I'm writing this on Promenade deck. It's almost 11am. The sea is smooth. Beautiful blue. This is my seat for the next 20 minutes.
I'm waiting for the laundry to dry in a dryer. Laundries at sea are the stuff of legends. We've heard stories of families being removed from the ship, the best story because one woman threw an iron at another passenger.
When a load is finished and there are no spare machines it seems the done thing to remove those (strangers) clothes and put your own in. It's an icky business. I don't want to touch someone else's clothes and don't want them touching mine. But people go away during the cycle. It's a hot noisy place.
This is the Laundry room.
It's free of charge. I opened the door and there are 8 people there. Mainly men. The men are doing the laundry. I think it's because women don't seem capable of operating heavy duty machinery like washers and dryers at sea. It's interesting.
Luckily there's a spare machine but I'm told the rinse cycle isn't working. It doesn't agitate and leaves suds. I can sort that. I do a wash cycle then when the rinse cycle comes on I return it to a wash cycle again but rinsing this time. It isn't rocket science but apparently no one else thought of doing that. Oh well, sometimes women aren't so silly after all.
Anyways, everyone seems remarkably chilled but I'm aghast at the amount of laundry people have amassed.
I leave my clothes in the dryer and grab a cup of tea on deck 7.
I'm interested to see what's happened to my clothes. Watch this space.