Among the many high points of socializing with NR fans was the great

Kipling-off across the dinner table that last evening. Our table had two

Kipling fans — Jim and Stuart, a father-son tag team from Florida — so I

and they did duelling poems for a while, to the great pleasure & instruction

of all present.

How people still love Kipling! This was really a poet for the people. Any

time I’m among a large group of Americans like this, there are always one or

two whose heads, like mine, are stuffed with yards and yards of memorized

Kipling. Is this an excuse to link to my own celebration of Old Eyebrows?

You bet; but

it’s true, just the same.

I am sorry to say the Derbs weren’t very diligent about taking cruise pics

last week – proper ones, I mean, with NR cruisers. Anybody that *was*, we’d

be glad to see their pics. Anyway, here are Mr & Mrs on one of the islands. (Rosie is going through a

Janet Jackson phase — so far, thank goodness, without any wardrobe

malfunctions.)