Secrecy and Mystery and really cool hats.

I held a "conclave" on the tug today. I do believe it is the first ever tugboat conclave. Like all conclaves, only certain people could attend.  I deemed it a "Engine Department Conclave", which means, only those people in the engine room could attend. Granted, it was a small conclave, there are only 2 people on here in the engine department. The upside? Less bickering.

The members of the deck gang, who were not allowed into the secret assembly, numbers 4, and they anxiously waited outside the room in silence as Brad and I assembled for this mysterious ritual.
Yes, we had flowing robes on.
We also dimmed the lights in the room. Seemed like the right thing to do.

You may be asking yourself, how can Mark and Brad choose a cardinal to be the next Pope?
Technically, any Baptized male can be elected to the position of Pope, but historically the cardinal's who vote always vote for another cardinal. Talk about the game being fixed?

Anyway....
 After many hours of voting, our conclave could not come to a unanimous decision. We started the main engines and black smoke poured from the stack of the port engine.
We all know what that means. The audible sigh of disappointment from the deckgang was heard all over the boat.
These conclave's can go on for days.
I can not share with you what went on inside that dimly lit room today, because conclaves are secret, and mysterious. We may or may not have a secret handshake.
Actually conclave law states that if I or Brad break the conclave oath, we would instantly be  excommunicated.
Brad is not a Catholic, so I threatened him with painting in the engine room if he broke our secret oath.

So, no new Pope was decided on today, but the Chief mate almost pulled off an upset.