The Shipman's Tale

I'm not sure if this is just my sleepy mind playing tricks on me, but for some reason I noticed the Shipman's involvement with this story more so than the other story tellers. He refers to himself in the story a few times. In particular, at lines 12-19, the Shipman uses words like "us," and "we," and "our."

"He moot us clothe, and he moot us arraye,
Al for his owene worship, richely
In which we dauncen joilily.
And if that he noght may, paraventure,
Or ellis list no swich dispence endure,
But thinketh it is wasted and ylost,
Thanne moot another payen for oure cost,
Or lene us gold, and that is perilous."

The Shipman also refers to some of the characters as "my lord." One instance is found in line 312, he refers to John as "my lord daun John."

This leads me to wonder if the Shipman is telling a story of a man or several men he once knew.

He also makes himself noticeable as the storyteller in another way. When he transitions between subjects or characters, he often announces that he is switching topics or points of views. Examples that I caught were:

"Namoore of this as now, for it is suffiseth" (52).

"And thus I lete hem ete and drinke and pleye,/This marchant and this monk, a day or tweye./The thridde day this marchant up ariseth..." (73-75). 

"But as a marchant, shortly for to telle,/He let his lif; and ther I lete him dwelle" (305-306).

"And forth he rideth hoom to his abbeye,/Or where him list; namoore of him I seye" (323-234).

 To me, what this did while I was reading was jolt me from the story that I was absorbed in and remember that it is being told by the Shipman. It brings attention to him as the storyteller.

Perhaps I've somehow missed this strategy employed otherwise in the Canterbury Tales and just noticed it now but it was really interesting to me to see this in the Shipman's Tale and makes me wonder what it was telling us about the Shipman.