Travel Highlights

So I flew from Miami to Frankfurt to Bremen, Germany today. . . yesterday? . .  arrived today. . . whatever.  Don't take the following as bitching, I'm well aware that I might be in for the most grueling experience of my life anytime I travel.  And this trip wasn't nearly that bad but it did have a lot of firsts.

My flight from Miami to Frankfurt was delayed by, get this, a faulty power line for one of the kitchen heating units.  An hour and a half later Lufthansa got the crisis under control.  Super.  Predictably I missed my connecting flight in Bremen by about 5 minutes (I watched the plan pull away from the jetway) and had to spend about 5 extra hours in the Frankfurt airport.  Time flew.  I tried to work, I dozed.  I tried to read, I dozed.  I tried to doze, I dozed.  Sometimes things just work out.  Thought I had my second wind getting on the flight to Bremen and read through take-off and even got some water before I put the book (and my arms) down on the tray table and really went for a world class snooze.  (Ed. note:  I can never sleep on planes, not even that one time when JG got us hooked up with 1st class seats from SFO to Newark. . . but that might have been because we were too busy being giddy with our champagne, screwdrivers, multiple choices of breakfast and, of course, hot washcloths.)  So I doze off and then apparently REALLY tune out. I didn't wake up till the wheels of the plane first touched the ground and you know what? my tray table was still down. . . probably because my arms where completely covering it.  Don't know if they tried to wake me but all I know is I beat the system, I landed in a plane with my tray table down and everything was okay.  Aaron 1 - Airline Rules 0

Other highlights from my flights:
-- I had an aisle seat. The guy to my left was about half my size and asked if I'd be willing to take the inside seat so he could put his extra carry-on bag under the seat.  To use the vernacular:  WTF?  This kid had no clue what he was doing.  We all waited 5 minutes while he tried to wedge a rolling carry-on under the 2nd seat in before he asked me to switch.  After I refused a kindly stewardess helped him find some room in an overhead compartment.  Bizarre.
-- I read one book and watched about the last 5 episodes of LOST on my Archos.  Talk about passing the time. . . if it wasn't for my seatmate it would have been a great flight.
-- My seatmate (the same kid/younger guy/Indian dude with no concept of personal space) decided that my waist was obviously a great place to store his right elbow during the flight.  Nevermind the luv handles takin' up space there, dude. . . go right ahead and stick that bony elbow about 4 inches over the armrest. 
--  I handled the bony elbow in it's more innocent form but later in the flight I was treated to the same elbow crashing down on my shoulder.  I can only assume that he dozed off and awoke with a start but when I looked over at him there wasn't so much as an acknowledgement coming my way, let a long a courtesy, "My Bad" from him.  Guess I'm overly sensitive. . . or severely bruised.

Well, I had planned to make those short but that didn't work so I'm cutting myself off.  Bremerhaven seems like a nice German town and I walked around a bit today.  It's about 40-45 during the day, mostly cloudy, but it'll be nice to work in this weather instead of the Bahamas.  My lids are drooping so I'm off to bed.  Got a week of receiving trucks, loading containers and trying to keep track of everything on a massive spreadsheet before the ship pulls in Friday night.  I hate spreadsheets. . . which is odd since I live to collate.  Good night.

Project Down

What's wrong with this picture?

Completed another little dry dock a little more than a week ago. Another Freeport number with all the fun/typical BS that goes with it. More pictures at Flickr under the set named, "Summit E-Dry Dock 2009."

Went to Germany last week for meetings but am home now till March 11th. . . then it's super-happy-fun time in Phoenix for a good friend's bachelor party weekend. After that things get a little more interesting. All is well. Stay calm.

Not Much Really

Well, as usual time has passed and I've had about a dozen ideas for things I should put on here and yet what do we see? Nothing. Nada. Bupkis. (How the hell do you spell "bupkis?" Oh, I got it right. . . I think there should be a 't' in there. Ah well, you can't win 'em all.)

It's been cool here for about a week. Probably hasn't gotten over 75 ONCE! Ha. This place is hilarious. Longest cool spell I can remember since I moved here. It's nice to sleep without the a/c on. Had a good weekend in the nice weather. Happy hour, gym, Lewis Black, biking, new web cam, boat work and maybe a mixed drink somewhere in there. But my free time is once again drawing nigh as another dry dock approaches.

