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Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

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Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#311

Post by lupire »

Chris2048 wrote: post #209
Der_Einzige wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am the smug American which reminds all the euros that they make 1/3rd of what an American does while simultaneously working harder than the average rest and vest engineer at a tech retirement home like Microsoft. Everyone I think about how bad American WLB is, I take a look at the supposed utopias of Europe and find that they’re whole nations of crabs in a bucket.

> I am the smug American which reminds all the euros that they make 1/3rd of what an American does Including healthcare and public facilities? Or does this only apply to tech workers?

PP is bragging that USA 2%ers do better financially than the European 2%ers, as long as their kids don't get murdered at school, because they can watch their investment portfolio grow while playing video games at the office all summer instead of going on vacation.

Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#312

Post by lupire »

protocolture wrote: post #302
chasil wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The big draw for me was that my phone wouldn't work. Peers had a habit of calling me for non-critical, non-production problems. The worst was Mardi Gras, where I'm on Bourbon Street for Fat Tuesday, and my operations head calls me with an analyst on the line and burns fifteen minutes with a problem that turned out to be development coding. My phone did occasionally explode with voicemails and texts when I got back to…

My sister in law brings her work phone everywhere and then finds the spot in the house with no signal and just leaves it there for hours on end. I can see it.

Show her the Airplane Mode button?

Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#313

Post by lupire »

giantg2 wrote: post #169
nullstyle wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Convoys have become shit shows more often than not in my experience, but point taken. So many ways to skin the vacation-cat.

Yeah, depends on the people and the quality of the vehicles. Motorcycle trips tend to work well as convoys.

Riding a motorcycle is not a substitute for sitting at a pool or restaurant. It's different.

Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#314

Post by UncleMeat »

davidashe wrote: post #69
verhaust wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get this kind of vitriol toward cruise goers. I like to plan trips as an adventure like you and 6 years ago had zero desire to ever go on a cruise. I ended up going on one because my in-laws wanted to do a European cruise with extended family for their retirement celebration. They don't drink, they enjoy their life and got to celebrate with family so no loneliness. They are just older and don't have the physi…

Look into what life is like for the staff. A previous commenter mentioned that cruises (paraphrase) “lack the colonial feel of mexican resorts” which is a testament to the power of consumerist illusion.

The cruise industry is indeed shitty to staff.

An all inclusive resort in the caribbean is also likely to be shitty to staff. Most people are drinking coffee or eating chocolate that has slavery somewhere along the supply line.

I think you can make the case that cruising is an unethical industry, either because of exploitative labor practices or environmental damage. But almost nobody who is criticizing cruising as a vacation is starting here. Instead, cruises are called trashy and fake in comparison to "authentic" travel experiences.

Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#315

Post by Scoundreller »

wpearse wrote: post #283
bosie wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Separate your work and personal phone? It seems not the healthiest of companies to work for. If you can’t set boundaries, might need help by using. A second phone

My colleagues and I put the work line on an eSIM so we can turn the work “phone” off completely with a toggle in the Settings app. (If anyone from Apple is reading this, would be great to be able to schedule DND on a eSIM line.)

Should be able to do that through shortcuts and automation?

Here someone disables it entirely, but should be able to do something less intense than that too:

https://www.reddit.com/r/shortcuts/comments/16hoo4h/automati...

Or is the issue that there is no way to set DND on a particular SIM on the front end?

Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#316

Post by ghaff »

kqr wrote: post #296
ghaff wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Generally speaking, I wouldn't do a cruise except somewhere like the Galapagos where it's pretty much the option. But I did do an Atlantic crossing after semi-retiring. I paid for a minor cabin upgrade and it wasn't really worth it. I'm not sitting on a balcony crossing the Atlantic anyway and I'm not spending time in my cabin.

Huh. Maybe these things change with age or I misunderstand the premise but sitting on a balcony over the Atlantic and just reading and writing for days on end sounds like a dream vacation for me. What made it unpleasant?

It's pretty chilly and windy for at least much of the year. There's plenty of outdoor space you don't need to pay a premium for if you do want to sit outside--probably with a sweater on. There is a nice promenade deck that I used daily but, in general, I didn't spend a huge amount of time outside. I found it very pleasant with lots of interesting activities and good food. I just didn't really sit around outside. (And actually didn't do as much reading as I planned with everything going on.)

I'll probably do again next time schedules align.

Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#317

Post by ghaff »

giantg2 wrote: post #272
School-Cotton wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it does seem that most tech jobs expect you to be available after hours for calls and extend that to vacation by default Not any tech job I’ve ever had, except very occasionally after hours if unavoidable due to working with people in Asia, and planned well in advance. Never during vacation, that would be crazy. But there have probably been people on my same teams who thought it was expected, due to them being work…

You have a separate team for on-call? Never need to do off-hours elevations? That sounds wild.

Except for my very first job when I was running shipyard jobs, no one has ever expected that they'd be able to reach me off-hours though they may have left messages of various types.

Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#318

Post by DiggyJohnson »

aj7 wrote: post #198
nullstyle wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s a different kind of serendipity that comes with Cruise vacations as opposed to road tripping, but it’s still very much there. Furthermore, I can’t really have a road trip experience with 16 people in my travel group; If we want to be together, we’ll be stuck, packed into a van. I can have a great cruise experience with a group that size on a cruise or at a resort. I say this is someone who had taken multiple…

Serendipity on cruises, eh? The axiom of cruises is: You will never see these people again.

Do people go cruising to make long term friends?

Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#319

Post by DiggyJohnson »

dylan604 wrote: post #51
icegreentea2 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cruises hit a spot of: * All the fun and "not thinking" of an all-inclusive resort (though obviously only if you pay for the drink packages) on land * Generally cheaper than all inclusive resorts on mainland USA (I'm not as familiar with Europe) * Competitive on pricing with all inclusive resorts in the Caribbean/Mexico * Get to skip out on flight to the Caribbean/Mexico * Get to skip out out of the overt semi-coloni…

> Get to skip out on flight to the Caribbean/Mexico This is a strange comment, as most people still have to fly to a port city. So maybe that flight is shorter and a domestic flight, but it's still requires a flight.

I would guess that over half of all Americans are within driving distance to a cruise terminal, and that this group is overrepresented in the cruise company clientele.

Re: Cruise ships chopped in half are a license to print money

#320

Post by DiggyJohnson »

lbriner wrote: post #16
protocolture wrote: post #4

I worked on a cruise ship below decks, once, for 3 hours, and I swore I would never take a cruise. Take the dirtiest hotel you have ever been in, and then ensure you cant leave it for days at a time. It interests me that demand is increasing but I suspect thats just good advertising.

"Prices from $1,000" but shows the picture of the presedential suite to lure people in. "Oh yeah, $1,000 is a room next to the engine room with no window and a single bed" at which point people feel a bit embarrassed and accept that it is another $10K just to get a window. On the other hand, lots of people are returning customers so maybe there is something to be said for moving slowly across the ocean as your life e…

> On the other hand, lots of people are returning customers so maybe there is something to be said for moving slowly across the ocean as your life ebbs away ;-)

This is incredibly mean spirited. Besides perhaps the cruise ship emissions issue, how do you distinguish leisure time on a cruise from leisure time setting in front of the TV at home, or road tripping, or a ski trip, etc.? I'm aghast at the tone of this comment.

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