A1 is in the books

Yesterday was Day A1. No, we didn't eat a bunch of steak sauce. A1 means it was the first day of classes, and was an "A" day. Classes on the MV Explorer are held every day we are at sea, alternating between "A" and "B" days. Today is B1. Grandpa has some classes that meet on A days and some that meet on B days. Sr has classes just on B days in the afternoon, so he is at his first classes right now.

My scheduled library hours are in the mornings to early afternoon, then I have some free time while Olivia staffs the library. We had all 9 of our work study students start yesterday in 1- or 2-hour shifts, so Olivia and I worked the evening hours as well to get the students oriented. As the students get more comfortable in the library, the evening hours will be staffed just by students, though we will check in on a regular basis with them. Since the library is pretty much the center of the busiest area of the ship, it isn't hard to pass by and check in as we go to evening seminars, eat dinner, etc. The students are doing a terrific job of learning library duties and asking good questions.

Right now I am sitting in the main dining room while Diedre, one of the Unreasonable Institute mentors, who works for Microsoft Studios/Xbox, is speaking to the dependent kids enrichment program about what it is like to work in the video game business. The children are very engaged in asking Diedre questions. She brought an Xbox on board but the power supply is bad, so they are going to get it fixed in Hawaii. It is easy to forget that we are in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, a couple of thousand miles from land, and things like a bad power supply, or a broken copier in the Registrar's office, etc, have to wait until the next port to get fixed. Internet bandwidth has been harder to come by since all 630-some students boarded, but it was completely out for several hours this morning, the shipboard intranet, on which the library catalog runs, was also very slow. We checked out books by hand, and found the people we needed to talk to in person instead of email ;-)

Seas have continued to be less than smooth, though last night was better than the night before, and most of us have found our sea legs. In two more days, we reach Hawaii. I promise some pictures then.