It’s about 0945 on the Allure and we have, surprisingly, done no work all day.
For the first time, The Department has sent us a newspaper from Earth, and, of course, everyone wanted to read it when it first came through. There was a mad scramble towards the log computer when the morning mail alarm first read aloud the incoming paper. Jacob got there first, because he’s the tallest, and he had Tommy Filt in a headlock to keep him out of the way. But then Mrs. S intercepted and made Jacob let Tommy go and then stand across the room. She decided the most fair way for everyone to read it was for her to read it aloud.
So the rest of us crowded around her seat and we spent all day reading the news. It felt a little bit like storytime, like when we were kids, all of us sitting on the ground in a huddle, just listening. And, honestly, it was kind of wonderful. We skipped the boring stuff, because none of us wanted to listen to Mrs. S drone on about things we didn’t care about, and nor did she want to read it. But the advertisements were amazing! The first one we read was for some new face wash that guarantees no acne within a week. All of us just about died when we heard that because we have to ration our acne cream on the ship—I think The Department largely underestimated the amount of acne cream that eight teenagers would need for months and months. Alexandra demanded that we turn the ship around right then and go back to Earth to get some of the new product. Mrs. S said she was being ridiculous and to sit back down.
Jake Kelsey and Nico Soto both flipped when they saw the pictures of the new Nintendo 4DS. None of us could figure out how it worked from the full-page ad, so Jake demanded that we look up videos about how to use it on YouTube. Mrs. S let him because he’s her favorite. She even let Gwen turn all the lights off, so it felt like we were in a proper movie theater while we watched.
We also read a couple movie reviews. After reading them we argued about which we’d all want to watch; we agreed upon the new Incredibles movie. So, if you’re reading this, and you have any power over which movies The Department sends…you know what to do. Sometimes, when we’re lucky, The Department will send us a movie, although it’s never been a movie that we’ve asked for. If we’re lucky, none of us have seen it before, but if we’re even luckier, it will be a Disney movie. I nearly cried when, a few weeks ago, Mrs. S told me we’d just gotten High School Musical 2. When we do get movies, they have have poor graphics and crackly audio (I guess because the transmission of movies into space is difficult?) but at least they don’t have ads like YouTube does.
Then Mr. B came in and asked for the sports news. Apparently it’s difficult to keep up with baseball when you’ve been cryogenically frozen and then stuck on a spaceship for an extended period of time.
It’s weird to think about how sports and politics and businesses keep on functioning on Earth while we’re all stuck up here. Of course I’m not egotistical enough to think that Earth would miss us now that we’re gone, but…I struggle to comprehend how life on Earth can still be normal for some people while my entire world has been turned upside down.
Ew, that sounded super cheesy. I just reread that last paragraph and I am supremely sorry that you had to read it.
So now it’s nighttime, or as close to nighttime as you can get on a spaceship, and Mrs. S said it’s okay that we didn’t learn anything, or do any physical labor all day. She said that even we deserve a day off every once in a while to do something fun. I guess that’s a nice sentiment, but if I get to choose what fun thing to do on my next day off, it will not be reading the newspaper.
And I guess that’s all for now. You’ll be hearing from me again tomorrow!
Love from,
Me
