JoCo Cruise Crazy 2012, Day 7

All good things do come to an end, and so it was with the cruise. Day 7 was our last day at sea, and you could tell people were winding down and starting to feel the crushing inevitability of the Westerdam’s return to Ft Lauderdale and our return to a reality without free ice cream, Famous People dance parties, and casual fez-wear.

I completely missed the morning event, because after a week’s worth of extremely little sleep, my body would not cooperate and get out of bed after the wakeup call. The thing with a wakeup call is that it has no snooze button. They need to work on that. So, because I was snoring away in my shoebox of a room, I missed Paul and Storm recording a live podcast. I don’t feel too horrible about it, because I got to listen to it a few weeks after the cruise and have a little moment of reminiscing while driving to work in bad traffic, but it sounds like the live audience had a blast, and I’m sorry I missed it.

The event of the day was the Big Event – the man, the beard, Jonathan Coulton, live and awesome. People were lining up in the hallways outside the Vista Lounge to get the best seats, but since we were tired, we came later, took mediocre seats, and still enjoyed the show tremendously. JoCo is so much fun in a live show. He had a band with him for half of the performance, which was neat and gave the show more of a rockstar vibe, but I think I liked his solo stuff better, since it’s what I’m more familiar with. I’m sure the newer stuff will grow on me, and certainly his new album is spectacular, but I enjoy seeing him onstage with his guitar, with no extra bells and whistles (except for the Zendrum for Mr Fancy Pants, of course).

When his show was done, it was time to start packing and getting mentally prepared for the early-morning disembarkation ahead of us. I had a sad.

We had our Saskatoon buddies come by our shoebox to help us finish off some wine we’d brought aboard, and we had a wonderful evening with them, including our last fancy meal in the Monkey Pen of the main dining room. There was a big goodbye party by the pool that night, the “So Long and Thanks for all the Booze” reception, where we had a last chance to chat with some of the Famous People and mingle with Sea Monkeys, exchanging business cards and email addresses as seriously as little kids exchange information on the last day of summer camp.

That’s what it felt like that night at the party, like it was our last night at camp and our parents were coming to pick us up in the morning.

I want to sign on for JoCo Cruise Crazy III, next February, but have to wait and see whether everything lines up right. I’m glad I got to experience this sort of thing at least once in my life, and I’m grateful to Paul and Storm, JoCo, and all the behind-the-scenes folks who made it happen. Even if I never attend another huge nerd boat party, I’ve got the memories from this one, and I’m happy.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *