I was pretty fucked up that night, I can tell you that. In fact, in between what I remember and what I’ve told you already, I wonder how much new there is to add for New Years. But, an event like this is sure to have at least one or two interesting moments, and surprisingly, it was the adults who catalyzed them.
Not that my peers weren’t present, of course. Joey, for example, was dutifully playing craps yet again in the casino. He promised me he’d make it up in time to see the ball drop. I only saw him once again that night, as I walked past the casino at 1am. He still seemed to be in the black.
And Brian was on hand, drunk, to tell me of his life goal to get head from a girl while he plays Gears of War. And Rebecca showed up to tell us she virtually finished off her pot without us. And Nick, also drunk, still with his entourage of underaged family members, gave me a free drink. That was sweet of him. And another guy, who was either a random stranger or Trent (who was a random stranger at this point) bought me and Nick and Rebecca a shot of something. And Amy, who I’d seen before but went out of my way to avoid meeting, came up to me to tell me she danced with my father.
I was confused too. Who is this girl, why was she dancing with my father, why was my father dancing with an underaged tramp, and how did she know I was his son? Well, those were all answered easily enough. My father was standing pointing-out-his-son distance behind me with the Fat Sisters, and in his inebriated state would not turn down a dance with a young blonde. Her motivations… well, that assumes she has cognition. As I continued to learn later in the cruise, this is debatable. All I’ll say now, to pique your curiosity: shower.
All that happened after the ball dropped. The night was actually quite dull beforehand. Hell, I spent 5 minutes trapped in the stairwell, unable to get onto the Lido deck because the conga line blocked the door. When I did get out there, I couldn’t find anyone I knew. I grabbed my more-than-fair share of the free champaign while milling about, but that was the highlight of the entire hour before the ball dropped.
Well, I can’t say I didn’t find anyone. I did find those quiet foreign girls from my dinner table sipping their booze quietly with Jen’s mother. Jen, thankfully, was nowhere to be found. Not that I didn’t want to see her – I did – but the stroke of midnight was approaching and I wasn’t prepared to try. My arrival managed to spark some life into those middle-aged corpses, and the Brazilian woman demanded I take her dancing.
My dancing the night before in the club was comparatively smooth and sexy.
11:59, and the seconds started spiraling downward. Jen appeared, and I beat a hasty cowardly retreat, heading up the closest flight of stairs to counterbalance history. I nearly ran over Dale in my haste, Chip in tow. 20 seconds. I surveyed the crowd from my elevated height mid-staircase, and decided this was my spot. I made my New Years resolution just in time. Chip and Dale toasted the midnight with a kiss as I resolved to give relationships, especially with girls, a genuine try.
I also resolved to not die this year. I make that resolution every year.
So that’s midnight. Then the rest of the stuff from this entry happens. An hour later, I leave the Lido deck and pass Joey in the casino on my way to the ship’s equivalent of the Holy of Holies (where my hebs at?), the nightclub.
New Years is a magical night. People are just drawn to each other. Chip to Dale. Rick to Rebecca. Fat Sisters to younger black guys. Me to the entire onboard dance crew. Jen to me. Then Rick. Then to the boyfriend she slurringly admits she has back on land Then to some hoosier schmuck in a John Deer cap. The Cruise Director to me...
Felipe had been nursing a cigarette by himself in a corner of the bar. New Years must be lonely for him; he spends months on end at sea, away from all his family and friends, and losing any new friends he makes every five days. I watched him, sympathetic and fascinated at once. He met my gaze and misinterpreted.
I wish I could remember the conversation to quote it for you, let you be the jury if he was really hitting on me. Yes he bought me a drink. Yes he was touching me, on the arm and rather low on the waist. Yes seemed quite keen to know about my personal life, and I believe I recall him asking me about my dating life too. But does that mean he was hitting on me? My gaydar was going off, but I can never trust it around foreigners. So I can never be sure. I must not have been showing enough interest, because he got discouraged and left, fraternizing his way around the bar crowd in that boisterous and hyperfriendly way I knew to be a sham. No better way to hide your lonely than to surround yourself with people. Then again, maybe I was projecting myself. I’d been drinking.
Slowly people left. Rick with Rebecca. Jen with Hoosier. Brian with his fantasies. The Fat Sisters with two young black guys. I remained, continuing to drink with the crew, feeling the tipsy creep up on me, inspiring me to drink more. Cue the unexpected arrival of Chip and Dale.
This was their first glimpse of the nightclub (I think), and I doubt it was a good first impression. The flagging stragglers were, as a friend of mine would put it, a ‘hot mess’. Undaunted, they made their way to the dance floor. My guess was that coming here was Chip’s idea, as Dale just didn’t have his heart in it. Neither did I for that matter, so I joined him for a mid-dancefloor conversation, punctuated by intermittent dancing (or a shitty facsimile of dancing) with his wife. I felt oddly comfortable around them, the first time I’d felt comfortable on the dancefloor this entire cruise.
Atleast, I’d like to think it was them. That thought makes me happy. The more rational explanation was that my BAC was cresting. After all, alcohol is not like a switch it builds up over time. But that wasn’t how it felt to me. For me, it went off like a gun. Someone pulled the trigger in my head. Specifically, Cascada. The fast-beat song resonated through me, reminding me of good memories. Usually pretty gay ones. I turned to Chip and said, “I don’t usually go to straight bars.” Bang.
I don’t have memories from this point, just flashes. The dam broke. A wave of booze and sweet release washed over my brain. I certainly hadn’t been playing straight on this cruise; hell, my brand-new New Years resolution was to get a girlfriend! Yet for some reason, outing myself to the closest approximation to a 31 year old female version of me was the doctor’s panache. My ‘dancing’ turned into simple, wild, exuberant jumping. I was in a gay bar, among friends.
Everything after blurs. Chip and Dale went to bed at some point. I tried, unsuccessfully, to hit on one of the dancers, though I couldn’t tell you which gender. And I’m pretty sure I debated the merits of rugby vs. football with a South African crew member. I somehow even managed to find my bed. Goodbye 2008, you rat bastard.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Unrefreshing Dip
I knew there was a problem when the first thing we could see on shore was a giant ostentatious “Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville!” sign. The port city was a tourist cesspool, and I was glad to my bones that I would only see it twice briefly.
It was somewhere around 8am. I’d gotten up bright and early, oddly chipper on 2 hours of sleep. Breakfast scarfed down in 2 minutes, and I was only 3rd on line for the 1st tender to shore. Which arrived 30 minutes late.
It was better on the water - the sky was blue, the water was bluer, the air was warm and the breeze was mild. The boy next to me, clutching his high-quality scuba gear, seemed the cute blonde surfer type. Quite appealing, yet I had that chewy feeling in the back of my mind that was becoming too familiar to me on this cruise. A brief chat confirmed my fears; Matt was a high schooler, diving here with his family. I was suddenly glad I had chartered a different scuba company.
Really, I can’t tell you much about Grand Cayman. The port town sucked. The beach was pretty. There’s a famous sandbar on the other side of the island where tourists can pet stingrays. Endangered iguanas roam around somewhere. Whatever. I was here solely to dive.
Until this point, I’ve been a spoiled diver. The boat in the Outer Banks had an indoor cabin and a grill on top. My dive boat in Australia had bed and a full kitchen. The boat in Cayman was a crappy little speedboat with one puny outboard engine. It fit eight people, barely, and the plastic awning did little to stave off the skin cancer. Backing right on to the beach was a neat trick though.
As I understood it, they were to pick me up on the beach and bring me down to the dive shop. Wrong. The boat was the dive shop, should’ve put on my bathing suit on shore. I was presented with an ill-fitting wetsuit, incorrect weights, flimsy plastic flippers, no gloves (I counted 24 scratches on my hands by day’s end) and no dive computer. Hell, they didn’t even have dive charts; it was a choice of sticking right next to the dive leader or risk getting the bends, a condition also known as decompression sickness, a fancy term for nitrogen bubbles turning your blood into foam.
The divemaster was a much more experienced diver than me, no surprise, which partially explains why the beginning sucked. The coral tunnel in the beginning was difficult enough as is, nevermind the weights which caused me to alternate between sinking into a crevice or rising perilously out of control. And nevermind the leaking mask, cheap piece of shit. And the agonizing pain of my ears failing to equalize pressure at 100 feet and no one stopping to look back or care. Point is, when they returned to the tunnel at the end of the dive, I abstained. I’ll risk the bends.
It took me nearly the rest of the dive to recover and get my bearings back. I enjoyed what I could, peering into giant sponges, marveling at waving Sea Fans and timid Christmas Worms (as festive as they sound). Pretty coral and neat fish were there to be seen, but the undeniable fact was that this reef was neither as vivid and varied as the Great Barrier Reef, nor were there any giant fucking toothy sharks to be found. It was, in a word, underwhelming.
There was also a mysterious green goo seeping into my mask. I figured it for algae, but couldn’t wipe it off. I also fingered rampaging snot as a possible culprit, but no snot was this shade of mutant green. The mini lava lamp in my mask was fascinating in its own right, but I found it distracting, as much for its enigma as for its visual impairment.
I decide to call this dive a wash. Enjoyable, in parts, but nothing to write home about. As I made my way to the anchor line to ascend, I saw a plaque installed on the reef. I broke away from the ascent to go see. Last time I’d seen such a monument, it was the gravestone for a lost young diver – as a fellow diver, I had to pay my respects. I settled on my knees gently in front of the sign, and wiped off the silt and algae. The sign said, in large somber font, “Please don’t kick, stand on, or rest on the coral.” How touching. I gladly obeyed the sign and made for the surface.
I felt crappy when I came up, and only felt crappier when I looked around at my fellow divers. One was an old woman. Another was a fat man. Three more were his children, the youngest one at 12 with nearly twice as many dives as me. One British chap. And me, the idiot who can’t float and somehow got a bloody nose.
That, by the way, explains my mystery goo. Water absorbs light, starting at larger wavelengths and going down the spectrum as you go deeper. Red doesn’t exist at 100 feet, so my blood looked a fantastic shade of green. Basic physics lesson for you, and a heads up if you consider a hobby in diving. The reefs down there aren’t nearly as bright and colorful as you see in photos; those photos are taken with expensive cameras with bulky intense flash rigs. Like the one the 12 year old was using.
I spent my surface interval mentally preparing for the next ordeal, chatting with the Brit while secretly wishing he were Australian, and greedily eating all the free powerbars offered to me. The boat motored elsewhere.
One of the first things I determined on the second dive was that while I was no longer in arduous pain and my mask was less leaky, I still had shit buoyancy and was regularly kicking and crashing down on the coral. That was still forbidden here, but atleast with no sign I could claim ignorance.
On the upside, this second site was arguably better. The coral seemed brighter and more varied, probably because we were closer to the surface. The fish were bigger, and I even spotted a stingray locked in a synchronized swim with another fish, matching zig for zag perfectly. A burrowing eel was to be found. But hands down, the best finds were the turtles. Cresting a coral ridge, I found myself face to face with a smallish sea turtle, which I correctly guessed to be a Loggerhead. It was clearly young, as the carapace shell was only the size and shape of my head (that is to say, bulbous and splotchy). One of its rear fins was entirely missing, a brush with a shark or fishing line, but the turtle seemed unaffected. It grazed on little creatures of the reef, paying me no heed despite being close enough to touch. The second turtle, found near the end of the dive, was not much bigger – also a juvenile – but had all limbs intact and glided over the reef gracefully. I joined it, matching its deliberate pace, its every rise and fall and turn. We were neck and neck in our slow race, and I felt more connected to it than any other animal I’ve encountered under the sea. This enchanting minute alone was worth all of the cost and pain and humiliation this dive and cruise could throw at me.
As soon as the turtle turned and sauntered away, I regretted that thought. I was gripped with a sensation more powerful than my earlier sinus implosion. I had to pee harder than I’ve ever had to pee in my entire life. The urge was overwhelming, mentally deafening. No big deal, you might say, just piss away. But I refused. I’d endured enough humiliation this day, I was not about to warm my wetsuit and give my boxers an unmistakable smell for the rest of the day. No, I resolved to hold it.
This put me at a crucial crossroads. The turtles had renewed my appreciation for the deep, and I wanted to stay down and examine all of Creation’s intimacies for as long as my tank and foamy blood would let me. On the other hand, I had to go so bad it hurt. So I compromised; I continued to scour the reef to find new animals to distract me, while praying the divemaster would call Time’s Up.
Somehow, miraculously, I endured. The divemaster summoned me to the anchor line, and I immediately raced for the surface. He stopped me. 3 minute safety decompression stop at 15 feet, standard safe practice. The single longest 3 minutes of my life. The divemaster noticed my leg uncontrollably quaking, but rather than comprehend and sympathize, he simply demanded I stop, the cruelest sign language I’ve ever seen. But my willpower is vast, and I survived. I let all the children go climb first, before I hauled ass up the ladder, threw down my gear, ripped off my wetsuit, and jumped over the side. I barely had the time to pull off my boxers and hold them over my head before the torrent let loose. I never pissed that long or that hard my entire life.
That moment, I accomplished two life goals. I had finally gone skinny dipping, and I flashed an old woman. She was the last up the ladder.
It was somewhere around 8am. I’d gotten up bright and early, oddly chipper on 2 hours of sleep. Breakfast scarfed down in 2 minutes, and I was only 3rd on line for the 1st tender to shore. Which arrived 30 minutes late.
It was better on the water - the sky was blue, the water was bluer, the air was warm and the breeze was mild. The boy next to me, clutching his high-quality scuba gear, seemed the cute blonde surfer type. Quite appealing, yet I had that chewy feeling in the back of my mind that was becoming too familiar to me on this cruise. A brief chat confirmed my fears; Matt was a high schooler, diving here with his family. I was suddenly glad I had chartered a different scuba company.
Really, I can’t tell you much about Grand Cayman. The port town sucked. The beach was pretty. There’s a famous sandbar on the other side of the island where tourists can pet stingrays. Endangered iguanas roam around somewhere. Whatever. I was here solely to dive.
Until this point, I’ve been a spoiled diver. The boat in the Outer Banks had an indoor cabin and a grill on top. My dive boat in Australia had bed and a full kitchen. The boat in Cayman was a crappy little speedboat with one puny outboard engine. It fit eight people, barely, and the plastic awning did little to stave off the skin cancer. Backing right on to the beach was a neat trick though.
As I understood it, they were to pick me up on the beach and bring me down to the dive shop. Wrong. The boat was the dive shop, should’ve put on my bathing suit on shore. I was presented with an ill-fitting wetsuit, incorrect weights, flimsy plastic flippers, no gloves (I counted 24 scratches on my hands by day’s end) and no dive computer. Hell, they didn’t even have dive charts; it was a choice of sticking right next to the dive leader or risk getting the bends, a condition also known as decompression sickness, a fancy term for nitrogen bubbles turning your blood into foam.
The divemaster was a much more experienced diver than me, no surprise, which partially explains why the beginning sucked. The coral tunnel in the beginning was difficult enough as is, nevermind the weights which caused me to alternate between sinking into a crevice or rising perilously out of control. And nevermind the leaking mask, cheap piece of shit. And the agonizing pain of my ears failing to equalize pressure at 100 feet and no one stopping to look back or care. Point is, when they returned to the tunnel at the end of the dive, I abstained. I’ll risk the bends.
It took me nearly the rest of the dive to recover and get my bearings back. I enjoyed what I could, peering into giant sponges, marveling at waving Sea Fans and timid Christmas Worms (as festive as they sound). Pretty coral and neat fish were there to be seen, but the undeniable fact was that this reef was neither as vivid and varied as the Great Barrier Reef, nor were there any giant fucking toothy sharks to be found. It was, in a word, underwhelming.
There was also a mysterious green goo seeping into my mask. I figured it for algae, but couldn’t wipe it off. I also fingered rampaging snot as a possible culprit, but no snot was this shade of mutant green. The mini lava lamp in my mask was fascinating in its own right, but I found it distracting, as much for its enigma as for its visual impairment.
I decide to call this dive a wash. Enjoyable, in parts, but nothing to write home about. As I made my way to the anchor line to ascend, I saw a plaque installed on the reef. I broke away from the ascent to go see. Last time I’d seen such a monument, it was the gravestone for a lost young diver – as a fellow diver, I had to pay my respects. I settled on my knees gently in front of the sign, and wiped off the silt and algae. The sign said, in large somber font, “Please don’t kick, stand on, or rest on the coral.” How touching. I gladly obeyed the sign and made for the surface.
I felt crappy when I came up, and only felt crappier when I looked around at my fellow divers. One was an old woman. Another was a fat man. Three more were his children, the youngest one at 12 with nearly twice as many dives as me. One British chap. And me, the idiot who can’t float and somehow got a bloody nose.
That, by the way, explains my mystery goo. Water absorbs light, starting at larger wavelengths and going down the spectrum as you go deeper. Red doesn’t exist at 100 feet, so my blood looked a fantastic shade of green. Basic physics lesson for you, and a heads up if you consider a hobby in diving. The reefs down there aren’t nearly as bright and colorful as you see in photos; those photos are taken with expensive cameras with bulky intense flash rigs. Like the one the 12 year old was using.
I spent my surface interval mentally preparing for the next ordeal, chatting with the Brit while secretly wishing he were Australian, and greedily eating all the free powerbars offered to me. The boat motored elsewhere.
One of the first things I determined on the second dive was that while I was no longer in arduous pain and my mask was less leaky, I still had shit buoyancy and was regularly kicking and crashing down on the coral. That was still forbidden here, but atleast with no sign I could claim ignorance.
On the upside, this second site was arguably better. The coral seemed brighter and more varied, probably because we were closer to the surface. The fish were bigger, and I even spotted a stingray locked in a synchronized swim with another fish, matching zig for zag perfectly. A burrowing eel was to be found. But hands down, the best finds were the turtles. Cresting a coral ridge, I found myself face to face with a smallish sea turtle, which I correctly guessed to be a Loggerhead. It was clearly young, as the carapace shell was only the size and shape of my head (that is to say, bulbous and splotchy). One of its rear fins was entirely missing, a brush with a shark or fishing line, but the turtle seemed unaffected. It grazed on little creatures of the reef, paying me no heed despite being close enough to touch. The second turtle, found near the end of the dive, was not much bigger – also a juvenile – but had all limbs intact and glided over the reef gracefully. I joined it, matching its deliberate pace, its every rise and fall and turn. We were neck and neck in our slow race, and I felt more connected to it than any other animal I’ve encountered under the sea. This enchanting minute alone was worth all of the cost and pain and humiliation this dive and cruise could throw at me.
As soon as the turtle turned and sauntered away, I regretted that thought. I was gripped with a sensation more powerful than my earlier sinus implosion. I had to pee harder than I’ve ever had to pee in my entire life. The urge was overwhelming, mentally deafening. No big deal, you might say, just piss away. But I refused. I’d endured enough humiliation this day, I was not about to warm my wetsuit and give my boxers an unmistakable smell for the rest of the day. No, I resolved to hold it.
This put me at a crucial crossroads. The turtles had renewed my appreciation for the deep, and I wanted to stay down and examine all of Creation’s intimacies for as long as my tank and foamy blood would let me. On the other hand, I had to go so bad it hurt. So I compromised; I continued to scour the reef to find new animals to distract me, while praying the divemaster would call Time’s Up.
Somehow, miraculously, I endured. The divemaster summoned me to the anchor line, and I immediately raced for the surface. He stopped me. 3 minute safety decompression stop at 15 feet, standard safe practice. The single longest 3 minutes of my life. The divemaster noticed my leg uncontrollably quaking, but rather than comprehend and sympathize, he simply demanded I stop, the cruelest sign language I’ve ever seen. But my willpower is vast, and I survived. I let all the children go climb first, before I hauled ass up the ladder, threw down my gear, ripped off my wetsuit, and jumped over the side. I barely had the time to pull off my boxers and hold them over my head before the torrent let loose. I never pissed that long or that hard my entire life.
That moment, I accomplished two life goals. I had finally gone skinny dipping, and I flashed an old woman. She was the last up the ladder.
Friday, January 16, 2009
Sociologists sometimes fail at being social
I make friends easily, wherever I go. I’m not trying to gloat, it’s just something I do. I’m like the pickup artist of friends, ish. So naturally, I looked forward to the meat and potatoes part of the cruise.
And while I did enjoy meat and potatoes that night at formal dinner, double fisting more free booze (a screwdriver and a whiskey sour), wearing my father’s shirt big enough to fit two of me, noticing the Navy girl looks quite attractive in a little black dress… right, sorry, ADD going bad places. Point is, the dinner was the most eventful part of the night, and dinner is just two hours of us sitting on our asses getting fat.
So, I did what any self-respecting man of legal age would do, I went to the casino. Now, normally I don’t gamble. Something about my grandfather’s addiction ruining my father’s childhood, yada yada. Basically, I just don’t like losing money. But I was bored, and Joey is cute, err, fun to talk to. Joey was at the craps table, mingling with boisterous drunks and sullen addicts, learning the ropes. For lack of better options, I hovered, listening, watching. The big chip man, hording easily a thousand, throwing down 50 at a time, scowled at me. But one of the younger noisier drunks had compassion, patiently explaining the intricate complexities in a way his BAC shouldn't have allowed, while Joey’s bets got bolder. I picked up 20 in chips, and put 5 on the pass line. A well-endowed woman threw the dice. My 5 doubled. I was in.
An hour later, Joey crashed for the night, having taken 10 dollars and alchemied into 100. I had turned 20 into 60, which wasn’t bad. Sure, I was tempted to stay, but with Joey gone, it was just me and the angry addict. Time to cash out.
Where’s the only other place on the entire boat where a self-respecting man of legal age would be? That’s right, in my bed fucking a hot chick. I, however, was where no self-respecting man would be, a place naturally full of sleazeballs, the only other people awake. I was back in the nightclub.
To be honest, I still feel awkward dancing with straight people. I’ve never danced well, but grinding is easy, especially with drunk guys. You expect me to grind with a girl? I’d love to, really, but my superpowers aren’t limitless. I tried to dance, but quickly retreated. I opted to sit on the sidelines and watch, but I was not alone. Jen was there, in her stunning black dress, watching them too. Watching me. I tried to engage her in conversation, but she just nursed her beer quietly. I couldn't tell if she was in her own world or taking in everything. It was more than disconcerting, though not nearly as jarring as her sudden revival at the sounds of Mexican music. Instant change, she was the life of the party, voluntarily doing amateur salsa with every man within reach. I was content to simply keep watching, but a wiggling voice in my head told me to join in. That voice I’m usually better off ignoring, because I know better. But this was vacation, and I decided to start a dangerous precedent of saying yes. In this case, yes meant highly self-conscious rhythmic shuffling for half a song with a tipsy member of the armed forces, but yes would get progressively worse. In the meantime, we both withdrew to our silent observation posts.
I couldn’t see anyone else I knew, with the exception of the fake tattoo artist, if you can call someone who airbrushes a stencil an artist. She was an attractive girl from Russia, natural blonde in her early 20’s. Her accent was enchanting, thick enough to be sexy but not too thick to be incomprehensible, and she was well spoken. I bought an overpriced spider on my forearm from her, which people in three cities unanimously thought was ugly. Mainly I got it just so I could chat up the extremely attractive man getting a styled cross on his formidable shoulder. He was straight, of course, but his innocent Tennessee accent and her sultry Russian accent...
Our conversational ménage a trois back then was interrupted by the arrival of a generic looking drunk idiot, plainly trying to pick her up. Without skipping a beat, her accent and lack of understanding of english increased dramatically until he wandered off. I had thought he’d given up and moved on, but I overestimated him. He returned, showing up at the nightclub and harassing her on the dance floor. A member of the crew politely shoved him off, but she still looked unhappy. I caught her eyes, and flashed her a sympathetic smile. She recognized me, or my thoughts, and smiled back. I felt empowered to go and strike up another conversation. Yes, I learned, she’s frequently accosted by sleazy drunk guys. But she could I was different, or thought so anyhow. I had never made a move towards her, and she repaid my genuine attitude with a dance. I’m sure I still looked like a tool, but now I was a tool dancing with the hottest girl in the bar. Gratifying.
And don’t feel bad for the drunk idiot. He was busy getting double teamed by the two drunk cougars from last night’s karaoke. In all likelihood, none of these people had seen sobriety since we cast off the mooring lines.
I only danced with her a few songs, not wanting to overstay my welcome. But, my escapades had not gone unnoticed. When I returned to the bar, I was approached by three guys. Two I knew from previous encounters in karaoke and the casino; the short tattooed guy and the tall bald guy, always loud and always making their presence known whether through ridiculous singing or obscene bets. The third was new, but clearly just as inebriated. His midlength hair did not wholly conceal his myriad of piercings – eyebrow, nose, industrial, gauged ears, ect. My gaydar went off strong, and a slurred sentence or two assured me he wasn’t European. The first two make some snide comment about Russians in bed and wander off, but their friend stays. I’m guessing I was not only right, but he’d picked me out too. He was touchy when he talked, using stories about women or dolphins to touch me all over. I’m nonplussed, having been groped plenty of times in my life, but I hadn’t yet decided whether I wanted him or not. It was still early in the cruise, and I wasn’t desperate yet.
He wants me to drink with him, and he wants me to smoke with him, and he wants me to tell me about his favorite pussy and top 10 blowjobs. All these are signs of a closet case. Drinking puts them at ease, and gives them an excuse and justification for experimenting. Smoking pot often precedes the beginning of foreplay, and an invitation to smoke can often be an invitation for sex after. And talking about sex with women, especially the act of oral sex, is a way to introduce sexual thoughts and associated mental pictures without revealing your gay side. He also offers me a cigarette, which I take to stall for time. I don’t smoke, a fact that would be apparent to any sober observer. I cough slightly, and accidentally exhale downwards, which only leads to rising smoke stinging me in the eyes. This is the fourth cigarette of my life, and I smoke it in the time it takes him to smoke three. That’s also about the time it takes me to conclude he’s annoying and smells bad and I don’t want to have sex with him. I carefully maneuver the large speaker between me and his wandering hands and overbearing lack of personal space.
On the other side of the speaker I find Rick, back from his own brief foray into dancing and looking moody as ever. The girls still aren’t attractive enough, I guess. He seems sober too, which isn’t surprising when you think about it. Rick also has no interest in talking to this human pincushion, so we start our own side conversation as he continues talking about marvelous pussy to no one in particular. Thankfully, it wasn’t long until his friends returned from the casino to retrieve him. Feeling strangely genteel towards them, I ask the short one how his night went. He grins the lopsided smile of a stroke victim and produces two 200 dollar chips, slapping them down on the speaker with a flourish. “600 dollars!”
I click my tongue against the roof of my mouth, waiting for the realization that doesn’t come. So I offer it. “But that’s only 400 dollars.” He looks down, confused. “Hmm, yeah. I guess I lost one.” He shrugs his shoulders, seemingly nonplussed himself, and orders a round of drinks for all of us.
A mercifully short time later, they depart, leaving me alone with Captain Kinetic, still in the same slumped state. I ask Rick what’s wrong, and he points to one of the decently attractive girls on the dance floor, currently sandwiched between two mullet-sporting schmucks. “My sister.” I offer a sympathetic grimace, then sit to talk to him for awhile, neither of us having anything better to do. I learn he’s quite a successful young businessman, relatively unaffected by the shit economy, and he’s just as attractive as he was the night before, and yet, he’s usually lonely. I ask him why. Lack of time and energy, he says. Getting old sucks, he says. Graduating college was the worst mistake of my life, he says. This confirmed all my deepest fears, but coming from him, it was oddly reassuring. He was richer and better looking than me, yet lead a far less fulfilling life.
Still, my superpowers aren’t limitless; I was rapidly crashing asleep. I had been for awhile, but I wanted to stay for his sake, for as long as his sisters antics pained him. I couldn’t. So I was honest. “I feel like leaving, but I’d feel bad for leaving you all alone,” I told him. That only made him feel worse. I slinked away.
It’s sad, but that nightclub was easily the most entertaining part of the ship. Just watching and listening. Freud would’ve cum in his pants on the spot. Meanwhile, I returned to my room with trepidation, not knowing if my father had fun of his own with Lisa that night. I knocked gently, then swiped my card and opened the door. The man was fast asleep, but the lawnmower in his mouth was going strong. He’d had anti-snoring surgery in the past, going as far as having his uvula removed, which destroyed his ability to make a ch- sound but left his malignant snore intact. I laid in bed, staring at the ceiling with my eyes wide open, praying for sleep or death, whichever came sooner.
My eyes eventually wandered around the room, where I made one last discovery that night. Draped over the top of his bag was a pair of my father’s underwear. They looked strangely stylish. They looked strangely familiar. I got out of bed and walked across the room, quiet as a churchmouse. I picked up his underwear delicately – not to avoid noise, but to prevent turning his jock sweat into an aerosol – and held it as far away as I could read in the low light conditions. The tag read 2xist – the nation’s largest gay underwear brand. I rolled my eyes, tossed down his tighty whiteys, crawled back into bed, and rapidly fell asleep, rather than even consider the thought.
And while I did enjoy meat and potatoes that night at formal dinner, double fisting more free booze (a screwdriver and a whiskey sour), wearing my father’s shirt big enough to fit two of me, noticing the Navy girl looks quite attractive in a little black dress… right, sorry, ADD going bad places. Point is, the dinner was the most eventful part of the night, and dinner is just two hours of us sitting on our asses getting fat.
So, I did what any self-respecting man of legal age would do, I went to the casino. Now, normally I don’t gamble. Something about my grandfather’s addiction ruining my father’s childhood, yada yada. Basically, I just don’t like losing money. But I was bored, and Joey is cute, err, fun to talk to. Joey was at the craps table, mingling with boisterous drunks and sullen addicts, learning the ropes. For lack of better options, I hovered, listening, watching. The big chip man, hording easily a thousand, throwing down 50 at a time, scowled at me. But one of the younger noisier drunks had compassion, patiently explaining the intricate complexities in a way his BAC shouldn't have allowed, while Joey’s bets got bolder. I picked up 20 in chips, and put 5 on the pass line. A well-endowed woman threw the dice. My 5 doubled. I was in.
An hour later, Joey crashed for the night, having taken 10 dollars and alchemied into 100. I had turned 20 into 60, which wasn’t bad. Sure, I was tempted to stay, but with Joey gone, it was just me and the angry addict. Time to cash out.
Where’s the only other place on the entire boat where a self-respecting man of legal age would be? That’s right, in my bed fucking a hot chick. I, however, was where no self-respecting man would be, a place naturally full of sleazeballs, the only other people awake. I was back in the nightclub.
To be honest, I still feel awkward dancing with straight people. I’ve never danced well, but grinding is easy, especially with drunk guys. You expect me to grind with a girl? I’d love to, really, but my superpowers aren’t limitless. I tried to dance, but quickly retreated. I opted to sit on the sidelines and watch, but I was not alone. Jen was there, in her stunning black dress, watching them too. Watching me. I tried to engage her in conversation, but she just nursed her beer quietly. I couldn't tell if she was in her own world or taking in everything. It was more than disconcerting, though not nearly as jarring as her sudden revival at the sounds of Mexican music. Instant change, she was the life of the party, voluntarily doing amateur salsa with every man within reach. I was content to simply keep watching, but a wiggling voice in my head told me to join in. That voice I’m usually better off ignoring, because I know better. But this was vacation, and I decided to start a dangerous precedent of saying yes. In this case, yes meant highly self-conscious rhythmic shuffling for half a song with a tipsy member of the armed forces, but yes would get progressively worse. In the meantime, we both withdrew to our silent observation posts.
I couldn’t see anyone else I knew, with the exception of the fake tattoo artist, if you can call someone who airbrushes a stencil an artist. She was an attractive girl from Russia, natural blonde in her early 20’s. Her accent was enchanting, thick enough to be sexy but not too thick to be incomprehensible, and she was well spoken. I bought an overpriced spider on my forearm from her, which people in three cities unanimously thought was ugly. Mainly I got it just so I could chat up the extremely attractive man getting a styled cross on his formidable shoulder. He was straight, of course, but his innocent Tennessee accent and her sultry Russian accent...
