overtime

Saturday 4th November 2006

4:39 p.m. CET Thursday night was very busy, largely due to a Belgian company who partially took over the ship. The couple who I mentioned were on their return trip, so I played the Peter Skellern number they requested which went down quite well. However in general it proved to be a rather testing night, as the majority of the audience were German, which as always was a bit of a challenge. And as if that wasn’t enough, we were extremely late into the dock in Hull yesterday morning (even later than on the previous round-trip) due to an unusually low tide, so much so that we ended up spending the morning crawling along the Humber waiting for the water level to rise. The majority of passengers resorted to passing the time until disembarkation in the bars, and I unwittingly consented to doing a one-off 45-minute set in the piano bar. Still I just played instrumentals, and it seemed to be well received by the passengers and officers. Plus the added benefit earning a bit of extra cash.

It was rather strange sailing during daylight hours (not something we tend to do at this time of year) so I seized the opportunity of taking a few photos. Here is one of the Humber facing inland, with Hull visible to the right of the picture, and the Humber Bridge in the distance.



Had a much more encouraging night last night, the best of the week actually. Managed to captivate the audience from the outset, which is always difficult. There were several attentive couples and groups in, not least of which an English group of students who were sat next to the piano most of the evening and requested several songs. Ended up playing allsorts, as diverse as Abba, Bon Jovi and Nat King Cole. They will be back on next Saturday for their return trip, which will be another welcome boost!

Also the MD from Live Business, Blaine Sherman was on board again last night, and gave me more positive feedback via James.

The sea was relatively calm last night, plus the sky was clear for the first time in a long time, which helped make for pleasant sailing conditions. The weather has held out today as well, has been a beautiful sunny day, if a little cold. Didn’t go further than the terminal this afternoon though, due to lack of funds.

When on my way into the terminal building earlier this afternoon, I was interested to note that there was a U.N. van parked outside.



Ida is coming up to Hull for the day tomorrow which will be nice, plus seeing her should help to relieve some of the tedium that I have been experiencing since returning to life on the ocean wave!

Sunday 5th November 2006

1:57 a.m. GMT Tonight went very well despite the average age of the audience being slightly higher than last night. Had a good mixture of people in too, and a few of them responded to my pleas for requests, among them were songs by Keane and Coldplay which I relished playing, along with Creep by Radiohead which I don’t think I have ever had requested or played before.

There is a fireworks display at Princes Quay in Hull tomorrow at 6pm so I should be able to get a pretty good view of it from the dock.