SOS Cruise Lines

By Ricky Adlam

A retired, middle-age mafia couple inherits a defunct Cruise Line, changing it into a spousal death ship that secretly offers Senior Couples specialized services for one near broke spouse needing to knock off their horrible, hard to live with husband or wife. When two "newly wed" couples accidentally arrive on board, riotous Anti-Love Boat comedy-havoc breaks out until the cruise has docked.  It's a funny, unpredictable, 'Love Boat', 'Golden Girls', 'Sopranos', fun to read family cruiseline comedy.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ricky Adlam
• Release date: Sep 14, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393773535

Ricky Adlam

Ricky Adlam has a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical & Industrial Engineering with a background in Electrical Technology. He has working experience as a News Anchorman, a Weatherman, a TV Comedy Writer, a Senior Aerospace Project Engineer, an Aerospace Systems Engineer, an Industrial Engineer, and a Senior Nuclear Project Engineer. He has also performed Big Band songs at numerous Mayfair Music Festivals. He played rhythm guitar as a member of the Wabash Country Band. Ricky likes to write music, screenplays, and comedy novels. He usually writes a screenplay first and then uses it to create his finished novel. Ricky’s comedy-oriented writing makes his stories fun, fast reading books, which are available as e-books and in hardcover. Adventures at Top Tractor Academy was his first creation. Following that was 12 Monkeys on a Bus, then Twitzy & Ditzy, then SOS Cruise-Lines, then House Shoes, then The Tall Man, then Return of Pitt the Pirate, then Pet Town, then STAR 999 Down, and then Coronavirus-6WKS 2D DAY. Each of his stories are unique creations on their own with no follow-up volumes. Ricky Adlam hopes that these popular unique books continue to be read by young and old adults. It should be mentioned, that as a youth, Ricky Adlam was always outside playing Baseball, Football, Basketball, Stickball, Handball and Hockey. He intends to write comedy action sports stories in the future to be placed in school and local libraries throughout the United States.

Book preview

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

SOS Cruise Lines

INDEX

.

CHAPTER ONE: RETIREMENT FOR TWO

CHAPTER TWO: PLAYING BALL TOGETHER

CHAPTER THREE: PLANS FOR THE CREW

CHAPTER FOUR: ACCIDENTS WILL HAPPEN

CHAPTER FIVE: DANGEROUS SNACKS

CHAPTER SIX: DART BOARD GAMES

CHAPTER SEVEN:  CREATING THE FUTURE

CHAPTER EIGHT: A CAGE IS JUST A CAGE

CHAPTER NINE: MATCH MAKING DAYS

CHAPTER TEN: FIXING SHIP ROMANCES

CHAPTER ELEVEN: PROPOSALS PLENTY

CHAPTER TWELVE: WEDDING DAYS - JIT

THE END:

CHARACTER REFERENCE LISTING

AUTHORS PAGE

––––––––

.

.

SOS CRUISE LINES

.

CHAPTER ONE:  RETIREMENT FOR TWO

.

It’s just passed mid-day and two middle-aged people are moving about a three-floor level, enclosed shopping mall.  Each one is holding a large paper shopping bag. The couple is finished visiting each store for the day. They head down the escalators to the lower level.  An old Sailing Boat Song now plays above them on a mall loudspeaker system. They exit the escalators and pause to stare at the poster of a huge vacation Cruise Ship poster. He points at it. She pushes his hand down, shakes her head and laughs. He then laughs at it as well. He whips out a black ink marker and adds a mustache on a half-exposed dolphin. He then places his fingers to his nose, meaning the whole vacation idea stinks.

ANTONIO and PAULINE ROMANO MAC CLOUD now move across the hallway and down to the lower level. They head towards the front glass entrance doors. Suddenly, he stops his wife to show her something else he’s spotted that might be amusing to her. His fingers point to a white Captains hat hanging in a distant display window. She smirks and punches Antonio’s upper arm. He flinches, then makes a crazy, cross-eyed face for his wife. He adds a stupid sideways salute and sticks out her tongue. He kisses her cheek. Pauline grins briefly. She is used to his antics, and so briefly makes one good cross-eyed face back at him just to make him happy and content. He points ahead. They move forward and laugh together as they exit the electric opening doors.  Approaching the first front row of cars, he stops at a curb, puts down his large bag and does a brief, old style sailors dance for his wife to see. He wiggles his ass last and then stands at attention with his arm in a salute position. Pauline bursts out laughing and then fake kicks it. He jumps up as if it reached his backside. Pauline blows a bubble gum bubble, and it pops. She then moves on and nods for him to follow. Antonio picks up his bag and follows her across the parking lot, directly to their old, dirty, rusty Ford station wagon.  The two, fun loving shoppers continue giggling as they enter their vehicle. They roll down the windows and drive away. Each spouse smiles like they just won a lottery and don’t have a care in the world. The radio suddenly turns up loud and stays that way.

