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BASIC BLACK ARTHUR BLACK ANCHORS AWEIGH! You need to be really careful careful about which words you allow to come out of your mouth - or your word processor. processor. You might find yourself eating them one day. A few weeks back I am in one of my favourite watering holes nursing a liquid libation when I notice a chap - a stranger -- at another table, looking at me. Not kindly. I look away, being a polite Canuck, give it a five beat, and look back. He's still staring at me. In another lifetime, say, ten years ago, I would have zoned into my Clint Eastwood-High-Noon- Eyelock -Stare-Down Whatareyoulookinat Bub mode, but life's too short. I consign the voyeur to Anonymous KookdOm, take another sip and - oh, cripes. He's getting up and coming over to my table. Let's see now: who do I owe money? Did I ding anyone's anyone's car lately? Whose girlfriend girlfriend might I have innocently innocently ogled? Now he's standing over me. And he's.. . large. "Yer the guy that writes in the paper amcha?" I nod. It's not really a question. "And last month you wrote about how much you hate ocean cruises." I nod again. I had written that I thought most ocean cruises were ridiculously expensive and plastic and silly and mat a honeymoon on an ocean liner must be, to paraphrase Oscar Wilde, a young bride's second greatest disappointment. "Yeah" growls the stranger at my table. "Well, I want you to know that I was a cabin steward steward for four summers on cruise ships out of Miami." Oh oh. Reflexively, I draw on my martial arts training, surreptitiously tensing my muscles, ready to swiftly morph into an effectively devastating defense posture. Groveling, wringing my hands, begging for mercy - whatever it takes. "And I just want you to know" continues the stranger (Lord, his hands are big!) "that it's 'way worse than you wrote." The gist of his beef was that T didn't talk about ocean cruises from the point of view of the poor saps who have to work on them. The pay, he told me, is crummy. The hours are insane, the accommodations accommodations Dickensian and the passengers.... O, my. The passengers. The stranger, whose name turned out to be Corey, had a theory about ocean cruise passengers. passengers. He figures each and every one of them has a mandatory lobotomy before they come aboard. How else to explain the stupid questions? questions? Such as the woman sitting us help finance your dreams! DUCA Mortgages* 6 month closed . 7.50% 6 month convertible 7.50% 1 year closed ■ ■ 7.65% 3 years closed' 7.85% 5 years closed 8.00% * Rates subject to change without notice ^ DUCA sassy CREDIT UNION Oshawa & Bowmanville Branches, Manager Paul Muller 15 Charles Street 136 King Street East Phone: (905) 728-4658 Phone: (905) 623-6343 E-mail: duca.info@duca.com Internet: www.duca.com ( Orono Weekly Times, Wednesday. July 26, 2000 - 5 poolside one afternoon who asked the enlise • director whether the ship's pool was filled with fresh water or seawater. seawater. "Seawater, ma'am" said the director. "Ah," replied the woman. "That explains why it's so rough today." Or the passenger who changed his mind about his accommodation once he was aboard. The ship's purser asked him "Would you prefer an Inside Cabin or an Outside Cabin, sir?" The man squinted his eyes and looked up at the sky. "Better make it an Inside- Cabin. Looks like it could rain." Or the newlywed couple who had just come aboard, and after viewing their cabin, came storming up to their cabin steward. The bride was crying. The groom was seriously seriously cheesed off. "You incompetent boobs!" yelled the groom. "We paid for a cabin with a view! And we look out the porthole and what do we see? A parking lot!" And then there was the passenger - a dentist from Wyoming -- who plied Corey with all kinds of inane technical technical questions, ending with "Well, tell me son, does the ship run off generators?" Corey looked at the man and deadpanned "Actually, no. We have this very long power cord running to the mainland." Corey took a sip of the beer I'd bought him. "That happened on my last trip" he recalled. He was smiling at the memory. NEWCASTLE FUNERAL HOME Carl Good ~ Joyce Kufta 386 Mill St. S., Newcastle 987-3964 www.newcastlefimeralhome.com "Caring for our Community" ■%? 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