff divers, if we wanted gum, do we need a taxi and other questions. But the thing was, we were asked about 15 THOUSAND TIMES! Some of these people were determined.. They would get up next to you and walk for a minute and just keep asking, which really got irritating. I understand it’s their job, but when you see 80 other people doing the same thing... Saying the same thing.... and getting refused, DON’T ASK!
So we walked a different direction from what the other passengers were going. Though it was a cloudy day, it was hot as hell, and I was really wishing I didn’t have my raincoat.
As we walked, we stopped across the street from three restaurants. We stood in place debating what we wanted, until a man named Miguel stepped over and told us the best restaurant in town was the little shack between the two larger restaurants. He walked us over there and got us set up with a table. We found out he’s a tour guide but he doesn’t get money from us.. We came to the conclusion he gets a percentage of sales from the people he recommends there. Which was fine by us.
The restaurant was pretty dirty.. But most of the town had that feel. But from looking around, they did make good food. So I ordered a pineapple juice drink. Everybody got their stuff. I was really trying my spanish out. Rosetta Stone has been a great review for me, because I could say a lot more today than I could in all the years of taking it.
I ordered 3 steak tacos, with some black-beans (which I don’t eat) and a Tamale. Eventually I got a banana milkshake too.. Which was GOD DELICIOUS! All the food was very good, and very filling. I must say I was impressed. But through out the meal, people from OUTSIDE, would come to our table and ask us if we wanted to by necklaces, gum, candy, hammocks, and then go all over again. The sad part was seeing the children do it. Because it was Thursday... why the hell weren’t they in school? We said no a lot.. We tried to discuss how Americans would act in America if people did that. I think they would freak out...
Thomas told us of stories of his run ins with the law, which was all a matter of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Eric told his... Claire and I didn’t really have any.
We paid our bill which ended up not being more than 36 dollars for all of us. We then just went for a walk. We walked through out the towns and saw the dirty shops.. Most of which were just open front buildings, with cardboard as a water-mat. Claire and Thomas wanted burnable DVDs, so we set out. We passed many stores. One had action figures, and I saw BATMAN... God... I wanted him... but my friends kept walking, and I didn’t want to get left behind. So I just ran on. We passed another store and a pretty mexican woman said “Hola” and I said it back, and we continued walking until she said “I love you.” Then I stopped and turned around. She smiled at me, and I said “Gracias” and kept walking.. I didn’t know how to react to that.
We into one store which was a like a mexican version of a small business Staples. They had everything.. but Burnable DVDs. The main store guy kept telling us to buy paper.. pens, pencils, and more. I think that was the only English he knew.
We walked a little further down and finally found a shop with some. Thomas and Claire got them, and we continued walking... Then it got to a point where were lost, and we just started making turns in hopes of finding the ship. We passed a dog that was lying on the side walk.. He looked dead... then he moved.. that freaked us out. I think more because we came to terms with his death as were about to pass him, but then his movement changed all that.
We walked by a prostitute house, which had 8 girls standing outside in slutty clothes. A few of them were actually pretty. I’m sure they were more expensive. It was kind of funny to us though. The town just grew dirtier and dirtier the more we went in. I mentioned to Eric, this is probably what America will turn into in 40 years when we’re not a super power anymore (God, I hope that isn’t the case.)
Eventually we found the ship, and we boarded. We went our separate ways for an hour, because had a rehearsal then. I just went to my room and practiced more spanish. Then I headed up and jammed out with the band. Then I went to dinner, and sat with Aaron and watched some of The Office on TV. Then went and recorded some of my new song. Then passed out until 11. I started to have some bad cramps in my stomach area. Diarrhea cramps....
I went to the Christian show and played. It was rather funny because the water tight doors were closed, forcing people that wanted to go to the crew bard to cut through the Versatile lounge where we were playing. So we had a good amount of people see us.
When we were done, we sang Mar, the bass player, happy birthday, then we went to the crew mess to get a bite to eat.
I got Frosted Flakes. Afterwards, I went to my room to try to sleep, which didn’t happen until 4 am.

My alarm went off several times, and I managed to get up for 8:52. I ran down to my class, tired as can be. Untalkative. Initially. Ruxandra said she didn’t like me in the mornings because I didn’t talk to her much. The class went on for an hour, and then we went up on deck to see the difference between the Tender boats and the Lifeboats. Tenders had navigation equipment on them, and radar... Makes me wonder why they don’t just put that on ALL life boats... but that’s just me.
Zophia and I talked in the back since we couldn’t really hear the instructor. I asked her how her bar was going (piano bar) she says that she hasn’t really cared, because she works so late and has to be up so early. She’ll get a new piano bar guy in a couple weeks though.
Afterwards, I came back to my room and definitely had diarrhea, (sorry to those who don’t care to know.) After that episode I laid down and fell asleep for 4 hours... Then I got up and had another episode. At that point I felt it was necessary for me to go to the infirmary to get something for my stomach.. I didn’t want to be playing tonight and had bathroom breaks every 30 minutes.
When I got there, they gave me a GI form... It’s a stomach virus that gives you diarrhea and vomiting spells for a couple days, and is highly contagious. The form required me to fill in what I ate, and drank and where for the last 4 days. I honestly think it was just the food in Acapulco. So the doctor gave me some pills, and told me I was to stay in my room until 5 pm tomorrow. He told me to call room service for food.
So, I went back to my room and took my pills, and again had another terrible episode. So it’s probably for the best I went. I don’t typically go to the infirmary unless it’s a real problem.. But I could have something, and I don’t want to be THAT GUY who gave the whole ship it.
Since I hadn’t eaten all day, I called room service. Turns out the GI menu is pretty limited. They sent over 4 pieces of toast, two bananas and two cups of apple juice. I ate the two pieces of toast, and then got an idea, and cut up the bananas and put it on the other two slices of toast like a sandwich and had a banana sandwich.
It was good enough for what it had to be. Now I’m just in my room... I can’t work tonight, so I guess I’ll just watch a movie, or work on music or something. Until tomorrow!

Days of hoping and a new class

2009-10-27T23:47:00.000-07:00

Went a couple days with out writing, but not due to laziness, I assure you. Sunday was quite a rough day because the night before I couldn’t sleep well at all. It was a slow day, but I went to the Supper club with Eric, and got some good food. My last night of playing went over well. Sold a couple CDs, so I was happy. I really couldn’t wait to finish and go to bed, because the next day would be the day I’d get my robot guitar.
Due to troubles of sleeping, I asked Val if she would give me a couple Tylenol PMs so I could fall asleep. Which she did. I managed to fall asleep around 2 am, but man was I mad I was getting up at 8:30. My body wanted to sleep for many more hours, but stubbornly I denied it.
I got up and did my usual throw a shirt on, put on my hat, and go to the gangway, where there was a line. So I got in line and waited. Cleo got behind me and we talked a little. Then a hostess from the Supper Club started talking to us.
Eventually I managed to get out. First thing I did was call the guy with the guitar. He let me know that his guitar tech, Derick would drop off the guitar around noon. Since I was out and about early, I decided to find the closest music store so I could get some strap locks and straps for the new guitars. I found Center City Music, which unfortunately was closed until 11 am. But fortunately it was only two blocks further than the mall.
So I walked back to the mall. I bumped into the security guard, Mark from the ship. I made a little “Hey, you do security for the mall too?!” joke. I got a white mocha iced coffee from starbucks and saw a Rossetta Stone booth. So I went and checked that out, since I was curious about it. The guy was real cool and showed me the demo of it, and went on to say Spanish has 5 levels in the box, versus most of the other languages which only have 3 (though they were planning to expand soon.) They had a little payment plan where I could pay it off over time, and the spanish level would get me to almost language fluency, unlike the other languages where you can do enough basic conversational levels. So, I got that.
Afterwards, I went back to the music store. Turns out it was a big Gibson dealer, so they had lots of Gibsons all around the place. I saw the Es-335 I had bought, and God was it beautiful. Looking forward to getting mine next week. Saw the ES-137... another guitar I have a fetish for. And they were all reasonably priced. Almost to the point where maybe I should have just waited to come to town to get the ES-335 (But I didn’t this store was here at the time... soo..)
I got my straps and strap locks, and headed back towards the ship. I bumped into Eric on the way there and we talked for a bit, and then I walked to outside of the ship, and waited for the call from Derrick. He called and we set up a place to meet, and he drove up in a black jeep wrangler. He pulled out the guitar and showed it too me, and went on about what a great guitar it was. It truly was gorgeous. I was very much satisfied.
I took it back to the ship, where I tried the “robot” capabilities. It worked great. Then I tried Rosetta Stone out. It was a great review for my spanish. I was really kicking it’s ass.
I had boat drill, and then I went to get showered and ready for my job.. which was at 5:30-6:30, and 7:30 - 10:30.
During my 6:30- 7:30 break, I ate dinner, and stopped by the CTC to talk with Simon. Told him about Rosetta, and then ran to get my guitar to show him. He nearly crapped himself by how amazed he was. His favorite color is purple, so the guitar was that much more appealing to him. I met his corporate boss who was on the ship this week looking over some stuff. Real pretty lady, and real funny. Can’t remember her name though..
Went and finished my set, and went back to my room to learn more spanish. Peter knocked on my door to let me know I had my training class starting the next day at 9 am in the crew bar. Then I went to rehearsal (I agreed to play acoustic guitar for this christian concert a few of the phillipino band members.)
That all went well. Eric was supposed to practice with us, but some drunk guy hassled him while he was working and threatened to stab him and punch him and the guy pushed him while he was playing. So he was pretty angry about all that.
We all went to the crew mess and talked about it and ate our food. Then I went back to my room and went to sleep.

GOT UP AT 8:45... which sucked sooo bad, but I went to the class. Aaron was there, and we talked for a bit, until most of the other people came. A couple were missing, so we had to wait for them. 50 MINUTES... And it was Sasima that was holding us up. I was a little aggravated. We went over some basic safety stuff and introduced ourselves.
Afterwards, I went to lunch. Sat with Ruxandra and Virginia (dealers at the casino) and talked for a bit, then went to my room, worked on more spanish, and complete and passed the first Unit! So hell yeah!
Then I started working on a new song. Getting new guitars always brings new songs out of me. I tracked some of it, and then I showered up and got ready for Formal night and playing in the casino from 5-6,7-8, 9:30-12:30. The reason being for the earlier hours because there’s a cruise critic on the ship, and we needed to fill some dead spots with nothing going on,
I played my stuff. Met some cool people, sold a CD, and now I’m in my room debating sleep, because I got class at 9 tomorrow. Getting up at 8 to shower. I’m going to get my sleeping schedule back to normal. I work at 8 tomorrow (YES!) so, should be a good day!

Employee of The Month Dinner

2009-10-24T23:05:00.001-07:00

As I watched the Watchmen, I got a phone call in the middle. I quickly got up to answer. It was Stu. He asked if he woke me, which he hadn’t, and I replied no. He then told me to remember the dinner tonight with the captain. He told me to make sure I’m dressed up nice, no elbows on the table, and to finish my vegetables (a little joke.) I told him no worries, and I went back to watching my movie.
When the movie finished, I went to take a shower. Then I played some spore. At around 7 I got dressed into my suit, and hung out at the CTC as I waited for us to leave (Simon, one of the CTC people.) He took me up to the bar outside the empire room. The deco lounge. Jim was playing guitar and singing some Bob Dylan. He had a nice little group of older people watching. He leaves in a couple cruises sadly enough, but I watched him play away. The Hotel Director was there, whose name is Keith. He’s a nice guy from what I’ve gathered meeting him in the past.
Soon, the Captain, the chief engineer, and head navigator arrived. Keith asked if I wanted a drink and to order it since it was free. So I ordered a virgin Bloody Mary. Very delicious! No need for alcohol! Keith asked how it was playing on Lido and I told him about my little experience with the interruptions. He said he had a meeting with Peter and Stu about not having people play during that time up there since it’s dead, and the possibilities of those interruptions.
We then made our way into the Empire dining room. I saw Svetlana and waved, as we, the group, walked down to our table on the floor below us. I was always under the impression that the food in the dining room wouldn’t be that delicious but that myth was definitely proven wrong. As we all sat, we were handed a menu. My eyes were set on fried oysters, shrimp cocktail, Steak and what ever dessert. Keith and I had the most dialogue. He’s originally from New Mexico, but lives in Hawaii now. I filled him in on my college, and music and all that good stuff. He told me he had a relative that was a disk jockey for radio in Arizona, and he would send my CD on over. So that’s cool!
The dinner was very delicious. I told everyone about my guitar purchases and such. The Captain said he had a friend who collected guitars. Had 13 gibsons, and fenders and other big names.
As we were finishing up our meal, over the intercom they asked everyone to congratulate the employee of the month for it’s because of their comment cards that we get voted to be it. Everyone clapped and all that stuff.
The waiter then came over and asked what I wanted for desert. I was stuck between this almond chocolate cake and this warm cake with ice cream. The waiter suggested the latter, but he brought out both. His suggestion was really REALLY good. I was so surprised.
By the end of the dinner, I shook hands with everyone and said my goodbyes, and headed down to the CTC, where I would hang before going to see the Big Easy show. An hour passed and I made my way down there and sat in the top row. Very good looking show until the middle where there was a technical difficulty and they had to stop the show. Due to lack of sleep I decided to leave, and try to get to bed around 12... Maybe it will put my sleeping pattern back in order!
I’ve been on the ship for 3 months and two days, and like the months before, I still love the job VERY much. The homesickness feeling has definitely died a lot in the last three weeks. Now I’m just falling into my patterns out here. It’s a great job and I’m really glad I was able to get set up in this! Hawaii was so worth it, and I loved Alaska, and now I’m in a country where I can use the 4 semesters of Spanish I had. Such a great job. Well, I’m off to bed!

Insomnia

2009-10-24T13:13:00.001-07:00

Well sleeping was a pretty hard thing to do last night. Because I didn’t fall asleep until 10 this morning. I watched The Longest Yard, and browsed the internet, looking through craigslist and San Diego for some cool guitars. Wanted to see if there were any deals. I did come across a robot Les Paul guitar. It was purple, but it was less than 1300 dollars. Only used 10 times and not at shows. Considering the guitar is a limited collectors item, and brand new would typically start at 2400 dollars, it was very much a steal so I contacted the seller. I had some money saved from my songwriting funds, and another Gibson guitar wouldn’t hurt to have. Aside from the fact that it’s one of the 5 guitars every guitarist should have, now I’ll have 3/5 (My Strat, Les Paul, and Es-335).
The guitar is called a robot guitar because it has mechanisms in the tuners, and some hardware built in, that lets it tune itself. I push a button and the winders wind the strings until it is in perfect tune. Not only can it do that, but you can program 6 other tunings into it and it will tune to it immediately. What’s different about this guitar from my variax (which changes tuning at the change of a switch) is that the variax uses some kind of synth technology to give it it’s tuning. Though it sounds great for live purposes, it isn’t very usable while recording in the studio. You also have to tune it by hand (not that that’s a problem.. just naming the differences.) On the Robot guitar, you simply push a button and it starts winding away. It strings itself, and if helps you fix intonation if it goes off. Minimizes the the trips to the music store to get that fixed. So, it seemed like a cool buy. The guitar is purple (not my favorite color in the world) but it is more limited than the blue ones, and that just gives me a reason to cover it up in stickers and make it look like a rock guitar.
After making the purchase, the guy told me he would drop it off (no shipping required) at the dock on Monday since he lived three blocks away. This was all done through paypal and ebay, and I have buyers protection, and he has a perfect rating, so it seemed safe enough.
After that, it was 7 am, so I made my way to breakfast. I figured the food would help make me tired. I have eggs, bacon and oatmeal. No one was in there but me and the waiters. I didn’t expect to see any of the entertainment people. Especially after the party last night.
I traveled back to my room and got online to tell a few friends from home. I called Nick and told him, and Felicia.. but the satellite cut out. I managed to get in a e-mail conversation with Nick’s real mom. She was really nice, and went on about how important I was to Nick. She asked if I wanted to come to the wedding, or if I could arrange it. Unfortunately it was so close and soon, I couldn’t make that happen on the ship in such short notice. But I’ll think of something to do!
I managed to fall asleep, but I was having dreams of the guitars and that woke me up in excitement. Now I fear I’ll never fall asleep. So I’m gonna put on The Watchmen and watch that until 5ish, where I’ll get cleaned up for my dinner tonight!

Early Morning, 1st day late, and outside crew party.

2009-10-24T01:52:00.000-07:00

Today, I woke up at 8 am. Got online and checked some stuff. Marina was pretty upset so I talked her for a bit. I had a safety meeting at 9:30, which I went too. On the way up through the elevator, I saw and talked with Pat. Then Glenn, and Peter. The meeting was something I’ve been too probably once a month since I’ve been here. So, it was nothing new.
When I got back to my room, Eric called and said he heard I wanted to go into town. That wasn’t really the case. I don’t want to go into Mexico alone. He and I talked about his new job and the pros and cons. And then how fast life goes by.
After the conversation, I went to eat cereal in the staff mess. I quickly ate it up, and went back to my room to watch Bicentennial Man. After about 15 minutes, I just felt very tired, so I went to sleep.
I woke up at 5 pm. I pushed play on the movie and watched it for about 15 minutes. Then I got a phone call. It was Peter. He said I was supposed to be playing on Lido Deck right then. Very confused, I picked up the caper. It said “Derek in the Casino, 9- late.” I told him, and he said “Are you looking at the right caper?” I looked again, and sure enough at the top of the list, it said “Derek on Lido 5-6”. I freaked, and apologized. I quickly got dressed, and ran to the casino, and got my guitar and wires, and ran as quickly as I could to Lido Deck.
When I got there, a married couple asked why the music hadn’t started at 5. I apologized and let them know the deal, though they seemed a little irritated, they lightened up after I played a couple songs. Unfortunately, every single song, Guest Services interrupted my songs looking for passengers. When they come over the intercoms, it disconnects my mic and guitar. So every song for a half hour, they cut it. Then at 6, Stu came on the intercom. Then the captain, saying two people were late getting to the ship, and we were waiting just a little longer. Then I played a couple more songs, and broke the b string, but since I ran up in such a hurry I didn’t have any replacement strings, so I just played with out it.
At 6:30 I finished up, since I wanted to make sure I played my full hour. I dropped my stuff off in the Casino, and went to dinner. I ordered a cheeseburger, and got a glass of tea and sat down. Stu came over and sat with me. I told him about the situation but he told me not to worry. It was his fault for separating my times away from each other. He also said he knew I would intentionally miss a set, and we all make mistakes. He told me then he wanted to try to figure something out where he showcases musicians on the ship like me and Claire, and Eric by having us play with the spirit orchestra. I told him I’d be very open to that idea. He said let him know any crazy ideas I may have, because he’ll make anything realistic work.
Afterwards, I sat with Peter and Aaron and apologized to Peter again. He said he set up a meeting with me and the captain (joking of course, because tomorrow I have the Employee of the Month dinner.)
I came back to my room, to finish Bicentennial Man, shower and then prepare for my 9-1 set.
I went up to the stage around 8:20, and started restringing my guitar, and getting set up. My voice was doing great and hitting all the songs with ease. I’m still dropping a lot of songs at least a half a step. It’s really making it less of a struggle for me. I played and got a good group going. On a break, I talked with a group that had been to see me every night, and talked about the CD and where it’s going.
After the gig, I went up to lido deck to get some of that mushroom pizza I had the other night. But they were really busy and couldn’t make it for me. I saw a party going on on the back deck. Turns out it was a crew party. Everyone was outside, but it was more desirable than the disco, because of all the fresh air, and not 80% smoke. As I looked around for Eric, or someone I knew, I passed Colleen but she didn’t seem very interested in talking with me. Probably because I haven’t made an attempt to hang out and all. And I’ve kinda stood her up a couple disco nights.. But it’s whatever. Svetlana stopped me and told me she hasn’t seen me in awhile.
Her and I got to talking. She asked me why she never sees me in the crew bar. And I told her because I don’t feel like drinking and all that. Then she wanted to know when she could get a cd. She asked where I was from. As most girls from Russia, she had no idea where Delaware was or that it was a state. So I informed her it’s the first state and she better remember. She told me she wants me to go with the disco with her one night before she leaves (which is in three weeks sadly.) I told her what I wanted to do for halloween which involved shaving my beard. She told me she liked my beard and I should keep it. I told her, if I shaved it I’d look younger. I pulled out my laptop and showed her a picture with me without the beard. She said she liked it even more. So, I’m thinking of shaving... just to feel it out. If I don’t like it, or if people don’t like it, I’ll just grow it back in a week.
So after a few minutes of talking, her boyfriend came over and put his arm around her to show me she was his property kind of thing, which was whatever, and I went to my room afterwards, since there was no one there I knew or cared to talk too.
I gotta fall asleep soon, but I have the day off tomorrow, which is great. Got my special dinner tomorrow with the captain! 7:45. So here I go!

Back to work

2009-10-23T02:59:00.001-07:00

I managed to drift off last night at 9:30... And woke up at 1. I listened to the song some more, and a completely different melody came about, and different ideas for lyrics. So I wrote down a few verses. After an hour or so, I wanted to lay down to sleep but unfortunately, I was too awake. As I was searching through my backup harddrive and found a bunch of itunes movies I didn’t know I had with me, I found Forgetting Sarah Marshall. So I put that on and watched that until 5 am. I really wanted to see it again since I’ve been to Hawaii. Watching it made me miss Hawaii a ton.
I managed to fall asleep around 5:30. I had a very bizarre dream. I was running with a couple people from some kind of bad organization. They were trying to kill us from what I gathered. We were caught, and they put machine stuff in us. When I awoke from the surgery, they asked me to walk to the side of the building (which we were probably 20 stories high) and jump. I was reluctant too, but they said the machines would save me. So I leaped and as I fell towards the ground, i became very nervous, but as I hit the ground, I bounced back up. I landed again, and over radio, the people told me I could jump high altitudes with just a little thinking. So I tried jumping and sure enough I jumped high into the air, and landed and did it again. Until I fell in between canyons in a mountain forest area. When I landed I was afraid there might be something I don’t want to face in there, so I tried to leap. But I didn’t jump high. I tried and tried. I heard one of the guys captured with me call out, and then I lifted into the air over the mountain back to the street to my counter part. Then I woke up.
It was 2:15. So I missed lunch. I got up and started working on the song again. I was really stumped on the chorus, until I realized I wrote something earlier yesterday that fit perfectly in the chorus spot. So most of the song is written. I fooled around with recording the vocals, but I’m not getting the right sound out of myself. So, after a bit I took a break.
I put on Pirates of the Caribbean. Showered up, went and got dinner, then came back to finish my movie. Peter called me asking me if I wanted to take a safety class that would show me how to drive the lifeboats. It’s a month long course, but if I came back to ships, it’d be a cool thing to know, so I said I’d do it. 10 minutes later he called letting me know that the captains dinner will be the next formal night (two days) at 7:45. So I get that night off. Which is pretty awesome.
I went to do my gig, and my voice seemed pretty normal. No squeaking, but I did start lowering the keys to a lot of the song, so I’m not over pushing myself. I’m becoming to notice that most people can’t tell the difference anyway. I don’t need to be able to prove I can hit these hard songs every night.
The night went over well. Wasn’t that crazy of a group. Pretty laid back.
At the end of the gig, I made my way to my room, and put on POTC : Dead Man’s Chest and watched it. Now it’s 3:57 and I have safety training tomorrow at 9:30. Best I go to sleep!