The Summit is only a quick 4-day "emergency" dry dock but it'll still steal a weekend away from me. I suppose I should follow everyone's advice and just be grateful that I have a job. . . but then I wouldn't get to bitch nearly as much. And speaking of bitching, I'm writing this from work and should really get out of this dismal office. The nearest window from me is 80 feet away and I have to stand up like a prairie dog in my little cubicle to see over the rest of the little prairie dog homes and try to figure out if it's day or night outside. Someday I should just learn how to tell time and then look up the sunset time on the intertwebs. . . but that sounds horribly efficient and I'm sure that's the wrong path for me.

I'm not sure if the gym or the bottle is calling me tonight. Guy at the boat told me that a buddy of his drinks vodka/sprite while they play hockey. Now THAT'S dedication. Bah, I guess the gym will win out. . . damnable sensibility, I'll get my parents back one of these days for passing that trait along. I finish with a warehouse shot. Why?
'Cause.


Can you even see the other end of this place?! Sheesh.

The Might, Mighty Shamrock

Welp, thar she blows!



She ain't much to look at right now because she's at the most gutted point in her life. We're abating mold, cleaning tanks, checking lines, removing old equipment, drawing new layouts, over-hauling the engines, etc, etc. . . of course my part in all this is to perform the most menial of tasks seeing as how my technical capabilities are somewhat less than my compatriots. There's quite a few more pictures up on my flickr page (find the flickr window on the right hand side of this site).



Man, these pictures really don't do much for this boat. It's 53' long and wedged in between other boats in a Ft. Lauderdale neighborhood waterway. For those of you who have never been to south Florida, Ft. Lauderdale is a bit like Venice in that there are a ton of houses along a myriad of waterways and each house has it's own pier in the backyard. Kinda crazy, fairly polluted, awfully cramped at times but a nice feature for a region driven by fun in the water.

I'm off to dinner (and the AFL Playoff game) in a minute so I don't have time to tell much more of the story. Long and short of this boat is that we're planning to get the basics taken care of in the water and then take her into dry dock. After dry dock we should just have finish work left and when she's completely done we'll use her for our pleasure and rent her out for charter trips. The timeline is for us all to be watching New Year's Even fireworks aboard our completed vessel going into 2010.

I know, a year sounds like a long time but we're pretty much only working on the weekends and most of us travel quite a lot for work. I'm the lowliest owner (I think) as a project manager. . . most people are Directors or VPs or other such nonsense. Busy people and their toy. That's what we are.

Except me. I'm not busy. But I gotta go.

On Being A Good American

I am a good American.  Which is not much different than being a good Amur'can.  So far this year I done gone 'n got invested in a small business AND bought a luxury item.  The small business involves a boat and would require a number of posts to properly explain (without actually boring you to death) and the luxury piece came in the form of a gee-tar.  Despite working for a cruise line I don't know much about boats and despite growing up with piano and trumpet lessons I don't know a thing about playing the guitar.  Should make for an interesting winter before I travel again in March.

I'll start to post pictures of the boat and give a few specs and the story once I get everyone's approval for the story going "public" via the interwebs.  And when I say Everyone's approval, I mean it.  There are fourteen people who own part of this boat and before anyone get's too excited you should know that it's definitely a work in progress. . . and probably will be for another year or so.  The guitar on the other hand doesn't need any work at all. . . just needs someone to play it (or learn how).  I'd give both ventures about a fifty-fifty chance of panning out in any sort of positive way.  Cause I'm both a glass half-full AND a glass half-empty kind of guy. . . hence the fifty-fifty. . . what?  Do you want a pie chart for clarification?

What else. . . oh yeah, on a much more important note, I'm an Uncle again!  (Implying that I wasn't for a while?) Now I've got TWO nieces to influence in my own particular way.  I'm still debating which Uncle personality to go with.  I'm leaning towards the slightly-off-Uncle-that-the-kids-like-cause-he-brings-them-stuff-from-other-countries but there's always the classic quasi-cool-uncle-that's-never-around. . . but then of course, I've have to be cool.  

