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Cruisin' for a Bruisin'
Despite my predictions of doom on the sea, my family and I (note the word family) actually had a great time together (note again the words family and together)! It was my mom's sixtieth birthday and to celebrate she sprung for a cruise for the entire Fuhr clan. This included my sister and her husband, my wife and two kids and naturally her husband, also known (albeit I try to keep it secret) as my Dad. Now it's quite hard to decline a free cruise despite the fact that I would have to spend an entire week with my family, but out of respect to my mom's aging carcass, I decided to go willingly without complaint. My mind was totally preoccupied preparing myself for the exhaustion of eating dinner with my Dad for seven nights in a row watching the food fly out of his mouth at great velocity. All this while attempting to amuse us with stale Polish jokes and sexual innuendo in front of my five and three year old kids.
We set sail on the Norwegian Sun, a brand-spankin' new ship that I must admit was a marvelous combined effort of design and functionality. My kids were thrilled about the bunk beds in our cabin (the cruise line likes to call them staterooms, I suppose because you're in a state of shock when you see how tiny your room is)! However, despite the novelty of the two beds stacked upon each other like the pancakes you would consume at the breakfast buffet, both children were too scared to sleep on the top bunk. Naturally then, Daddy ends up sleeping on it to prove a point while the two runts, er kids, spend the night cuddling with my wife in king-sized luxury. I, cramped and miserable on the top bunk, found it surprisingly difficult to pee at 2:30 am when I realized I was six feet in the air and couldn't find the minuscule ladder in the dark. After that night my kids were forced to get over their vertigo and they switched top and bottom bunks on alternate evenings. Of course I still had to get up at 2:30 in the morning for peeing but in most cases it was at the whining request of the son in the top bunk needing me to pull him down and escort him to the john.
One of the family events that were planned was the weigh-in. As most of you realize the food on a cruise is bountiful, if not entirely edible. I come from a quantity over quality type family..."the fried clams weren't real good but they sure do give you a lot!" Knowing that mass quantities of cruise food such as Veal Oscar ala buffet was on the horizon, we all stopped by the gym to see where we stood weight wise. Then on the last day we would see who most tipped the scales after having plied themselves with the voluminous amounts of reheated lobster tails and ambrosia at the Captain's dinner. Just for the record, I LOST one pound by the end of the trip! And no, I didn't have to cut off any body parts to do so.
How exactly did I lose the weight despite my suppressed appetite while dining with my father? Exercise. I did my regular daily routine and then took various classes from spinning, to abdominals, stretching and even Yoga. I actually learned a great pose in Yoga, where when executed properly at the dinner table I could stretch my neck in such a squiggly position that I no longer was forced to see my father chew, alternatively I spent most of the time looking at my sisters cleavage. I know, my wife's bust would have been preferable, it wasn't by choice, but you've never seen my dad eat! It's like a pride of puma ravaging a wildebeest on the Discovery network. My sister's cleavage is more like watching two lion cubs resting on the plains...if you get my drift. It was out of total desperation and the lesser of two evils I assure you.
In honor of my Mom's 60th Sis, my wife and I put a video tribute together for her. It took some six months in the making and it came out as compelling as any E! True Hollywood Story or at least as entertaining as one of those A&E Biography shows. This was fortunate because should the ship have sunk, or if my Mom accidentally choked to death on a pretzel, or the most ghastly death of horror...watching my dad eat creamed spinach...should have occurred, this videotape was automatically going to be sent to the highest bidding newsmagazine show for exclusive rights of broadcast. The monies being donated to The International Yoga Foundation for the Neck Stretching Aversion Therapy Research Department. But outside of some weeping and a little bit of laughter, the video served it purpose as my Father exclaimed "That was the best birthday gift ever!" Or perhaps my Dad said "That was the best buffet but I missed the cheddar!" I couldn't tell because there was too much birthday cake buttercream oozing out of the left side of his mouth upon the utterance.