A much needed day off!

2009-10-21T20:32:00.001-07:00

Today was definitely a day I needed. It was nice to not really have anything to do. I got up at 12:40, and got lunch, and then played Beatles Rockband. And beat it.
Eric came knocking on the door at 3 o clock, to give me his ID so I could get off, but he said lots of pimps were trying to hook him up with prostitutes, and children would run over tugging at him to give them money. So I decided to just stay put. We talked for a bit, and he told me a couple funny stories of his past. Let’s just say it involved a special cocktail. And no.. not drugged.
We both decided we wanted to eat up in the supper club, so we ran up to try to get a reservation. Unlike last time, they were pretty mean and pushy and told us they wouldn’t hold anything unless our boss emailed them. Unfortunately Peter was off the ship, so I guess that wasn’t happening.
After Eric left, I started working on a new song. It’s real digital like, kind of like “Day Dreaming” but it’s a lot more involved with digital instruments and it has a real cool feeling to it. Reminds me of something the killer would do, except a lot darker.
Went to take a break from it, and ate lunch in the staff mess. Food looked pretty gross but I gave the sweet and sour chicken a try, and I’m really glad I did. It was really good.
Afterwards, I came back to the room to continue working on the song. At some point my program was giving me problems, so I had to move some stuff around on the computer to get it back to normal.
I took a little break and checked my email and shipping status on the guitar. It said the expected delivery date was Tuesday... One day after I leave San Diego. So I emailed Don (sweetwater salesman) and asked if he could call them and see if they’ll expedite it. I don’t really want it to sit in a hot warehouse for 8 days, with the chance that someone could steal it. And the whole reason they held on the guitar an extra day was so it would arrive on Monday. So, I’m going to fight to get it here, so I can have it then. It’s not a matter of patience.. it’s a matter of the thing being safe.
Now I’m working on melody and lyrics for this song.I have two different directions I’m working on, but neither really intrigue me. So... this will take awhile!
I work tomorrow at 8, so I’ll taking it easy. Maybe working on this song. Try some guitar on it maybe.

voice problems...

2009-10-21T02:53:00.000-07:00

I woke up today around 9:30. All on my own! No alarms, and I felt pretty good. My voice felt good. I really felt I was going to have a good day. The ship was bouncing around a bit so I figured we were in a storm, so I switched on the TV to make sure. Sure enough, it was raining and windy with choppy seas.
I watched a movie called “InkFelt”(I think that’s the name.) It was pretty cool. Brendan Frasier, and the guy who played smiegal from LOTR was in it. I had lunch, which consisted of lucky charms. Then I showered to get ready for my lido gig. I assumed from the rain, it would be cancelled, so I called Peter to ask, and he said just play the extra hours later on in the casino. He made it my call to start at 8 or 9. So I decided 9.
I then watched “That Thing You Do” and played some Beatles Rockband. Went to dinner, and had eggs... Sunny side up. I was kinda full from the cheetoes I got from the upstairs store earlier.
After dinner, I took an hour long nap. Then made my way up to the stage around 8 to restring my guitar. I made the right choice to start at 9, because the bar was dead at 8. After restringing, I got an iced mocha to wake me up. I talked with a couple dealers, and then went up to play my first set. A couple was watching, and I managed to play a couple songs off the album, and they bought the album right after. Then more people showed up and I was playing hard for 2 long hours.
I took a half hour break, and went and chatted with Michelle the dealer, Rezalee, and then met the new dealer Mariya. She was very nice. She was 28 and from Russia. It was her 1st contract on Carnival.
My voice was feeling good through the two hours, but then it started to squeak again, which really was frustrating for me. I think it pissed me off more than normal tonight, because I’m getting sick of easy songs becoming a hassle for me.
When I finished my gig, I went to my room, and researched vocal nodes. Maybe that was the problem, but nodes would constrict me from singing all the time, not for 5 days off and on. So I posted a question online to ask, and we’ll see what kind of answers I’ll get. I’m going to go to the infirmary tomorrow and see what they think.
Eric called me to talk about a hook up he had, and we talked for about an hour. He told me he wanted me to be his wingman for when he was in the disco. There were two sisters hanging out there, but I had work. I just would have helped distract one anyways. Not really looking to get myself in trouble with passengers.
After talking with him, I started writing this! Tomorrow is my day off, so I’m going to try to take it easy!

Got my CDs, and... the hurricane died a little!

2009-10-19T19:42:00.001-07:00

Falling asleep was such a hard thing to do last night. I tossed and turned for over an hour with senseless thoughts running through my mind. By senseless, I mean, they had in no way in an affect on my life. They were alteration thoughts of reality that had no busy keeping me up.
I managed to to sleep until 2:30. And I wanted to sleep more. The ship was bouncing a bit, and very much thought we were in a storm. I turned on the television to see it was a cloudless gorgeous day outside. I knew I had to play at 5-8 and 9:30 to 11:30, so I took it easy. My voice was still hurting. So I just relaxed until 4, where I took a shower. Got dressed in my suit, went down to the MSA to see if my CDs had come in and they did! So now I have 120 CDs!
I came down to the VERY dead Casino, and player some upbeat songs.. for no one. Played until 6. Then I went to dinner. There Glenn told me I should go to the infirmary about my voice, because maybe if enough people go there, the company will realize that pushing musicians to work longer hours actually hurts performances. 4 hours was always tolerable for me. 5 is pushing it.
I sing hard as it is, so, I’m really going to have to learn more quiet songs to take it easy. I will go to the infirmary tomorrow if it still hurts.
I came back to play at 6:30. At 6:40, Peter told me to break ‘til 7. He asked if it was busy at all. I informed him, that it really wasn’t that busy.
I bumped into Stu, and he asked me how it was going and I filled him in on the voice bit, and the dead crowd. He told me simply not to sing if no one is there. So I went outside and got some fresh air. I noticed the huge swells in the ocean. That hurricane was sending quite a rift. Luckily though, the hurricane has died to a Category 3. It was expected to die to a 1 in a couple more days. And we are expected to do our regular itinerary. Acapulco, well get to a little late but, we’ll manage to go. I have port manning, so it’s whatever. Hopefully I’ll get the day off, because I REALLY need it!
I’m on break now.. and then I have work 9:30 to 11:30. I’ll have to sing then. But it will be cool.
Amanda emailed me and told me she stuffed 75 envelopes with my pictures and she needs another 100 pictures. So I’ll do that. Should all be nice!
Alrighty, I’m going on!

2 hours of land, and heading towards Category 5 Hurricane Rick!

2009-10-19T01:06:00.000-07:00

I woke up at 11 this morning, and I really regretted it, but I needed to make some phone calls. I called Nick first and talked to him for a bit. Then I talked with my dad for awhile. Then I called Amanda and talked about the music business stuff, and we filled each other in on some things.
After the phone conversations, I went down to my room, and called up Eric (whom I saw return while I was talking on the phone) and asked for his room key. I then made my way into town, towards the mall. I only had 2 hours to be out. So I moved fast. As I walked into the outside mall, I was stopped by a lady selling lotions... She talked me into buying a couple.But I gotta hand it to her, I feel a lot smoother :)
Then I went to lunch at a Japanese place, and had Teriyaki chicken and Sushi. All awesome.
As I was leaving the mall, I saw Val, and then Glenn.. and then Cleo. So we all walked back together.
When I got to my room in the ship, not five minutes went by before we were called to do boat drill. So, I ran up to do so. On my way up, I found out we may take the ship around Hurricane Rick. Which seems a little crazy to me. I think we should go the opposite direction, versus going towards it.
After boat drill, we had a meeting. Stu introduced himself as the new cruise director, and he introduced the new dance team, and did a run down of things.
I made my way to my room, and showered up and prepared for dinner. They had the good steak at dinner, so I ate a couple things of that. Talked with Glenn, Cleo and Val. Then I went to my room, and got ready to go to work.
I was feeling the tiredness... My voice still hurt, and there wasn’t much of a crowd. So I just took it easy and played a lot of slower songs. I left at 12, due to lack of audience, and now I’m going to get some REAL sleep. So, until tomorrow!

Last night of the 1st Mexican Rivera cruise... more goodbyes.

2009-10-18T05:17:00.001-07:00

Woke up at 12 o’clock. Voice was horse. I got up and checked my email and stuff, and I went to eat lunch. I came back to my room and practiced “Michelle” by the Beatles, “Meet Virginia” by Train, and a couple others. Afterwards, I played some Madden ’10. Gave Felicia a call and talked with her about ship life and stuff going on in her life. She was spreading herself thin so she decided to drop out of Dance Ensemble, and SGA.
I sold my 12 string, and turned around and bought the Gibson ES-335. Black. I talked with Don, the salesman of Sweetwater, and filled him in on the cruise. He’s a real nice guy. Real personable. He told me the guitar I was getting was a great buy. He knocked off a couple hundred dollars .
At dinner, I sat with Jeff and Aaron. Jeff’s last day was today. Sad. He’s a nice guy. I helped him out with his songwriting and just stressed that he can’t be afraid to write a song. He has to write stuff until something good comes out. He managed to finish a song I stressed he should finish and he thanked me for doing so. I told him to stop by my room around 7:15 so I could give him my album (digitally).
I gave it to him, and I got ready for work. Went up to the stage around 7:30 and restrung my guitar. I got playing at 8, and everything started to build from there. It got real busy, and it was a great night. Everyone was so cool. Made 140 dollars in tips. Everyone told me they left great remarks on their comment cards about me. And the cop (Greg) said anytime I need anything in San Diego, give him a call. another husband and wife offered the same.
When I finished up, Sasima told me she had to do the “Just ask” 1-4, so I said we could go out in Acapulco.
I came down to the crew bar to say goodbye to Jeff. He thanked me for everything, and I wished him luck. Found out Alex was leaving too.. Which I had no idea. We had just spoken yesterday, and I don’t recall him telling me that. So I said my goodbyes to him.
I noticed Nunik crying really hard in the corner of the bar. Turns out her boyfriend broke up with her. He didn’t really take it seriously, but she did. Everyone seemed to know but her. I remember when we worked together in the piano bar, she told me she hadn’t dated in over a year. They started dating the last whittier.
I went back up to the bar where I play, and Alex was there and Sasima was still working. We just kinda hung and chatted for a bit. Sasima and I went out on the bow deck and listened to some music and she filled me in on some of her life stuff.
Now, I guess I’m just going to go to bed, and get ready to go into town tomorrow.

Good night

2009-10-17T04:14:00.000-07:00

Well, after updating my blog I went to eat dinner, at what I thought was 6 o clock. Turns out it was actually 5. The clocks went back an hour. I found that out after confusion of the staff mess being closed. So I went and ate dinner in the crew mess. I ate with Alex, and had a cool conversation about russia, women, his life and all that. At 6, I went back and got cleaned up and dressed in my suit. Before going to my gig, I went outside and took a little bit of air in. Then I went to my gig. It quickly picked up and got busy. Just in time for my boss Stu to come in. He hung out for over an hour talking with different customers. Part of the huge group called out to him to tell him they were there for me, and they loved me. He said he knew, and he gave me thumbs up. It was nice to see him check it out.
I talked with a couple that had been to see me since the beginning of the cruise. The husband was a cop, and they were from San Diego. He used to be in the marine corp. and has a disability with his voice. He was a drill sergeant, and messed his voice up. Was a real nice guy. He told me I was awesome, and he he usually isn't into the whole bar scene, but he could come see me every night.
On my last set, my voice gave out a lot, but everyone sang along with all the songs, so I made it through. I talked with Sasima about getting together for thai food in San Diego. Dewa Ayu talked with me, and asked how old I was. She was shocked. She's 27. She asked me if I had a girlfriend on the ship, which I don't. I said I wasn't really looking, but she went to Sasima and mentioned that. Sasima said "and why do you think I need to know" and Dewa Ayu giggled and went back to work. I hung out with both of them until late. I went and got some pizza since I had only one meal today. It was great. Then I bumped into Dewa Ayu again and talked with her as she vacuumed and mopped the floors in the casino.

Now I'm debating going to my room and sleeping. Since it's 4:25. We'll see!

Most of my first Mexican Rivera Cruise!

2009-10-16T16:50:00.000-07:00

It’s been almost an entire cruise since I’ve updated. I need to break this long extended habit and get down to at least once every other day! But I’ll write for each day!

Saturday, October 10th was an interesting day. I got up around 11:30 and ate lunch, and then got cleaned up with the intentions to play 2 to 4 on the Lido deck. I went and sat on the 2nd deck and checked my internet on my phone since it was in service. But what I noticed was we were quite a ways from the port. I didn’t think it’d be possible to have people on the ship by 2 at the rate we were going. When I got upstairs and got to setting up, a huge table was in the middle of the stage, but I didn’t want to mess with it incase it was something important. I set up around it and then Peter, my boss, came up and said we wouldn’t be in port until 2:30 and people won’t be on ‘til around 3.
He helped set up the sound and all that and said I could just wait ‘til 3. So I called up Felicia. Our conversation was cut short by loss of service? Not on my end, I had full bars! Then I called Nick and talked with him for a bit about the radio push. I filled him in on the pictures I ordered, and the cds and all that. I definitely had to give a lot of credit to Amanda for really getting this going. She’s quite a determined girl.
After I got off the phone with him, it was about 3, so I got on stage to play. No one was there except workers. And the ship had JUST parked. So, I played for the workers. They requested songs and I played. Svetlana, a girl I met at the last jam, was there and she requested “You’re Beautiful” by James Blunt. I think that made her day. Agnes asked for “Last Kiss”, and then I just warmed up my voice. My voice was seemingly back to normal after five days of crap.
My connection to my voice and being outside is, that every time I go outside to play, my voice clears up after a couple of hours and feels fine. So I’m going to need to make a note to go outside at least for a half hour a day and just breathe.
At about 3:40 the first passengers walked by, and seemed into the music. I noticed a lot more kids walking around than I’ve seen on all my cruises combined. Good sign for me and the crew, because we were going to have real shows and make some good money!
At 4, I finished up and ran downstairs to get my ID, and headed for the gangway. As I was about to get off, our new cruise director, Stu, was getting on. I asked how he was doing since a couple weeks ago, he got the mumps. He said he felt a bit better, but he did have a loss of color from the last time I saw him. When getting outside a woman was there and she asked if I wanted to go to crew services, or out into town. I asked what the first was, and she said it’s a little center with free internet, phone and all that for the crew. I truly just wanted to get the hell out of the area, so I went into town. I called my dad and filled him in on everything. I walked around San Diego for awhile looking for some type of mall with food and all that. After walking a long circle and ending the conversation, I finally saw it. But I gotta say, from the walk around town, I was very surprised to see how many homeless people live on sidewalks, in tents and all that.
When I got to the mall, it was a complete outside mall. It was 3-4 stories high, with all the ships lined up going back and forth. All exposed to the weather. Very neat looking. I looked around for a bit, browsing through shops. Eventually I got real hungry so I started looking through the food court, which was all in a line on the top floor. I walked by the mexican food place, and I saw Val, Cleo and Glenn there. So I went in and sat with them. I ordered nachos. Haven’t had those in a while!
After dinner, we walked into a Sam Goody, and everyone got movies and stuff. I walked back with Glenn and we talked about more music and stuff like that. When I got back to the ship, I went to my room and wasted time playing video games until 9:30. There was a little group just hanging out at the bar. The ship hadn’t left yet.. and it was supposed to over an hour before that. The casino can’t open until it’s 3 miles from port. So people waited patiently. But I got them all riled up and they bought drinks and hung around, tipping well, and just loving all the song selections.
Aft 12:10, the ship was finally out of port and the Casino opened. My crowd dissipated to gamble, and I got off at 12:30. I met, or rather, got the names of a couple people that will be working with me for a couple weeks. One is Sasima. She’s a waitress, and from Thailand. The other was Dewa Ayu. She’s from the Philippines.

Sunday, October 11th, was our first sea day. We lost an hour. So in a weeks time, we lost 4 hours of sleep. BLOWS. I just kind of hung to myself for the day, Playing games and the such. Anticipating playing at 8 pm. I had my meals and it really was an uneventful day. Sea days are just those kind of days. You don’t feel bad for wasting them because there really is nothing to do. Amanda emailed me and told me a promoter was very interested in me, and she’ll talk with Mike about it. It’s kinda nice to not have to worry about the business part of everything. I really would like to focus more on performance and writing. Alan said he sent my CDs, so I should have them for the next cruise and I plan on promoting the crap out of it.
At 8 PM, The bar was very busy. The busiest I had ever seen it. I went and I played, and the place was crazy. During breaks people stopped me to tell me how good I was. Some said I was the best on the ship. I knew a lot of the songs requested. It was nice, because it seemed most of the people watching me have listen to the radio for the last 30 years, versus turning it off 30 years ago, and never listening to another thing. So all my new music has definitely paid off this cruise. A couple people asked for “Unwell” by Matchbox 20, and “Mad World” by tears for fears but made famous by Gary Juals*( check spelling..) I made promises to learn both.
Mark, the passenger I promised to learn “Mad World” for came up on my little bar stage and checked out my setlist on my computer.
Sasima and I had little conversations in between, and I noticed all the guys flirting with Katerina the bar tender. In fact, this week, two people have facebooked me ONLY to get info from her so they can stay in touch. She is a gorgeous girl and sweet as pie, but she has a boyfriend and a son. It’s quite amazing how everyone goes after her.
By the end of the night, I saw Dewa Ayu and asked what song she liked, and he favorite was “One Last Breath” by Creed. Though very challenging I said I’d try to learn it for her.
After my set, these two gentleman that were sitting and watching me called me over. They were the Auditors that were inspecting the ship that week. The main chief told me he wasn’t a big fan of lots of music but he liked the way I performed. He also told me not to let anyone on the stage, because if they fall, it’s Carnival’s fault. So that would be my excuse to tell people who want to sing, that they can’t (because believe me, a lot of people ask if they can come up and sing. There’s a karaoke around the corner. They can go there.)
I got to bed that night pretty late, and was having trouble sleeping. The hours have been throwing me off. My new sleep time is between 3 and 4. 11 Is the earliest I get up anymore.

Monday, October 12th, was a rough day at sea. Apparently we were going through a tropical storm. I felt the movement early on, so I took seasickness pills and I didn’t feel sick for the whole day. Most of the ship, I think it was opposite. There wasn’t a lot of people running around. Even my gig was a lot less energetic than the night before, but the people that were there were the people there from the night before. So it seems I had another group to follow me. I played “Unwell” and “Mad World” and they were receipted well. I asked Sasima if there were any songs she really liked that she wanted me to learn, and she said “One” by U2. Ironically a safety officer a month ago asked for the same song and I had bought it and had the tabs in my computer already, so I made a note to learn it by the next time I played.
On one of my breaks I checked the capper for the next day and it turned out I had the day off! So that was very exciting for me!
At about 12, my medicine started to wear off and I started to get tired. Really tired. It looked dead enough where I could leave by 12:30. But not 2 minutes later, did a huge group of people come just to see me. So I stayed ‘til 1. I knew we had a boat drill, so I got to bed early.

Tuesday, October 13th, we arrived at Manzinillo*, and I was woken up by the boat drill. The last time we had one it took over a half hour for the alpha team to get set up, so I took my time getting ready. It wasn’t more than 5 minutes before they called for us to be up there, so I rushed to get my stuff together.
When I got outside, a humid heat hit me, and it was like unbreathable hot. I haven’t felt it this way since I lived in florida in the hottest part of the year. As I lined up in my spot I was over looking the port. It didn’t look like much was going on in this particular place. The mountains were a lot smaller and had a a lot of different vegetation from what I’m used too. Claire, the piano player lined up next to me, and it was her day off as well. I asked if she wanted to go into town with me and get some food and if her boyfriend Thomas wanted to come along. Thomas had port manning, so I called Eric, and asked if he wanted to join Claire and I.
At 11:30, we met outside of the infirmary, and we made our way off the ship. Immediately as we were leaving we were bombarded by taxi drivers and tour guides. One taxi guy said he would drive, the three of us to the other side of town where the good food was and back for 60 bucks. Seemed pretty steep to us, so we thought we’d play our chances in the immediate town.
Unfortunately after minutes of walking, we found that finding good food was going to be hard to come by in the area. So we flagged down a taxi. He only spoke spanish, and lucky for me I remember a lot of vocabulary from class, and ways of making sentences to ask him to take us to the other side of town where the good food was. He knew exactly what we wanted and he took us there. He dropped us off at this nice indoor/outdoor bar like restaurant. It was only 20 bucks (which was a lot better from the 30 we would of spent just to cut the trip in half from the other guy.) So we sat and ordered drinks. I got Coke. It tasted... a tad different from regular coke. It wasn’t as sweet. Still good. Unfortunately for Claire they didn’t have any vegetarian food.. except a bean taco. She order two of those, I got steak, and Eric got Shrimp. It was pretty good for the price. Eric and I started doing the “that’s what she said” jokes, and Claire didn’t understand some of them, so we decided to corrupt her mind, and by the end of the trip she was doing it as much as we were.
When we left the restaurant, we just walked and talked. We passed a lot of rundown looking places for about an hour. Claire and Eric talked about his upcoming job with Holland America, starting in January. He leaves in November. Blows. 3 cruises actually.
We came across a bank, with an ATM, and Claire wanted to withdraw some money, so we went and did that, and then shot across the street and went into a 7/11 kind of store. First thing I noticed inside, was that they had single beer cans available in the drink freezer in the front near the cash register. Like any regular beverage. I was thirsty as hell so I went looking for something, and i found my favorite drink. In spanish, no less. Arizona Green tea.. with HONEY. I got two cans and a pack of gum. Normally in America those three things would run me 3 dollars and some cents. But here, 1.99! It’s 1.98 for two Arizona cans without tax in America, but I got a pack a gum with that! Crazy stuff.
So we walked a ways more, until we realized we may be going the wrong way. We flagged down another taxi, and he picked us up and took us to the ship. Strangely enough, he only charged 10 dollars. I think that taxi guys just charge what they want. But we still saved 30 dollars from the guy we met at first. So we made the right choice.
We got on the ship, and I had dinner and stuff, and just watched movies all night, and took it easy for my voice. I gave it a real break. Though I did manage to write a song for a customer.

Wednesday, October 14th, we had a tender port, but I didn’t really feel like getting off. In fact I slept until 11:30. Had lunch, recorded the song for the customer, and just played around, dinner, until 9. It was a very awesome crowd, and it went over really well all through out the night. I played up to 2 am. Hit the sack, and that was really the end of that day.

