Prospects aboard?

M. Welshman

M. Welshman

Hi folks.  You were very supportive a week or so back when I told you of the offer to do some talks re 'Pets in Prospect' on a cruise ship which I had to turn down as it was last minute and I thought I wouldn't be prepared enough.  Felt a bit down about it wondering if I'd made the right decision. Well I've now been asked again  ...this time a two week Western Med cruise in August.  And no guys...I'm not going to turn it down.

Carol

And you have plenty of time to prepare for it.

Jenny

What fun awaits you! I used to work for someone who went on a cruise as a photographic lecturer and he had a great time.

Stan2

Sounds great.

Jay Mandal

And you might even get some ideas for a second book ... on cruising. Boats, that is, is case you wondered.

Jay Mandal

Er ... ships?

M. Welshman

Er..yes..Jay.  A ship I hope (or a boat with two oars?) But apparently according to the brochure 'it harps back to a golden age' i.e. it's ancient. Still as long as they've fibre-glassed the rust holes for the duration of the cruise, then it should be swell - providing I can fathom out what I need to do without sinking into the depths of despair oar going overboard with too much talking.

Jenny

MW - That's what you'd call an economy cruise - two weeks in the Med in a rowboat containing you and one other person! Which of you would do the rowing?!!

Carol

That's an idea MW, Pets On-Board, do you know of any animals who spent their life at sea?

neil

Yann Martel's 'Life of Pi' springs to mind!
Enjoy the cruise, Welshman. Go on a dedicated diet beforehand, and get some quoits practice in.

Jenny

Neil - Your "Enjoy the cruise, Welshman" sounds very dramatic! Reminds me of something (in a film maybe) but I can't think what!!

sooz48

We have a boat in The Netherlands which we use in the summer months on the inland waterways. We see lots of people on other boats with dogs, some of them wearing little life jackets. They look really cute. We often see boats with cats on as well and when they moor we watch their owners taking them for walks on leads. I don't know that it's fair to keep cats on small boats as space is a bit cramped and I think cats prefer to be able to wander a bit, but maybe if they're only on the boat for a week or two it's not so bad.

M. Welshman

Jenny...I'd be so busy sticking my oar in that we'd be going round in circles if I was rowing.

Island Girl

Yippeeeee! So happy for you MW.

M. Welshman

Thanks Island Girl. I'll now be biting my nails for the next five months worrying about what I'm going to say. And how to present it. I'm very computer illiterate and when people say I should give a power point presentation all it means to me is switching a light on to see what I'm reading. Duh.

Kangaroo

Congratulations MW!

Tessa Tangent

Nice one, MW... I'm sure our Beryl (the cat) would love it!

Tessa Tangent

Been thinking about this.  Don't suppose they encourage people to take cats on board this ancient vessel?

Katy

MW, just think about PowerPoint as a modern method of showing slides in the good old fashioned way; slides only accompany what the speaker is saying, not replace it. Actually, PP presentations can be very dull because people try to cram too much in and they often last too long. If you can't do PP, no worries; a lively talk and some pictures (actual photos or slides) will delight your audience. Sounds wonderful!

M. Welshman

Thanks for that Katy. You've given me heart. Mind you I'm expected to talk for 45 minutes on five occasions and each talk has to be different. That's a hellava lot of chat.And though my terrier, Arthur Rex is a smashing little chap - very photogenic as seen on the back of my book - I think if I showed more than a dozen slides of him I'd be made to walk the plank.

brownfox

You're quite right MW, 45 mins of chat is a long time.  Don't forget you can vary it a bit with getting the audience to talk as well.  You could consider asking them about their pets - teaching, as it were, rather than lecturing.  I was a school librarian and have had some experience of this type of thing.  I expect some of the actual teachers on Talkback can give you some other pointers. 

brownfox

Re Powerpoint - will you have a big screen available behind you for your audience to view?  If you only have your laptop on the table in front of you, they'll all be peering at it. I suspect a good few of your audience will be rather short-sighted as well.  It might be easier to do a display of illustrations, if a pinboard is available for you to use.  If you're illustrating your book 'Pets in Prospect', you'll need pictures of the various pets you've treated, I suppose, but I don't imagine you've got photos of the actual animals.  You'll have to obtain photos of stand-ins and pretend they're the actual animals. 

Carol

So you better ask now what facillities will be available for your talk, so you have time to prepare all these suggestions in whatever format you need.

josiehenley

This all sounds really exciting! Well done MW.

Now, I read a fabulous story about a lecturer on a cruise ship – one of the Alexander McCall-Smith Von Igelfeld Trilogy (I think the middle one ‘The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs’). The whole thing is a must-read, it’s published in one volume titled ‘The 2 ½ Pillars of Wisdom’ and is about these German academics who keep trying to get one up on each other.

The cruise story is that Von I gets invited to do lectures on a cruise (his subject is Philology – a sort of philosophy of language – which is incredibly tedious from what I can gather, therefore hilarious of course) and he doesn’t have any audience. Then he’s interviewed by the ship’s newsletter and mentions that he’s single, unmarried, then the next day he has a packed room full of wealthy old ladies. Oh and the sausage dog story is probably more up MW’s street, that is when one of the other academics goes to America to a conference mistakenly as the Americans think he’s an eminent vet when he was expecting to deliver a speech on Philology and so he speaks about sausage dogs, because this is the only thing about animals that he knows. And there is a vet in it somewhere as well because someone’s sausage dog gets hurt (I was upset at that bit even thought it was meant to be comedy).

Yes absolutely A MS is one of my fave authors. I’ve read all the ‘Ladies Detective’ series, but this German academics one is funnier in my opinion – or it may be that I’m an academic myself, and live with one, so I find those things funnier.

Jenny

Look - Josie managed to get the 'half' printed properly! (Ref another thread!!)

I loved the Botswana books - I've read all of them - but I've tried two of the books in his Scottish series and can't get into them.

At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances was also very funny - that must be part of the von Igelfeld trilogy.

josiehenley

Yes, that’s the 3rd one. I use Microsoft Office to type my posts and then copy and paste them into the little box. It helps with the spelling (but not my grammar unfortunately!). So the ½ just came over naturally, no idea how I’d do it otherwise. I don’t even want to think about that 727 thing, seems a bit odd to me, more like an aeroplane, here we go for the 911 thread. How many threads can we make reference to within one thread?

I really liked the Scottish series, but I suppose it’s a matter of taste.

Jenny

Once someone at work asked me to fill in a form for him and when it came to "Position", I asked him what I should put.

He didn't have an official job title so he said he'd leave it to me. For some reason - possibly because I had just come across the word - I asked him if it was OK to put "Chief Syllogist".

He was quite happy with that and we both thought it was funny when the reply arrived addressed to "Mr J..... C....., Chief Syllogist".

You'd think they would have been curious as to what it meant, looked it up and realised we were having a laugh - although maybe they were humouring someone they thought was eccentric!