Well, I'm definitely not cool but I am finishing off my work day by writing this.  Sorry there's no fun work stories or amusing anecdotes about monkeys or lemurs.  So Flo is surprisingly lacking in both animals.  I do have a short, four day dry dock coming up in February.  We're gonna exchange a whole azipod on the Summit.  Should be interesting in only four days. . . kinda like exchanging that diesel engine block on the Jewel in four days in Boston back in October.  Like Kevin Nealon once said, "Life is circular, Happy.  You've gotta block out the bad and let in the good."

Block, Bad.
In, Good.

Bueno.

Limited Picture Post

Travel. . . Yes, Please

Fund app that I use through Facebook. I think I need to start working on spreading the pins out a little bit.

• Create your own travel map or travel blog


• Travel Info at TripAdvisor

We've got a new year coming up. . . maybe it's time to put a little personal travel on the calendar.

Yuletide Cheer

In Idaho it's cold outside. Cold and windy. Snowy, cold and windy. Wintry, snowy, cold, windy and some other descriptive adjectives and it feels goooooooood. Merry Christmas to everyone reading this and I suppose to the rest of the world too. Got a typical holiday planned today with family, food, presents, a cute kid, a warm house and good times. For most of my family this is the first Christmas in Idaho, but my sister-in-law's family has been here for years. Not years as in, "I remember when this was all orange groves (which don't grow here) as far as the eye can see," but years nonetheless. All the locals say that it's never this cold for this long here. Good for me. . . I came to shake off the oppressive Florida heat and that slightly unsettling feeling of almost breaking into a sweat at the slightest movement. . . and I think it's working.

I'm dubbing this the Laptop Christmas. I'm sure there are plenty of families that have had multiple holidays dominated by mobile computing devices but this winter is the first year we've found ourselves sitting around with a computer on every lap. Times change and so do we, I guess. Now don't get me wrong. . . computer time has been fiercely rivaled by Scrabble time but of course the circuit boards have their say in that game now as well. Easier to let the Scrabble website tell you what word is legal than sift through those pesky pages in a big, fat dictionary.

Speaking of things big and fat. . . I'm heading over to the bro's house soon where the snacking will likely be epic. Better get in gear and eat some cookies. I mean, pack some cookies up to take over. Sure, that's what I mean.

The snow is coming straight down now and the other bro says we're supposed to get 1-3 inches today. When was the last time that you had a white Christmas? Personally I'm gonna go enjoy the one we're having right now.

A very Merry Christmas and perhaps a tall mug of something warm (and partially toxic) coming right up. Cheers.

FWD From A Family Member

The following was presumably sent to me in order to make fun of my lack of belief in a higher being. However, I just want to know. . . do I get the day off or not? -AD

FWD:
In Florida , an atheist created a case against the upcoming Easter & Passover holy days. He hired an attorney to bring a discrimination case against Christians, Jews & observances of their holy days. The argument was it was unfair that atheists had no such recognized day(s).

The case was brought before a judge. After listening to the passionate presentation by the lawyer, the judge banged his gavel declaring, 'Case dismissed.'

The lawyer immediately stood objecting to the ruling saying, 'Your honor, how can you possibly dismiss this case? The Christians have Christmas, Easter & others. The Jews have Passover, Yom Kippur & Hanukkah. Yet my client & all other atheists have no such holidays.'

The judge leaned forward in his chair saying, 'But you do. Your client, counsel, is woefully ignorant.' The lawyer said, 'Your Honor, we are unaware of any special observance or holiday for atheists.'

The judge said, 'The calendar says April 1st is 'April Fools Day.' Psalm 14:1 states 'The fool says in his heart, there is no God.' Thus, it is the opinion of this court, that if your client says there is no God, then he is a fool. Therefore, April 1st is his day.

Court is adjourned.

Hi. My Name Is Aaron Diffleboppersen, And I Have A Drinking Solution

All together now. . . "HI, AARON."

I'm trying to figure out why we only refer to someone having a drinking problem but never a drinking solution. Do people really believe that no good ideas have ever been spawned throughout history without the assistance of a little Dutch Courage? Now don't get me wrong, I would never go so far as to argue that the imbibing of toxic liquids has produced MORE good ideas than bad over the years. I mean, let's face it, the old, "We're driving to Florida!" announcement at 5am has never worked out very well. . . or, indeed, ever even gotten out of the parking lot. (Thank you Larry Miller.) But (almost) seriously, doesn't the effect of alcohol on our brains make us think a little more loosely? Maybe you'll not just dance tonight but you'll dance with that midget on the bar? Ok, maybe not.