Thursday, October 15th, which was yesterday for me, was filled of interesting dreams, in the morning. I had a bizarre dream of seeing my mom and step dad, and my little brother but at the age of 8, and Courtney, but she was old enough to drive. At some point I realized I had missed the time due back on the ship, and started freaking out, because no one really cared if I made it back. Then time fast forwarded to me in my room on the ship except it was huge and looked like it was made of wood, and I had a roommate. On the computer, there was a recording of the conversation I had with Mila Kunis. It was me breaking up with her and her getting angry. Then I woke up to the phone ringing. It was Colleen. She was surprised I was still sleeping and asked if I was going out. I told her no, since we had to be on the ship by 3 pm. She apologized for waking me up and hung up. I went back to sleep for another half hour and then I received another phone call. I answered and it was a girl with an accent asking for Derilich. I thought she meant me so I said this is Derek. She asked for Derilich again, and I told her wrong number. I got up at that point and went and ate lunch.
Afterwards, I tried tracking a new song I’m writing. I was doing laundry also between takes. I was 100 percent out of clothes.
I played a couple games, and worked on a new song for my set. After a bit, I went to dinner. I ended up being there for an hour, talking with Eric about various topics. Then came to my room, got showered and ready, and went to go restring my guitar upstairs. When I got up there it was SLAMMED full with everyone. Really really loud. Katerina told me they were all there for me. So I restrung my guitar. An engineer on the ship named Gyssepie* asked me if he could buy my 12 string. He said it was gorgeous and loved it. I let him play it for a bit, and he was sold. I told him that’d be fine, because I would just put that money back into another guitar. The ES-335 I’ve had my eye on for over a year.
At about 5 to 9, a drunk man asked when I was starting because everyone was waiting for me. So, I got up and started off immediately with upbeat stuff, and got everyone going. Lots of energy. On breaks, I talked with Sasima, a couple of the dealers and all that. Over the last days, I’ve played “Viva la Vida” for Ruxandra, one of the dealers. She was thankful. Sasima asked me to play her song, and I did and she liked it.
On one break, a waiter brought down some dips and desserts from the mexican buffet upstairs (I can have some, but because I was working I didn’t have the time to go up and eat). I tried the dips, and it was all very delicious.
So I played through out the night, until 2. I was going to shut down, but everybody screamed and begged me to stay, and they all said they would tip me. So I waited until I was tipped something to wean me over. 25 went in right then. So, I played for 20 minutes. Then they begged for more, so I said tip, and I’ll go. I got another 16 bucks, so I played another ten minutes. At that point I needed to stop, my voice needed the break, so I stopped and broke down. As I was leaving, Sasima asked me if I could sync her iphone with my itunes, and take some of my music. I said that’d be fine. She then asked if I wanted to go for some Thai food in San Diego. I told her that’d be cool. I love thai food, so I’ll to find out where they serve it.
I came to room and got online and saw Felicia was on, so I talked with her for over an hour, and then I got real tired and went to sleep, to wake up at 2:30. I checked some internet stuff, and started writing this! Got work at 9 tonight! Should be fun!

It's sad to see people go.

2009-10-10T02:52:00.000-07:00

Crazy how time flies. Especially when you’re sleeping a lot. My days have consisted of random times online, playing with a raw voice all week, making good tips, filling out the casino bar (which I didn’t think was possible), and other stuff in the like.
Eric (the piano bar guy) came over on Wednesday and listened to some of my music, and saw some of my movie clips from the independent film I was doing. He loved the music, and was very entertained by what I had shot. We talked about a lot of the music business, some things he’s been trying to accomplish, and all that stuff. At the end of it all, he and I decided to reserve a spot to go to the supper club and eat a fancy dinner for the following day. Afterwards, I just played that night, and entertained the group that had been coming to see me every night.
Every day, I had been sleeping A LOT to try to heal my voice. Thursday, I slept until 2:30. Voice was still rough. Eric and I went to the supper club, much to the assumptions that he and I were gay, which was not the case in the least. I just wanted really good damn food, and I didn’t want to go alone, and he had never had it. So... We talked about him trying out for American idol, girls, ship life, future plans, and all that stuff. I had the crab cake and surf and turf again. It was so delicious. He had a 24 oz steak. And surprisingly he ate the whole thing.
I went to my gig last night, and EVERYONE was there. It was slammed, and the bar was doing great. My voice was still crap. I can sing about 60% of the songs in my list. It’s the mid-high range songs that squeak when reaching for them. There were three groups of newly weds that had been there to see me every night, and I played all their wedding songs,”Iris” by the goo goo dolls, “If You could only see” by Tonic and “Colorful” by The Verve Pipe. I made over a 100 dollars that night in tips. Overall, I’ve made about 250 in tips. A lot better than the 40 I had made last cruise. But I was sporting a tip jar then.
Chris, the cruise director, had his going away party last night. He’s my head boss. He’s been out here for 12 years, and he’s retiring. No more ships for him. I couldn’t go to his party, because I was working. Sad...
Today, I woke up at 2, and went to help Trevor with some audio stuff.. but due to usage of the venue, we couldn’t work, so I went back to bed until 5, and showered up and went and got some promo pics taken for my press kits.
Then I went to have my first meal of the day, which was a cheeseburger and fries. I went and hung out in the CTC for a bit with Simon and Natalia. Then went and restrung my guitar.
I started playing with the confidence that my voice was back to normal, but “I’m A Believer” gave me trouble and I was squeaking again. Everyone was really great though, and I made 80 dollars in tips, so It was a good end. The casino closed at 12. So I went down to the crew bar, and said good bye to a lot of my friends that were leaving. 100 people were signing off tomorrow, and 110 new people start up. Chris Roberts (CD) was there, and James, the sound tech, was leaving as well, and casino dealers, and a ton more. The Blues Brothers dvd was playing through the television and everyone was drinking and watching it. I saw Eric and went and hung out with him for a bit. Marina, the supper club girl came over and told me to get a beer in my hand. I said I didn’t want any, and she seemed shocked that I wasn’t much of a drinker.
Sara, a casino dealer, came and talked with me for a bit about learning a song for her. I told her I sang “Hey there, Delilah” today and replaced the name with Sara, but she didn’t notice. After awhile of chit chatting, I decided to head back to my room. Due to the water tight doors being closed, I had to go the long way. As I was walking through the Versatile lounge, I saw Chris Roberts waiting for de-embarkation. I went over and told him it had been great working for him. He told me I will be very successful out here and he wished he got me and Eric a lot sooner. He thanked me for everything, and I wished him luck in the real world.
Then I came back to my room and here I am. Tomorrow, we enter San Diego... I can't get off until 4 o clock.. Because I work 2 to 4... then 9:30 to 12:30

Employee of The Month

2009-10-06T04:40:00.001-07:00

It has been quite an uneventful last few days since the skydiving stuff. Our last day of Honolulu, I stayed on board and just worked on learning songs, and catching up on sleep. We had boat drill at about 5 o’clock and it was very warm. Nice weather. A lot of people were already out on the deck waiting 20 minutes before the drill was to begin. Usually there will be a small group but over half the people that were supposed to be there, were there. I played my gig, and was trying out the harmonizer more. It sounded great, and I love having it in my act. Definitely fills up the dead spots, and gives the songs with harmonies a kick.
The following day was Nawiliwili. I got up around 10, and went to the internet cafe, and uploaded my skydiving video and more pictures I had taken of Pearl Harbor. i was there for a couple hours just doing little things I needed to do.
I took the trolley back to the ship, and got on a shuttle to go to Kmart. I went inside, and got a box of cheese-its, and had some little ceaser’s pizza. Amanda and I were texting back and forth and I told her about Words You Bleed and Josie being on the radio, and Marshalls. She said she she had down time, she wanted to help me get together a “blitz” kind of push for Words You Bleed and get it on the radio in more places.
As we were texting back and forth, I searched online for a Gamestop, to get a cheap game. It said it was 2 miles south. So, I started walking near the highway in that direction texting back and forth with Amanda. We decided on singles, she got me websites for radio stations, and all that. She said she’d burn some CDs for the press kits, and I’d get Nick to write a new bio, and we would start preparing to get all my friends and family and fans to help push this. After about a 2 mile walk I realized.. there wasn’t a gamestop in sight... No where NEAR me. So, I turned around and walked back to miles to find the gamestop was actually right around the corner from K-mart in a shopping center. A little aggravating, but got exercise, so I guess I can’t complain.
I made my way back to the ship, and called Nick and let him know his task, and I started on mine. After a few moments, there was a knock at my door, and I went to answer, and it was my boss Peter. He told me I got employee of the month. I get a bonus 100 dollar check, a nice dinner with the captain (with that night off) and my picture out where everyone can see. I also have to go to a few end of cruise shows and stand on stage when they explain how comment cards can get us this privilege and stuff. Very exciting none the least. I’ve only been here a little over two months, so I felt very accomplished.
I played my show that night and it went over well, and I met two ladies who are now known as Cruise Mom Chris, and Aunt Bev. They were both really nice and we talked for a few hours. Cruise Mom Chris (CMC) does a lot of traveling. She had been on the spirit 4 times. She asked me where Doug was, and I told her he had just gotten off 2 cruises ago. Aunt Bev, well this was her first cruise. She has done the whole waitress, bartending kind of lifestyle. 135 jobs. Pretty crazy!
They both insisted in buying me a drink, but I didn’t want anything, so CMC said she would try to find me some good fried chicken out in Hawaii.

The following day was my day off and it was in Maui. Unfortunately I had port manning so I just stayed in, ate my bland meals, surfed the internet on my phone, and just hung around. The following day, I also stayed on the ship, and just prepared to play.
I played and I was starting to see people coming back to see me personally which was nice. I played for a while, taking my breaks and spoke with CMC and Aunt Bev. CMC said she couldn’t find any fried chicken but asked what other things I liked, so I went down my list. I went to bed soon after.

The next day was Hilo. I got off at about 11, and went to Walmart, and got a bunch of movies for the 5 sea days. Most of them were bargain deals. Then I went to the mall, which had Ihop, and I ate there. Kamille was on aim on the iphone, so I spoke with her for a little bit. After I finished my meal, Thomas and Claire had arrived and asked if I wanted to sit with them. I did so, and we talked about various things. Claire has never been to an Ihop (she’s from England, so makes sense). She told me she’s been doing ships a long time and not once had she seen another musician get employee of the month. That made it seem even more cool I suppose.
I walked around Borders, but couldn’t find any books I wanted to read. I came back to the ship and bumped into Eric. He asked if it was freezing in the ship, in which I replied it was cold... but not 30 degrees. He said he thought he might be coming down with something.
I went to my room, and put in Cast Away, and watched that. An hour later, Eric called and he said he’d been throwing up and such. I told him to go to the infirmary. Better he takes the night off than risk getting everyone sick. Especially before 5 sea days.
At dinner, I saw Peter and mentioned Eric being sick, but he didn’t know anything about it.
Worked more on emailing radio stations, and emailed my lawyer about the push.
Two songs into my gig, Peter came and asked me to go play the Piano Bar at 9:30. So I broke down at 9 and moved over. There was a good crowd there, and the bartender was a real sweet girl. I got to play a lot of my songs, which was nice, because everyone was really into them. “Words You Bleed” and “How I Roll” got receipted well from the younger crowd. “Grounded”, “Fixated” and “Where to Begin” were really enjoyed by the more moderate aged.
I played tons of 90s too and ended the night around 12:30. I went to my room,and watched some of Saving Private Ryan. Fell asleep not too long later.

Yesterday, I woke up at 10, called Nick, and talked to him about the bio. He said he talked with Mike, and he was all for the radio push. He gave Nick some tips for the presskits, and he said I need to be pushing this cd hard on the ship, so of course, next week I’ll be getting some CDs from my producers to sell out here. I emailed a bunch more people, texted some friends, talked to Felicia on the phone, and other stuff.
I started finishing up SPR and Trevor called me about meeting him at the Pharaoh's Palace for the Blues Brother’s show, and recording it. I brought my interface, but Trevor didn’t have a program on his computer to record to, I was rendered useless. Peter was there, and he told me I could collect my 100 dollar bonus in the morning at 10 am at the pay master.
After that, I went to dinner, had a cheeseburger and fries. Peter called and asked if I could play in the piano bar again, He said Eric should be fine the next day. So I got my stuff and went back over and set up early. For the first two hours, I had gay couples just shmoozing around. When they went to dinner, I had one more little burst of people, then the place was empty for an hour and a half. So I broke down at 11:45. No one else came. I went down to my room, and started watching Family guy and fell asleep.

This morning I woke up feeling a little sick. I got dressed, and collected my money. Came back, and took some sea sickness pills. I felt better within the hour. I went to lunch, and just had rice krispies and tea. My voice is kind of raw today. Hurts a little. Not liking it too much. I watched Wizard of Oz on blu ray. Though it looks great, it doesn’t fill up the whole screen which was a little disappointing. I tried to compose a little, but nothing really flowed out of me, and now I’m debating a nap before dinner, and I have to play at 8! So, that’s it for now! Internet black out for a couple days, then I’ll be back to work on radio stations.

5 days of Hawaii: Skydiving, playing, Pearl Harbor, and 2nd month Impressions.

2009-09-29T15:32:00.001-07:00

I’ve had quite an eventful last few days, and haven’t had much time to update, so I thought I would take this day to do so.
The day after the Volcanic Sunrise, I really just took it easy on the ship, got some sleep, watched some movies, and did my gig. Rick, a person who was there 9 out of the 12 nights, and is from Australia, hung out and I let him know the whole run of what I went through. He’s a real nice guy. He told me his sister was a musician and recently won a 50k dollar contest on Sellaband.com.
After the gig, two guys who were probably just a few years older than me told me my music was great and I was the best musician on the ship. They were both from Canada, but they were out to see me every night I played, so it was cool to meet them. After that meeting, I went to bed and took it easy.

The following day was Kona, and I didn’t feel like taking the lifeboat to land, so I just called some friends and family from the ship. It was during this time I found out from my dad that my song “Words You Bleed” was played on a Allentown, PA radio, and Josie was in Marshalls. Pretty exciting stuff. I had my regular meals and talked with Glen about all the stuff we’d gone through and talked about skydiving. At that point we both weren’t really nervous about it. We still had two days...
Earlier in the week, Pat was telling me about his new vocal harmonizer which adds two harmonies to your voice when you sing. It sounds really good, and I thought it would be a good addition to my set, and add another layer to what I’m doing and make it interesting.
I played my gig, and talked with Rick and showed my pictures of the sunset on my computer to everyone that was around. I got some real gorgeous pictures.
I checked my account to see if I was paid, but for some reason my account was 200 dollars shorter than it normally is after payday. I was a bit concerned.
Afterwards, I went to bed.

Saturday was Nawilliwilli, and I managed to get off the ship by 9:30. It was beautifully sunny. I stood around for a bit searching the iphone for a local music store that might have the harmonizer. After about 25 minutes I found one, and I walked over to the taxi line, and got a taxi, which drove me the 20 minutes too and from there. It was an absolutely gorgeous drive. Mountains were amazing, the beaches were luscious, and the weather stood beautifully strong.
We got to the Bounty music store, and I picked up the harmonizer, and we drove back. I had him drop me off at an internet cafe. I hooked up there and downloaded the string program I bought a month ago... and couldn’t get the internet speed to download it in time.. This time, it flew, and I got it in under an hour. I also got the update for my iphone. I uploaded almost 700 pictures to facebook and checked my regular stuff.
Afterwards, I went to a little hut next door and got a tuna melts (I haven’t had tuna once since I’ve been working for Carnival,) so it was really good.
After that, I took the free trolley back to the ship, and I ran to my room to set up the pedal and try it out. I spent about three hours figuring out which settings worked for which songs. But it definitely got me excited about playing that night. I went to dinner, and saw Peter. I asked him about the pay decrease, and he said he didn’t know anything about it and said I should ask the paymaster in the morning. I left and got ready, and went to my gig a half hour early to rearrange and set up everything on stage. The Casino was the busiest it had ever been during this particular cruise.
The harmonizer definitely added another dimension to everything, and made people turn their heads. Everyone that I noticed through out the cruise watching at some point was there and watching. So that was a really cool thing. I put out a tip jar, and made 40 bucks. I hadn’t had a tip jar out at all during this cruise, so this Cruise and everyone from here on out, I will put one. I’m also going to get some CDs to sell on here.
During my break I went and talked with James and Val at Val’s desk. I tried to figure out when we were supposed to leave which both of us didn’t know. So I waited until I found Glen to find out.
After the show, I went back to my room and couldn’t fall asleep until 3 am.

I woke up to a phone call and it was Val letting me know to meet outside the port at 10:20. I checked the time, and it said 9:30.. I wanted to wake up at 8... but my alarm on my phone was on silent even though it went off. I got ready, showered quickly and ran to go outside with the group.
A lot of dancers and some musicians were there. Casino people came out too, and there was a group of about 30. Glen and I rode in the back of the shuttles that picked us up. We got to see a lot of Honolulu as we drove. It also is a gorgeous place. When we reached the skydiving place, it looked like your typical Hawaiian looking place, and there were a lot of Bikers there for some reason.
We got out and went inside, to see contracts to sign. The contracts stated that this is a voluntary, and you can die, or the plane can crash, or someone can pack the parachutes wrong, or your instructor could die of a heart attack, and we accept those risks and can’t sue the company. Seemed reasonable to me. If I died, I don’t get any of that money, so why would I care to sue them?
Glen put a lot of our stuff in a rickity locker.. brownish yellow looking. Rusty looking. We waited until our names were called and we got dressed up in harnesses. My dvd guy walked around and introduced himself and he recorded a bit of stuff going on around before we left. His name was Jeff. I met the person I’d be jumping with. His name was Brendan. He went through the explanation of what I had to do when I jumped. I had to crouch down, put my head back and hold onto my harness. And release when he told me so.
Around that time, I saw parachutes falling from the sky. First to land was Jeff. Me and a few ran over to ask how it was and he said it was incredible. An unforgettable experience. Everybody landed safely. Which meant the odds were against us! For every person who survived that was one less person in the odds of surviving! I wasn’t really worried about that though.
Val gave me here picture camera to record her landing. Unfortunately after she left, they called for me to leave, so I gave her camera to a casino girl, and ran off. I boarded the relatively small plane, and sat on the bench with my legs separated. Glen was at the front of the line. As the plane took off, it was really amazing, and yet a little scary, because the door we jump out of was slightly open. And I couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if someone slipped and fell out. Seemed easy enough.
As we got higher, we could see the edge of the coast and the bright blue water. Such a beautiful sight. It took about 10 minutes to get to the altitude where we were jumping. Glen was first to go. I could tell he was a bit nervous. His instructor locked him in and the door went completely open. Glen’s photographer got out and stood against the side of the plane. Glen pulled himself up to the bar. His instructor told him twice to let go and to hold his straps. He did. And in a matter of two seconds they leaped from the plane. At that particular moment, I was thinking... I’m insane... Another person went up to the side and jumped in a matter of seconds. Then it was my turn. My photographer got out first and my instructor and I edged our way to the door. He pulled my head back a little, and told me to look at the camera and smile, and then we leaped.
The free fall sensation was there for about a second, and then there was no queasiness. My arms came up and my face seemed to morph little by little with the wind. When my mouth was open wind, just went in and filled it up like a parachute. So I tried to close it as ofter as I could. My photographer was right in front of me falling with us, keep his head looking at me (since his camera was on his helmet). Everything was just so clear and beautiful. Clouds were creeping up closer and closer and in an instant, we slow down, my photographer keeps falling fast, my crouch hurts, and my ears go into a clogged feeling. And painful. All I could hear was the wind blowing beside us. It was very peaceful. My crouch was definitely in pain. Brendan told me to give him a second and he’d try to make it like a seat for me. He had me put my feet on his feet and pick myself up. He loosened my harness, and just like that, everything felt better. Except for my ears. He told me to plug my nose and push gently. My ears opened right up and felt a lot better. He let me hold onto the turning mechanism and turn the parachute a bit. We went into crazy turns. Like an insane roller coaster. He told me about the mountains as were were passing by them. I could see the airport we took off from, and were heading in that direction. He took control of the turning after a bit, and maneuvered us down towards the land. Everybody looked like ants that were getting larger by the second. For that last 10 seconds of the fall, I kind felt like I was flying, or knew what it would be like to have the ability to fly and see what they see when they do so. We landed easy, and I detached from the chute.
I saw Glen and he said he loved it a lot. He said if we had a paycheck before we left Hawaii he would have done it again. It truly was an amazing time. Eye opening for sure. But I credit that to the forceful winds.
I walked for a bit and waited for the DVD to be finished. I watched it, and video just doesn’t do the jump justice. You don’t know what it’s like until you do it.
We got back in the shuttles after a bit and rode back. Glen wanted to get his laptop and go get something to eat, so we went back to the ship for about 5 minutes to get our stuff and we walked into the city. We walked for about 2 miles before coming up on a Starbucks. He and I were pretty tired. For some reason, skydiving wears you out. I got a vanilla latte, iced. He got a coffee. They had the Beatles Remastered Abby Road there, so I got it, since Alan, my producer said it was an absolute must.
We walked looking for a Walmart, and after about another half hour, and help from my iphone we found it. I got a couple more Beatles remastered albums, and Glen got a shaving kit. When we left we walked another mile before stumbling on a Japanese restaurant. We went in and got our food. I got fried oysters, rice, salad, and soup. He got Teriyaki Chicken. I loved the oysters. Haven’t had any since late May.
Afterwards, we made our way back to the ship because it was starting to get dark. Glen told me lots of stories of his life when he was a bit younger. He’s definitely had a lot happen in it. Cool to learn about it.
When we got back, I put my card in port manning, and took it easy. I worked on remixing my song “Ricochet” and am deciding if I want to rewrite the lyrics and melody, and make it a stronger song. I really love the music. And I don’t want it to go to waste. It sounds a lot better now that I’ve mixed it on these speakers. I cleaned up all the low end problems.
I also fooled around with my logo and worked on that until 3 am.

