C5- Ever Sweet but Strange

Today the seas were as calm as they have ever been. The arches of the waves were smoothed out as if flattened by a pizza maker, that maybe got lazy, or perhaps creative. No longer were there white crashes , but almost completely symmetrical arcs.  I'll show you a picture when I have the chance; the sea was as nothing you've seen before.
As I woke up this morning and stared out the library's port-side window, I couldn't help but notice a rather large figure. I asked out loud, “Is that a mountain or a cloud?” To which some old lifelong learner replied that it was the Azores, a number of islands controlled by the Portuguese. Apparently they have a volcano or two. Cool. Or hot, rather. Either way, we're getting closer to the Strait...
Class for the most part the same routine. Finally we've reached conjugations in present tense in French class, and we talked about short and long term memory with Professor Morris, and people dozed off as Professor Butler went on and on about artifacts and atriums in Global Studies. But as I sat there while he differentiated Romanesque and Gothic churches and arches, my mind couldn't help but remember my two prospective architect friends that I haven't disowned back home, how probably over some of the same churches they slaved hours in the Bel Air lounge with notecards to remember each cathedral's name. Assuming whatever class that was didn't beat their love of buildings out of them by now, I think this trip would be a wonderful way to spend the summer for either of them, a just reward for their work. And yet here is the linguist ready to dimwittedly walk up historic bell towers like a fool. (That said, I love bell towers. remember Florence? No better triumph than twenty-some flights and having a panoramic view of a city...)
Tomorrow we have another quiz in Elementary French, testing our knowledge of conjugation of verbs. I ended up studying with a friend from class, only to be joined at our table by another Hispanic French student, an Elementary Spanish student who had better French than us, and a girl studying for Marine Biology. We threw around language terms like pudding at the food fight, laughingly asking the more fluent over whatever language we were studying.
Trying to fill up a vocabulary diary due in two days, I found the verb embarasser, which in French means to kiss. In saying Je embarasse mon fiancé (I probably didn't type that out right, to which I reply "C'est la vie"),  my Hispanic friend turned to me with a confused look and asked, “You impregnated your fiancé?” Oh, the ridiculousness of false cognates never fails to entertain.
We adjourned studying to make our way to the union, the biggest lecture hall on the ship. (I use lecture hall loosely, it was more of a converted performance space and lounge.) Rather than finding seats, we found a crowd. A gigantic crowd. A crowd probably consisting of maybe half the student body on the ship. We were trying to reach a study session. Except the class we wanted to study for consisted of virtually everyone on board. So we gave up and went to our rooms. I didn't miss anything because they broadcast the lecture on television. Admittedly, it was better than watching Leonardo DiCaprio in Romeo and Juliet.
So apparently either tomorrow or the next day we're docking to take on fuel somewhere on the Strait of Gibraltar. This is cool- Barcelona here we come...