paperwork in place

I've now got my passport with spiffy new visas for Brazil, India, and China. It cost an arm and a leg -- over $700 going through the visa service. But there they are. I can bop in and out of India until October 2016, China until October 2012, Brazil until -- yikes! only 90 days from last Monday! OK, that's nine days until the end of November, plus 31 days of December, 40 days, plus 31 days of January is 71 days. Whew! I'm OK, we'll be done with Brazil by January 20 unless I get kidnapped by curare-dart-wielding tribesmen from the depths of the Amazonian rainforest. Even then I'll be OK as long as the ransom gets paid before February 20 or so. I wonder why Brazil is so stingy.

And the welcome packet from Holland America arrived last weekend with the information that there will be 18 formal nights, about one a week, plus offers for beverage and spa and internet packages. I've already ordered a glass of "house wine" with each dinner, 1000 minutes of internet access, and the cheapest of the photo packages -- I am a dunce at photography, and if I want to remember how I looked on this cruise, I'm going to have to pay for someone else's version of me. And there's a deal whereby I get a liter of water delivered to my cabin every morning. Probably a good idea, since we'll be in hot, humid tropical places most of the time. I can put my liter of water in my knitting bag with my tablet* as I wander about the ship looking for a place to sit where I can watch the ocean go by. **

*Yes, I've ordered a tablet, a Toshiba Thrive. My friend Nanette got one, and just twiddling with it for a few minutes was all it took to overcome my feeble resistance. It arrives late next week. I had all sorts of very valid rational reasons not to get one. But Nanette's was all shiny and colorful and had all these neat apps on it and I swear I was a grownup once, I really was, I did deferred gratification and everything, I really did. I have the image of the fallen woman crooning, "I was not always as you see me now."

**It will, of course, be nothing like this when I'm actually on the ship. There are people who plan out their adventures to the last detail, then go and march triumphantly through their plans, point by point, and return having done exactly what they expected to do. That sounds to me like a total waste of time. Why have an adventure if you already know how it's going to turn out?