Upon reaching home, a house with a driveway but no garage, Antonio enters through the old, half-stained front door followed by Pauline. Unlike the old car, and sad, weather-beaten house that could use a coat of paint, the vaulted living room interior is a spotless showroom. The kitchen is a marvel of appliances. The thick rugs and wooden floors are clean and without any dust build up. The venturing couple drop their heavy bags on the center of the floor. He flops down onto the soft flowered couch. She collapses on her favorite reclining love seat. In his hand is a telegram that was stuck to the rusted front door knocker. He opens it and reads it to his wife.

Pauline? Why don’t people use the mailbox out front? In any case, this telegram says that old Uncle William Bradford Pitts, has passed away and left that broken poor excuse of a ship to us. Says he had six years left to pay off. Not bad. The old sailor had a good thing going. What did he repeatedly tell me? Oh yes. Wash your underwear twice and it comes out nice. Funny guy. Loved Brad Pitts sense of humor. You know, I thought he owned two defunct cruise ships. Honey, he was only a drunk part of the time, right?

Pauline adds, He was a full-time party drunk who never married. He must owe tabs in every bar around town. He’s just like Floyd the Barber, the hairy guy you snuffed out in Panama City two years back. You never laughed at his jokes while getting your hair cut. Leaving him dead and tied to a bull’s backside in the town square was sort of funny. It did get the next day’s headlines in Brazil.

Antonio turns the paper upside down. He stares at it, front and back. He tosses the mail gram over to his wife after crumpling it in a ball. Well honey, he’s actually your dead Uncle. You take a look-see. Tell me what you think. He never hired us to knock anyone off. I told him the first one is free. In fact, he despised our method of earning a living.  I told him that we never knock off anyone who doesn’t deserve it.  He argued that we do it for the money first and that the rest is pure bull shiiii, oh dinky.

Pauline interrupts, "He, told me over the phone last month that he sold the second outdated cruise ship and a third functional ship. He was planning on putting the profits into the first for a refurbishment. He also mentioned that he was experiencing chest pains followed by several moments of passing gas like a volcano. Oh dear! This is terrible. I just had a terrible thought that could make me laugh and cry."

Antonio sits up and asks, Why? Are you sad that he’s gone? You never get upset whenever you knock anyone off. I’ve never seen you shed a tear. What is it dearest?

She grabs her face and pouts, Not anything like that, silly. I’m not going soft yet, fart brain.  Listen up, Tony the Tiger, I always wanted his coconut almond, cobbler pie recipe. Maybe he wrote it down somewhere. It’s the only thing he did that was superb, otherwise, I could give a rats-ass that he’s gone, love chops. She points a finger at her head and fake pulls the trigger. Pauline takes the wrinkled the paper and reads on further. "The bottom says here that the cruise ship needs a lot of work done on it. Oh my! The nut case was operating in the red for the last ten years. He must have been living it up and squandering the profits on wine and whiskey. Sad puppy he was for sure. Pauline blows her nose in a handkerchief. Smiles. We both shared one minor thing, cat allergies. That’s all thank goodness."

Antonio slaps his belly and shouts, Great Scott! Twenty years as an Independent Hit Team (IHT) and we get left a worn-out, old cruise ship. -—Where is our reward? Where is the justice? We help people out by eliminating the bad guys and all we get is this telegram. - - - Heavens and souls! I never told you this one special secret. But I miss my mother’s burnt apple pie at times. She burnt it slightly and over seasoned it with cinnamon. It was great.

Pauline rises-up and stretches her arms, It’s just a Cruise Ship. We’re retired now. Ahoy! Maybe we can get it going again, Tony baloney. Brad left us just enough money to have it done. Think about it! -—No more cutting the lawn. No more wash for me. You won’t have to eat my horridly bad cooking. Hey, no more airplane delays. You can wear ‘white’ for a change. Hmm. No more cleaning the neighbor’s dog poop left on the front lawn. It could be a regular holiday for us. We just have to think about how we can market interest so that we have a full ship of fools each time we sail out over the ocean blue. She reaches for the planter she just bought, then twirls a small flag around in the air. Antonio ponders her proposal for a moment.  Suddenly he grabs the crumpled paper up and kicks it away. It bounces off a photo of Uncle Pitts, hanging on the living room wall, with his Seaman’s cap tilted left over his forehead and corn cob pipe protruding from in his tight-lipped, beer swelling mouth. Tony turns up the table radio. He then does his crazy sailors dance to the ‘Sloop John B’ melody. Pauline points at his ass and he wiggles it about. She imitates his movements. They laugh and dance about the adjacent, spacious living room. He stops and bends over to catch his breath a moment. Then he feigns a heart attack, leaning on the coffee table.  She simply sticks her tongue over at him. He straightens up and smiles.