I woke up at 8:30 yesterday and got ready and met Eric and 9. He, Claire, Thomas and I were going to go to Pearl Harbor. Eric and I met outside of the gangway and walked outside. We figured they’d be a few minutes so we decided to look for breakfast. After about a half hour, we found a Mcdonalds. As Eric began to eat, we got a phone call saying Thomas was ready to pick us up. So, we got a couple Egg Mcmuffins, and scarfed them down pretty quick. When Thomas and Claire arrived, they decided they were hungry too so they came in and got something.
Afterwards we headed towards Pearl Harbor. Took us about a half hour due to misplacement of signs and such. When we parked, were were met by a security officer who said the USS Arizona were out of tickets for the day. That kind of blew because we were all looking forward to that the most. But they had tickets for other things, so we all got tickets for USS Missouri and The Pacific Aviation Museum. At the ticket place, there were lots of unused Missiles, and torpedoes set up on display. There were also a bunch of plaques that were there as memorials for sunken ships and submarines. Lots of sad stories. The USS Bowin was beside the ticket place and it looked pretty cool. We didn’t really want to go on it.
We rode a shuttle to the USS Missouri. The ship was being restored on some parts, but we got to go through most of it. It was crazy seeing some of the rooms people lived in. The chief engineer’s room was about that size of my room... and I’m a SOLOIST! I have no real responsibilities. Regardless... We saw lots of pictures, newspapers, and all that about the war, and what the ship went through. It was very interesting. Took us about 3 hours to go through it at a fast pace.
We made our way to the shuttle to take us to the Aviation center. When we got there, we caught a movie that explained the Pearl Harbor attack. The first explosion took place 200 yards from where we sat. Pretty nuts.
The museum was a hangar, and had lots of real planes from that era of time (WW2). We only spent about a half hour in there, but there wasn’t too much to see.
As we rode out with the shuttle, we passed a couple hangars with broken glass. The driver said that was caused from the explosion from the USS Arizona. There was another ship we passed that was submerged underwater. It was the USS Utah. It has 53 bodies still stuck within the ship.
When we got back to the car, we decided we wanted to get some food so we went to find chinatown. After about 35 minutes we found it, and searched for parking. We came into a china restaurant, which was very white and very plain.. Not Americanized like your typical all you eat buffet kind of places. We sat down at the table and let the women know we’d be on two separate checks. But weirdly enough, we had two different waitresses. Who spoke very little English. Thomas and I ordered Seafood on Fried Noodles, and egg drop soup. I ordered in addition fried oysters. My waitress brought out Egg Drop soup... which was a HUGE bowl that could easily feed 4 people. Thomas and I assumed they just put both our orders in one bowl. So we ate that up.. and we realized they were going to bring us another one. He told them we didn’t want two, and the waitresses kind of got pissy about it. Luckily I had gotten my food before that event so I didn’t have to worry about poison or anything.
Eric and I got our food about 15 minutes before Thomas and Claire did. It was really good though. It tasted like the legit stuff.. Not americanized. The fried oysters were AMAZING! They were soooo meaty too. I kind of wished I just got two orders of those. That would have filled me up easy.
Thomas and Claire got their food. The broccoli stems they gave her weren’t easily cuttable so she asked for a knife... which they didn’t have.. So they brought her out some heavy duty scissors. Classic. I think that made my day.
The food was reasonably priced, and the waitresses didn’t seem angry by the end (they probably did something to the other’s food and felt justified.)
Thomas and Claire dropped Eric and I at the ship, and we walked looking for a tip jar for me. Everything in the area was handcrafted and about 1000% more expensive than I wanted to spend for something I wanted to collect tips in. We got some ice cream thought. Shared some stories of stuff that’s happened in our lives.
We got back to the ship and started messing with more demos. I got online and got tabs to a few more songs to add to my setlist this time around. Glen called and asked if I wanted to go to a club in town with him, Gabe and a few girls. He said he’d call me a little later when we were going. I decided to take a nap while I waited. I passed right out. At some point, I know I woke up and was coughing pretty hard, and I was worried I was getting a chest cold. I fell back asleep, and I didn’t wake up until 10:30 this morning. I saw that he called, but I guess I didn’t hear it. I don’t have a cough this morning and I feel better, so that’s a bonus.
I did get up and get some lunch, and now I’m just taking it easy today. I’m worn out from the last couple days. I play tonight and tomorrow, and then I have off again on Thursday. Blows... because I have port manning all day. But I will have gotten 4 days off against 5 days of work.. so 4 days off in 9 days. Pretty cool if you ask me. I also found out this is the only ship in the Carnival Fleet that comes to Hawaii... for only 4 weeks a year no less... So I found I’ve been very fortunate to come here.
I’ve also been here for over 2 months. My thoughts after two months are still about the same, I love the job, just miss my friends. But time it flying real fast here. I can see where life would become a blur after awhile. But still a great job. I find myself looking around and laughing... because I’m in Hawaii... a place I never thought I would visit without thousands of dollars. I’m very fortunate. Anyways, I’m out!

Hawaii Day 1 and 2

2009-09-24T20:03:00.000-07:00

My first day of Hawaii started off at 8:30 AM. I quickly got up, got my hat, got in shorts, and went outside of the warehouse which was beside the ship. I sat and checked out the internet on the iphone, checked email. Then I called Nick. We got caught up on what’s going on on the ship, since we hadn’t spoken in 6 days due to sea days.
Afterwards, I got on a free trolley which would take me to Walmart. The difference of ports in Hawaii and in Alaska, is most towns in Alaska are built around the port, but in Hawaii, everything is very spread out and far away. So your best bet is to rent a car, if you want to see the islands the best.
The trolley, which was a huge tour bus, drove us through the town for 10 minutes. First things I noticed was that the island looked too dip and rise in the distance, so the island wasn’t flat in the slightest.
When we got to Walmart, I took a look around inside, and it looked like every other Walmart I’ve been in in the last couple years. I walked out across the street and saw a mall. I took a walk inside and looked around. It had a Radio Shack, which so far I’ve seen one in every town we’ve been too in America. I took a look around Gamestop, and decided I would trade in my PSP and games for some extra money. Which I would have to get later.
I saw an Ihop in the mall, which I haven’t seen before (in a mall.) So I was craving Pancakes, and an omelet. So I went and got some. It was absolutely delicious. I called Felicia while I was waiting for the food and got caught up with her.
After I got my fill, I went back to the bus and rode to the ship to get my psp. I decided to call Mary and Dick since I haven’t spoken with them since I left. I filled them in on what I’ve been doing, and I wished Dick a happy birthday.
I got my PSP, got on the bus, and rode back to the mall, traded it in, and the games and got a couple hundred dollars worth. I got a smoothie from DQ, called my dad, and filled him in on the 6 days. Then I went to walmart, got The Office Season 5, and went outside and waited for the bus. As I waited, Greg sat and talked with me a bit about skydiving.
As we rode back, he told me we had a drill the next morning... Which kind of sucked... but regardless. When I got back to the ship, I messaged Kamille on AIM, and caught up with her for a bit. Afterwards, I went to my room and just watched some of The Office, The Haunting in Connecticut, then I went and did my gig for the night. It was a quiet gig, and a lot of people weren’t around, probably because everyone was worn out from the day on land.
At the end of the gig, I heard there was a huge party on the deck... but I didn’t feel like going. So I went back to my room, watched some more of the Office, and fell asleep.

The next morning, I woke up at 8:30, made a couple phone calls to friends, and was interrupted by the drill. I went down to my room and waited for them to call for the general emergency... Which took a long time to happen. After 30 minutes, we got called up to the deck, and we, as in the crew, were up there for another half hour.
When we finished, I went down to my room, got my bag, which had a camera, towel, bathing suit and sunscreen in it. I went to breakfast. Glenn came in and informed me he and Val were going to go get the van we’d be driving in. So as he walked off, Claire and Thomas (A couple who play piano and Saxophone) came in and got some breakfast, then we all walked out of the ship and met up with Glenn and Val. Enterprise hadn’t been by to pick them up at that point. So we waited another 15 minutes or so, then the enterprise van picked us up. At that point, Natalia joined the group. The guy who was the driver, explained that he moved here 12 years ago. He had a job in Alaska and saved 13 grand. He came to Hawaii for a vacation. By the end of the vacation, he called his parents, said he wasn’t moving back, bought a year lease, bought a car, and has been there ever since.
We went tot he Enterprise building, and Glenn filled out some stuff. We in the car waited, and eventually he came out, we were given a ride to a satellite parking lot, and we got a Chevy SUV.
Funny enough, instead of getting Hawaiian food, we got Mcdonalds to talk about what we would do for the day. During us eating, we decided we were going to go to a Biontical Gardens, go to the Luau, check out the clubs, and see the sun rise on the top of a volcano.
After we finished eating, we went and picked up the Shopping Specialist, Cleo. She’s a pretty cool girl and lots of fun. We rode to the gardens, which took a little over a half hour. I took tons of pictures of the mountains and ocean around us. It was a beautiful and scenic drive. We took many U-turns and such. I helped navigate with my iphone google maps. It was very helpful.
We eventually got to the Gardens. There was a dark storm cloud over it, but we could overlook the whole island from where we were which was absolutely stunning. We walked through the gardens, and there were many beautiful flowers, birds and other little objects. We all took lots of pictures.
After about an hour and a half, we got going to the Luau. It took about an hour and a half to get there. It was an even more scenic route. When we got to the hotel, we got out and got our tickets and got in line. There were a lot of people from the ship waiting. When we got in, there were a bunch of rows of tables, a stage, and lines for food. You could overlook the beach and see the sunset.
I had a couple drinks since it was an open bar, but nothing severe. I took TONS of pictures of the sunset. It was amazing. I saw the pig they were cooking. For food I had pork, Banana Salad, noodles, turkey, some coconut pudding and cake. Then dancers came on stage, and musicians and we heard Hawaiian music. It was definitely a cool show. Something cool to see.
When we were done with the Luau, we added another girl named Claire to the van. She’s Australian and works in Club 02. We went for a walk on the beach. The stars were gorgeous. The tides were a little crazy. Every once in awhile water would just shot for the top of the beach. At one point I noticed the water coming, and I ran and everyone else got soaked. I was dry.
We went to Safeway and got some drinks for the sunrise, and I got some green tea, and Starbucks drinks to keep me awake over night,
After we got done purchasing everything, we went to Lulu’s, which was a Salsa dancing bar. We all sat down and talked with each other for awhile, and everyone at some point got up to dance. But me.. I wasn’t really feeling it. I got to talk with Cleo about her job, and Val and I had a conversation. Val’s a cool girl. She’s 34 and sells the Credit Cards on the ship. Real pretty and such. Talking to her though reminds me of talking with someone my age. Maybe because I’m just getting to a point in my life where everyone at every age just kinda blends together.
After a few hours of me drinking water and them drinking and dancing, we decided to get going. Glenn and Val went back to Safeway to get something. Cleo and I walked out side and talked for a bit. She was pretty tired and wanted to go to sleep. So we all got in the car and drove an hour to drop off Cleo.
There were no parking spaces to park, so we parked in a no parking zone, since most of us would be staying with the car. Glenn, Val, Thomas and his girlfriend Claire went inside to drop some stuff off. The other Claire, Natalia, and I sat by the car and waited. The security guard, who was a complete asshole, said he was calling the tow truck to tow us since we wouldn’t move. So we drove down the street, and waited near a warehouse for a half hour, awaiting a call. Eventually I drove us over to check to see if they had gotten off the ship. Luckily Claire and Thomas were coming off, so they joined the car, and we waited another 10 minutes before Val and Glenn came.
They were late because Val forgot her room key in the car and room service took their sweet time going to let her in.
We drove an hour and a half to the top of the 10000 ft. volcano. Val fell asleep against my shoulder. She’s about 5 foot tall, so her head came right to my shoulder. As we were on our way up we looked off the mountain and you could see the lights of the city, which looked like they were floating in the clouds. Quite breathtaking. We saw fire in the distance which we assumed was a volcano letting out lava. Because after a little bit it stopped. Quite beautiful to see though.
We stopped for a bathroom break at a visitor center. I’ve never seen so many stars before. The over look of the city was just great. The temperature dropped rapidly as we got higher. It went from 73 to 40 in a matter of a few minutes.
When we got to the top, we were there about an hour and a half before sunrise, so we all parked and took a nap. At about 5:30, I could see the light coming from the horizon... Dimly but quite beautiful. Glenn, Claire, Thomas and I went to the top, and my GOD it was FREEZING. There were a lot of people up there. James showed up, and Jennifer, and Melody, and lots more! I took over 100 pictures as the sun rose and it was so beautiful. At one point, a random girl asked me to take a picture of her with my camera... I did... but not sure why... As the sun came above the horizon, Glenn, Claire, Thomas and I ran to the car to get a leg up on the drive down, since traffic would be terrible, and Glenn had to be back by 7:30 for Port Manning.
I managed to get a ton of pictures on the drive down. The way the mountain shadows over the island, and the sunlight against the rocks and the next highest mountains in the distance.
After an hour and a half of driving winding roads, we finally made it... and when I got to my room... I passed out... Slept for 4 hours... Called a couple friends, and came to my room and watched the Office. Probably going to catch one more nap, then play tonight at 8.

More seadays

2009-09-21T18:16:00.001-07:00

The last couple days have been pretty laid back. Saturday, I woke up at 10:30 to take a shower, eat a quick breakfast and go play on the lido deck. It was a pretty big stage and the weather was beautiful. It was the warmest i've felt since I've been the ship. Defi etly in the 90s. The crowd was pretty cool and my sinuses seemed to clear up (which I credit for the squeaky noises in my singing). I got to eat on The lido deck. Cheeseburger and fries and some japanese food. The gig was pretty laid back and got to chat with some people. One gentleman was a touring country guitarist who got to play with George jones, Willie Nelson and others of that caliber. After we finished talking I dropped my stuff off in my room and went back to the deck for sunset. It was utterly amazing. Loomed like fire burning in the horizon and rain was in the distance around it. I took 60 pictures worth of it, some of which turned out great.
After that I went an saw the blues brothers show I've been meaning to see for a long time. It was really goood. The band on the ship is really great. Glenn and Chris are very tight as drummer and bassist. Horns sound great and Gabe is a real good guitar player. Very good soloist.
After that I went back to my room and just hung out for the night.

Yesterday, Sunday, started off with a LOUD ALARM which woke me up in a hurry. I rushed to get my pants on, looking for my life jacket and my flaming green hat. Then I heard the alarm ask for the alpha team. Which is the fire team for those who don't know. In that situation, you have to wait until further instructions. After about a minute the captain came on over the PA system and told everyone that was an accident and he appologised and that everything was fine. I went to lunch and talked with Pat for awhile about what he uses for his backing tracks and such. Then I went back to my room and tried writing a song, watched tv, showered, ate dinner, and went to my gig in the casino. By the end of the night I knew there was a crew party in the disco, and I needed to find Greg to pay him for the skydiving. So I went down to enter a room full of smoke and tons of people. It was the busiest I have seen it. Colleen stopped me and said "I thought you weren't coming" I explained the situation, and bumped into Aaron and Eric. We all talked for a bit. Eric and I are going to see pearl harbor on Monday. The actual place, not the movie..... Aaron asked me if there was a hazer in the room or if it was just all the smoke In The room. I told him it was the latter. Nunik came and talked for a bit. After awhile the smoke was kind of wearing on me. So I wanted to leave. Colleen tried to get me to stay but I told her she'd have to be my girlfriend. And even if she was I'd still probably leave because I'm a free spirit like that. Joking with her of course.
So I left and went to my room and fell asleep rather quickly. I set my alarm for 8 am so I could eat breakfast.
Sadly I woke up at 12 pm. I think I turned the alarm off in sleep and when I managed to wake for a few seconds at a time I just assumes the alarm hadn't gone off so I went back to sleep.
At 12:15ish I went to lunch. I saw Greg there and gave him the 50 dollar deposit. I went up on the second deck and Checked some Internet stuff. Glenn came over and invited me to a night out on the town with him and six other people in a van he's renting. We both have the night off so I agreed and we're going to do that. He might tag along for pearl harbor later on in the week. Now I'm listening to the jazzband and waiting to play my last seaday for 2 weeks. Tomorrow, we hit land in Hilo. I'm going to go for a long walk tomorrow. And enjoy land. I'll update soon!

Last Vancouver... and many sea days

2009-09-18T17:37:00.001-07:00

It’s been a crazy few days, and now that I have some time during this day, our second sea day, I figured I’d write up to speed!

So, last I wrote, I had gotten an iphone in Ketchikan. The rest of the evening consisted of me calling Nick and saying the good byes for the week since, we wouldn’t be able to talk until at least Tuesday of next week. I went and did my gig. During which I spoke to the couple from Vancouver again, whose names were Ralph and Diane. We talked about how they met and all the such. Really nice couple.

The following day, Tuesday, was a sea day and I just played around with my guitar, and did my gig and had my last little chat with Ralph and Diane. The night finished out well. I went back to my room and just kinda played games for awhile. I fell asleep, to wake up at about 9:30.

I took a shower and went into town in Vancouver. I went straight into Tom Lee Music for my last time. I looked at some guitars and came across a 12 string Takamine. I played it and I was immediately drawn. I played with it for a for a half hour, and then saw another model and played with it. After about an hour, I decided to get the Takamine. I bought 12 more boxes of strings for the long trip, and some bridge pins.

I went and got some sushi, and saw Simon right afterwards. So we walked back together. When we about got on board, Colleen poked us from behind, and talked with us for a little bit. Then when we got on the ship, I pulled out the guitar and jammed for awhile. I ate some dinner later on, and went and had my first gig in the Casino.

It’s a pretty laid back gig. Most of the time, you feel like background music, but there was a group that watched and expressed that they liked me a lot. After the gig, we “ the staff” had a meeting. Which consisted of food and drinks. There I saw Anna, one of the staff mess waitresses. She was talking with Gabe. We all went to the crew bar, and just chatted.

At the end, I went back to my room and slept. Miserably. The ship moved a lot. At 6 am, I got up, and took some sea sickness pills JUST IN CASE. I went back to sleep, woke up around 11:30 and got lunch. Then I went and did some laundry. And napped.. and napped... and napped. The medicine wore me out.... I slept most of the day. Another little problem I was having was when singing the last few days, certain notes that I usually hit with ease, have started to squeak. I don’t know if the voice is just exhausted or what, but it’s happened a lot.

Anyways, I got up around 5, ate dinner, and then worked on some new music. I went and got to playing around 8, and Did my gig until 12:20. Gabe came by, and I let him come up and sing a few tunes.Which attracted a girl named Malaya. She came over and talked with us for a little bit.

Gabe and I went to the crew bar for a little bit, and hung around. It wasn’t very busy. But the ship was moving all over the place. It was crazy. I went to bed soon after, and woke up at 10. Turned on the tv, and saw the end of X-MEN ORIGINS was on. So I checked the caper to see when it was playing next, which was 12, and I went to lunch. Anna was working and she talked with me while I ate.

I came back and watched the movie, and here I am. Also, I found out I’ll be playing on the Lido deck tomorrow because the Hawaiian band is needed in the Atrium, so I get a night off which is cool.

Last Vancouver... and many sea days

2009-09-18T17:37:00.000-07:00

It’s been a crazy few days, and now that I have some time during this day, our second sea day, I figured I’d write up to speed!

I came back and watched the movie, and here I am. Also, I found out I’ll be playing on the Lido deck tomorrow because the Hawaiian band is needed in the Atrium, so I get a night off which is cool.

My last Skagway and Ketchikan

2009-09-14T15:25:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I had to make my way out into town to get a couple nine volt batteries because my guitar cut out for a moment last night.. which made me think, dead battery. Before I left the ship, I stopped for a quick breakfast, and Megan walked in, and she went on about how we hadn't seen each other in over a week. She was going into town as well, so we went together.

We talked about lots of stuff, from Jeff wanting to talk to me about songwriting, and she showed me a song she wrote. I gave her my opinion and critiques. Which she said was useful.

We walked around town, and I took lots of pictures. We stopped into a grocery store, and I got some granola bars and stuff to stock up for the 5 sea days. Then her and I went to a pizza place and I got some king crab legs, and cheese fries. We took some more pictures, and headed back to the ship. I made a couple phone calls, and went and played. It was a good night of playing. Good people listening.

Afterwards, I finished breaking down stuff, spoke and took pictures with some of the people. One couple was from Vancouver, and the husband was an engineer. He had built guitars before. Nice couple. One man told me he went to school for Opera and classical music and he said I had it, and I have nothing to worry about in the music world.

I went to bed to get up in Ketchikan.

I got up, and got ready and went out to get an Iphone. With the amount of money I pay to use the slow internet on the ship, I could save money by just getting an iphone and using the unlimited data plan. So I went and got a 32 gb Iphone, and a small 450 minute plan with unlimited data. No texts.. My verizon phone will be for talking with family and friends at home, since all of them have Verizon. I took some pictures with it, and it puts down the exact location on a map where they were taken. It's a cool little gizmo.

Now I'm gonna work on some music for tonight, and call some people up!

My day for today :)

2009-09-13T02:13:00.000-07:00

Last night, I went back to my room, and went to play my Batman Game. I ended up beating it. Great game though. I then put in “Hannibal” and watched that until 3 something. Then I went to sleep... to have dreams about Hannibal Lector and other stuff.
I woke up this morning at 11 am, and I checked my email to find I had a song order. They wanted it in the style of Elvis, and all the stuff they had for me to write was pretty much making fun of the guy. So, I listened to two Elvis songs, and I picked up my guitar, and wrote a blues chord progression in the Key of F, which took a total of 21 seconds. The lyrics came really fast. I had the song written in a half hour. I sang it like Elvis, and had a lot of fun with it.
I went to lunch and ate quickly, and ran back to my room to record the song. I finished recording it after a couple hours. Had a good funny sound too it. I made the guitars sound like the 50’s sound, and all that. I was real happy with it. I showered up and prepared for my gig.
I arrived at the Artist lounge, and got to setting up. I was feeling very social so I tried to converse with the Audience which went over very well. In fact most of my sets went over great. I had a great audience and I had a lot of fun. I went to dinner inbetween there, and had yogurt. Chatted with Doug, Glenn and Chris, the bassist. Glenn’s been calling me Matt Damon since I got my haircut. He asked me about my new movie.
After dinner, I went back up and talked with Agnes about my music, boys that have asked her out lately (most of which are phillipinos,) and her signing off in a month and a half. I went up to play again. I had an even greater crowd, and had a wonderful time. I got an apple strudel when I went on break. Eric, the piano player, came to the bar and we ended up talking for about an hour. Talked about music, recording, his career with cruise ships, touring with his brother, being at every state except for Delaware. Talked about girls, and dating passengers, and how to get away with it. All kinds of stuff! He hung around and requested a few songs, which he picked all songs that were on my list. He and I have the same kind of setlist. We both have a majority of the music from the 90’s.
I finished up my set, and spoke with Alex, the bar waiter. We talked about some music, and having my own room and how he hated me for that. Eric showed back up, and we talked about lots of guy stuff.
Eric and I went down to my room and we talked more about ship life, our bad experiences with passengers and all that. He’s a real cool guy. Cool to meet someone with the same interests and stuff. Sometimes you gotta just guy out.
I went to the crew bar to socialize... but there wasn’t anyone there... that I knew, or felt the need to meet. So I came back to my room. Now I’m going to bed!

Last Juneau

2009-09-11T17:32:00.000-07:00

I finished up the gig last night. My voice hurt a bit. I went to my room and finished up "Super Bad" and I went to sleep and continued to have weirder dreams. I woke up at 12 pm, which was fine because we wouldn't be into Juneau until 2. So I got up, and ate breakfast...or rather lunch, and then showered up. I called friends, and got caught up with them and their lives.

The line of people wrapped 4 rooms. It was huge. SO I just went back to my room and get my stuff together, like my computer, my camera, and all that. This will be the last time I lay my eyes on Juneau... at least for a while, so might as well take some pictures.

