Our gallant
captain has thoughtfully given the crew the opportunity to contribute to the
blog. The skipper is a kindly man, of gentle temperament, a fine seaman and a
dashing leader, a wonderful example to us miserable sea dogs.
The last
paragraph was written with him leaning over my shoulder and grunting
contentedly. He has now gone off to bed in his winceyette nightgown, clutching
his teddy bear and a steaming mug of fortified low calorie decaffeinated
camomile tea. Cocoa, the sailors’ traditional nightime drink ,is banned on
board, since, according to Tim, (and as all aficionados of wartime naval films
know), the offer of it to the skipper on a night watch is likely to end in a
torpedo or artillery bombardment, or both. The mere mention of the word the
other night triggered a thunderstorm of Wagnerian proportions, a timely warning
to us all.
But I
digress. Now he has gone to bed I can tell you what life is really like on
board. With any luck I can get this off before he wakes up, and he will be none
the wiser.
Conditions on
board are a cross between a Trireme and a slave ship. The master, a tyrant of
the old school, believes in good old fashioned naval discipline. He has given us
all ranks, and insists on being addressed as sir. He has taken to spending long
periods alone on deck while we play cards below and experiment with new cachaça
cocktails. Frankly, he is a bit of a worry, and Tom, our resident medical man
(retired dentist actually) has offered to keep an eye on him, when not
perfecting new miracle cures for migraine and other ills using locally-sourced,
sugar-based, distilled aqua vitae.
As
entertainments officer, I have been tasked with directing the SADIST (South
Atlantic Drama Institute Studio Theatre) production of HMS Pinafore. Frankly,
this is not going as well as I hoped.
Tim insisted on playing the Captain , and has called for a re-write
so that he dominates the plot. As as a result, we have lost Rafe Rackstraw and
Little Buttercup (sorry Lawrence). Eating the cabin boy two days out (delicious,
lightly roasted with a smear of French mustard, honey and an egg glaze) meant
that we had no-one to play Josephine, so now we are down to the captain, the
crew, and possibly Sir Joseph Porter.
Rehearsals
are difficult, since the only time we are together is during happy hour, when we
understandably have more important things to do. To be honest I would have
thought that the Skip might do the decent thing and give us time off from our
watches, but no way, the bloody tyrant. If the production suffers it won’t be my
fault.
I shall
report more if His Majesty falls asleep again, and I can get my hands on the
computer.
