Sea Cruise (Huey P. Smith)
Old Man Rhythm is-a in my shoes,
It’s no use sittin’ here singin’ the blues,
So be my guest, you’ve got nothin’ to lose,
Won’t you let me take you on a sea cruise?
Whoo-ee, whoo-ee baby!
Whoo-ee, whoo-ee baby!
Whoo-ee, whoo-ee baby!
Won’t you let me take you on a sea cruise?
EVERYBODY is going on a cruise these days. The Ellison Overload went to the Bahamas, Carol and Barbara from the gym are off to Bermuda and now my sisters, Alice (the Republican) and Kathy (her sister) are sailing off to Belize, Honduras and Cozumel, where they will, of course, swim with the dolphins, as all self-respecting cruisers are expected to do at one time or another. I think it’s like the boy scouts, where you get various pretty badges for esoteric accomplishments like knot-tying, compass-reading, atomic wedgies and the like. “Okay Martha, swam with the dolphins—scratch that one off the list.”
We don’t get it. Why does anyone want to live in a tiny cabin for several days, glop down tons of unhealthy food, gain five pounds (if they’re lucky) and play buffoon tourist games? And, as if that isn’t bad enough, now you’ve got clown boat operators like Captain Guido Sarducci over in Italy who might smash you on the rocks, turn the nice $450-million ship over and get you extremely damp. Or dead. I am not the smartest business person in the world but if I were hiring people to captain my ship I would not be hiring pretty-boys off of Craigslist. Some actual boat experience would be required.
In all fairness, we should report that Captain Sarducci denies all culpability in this matter and we are not entirely unsympathetic. We firmly believe that, under ordinary circumstances, everybody has the certain inalienable right to eat his dessert in peace and if there is a little hanky-panky going on with attractive female passengers, well, this is probably standard operating procedure in the cruise ship business. We do think, however, that if the boat has actually CRASHED that you should finish up your dessert quickly and man the lifeboats.
Captain Sarducci was on his way to help, of course, when a funny thing happened. Seems he stumbled and fell smack-dab right into a lifeboat, can you imagine the luck involved here? And so he went on his merry way as his abandoned passengers scrambled about like a colony of ants whose anthill has just been abused. No amount of polite urging from the Italian Coast Guard (“GET BACK ON THAT SHIP, YOU SNIVELING COWARD!”) was enough to encourage Sarducci, who protested that it was “dark out there” and he “couldn’t see a thing” to return to his post. We don’t think this bodes too well for a good-paying follow-up job for the captain. Next time you’re at the Napoli County Fair, look for the guy in the sea captain’s hat operating the Tilt-A-Whirl.
Alice (The Republican) Meets The Pirates Of The Caribbean
We are going down to Tampa tomorrow to see Alice and Kathy off and to have dinner at the iconic Columbia Restaurant in Ybor City. The nice restaurant people wanted to know if this was a special occasion (it is Alice’s 69th birthday but she doesn’t look a day over 68) so they could bring out the mariachi band to celebrate but I told them we’d be happy with the complimentary flan. I don’t mind telling you that I hope this isn’t Alice’s last supper even though it would mean one less vote for Romney/Gingrich in California. You may not be aware of this but there are dangers lurking out there in the open seas.
“Alice, I don’t mean to terrify you or anything, but have you ever heard of The Pirates Of The Caribbean?”
“I’m not afraid of any pirates,” said Alice. “I went to Lawrence High School for four years.”
“Well, yeah, but that was land-based terror. This is different.”
I guess I shouldn’t worry about Alice, she’s pretty tough. When she was in high-school, she was one of those girls in the tight sweaters, smoking out back by the trash compactor with the other riff-raff. If the pirates did show up, it would probably go something like this:
Pirate ship, Jolly Roger flapping in the wind, whips out of a hidden cove and quickly comes abeam of the tourist ship. The vaguely recognizable pirate captain draws his blade from its scabbard and waves it toward the awestruck passengers.
“Ahoy, tourists—prepare to be boarded! Tell me now—who’s in charge here?”
Alice: “I am.”
