We Met the Captain

The captain of the ship is a fun round guy named Lars who is from Sweden. We had lunch with him today. My last temp job, it took several weeks for my boss to learn my first name. Now somehow we can have lunch with the guy in control of 2,000 humans eating ice cream constantly and 1,000 humans working like crazy people. He lives in Thailand because that way he “can drive his Harley in December, and you can’t do that in Sweden.” He works 12 weeks on, 12 weeks off. This is this guy’s life. That’s insane.

The ship is powered by 1,400 tons of fuel. This is how much it takes to go on each cruise, down to Acapulco and back to LA. This is on one of the bottom decks, stored in something. I said “does it take up a whole deck?” and he said “oh noooo” in the way of all people at their job, meaning they think the answer is obvious. So I said “would it fill this restaurant?” which is a huge restaurant about the size of 75% of a football field. He said “oh noooo. Remember a ton is a cubic meter.” So I have no idea what that means, but basically there is a ton of fuel somewhere, but not as much as you’d think if you’ve worked as a temp in an office and have my name.

He also said the one ship he quit was because there was an arsonist on the crew (not an official capacity) who was setting fire to like…dirty laundry and cutting the fire alarms. Also, apparently the main risk is in the laundry because there is so much dust from the clothes and if they don’t keep it clean, it can explode. You know. Obviously.

He told us about going through the Panama Canal, that this ship is one of the biggest ships ever to pass through it. It has, on either side of the boat, about 5 inches of clearance. They refer to this width of the ship: Panamax. To go from the Atlantic to the Pacific, you go in, go up 3 lochs, get to a lake, then go down 3 lochs. All for the bargain price of about $250,000.

Our captain started out as a deck hand, which means that he has no pretension about him and that he says he only goes to the bridge (where the ship’s controls are) about once a day because “that’s where the coffee machine is.” We all talked to him like he was a magic king because he is because he drives our house. He had to cancel dinner plans from the night before because “there is too much fog.” Why the hell would…oh right, you’re a captain. Also, apparently this massive thing is controlled by hilariously small little joysticks that are like the size of the top of your pinkie. And those joysticks can control the ships movements to the inch. I guess you can manage the ship with all GPS now, so if the waves are rocky, you can still manage to keep it in one place with little tiny adjuster jet movements.

I also met my second working magician last night who logically knows the only other working magician I know. To the point that they did a show together. And he knows the 2 magicians I took a class with in LA. When I told him how amazing one of the magicians was, for walking on stage and pulling a live rabbit out of his hair, he said “well, it should be a WHITE rabbit. Because a black rabbit, I mean, who cares. He obviously had it in his hair or something and kept it there with paperclips or whatever.” Delightful. Also, I saw his point. This is all ridiculous.

Also, one of my cast mates has violent opinions about magic and magic tricks. This is the same cast member who wishes he could be a woman so he could get more accessories, like shoes and a purse that match. He is sincere about these things, which is delightful.