I got to the coffee shop, and got right to downloading this program that closed in the middle of my last try... so I'm trying again, and ALREADY it closed once and I had to restart. GOD I PRAY it doesn't stop again.

Otherwise, I'm just talking to friends, and hanging on my own!

Crazy Nightmare

2009-09-11T00:55:00.000-07:00

The gig went over pretty well. I was essentially background music until the end. Then Boat Drill went underway, and I got my lifejacket, and hat and went to my position. On my way there, Peter stopped me and said I had a liferaft thing tomorrow AT 10:30 AM.
After drill, I went to the meeting, which was short, but I did find that there were over 300 australians onboard, most of which were staying from now until the end of the first Hawaiian cruise. That’s 19 DAYS! They’re going to be so sick of us by then. We were told traveling agents try to package it as a 19 day cruise of new stuff.. But it’s really just two cruises.
I went to break down my stuff afterwards, and ate dinner. Then I got online to talk with some friends.
After awhile, I went back to my room and decided to watch a movie. I had bought “Meet Joe Black” from the 5$ section in walmart, and I hadn’t seen it yet, so I put it in. It was a very good movie. I enjoyed it a lot. Unfortunately it took until 2 am to finish it. After which, I went to bed immediately.

I woke up at 9:50 and got ready quick, and went up to the drill. Once again, I couldn’t hear anything because of the large fan above us. It was rather quick, and I went back to my room and napped until 11:30. Jeff came over and we talked about songwriting, lyrics, and all that. Then I went to lunch.
Came back to my room after and put in “Super Bad.” I paused it midway through and fell asleep.
In my dream, I remember images of me going crazy and destroying everything in my room and bathroom. Then I broke something on my electric guitar. I got off the ship and it was terribly late. I saw a passenger in this music store right off of the ship. Strangely enough, the music store was the one I won the gift certificate for. I was very confused by it. It was merged with a gas station, but the whole building was made out of logs and wood. Lots of Star Wars Toys and Batman stuff in it. The passenger said she wanted to buy me a gift so she bought my strings for me. As we were coming back to the ship, the whole place outside was covered in snow, and I decided to go for a drive. I saw some car, and got in it. But then I noticed the road started to look like Plantations road. The car spun out of control, but by then I realized it was a dream. So I wasn’t worried if I crashed, which I did. I woke up, and looked at the clock, and saw that it was 8:02... which meant it was 9:02 PM, which meant I was 4 hours late for my gig! No messages were left, but I jumped up quickly, very disarranged from the dream, and looked around for my suit, and opened the bathroom door, The bathroom was completely destroyed. The handles were busted off, the mirrors were smashed, and then I started to question if I had done all that stuff while I was awake. I started to panic. I tried to think of how I could explain it to my boss. THEN I woke up again. In a cold sweat, and it was only 3:38... It was all only a dream. But it freaked me out.
So I got my stuff together, showered, got my suit. The ship was in a storm and I think that’s what simulated the car driving feeling in the dream. I got my suit on, and got some sea sickness meds, just in case. I took them and went and set up. It’s been a rather quiet night. I’m feeling pretty tired, but looking forward to my day off tomorrow. Plus, tonight the clocks go back an hour, so I’ll get that extra hour of sleep. Plus the Steelers won today!! 13-10 to the Titans. A first in a long time.
Anyways, gotta go play!

Last Alaska Cruise begins.

2009-09-09T19:32:00.000-07:00

I was a little vague for last night, just due to wanting to sleep. Working on a song will do that to ya. At one point last night, an older gentleman, probably in his 70s came up to me and told me I was the best music on the whole ship. He didn’t necessarily like all the songs I was playing (though he liked a bunch.. I think he was referring more to the new stuff), he said I had “the beat” that made people want to get up an dance. A lot of people through pout the week danced, so I guess I know what he was talking about. Ever yesterday, another 80 year old gentleman told me I played the only music worth dancing too on the whole ship.

I also have had people through out the week come in and listen to me do my 90’s thing and they love that, so it’s just a nice mix of music for everyone, and anyone can dance to it.

I was sad however, that I didn’t get to see Greg or Jill the last couple days. Not even to say goodbye. Hopefully they e-mail me, because they definitely made my job all the more enjoyable.

Last night was pretty dead towards the end. Most people were heading to the dancin’ disco. Kind of odd, because usually no one is in there, but the older crowd were eating it up. So for my last hour, I played for one woman, and eventually just broke into a dialog about her working for a newspaper in Houston, Texas. We talked about music, her website, and stuff like that, and I managed to finish 15 minute early. I went to my room and immediately got to work on the song. I worked on it straight until 3 am.

I passed out pretty quick, but had nightmares I woke up late and didn’t get to my gig on time, so of course I woke up a few times in worries.

Over my room intercom, Colleen made an announcement from guest services. I decided to just get up, which was about 9:40. I listened to the song, went and showered, and went out and got a caper. Hung out and chatted with the girls at guest services for a bit, then ate lunch. I had raisin bran, and yogurt.

For all those who don’t know, I LOVE Yogurt. I have a cup at every meal. It’s good too! A good brand. I think that will be one of the biggest things I’ll miss.

Also, last night I was talking with Peter about when I would be leaving the ship. I guess I’ll be going January 6th. His reasoning made sense. It would be pretty hard to get someone to come out here on the ship right before Christmas. So I said I’d stay until then. I’ll just have to rush a bit when I get home. I’ll get like a day to see family and friends, and then I’ll have to pack, and go to NC, and get moved in and start classes soon after. I hate to rush, but I could use the extra 2000 dollars.. so no complaining there.

Well, gotta go do my 12:30 to boatdrill gig. It’s like a day off to me, because I get the night off. Which is the time I like to do stuff. So... yep.

Finished the song

2009-09-09T02:59:00.000-07:00

Within an hour I wrote a new song called “The Other Side.” I went and played my shows for the night, and at one point mentioned the song, and writing it, and someone asked me to play it. So, I did, and it was receipted very well.
After the gigs, I hung out with Milan for a bit, since he leaves Wednesday, and we get a replacement piano player. We talked about recording, Macs, Music, school and other stuff.
Afterwards, I went back to my room, and went to bed.

The haircut came out good. A lot of people said I looked a lot younger.. which is good. I’m tired of people thinking I’m 30.

I woke up this morning at about 10, and I began recording my song. I got some cool ideas down. I managed to eat lunch, and do my laundry, but I got the song down about 60%. There’s a little bit more I want to do with it. I’ll try to do what I can tonight. Tomorrow, I play 12:30 to 5, so it will be full week since I’ve stepped foot on land. Which is fine.. I’m getting used to being on the ship, where it doesn’t bother me so much. I have a lot of work to do on my new music, and my website.
I have a killer headache tonight, which keeps coming back, and the crowd has been pretty cool. I managed to bump into Jeff, the piano player, and he wants me to run him through the process of what I do when I write songs. He says he has no problem writing music, it’s just the lyrics. I told him it takes a lot of practice, but we could go over it otherwise. Probably on our first sea day. Well, now I gotta go run and finish up my gig. Got two more hours to go, and then my room to finish up my song.

After the gig, I went to my room and I finished my song for the most part. I might go back and fix little things as I learn how to do them in logic. But.. it’s 3 am.. time to sleep!!

Songs, coffee, website back up, and more songs.

2009-09-07T15:05:00.000-07:00

Two nights ago, I went through my gigs. It was a rather quiet night. After I finished up, I visited Yulia, (because she was on the way to my room). I went to my room, and paid to get my website up. I’m going to work hard on it to get it up to date, and maybe offer some songwriting services for bands, artists, producers, and possibly gifts.

I went to bed, but tossed and turned and had a lot of weird stuff on my mind. From people at school, to people I just met; what I’ll be doing after school and other things like that. I finally fell asleep after about an hour.

Yesterday morning, I woke up, and got started on writing the dd 31 song. After about an hour, I finished writing it. I went up and called my dad, and texted a few friends, then went downstairs and started tracking my song. After a few hours, I took a break from it, and showered up, and talked with some friends on facebook. Then I went back to working on the song, and finished it, then I got dressed in my suit, not my tux this time. Got up to go play.

When I got to my stage, a photographer was set up to take pictures at it. And he was going to be there until the end of the night. So I searched out someone with the approval to tell me what to do. I bumped into Marc, and I let him know the situation. He said he’d let Chris know, and so I went and dropped my stuff off in my room and went to eat dinner. I met a new girl named Anna from Belarus. I hadn’t seen her before, and the reason being because she joined the ship two day ago. So we chatted a bit, and I ate my sandwich. Eventually Peter showed up in a hurry. He asked if I could play in the Deco instead (because he knows how much I hate that particular room) which was fine. In the end, he’s the boss, and I’d do it anyway. But I agreed. So I only had to play 3 hours today. I listened to George Carlin, and wrote the blog as I wait to go to my gig at 7:30.

The deco wasn’t too bad. Greg and Jill hung out which made the transition easy. I went to see Eric, the piano player with Greg and Jill. Chatted with Eric a bit, and went back to finish out the night. Got to play over an hour of original music for a couple. Then, I got a mocha, got my computer, and continued work on my website. I got paid for the third song, so I’m all caught up. I went back to my room afterwards, and watched some of king kong. I fell asleep, and woke up at 10, showered, and continued more work on the website. I called in an appointment for a haircut, and now I’m about to write a new song for myself. So... here I go!

www.derekdaisey.com

Moving Along

2009-09-05T13:04:00.000-07:00

After the gig that night, I met up with Colleen and went to see the comedian, who was pretty funny. Then she went to bed, and I went back to my room and played games! THEN, I went to sleep. I woke up at 12:30.... Pretty late... but there wasn't much to do because we weren't docked at Juneau until 2. So, I ate lunch, signed up for skydiving, then played more games. At 2:30, I checked my phone messages and saw that Nick had called three times. So, I caught up with him, and found out what's going on in his life. Lots of stuff. He's moving out of NC. But, due to the circumstances I won't say where he's going. But he's doing good, which was nice to hear.

Then Colleen and I went to see The Final Destination... which was the same premise of a movie as the first two.. They relied heavily on computer effects which kinda becomes fake for me. Afterwards, she went off with her friends, and I came back and called Felicia from school, and talked for a long while. Then, I got a banana split from the coffee shop, and chatted with Yulia for a bit. Then I decided to be productive, so I went back to my room and tracked and recorded the acoustic song in 3 hours. Most of the time was just me fooling around trying to get cool acoustic riffs going.

Afterwards, I did some research on band logos, because I really need to get one, and get my website back up. So, I emailed a site that specializes in both website design and logo creation. Then I headed off to bed.

This morning I woke myself up at 10, and took a shower, went to eat lunch. Colleen and a co-worker walked in and asked me to sit with them. Looking out the window the glacier in Glacier bay was right beside the ship. Absolutely beautiful. SO I ran up to take some pictures. Afterwards, came down to my room to check to see if I got paid for the song, and I found I pronounced a couple cities names wrong. So I rerecorded those, and sent them off. Got a reply from the website about the logos, and said they could do it by the 14th, which I gave them the thumbs up, and now I'm going to start writing the next song. I play 5-6, 7:15 to 8:15 and 9:30- 11:30. So.. here I go!

Off to a good start

2009-09-03T15:40:00.002-07:00

Well after I blogged, I found the muse in me to writer another of the three songs. It turned out really cool. I went to bed, and woke up, and immediately got started on recording the Christian School song. I got to test out my speakers,my new mic, my porta-booth, and logic. After about 5 hours, I got it tracked and mixed, and just sent it off. A lot of it sounds great on my speakers. I was told they translate well to other speakers, so hopefully that's true! I got to play a spotted schedule tonight, which leaves me being done at 11:30. Not too bad. And tomorrow's my day off.. a day early! We'll be in Juneau, so I'll check my internet stuff, do my usual runs and then record the next song I wrote.

I might try to write the other one tonight, just to have in case I want to record back to back. The 1st one I'm doing will be pretty simple on the account it will just be acoustic. The other one will probably be a band song, which takes longer,obviously. Well I'm gonna go string up my guitar! Write soon!

4 days apart!

2009-09-03T00:05:00.000-07:00

Wow! It’s been quite a few days since I’ve updated! The last few days have been pretty crazy. To finish up what went down on Saturday, I ended up riding to Walmart alone, due to not finding Gabe. I ended up getting a temporary replacement speakers until I could get my monitor traded. I also got a bunch of 5 dollar movies.
When I got back to the ship, I showed Colleen, who was at Guest services, and she liked a couple of the movies. She said there was a party that night for the crew and her friends were making her go, and in turn she was making me go. I went back to my room and started working on a new song. Has a cool rock feel to it. After fooling with it for a few hours, I had dinner, and just watched movies, until Colleen called and said she didn’t want to go to the party and asked if I wanted t do a movie night. So she came over and we watched “The Dark Knight”.
Afterwards, we put “Big Daddy” in but she fell asleep, and suddenly woke up, so she left, and I finished the movie and fell asleep.

On Sunday, it was Skagway, so I didn’t get off the boat. I really didn’t do too much. Practiced some new songs, and had my meals. Did laundry.. Did my gig... It was pretty bland for a day.

Monday, it was Ketchikan, and I had gotten a couple song orders, and I saw the price of the ps3 went down, so I picked one of those up and the batman game with Colleen (Who managed to catch me as I was leaving the ship.)
When I got back to my room, I set everything up, and got playing. She called me about 30 minutes into it, and said the cleaning steward wanted to clean her room, so she asked if she could come over and watch. So, she did, and napped through out some of it. Then she ran off the work. I didn’t have to work until 9:30. So I just played games. I was pretty unproductive.
I did my gig, which I had some good people hanging out. I finished at 12:40, which was cool, and I got to go to bed .

Yesterday, it was a sea day. I made myself get up at 9, so I could continue the Batman saga! I went to lunch at 11:30, and sat with Glenn and Aaron, another instrumentalist. I then found out the clocks went forward an hour.. so it was really 12:30... Woops. So I continued playing games for a bit after, then set up my guitar, to go play in the Atrium at 5. I played all soft old songs. It got a lot of old people hanging out at the bar.
I saw Greg and Jill, the Australian couple so I ran and talked with them for a bit, and then I went to eat dinner, played my game! AND then went to my gig, and played 9-1. My last night in the Shanghai bar, because the new piano player was boarding today. His name is Eric from what I saw on the Caper. After the gig, I went to the Crew bar to say goodbye to leighton who was signing off. James let me know I would be playing the artist lounge for the next two weeks. Lame... I saw Colleen with her friends, so I just waved, and hung out with the guys.
Afterwards, I went to get a little bite to eat, and a production singer sat with me (forgot to ask for his name). He mentioned that some of the production people were curious if I’d be a production singer. I said if I didn’t get a pay decrease, and had all the same benefits I’d be open, but with the casino job coming up, I’m not going to have time to do it.
When I got to my room, I checked my internet, and saw I had another song order. And a lot of emails from confused friends why I haven’t been on to talk. Colleen called and asked why I didn’t come over and talk.. I just figured she was having a “girls night”. After that, I went to sleep!

I woke up at 10, quickly got dressed. Packed my busted speaker, and went up to leave. I had to wait with Gabe, because we had items we were going to return. After waiting a bit, MSA walked us into the terminal. We were quickly allowed to leave, since we had receipts. We walked to Tom Lee Music, and split up. I went upstairs, and explained the situation, and they swapped it out for me. I picked up a condensor mic, and a porta-booth kind of thing, where it deadens the sound around the mic, so I get a more crisp sound, and it gives more more room control in the computer. I picked up Apple Snow-Leopard, and rode a taxi back to the ship. It was worth it.
Came back to my room, reorganized my room so I could fit the speakers, TV, ps3, and other various items on my desk, I set up the porta-booth, and tested everything out and it sounds great! Tomorrow, I’ll get to tackle a song order, and try to finish it. I play in the artist lounge from 5:30 to 6:30, and then 7:30-10. Least I finish up at a decent hour. We start the Glacier Bay run this week, which means We start, and end in Vancouver, but we still see Ketchikan, Juneau, and Skagway. All in a different order. Juneau is first... Not sure if my day off changes or not... But I assume it will since Saturday is now a sea day.
Two weeks until Hawaii!!! I’m going skydiving!! Okie, gotta get to work!

I went and played. It’s a nice little place. I liked it more than I thought. Greg and Jill watched me, so I played all originals. Then went to dinner, then went back, and had a lot of people there so I rocked out and had a great time. People were dancing, singing along, and all that great stuff. When I finished, I checked out the new piano guy. Real good piano player. He looks to be between 22-28.. I’ll have to ask.
I got a milkshake and talked with Iulyia, who served me the drink. Then I came back to my room. And here I am writing a song for a christian school. One of the three song orders. I’m one line from being done writing it, and I’ll spend tomorrow recording it. Good night though... I was done at 10.. great stuff!

Recovery from "Whitter's Revenge"

2009-08-29T13:26:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, James came over to check out my speaker to see if I really damaged it. It didn't seem damaged anywhere apparent, so he said it was either the switch, the transformer or some other part. Guess I'll just have to exchange it when I get to Vancouver. But he said that some of the crew are referring to the storm as "Whittier's Revenge" since it was our last day and all.

I did my 5-6 gig in the Atrium. The Sitka Capers from two days before were near the CTC training area, and unknowingly I went to the Deco to set up, only to be pointed out by Jim that I was in the wrong area. I also was under the impression I had to play 8-1. It turned out to be 9:30-1. The 5-6 gig went good. Most of the people said they were sea sick the day before.

Afterwards, I went to dinner, and chatted with Chris (bass player), Doug (casino guitarist), and Glenn (the drummer.) They all said they had never experienced that on a cruise ship before. Then we got to talking about Hawaii. Doug has been on the ship for 5 years, so he's been 5 times. He said it's gorgeous and one thing we have to do is ride the helicopter tour. He says it's worth every penny.

Glenn and I agreed to go skydiving together in Honolulu since it's our day off. Doug told me the casino gig is the best on the ship. Real easy hours and easy to do. He said I'd love it. I'm gonna jam a little with him one night before he leaves there, to get a feel for the place.

Afterwards I went to my room to just hang for a little bit. Colleen called me to check in on me to see if I was ok. She said I sounded pretty awful the day before. She didn't get sick.. Lucky... The majority of the ship definitely got sick.

Later on, I got to the piano bar and played for a room full of people for about an hour. Greg and Jill, the australians that had came to see me a couple nights before were there first, and hung out for a while. I played them a few songs I hadn't played out before. One being "Between the Silver" which they liked a lot. "Fall" and "Stay or Leave" were also well receipted.

But I played my night, and got back to my room to go to bed, for we had a coast guard drill this morning.

I woke up at 8, and checked my facebook stuff. I saw that Monica from the last cruise added me as a friend. At the bar our last night, she and I both said we weren't big on initiating conversation. So I took it upon myself to write her, and she wrote back and said she was very surprised I wrote.

I went to go get breakfast at 8:30... Unfortunately, they were closing by then, so I just got a can of sweet tea, and went back to my room and waited for the drill. At 10 o'clock the alarm was sounded and I ran up with my lifejacket, and stood with Gabe, James and some others. Coast guard people came up, asked a few people a few questions, and then they let us go. Pretty painless. I quickly ran to my room to gather my computer and phone, and ran out to the internet place. I ordered a chicken quesadilla, and am downloading an upgrade to my string program. I'll probably head up to walmart around 2ish. It's my day off, so I might as well take advantage of it!

SEASICKNESS SUCKS!

2009-08-28T15:00:00.000-07:00

Two nights ago, I ended the night with my gig, and had a couple from Australia listening, and another couple from the US. They requested lots of songs I had which was a nice thing.mI always feel bad when I don’t know songs people request. I made 30 dollars in tips! When I got back to my room I found myself to be pretty hungry so I went to the crew mess. On the way there, I saw I was walking behind Colleen and her two coworkers. Colleen noticed me and asked if I was stalking her. I told her no, and kept walking. I was pretty tired at that point.

I got my cinnamon toast crunch and ate, and she and her coworkers sat with me, and they talked about lots of girl stuff I wasn’t paying attention too. After that, I went to bed for the night.

Yesterday morning, I woke up to the safety drill we had, so I went upstairs to my spot, and I had to open the door and hold it for people to come out. It was a gorgeous morning. Not a cloud in the sky, and snow on the mountains. It truly was a wonderful sight. Afterwards, I went to bed for another hour nap. When I woke up I noticed the boat was moving a little more than usual.

I went to get food for lunch, and came back to my room. I started to feel a little sea sick so I started chewing my ginger gum. Then I took Dramamine, and then put the ear liquid stuff behind my ears. It started to get worse, so I laid down for a bit. It got closer to the time when I was supposed to play, so I tried to call my boss. He didn’t answer. I called James, and he informed me Peter was on stage.

I laid down again quickly, because I was beginning to feel the puking sensation. My phone rang a few moments later. I figured it was the bar asking me where I was, but to my surprise it was Colleen. She asked how I was, and I let her know I was feeling sea sick. She said she figured since she hadn’t seen me all day. She gave me Chris’s number (cruise director) and he told me to go to the infirmary.

I was half dressed in my tux, because I wasn’t sure if they were going to make me work (I would have thrown up if I had had too.) The place was pretty busy, with seasickness people. The seas were the roughest they had ever been. Many times an hour, I could feel the boat come out of water like a jet-ski, sending everybody on the ship into a free fall, before crashing into the water, which sounded like a fist punching in the walls of the whole ship. It was absolutely awful.

They asked me what meds I took and all that and I informed them, and within 2 minutes, they had my pants dropped and gave me a shot in the butt-ox. They then sent me to get my ID, but before I could leave, the ship jumped water again, and my stomach started preparing for vomiting. The nurses told me to go to my room and lay down and bring the ID back later. I ran to my room, untied shoes, and half dressed tux and all, and landed in my bed. Passing out hard.

I woke up after a couple hours to bring my ID to the nurses. My stomach didn’t hurt as bad, but I was VERY tired. The nurse told me I couldn’t play that night because the medicine was going to keep me extremely drowsy for the following 12 hours. I went to my room and fell asleep again.

Many times through out the night, the boat jumped harder and harder into the water, making crashing noises, and throwing stuff around in my room. It was miserable. When I did manage to sleep peacefully I woke up at 11:50. I slept for 17 hours.

I showered and went to lunch. Peter was there, and I talked with him. Turns out everyone was seasick yesterday. Even people who claimed they never get sea sick. They told me passengers weren’t walking about late either, so there probably wouldn’t have been people at the show. So I felt better about that.

Right now I still feel tired from all that medicine that was injected in me. I’m gonna try to move around. Write soon!

ALSO I found out I don’t have to leave the ship for a week. Pat, the person I am filling in for will come back the 16th.

Sea Day, and Whittier

2009-08-26T14:54:00.001-07:00

When I got to the Atrium yesterday, all my fans from the piano bar were there. So it was a good gig. I really enjoyed it. I love talking with passengers that come to listen, because it does turn into a kind of friendship. I ate dinner afterwards, and bumped into Colleen so I ate with her. Found out she was going to the bar in town where we (the musicians) will be playing.