Our conversational ménage a trois back then was interrupted by the arrival of a generic looking drunk idiot, plainly trying to pick her up. Without skipping a beat, her accent and lack of understanding of english increased dramatically until he wandered off. I had thought he’d given up and moved on, but I overestimated him. He returned, showing up at the nightclub and harassing her on the dance floor. A member of the crew politely shoved him off, but she still looked unhappy. I caught her eyes, and flashed her a sympathetic smile. She recognized me, or my thoughts, and smiled back. I felt empowered to go and strike up another conversation. Yes, I learned, she’s frequently accosted by sleazy drunk guys. But she could I was different, or thought so anyhow. I had never made a move towards her, and she repaid my genuine attitude with a dance. I’m sure I still looked like a tool, but now I was a tool dancing with the hottest girl in the bar. Gratifying.
And don’t feel bad for the drunk idiot. He was busy getting double teamed by the two drunk cougars from last night’s karaoke. In all likelihood, none of these people had seen sobriety since we cast off the mooring lines.
I only danced with her a few songs, not wanting to overstay my welcome. But, my escapades had not gone unnoticed. When I returned to the bar, I was approached by three guys. Two I knew from previous encounters in karaoke and the casino; the short tattooed guy and the tall bald guy, always loud and always making their presence known whether through ridiculous singing or obscene bets. The third was new, but clearly just as inebriated. His midlength hair did not wholly conceal his myriad of piercings – eyebrow, nose, industrial, gauged ears, ect. My gaydar went off strong, and a slurred sentence or two assured me he wasn’t European. The first two make some snide comment about Russians in bed and wander off, but their friend stays. I’m guessing I was not only right, but he’d picked me out too. He was touchy when he talked, using stories about women or dolphins to touch me all over. I’m nonplussed, having been groped plenty of times in my life, but I hadn’t yet decided whether I wanted him or not. It was still early in the cruise, and I wasn’t desperate yet.
He wants me to drink with him, and he wants me to smoke with him, and he wants me to tell me about his favorite pussy and top 10 blowjobs. All these are signs of a closet case. Drinking puts them at ease, and gives them an excuse and justification for experimenting. Smoking pot often precedes the beginning of foreplay, and an invitation to smoke can often be an invitation for sex after. And talking about sex with women, especially the act of oral sex, is a way to introduce sexual thoughts and associated mental pictures without revealing your gay side. He also offers me a cigarette, which I take to stall for time. I don’t smoke, a fact that would be apparent to any sober observer. I cough slightly, and accidentally exhale downwards, which only leads to rising smoke stinging me in the eyes. This is the fourth cigarette of my life, and I smoke it in the time it takes him to smoke three. That’s also about the time it takes me to conclude he’s annoying and smells bad and I don’t want to have sex with him. I carefully maneuver the large speaker between me and his wandering hands and overbearing lack of personal space.
On the other side of the speaker I find Rick, back from his own brief foray into dancing and looking moody as ever. The girls still aren’t attractive enough, I guess. He seems sober too, which isn’t surprising when you think about it. Rick also has no interest in talking to this human pincushion, so we start our own side conversation as he continues talking about marvelous pussy to no one in particular. Thankfully, it wasn’t long until his friends returned from the casino to retrieve him. Feeling strangely genteel towards them, I ask the short one how his night went. He grins the lopsided smile of a stroke victim and produces two 200 dollar chips, slapping them down on the speaker with a flourish. “600 dollars!”
I click my tongue against the roof of my mouth, waiting for the realization that doesn’t come. So I offer it. “But that’s only 400 dollars.” He looks down, confused. “Hmm, yeah. I guess I lost one.” He shrugs his shoulders, seemingly nonplussed himself, and orders a round of drinks for all of us.
A mercifully short time later, they depart, leaving me alone with Captain Kinetic, still in the same slumped state. I ask Rick what’s wrong, and he points to one of the decently attractive girls on the dance floor, currently sandwiched between two mullet-sporting schmucks. “My sister.” I offer a sympathetic grimace, then sit to talk to him for awhile, neither of us having anything better to do. I learn he’s quite a successful young businessman, relatively unaffected by the shit economy, and he’s just as attractive as he was the night before, and yet, he’s usually lonely. I ask him why. Lack of time and energy, he says. Getting old sucks, he says. Graduating college was the worst mistake of my life, he says. This confirmed all my deepest fears, but coming from him, it was oddly reassuring. He was richer and better looking than me, yet lead a far less fulfilling life.
Still, my superpowers aren’t limitless; I was rapidly crashing asleep. I had been for awhile, but I wanted to stay for his sake, for as long as his sisters antics pained him. I couldn’t. So I was honest. “I feel like leaving, but I’d feel bad for leaving you all alone,” I told him. That only made him feel worse. I slinked away.
It’s sad, but that nightclub was easily the most entertaining part of the ship. Just watching and listening. Freud would’ve cum in his pants on the spot. Meanwhile, I returned to my room with trepidation, not knowing if my father had fun of his own with Lisa that night. I knocked gently, then swiped my card and opened the door. The man was fast asleep, but the lawnmower in his mouth was going strong. He’d had anti-snoring surgery in the past, going as far as having his uvula removed, which destroyed his ability to make a ch- sound but left his malignant snore intact. I laid in bed, staring at the ceiling with my eyes wide open, praying for sleep or death, whichever came sooner.
My eyes eventually wandered around the room, where I made one last discovery that night. Draped over the top of his bag was a pair of my father’s underwear. They looked strangely stylish. They looked strangely familiar. I got out of bed and walked across the room, quiet as a churchmouse. I picked up his underwear delicately – not to avoid noise, but to prevent turning his jock sweat into an aerosol – and held it as far away as I could read in the low light conditions. The tag read 2xist – the nation’s largest gay underwear brand. I rolled my eyes, tossed down his tighty whiteys, crawled back into bed, and rapidly fell asleep, rather than even consider the thought.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Merely Players, pt. 2
I didn’t stay with them long because, small boat that it was, Nick appeared, still drunk. He wanted me to buy him a drink, a phrase I’d hear from underaged kids the rest of my time on the boat. Still, 18 beats 15 or 30, right? I figured my night would be gravy now that I was in the company of an age-appropriate peer… not quite. We hunted around for more people our age, to no success. The nightclub and casino, the obvious haunts, were ghost towns. So he decided to join his younger brother and cousin at the pizza place, as they’d recently escaped from the bizarrely mislabeled O2 teen club (trust me, I looked for the tanks). I, for lack of ideas, joined them. Mistake.
Here I was, a 21 year old, sitting next to an 18 year old, sitting next to 3 loud and obnoxious 16 year olds, sitting next to a quiet 16 year old, sitting next to a very bored-looking 21 year old, the chaperone from the teen club who’d been shanghaied into joining them for pizza. I, personally, try to block high school out of my memory, but I cant imagine it was this bad. They just lazed around making boner jokes, interspersed with the occasional gay joke. One of them mentioned how awesome it was that he danced with a girl. Another hinted that he saw a girl’s boobs, only to admit his story was a lie. Were we like that?
I felt sympathetic for the poor chaperone. I felt even worse for the quiet boy. He was skinny, blonde, and pretty, in that I-cant-say-anything-more-than-pretty-because-he’s-far-too-young kinda way. But my gaydar doesn’t lie. This boy was clearly gay and unhappy. I shot him a sympathetic smile, hoping he’d see it for what it was and not misinterpret me and report me to the authorities. I was not going to make the same error a third time. I don’t know if he got it, but it wasn’t long until he became fed up with his friends and walked off. They never knew why.
It wasn’t long after that when Nick and entourage decided to sleep themselves, so for lack of a better plan, I returned to the casino. To my surprise, Brian was there, at the roulette table. I’ve always had bad luck with roulette, so I abstained. It wasn’t long until Brian went broke anyway. We decided to walk past the nightclub, and in yet another miracle, people were there. The slow trickle hadn’t started until nearly 2, but people were there. I met, in order, Joey, the tall 21 year old with a problem he hadn’t discovered yet, Aaron and Alex, cousins, tall and skinny and stutter, and short and fat and low self-esteem, respectively, Rebecca, the spunky redhead girl with strong, loud opinions on everything, Amy, the girl so drunk and stupid she wears a rubber wristband with her name on it, and Rick, the introspective, older (well, 25) guy who could easily have any girl he wants yet curiously abstains. Apparently none of the girls are attractive enough for him, which makes him sound arrogant, but ultimately he was more sad than anything. What was really sad was that all these people showed up shortly before the club kicked us all out, so we (thankfully sans Amy, who passed out somewhere along the way) all made our way to the top deck.
