Monday - November 24, 2008
QE2 Characters - The Flutesnoots
Most of the people on this cruise are long-time QE2 passengers and are quite devoted to the ship. They love her passionately and wanted to be part of this final send-off. But there are also a few people who are on the ship for the first time, and as the Captain said at one of his receptions, "What took you so long?" And these new people divide into two camps - those that are sorry they didn't travel on the QE2 sooner and those who think she is a tired old lady and can't see what the fuss is all about about. I guess the people in the second camp would rather have the glitz and glamor of a new ship rather than the history, tradition, and elegance of the QE2. Each to his own.
As for the characters, I think that most of them are in our dining room which has made for some interesting people watching. Because of the nature of their quirkiness, I can't really add any pictures to this entry, but I can certainly describe appearances and behavior, some of which is quite dreadful.
Mike and I have a table for two which is on a raised level at the back of the Princess dining room, along with about 15 other tables for two. We sit right by the railing that divides the upper level from the lower level, so we can see out over almost the entire room and out the windows. I said to Mike that I love our table because I feel like a bird on a branch, eyeing the world spread out below me. And it seems like the major characters in the room are seated around us.
An interesting woman is an English lady who sits with her husband a couple of tables away from us. She is quite a jolly person and likes to have conversation and tell stories to the three couples sitting at tables around hers, and when she laughs, which is often, it can be a bit raucous because she has a very deep voice. But she is just having a good time and enjoying herself and her nearest table mates (2 British couples and 1 American) find her entertaining. It turns out that she and her husband are retired police officers, so I expect they do have a lot of interesting tales to tell.
Then we have a couple who sit just opposite us, against the wall (at the table we asked for), and they are another story. She is French-speaking and he is a New Yorker. They have travelled on the ship many times, often in Queens class, so they probably think they are slumming by having to dine in the Princess Grille this voyage. They keep very much to themselves, often conversing in French. They have been married a long time, yet his French is still of the high school level and painful to listen to. He wears big, round, tortiseshell glasses and often swans around the ship wearing a navy blazer with brass buttons and a white captain's peaked hat. We have encountered them at a few parties as well and I find them (particularly him) quite pretentious. Even though they sit directly across from us, the most conversation they have had with us consists of Good Evening and Good Night!
Well, these two forces - those that like to be sociable and those that should be dining in their cabin where they can talk to each other and not be bothered by the conversation of anyone else - butted heads last night and it was not pretty. As a matter of fact, it got quite ugly. The Chatty Cathys were having their usual conversations and enjoying themselves, but were not what I would call a disturbing element or anything, when the Flutesnoots arrived, at the last possible minute as usual. They had been at the Engineers Party, as were we, but they apparently stayed longer and drank more. Then they had a bottle of champagne with their dinner. And then the fireworks began.
Just as the first couple from the other section were getting up to leave at the end of their meal, Monsieur Flutesnoot lit into them, telling them they were being far too loud, that they had no sense of decorum and no idea of how to behave in public, etc., etc. Then it got really ugly when he verbally attacked another of the couples, who had started to protest his behavior, calling the gentleman a "senile, old man who should be dining in the Lido (the buffet-style dining area)". At that point, Mike and I, who were waiting for our after-dinner tea and coffee, decided to stand up and leave before things degenerated any further. On our way out, we alerted the maitre d' to the problem just as our waiter came to get him, saying the women were in tears. We carried on out the door, and what had been a really nice dinner, with chateaubriand and souffles and a nice wine, was completely ruined.
Just after we left, we learned from another couple seated in the same area, that this same man had gone over to the lady with the deep voice at lunch and had told her to pipe down. To her credit, she had apologized and left it at that. And he was sober then.
I have to say that I have never seen such despicable behavior on the ship. Monsieur Flutesnoot is the kind of puffed up wanna be, with more money than sense, who gives Americans a bad name. I was ever so briefly tempted to say so to him, but why throw gasoline on a raging fire. They didn't appear at lunch today, but going to dinner tonight should be quite a treat!