Sadly, that last paragraph does not mean that I've just cured cancer whilst having a cocktail. I merely want to remind people that some of our vices are just a part of life and maybe not as evil as some people might pretend. (But don't be afraid of taking a couple weeks off from Beelzebub's shillelagh. . . okay, I might have made that last one up but that doesn't mean it won't be popular vernacular for a drink by the end of the weekend.)

I'm watching Michael Phelps on The Colbert Report but I'm also clearing my gmail inbox, my work inbox, christmas shopping, planning my Tuesday night with some local Atheists, checking out a website my brother recommended, having a cocktail, holding my bed down, pondering 3 of life's 13 great mysteries, calculating 2 quadratic equations, eagerly awaiting the next installment of XKCD and watching the clock. Who said my generation suffers from ADD. I'm just AD. . . no extra D required. Of course trying to do all that necessitates the reality that this current sentence is now being typed almost 30 minutes after the beginning of this paragraph.

As usual I had grand plans for this post, including an expose explaining why it's strange to return to the states after a month in the islands (though island in the singular is certainly more accurate). However, it is not to be. . . so I will leave you with this one unprofound fact.

1) When I tell people that I'm working in the Bahamas the inevitable response is something along the lines of, "Oh, you lucky bastard!" But the truth is that when I tell you I've been working on "South Beach" for a month it's got nothing to do with swanky (overpriced) bars and beautiful women. THIS is South Beach (in Grand Bahama Shipyard on Grand Bahama Island) and yes, everything that looks like scrap metal in these pictures IS scrap metal. . . and there's a lot of it.




And THIS is our office container where BBQs are frequent and the beer flows like, uh, sorry there's actually no beer here. The shipyard doesn't allow it. (Nudge, nudge. Wink, wink. Say no more.) The actual "office" container is the tan one and yes, that is a wood deck out front.



So I guess I haven't taken the time to fully explain the misery of working on South Beach 12+ hours a day. The reality of the "beach" is that it's made of dirt, sand blast grit, trash, scrap metal and the tears of children. It truly is a hellish place, but the shipyard is too cheap to pave it over (or even spray a little tar to keep the dust down). When the wind picks up it's common to see a dust wave of carcinogens descending upon one's self like soul crushing truth descends upon a person watching a documentary about a topic they'd rather not think about. (Britney Spears once said that she didn't like the films at the Sundance Festival because she had to think while watching them. Awesome. Now how do I get down off this soap box? It's a long way down and I'm without a single carabiner.)

Tangent complete. I've moved on to Craig Ferguson on CBS. So much funnier than Leno and Letterman it's not even funny. Wait. . . huh?

I leave you with some sage words.

That's right, people, let's stay out of the dark and as they say in biking, Keep the rubber side down.

Not Even The Least Bit Interesting

This is what I normally carry during dry dock (- the radio). I either need me some suspenders or a purse.



In all fairness, the giant silver Bahamian cell phone died on me and I bought me a spanky new tiny Bahamian cell phone. Either way, I need some bigger/better cargo work pants for all that junk.

Ifin you're bored I dunn gone 'n put up a bunch of work photos on Flickr. Sorry there ain't much interestin' on the personnel front. . . 'fraid people might be 'fraid of their souls bein' stolen by the photog boogeyman (or just that climbing the corporate ladder is kinda hard when there's lascivious pictures of your person online).

Either way, enjoy. If you're a family/friend type person of mine you only need to request the whole shebang and I'll laden you with photos in such a way that will put my Pa's camping pictures to shame. When the camera's a clickin' I certainly knows from wheres I gets it.

Common grammar aside (obviously). . . I guess it's good to be back stateside, but it will probably be better in two weeks when I head to the land of potatoes and rednecks without ye olde company laptop (for once). Merry Thanksgiving to all, and to all a good. . . crap. What?!?! I missed Thanksgiving?

Awww, shucks.

One More Month Gone

Still stuck on Grand Bahama Island until tomorrow afternoon.  Turns out the name of the island does not seem to transcend to the island itself.  But then again, I'm not exactly here for the beaches.