On our way back to our rooms she said she got tickets to go on the Yukon Trail tour, and asked if i wanted to go. I said as long as it doesn’t interfere with the time I’m playing, that would be fun.

I went back upstairs and started restringing my guitar, when Monica, a passenger that’s been to see me almost every night with her dad, sat and talked with me for a bit. She was 24, and from Texas. She will finish her degree in Psychology in December. She worked and tried to get her degree at the same time so it took a little longer. The last couple nights she had requested songs I didn’t know, but I took time to learn two of her requests, which I played, and she liked.

After that gig, I went and set up in the piano bar where she came and the others from the other night. It was a great night of conversation and music. And I made 146 dollars in tips! Best night thus far. Unfortunately, this will be my last week in the piano bar. A new piano player is coming in on the 2nd, so I’ll be forced to the atrium or the Deco Lounge. After the piano bar, i talked with Carlos (a man who has worked for Carnival for 15 years and was on vacation) Monica, Billy (the drawer, artist) and Megan, and tried to talk them all into coming into town to hang with us and the musicians. Within seconds, Monica and Carlos agreed.

We all met at the gangway, and approached a red van that took us to the Bar. When we got there, there were maybe 10 people in there... That were locals. I was beginning to worry. Monica said she was having a good time, and Carlos bought us our beer. He’s a real cool guy. Too bad he doesn’t work on our ship. So we chatted about lots of stuff, when suddenly the musicians showed up. And two minutes later, half the staff was there! The place was SLAMMED. Within minutes i was pulled up to play with the band. I sang “All My Loving”. And jammed through lots of different tunes. It was a great time. Colleen indeed showed up with her friends.

My boss, Peter, who is a very soft spoken guy, definitely let loose and was crazy! It was a great time.

At one point I mentioned to the Cruise Director that I would be leaving for a week. He told me he’d find room for me to stay if that’s what their (corporate) concern was.

When it came to leave, Colleen, her friend, Monica and I went back to the ship. We all went our separate ways and I fell asleep.

This morning I woke up with a massive headache, but I checked my email to see something from Chuck. He said that he was trying to work out the details of keeping me on the ship for the week, UNLESS I wanted to get off, which was just as easy to arrange. I told him if Pat wanted to come on immediately, I could take the week off and see some friends, It might help me through the next 4 months.

Won the Goo Contest, and maybe getting a week off the ship?

2009-08-25T16:36:00.001-07:00

Yesterday, I got to a great start, by sleeping in until 11:30! I felt great though. It really helps to sleep in, especially when I’m up so late playing. I went to lunch, went about my day as usual. I found out I won the Goo Goo Doll Contest. 2 years in a row! So, I get a 100 gift certificate to a music store, and a bunch of Goo Goo Dolls stuff. But the fact that the Goos liked it so much made me happy enough.

I made my rounds of phone calls to tell people, and texted a lot of friends. I restrung my guitar, and went and did my 5-6 gig in the Deco. The room is just.. too weird for me. There were more people in it this time, but only one older woman was clapping. So I played more for her than anyone. She gave me a 5 dollar tip, so that was nice. Afterwards, I went to dinner, and sat and talked with Glenn, the drummer of the showband. He and I haven’t had much of a chance to chat, but he’s 47, and he’s from NYC.

He considers himself the “Garbage Man” of Carnival, because he takes all the filler jobs on the ships. If someone gets sick, he fills in for a few weeks, and leaves. He says he’s been on 5 ships in the last two years. They call him a lot. We talked about Frank Sanatra and how he was involved with the Mob, and how Mayor Gulliani got rid of the mob in NYC. It was a very cool conversation. Peter, the boss, sat down. I was asking about his job as MD and stuff a little more. Turns out.. I make more then him, and he’s been doing cruise ships a long time. I was kind of surprised because the Musical Directors are responsible for everything. If something goes wrong, all eyes turn to them. So... with that knowledge, I decided if I stay with Carnival, I may just avoid doing that, and just stick to solo, because I get paid so well as it is.

After dinner, I bumped into Bryan in the hall way. He had a bunch of photos that were taken of crew members they were going to sell, and sure enough I found a bunch of me with my guitar. I might a couple because they looked pretty cool.

I ran up to my gig at 8 in the Shanghai bar, and I had a couple people off and on. One gentleman gave me ten dollars. I took a 45 minute break in there during the show that was taking place. Luckily I did, because not ONE person walked by the room, let alone into it! So Nunik and I talked a lot, and then Dana, one of the store girls came in aggravated at someone she worked with. So we made her feel better.

At 9:30, no one was still there, so I pulled out my fakebooks of top pop music, and fooled around with stuff. Nunik came up and sang along too, and then people came in. My same group from the last few nights. It was a fun time. Megan sang Free Fallin’ with me, and we all managed to finish up by 1.

I went back to my room and started watching a movie, and fell asleep just to wake up at 12:45. I checked my email, and Chuck had emailed me back about the Casino job on the ship. He said that he had me scheduled to come back on the ship to take Doug’s spot on the 16th. If he meant “come back on”, that means I’d have to leave. Which I assume is September 9th, because that’s what I was originally told. I was under the impression that they would just keep me on until the 16th, then move me to the casino. But, I guess... they’ll just go the more expensive route. If that’s the case, I asked if I could fly into Charlotte, so that I could see some of my friends at Catawba, so I’m waiting for an answer back from Chuck.

Now I’m going through some songs before I play tonight. 5-6, and 7:15 to 8:15 in the Atrium, and 9-1 in the piano bar.

The last couple days, and my 1st month review.

2009-08-24T03:04:00.000-07:00

I finished up yesterday walking through the rain for another hour and a half looking for the hardware store. They ended up selling me the wrong fuses even though I brought the right specifications. I got to talk to Amanda as well. She sounded good.I think she still misses it though. I know I’ll miss her ‘cause she was my good buddy.
I messed around with music a bit, took a nap, and hung around until Colleen called at ten. She came over and we watched a disc of Family guy which ended up being a little over two hours. After she left, I wrote a song, and went to sleep. Not sure if the song is keepable yet.
I woke up at 9 this morning in anticipation for the boat drill we were supposed to have. Though there was one called for the fire team, none was called for the rest of us, leaving me and a bunch of my musician counterparts confused and worried we had missed it. Turns out it was cancelled for us. The Coast Guard is conducting a drill next saturday so we wanted to make sure we knew what we were supposed to do.
I got my laundry together, and went and did that. Took naps in between loads. Ate lunch (mm mmm, fried chicken) Then I learned some new songs for my list, and tried recording some ideas down. Then it came to doing my first gig in the Deco lounge, so as I got there, an Art Seminar was taking place near where I’d be playing and I was asked if I could wait 15 minutes. No problems there. I went and said hi to Colleen, and let her see me in my tux, since apparently she hasn’t seen me in it yet. I also chatted with Megan for a bit.
At 5:15 (15 minutes after I was supposed to start) I got going, to an audience of exactly two people... who weren’t watching me... but were yet, looking out the window. So, I played quiet songs. At 5:50, people showed up and sat down, just in time for me to finish. But after I was done, I stood and talked on the mic with everyone for about 20 minutes. It was fun stuff. A few people promised to come see me late on.
I went to dinner after that, and that was... ok... Sat with Chris, the bass player, Jeff and another dude I don’t really know. They all asked if I was coming to jam in Whiter on Tuesday night, since it’s our last night of going there. (Every Whiter, the musicians go and set up in this bar in town, and they jam all night, and all the crew come out and party. I’ve missed it the last two times because I didn’t know about it. Apparently it’s an all night thing. Starts at 2 AM, and ends around 6. Since it’s the last night, I said I’d go).
Went back to my room, and messed more with my song. Then left to go to my gig about a half hour early to get a coffee to wake me up. On my way out of my hall, I saw Colleen talking with a friend. To avoid being rude, I just said hey and kept walking. After I reached a flight of stairs, she called for me to wait up. We met up with a friend of hers and they went shopping in the gift store. Looking at jewelry and such. Colleen made a joke about me looking to buy her something. But.. I laughed that off. She’s crazy. I don’t buy jewelry. Hah.
Afterwards, she walked me to the Coffee shop, and we split ways and I got my mocha, and went and played my gig. The crowd was pretty good tonight, and I was feeling good about singing. I was well rested and very talkative, and had a lot of fun making jokes and stuff.
Now I’m here writing this out.
It also occurred to me that 2 days ago was a month since I started working here, and I thought I should give the overall impression and feel of it all!

My impressions so far are that the job is really great. I’m getting paid very well to do what I love, I love the people I work with, the audiences have been a lot of fun, the scenery is gorgeous, having my own room rocks, big paychecks, getting hit on by older women, and so on and so forth. Honestly, as from this stand point, the only part of the job I wish I had was access to my best friends back home. Friendships come and go on the cruise ship, and that makes it hard to hang out with people and such. Right now Colleen is the only friend I hang out with. I see Leighton from time to time, and I have what I call “passing friends,” as in people who know me and I know, and we say hi, eat lunch and go our own way. Internet is kind of expensive too. But as of now I love it, and I find myself to be very lucky being able to do this for a living. This is a great back up career choice.
Well, I’m beat. Time to catch some ZZZs. ‘til I write again!

Cool stuff!

2009-08-22T15:05:00.000-07:00

Yesterday ended up being a pretty cool day! I woke up at 10 to find my power was fixed. I ventured out around the ship and saw Colleen for a second, and then went into town looking for a hardware store. There were none in the immediate area, so I decided to wait until Juneau to get the fuses. When I got back on the ship, I checked my email and found that I had a couple from my good friend Amanda. She mentioned that AG, the head of the site the goo goo dolls contest I'm in, was trying to get ahold of me. So I called her and caught up with her since we hadn't spoken on the phone in months.

Then I called Nick and got filled in on his business. He applied to be an audio architect at Muzak. I filled him in on my royalty business, and got him excited. Afterwards, I searched my spam folder and found the email from AG, so I emailed him back and a few moments later I received an email from him saying:

"They thought you did awesome, and declined even picking a second place "band". The goos enjoyed your version of cant let it go so much, that, because of you, they have decided to add it back into their setlist at some point for the upcoming tour. Pretty high compliment dude.

If you go to a show on the upcoming tour let me know, we'll put you on the meet and greet list.

Great job derek..hang in there man and never give up."

So that definitely got me excited and I called all my closest friends. Afterwards, I pretty much had a the typical gigs. Non-responsive crowd in the Atrium, and a nice little bunch in the piano bar. I went to bed soon after because I had to be up at 8 this morning to wear the Bear Mascot suit for 3 hours for 50 bucks. Though I was very animated, it was rainy and wet and it wasn't a very pleasant experience. Water got into my feet paws, and it began getting colder which made it more miserable and a lot of people didn't want to hug me because the costume fur was so wet.

The first hour was a little crappy because It was hot and I felt a little sick in the thing. After that it was pretty laid back.

Afterwards, I went to lunch with Bryan, Megan and their boss. Then I came into town looking for a hardware shop but still can't find it. I located it online, so now I'm about to head that way!

After I record for a bit, I'm supposed to have a movie night with Colleen. Watch some Family Guy, and the Dark Knight, since she hasn't seen it. I like breaking people of their Dark Knight virginity. I have taken 5 :)

Okie, I'm off!

Thursday, Aug 20th

2009-08-21T17:16:00.000-07:00

I slept a good 10 hours last night. All the way to 12:20. But I gotta tell you I felt great! Unfortunately in the middle of the morning I heard a pop noise, and it appears the power on two of my outlets went out. I let my room steward know, and I went for a quick lunch. Then ran up to get a Caper upstairs from the atrium. I saw Peter, and he told me that the photography department wanted to use me at either 6:15 or 8:30 to be in the costumes. Apparently Danielle and I were the only ones to sign up. It’s 50 bucks though.. You can’t argue with money. I’ll have to do it on my normal day off in Juneau. That’s the only part that blows. But I should be done late morning, and get to do my normal business in town.

I went to the CTC training area and talked with Simon for about an hour. Just random stuff.. Nothing too job related. He’s a cool guy though.

Afterwards I went back to my room, and the power was still out. So I went up stairs to the stores to see if I could buy a converter for the UK plug in my room. I did, and it was still recieving power, amazingly! So I hooked up everything through it, and blew two fuses on the speakers... Because.. apparently, they use a different kind for 220v outlets. So... that really sucked as well. But I did tinker with Logic anyways and messed around with some guitar effects and experimented with it. It really is a great software. BFD2 Drum software is MILES ahead of the last one, and it sounds so much more professional sounding. All I need is a shipshape mic and I could do my albums on my own! (But I need years of sound training to learn how to mix and all that.)

Did my 5-6 gig in the Atrium. Midway I was asked to turn down (which for some reason just deflates my energy, and drive for playing.) So I did, and that’s what happened. I went to dinner, and had some steak, rice, and spinach with mushrooms. Peter came and sat with me and we talked about the place I’m playing. He thinks if I’m not filling the place up at 8, that I should use that hour some place else, which I agree. I found out he’s been working on cruiseships since ’92. He’s been with Carnival for 6 1/2 years, and a Musical director for 1 1/2. He plays saxophone. He just tries to stay on the ships, so no home life. He said he got an email about my CD, and Now I have to record a cover of Carnival’s “theme song” and do a commercial kind of deal, and send it in again. THEN I can order them, and get to selling.

After dinner, I headed back to my room and messed more with Logic, and BFD.. got lots of cool ideas down.. But probably nothing concrete.

Went to do my gig in the Shanghai bar, and a couple people showed up from last night, and then it was moderate for about an hour. Then it was about 8 people for the rest of the night. An officer and his friends (an officer of the ship) was down having drinks and listening. He told me he thought I was great and he loved when I played pink floyd the other night. So I played two for him, and he bought me a shot of something.. It sat on the piano for over an hour before I drank it... but it hurt when it went down, and I was definitely feeling it the rest of the gig.

I met a gentleman and his wife/girlfriend. I placed them in their 20’s. Turns out they were 50, and 40. I couldn’t believe it. The woman looked SO Young.. no wrinkles, very attractive. I was quite surprised. I met another gentleman who wants to play on cruise ships and do what I do, so I explained the whole process to him.

At the end of the night, I packed it up and headed to my room. Now that Amanda’s not here, I have no one to make me go to disco, so I probably will become less social in that department. Unless Colleen makes me go. But I didn’t see her today, so that won’t happen. Anyway, I’m going to bed!

2 days of craziness..

2009-08-20T01:23:00.000-07:00

I’m installing some software right now, so I thought I would write my blog for yesterday and part of today while I’m waiting for it to finish.

Yesterday, I got a phone call from Amanda about going to lunch at 11:30. But I declined. I was far too tired. I got up closer to 1 PM. I restrung my guitar, and did my usual stuff.

I had to play in the atrium from 5-6. A lot of the people that had been watching me from the night before were there. It was fun. After I finished, I went to dinner with Amanda in the Crew mess. I had a cheeseburger and fries and she had her usual salad. Leighton was there too. So we chatted it up for awhile.

Afterwards, I went back to my room and burned a LOT of my albums, to give to those who tipped. When I went to set up, I chatted with Nunik for a bit about why she hasn’t dated in awhile. And then Rachel came by, and picked up an album and said goodbye. She had lots of packing to do and she needed a real night’s sleep. So she didn’t stick around A lot of people tipped and I managed to give out over 20 albums. The night gig was pretty quiet for a few hours. Then it picked up, but my lack of sleep caught up me and I just wasn’t feeling the energy. But it was my boss’s last night, as well as Roxanne’s last night... So after the gig, I went to the crew bar to find my Boss was already in bed, but Roxy was there with Colleen and the other girls from the front desk. I hung around for a little bit and chatted. Then headed to the disco because I promised a lot of the people that saw me I’d come out to see them.

It was pretty dead there, but there were all there. A couple people told me they had agents and such that they would give my album too. So, lots of networking! I spoke with some girl from Illinois for an hour or so. She was the girl dancing it up with Gabe the other night. She was a little aggravated that he didn’t come up to say goodbye, since they were kind of hanging out over her cruise. (The reason was that he kinda didn’t really like her,) but I played along and just pulled the ignorance card.

After that, I went to sleep.. Then I got a phone call at 7:30 am. I answered, and it was Amanda crying. She said she was fired and had to be off the boat by 9. I asked her what she did, and she said she didn’t know. She asked me to come say goodbye to her and that she’d call me. But by 9:10 I hadn’t gotten a call. So I went out looking for her, and couldn’t find her... So... I’ll be pretty sad if I didn’t get to give an official goodbye. Hopefully I’ll hear from her soon.

I went into town, and got Apple Logic to record some new music, and some monitors so I could mix my music on something real.. and not my laptop speakers. I also bought 2 weeks worth of strings (12 boxes). The speakers were pretty heavy. I had to walk them back 10 blocks back to the ship, which seemed pretty impossible. But half way there, one of the bar cleaners, who is indonesian saw me and helped me carry one back to the ship. He said he hears me every night and really likes my music and thinks I’m really good. I was most grateful.

I got back on the ship, and came and showed James and Colleen my stuff, since they were both at guest services. We chatted for a bit, and then I lugged my stuff down to my room, reorganized my desk so that my speakers would fit (I had to move the tv... I’ll probably let someone who doesn’t have one in their room use it.) And I’ve been installing Logic and BFD 2... as I take 10 minute naps here and there. But now I gotta shower, and get ready for boat drill. I play at 7:30 to 8:15 in the Atrium, and then 9-12 or 1. Hopefully 12. Tonight I’m going to sleep like a baby.

ALSO, earlier when I was checking the internet, I saw that the semifinalists were voted in by the judges. Out of all 5 groups, the Goo Goo Dolls picked me. They were allowed two votes, and they only picked me! So that was pretty awesome. I’m supposed to see the comments after the voting from the people is over. SOOO!! Yay. Ok, going to shower up!

Just got out of boat drill and our bi-weekly meeting. The boat drill was same as usual, but Bryan told me Amanda was fired because they didn’t like her attitude. Sad for sure... The staff meetings just have all the staff members in a room while our boss tells us what’s going on, and all that stuff. The big boss that was here with his family enjoyed their trip, so it was all good stuff. I talked with Danielle (one of the show girls) for a quick second. She told me she went to the beach today. This is out last cruise to Whittier. Afterwards, we’re go to the glacier bay for two cruises, and then Hawaii! Mark, the assistant cruise director read one comment card, and it was for me, and it read “Derek in the Shanghai Lounge went way above and beyond. He truly made my experience on the boat and in the bar something to remember. He learned 8 songs requested by me and 2 other guys on his off time. He is the coolest guy and I will miss his humor and his beat. Thank you Derek for making my trip awesome.” Everybody clapped for me, and Danielle added the “thanks for playing in the crew bar!” So, that was pretty awesome.

On my way back to my room, I was walking with Doug and Jim, the other two soloists, and they said jokingly “Man you really went far and above to write that stuff about yourself.” and “The must have been one wild night with that girl.” I think I know who wrote it. My guess is Rich. But it could have been either Rich, Neil or Dean. Sooo,we’ll see!

Then I went to dinner, and saw Colleen and her friend from guest services. Colleen and I are supposed to go to the supper club soon, but the last two times her friend couldn’t make it, so I said I’d take them both. Good for them because they can go together, and good for me because I look like a pimp. Haha. After dinner, I walked them to their hallway, and Colleen said depending on how she felt she might come out to see me. I begged.... I have no pride. She told me to keep my fingers crossed... So.. YEAH.

Afterwards, I continued installing my software, and got ready for my first gig of this cruise.

I played it and people seemed to like it. I was definitely feeling the tiredness. My voice needed a good break. After I finished, I bumped into Marina and talked with her for a bit, then ran and set up to play. It was quite dead. Met a guy named Bill, from Kentucky. He’s 27. Nice guy. Flirted with Nunik a lot.

Colleen came out to see me! During my break I went and talked with her for awhile. Then went back up when two older ladies came in. One of them was hitting on me.. I thinking she thought I was a lot older than what I am.. My new boss, Peter came to see me..but I had just finished. So I introduced myself.

Afterwards, I walked Colleen to her room, and I came to mess with my new software and play with it. Now I’m going to bed!!!

Monday, August 19

2009-08-19T03:16:00.000-07:00

I woke up today at about 9:45 to go into town to Walmart. As I was leaving my room, I saw my room steward in a room cleaning... and I noticed in the window behind him.. the boat was still moving. He informed me we wouldn’t stop until 11 AM.

So I went back to bed because I needed the sleep. By 12, I woke up again, and went out into the sideways rain. It was freezing cold, and raining hard. I looked around town for the Walmart shuttle. Eventually I ran into Bryan and Megan. When the little shuttle came, it turned out all would fit but me... So I got out to get in the next one. Megan and Brian followed, and we managed to get on a non-squished shuttle.

The town is a lot larger than I thought, for the Walmart was a good ten minutes away and we passed LOTS of places.

Eventually we got there, and it was the standard Walmart. So I went in and got Madden ‘10 for my psp, Family Guy Volume 7, and a 5 dollar movie. I also had a sub at Subway. Eventually I bumped back into Bryan and Megan and we all left together. But the same problem arose when it came to coming on. There was a little room, that I thought I could squeeze into, but some weasel jumped in right in front of me, not giving me a chance. So I just got in the other one by myself. When I arrived back to port, Bryan was waiting for me. So that was cool.

I went back to my room and watched Family Guy, and tried my game out. Turned out I didn’t hae to work until 9:30, So I just hung low.

At 8ish, I was checking my email, and I got an Email from Pumpaudio.com stating they sent my check to my address but it was sent back. They mixed half of my college address and my home address together. So I emailed them and said I’d do direct deposit. I just assumed I probably made 50 bucks or something from song use. TURNS OUT... I made 902 dollars from my songs being used in TV, Website, and other miscellaneous things. “Tainted”, the one song I had no desire for on my album, made me 700 of that.. So.. it was exciting. I’m using that money to order the CDs I sell on the ship.

Gerhard knocked on my door and gave me a stand for the poster that would go in front of the Shanghai Bar. I retrieved my poster, and it was very cool looking. I’ll post it soon.

I got to playing at 9:30 and it was busy once again with everyone singing along. The majority of the music played was music from the last 20 years... I got to play some oldies towards the end, but it was all very fun. Amanda also got the job for CNN as a reporter. She starts in November! I had a couple shots of some very strong drink.. One was from the bartender.. and the Cruise Director came in and bought me one.. I couldn’t turn it down because.. we’ll... he’s the big boss.. So.. that burned.. I definitely don’t like that feeling.

Afterwards, Rachel was back, so we hung out and talked for a few hours. Clocks went forward an hour sometime through out the night, and I ended up going to bed at 6 am. Soo... Gross... I did manage to see the sunrise over the ocean.. It was very worth it.. SO beautiful... So.. I’m going to bed!

Best tip night so far!

