September 1, 2025
Funny, isn’t it, how the mind works?
For example, this illustration from Alice in Wonderland. Those of you who might have had the misfortune to see me preparing for a vacation will recognize the look on Alice’s face as a remarkable likeness of Cathy and the expression on the White Rabbit as…well…me.
She might have shared with you that I tend to over prepare.
How I came to this illustration might demonstrate why Cathy has cause for concern.
First Bell
I woke up this morning as I normally do, around 4:15, set Cathy’s white coffee cup in her nifty Nespresso machine, filled the water canister with filtered water, and positioned the copper-tone-disposable-land-fill-friendly-pod in the center of her white saucer to be ready to administer caffeine the second she awakes. I then filled my groovy jet black long necked Cosori tea kettle, pushed the button labeled “Oolong/195°F”, and carefully placed a fully caffeinated Lipton tea bag in my stainless steel YETI cup so that the string on the tea bag would be on the far side of the cup and not get in the way of me sipping from my sipping portal in the clear plastic keep-the-heat-in lid when sipping right handed.
I then opened the Monday morning compartment, one of 28, in my depressing seven-day-a-week, 4xs a day pill box, grabbed two chewable berry flavored Vitafusion Men’s Multi gummies and two yellow non chewable carbidopa/yabba dabba pills, and set them in order waiting for my tea water to cool to a temperature that, if I had any foresight, I might have chosen when I fired up the Cosori to begin with.
Then, lifting the lid on Old Reliable, my 13” MacBook laptop, and blowing air onto my curled fingertips like a safecracker about to read the fall of the tumblers, I set out to explore cruise ship nomenclature so that, should I encounter the Captain, I will know my aft from a hole in my bow.
Note to you uninitiated sailors, your “aft” is a direction; your “stern” is the place you arrive when you can’t go aft anymore without getting your aft wet. And remember, the left side of the boat…whoops, I mean ship…is the port side. Just think: “Left” has four letters and “port” has four letters. “Right” has five letters and “starboard” has …uh…nine letters. So that’s an easy way to remember it.
Right?
Or if that doesn’t work, just remember the phrase “Is there any red port left in the bottle?” I got confused on this one, but this apparently has something to do with red lights on the right side of the boat and green lights on the left side of the boat. Doesn’t make much sense to me. I mean, if port is red and the red lights are on the right, then that side should be the port side. Right?
To be honest, I don’t know my port from my hearty burgundy. I do remember port is what those rich guys in Downton Abbey and The Gilded Age leave the women to go drink after dinner. So “leave” starts with an “L” and, if I hold my left hand up in front of me, my index finger and my thumb make an “L”, so if I think “port”=”leave”=”you loser”, I should be seaworthy.
You know, ship shape, squared away?
Second Bell
This led to the second stop in my voyage of terminal curiosity: the nautical origins of so much of what we say. I’m reading The Wager right now. It’s a story about a British crew that was shipwrecked off the coast of Chile and took to eating each other before they were rescued (seemed a good book to prep for our voyage); so I know my nautical etymology.
Ship shape seems clear enough, but “squared away?” Apparently, this has something to do with a square-rigged sailing ship setting its sails at the right angle to the wind for optimal speed.
Speaking of sails, “three sheets to the wind” refers to the ropes which attach to a sail. When three such ropes (i.e. sheets) are unattached, the sail flaps uncontrollably in the wind.
“To toe the line” arose out of the practice where sailors, ordered to line up for inspection by the captain, made sure to place the toes of their shoes on the line formed by a plank in the deck.
To “turn a blind eye” refers to when, at the Battle of Coppenhagen in 1801, Admiral Horatio Nelson defied orders to retreat by intentionally placing his telescope to his one blind eye.
“Batten down the hatches”, “even keel”, “keel over”, “in the doldrums”, “high and dry”, “groggy”, “under the weather”, “loose canon” …hell, I know them all.
“Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey?” Nautical? Nope. Trick question. Wanna know why? For starters, the brass trays used to stack cannonballs in pyramids were for land lubbers, not sailors. Sailors stored their cannonballs horizontally in wood trays called “shot garlands”. Second, brass, even when used on land, doesn’t contract enough to dislodge a cannonball. Third, the term “monkey” was never used to refer to a cannonball tray.
Just goes to show you, never trust an idiom to an idiot, especially a Brit.
Three Bells
Where was I? Oh yeah, the stream of consciousness that led to the illustration in the first edition of Alice In Wonderland.
Having visited nautical nomenclature, I figured I better brush-up on cruise ship peculiarities. For example, did you know that a magnetic pineapple posted on the door of your cabin upside down is a wink-wink-nod-nod sign that you and your first mate are open to swapping mates?
It’s true. I read it on “Cruise Lowdown.com” You can even order these magnets on Amazon. A set of six for only $11.99. It says right here, “the quantity is sufficient to meet your decoration needs.” Six? Boy howdy, I should say so.
I thought about ordering up a set to surprise Cathy, but that would probably get awkward. You know, introductions and all. And I’m pretty sure Cathy would be only too happy to swap me out for no remuneration at all.
Four Bells
This got me thinking about what kind of personality disorder I must have to find myself obsessing over the proper orientation of fruit magnets on our cabin door. So, I looked up how much a copy of the DSM-5 would cost so I could self-diagnose.
Yikes. Your DSM-5 will run you $220 hardcover, $160 in paperback, and they don’t even offer Kindle. It’s probably in the ship’s library, but that might be awkward checking it out or drifting off in a deck chair with it spread over my chest beneath my drooling chin.
So, then I thought, I just need a cheat sheet. And sure enough there is one. Laminated and only $8.95.
Economical, handy, discrete; I can wipe off the ocean spray while studying up on our personal port side balcony.
Hmm, let’s see… so many possibilities. Where to begin?
“Intellectual development” is questionable. “Reasoning and problem solving” are definitely lagging. But, I really don’t think it’s neurodevelopmental.
Cathy often says I’m delusional, but schizophrenia seems a stretch. I’m a loose cannon…I’ll give you that…but I don’t have imaginary friends. At least, I don’t think I do.
Cathy? Honey?
No, the more I think about my compulsion to plan, I suffer from a likely generalized anxiety disorder on one DSM axis and a good old fashioned obsessive/compulsive disorder on the other. Not disabling, but certainly enough to prompt the stank eye Alice might give this White Rabbit. I’m guessing the spreadsheets and Powerpoint slide shows are probably giveaways, don’t you think?
Five Bells
So, then I started thinking, “How’d you start down this rabbit hole, Rob?” And that got me thinking, “Where does the expression “rabbit hole” come from.” So, I looked it up and it dates back to that ol’ laudanum lover Lewis Carrol’s story about the young girl with the stank eye who followed the white rabbit down the hole.
So that, at long last, is how I came to the illustration.
I know that look.
Probably best to pass on the pineapple magnets.
Don’t you think?
"Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost" 