Another dry dock done but not gone.  The clean up and return shipments along with the invoices for the past month of work are the worst part.  But at least I've found a good sushi restaurant near my hotel and I plan on using my whole day's food allowance on dinner tonight. 

Strangest thing about finishing these jobs is getting back to Florida and not really knowing what to do with myself.  I should either join or start a cult.  Nothing makes time fly like craziness incarnate.

Rambling, rambling. . . as usual, I got nuthin' and I need to get back to work.

Cheetos.

Drydockwhynot

As usual when posting during a dry dock I'm exhausted and I should be going to bed right now. But I guess my ego just won't let this site go. . . or I could just convince myself that I really do it for my family to know what I'm up to. No fun pics cause the company laptop just don't much like flickr. Gonna have to remedy that some day.

Five or so days into Infinity dry dock. Typical cluster (of nuts and berries) with all the same players following all the same stereotypes and utterly destroying the word fail and then dropping it down the tubes to the next, eagerly waiting, level of hades. Good thing I don't believe in the afterlife or I'd already be throwing three sticks for Cerberus just to see which way he goes. Point is that like most things is life that we don't do too often it's easy for me to look forward to dry dock when I haven't been on a tough on in a while. But the truth on the job is always so much uglier.

So far during the 5 days of this dry dock I have:
-- Thrown my hard hat twice (once in true frustration with a two handed dome cracker straight down into the dirt and once in a show of disbelief that sent my full-brimmed heat-trapper spinning beautifully along the dirt, sand grit and rock "pier" that we call South Beach here at the Freeport shipyard).
-- Yelled profanities at a level befitting a Bahamian dry dock but probably inappropriate for your local monster truck rally.
-- Made friends and gathered enemies.
-- Been offered a job that pays more and promises less stress (but is probably lying about both).
-- Worked more hours than. . . ah, nevermind. It doesn't matter how many hours I've worked when there's people out there like my Uncle, Cousin-in-Law and old college roommate who all regularly put in more weekly hours than I ever will (and my Uncle is RETIRED!).
-- Gotten a flat tire on the company F-150 and changed it with help from a fork lift and a passing Bahamian driver with a similar truck because mine happens to lack a jack, lug wrench and necessary bars to lower the spare tire. (Some good lookin' out when the company bought the truck at the Miami auction. "It's got 4 doors? Windows tinted so dark that you can't see anything at night? A/C works? Bald tires? Get's six-point-six miles to the gallon? Front end that needs more work done than Carrot Top? We'll take it!)
-- Chased, bribed, cajoled, belittled, praised, begged, cursed, insulted, drank and joked with riggers, slingers, crane operators, foremen, fork lift drivers, sub-contractors, vice presidents, rats, truck drivers and anyone else I need work from.
-- Bought a Bahamian cell phone for 45 bucks and kept the old Bahamian number I had when the local agent tried to rent me the same phone for 50 bucks a week AND I would have had to change my number.
-- Bouced a dozen mini-super balls off of, into and all around a large steel dry dock.

And I'm spent. Hope everyone who reads this is doing well and cutting me slack on spelling, grammar and class. Cause we all know I'm in a class all by myself. . . so quite asking if you can cut into my one-man line.

To shower
To bed
To do it all again

Hmm

I just read a little bit of what I posted the other night. Scared myself by realizing that I wasn't even drinking for that one. Guess I really was that tired. Well I won't make the same mistake tonight. Work is going well and I'll be ready for the next job that starts on Sunday but it's amazing the amount of work I need to do before then. I keep justifying these long work hours to myself by citing that I must be one of the only men for the job due to my lack of house, family, dog, compost pile, hobbies and social life. . . but then a small part of me realizes what I just wrote and that it ain't quite right.

I'm very curious to know exactly how many hours I really should put on the clock each week. (And who made this magic clock that we all use to gauge our time?) And that being written, it's past my bedtime again.

Good night, and don't let the bed bugs bite because if you let them get away with it once there really is no stopping the little buggers.

One Down, One Falling and One at the Ledge

Well, here I am. . . in Freeport. . . again. I spent all of February here on a single job and now I'm spending all of November here, but now I have three jobs. I initially thought the Monarch of the Seas was only coming in for a shave and a hair cut (i.e. hull prep and paint with other minor works being done) but a 1.8 million dollar refurbishment package destroyed any hope I had of an easy dry dock. Thinking about it now, I guess it would have been easy (relatively) if it hadn't been for the Sovereign of the Seas coming in on the third day of the Monarch dry dock. And I guess even those two wouldn't have been so bad if I wasn't having to run around chasing shipments for the third job of the month which is the Celebrity Infinity dry dock.