2009-08-17T04:36:00.000-07:00

Yesterday ended up being very uneventful. When I got back to my room from doing all the stuff in town, I went and laid down for a nap. Within a few minutes, someone knocked at my door, and it was the drummer of the showband asking if he could switch me in for Port Manning for a couple hours so he could go into town. I agreed, and went back to sleep. I got a phone call at 3, and it was Colleen. I informed her that I couldn’t get off the boat for the movie. I apologized and went back to sleep. At around 7ish, I went up and made a phone call and went back to my room, and watched movies. At about 11ish, I wrote a song which I hope to record in the coming days.
I went to bed, and slept until 9. I got up and watched another movie, showered, put laundry in the washer, and saw Amanda in there. So me and her went and got Leighton and went and ate lunch. After chatting and eating for about a half hour, we went back to the laundry and waited. At one point, Nunik came in (the bartender at the piano bar for the next week and a half.) We talked for a bit... Then I went back to my room and practiced some new songs like “On the Road Again,” “American Pie”, “Sitting at a bar”, and “Imagine.”
Got my clothes out of the dryer afterwards, put them away, and practiced more. Then watched “Click.” Afterwards, got dressed in my tux, and went and played a set in the atrium. It went by fairly quick and was a decent crowd. Dropped my stuff off at the piano bar and then went and ate some dinner. Decided to go back to the guest services desk and talk with Colleen and apologize for not going to the movie. She didn’t go, and said there’s always next time. Roxanne, another girl that I’ve seen before hanging with Colleen (she was also the girl to tell me to say hi to her in the crew party a few days ago,) is being moved to the Pride on Wednesday. Her and I haven’t had much of a conversation before but she said the next few days are going to be “party hard” days.
Amanda walked down and asked if I had dinner, and though I said I did, I went with her just to give her company. We talked and joked about lots of stuff. Leighton leaves in under two weeks, and I said “Are you trying to get me in the picture now so that when Leighton leaves, I just fill the void he’d be leaving and you have a replacement boyfriend?” She said yes jokingly...
After dinner, I went back to the room and took a nap. Got up and went to the piano bar, and started getting set up. Within a few minutes of nine, the bar was packed, and it became the busiest it has ever been with me in there. I made 96 dollars in tips. I spoke with a gentleman who said he was so impressed with my playing, especially the Piano Man on guitar. He told me he had a custom Les Paul from ’68, and that he might send it to me because he thinks I could make good use out of it. I hope that’s true!
Rachel, a passenger who worked for myspace, that had been to see me a couple times before was hanging around tonight. After my gig, her and I had a chat about lots of stuff. Her job, the lay off, her dad, boyfriend, my songwriting and such. Then we went and got pizza. I got Salmon pizza. Pretty damned good. And we went out on the back of the ship. It was FREEZING and raining. The boat was rocking a lot!
I told her I’d hang out tomorrow night after the gig if she wanted too. It has been a really great cruise this round. I was told again tonight I was hands down the best entertainer on the ship. So.. all good stuff. Tomorrow is Ketchikan. I think I’m going to see Walmart. It’s 3:34... gotta sleep!

Sitka and the Crew Party (cool movie title)

2009-08-15T13:25:00.000-07:00

After 4 hours of sleep, my alarm woke me up at 8 am. Took the shower, and went to the safety class. It was pretty much what I’ve been learning all along. It was about 2 and a half hours. But it was pretty cool. Joanne and Simon taught it well and it was fun, so it wasn’t bad.

Afterwards, I went to my room, and gave Colleen a call about going to Sitka. When we got to the line to get on the lifeboat to ride to town, it was HUGE! And they were taking their sweet ass time letting us off. We sat in line for 20 minutes before they let anyone of the crew on there. Passengers had been allowed to get on since early that morning... Soo.. After 45 minutes of waiting, we finally managed to get on and ride to town.

We went to the electronic store to get Family Guy, Volume 7... But OF COURSE.. they didn’t have it.. Or Madden 10 for psp.. But I guess that’s expected in Alaska.. I’m sure they get stuff later than the other states.

We went to Subway again and got two philly cheese steaks this time, and um.. orange juice. Then we headed back to the ship, and we parted to take naps. I slept until 4:30, went and got a coffee to wake up, then went to play my 5-6 gig. It was busy.. took a few songs to really warm up.. Then I was feeling good.

When I finished up, I came back to watch “Me, Myself, and Irene.” I took another hour nap, and went to play at the piano bar, which only had a few people up until 11:20, then people showed up, but I had to break down at 11:30 , and run to the crew bar.

James had set up the speaker and stuff for me. The cruise director, Chris was there, as was a lot of the crew... Already drinking and ready to go. I got off to a great start with all the upbeat popular songs I knew. It was VERY hot. Two people got me two liter bottles of water. After a few songs, Chris (the bass player) came up and played with me, and then Gabe came in on the guitar. We jammed on many songs and it really was a great time. The most fun I’ve had performing yet. Gabe, Chris and I talked about possibly putting together a little band. I brought it up to Gerhard (though he’s leaving in a few days) but he thought it’d be a great idea to do an hour set a couple times a cruise. So I’ll talk to the guys and the new MD and see if we can pull that off.

AFTER all of that, I helped James broke down, and I went to my room and slept.

I woke up this morning at around 10:20... I did NOT want to wake up. I checked my account and my first paycheck was in. 1436 dollars. Slightly more than the 700 a day.

I grabbed a hot and a raincoat, and ran into town. I had Mcdonalds for lunch since I haven’t had it in over 3 and a half weeks. It was good.. but it wasn’t as great as everyone seemed to make it out to be.

I came to the internet cafe afterwards, and am just looking around online. I walked through the electronic store here.. Everything’s about 5% over what it is in the continental US. Lots of used PCs and Macs, video games, Bose speakers, car stereos and ipods. Nothing of value to me.

Got Gerhard’s email and number while I was sitting here and chatted with him, and that’s about it right now.

As of yesterday I was supposed to go see G.I Joe with Colleen.. but as of now I haven’t really talked with her about it, so I might just hang in my room tonight and some some good needed rest. I played until about 3 AM last night..

So.. until then!

Movies, BUSY night, with a little Disco

2009-08-14T04:45:00.000-07:00

9:30... I woke up, and went out to do the boat drill. It sure was FREEZING... God... was it cold. Had to be in the lower 40s. But it went by real fast. Then I headed to my room, and got showered up and went to lunch. Afterwards, I went to my room, watched “Pleasantville’, worked on a experimental song.... then watched part of “Simon Birch.” Before I left to play my gig in the Atrium, I almost forgot to put on my TUX. So... I did that quickly, and went and played. It was a really good group watching today. One woman that saw me yesterday asked for “Grounded,” so I got to playing that. Warm reception. After I finished up, I went to dinner, and managed to catch a few minutes of the 4th quarter in the Steelers preseason game. They won 20-10! Cool stuff..

Finished up “Simon” and looked through some of my footage from the movie we never finished. Really funny stuff. Made me really miss all my friends from college, like Nick, Drew, Paul, Jake and Caibel. It’s a shame that the chances of getting us all together are real slim.

I went to my gig at the Shanghai bar... and as I was setting up, I realized my microphone was missing. I ran back to the atrium, and Jim had already set up his stuff, and he wasn’t around... I saw Colleen at the guest services desk, so I said my hellos to her. She told me she was working until 12:30 so I told her to come see me, and I’d play her the Killers song I learned for her. I ran back to my room and grabbed my spare mic, and went back to get started. I started playing around for a few minutes, and within a half hour, the whole bar was full of people singing along and having a great time. The gig flew so fast. Amanda came by, and I asked her if she could ask Jim if he had my mic. She asked if I wanted to go to Disco... I wasn’t really feeling it.. so I told her “We’ll see.”

At the end of the gig, I managed to pull in 49 dollars in tips, and have a lot of people tell me they’d be back tomorrow. Though at one point during the night my age came up, and I asked the crowd how old they thought I was. Someone told me 34... then someone else said 27. Pretty insulting for the 34.. But they all said my sound and the way I interacted didn’t seem like that of a 22 year old so they were all shocked. As I was breaking down, Amanda and Leighton came by and told me to meet them at the crew bar. So I broke down, and before I left, Colleen stopped in... but she was too late. She told me she was going to crew bar and that I should come along... And I did the whole “eh... I really don’t want to.” but she said “You’re coming! I’ll see you there” and she walked off. So I took my stuff to my room, got out of my tux, and into a dress shirt and tie, and went to the crew bar. I saw Amanda immediately and she instructed me to get a drink. So I got a corona. I went back and she was talking to someone else so I just drank my beer and looked at the tv. One of Colleen’s friends was sitting by Amanda, and she yelled my name and said “Colleen is over there! Go say hi to her!” I turned and saw her walking from the bar with two large water bottles. I said Hi, but she said she had to take those to her room, and she quickly walked off. So... alone... I went back to where Amanda was, and I saw that jim was sitting down. So I sat and had a talk with him about the job. He’s a real cool guy. He told me Doug is making 1000 a week, and he’s been at the company 5 years. And another friend of his makes 1200 a week, and he’s been 7. Pretty promising pay for the work that we do, if I had nothing else going on. Definitely something to keep in mind.

Colleen had come in by then and was sitting with a bunch of the guest services girl, and Simon. So I went over to say hello to Simon, and told him that I had a class tomorrow morning at 9. Turns out he’s teaching it. He said he would get it done as fast as possible so we could all go into town. Colleen mentioned she was going into town around twelve, and I asked if I could tag along. After a bit of talking, Simon said he was going to crash since he had to be up two hours before me. Soon after, Colleen said she was going to bed, so I walked her to her room, and told her I’d call her around 11:45 about going out.

Then I headed to disco because I told Amanda I would. When I got there, the place was dead... SO I turned around and went back to my room. Now the disco is on the complete opposite side of the ship. So It’s a good 7 minute walk. When I opened my door, my phone was ringing. I was sure it was Amanda calling to ask where I was and why the hell I wasn’t at the disco. But it was a softer voice, and it turned out to be Colleen. She asked if I wanted to go to Disco. I agreed, and she said she’d meet me there. So... I walked back, and there were a bit more people. I saw Debbie, and she said hi and introduced me to her roommate. Gabe was there, so I said my hellos to him. Two gentleman that had seen me play the last two nights came and complimented me on my set and asked if I was there to party. I saw some of Colleen’s friends and informed them she was on her way. They didn’t believe me.. But eventually she showed up. Me, Colleen and two of her friends went out on the dance floor and danced for awhile. Gabe was dancing dirty with this one girl. He had some moves on him. Colleen asked if I wanted to see a movie in Juneau with her on Saturday since she gets a day off.. her first in like two months. So, I said of course, and I asked if she wanted to go to supper club since going alone was kind of boring, and she said she would for sure.

After dancing the night away, we all went to our cabins, and here I am... ready to get 4 hours sleep... before this class, Sitka with Colleen, an early gig, a piano bar gig, and the crew bar gig... Then my day off on Saturday! So... here I go!

Wed. August 12th

2009-08-13T10:29:00.000-07:00

Today, I slept in until 11 am. I didn’t set any alarms, so that I could get all the sleep my body wanted. Showered up, and went to lunch. They didn’t have much that I liked so I ordered a cheeseburger.

Afterwards I went up to get a Caper from the atrium, and I saw that Colleen was working. So I went over and said hello, and chatted for a few minutes, since we didn’t talk yesterday. I got her some goldfish from the bar, since she hadn’t eaten and wasn’t going to be able to until 5. As she got a customer, I backed off and saw an entertainment girl wearing a “just ask” shirt. These are the people that passengers ask questions when in doubt. So I took it upon myself to be a smartass and walked over to her and asked “How many fish are in the ocean?” She guessed a billion, but then I had to bring her my reasoning how that couldn’t be true, because there are 6 billion people on the planet.. and a lot of us eat fish... And a billion.. well.. I just think we’d eat through that in a day. I suggested she ups her guess to the trillions.

We started talking, and found out she’s from Idaho. Once again, I was a smart ass. I asked “where are you from?” and she said “Idaho.” I said “Ummm.. That’s neat but that doesn’t answer my question.” I think she rolled her eyes, and I said “Yeah.. I’m sure you’ve heard that a million times.” Her name is Jenn. She was valedictorian at her college of Boise State University... So I’m guessing she’s a brain. What she’s doing on a ship, I haven’t a clue. But we talked about the ship, her home, and her plans. I asked a lot more questions than she did. She probably wasn’t interested... and was bored with my info. So I left her alone after a bit. (Sometimes I can be a little forward with knowing people.. and it tends to bug smart people... From experience.)

I went back to my room, and practiced some music. I walked back to the atrium and saw a blonde spa girl sitting at a table. I went over and introduced myself since I was feeling social. Her name was Debbie. She was from England and she gave massages. We talked about her job, and I found out it’s all commission.... Which kind of sucks because this particular cruise isn’t the most popular of things to do on board... But she was real cool. She’ll be around for 2 and a half more months. I told her I’d come get a massage sometime.

Then made a couple phone calls to a couple friends. Jenn at some point sat down near me and made a phone call as well. I gave a little hello, but now I gotta play the whole “yeah I see ya, but I’m not going to start the convo,” attitude. If she wants to talk, then she will, and all my other accusations will be proven wrong!

I got playing at 5 in the Atrium, and had a.. quiet time. A lot of people around, not too many paying attention.. But then I managed to fill the bar up. Afterwards, I took my stuff to the piano bar, and saw that the jazz band was playing, so I watched them for the rest of their set.

Then went to dinner with them. Hung out at the mess for over an hour. Then went to my room, listened to music until 8:30, went to the shanghai bar, got set up. I saw Nunik there. We both predicted it would be a dead night, because.. well the first night is usually the worst. But within a couple hours it was really busy and I had a lot of traffic inside. I had a lot of fun.

Amanda got off work at 11, so she came by and requested song after song. She was very bossy, which made all the passengers again think we were dating. She even went and got dressed up real nice and came back. Today I found out she had an interview with CNN over the phone and passed the first interview. She has a follow up Friday.

I came back to my room and I think I’m going to go to sleep. Drill at 9:30 tomorrow... Gross...

Saying Goodbye

2009-08-12T04:22:00.001-07:00

What a sad night this has become. My day started with a 5 minute drill... Afterwards, went to lunch and ate a cheeseburger with my boss. After that, I went to my room, and watched the movie “Live Free or Die Hard.” Really cool movie. I’ve seen it multiple times. Afterwards, I took a game up to Edwuardo at the Atrium. He just got a new PSP with no games.. so I thought I’d let him borrow one. I saw Colleen at the help desk. I waved, since she looked busy. Then I went to my room and napped until my gig at 5. I played in the deco lounge. It was a moderate crowd. They were quite but clapped after each song.
After that, I took my stuff to the piano bar, went to dinner, then went back to my room to burn some CDs to sell. Went up to the bar, and started fooling around with some songs while no one was in watching. At about 8:25, a woman came in and started listening. She asked for 90’s music for the most part. Then she went on to tell me that her and her husband were fighting and are probably going to divorce after this cruise. She said this was their last real try at making things right but it just didn’t work. Then he walked in the room.. talk about awkward.
She said she’d be back later, so I took my break until 9:30. Neil showed up around 10, and then I had a nice moderate crowd throughout the evening. Mel came by to buy a CD. I managed to sell 13 of them. I met a woman named Kelley, who was a very gorgeous woman, and singer. Turns out she was 43... I wouldn’t have guessed anything over 29. She sang along a lot, and was real cool. She performs for a living as well.
By the end of the night, it was Dean, Rich, Neil, and Hilary (the girl I thought was Neil’s girlfriend.) Hilary was goodbye to everyone, and gave us all a hug. The guys wanted me to go to disco with them, so I went to my room to drop off my stuff, and on my way there, they were all walking back. They said it was closed, so we all went up to the lido deck to talk and eat pizza. We had some great talks about girls, work, life and all that stuff. Then it came to the goodbyes. It was really weird, because I really felt like I got to know these guys well. Like enough to be friends I’d hang with on a daily basis. So it was sad to say goodbye. It was like highschool or college graduation. They all complimented me many times and said they would help promote me, and they know I’ll make it soon. Hopefully I’ll run into all of them sometime in the future. They made this cruise a blast.
Well, It’s late. I’m going to sleep IN tomorrow!! No alarm will wake me!

Fun stuff

2009-08-11T03:40:00.000-07:00

This morning, I woke up at about 9 o’clock. Took a shower, shaved and all the stuff that comes with that. I figured I’d call Colleen after 10, incase she was sleeping in. So when I did call, she sounded like she just woke up, but she said she’d call and we’d meet at 11.

So, at 11 we met up and boarded the lifeboat that took us to shore. She’d never been in the town so I was her tour guide per say. We walked around and talked about lots of random stuff. Went into a electronic store. I found that the 7th season of Family Guy is out, which I was not aware of... Sooo.. Now I really want it. Found out she likes Family Guy a lot.. and CSI.

After that we looked around a diamond shop... Lots of things were 25% off.. but I had nothing to compare that too since they don’t show the prices. We walked a little further just to see some of the town, and then we came across a Subway!! So we went there. It was the craziest thing though. They make such a deal about the 5 dollar foot longs at home. Well... they had the same advertisement paper up.. except instead of the 5, it was the 7 dollar footlong... We decided to get two footlong subs and we’d just split them, so we could try them both out. I got philly cheese steak, and she got the tuscan chicken sub. They were both delicious, but the philly cheesesteak was definitely awesome. I had hollipinos put on it... Bad mistake... SOOO HOT. But we chatted about lots of stuff, and then we headed back to board the ship since she had to be at work by 2.

I walked her to room, and came to notice I locked myself out of my room (left my card key inside.) So I went up to guest services, and they told me to call room services. As I was walking back from there, I bumped into Colleen again, as she was on her way to work there. Explained the situation, then went down and called room services. They sent a person over, and I got in. I restrung my guitar, and just decided to take an hour and a half nap since I was supposed to play a private party at 5:15.

At 5, I walked to go get set up. In the middle of setting up, Gerhard came to me, and said I was double booked, but he wanted me to play in the Deco lounge instead. So I moved all my stuff over to the deco lounge to play in front of 2 people up until the last 2 songs.. Then I got the whole room filled.

Afterwards, I dropped the stuff off in the piano bar, and bumped into the jazz band. I ended up going to dinner with Jeff and Gabe. Gabe dissappeared after a few seconds, but I sat with Jeff, and then Milan joined us, as well as Megan. Apparently Megan missed work this morning, because she didn’t hear her three alarm clocks, the two phone calls or the two visits by security knocking. She partied kind of hard last night. She came to the realization that she has a problem. She could possibly be fired. Sad news.. Keeping my fingers crossed that that isn’t true.

After dinner, I worked on my poster for the piano bar with Gerhard. Then went, got set up, and played a long night. But I managed to fill the bar up tonight. It was a lot of fun. During my one and only break, and I went and visited Colleen at work. Just said hi.. haha.. Wasn’t much to it. Then talked with Milan about him getting a new mac.

So I played until 1 (totaling up the time I played, I managed 5 and a half hours, not including breaks. Made 32 dollars in tips. It was a good night. Neil was definitely hyping me up tonight. Gotta give him a lot of credit for helping me out. He said it’s a shame he’s leaving ‘cause we’d be good friends. He also said he’d hype me up to everyone at home.

After the gig, I’m just coming home to pass out. Got life raft drill tomorrow.. 10:15... oh joy.

Sun, August 9th

2009-08-11T03:35:00.000-07:00

What a weird day!! I got up at about 10 this morning, and showered up in time for lunch. As I almost finished, Colleen came in, and sat with me and we ate. Last night, I did my whole “You jerk” spiel (which is when someone does something slightly un-nice, I say that, jokingly of course... but she isn’t used to that part of my personality yet.) She was like “You’re mean!” So, I told her I would buy her skittles if she’d forgive me (which is her favorite candy.) So when she was sitting with me, I asked if the town was large at all. She said it’s pretty small and not much to do, though some nice resturaunts. I asked if there were any convience stores where I could possibly get skittles. She went on about how I didn’t have to get her any, but I insisted.
After lunch, I walked her to work (which just so happened to be where the gangway entrance is) and I went out into the town. The town Skagway was about 1/4th a mile away from the ship. There was a train outside waiting to pick people up, I walked by a little river with fish trying to jump upstream, which I thought was pretty neat looking. When I managed to reach town.. it looked like an old western town.. Except in Alaska... But it followed the pattern of the other Alaskan towns... Lots of fur and diamond shops. So I walked and searched for skittles. The mountains surrounding the town were quite amazing looking. It was raining slightly.
After one walk around the town, I stopped at Starbucks and got a iced mocha. It tasted about the same as the coffee on the ship, and was 3X more expensive! (On the boat, we get a discount, so an iced mocha is like 2.20 dollars, and on land it was $6.75.)
I did another loop to make sure I didn’t miss any places.. WHICH I DID!
I saw a candy/ice cream/ treat shop. I thought to myself, YES... they MUST have skittles. So I walked over and took a small step inside and looked around. They had the jelly bean dispensers and all that, and I was about to look away until I saw that one of the dispensers said peanut M&Ms. If they had that, they MUST have SKITTLES! And sure enough... 2 dispensers over, I saw in lower case letters, skittles.
So, I just filled a little bag of skittles and bought them. I think I over estimated the amount of skittles that come in a normal bag.This was close to a two pound bag. Woops.. Kind of expensive...
I hurried back to the ship, so that I could practice all the new songs I added to my setlist. When I got on the ship, I saw that Colleen was at the main desk, and wasn’t on the phone or with passengers, so I walked over and dropped the bag on the counter, which made kind of a loud sound. She said “Wow.. Someone isn’t happy.” I denied any angry intentions and gave her her skittles, which she said made her day and should last her her whole contract.
I walked to my room and practiced... A lot... and managed to do laundry (took three tries with dryers before one actually did its job.) I got dressed in my tux, and went to go play in the deco lounge... But when I got there, there was a projection screen, and a man explaining what to look for in paintings and such. I sat down and expected him to be done at 5 (the time I started playing.) But.. he didn’t stop. He just kept going... So after another half hour, I just took my stuff to the piano bar, and found the assistant cruise director, and let him know the area was double booked and I wasn’t slacking on the job. He said no problems and that he would let my boss know.
I hung around the atrium and talked with friends for a bit, and then went down to the crew mess and ate some dinner. Steak and this spinach stuff with corn and cheese. SOOOO freaking good. My God.. I look forward to eating that again soon!
After dinner, I found myself to be pretty bored, so I just went and set up my computer and stuff in the piano bar, and practiced a little with the “Viva La Vida” track I made. I did that up until 8, and then a few people came in and I played ‘til 10:30ish without any breaks. “Viva La Vida” went over VERY well, and it got people very excited. I played lots of the new tunes I learned, and they were all recieved very well. Managed to meet a couple from Charlotte, NC and we got to talking about my college and radio and the town and stuff. Real nice folks. I played “VLV” three times by request, and “Hotel California” twice. Katrina, the bar waitress, asked for it. She’s from Russia. ALL the guys have a crush on her. She is very pretty. She’s almost 30, and she doesn’t look a day over 21. She has a very friendly way about her, but I think that sends the wrong messages to all the men, because they all tend to come to visit her... She thanked me a lot for playing the song for her and she kissed my cheek (which really isn’t a big deal, because a girl from Russia stayed with me at my home 5 years ago, and she kissed both my cheeks and thanked me and went on to tell me that that was just what they do.) All the passengers that saw went “OOooo” but it’s all just friends.
Katrina told me Agnes was looking forward to being the bar waitress next week. Agnes was working in the atrium when I first started and she loved my music. Apparently she told Katrina, she doesn’t care if she makes any money, she just wants to watch me play. Katrina thinks she likes me for more than my music. But who knows. Agnes is a cool friend. She just had her 25th birthday a few days ago. It’s cool to know I’ll get to work with her again. She’s a cool girl.
So I finished up my sets with a couple piano tunes, “A Long December” by the Counting Crows, and “Hallellujah” by Jeff Buckley. I packed up my stuff, talked with Rich, Neil and Dean for a bit. Katrina asked me to go to the crew bar and have a drink with her and Edwuardo. I agreed for one drink, so I ran to my room, got on some shorts, a polo shirt and my sneakers. I noticed I had a message on my phone, so I checked it, thinking it was probably my boss letting me know about the private party I was playing (he left me a note on my door.) It was actually Colleen, saying “I know you’re in the middle of your set, but I wanted to see if you wanted to come into town with me tomorrow around 11. Give me a call in the morning and let me know! Hope you had a great set tonight!”. After listening, I headed to the bar... Katrina and Edwuardo weren’t there yet, so I went and got a drink and talked with Gabe, Jeff and Megan. After hanging for 15 minutes, I kinda figured they weren’t coming, and Gabe invited me to come along to the crew mess to get a bite to eat. So we went on over, and I ate some salmon. While I was getting my food I saw Katrina there eating with Agnes. I waved and said my hellos and went to eating.
Talked with Gabe about recording, God, and women for a bit. After we finished up, I came to my room and here I am. Tomorrow, I guess I’ll be going into town with Colleen and playing 5:15 for a private party... So.. ‘til then!

