Titanic 2020

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To save a lot of time, right here at the start, let's be sure of our facts:

1. In this year, 2020, as the new Titanic prepares to set sail on its maiden voyage, nobody can doubt it is the finest, most luxurious cruise ship in all the world. It's unsinkable.

2. The original Titanic was built in Jimmy's home town of Belfast. It sank in the early hours of April 15, 1912.

3. Jimmy's great-grandfather helped build the first Titanic. Jimmy's great-grandfather was useless at building things — no wonder it sank.

4. Everyone said that Titanic was 'unsinkable' as well. 1,500 passengers and crew died when the Titanic went down. Moral of the story — don't listen to what people say. And learn to swim.

5. History is dead boring. If you really want to learn about the old Titanic, go rent the movie.

6. Can't think of a 6, but I'm sure something will come to me.

7. Nope, still nothing.

This is the bit before the story really gets going — i.e. before The End of Civilization As We Know It — which kind of goes some way towards explaining what Lucky Jimmy Armstrong was doing stowing away on the new Titanic in the first place. It's sort of exciting, although not as exciting as the rest of it — what with the plague and the mutiny and the flesh eating dogs — but it's worth bearing with it so that you understand that he wasn't really there out of choice, that he was just trying to do something right for a change.

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