November 21st, 2003
Hey everybody, here's an update on what I've been up to. There's been some excitement lately with a fire on the stage, our guitar player getting picked up by the FBI, and I went snorkeling today. Here's the details.
Let's start with the fire. We were playing our production show "Nightclub Express" last night, which is all dance-club kind of music. On the first show, about 1/2 way through the track skipped to the 2nd to last song, but noone bothered to tell us, so we were left there scrambling to find the right music. I guess the dance captain decided at the last second to cut the show short because the seas were choppy, and didn't have time to notify us. On the second show we were going to do the same cut, so the light guy decided to set off the pyrotechnics during YMCA instead of on the songs that got cut. A couple bars after that, I looked up and noticed one of the upper curtains in the back was ON FIRE. It took me about three glances to realize that it actually WAS fire, and when no one else in the band seemed to notice I got the musical director's attention and pointed to the fire. He phoned the sound guy, and within a couple of seconds there was a fire crew extingishing it. We kept playing for about 16-24 bars, but the curtains in the front were being closed, so we stopped playing and went back stage. It wasn't really a big fire, maybe 2 feet by 4 feet, but it definitely wasn't something that happens everyday. It's funny, there's these signs everywhere on the ship that say "A Fire Today--No Job Tomorrow." Most of the guys in the band used the fire as an excuse to get drunk (not that they really need an excuse...). So, in all, we ended up only playing about 35 minutes between two shows.
A couple weeks ago our guitar player got picked up by the FBI/bahamian police. He got called to the staff captain's office on the boat early in the morning, and there were a bunch of suits there waiting for him. They made the staff captain and cruise director leave the room and interrogated him for a bit. It ends up that he has almost the same name (Steve Blum vs. Steve Bloom) and looks a lot like somebody from the FBI's most wanted list. I think the other guy is wanted on drug and child abduction charges or something. Steve seemed to take it pretty well, though, and we make jokes every now and then about how he's really a criminal.
Today I went snorkeling on one of the shore excursions that the ship offers (free for me). We took a boat out to a reef and had about 45 minutes to snorkel. It was kind of cool to swim around next to some tropical fish, kind of like being in the movie finding nemo, except not as colorful. The water was a little choppy, though, and my mask wasn't very tight and water kept leaking by my nose. But on the up side, my sinuses are clearer than they've been in a while, especially after last night's fire.
About a week ago we went up and played a medley with the lounge band, which was pretty cool. It was formal night, so we had our tuxes on, and after our show we went up to the lounge, walked on stage, did our thing, and left. The medley we played was from KC and the Sunshine Band, and although I don't know the names of the songs, I'd heard some of them before. It was fun, and eventually we might do a whole set with them, once Dan writes us parts.
Let's see, in other news... I played soccer on Monday and got kicked in the eye, a bruised shin, and a bruise/purple welt on my ankle. Nothing major though. I think I mentioned this already, but we got a new drummer that can actually play, I switched roommates so I'm with the other sax player (Marcel from Canada), which is working out well. Also about 2 weeks ago when the boat was really rocking I threw up 3 times (next time I will take the sea sick pills and just deal with the drowsiness). And we are starting a Christmas production show after Thanksgiving, which means rehearsals will probably start within the next week.
Anyway, that's all the news for now.
Brian Einstein Lassiter