(This appeared originally in The Times and The News-Star back when luxury liners were having a not-so-swell run; this is after a ship broke down 55 miles, give or take, from San Diego. Offshore, not inland…)

I have never been on an open-sea cruise aboard a luxury liner. I have never even been on an open-sea cruise aboard a run-of-the-mill, secondhand liner, one where the live band is a knockoff of Herman’s Hermits and the most important thing in the buffet line is the microwave.

And I doubt I’ll ever take a cruise, for a couple of reasons. One, too many episodes of “Gilligan’s Island.” I like “Gilligan’s Island.” A lot. On television. Near a bathroom and an icebox that I know will be there, come hell or high waves. It would be neat to get stuck with Mary Ann on a deserted island, but not if it were so deserted it didn’t have cable. And a Wendy’s. Just sayin’…

The second reason – and this is the biggie — I have some pretty serious Stump Fear. Even in open waters, your Atlantic or your Pacific, my theory is that, well, you just never know.

I did take a bath with a toy tugboat once. And I enjoyed that. At least for a little while, until the water got too dirty and I couldn’t see the bottom and I thought I felt a stump, which is a whole other story…

What I’m getting at is last week’s “problem” with the broken-down cruise ship 55 miles off the coast of San Diego, and how it made me jealous. It was all over the news, as you recall. Engine woe aboard the Carnival Splendor led to loss of power. It took three days to get the more than 4,000 tourists and crew back to shore.

With the ship’s ovens stalled, the U.S. Navy dropped Pop-Tarts and Spam aboard. Drinks were on the house. The cruise lines offered free transportation home, full refunds, and free future cruises to the inconvenienced passengers. Yet what did I hear from that sorry lot of spoiled vacationers? Massive complaining. A mini-mutiny. A “high seas nightmare.”

Really? Even with free Pop-Tarts and Spam!? HA! That is my kind of boat! And it’s all FREE! I mean, what does it take to PLEASE these people?

ODE TO THE CARNIVAL SPLENDOR

OR,

MY LIFE IN STEERAGE

Spam and Pop-Tarts, Pop-Tarts and Spam,

What’s not glam

’bout ’Tarts and Spam?

 

Too bad your

Dreamboat struck a snag,

But good for you

There’s no price tag!

 

You’re next trip’s free,

And this one too.

Still we have

More good news for you!

 

Instead of crab

And steak and lamb,

We’ve ordered out:

Pop-Tarts and Spam!

 

You do not like

Pop-Tarts and Spam?

Do you think you are

Sam-I-Am?

 

You will eat

Pop-Tarts and Spam

Or we’ll break out

Green eggs and ham!

(Or starve! I just don’t

Give a …. dang!)

 

You can gripe ’til

Red’s your throat,

Just point me toward

The next big boat

And I will ride this

Wave again,

Rebouyed by

Pop-Tarts and Spam.

 

(All I can cram?

Oh thank you ma’am!

I love my free

Pop-Tarts and Spam!

It’s like a Love Boat

Food Program!)

 

So sail on, captain

Of this boat,

And I will keep

My dreams afloat

Of Spam and Pop-Tarts, ’Tarts and Spam,

What’s not to love

’bout ’Tarts and Spam?

From Bali Ha’i to

Birmingham.

(Especially when they’re

On the lam!)

 

(Can we get more

Once we’re on land?

If not, hide me as

Contraband.)

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(This originally ran January 6, 2019 in The Times and The News-Star.)

Maybe it’s the New Year that has me thinking of babies.

One I used to write about before he could read was my son. One day when he was 3, he saw me limp with a bad back to a hot bath. I sat down to soak it and at the bathroom door he said, “OK, well, I’ll be right in here, so yell if you need to throw up or something.” Then he walked off in his tiny tenny shoes and a T-shirt that I suppose had a Snoopy or a Cleveland Indian on it.

Because time is the great mystery, he’ll be 30 Wednesday and is looking for a new job. He has a degree in communications but is very good at helping guys with bad backs, too.

Speaking of bad, when I was an uncle for the first time — the fall of 1977 — I called the hospital to check on Sissy, my big sister. They had no one registered by her name. Yes they did, I said, because she was in there having a baby. Even I knew that.

No she wasn’t, they said.

I called two more times before I realized I’d been asking for her under her maiden name. Which was not what she was registered under since she was married and registered under that name. People tend to do that when they get married.

Now and then — and this is one of those times — we check in with our old friend Don Walker, one of the best news reporters I have ever been privileged to work with and to know. He was a stud when at The Times in Shreveport and still is, although now he works in south Florida as the communications guru for a county that has a lot of golf courses and beaches. And the occasional hurricane.

But even Don was brought down to his knees by the baby beat. The smaller they are, the harder they make you fall.

In the 1980s in Shreveport, when both Don and I were “promising young men,” the hospital would give new mothers and fathers steak dinners with champagne the night before baby went home. One year, though, they decided instead to start sending new mothers home with infant seats.

“They even hired a firefighter to show moms and dads how to hook the seats and baby snuggly into their vehicles before they drove away from the hospital,” Don said. “The paper sent me to do a story on this program, and after interviewing the firefighter and some new parents I asked who at the hospital could give me a comment or two.”

The firefighter told him to “Call Ellen Dee,” or at least that’s what Don thought he’d said, and then firefighter gave him the phone number to call.

Later that day he called the hospital and a woman answered.

“Ellen Dee, please,” I said.

“This is Ellen Dee,” the woman responded, or at least, again, that’s what Don thought he’d heard. He was delighted; back before cell phones, a reporter rarely caught a fish on the first call.

So Don told her his name and said, “Thank you, Ms. Dee,” and explained he was calling about the hospital’s infant seat program.

 

The woman stopped him abruptly and said, “Who are you calling for?”

This confused my man. He’d clearly asked for Ellen Dee, and the lady said Ellen Dee is who she was. Confused but undaunted, my guy persisted.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I was calling for Ellen Dee.”

The woman then said, “This is Ellen Dee.”

Don chalked it up to a miscommunication and went through the exact same thing again. But after he again thanked “Ms. Dee” and before he could spit out the words “infant seat program,” she interrupted him again.

“Who are you trying to reach?” she said.

“Well, you’re Ellen Dee, right?” said Don.

“This is Ellen Dee.”

Within another second or two of this “Who’s On First?” parody it suddenly sank in on Don that Ellen Dee was “L & D,” as in “Labor and Delivery.”

He hung up. Had to.

But then later, when a new shift was on the clock in L&D, he called back and pretended the other conversations had never happened. It was a tough road to get there, but in the actual story he finally wrote — with no help from Ms. Dee — Don, as usual, delivered.

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