It was nice up there. The night was dark, the air was warm, the breeze was soft. We talked about everything, from sex, to drugs, to more sex. I once again was forced to relinquish a preconceived notion. We were exactly like those annoying 16 year olds, only more experienced. I also noticed that there was only one girl among 6 guys, and she only seemed to show interest in the Hungarian janitor who paid us a visit at 3am to tell us about the 40 year old with kids who was trying to seduce him. It really seemed that the only people going to get any ass on this cruise were the 40+ divorcees. I wondered what my father was up to, then quickly wished I didn’t.
We turned our attention away from Rebecca’s ass and to her alleged pot stash. She promised she’d share her last joint on New Years. I wondered if I should invite Chip.
If it seems to you like this post is just kind of limping along, you’re right. That’s what my night was. And endless, uneventful limp. Pleasant, but not especially thrilling. What it did was set the stage. All the players were in place, and they would all make strange, unexpected reappearances before the play was through. In the meanwhile, I hadn’t slept for like 2 days. Exit, stage left.
Here I was, a 21 year old, sitting next to an 18 year old, sitting next to 3 loud and obnoxious 16 year olds, sitting next to a quiet 16 year old, sitting next to a very bored-looking 21 year old, the chaperone from the teen club who’d been shanghaied into joining them for pizza. I, personally, try to block high school out of my memory, but I cant imagine it was this bad. They just lazed around making boner jokes, interspersed with the occasional gay joke. One of them mentioned how awesome it was that he danced with a girl. Another hinted that he saw a girl’s boobs, only to admit his story was a lie. Were we like that?
I felt sympathetic for the poor chaperone. I felt even worse for the quiet boy. He was skinny, blonde, and pretty, in that I-cant-say-anything-more-than-pretty-because-he’s-far-too-young kinda way. But my gaydar doesn’t lie. This boy was clearly gay and unhappy. I shot him a sympathetic smile, hoping he’d see it for what it was and not misinterpret me and report me to the authorities. I was not going to make the same error a third time. I don’t know if he got it, but it wasn’t long until he became fed up with his friends and walked off. They never knew why.
It wasn’t long after that when Nick and entourage decided to sleep themselves, so for lack of a better plan, I returned to the casino. To my surprise, Brian was there, at the roulette table. I’ve always had bad luck with roulette, so I abstained. It wasn’t long until Brian went broke anyway. We decided to walk past the nightclub, and in yet another miracle, people were there. The slow trickle hadn’t started until nearly 2, but people were there. I met, in order, Joey, the tall 21 year old with a problem he hadn’t discovered yet, Aaron and Alex, cousins, tall and skinny and stutter, and short and fat and low self-esteem, respectively, Rebecca, the spunky redhead girl with strong, loud opinions on everything, Amy, the girl so drunk and stupid she wears a rubber wristband with her name on it, and Rick, the introspective, older (well, 25) guy who could easily have any girl he wants yet curiously abstains. Apparently none of the girls are attractive enough for him, which makes him sound arrogant, but ultimately he was more sad than anything. What was really sad was that all these people showed up shortly before the club kicked us all out, so we (thankfully sans Amy, who passed out somewhere along the way) all made our way to the top deck.
It was nice up there. The night was dark, the air was warm, the breeze was soft. We talked about everything, from sex, to drugs, to more sex. I once again was forced to relinquish a preconceived notion. We were exactly like those annoying 16 year olds, only more experienced. I also noticed that there was only one girl among 6 guys, and she only seemed to show interest in the Hungarian janitor who paid us a visit at 3am to tell us about the 40 year old with kids who was trying to seduce him. It really seemed that the only people going to get any ass on this cruise were the 40+ divorcees. I wondered what my father was up to, then quickly wished I didn’t.
We turned our attention away from Rebecca’s ass and to her alleged pot stash. She promised she’d share her last joint on New Years. I wondered if I should invite Chip.
If it seems to you like this post is just kind of limping along, you’re right. That’s what my night was. And endless, uneventful limp. Pleasant, but not especially thrilling. What it did was set the stage. All the players were in place, and they would all make strange, unexpected reappearances before the play was through. In the meanwhile, I hadn’t slept for like 2 days. Exit, stage left.
Merely Players, pt. 1
Shakespeare is famous for saying “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.” We have our stage, lets get us some players. Starting with Brian. I knew I wanted to talk to him because I could see the top of his bathing suit. In fact, not only did he lack jelly rolls, he actually had nice abs. Surely he’s a nice boy, right?
Brian was a 20 year old attending a small rural college in Alabama. His greatest aspiration on the trip was to smuggle empty shampoo bottles off the boat in Grand Cayman and come back with rotgut tequila. Make of this what you will. I for one didn’t care. He was in my age bracket, easy on the eyes, and didn’t drool when he spoke; that was more than I had hoped for up until this point. We only talked for a brief while before he had to leave, but I told him I’d run into him again. “It’s a small boat,” I said. I didn’t know yet how right I was.
As this was the first day, and the boat had yet to even leave the dock, the free drinks flowed plenty. I for one developed an impervious liver in Australia (only got drunk once on the trip, more on that later), but others were not so lucky. Or rather, are luckier than I. Anyway, point is they were giving out free samples of fancy liqueurs outside the onboard mini-mall, and people were lining up in a frenzy to try miniature shots of mixers you really shouldn’t be taking shots of. I of course joined the fray. Near me was a young man far too giddy for his own good. I struck up a conversation, which lead nowhere, as he was already drunk on cheap champagne and tiny shots of Baily’s. I learned his name was Nick, he was here with his extended family, and he was giddy because he was getting free drinks at 18. He told me all this with his eyes slightly glazed as he drifted aimlessly away. I told his back that I’d see him again. “It’s a small boat,” I said. Nearby, some lush sang “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”. He is not part of this story.
I found my father, who was also where the free drinks were. He was talking to some older woman, of course a blonde, standing with her children. The girl was short, with shorter hair, and a bit nerdy. The boy seemed familiar; I recognized them from the terminal in JFK. I thought he’d seemed cute, from a distance. As I joined my father in the conversational equivalent of a double date, I learned two things about this boy. One, his ADD was way worse than mine, and two, he was still in high school. I shuddered slightly on the inside, and left to find someone calmer and more legal.
My father, on the other hand, seemed to like this woman. Her name was Lisa. Her name was not Shawn, my father’s girlfriend. Before we got on the cruise, I’d hinted to my father that I may have to kick him out of the room to have sex on his bed, just to tease him a bit. He told me that was fine, as he has a happy and stable relationship and doesn’t need sex. Now, as my father and I got dressed for dinner, he told me his strategy for seducing Lisa, and advised me to knock before I opened the door tonight. Monogamy: the eternal bond – warranty may not apply in international waters.
If he was so certain he was going to keep it in his pants, why did he pack condoms in his toiletries bag? And why does he even have a toiletries bag? That’s too gay, even for me.
If my father likes pussy, we sure got assigned the right table. Men were quite outnumbered. First you had the two women from some South American country, I forget. Besides occasionally speaking a line or two at the table, asking where my father was when encountered randomly on deck, dancing with me for a minute on New Years, and standing awkwardly surrounded by youths in the nightclub, they were pretty much a non-presence. They might’ve been coworkers or lesbians, I forget. My spider sense doesn’t work on dykes. Then there were the two fat sisters. Besides occasionally speaking a line or two at the table, asking where my father was when encountered randomly on deck, dancing with me for a minute on New Years, and flirting with younger black guys in the nightclub in a beautiful textbook example of why stereotypes are sometimes true, they were pretty much a non-presence. I’ll be surprised if I mention any of these four again.