Antonio shakes his head and spouts out, Well I guess we have acquired good business skills over the years. Enough to run a floating hotel thing. I was once in the sea cadets as a boy, and I learned how to tie a noose and to navigate to the nearest toilet. He reflects in thought a moment, then continues planning. "You’ve got many retired loyal contacts in the mob, the hood. You could find us the skilled cheap labor. Most mobsters don’t own a house. They would love free room and board. -—So, it’s back to the mall to get me a Captain hat. -—We’ll sell this rotted old house tomorrow! Or we could rent it out fully furnished. SOS Ahoy! SOS Ahoy! SOS! -—SOS Cruise Lines here we come. How about this dance move, honey? He tosses a pillow up and down as he dances about in jerky robot movements. Pauline flops down in her armchair and grins at his foolishness, which she thoroughly enjoys. He reaches down and pulls her up to her feet. He grabs her and dances normal now, arm about her waist. The radio music changes to a soft ballad.

Leaning on his shoulder she whispers, I know several retired mob guys and a good cook. My Cousin, David what’s his name, just retired as the legal beagle to some big casino. You friend BB is out of work. Katie K the vet, was the doctor the mob used for special, fixups including their sick pets. She just loves boating and hates the city. I once watched flipper six times at her place. That big lawsuit she lost drove her out of the business. - - - Why not? I’m sure we can get them all. If everyone wears more than one hat, we can get by with half a crew. What do you think? Tony gives her a whirl and she twirls about holding his hand. He stops and points to his head. He rubs his chin.

Well. We had better get down to his office first, not the mall. Why not start tonight. Tony clocks off the radio. We don’t need a key. We never needed one before. Ha! Ha!  Before anyone else gets in there to look around. Haste is of the essence shipmate. I need to see his finance books first. Then I’ll make a final decision my sweet intelligent daughter of a town judge. He leans her back and pauses to say, Your mother would be so proud of you. I was impressed that she worked for the mob and your father never suspected a thing. She was a lovely liar and devoted vegetarian too. Pauline smiles up at him and rubs his ass and then messes his thick, long gray hair. He rights her upward and laughs.  Together, they seaman-strut right out the front door. It slams shut with a loud thud.

In no time the couple has crossed town and broken into her Uncle’s locked office located in his unkempt, home apartment. Antonio wastes no time and is sitting at a wooden desk reading the old Seaman’s ledger, which reads more like a ten-year old’s diary. Pauline begins paging through the inbox of bills and the full to the top waste basket next to the desk. Soon, Tony He places a fatter, second book on the table and opens it up. In a short while he places a third ledger down and points to them all. He shoots them with a fake finger gun.  Bam-bam!  The books say it all. Three books for three ships. He just didn’t get it. None of the cruise lines do. As we said in Harvard while I was getting my business degree on how to cheat customers and make them love you at the same time, Rich owners just don’t get the real message when it’s right in front of their nose".

Get what dear? she asks, blinking her blue eyes at his hazel green ones.

Antonio takes a deep breath and continues, The driving factor was the rich younger passengers. They attracted them. OK.  However, their kids ate each ship out of house and home. Big losses on the decks with large families on every cruise. We need to reverse that trend and yet make our customers happy to be on board. Antonia lights the uncles pipe left on an ash tray and puffs several times. He leans forward on the wooden -desk and points to a large cruise ship poster on the far wall.

Go on. Pauline leans back on a dusty bookcase to listen.

Tony waves a pencil around. Now the older passengers, ah ha! They lost much more at gambling tables. They ate less while they were on board. This is where the good money is dear. The seniors. Good money from all over the USA.

What’s the plan then? She places her fingers on her nose to block the moldy smell.

Tony sits back. "This ship has about two hundred rooms on two decks.  We will simply fix and book one hundred old Seniors cabins and offer them two connecting rooms each. Two connected, baby-cakes! Simple.

She almost sneezes, I don’t get it? Why two per couple? Is that not a loss?

Anthony grins and continues. How many times did we hear snoring while staying in a motel?  It’s for the spouse who snores. It’s simply a lovely way to give the other spouse silence for the night. Young couples rarely snore, Pauline. This alone will fill the ship for years. We serve food only at dinner, morning and lunch are buffets. We all do two jobs each.  It won’t be hard since we only book half of our rooms. They just want a last time to see the ocean, no matter how slow we cruise. See where I’m going dear."

Pauline leans over and kisses Tony on the forehead. Genius! -—Most of our neighbors have a second guest room for the husband to sleep in when he snores. Oh, you’re so brilliant, Tony-baloney. She places her arms around his neck. I mean -—Captain Antonio. So, that makes us big profits, right?

Antonio closes the books and bites his upper lip. Not really that much. Fifty couples per deck will keep us in the black for six years until the ship’s payoff is complete.  We need to use our skills to get some more money until then.  Let’s think outside the proverbial box. Hmm!

Pauline looks at a dozen brochures of coffins referred by companies that do burials at sea.  She hesitates to speak. She smiles and holds it up.  She points to it repeatedly. She rubs a tube of lipstick with a finger and pops a red dot on the end of her nose to be funny.

Tony- baloney’s eyebrows rise. "Your Uncle was buried in