Susan, Sequoia, and Todd go sailing

Susan and I agreed early on that it would be good to apply sarcasm and humor to our blog to make for more entertaining reading. Every sailor knows a yarn isn’t a yarn if you don’t take some liberties with the truth. Little did I realize the humor would largely be at my expense, but as First Mate Mischief Maker keeps the ship’s log, I should have seen it coming a minute of latitude away! So I decided to pick up my marlin-spike and do what any formerly hard-working executive turned Capn would do: I delegated to Susan the task of writing a witty rebuttal in my defense that would restore my good name and that I would then ultimately take credit for.

I left no room for ambiguity, with instructions to highlight my strengths as a strong salty tar. Specifically, a burly man jack that wouldn’t run screaming from the quarter deck when a drop of lime juice from my margarita spilled into a hang nail that had been clipped during my most recent manicure. Thus leaving the First Mate in charge with the peace and quiet necessary to do my work for me, I had crew(wo)man Blondie Koiya row me ashore in the rigid inflatable jolly boat so I could run an errand to the seamstress to be fitted for a custom yellow speedo thong. Upon returning I was more than a little dismayed to see she’d titled my rebuttal “Capn Big Girl Panties’ Stain Removal Tips” and I began to suspect that she hadn’t taken my orders seriously.

This called for discipline but I know better than to take a ships officer to the grating in front of the crew and thus resolved that I might recover the weather gauge by writing an anonymous slander piece. One highlighting First Mate NagsALot’s constant hen pecking, incessant rabble rousing, and mentioning that it has been so long since she’d shaved, one might think she was wearing leg warmers! Upon further reflection though I thought better of it as Admiral Mama (as she’s referred to before the mast) is clearly favored by the crew and I’d risk inciting mutiny if discovered; after all, when you’re in the unenviable position of commanding a French cutter, you know better than to take on the King’s Channel Fleet. And besides, if I really pissed her off, who would take the 10pm to 10am watch? As First Mate Incites Mutiny would point out, Princess needs his beauty sleep, so you can see my predicament.

I finally jettisoned the idea and decided a little shore leave was just the thing. So I belayed writing, slathered my skin in baby oil, got crew(wo)man “Will Work for Ice Cream” Koiya to mix me up a fuzzy navel, lit up a Virginia Slim, and then retired ashore for a siesta under the shade of a palm tree (you don’t get a gloriously milky complexion like mine from sizzling in the sun!). After waking from my nap and recovering from my grogginess with a shoulder massage from the natives, my mood was much improved! And in no small part because I realized it was happy hour, which meant for the rest of the day I no longer had to pretend that the colorful frozen beverage in my glass was just a smoothie!

See you at the bar,
Capn Big Girl Panties

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 3rd, 2008 at 12:37 pm and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.