But, as usual, I regress. I suppose I could digress but that would merely imply that I recognized my aggression and was stubborn enough to merely digress rather than regress. The world's a dress. (And if you can tell me what song the last sentence is from then I greatly admire your musical choices. . . and there might be points for you.)

Anywho, by now you've probably found typos, hippos and other general poes in this little opus. Even though it's before midnight and I slept in this morning (8am BABY) I still find my eyelids to be mysteriously heavy. . . hence the hippos I guess. There's not enough hours in the day to do every little thing that my employers wish for me to do and there's certainly not enough motivation for me to master the manipulation of time in order to create enuf time for me to do more work.

So, with hurricane Palona we're getting some cool weather here on Grand Bahama Island. Makes all the difference in the world. This may be rambling a little more than I ever thought I could but would that I could then I would yest I would. Making up words, it's on my list of things I enjoy. Lifivious. Yest it twer lifivious. I should start a cult. . . I bet I'd be good at is.

Yeah, Not Really

Okay, so the motor vehicle pictured below with me in it is most definitely not mine. But it's fun to pretend. Got back from Boston on Friday night and drove up to Port Canaveral on Monday. The truck/car/roadster belongs to the man who initially hired me at Royal but was subsequently let go when the company, uh, went feral or something similar. Graciously he let me drive that roaring Chevy SSR most of the way back. Environmentally minded as I normally am I must admit that is was nice to just toe the accelerator in order to achieve a hundred plus with complete stability. (The Chevy SSR has a Corvette engine. It starts at over fifty-K and with the additional eight-K this guy put into the performance of the engine it's a pretty decent ride.)

Just wrote that I don't have much else to say but then kept writing after that so I was obviously lying. So I erased it all and wrote that. . . and this. My week in the office between dry docks has been stressful. My inbox is averaging over seventy messages a day which equates to a lot of interruptions when trying to get things done. Certainly not all of these messages need answers and at least ten of them are probably complete and absolute BS but that's still a lot of pings. Two more days, and maybe a few hours on Saturday, and then I join the Monarch in Miami on Sunday.

I guess I would have been correct if I had written that I don't have much else to say in that last paragraph.

Yeah.

Thousand points for whoever can stump me with a quote.

My New Toy

What?!? I've been working hard!
Don't I deserve nice things?

Another One Bites The Dust

Just got back from Boston last night. Was on a five day dry dock for the Jewel of the Seas. We installed a big diesel engine and generator (or a genset, as they say) back in October 2007 but it threw a counter-weight, damaged the crank shaft and twisted the engine. . . or some such nonsense. So in four and a half days we cut an access into the ship, removed the old engine block, slid a new one in and welded her back up. Of course, I say "we" but in reality I had nothing to do with that work.



Took a few pictures though and I'm gonna try to get a bunch of old photos up on Flickr this weekend. I've got a week back in Florida with the possibility of flying to Freeport late in the week before my next job and I get to drive up to Port Canaveral (about four hours) on Monday for a meeting on board a ship. I've got three jobs coming up and two of them overlap. RCCL is handing the Sovereign of the Seas over to our Spanish branch (named Pullmantur) and the Monarch of the Seas is going into dry dock in Freeport for about seven days.

The real job is the Celebrity Infinity that I'll be starting in mid-November, also in Freeport. The last of the diesel genset projects. We've added these engines to 7 ships so far and replaced one as well. . . I've worked six out of those 8 jobs. . . wish I could say that I know the job in and out by now but the reality is that each job is done in a different shipyard and sometimes the contractors change AND the jobs are either for the Royal side or the Celebrity side which makes a huge difference. Anyway, just wanted to get something up again. I'll basically be in Freeport for all of November (happy Thanksgiving to me) but I'll try to post a bit. This picture below is probably my favorite from this last job.

The Real McCain

Cut and paste your way to the truth.  I'm not saying Obama is perfect but I am saying he's the better man.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/make_believe_maverick_the_real_john_mccain

Silverman Is Funny