Aug. 8th

2009-08-11T03:20:00.000-07:00

Today, I woke up at 9:30... and I still felt like I needed more sleep. But I forced myself to get up and take a shower and go into town. I went straight to the internet cafe, which wasn’t open for another 20 minutes. So, I just walked around, and called Nick and checked in on him. Afterwards, I saw my boss outside the internet cafe, I let him know about the night before, and he told me to keep playing when a customer asks me to break.

I went inside, and checked all the internet stuff, and bought a bunch of new songs to learn for the new sets. 18 to be exact. I chatted with some friends, ate some enchaladas for lunch, and headed back to the boat. On my way, I was listening to music on my Ipod, and i got a hard hit to the arm, and i thought I had accidentally hit someone. Turned out to be Colleen. But by the time I realized she was too far away to say anything. Before I got to the boat, I called my dad and filled him in on stuff.

So, I got on the ship. and worked on getting a track together for “Viva la Vida.” Practiced through some of the new songs. Then took an hour nap, went and ate dinner. Went up stairs to the atrium to let Colleen know I didn’t see her when we were walking. Then invited her to go to something tonight. She said she’d be available around 10:30,. I talked with Milan, the piano player about recording and Mac Computers. He’s looking into getting one, and he asked me lots of questions..

Afterwards I went to my room and practiced more and more, until 10:30ish, and I called Colleen. Her, a couple of her co-workers and I went to the crew bar and we just sat and talked for awhile. They had a couple drinks. Colleen isn’t a big drinker, which is nice. Amanda showed up a little later with Brian. She said she tried calling me about going out. Gabe (the showband guitar player) came over and talked with me. He asked if I’d be up for doing a few songs together during one of my sets, which I agreed too. We all just hung around.

Then it got late, and we all walked back to our rooms. And now I have a bad headache and I’m going to sleep .

A TIRED day... but a GREAT NIGHT

2009-08-08T02:59:00.000-07:00

SOOOOOOO tired today.. My God... I woke up at 5:45 AM to shower, and go to immigration. There was already a line of 40 people there. So, I was in line for about 45 minutes, and then I managed to get my stuff signed and stamped. As I was leaving, the line out grew the one I was in by 10 times... Trevor and I went and ate breakfast, since we were already up. I got scrambled eggs and bacon. It was pretty satisfying. Chris ended up sitting with us, and then Gabriel, the showband guitarist. I asked him if he had to do real sight reading for guitar. He said it was mostly just knowing the chords.

Afterwards I went to my room and slept until 10:40 AM. I got my raincoat on and went into Ketchikan for about 20 minutes. I mailed off my CD to corporate so that I can start selling them. Lots of people already have been asking for the burnt ones... So I don’t think I’m going to have a problem with selling professional made ones.

After that, I checked my texts and answered a few. There weren’t too many. Most people got the hint that I won’t be using my phone much while I’m gone. I went back on the ship, then went and ate lunch. I sat and talked with one of the security officers. His name was Mark. He was very friendly as well.

Then I went back into the Atrium bar and sat and waited for Amanda because we were supposed to go into town together. As I waited, I saw Dean and he came and sat and talked. Then me, Edwuardo (The Bar tender) and Dean met a man named Jesse, who helps build engines for the NASA shuttles. We talked for about an hour. He explained everything about them, and how powerful they are. He says they’re still using 60’s and 70’s technology. They haven’t varied too much from that. He also said that when they retire the space shuttles next year, we won’t have one for 4 more years. Due to poor management of money I suppose. Very informative fellow.

After that, I saw Amanda talking with her mom on the phone, and she apologized and said she was really drugged up from being sick and she couldn’t leave the ship. I went back to my room to restring my guitar, and took another hour long nap. It was unquenchable sleep. I just felt more and more tired.

At 4:40, I went and set up and performed at the Atrium. Another good little crowd. I had a lot of fun talking, but I was very aware my voice was suffering from the lack of sleep, for it was harder to hit my notes than usual, and I cracked a couple times, so I started dropping the keys to a lot of songs to offset myself.

After that set, I saw Colleen working at the guest services desk, so I went and had a 14 second conversation with her until a customer just kind of pushed by me and asked a question. But in the 14 seconds, Colleen said she was going to come and see me play tonight. After our talk, I went and ate a small dinner, then ran to the Deco lounge to play a 30 minute set. The deco lounge is a really small place near the dining area where chairs are all around you. In that half hour, every chair was full and I had everyone’s attention. I was having a great time. Then in the middle of a song, I heard someone whisper into my ear “take a 10 minute break.” I assumed it was a boss telling me, so afterwards, I told everyone that would finish up my set. But then I turned to see the person who told me to take a break, and it was just some passenger, who was about to start a birthday party in another room. That kind of pissed me off, because I only had 10 minutes left to play, and I do get paid to be here for a reason. SO I was just slightly aggravated about that.

I dumped my stuff off at the piano bar, and went and took another 15 minute nap. That didn’t seem to help much. I came back to the bar, and started setting up my stuff, and within a few minutes my crowd from the night before was back, with a set of some people that had seen me earlier. I was very tired by this point and really just didn’t have the energy. Colleen and a couple of her friends came to watch and requested songs. Neil, Dean, Rich, and Neil’s Girlfriend hung around all night. During my one break, Neil went through my setlist and picked all the songs he wanted to hear that night (which was fine by me.. At least I knew they’d be happy!) I sat and talked with Colleen and her friends. All real nice girls. They all work at guest services. I probably talked with them for about a half hour. Then I went back to playing, and from there on out it was a straight party. I loosened up a bit, and started having a lot of fun, making jokes, adding people’s names to songs. Megan came out and sang a few songs for me. Colleen’s friends had to go to work at some point but Colleen stayed the whole time with everybody. Neil told me that tonight was the best night so far on the cruise and they all look forward to me playing on Sunday (since tomorrow is my day off.)

So my crappy night ended up being a really great night. After I was done, Colleen waited around for me, and I told her I’d walk her to her room since she stayed out to watch me (though it is right on my way.) When we got there, I asked if she had scissors or something to cut my shoe laces with (my shoe laces are REALLY long... and I have to triple knot them to make them untrippable.) She just so happened to have a razor blade. So she met me in my room, and I showed her around (She said her room is different because the top bunk doesn’t push to the side.. It’s stationary.) She helped me measure the length of the shoe laces and get them cut right. She told me she had a really fun time and I told her she definitely needed to come out again soon. Then she said to enjoy my WHOLE day off (since she works 7 days a week.. only gets sections of days off.) I walked her back to her room, came back (which took a total of 12 seconds,) and here I am writing away. Now I’m going to sleep til about 9:30, shower up, and go into town and use free fast internet.

SOOO, ‘til next time!

Catching up! And a good night!

2009-08-07T04:14:00.001-07:00

It’s been a busy couple days... But not really. Ha. Just trying to do what I can. Yesterday, I went out into Vancouver around 8 AM, to find that nothing of value opened until 10 AM. So.. I walked around and took many many pictures. A very beautiful town, it was. I managed to find the Apple Store, so I most certainly took a look around. Logic 9 came out, which is a very cool recording software. Unfortunately it’s a lot more expensive here than it is in the US. So, I passed.

Also in the Mall I visited, I tried some sushi (which was very delicious.) I also had a fruit smoothie. I then went to Staples and bought some burnable CDs, so that I could some of my album while I wait for approval from Carnival. I also noticed that most ATMs in Vancouver, don’t accept VISA. It was so backwards to me. But luckily most shops did accept it. So, I was safe.

After a few hours, I went back to the ship and prepared to play for my new audience. I started off with a bash, and played lots of upbeat good songs and got lots of onlookers immediately. Then I went to the piano bar, and it was kind of dead. A couple cool people hung around, but it was overall dead. But that’s normal for the first night.

So, after sleeping in late, and having lots of weird dreams that involved an old man psychic, I woke up, ate lunch, took lots of pictures out on the deck, in search for whales (of course they were jumping around when I didn’t have my camera. I ran to get it, and when I got back.. there was nothing..) Then I played in the Atrium, and after I played one original, I got requests for more. Then, I got some pictures taken of me in a tux for a poster, and then I went and played the Piano Bar. This time, I managed to fill it pretty well tonight. Sold two cds, and by the end of the night, everyone was singing along. Met a gymnist teacher named Neil (who swears he will fill the place up tomorrow for me,) and Australian named Mel (great funny guy,) and an 18 year old named Dean. Amanda came and asked if I wanted to go see the comedian with her tonight at 12 (assuming I got off then) and I agreed. But at 12, the place was really rocking, so I couldn’t leave. She was dressed up real nice. All the people at the bar were heckling me to go out with her and all that. Especially Mel. But I informed them many times she had a boyfriend.

Amanda came back around 12:50 and said the comedian sucked and asked me if I wanted to go to Disco. All the people at the bar started cheering for me, though I repeated once again, it wasn’t like that. We invited everyone out, and I ran back quick to get dressed into a dress shirt and tie. My boss had his door open, so I let him know how it went, and that I was going to go out and socialize (which he liked.) Gerhard has been really cool to me. He really encourages me to go out and meet people, and he and I have lots of cool conversations after the gigs. It’s really going to suck when he leaves. He’s a cool mentor.

So, I went to the crew bar, to not find Amanda there (where she told me to meet her.) I saw Chris, the bass player and he made me get a beer. Haha. Funny english guy. So I got one, and chatted with Megan, Jeffery (the showband piano player) and Melody (entertainment girl.) After a few jokes and laughs, Amanda showed and we made our way to the disco. She asked what all the cheering was about when she left the bar earlier, and I let her know. She thought it was funny.

We got to disco and it was DEAD. Like.. maybe 15 people there. She bought me a coke and rum, and we drank and talk for a bit, and waited for people to arrive. Not many arrived... then she got the sudden urge for pizza, so we ran to the pizza bar and got a slice each. Then ran back down. We bumped into a few of the passengers and made them come (Dean and Mel.) So they came in and I talked with them and Amanda, until Amanda got tired and left. So I talked with both of the guys for a bit, and explained my job to them. I turned around and noticed Colleen (a girl that works at guest services, that I had met a couple days before.. we also ran into each other the same time 3 nights in a row at her door.) coming up the stairs and I poked her and we got to talking. Found out she’s 27, and from Toronto. This was her second contract and she’ll be here until December. She likes her job, though it has it’s ups and downs. While she ran off to get a bottled water, Mel left, but I talked with Dean for a bit. He works for his dad’s auto mechanic shop. His dream is to start a underground record label and help the local bands he loves. So I gave him my advice on it all. He was a real cool kid.

Colleen came back, and she asked if I wanted to go to the lower level of the disco with her, so I did. When we got to the bottom, we pretty much demonstrated what bad dancers we are. Though she’s black, she admits she has no rhythm. As I am a white guy it’s already a given I can’t dance. We hung around and talked more, as we danced. The song “Womanizer” came on, and she asked me if I was a womanizer.. I told her no.. not by any means, but she didn’t seem convinced. She noticed me coming in with Amanda, but I once again made it clear we were friends. Another one of her friends came over and danced with us. Colleen left to do something real quick and she told me not to leave, so I hung with her friend. We ended up being the only 2 people besides the DJ left in the room. He called out “last song”, and Colleen came back, and we all walked out. Colleen lives 4 doors down from me, so I walked her to her room, and I came here to go to sleep, because.. well.. I have embarkation tomorrow.. well.. in 3 hours. So.... NIGHT...

Good Things

2009-08-04T01:36:00.000-07:00

It’s 1:36 AM right now, and I’m about to set my clock forward an hour as we make our way towards Vancouver. Today, I slept in, since I was up so late last night. I woke up at 11. Got cleaned up and went and ate lunch, which consisted much of fruit and yogurt. I love the fact that that’s available every day. It makes me so happy when I see it!
Afterwards I checked the Caper, which listed me as playing from 9:30 to late in the Piano bar. A very late start compared to my other times. So, I went to my room and started recording a demo of my new song. I managed to get through the drums, bass, and guitars. My voice wasn’t too warmed up so I’ll work on that in the next couple days. Afterwards, I just played some games on the psp, and watched Forrest Gump. Such a good movie. Afterwards, I made my way to dinner, and managed to burn the top of my mouth with HOT Mashed potatoes. The outside of the potatoes weren’t steaming, so I thought I’d be fine. How wrong I was. The hot stuff was in the middle..so that got me good.
After dinner, I went upstairs and talked with Megan and Amanda a little bit.. Then went down to the crew training area (in this place you can learn another language, learn how to use a pc, learn business, how to save money, powerpoint and many other things in your free time. I went and talked with Simon for a bit in boredom, but decided I would try learning Spanish for real... Since I have so much time on my hands. I’ll start tomorrow around 10 AM.
Afterwards, I came to my room, and ended up taking an hour nap because of a minor headache. I woke up around 8:45, and got my stuff together and went to the piano bar, There was a girl there, that I had seen the first day of this cruise. Found out she was a senior in high school from Colorado. And she has taken 7 years of violin. I ended up starting at 9:15 because I was bored, and because she was there to listen.
After about 45 minutes, another couple came in, and started requesting lots of my soft ballads. Billy Joel, Elton John, and others in the genre. Found out the woman was a nurse who travels to different ships every two cruises.But her and her husband enjoyed it very much, which I was most happy for. Then they left, and a group of Indians (folks from India) sat around and asked if I knew Beatles. So I played through all the Beatles songs and they sang along, and they requested more and more. Then a c ouple other ladies joined, and then some of the 14 year olds that were watching a few nights ago. It was a pretty cool group. Then everyone realized that the clocks were being pushed forward, so most of them went to bed. The two girls hung and asked lots of questions about my job, and how I got it and such.
I was finished at about 1. Got my stuff and put it in my room, then went to go get a bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch. I was starving! My boss, and some of my fellow musicians were there, so I went and sat with them. My boss, whose name is Gerhard, joked that he needed me to play 10 hours tomorrow. Then he said he had a paper he needed me to sign. I asked if it was a bad piece of paper, and he shrugged his shoulders and said “I guess you’ll just have to see”.
I’m not gonna lie.. I was a little worried. I wasn’t sure if I missed something, or whatever. So I finished up my cereal and went to go retrieve the paper. It was a positive comment sheet. It was filled out by Gerhard, saying “Derek is a high energy performer and shows outstanding people skills, no matter if it's among his fellow crew members or if it's indulging guests into his music. After performing already 4 hours on 7/27, Derek was needed to sub in the piano bar where he performed nonstop for another 2.5 hours and quadrupled bar revenue compared to average nights.” It was signed by both the Cruise director and Gerhard. So, that was a pretty cool thing to see. Boasts the morale a bit. I don’t know where it’s being sent too and what it means for me exactly, but at least I know I’m doing my job well, and I’m fitting in well.

Well, it’s 1:57... but let’s just say it’s 2:57. I’m off to sleep!

Working out and being social

2009-08-03T04:19:00.000-07:00

Last night was pretty uneventful. In fact, I fell asleep by 11 o clock. I woke up at 6:40 to the sound of some loud motor below (one of the engines, I guess). Took about an hour to fall back asleep. Then I woke up at 10:45. I quickly got dressed, for I was due at a boat drill. So I got my green hat and life jacket and arrived to see Amanda, Bryan, Doug (another soloist), Simon (One of the training personnel from England. Really cool guy) and James (sound tech) with many others. The drill consisted of us being shown where all the life boats and life rafts were and then told that in three weeks the coast guard was coming on the ship for a drill, so they wanted to make sure we all knew what we were doing.

Afterwards, I went and got my workout clothes on and went to the gym. It was pretty empty. I ran on the treadmill and the elliptical machines. Tomorrow, I’ll work on lifting some stuff for weight loss.

I ran back to my room, showered up, and went to lunch, which consisted largely of fruit, and yogurt. Pretty delicious if I do say so myself.

Then I went BACK to my room, and found myself blocked in by painters, that were repainting our area. So I was stuck in my room until 4:40. I got my tux on and went and played in the atrium for an hour. It was a real good crowd this time around. I miss playing there. I love standing and playing. I noticed the guy who worked with the Goo Goo Dolls there listening with his family.

After I got done, I moved my equipment to the piano bar, and then went and got some miniature Spirit ornaments that I’m going to send to some family and friends.

Then Amanda and I went and ate dinner. She pointed out a girl who was stalking the golf pro teacher. The girl was a cute blonde, and from England. She had come to me a few days earlier and said I did amazing at the show. SO, now that i have the red flag, I can’t be too nice. Being too nice sends bad messages and gets stalkers.

After dinner, I went out on the deck and just gazed at the beautiful scenery. The sun was out in a red haze, as the mountains passed us with snow on them. Quite gorgeous. Then I went to my room to hang until 8:30.

Made my way to the piano bar, and had a good little crowd hanging out. A couple had just renewed their vows for their 50th anniversary. So I tried to pull every old song out of my book as I could. Amanda visited with a Ketchikan Chocolate... and it was damned good. Definitely gave me a sugar rush. She said she’d talk to me later about going to the crew bar to socialize.

At 12 o’clock the manager said I could leave. (The ship was dead.. very old crowd on this particular cruise.) So I went to my room and got dressed in very casual clothes and decided to go to the crew bar on my own. When I got there, I didn’t see anybody I knew too well. So I went and bought a 1.5 liter bottle of water, and brought it back to my room. But refusing to give up on socializing, I went back. I noticed the bass player from the Jazz band sitting with a couple guys. He waved me over so I went and sat there. He’s around 50 years old, and he’s from England. Really nice guy. He was sitting and talking with the Golf Pro, Mike. So I chatted with both of them for awhile. I had 2 beers, but that was more than enough for me. Mike told me all about the stalker and such. He told me not to start any convos with her and avoid convos if she starts them.

A sound tech came and sat down named Trevor. He was my age, and a real nice guy as well. Mike got up at some point, so it was me, the bass player, and Trevor all talking about music, ship life, the road, etc. We all made our way to the bow deck, and continued chatting. The air was FREEZING.... Reminded me of Titanic.. as dark as it was. The bass player (he never actually gave me his name. I hope to get it tomorrow) told me he thought I sounded great and I didn’t play like a 22 year old, and that I was beyond my years. Which was a cool compliment. He said I was the right guy for the job, and was glad I got it. Trevor said he’d definitely go out of his way to come see me sometime soon. So that was all cool.

After that, I wanted to go to the lido deck (the deck where passengers eat) and use my privilege to get some good food. I went up to the pizzeria (which is open 24/7). They had salmon pizza, caesar salad pizza, and many other specialties.I stayed basic with pepperoni, but I look forward to trying the others.

WELL, I’m tired.. time to hit the sack.

Day off, and the Supper Club

2009-08-01T22:50:00.001-07:00

Today was my day off. A VERY uneventful day. I got up at around 9, and about 10 minutes later, a drill was called for port manning (the members that had to stay on ship while in port.) I got my bright green hat, and life jacket and headed to the area that my emergency card told me to go. When I arrived, I was met by one of the security officers with a sheet of paper to sign. Afterwards, he said “thank you” and I went back to my room to drop my stuff off, and went to get lunch. While I was in the middle of eating my fruit bowl, an announcement was made for the port manning to meet in the piano bar. SO, I had to ditch my meal and went up for the 10 minute meeting. The top security officer described what port manning was, checked our cards and let us go.

On my way out, I saw Amanda and her boyfriend. They were checking the ATM machine both to notice they got paid (via direct deposit.) After they left the ship to go see Juneau, I checked the ATM as well, to find I got paid for 5 days of work during the pay period. So there was a nice 500 dollars in there. So I quickly went to my room, paid off a credit card, and other little bills.

Afterwards, I watched the movie “Hook”, and managed to get my laundry done (which is usually a very hard thing to do due to the amount of people there are sharing the little amount of washers and dryers.) But on Juneau day, most people go into town because it’s the 2nd nicest (against Vancouver).

As 6 o’clock got closer, I got dressed up in kaki pants, a dress shirt, and a tie, and I went to the Supper Club (the very luxurious restaurant at the top of the ship.) I was greeted by a couple girls that I had seen in front of the Atrium Elevators promoting the supper club. I was sat down by a window which showed nice snow mountains.

My appetizer was a crab cake, which was presented very nicely and tasted amazing. The whole feel was like cuisine. Second, I got a Caesar salad, with anchovies. THEN, I was brought the entrée, which was a huge lobster tail, delicious steak, with some sauteed mushrooms and asparagus. It was soo good. For desert, I was given 4 small cups of different deserts. THEN I was given a truffle desert from the chef.

The bill was 30 dollars. It was great service, awesome food, 5 star quality. I was very VERY impressed. You can’t get food like this anywhere else for 30 dollars. No less than 60 in most places. It will be something I’ll do from time to time as a relaxer. When I acquire tips and such.

Afterwards, I headed back to my room, and am just taking it slow tonight. Just watching some movies, and hanging in my room. Tomorrow, I got work 5-6, then 9 til late.. SO until then!