Unlikely entertainment

Shortly after Captain Henry leaves us, Bob and Linda get up to go to the Suite to change. Becky and I spend another 20 or 25 quiet minutes relaxing on deck, and then we follow.

When we arrive in the Suite, Aladdin is showing on the television. Disney, Disney, Disney, all around us. It's wonderful. Certainly there are people in the world for whom this would be "Disney overload" – and there are plenty of non-Mouse-related channels and other options for them – but I love the total immersion in the magic.

Bob and Linda point out our newest delivery from the concierge staff – a plate of deluxe sweets, including chocolate truffles, chocolate-dipped strawberries, and mini fruit tarts. I’m still full of hot dog and pizza, so I just share a truffle with Becky, and then she also has a chocolate-dipped strawberry.

I flip the TV over to the other Disney movie channel and find Lilo & Stitch, a movie I can watch over and over without getting tired of it. Bob goes to take a nap, and the boys return from swimming. We send them to shower the chlorine off.

Once again, this is the life – just relaxing, doing not much of anything, in the Walt Disney Suite. It's still hard to wrap my brain around the idea that I'm actually getting to do this, but it's getting easier. I'll be fully adjusted to the luxury by the time the cruise ends, I'm sure.

At one point I flip over to a shipboard channel, where cruise director Christiaan is giving the debarkation talk. They used to do this live in the Walt Disney Theatre and then replay it for those who missed it, but now I think it’s just shown on the television.

Normally I don’t pay too close of attention to these talks, since they don’t tell me much I don’t already know, but I find myself really enjoying Christiaan’s version. He’s pretty funny.

Christiaan gives the usual information about using the luggage tags and filling out the customs forms. When he starts talking about the printed charge information being slipped under our stateroom doors in the wee hours of the morning, he says, “Now, for some of you, your printout will be too big to fit under the door. So when you hear a big ‘thud’ in the middle of the night, that’s what it is.” He then gives an embarrassed laugh and says, “I shouldn’t say that!”

Whatever reluctance he feels about improvising on his script doesn’t last long. He advises cruisers that no alcohol can be in checked bags, and then says if any is found, “it has a way of showing up at crew parties.”

He then reminds cruisers that, before they put their bags out in the halls tonight for removal from the ship, they should remember to get clothing out for the next day. He reports that he has seen whole families appear in the atrium, “wearing nothing but pajamas or pillow cases, and it’s not funny.” He pauses a bit, and then admits, “Okay, it’s funny for me…”

I’ve never been so entertained by a debarkation talk before.