Next to them were a mother-daughter pair. I tried to talk biology with the mother, seeing as she works in the biology department of Princeton, but it only went so far after I found out she was a glorified secretary. My father didn’t like her from the start. See, he didn’t want to go to formal dinner. He didn’t want to be forced to sit with strangers. He wanted to be quiet, grumpy, and antisocial. I forced him to go, forgetting that his way of coping with being grumpy and antisocial is to become a loud drunken court jester. I wanted to slap him upside the head, but she beat me to it, putting him verbally in his place in a bizarrely maternal way from one 50-something to another. He never liked her after that. Her daughter on the other hand was quite intriguing, to both him and I. Jen was kind of pretty, with a large Guns n’ Roses tattoo on her back. She was funny, smart, grounded, and had lots of stories from being in the Navy. I was quickly intimidated by her.
Oh, and there were two more people at this table. A young married couple, early 30’s, kid or two safely at home. Lets call them Chip and Dale. I wont even try to simplify them into a caricature, I’ll simply say this isn’t the last you’ll read of them.
After the party, I headed for the welcome show. There we got our first taste of Felipe, our bombastic attention whore of a cruise director, straight from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Accompanying him was his squadron of cruise dancers. The men were objectively prettier, but it was hard to notice them when the women were wearing skintight lycra suits with holes cut out conveniently where their artificially enhanced cleavage was located. Oh, and there was a dancing smokestack mascot. I shit you not.
They were followed immediately by a guitar-wielding comedian, like Stephen Lynch but without talent. I quickly began looking for new people to meet. Mostly I saw old fat Southerners, but I locked eyes with one boy sitting on the stairs. The room was very dark, but my gaydar told me I’d found a hit. My gaydar almost never leads me astray, unless he’s European; for some reason, gays and Europeans are entirely indistinguishable to me. Other foreigners are sometimes hard to tell as well, but Europeans trick me every time. The only way I would know would be if I crossed the room to talk to him, in the middle of the show, which is of course exactly what I did. But something seemed amiss as I approached. As I sat down, he sheepishly said ‘Hi.’ in a distinctly American voice. Then he turned to me, and gave me a meaningful gay smile. The smile that means “I know what you are, and you know me too.” The light from the stage show reflected off his braces. Fuck! I cursed my bad luck and worse eyes. I was angry, and felt dirtied for misjudging age again. But, I endured a conversation with him, and endeavored to avoid him for the rest of the cruise, to more or less success. But enough of that.
I made my way to the back of the ship, hoping for better luck in the older areas. I found myself at karaoke. On stage was a short overtattooed drunk guy and his tall, fat, bald, drunk friend, singing a song I frankly couldn’t distinguish from a tortured rabbit. The place was mostly empty, as the rest of the ship seemed to be after the show. It was far too quiet for the first night. However, there were one or two friendly faces to be seen. “Scott, hey!”, someone called from a booth. I didn’t recognize at first, but it was Chip, with one of the fat chick twins. Being the polite gentleman I occasionally pretend I am, I decided to go over and make smalltalk before making a convenient and timely exit.
I learned, right then and there, that perhaps all my preconceived notions about being 30 may be wrong. She whispered in my ear “Do you have any pot?” I liked this one.
Brian was a 20 year old attending a small rural college in Alabama. His greatest aspiration on the trip was to smuggle empty shampoo bottles off the boat in Grand Cayman and come back with rotgut tequila. Make of this what you will. I for one didn’t care. He was in my age bracket, easy on the eyes, and didn’t drool when he spoke; that was more than I had hoped for up until this point. We only talked for a brief while before he had to leave, but I told him I’d run into him again. “It’s a small boat,” I said. I didn’t know yet how right I was.
As this was the first day, and the boat had yet to even leave the dock, the free drinks flowed plenty. I for one developed an impervious liver in Australia (only got drunk once on the trip, more on that later), but others were not so lucky. Or rather, are luckier than I. Anyway, point is they were giving out free samples of fancy liqueurs outside the onboard mini-mall, and people were lining up in a frenzy to try miniature shots of mixers you really shouldn’t be taking shots of. I of course joined the fray. Near me was a young man far too giddy for his own good. I struck up a conversation, which lead nowhere, as he was already drunk on cheap champagne and tiny shots of Baily’s. I learned his name was Nick, he was here with his extended family, and he was giddy because he was getting free drinks at 18. He told me all this with his eyes slightly glazed as he drifted aimlessly away. I told his back that I’d see him again. “It’s a small boat,” I said. Nearby, some lush sang “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”. He is not part of this story.
I found my father, who was also where the free drinks were. He was talking to some older woman, of course a blonde, standing with her children. The girl was short, with shorter hair, and a bit nerdy. The boy seemed familiar; I recognized them from the terminal in JFK. I thought he’d seemed cute, from a distance. As I joined my father in the conversational equivalent of a double date, I learned two things about this boy. One, his ADD was way worse than mine, and two, he was still in high school. I shuddered slightly on the inside, and left to find someone calmer and more legal.
My father, on the other hand, seemed to like this woman. Her name was Lisa. Her name was not Shawn, my father’s girlfriend. Before we got on the cruise, I’d hinted to my father that I may have to kick him out of the room to have sex on his bed, just to tease him a bit. He told me that was fine, as he has a happy and stable relationship and doesn’t need sex. Now, as my father and I got dressed for dinner, he told me his strategy for seducing Lisa, and advised me to knock before I opened the door tonight. Monogamy: the eternal bond – warranty may not apply in international waters.
If he was so certain he was going to keep it in his pants, why did he pack condoms in his toiletries bag? And why does he even have a toiletries bag? That’s too gay, even for me.
If my father likes pussy, we sure got assigned the right table. Men were quite outnumbered. First you had the two women from some South American country, I forget. Besides occasionally speaking a line or two at the table, asking where my father was when encountered randomly on deck, dancing with me for a minute on New Years, and standing awkwardly surrounded by youths in the nightclub, they were pretty much a non-presence. They might’ve been coworkers or lesbians, I forget. My spider sense doesn’t work on dykes. Then there were the two fat sisters. Besides occasionally speaking a line or two at the table, asking where my father was when encountered randomly on deck, dancing with me for a minute on New Years, and flirting with younger black guys in the nightclub in a beautiful textbook example of why stereotypes are sometimes true, they were pretty much a non-presence. I’ll be surprised if I mention any of these four again.
Next to them were a mother-daughter pair. I tried to talk biology with the mother, seeing as she works in the biology department of Princeton, but it only went so far after I found out she was a glorified secretary. My father didn’t like her from the start. See, he didn’t want to go to formal dinner. He didn’t want to be forced to sit with strangers. He wanted to be quiet, grumpy, and antisocial. I forced him to go, forgetting that his way of coping with being grumpy and antisocial is to become a loud drunken court jester. I wanted to slap him upside the head, but she beat me to it, putting him verbally in his place in a bizarrely maternal way from one 50-something to another. He never liked her after that. Her daughter on the other hand was quite intriguing, to both him and I. Jen was kind of pretty, with a large Guns n’ Roses tattoo on her back. She was funny, smart, grounded, and had lots of stories from being in the Navy. I was quickly intimidated by her.
Oh, and there were two more people at this table. A young married couple, early 30’s, kid or two safely at home. Lets call them Chip and Dale. I wont even try to simplify them into a caricature, I’ll simply say this isn’t the last you’ll read of them.
After the party, I headed for the welcome show. There we got our first taste of Felipe, our bombastic attention whore of a cruise director, straight from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Accompanying him was his squadron of cruise dancers. The men were objectively prettier, but it was hard to notice them when the women were wearing skintight lycra suits with holes cut out conveniently where their artificially enhanced cleavage was located. Oh, and there was a dancing smokestack mascot. I shit you not.
They were followed immediately by a guitar-wielding comedian, like Stephen Lynch but without talent. I quickly began looking for new people to meet. Mostly I saw old fat Southerners, but I locked eyes with one boy sitting on the stairs. The room was very dark, but my gaydar told me I’d found a hit. My gaydar almost never leads me astray, unless he’s European; for some reason, gays and Europeans are entirely indistinguishable to me. Other foreigners are sometimes hard to tell as well, but Europeans trick me every time. The only way I would know would be if I crossed the room to talk to him, in the middle of the show, which is of course exactly what I did. But something seemed amiss as I approached. As I sat down, he sheepishly said ‘Hi.’ in a distinctly American voice. Then he turned to me, and gave me a meaningful gay smile. The smile that means “I know what you are, and you know me too.” The light from the stage show reflected off his braces. Fuck! I cursed my bad luck and worse eyes. I was angry, and felt dirtied for misjudging age again. But, I endured a conversation with him, and endeavored to avoid him for the rest of the cruise, to more or less success. But enough of that.
