The four of us will Uber together to Logan Airport for our seven-hour flight to Barcelona at 11 a. My sister-in-law Susie makes Chicken Parmesan. At Logan, I get an aggressive pat-down from security. Apparently, my fly zipper contains too much metal. An hour before takeoff, Susie is paged to the Iberia Airlines station. Her seat in Premium Seating is broken so she must mingle with the proletariat apart from us.
My Premium Seat is 1A. An elderly couple have 1B and 1D. I offer to switch seats so they can sit together. They thank me then argue for seven hours. We taxi to the port and board the Norwegian Escape along with 4, other passengers. We have dinner at the Manhattan Dining Room where I begin my streak of double entrees with a pork tenderloin and baked ziti. Cyndi wins big at the Casino. I fall asleep on a penny-slot machine. Most contestants opt for Number 3. More: Pet Rock Fest ready to spread the joy and love of animals at its new home in Lancaster.
More: Janice Harvey: Parents carry history. Ask them now. Back on the ship around 5 p. Her fourth husband, 80, has the beginnings of dementia and stayed home in Virginia. We talk for 33 minutes breaking my previous record of talking to a complete stranger by 31 minutes. I forget my phone in our cabin and lose my wife Cyndi in the gift shoppes, so I head over to play BINGO for the first time in 70 years.
The couple in front of me get the four corners of their card in five moves. That night, the four of us head to karaoke. A woman in her 50s, say 56, starts gyrating wildly to the karaoke tunes. In one sweeping, drunken motion, she knocks all the glasses off the front-row tables. The waiter looks at her sternly as he picks up the shards.
Our Dancing Queen remains in detention the rest of the evening. We get lost walking back to the tour-bus in Pisa and miss its departure. The Colosseum is remarkably huge. We have homemade pasta for lunch with The Pope. He has a hearty appetite for such a frail man. Cheeseburger in Paradise. The thing I remember most about the city is the graffiti.
