A hugely entertaining account! Thank you.
Incidentally, I've stopped asking the Navigator for ranges for the reason you quote - they very wildly, even if you ask twice in a couple of seconds. I discovered this when I was off Canada in a IXB, trying to work out if I had enough to get home on standard. Every time I asked, he got more and more pessimistic, even though I was at 1x TC at a constant speed and asking once a second.