If you're reading this on Sunday, perhaps in your PJs, on your couch, or munching on corn flakes for breakfast, quietly dreading the approach of another Monday, then imagine with envy the fine passengers of the "world's greatest ocean liner", currently in the midst of a Grand Adventure.
Round about now, they'll be returning to their luxurious lodgings to dress for dinner, after a day of adventuring in Tauranga, New Zealand. Tomorrow, there'll be Auckland. Next week, Brisbane. Next month, they have stops in Singapore, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, India, Oman ... and on and on as their marvellous vessel, the Queen Mary 2 (QM2), cuts a proud path through the Suez Canal, then the Mediterranean, to finally arrive back in Southampton, UK, from whence she set out in January - a journey of 120 nights, all told.
For those with the time and money to make such a monumental voyage, it is no doubt the experience of a lifetime.
One can just hear the bucket-list items clanging like coins from a slot machine as exotic islands, towns and cities loom into view, and then fade out again.But it's not just the fabulous and far-flung ports of call that make Mary's magic.
As the flagship of the Cunard fleet, which includes the smaller Queen Elizabeth and Queen Victoria, the QM2 is famed for her palatial interiors, impeccable service, almost endless entertainments and grandiose style.
SOMETHING ABOUT MARY
She is often vaunted as the "world's only ocean liner", a term harking back to the golden days of travel, when - for the upper classes, anyway - every dinner was an occasion for bow ties and jewels.
But it's also a reference to when ships were made for transport - that is, they were the means by which people actually got from point A to point B.This, of course, was not the company's raison d'être when Sir Samuel Cunard started his regular transatlantic service back in 1847. Then, his mission was to carry mail, but that soon changed. Between 1860 and 1900, 14 million people emigrated from Europe to the US and about 2.25 million of them made the voyage with Cunard.Cruise ships, by distinction, don't "post people" anywhere. Rather, theirs is a leisure-bent trundle from port to port, purely for the purposes of a holiday, and they usually deposit their passengers at the end in the same spot where they came aboard.
Though the days of needing ships to go places are long gone, the QM2 retains the "ocean liner" accolade since she is the only ship operating today that does regular, scheduled transatlantic crossings.
Since her launch in 2004, she has ploughed back and forth between New York and Southampton several times a year from May to October. The rest of the time, her routes vary from year to year, as do Elizabeth's and Victoria's.
The transatlantic crossing, however, remains extremely popular. Many of those who make the seven-day journey don't need to get anywhere - except on board.
SO MUCH TO DO, SO MUCH TIME
Cunard's latest slogan for the QM2 is "So much to do, so much time". But on my three-day ride from Walvis Bay to Cape Town in January, for just a taster of her charms, I found the traditional trope - "so little time etc" - to hold true.
So laden is her daily programme that even passengers on the 120-day voyages must face some tough decisions.
How many days can you spare on a deckchair, dozing or dipping into your borrowed book (the ship has the largest library at sea), just occasionally lifting your eyes to consider the horizon?How many of the mind-boggling 15 bars and restaurants on board will you try?
Can you make a dip in all of her five pools? (If not, do make the pool in the Canyon Ranch Spa. It's an incredibly large cauldron of high-pressure jets - warm water rains on you from above and bubbles nibble at you from below. The combined effect is to pummel your every ache away and leave you limp as a jellyfish - with or without being followed by a massage.
And then, after dinner, will you go to Dixieland jazz in the Carinthia Lounge, karaoke in the Golden Lion Pub, or watch the show (which changes nightly) in the thousand-seater Royal Court Theatre?
How much stamina do you have for late-night dancing, and will it be ballroom with the live band (the largest dance floor at sea) or beats and cocktails in the G32 nightclub?The myriad daytime activities on offer are largely cultural and educational, and so befitting of her refined air.
One man I met, who'd embarked in New York, had spent every morning thus far in an art class. Later, there would be an on-board exhibition of the students' work.There was also a woman who'd joined the choir, which had rehearsed for much of the crossing and then performed for their fellow guests.
There are lectures from experts on all sort of subjects, fitness classes in the fancy gym and stargazing (QM2 also boasts the only planetarium at sea). There are movie screenings and Facebook lessons. A cornucopia of choices.
LOST AT SEA
With all this choice, it stands to reason that the QM2 is enormous. At 345m long and 72m high (from keel to funnel), she can carry 2,695 passengers and 1,253 crew.
Yet, all those high ceilings, curving staircases and rambling decks mean you're hardly aware of the huge numbers around you.
In fact, the ship is so large that, if you're navigationally challenged, as I am, then finding your sea legs here doesn't mean adjusting to the swell - which is hardly discernible - it means figuring out where things are.
This may mean several trudges up the wrong corridor, and being a bit tardy for your dinner sitting - but the waiters will still welcome you with aplomb.The decor doesn't help either with punctuality if you're a distractible sort. All over the ship, in the long corridors and on the stairwells, is a curious artwork or a museum-style storyboard with some tale about Cunard's incredible history.I learnt, for instance, simply by losing my way, that Charles Dickens, who sailed on the Britannia in 1842, described in a letter his discomfort with his tiny room and especially the bed - a "muffin beaten flat", he said.
Fortunately, things have changed much since Dickens' day. My own bed was as homely as a perfectly made melktert.
YESTERYEAR TO TOMORROW
The Cunard ships do attract a large number of retirees - people with the time and money to spend months at sea - but they are also catching the eye of a younger - as in 40ish - crowd.
For them, the transatlantic crossings, just six nights, are a feasible holiday option, which give them the chance to enjoy all the culture and comforts of the QM2 without taking too much time away from their family and work responsibilities. There is even a two-night leg (from Southampton to Hamburg) for those in the market for the briefest of treats. 
Perhaps keeping a younger set in mind, the QM2's £90-million facelift in mid-2016, by all accounts, took years off her and added some entirely new venues, such as the Carinthia Lounge and The Verandah Restaurant, with clean, chic, modern appeal - while staying true to her elegant heart.
The result is a surprising cross-section of passengers. In my mere three days, I met all sorts. My dining companions were all retired Americans, all on the round-trip cruise.But in the bars in the evenings especially, there were honeymooners, couples celebrating big anniversaries, some 50-ish professionals who sail with Cunard once a year, and even a 20-year-old doing the entire voyage solo - either a trust-fund kid or a tech genius who'd retired after selling his company. He hinted both, but wouldn't say.
For all of them, the QM2's allure remains her supreme capacity for transporting people - maybe not from point A to B anymore, but certainly out of their regular lives and into her elegant dream, for a while.
If you, on your couch, like the sound of this at all, do go. There are, after all, no blue Mondays on the QM2.
PLAN YOUR TRIP
THE VOYAGE HOME
A popular way for many passengers to experience the Cunard charm is to fly somewhere and sail home with one of the queens.
Next year, it's the Queen Victoria's turn to call at Cape Town - on April 12.
You can catch a ride there from:..