I made my way to the back of the ship, hoping for better luck in the older areas. I found myself at karaoke. On stage was a short overtattooed drunk guy and his tall, fat, bald, drunk friend, singing a song I frankly couldn’t distinguish from a tortured rabbit. The place was mostly empty, as the rest of the ship seemed to be after the show. It was far too quiet for the first night. However, there were one or two friendly faces to be seen. “Scott, hey!”, someone called from a booth. I didn’t recognize at first, but it was Chip, with one of the fat chick twins. Being the polite gentleman I occasionally pretend I am, I decided to go over and make smalltalk before making a convenient and timely exit.
I learned, right then and there, that perhaps all my preconceived notions about being 30 may be wrong. She whispered in my ear “Do you have any pot?” I liked this one.
Setting The Scene
To my newest audience, all one or two of you, let me bring you up to speed. My name is Scott. I like to travel. I like to write about it. I do my best to make it interesting. After all, if you’re anything like me (at the ripe age of 21, my biggest dream is to get a vasectomy), there’s little else to do with yourself. So indulge me for a bit, as I try to make the mundane exciting and the insane digestible.
Disclaimer: Names are pretty much unchanged, with one or two exceptions. Fuck your privacy, we need a good laugh at your expense.
Lets set the scene. As I’ve said, I’m 21. It’s winter break, before the start of my very last semester in college. The basic plan is to go home to Long Island – a small semi-wealthy town called Syosset, but to help those who don’t know New York geography, and to hide my shame from the ones who do, I say I’m from Queens – then a 5-day Caribbean cruise with my middle-aged 50-something divorcee father, a brief weekend joint up to Boston to visit an old school friend, and a return to New York to round out the rest of break before going back to St. Louis and my inescapable (barring a few F’s) fate. A simple enough plan, but varied enough to keep the attention of my ADD-addled brain weighs on average 3 pounds, about 2% of my total body mass…
Right, enough exposition.
Skipping my week in the unmentionable place, I start my story in JFK Airport, one of two JFK-related sites I’d hit before my trip was over, well before sunrise on a Monday morning. My father, naturally, was a bit grumpy. I was high strung, as I tend to be when I break the 24-hour mark. The airport was strangely busy for this early hour, so we passed the time in our own ways; him being the strong silent type, and me fucking with security. At JFK, they talk to so many different types of people, they don’t notice when you go from New Yorker to Southerner to Irish to Australian in the span of 30 seconds. I’d be envious of them if they weren’t security guards.
Does that help you get acquainted with me? I hope so, because I’m just going to fast forward to the boat. You don’t really want me to waste your time describing how I asked my flight attendant with the drink cart if she knew how to mix a fuzzy navel or a dirty sanchez, or how I loudly called out “Mullet!” whenever I saw one (a common occurrence in the Tampa airport), or how I tried to place bets with the people on the bus over what tree species we were driving past. No, lets just get to the fun part, the ship.
Points if you catch that bad joke, free blowjob if you laugh at it.
Speaking of blowjobs, here’s another opportunity to tell you about myself. My life as a scientist has taught me to be observant and experiment in all aspects of life. So much of this trip (and by extension, this blog), is observation and experimentation. But I bet you’re thinking about a different type of experimentation. No, don’t bother. That was a vacation many moons ago; by now, I’m quite comfortable in my deviance. But, suffice to say, as I walked the poolside Lido deck, I took in all the eye candy, girls and guys alike.
Except, the eye candy was in short supply. If you ever doubted America’s obesity epidemic, you only have to spend time on a budget cruise. I saw enough FUPAs to make my eyes bleed – Google it, or not. This cruise was far fatter than the cruise I’d been on as a child, a Princess cruise, Carnival’s high-end line. We used to be able to afford such things. But, besides the clientele, the boat and cruise were very much the same, right down to the menu. I assumed this meant that this boat too had a 24-hour pizza joint and room service. Because that’s exactly what these people need.
Turns out it wasn’t exactly the same. The food, while identical in name, was crappier in taste. But considering most passengers idea of classy was a box of Franzia with their deep-fried squirrel, I figured they’d hardly notice.
One more generality needs to be said about the cruise before I talk about what actually happened. See, this is a Carnival Fun Ship (get the joke now?), which means it’s meant for families. Nearly the entire roster consisted of parents and their children. My father and I were no exception, but most of these kids were preteen or younger. I felt like the only 18-25 year old on the entire boat, and I wasn’t that far off. We numbered maybe a dozen on a good day. However, the upshot of having a small group of peers was that we all kinda knew each other, Makes for more interesting dynamics, I’d hoped. We’ll see.
Disclaimer: Names are pretty much unchanged, with one or two exceptions. Fuck your privacy, we need a good laugh at your expense.
Lets set the scene. As I’ve said, I’m 21. It’s winter break, before the start of my very last semester in college. The basic plan is to go home to Long Island – a small semi-wealthy town called Syosset, but to help those who don’t know New York geography, and to hide my shame from the ones who do, I say I’m from Queens – then a 5-day Caribbean cruise with my middle-aged 50-something divorcee father, a brief weekend joint up to Boston to visit an old school friend, and a return to New York to round out the rest of break before going back to St. Louis and my inescapable (barring a few F’s) fate. A simple enough plan, but varied enough to keep the attention of my ADD-addled brain weighs on average 3 pounds, about 2% of my total body mass…
Right, enough exposition.
Skipping my week in the unmentionable place, I start my story in JFK Airport, one of two JFK-related sites I’d hit before my trip was over, well before sunrise on a Monday morning. My father, naturally, was a bit grumpy. I was high strung, as I tend to be when I break the 24-hour mark. The airport was strangely busy for this early hour, so we passed the time in our own ways; him being the strong silent type, and me fucking with security. At JFK, they talk to so many different types of people, they don’t notice when you go from New Yorker to Southerner to Irish to Australian in the span of 30 seconds. I’d be envious of them if they weren’t security guards.
Does that help you get acquainted with me? I hope so, because I’m just going to fast forward to the boat. You don’t really want me to waste your time describing how I asked my flight attendant with the drink cart if she knew how to mix a fuzzy navel or a dirty sanchez, or how I loudly called out “Mullet!” whenever I saw one (a common occurrence in the Tampa airport), or how I tried to place bets with the people on the bus over what tree species we were driving past. No, lets just get to the fun part, the ship.
Points if you catch that bad joke, free blowjob if you laugh at it.
Speaking of blowjobs, here’s another opportunity to tell you about myself. My life as a scientist has taught me to be observant and experiment in all aspects of life. So much of this trip (and by extension, this blog), is observation and experimentation. But I bet you’re thinking about a different type of experimentation. No, don’t bother. That was a vacation many moons ago; by now, I’m quite comfortable in my deviance. But, suffice to say, as I walked the poolside Lido deck, I took in all the eye candy, girls and guys alike.
Except, the eye candy was in short supply. If you ever doubted America’s obesity epidemic, you only have to spend time on a budget cruise. I saw enough FUPAs to make my eyes bleed – Google it, or not. This cruise was far fatter than the cruise I’d been on as a child, a Princess cruise, Carnival’s high-end line. We used to be able to afford such things. But, besides the clientele, the boat and cruise were very much the same, right down to the menu. I assumed this meant that this boat too had a 24-hour pizza joint and room service. Because that’s exactly what these people need.
Turns out it wasn’t exactly the same. The food, while identical in name, was crappier in taste. But considering most passengers idea of classy was a box of Franzia with their deep-fried squirrel, I figured they’d hardly notice.
One more generality needs to be said about the cruise before I talk about what actually happened. See, this is a Carnival Fun Ship (get the joke now?), which means it’s meant for families. Nearly the entire roster consisted of parents and their children. My father and I were no exception, but most of these kids were preteen or younger. I felt like the only 18-25 year old on the entire boat, and I wasn’t that far off. We numbered maybe a dozen on a good day. However, the upshot of having a small group of peers was that we all kinda knew each other, Makes for more interesting dynamics, I’d hoped. We’ll see.
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