The week that were

  I'm not exactly sure why I'm writing. I'm pretty much doing the Monty Python "I'm not dead yet!"  thing.   All is well, as well as it can be at work, anyhow. I've had some down time, we pumped plenty of cargo too, I got to go ashore and get fresh grub, etc etc rinse repeat. 

     As my shipmates and I are all on the same page, beyond a 'Good morning' to the guy who just woke up, we wait for the oncoming guy to talk to us first, because sometimes you just need some time to yourself before you kick the brain in gear in the morning. Even when you're not alone, if you can sit in comfortable silence until the newly awakened guy is ready to talk, that helps to make the start of the day a better day, so we wait for the other guy to get caffeinated, eat an egg, check emails etc before starting to talk. 

    This morning I was a solid 20 minutes before I asked about the night watch. I wasn't feeling off, just needed the silence while my high blood pressure meds kicked in. I'm smart enough not to read the news until the pill kicks in, too. Only B, my partner of lo these past 13 years, somehow insists on finding news to watch as soon as I get in the galley. B doesn't watch TV. Just the news and just when I'm waking up.  But then again, he was a navy corpsman so he's got a sadistic streak obviously. But B's at home right now, and E and I are not into watching TV, which is awesome, as I don't have to listen to a bunch of assholes making sounds out of their food holes of a morning. 

     E, on the other hand, woke up this afternoon, looked at our orders for the next few days, saw that there's nothing going on tonight, and I could watch the tension disappear from his posture.  A night off at anchor is a blessing, and he's on the back watch this week while I'm on days. I'll take my turn on nights in a few weeks. 

    So, stuff... I'm going to Brazil in August, so that's pretty cool.  Got to go check in with Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife's family. I've made some thoroughly decent strides in my efforts to learn her language a bit better, so I can carry out a conversation sorta, now.  Only took 20 years.   Going to be interesting, though.   

    You know that expectant silence and stare that Indians (feathers not dots; American indians) can do, that is so unnerving?  Brazilian Indians can do that too, turns out.  Guess what ethnic subgroup 80% of my wife's family are?  So I get to babble at them in my awful portagee pidgen, and they get to stare at me owlishly for about 2 weeks. 

 Ah well. I'll be fine. I already looked up how many bottles of Jamison I can carry legally in my suitcase. I'll still have room for some socks and 2-3 pairs of fresh drawers left over I'm sure.