Enthusiastically Ambiverted Hopepunk
Day 113: Most of the day was spent hiding in our room, so as to rest and avoid possibly infecting anyone else. The second big gala event of the voyage was tonight, with a 1920s theme, and as we didn’t want to entirely miss it, we got dressed up and ventured out for about an hour (masked the entire time, aside from a couple brief moments to have our photos taken). Once we’d been there long enough to say we’d been there, it was back to our room and back to bed.
41/2023 – ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Standout stories in this issue include “Tantie Merle and the Farmhand 4200” by R.S.A. Garcia, “The Ghasts” by Lavie Tidhar, and “The Music of the Siphorophenes” by C. L. Polk.
Day 112: The day started well, with another history lecture, a cute new haircut for my wife, and an attempt at afternoon tea. However, about the time tea started…disaster! Well, no, not disaster, but a hearty amount of grumbling and annoyance. A few days ago at dinner before the Red and Gold gala event, we had a couple sit at the table next to us, and one of them was obviously ill: sniffling, sneezing, coughing, and bleary-eyed, all the time assuring us that he “wasn’t contagious” and it was “oh, nothing, just some little virus thing”. In hindsight, we should have excused ourselves, but between wanting to enjoy the evening and general social pressures, we stayed…and today was the day when we started feeling the effects of that decision. COVID testing has come back negative, so we’re hopeful that this is “just” a cold or flu.
So, we cut tea short, went back to our room, and spent the evening resting and preparing for our upcoming London adventures…otherwise known as watching Notting Hill and Bridget Jones’s Diary. That counts as research, right?
Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001): ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Late ’90s/early ’00s Hugh Grant is always fun (Hugh at his peak Hugh Grant-i-ness), and this (along with one other) was a perfect choice to watch on an evening in during our New York to London voyage.
Late ’90s/early ’00s Hugh Grant is always fun (Hugh at his peak Hugh Grant-i-ness), and this (along with one other) was a perfect choice to watch on an evening in during our New York to London voyage.
Day 111: Today was a second astrophysics lecture, a history lecture by Giles Ramsay about British actress and spy Aphra Behn, and an evening dancing to pop tunes by the in-house cover band. Since this is a trans-Atlantic voyage without any stops, there’s a lot more day and evening programming since there aren’t ports of call and shore excursions to keep the travelers distracted.
Day 110: Today included watching England fall to Spain in the final match of the Women’s World Cup (to great dismay among the fans gathered in the ship’s onboard pub), the first in a series of four talks by astrophysicist Prof. Nathan Mayne of the University of Exeter about our search for habitable extrasolar worlds, a (somewhat entry level) planetarium show, a live performance by acapella-with-drums vocal performance group ODY-C (technically fine but missing any real spark, making them dull and lifeless; basically Pentatonix for people who don’t want to risk raising their heart rate), closing out with big band music on the big dance floor and dancing to a fun pop cover band and DJ in the ship’s nightclub.
Strange Days (1995): ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Almost 30 years later, and this still packs a hell of a punch, and is still amazingly topical for the present day. I remember when this came out being pretty convinced that, save the sci-fi device, it was quite possibly an eerily accurate prediction of where we’d be societally at the turn of the century. Turns out that while the SQuID hardware still isn’t a thing, the rest was somewhere between right on point and just a couple decades too early. Plus an all-around stellar cast (I mean, come on: Ralph Fiennes, Juliette Lewis, Michael Wincott, Tom Sizemore, William Fichtner, Vincent D’Onofrio, Glenn Plummer, and Angela Bassett at her badass best, all in one film?) and a killer soundtrack.
40/2023 – ⭐️⭐️⭐️
More Discworld silliness, this time following the eighth child of an eighth child who, for very good reasons, is asking just why women can’t be wizards. Something of a mid-80’s take on feminism in fantasy literature.
Day 109: We’re on a boat! The Queen Mary II, to be precise, the only currently running ocean liner (as opposed to cruise ship). We departed from New York City yesterday, and are working our way out into the Atlantic Ocean. Tonight is the first of the trip’s two “gala nights”, this one with a “Red and Gold” theme, so we made sure to dress for the occasion.