Vacation slideshow!

I know, I know--I promised vacation photos and then failed to produce vacation photos. The reason for this is because I am a LIAR.

Also because I don't really like the uploady mechanism in Blogger. Excuses, excuses.

Anyway, here we are on our first day, boggling at the blueness of the sea and the warmness of the air. Coming from Seattle, I felt like I had walked into an alternate dimension.

Here are some Very Important Dudes enjoying cigars.

Pretty water. There was really no one around--at every restaurant we went to, we were the only table. The cruise ships come in a few times a week and I guess it's crowded then, but teh crowds are easy to avoid. Otherwise, it's completely empty except for one patch of beach filled with partying Italians.


Interesting signage.

The greatest bar of all time.

Sunset.

DIY bar.
The view from our house.


A kitten who lived on our doorstep the last day or two we were there. We fed her (him?) the strange gelatinous cream we had bought for our coffee and named him Peaches McScreeches/Steve Perry*. (Later the owners of our house told us her real name was Olive Oil, but whatevs.)

Crazy rocks on the east side of the island.

Sad faces on our last day.


The coolest part of the trip was the snorkeling, which you could do by stepping off the beach and into the water--that's how close the coral reef is. There was every rainbow color of fish you can imagine, and they just swam right up and stared at you. At one point I was surrounded by a school of flat turquoise fish the size of dinner plates.


Here are a couple of pictures that our friend P took with his fancy schmancy underwater camera:

Cool, right?

Anyway, it was super awesome and you should probably go to there.

*There was a cd player and an odd assortment of cds in our cabin. We listened to "Don't Stop Believin'" every morning as sort of a battle cry.

At the reference desk

A few days ago, an older man approached the desk with a long piece of paper--probably a toothpick or straw wrapper--dangling from his lower lip. He handed me a business card for a restaurant.

Man: WOULD YOU LIKE TO GO TO THIS RESTAURANT?

Me (brightly) : I'm not sure what you're asking. I'd be happy to look up reviews of that restaurant if you like!

Long pause.

Man: I WENT TO COLLEGE.


**
**

The Amazing Vacation of Laziness was indeed amazing, and already seems like a distant, distant dream. I'll post a couple of pictures of it tomorrow, should you happen to care.

Speckled trout

This time next week, I will be on The Amazing Vacation of Laziness. I can't even explain how excited about it I am.

The other day I was talking to a coworker who had just gotten back from Hawaii,and she was full of advice for traveling to warm climates. "Hey, you know what you should do before you go?" she said to me. "You should go to the tanning bed. What you really need is a nice base tan."

I'm pretty sure I managed not to laugh in her face. But maybe not completely.

Because here is the thing about people who tan. Deep down inside, none of them can believe that there is a human on this planet who can't do it. It's SO EASY, they think! You just go outside and magically become darker! It's like God's hypercolor!

I can tell these people truly believe that if I just tried harder and weren't such a wuss about it, I could do it too. But allow me to share a science fact with you, oh tanners: I CAN'T TAN.

But I can do other stuff. Here's what I can do: I can get a sunburn in February. I can shed my entire outer layer of skin like a snake. I can have darker freckles. But the skin inbetween the freckles is never, ever going to tan. So please do not speak to me of base tans and SPF 8 and the like. It's SPF 1,000,000 for me, and a big ridiculous hat. I know I look like a speckled trout in a bathing suit, but trust me when I say there is nothing I can do about it.