Rain, rain....

Its shaping up to be a rainy week here in paradise.  When we pulled out of Charleston just after my last post, the weather really took a turn for the worst - we sailed right into a thunderstorm. There was a ton of lightening, which you could see from any window on the ship, and sheets of rain all night.  Needless to say the ship was rocking quite a bit, and the following sea day was pretty interesting as well.  The cast really thought about canceling the show, but the seas calmed down enough for us to go ahead with it after all.   By the way, the show is called "Standing Room Only" and is just your basic collage of famous broadway show excerpts.   I don't think I'm ever going to get tired of it before I leave, although I might feel differently after I'm in my second month of playing through it twice a week.  

I've started giving trombone lessons to Brett Cave, the guest entertainer.  He wants to put a multi-instrumental aspect into his show, and trombone is the only instrument he doesn't know.  So having my second trombone around is really coming in handy - its living in his room at the moment.  I haven't taught a trombone lesson since I was in high school, and its been fun for me - especially since he learns quickly, being an accomplished musician already.  

Today we are in Nassau, Bahamas, and the rainy theme continues. On rainy days you can count on a lot of crew just spending the day on their laptops in Starbucks, which is where I am right now.  Almost the whole entertainment department is here, drinking hot coffee and staying out of the rain, fighting for bandwidth.  Earlier this afternoon half a dozen of us went out to lunch at Señor Frog's, a famous mexican food restaurant on the water.  They have some good food, but it got a bit pricey so I think that will be my one time splurging for a meal there.  Cursed social eating!!  It was a lot of fun though - they make you balloon animal hats and have karaoke and games going on all the time.  My friend Mark (dancer, Scottish) won one of the games and got a free drink out of it.  

Tonight we have our swing set again with singers - Sarah who sings in the cast and Mark who is dance captain (mentioned above) but also sings.  They will be trading off doing some traditional big band songs.  Mark covers the rat pack (Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr.) and Sarah covers everything else.  Its very casual and relaxed - probably our easiest night of the cruise.   We only play one set, for about an hour, and we don't rehearse it anymore.  Just show up and play, then done for the night.  I think its the closest thing we'll have to a night off.  Although, we did just get a ventriloquist on, who I've worked with before, who uses the band basically just for his play-on and play-off music.  So during the show I'll be sitting behind the curtain reading a book.  Technically that will be a lighter night for me, with a lot less playing than the swing set, but because of the setup it will be a much longer time commitment - I'll be working in 20 second spurts all evening, from 7:15pm to 11:00pm.  Such is the life....:-)

Week 3 begins...

Today I'm in Charleston, hanging out with one of the cruise staff, a new friend of mine named Teal.  She and I have really connected and been hanging out and talking a bit.  She took me to her favorite hangout - a place called Caviar and Bananas.  Yep, there's free wifi, you guessed it.  Its a neat place, with everything from coffee to groceries, a bistro and a salad bar, and yes, caviar and bananas.  

Last night was a fun night.  It was our original drummer Jeremy's last night on the ship, so we all went out to the restaurant for a nice dinner between shows.   The new drummer is Tim, a British guy who was here before, and is dating one of the dancers in the cast.  We also got a guitarist today, Alejandro.  I'm excited to play with a guitarist in the band!  He used to be here as well, a few months ago.  We also get a couple of new acts, losing the comedians we've had on board for week and weeks.  

After the shows I was getting ready for bed when the big announcement was made - we were"go" for movie night!  Apparently its a tradition to sneak  up into the kids center (we aren't allowed in guest areas after 2am) where there is a big screen T.V. and all watch a movie.  Last night was Twilight, which just came out on video recently and all the girls on staff were dying to see.  So we watched it up there all together in out p.j.'s sitting on beanbags and the floor (Bring Your Own Pillow), and had a blast.  But as a result I didn't get to bed until after 3am...and I'm pretty tired.  Ready for a new cruise to begin today!!!  Ha ha.