Johnny Depp: “Well, gather your mates at the stern of the ship and remove all your jewelry. We’ll be by to collect it forthwith!”
Alice turns on her heel and flips a handgrenade—which she keeps in her purse for just such occasions—over her shoulder. It lands at the feet of the pirates.
Handgrenade: BLAMMO!
Pirates: “AAARRRRGGGHH!”
Curtain.
Other Unseen Dangers
As you all know, Siobhan’s brother, Stuart, his wife, Mary, daughters Ashleigh and Kathleen and boyfriends Flo and Yaniv recently went on a brief cruise to the Bahamas. During the evening shenanigans, a pair of seagoing goons scooped up a helpless Stuart, brought him up to a makeshift stage and robbed him of his shirt, after which the gathered passengers were encouraged to subject him to various forms of torture. I know, it’s hard to believe, isn’t it? This could happen to you, too, on one of these nefarious outings. Suffice to say, the whole experience left Stuart psychologically scarred and now all he can do is spend his time padding around the house and using marginally legal words to beat his little sister at long-distance Scrabble. It’s a sad situation. So if you’re planning on taking one of these risky voyages, give some serious thought to taking a couple of self-defense classes. Or, better yet, bring Alice.
Whatever Happened To The Bermuda Triangle?
For years, we worried about the Bermuda Triangle, which extended roughly from the Broward/Dade County coast northeast to Bermuda, then south to Puerto Rico, whence back to Florida. Ships and planes kept disappearing in there. Nobody wanted to go near the place. It all started with the loss of Flight 19, a group of five U.S. Navy TBM Avenger bombers on a training mission. The planes just disappeared—poof—like that. It was not your everyday “oops, that silly Captain Hardacre flew a little too close to the water” situation. We’re talking FIVE planes here. Just before they disappeared forever, the flight leader reported this spooky bit of news: “We are entering white water, nothing seems right. We don’t know where we are, the water is green, not white.” Uh oh. All kinds of suggestions were offered, many alleging supernatural involvement. Anyway, things kept disappearing in the Triangle, mainly ships, and there was never any debris left strewn around to provide clues to their fate.
Then, all of a sudden, everything went back to normal. No more disappearances. Did everybody just stop going there? For awhile, maybe. But these days the traffic out there is greater than ever and nobody has been lost. It’s a dilemma. Did the perpetrators take their giant vacuum cleaner elsewhere? Did the sinister vortex just close down? What happened? Inquiring minds want to know.
Movie Review
The Oscar nominees came out the other day so we thought we’d better give you a heads up. We have not seen them all, but we’ve seen a bunch and they are not uniformly wonderful. Feel free to go see The Descendants or Moneyball or The Help, even though the latter is overrated. Especially, go see Woody Allen’s Midnight In Paris, our favorite, even if you do not like Woody all that much. Our non-horse friends all seem to like War Horse and the audience even applauded but it is very sappy and features the most resilient animal ever seen by man. Run through a few barbed-wire fences? No problem! Recover from a near-death experience and be bouncing around seconds later? Hey, Superman could do it once you removed the Kryptonite!
Whatever you do, though, AT ALL COSTS avoid the impossibly wearying The Tree Of Life. The only people who should be forced to see this movie—in which nobody speaks, although there is an occasional whisper—are those who have committed grave crimes against humanity, like, for instance, the producers of this movie. We thought it would be years before we saw another film as bad as this but then they came out with Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, which is not nominated for an Oscar although the male lead, Gary Oldman, is among the nominees for Best Actor. If there is a book and if you read it, you may have some idea of what is going on in Tinker, Tailor…, otherwise, like most of this column, you will be at sea. It is unendingly bleak and confusing. Somewhere in the course of the movie, one of the actors said “All I want to do is get this over with and go home.” I leaned over to Siobhan and uttered, “Exactly my sentiments.” If you are ever given the choice of watching this movie or spending a week in a slaughterhouse, take the slaughterhouse.
Horse News
Wilson has found a new home with the lovely Sara, 19, daughter of one of Siobhan’s clients, on a 95-acre farm in rural Alachua. He was a bad boy when taken for his first lounging experience, kicking back and trying to step on everybody, but next day he performed like an old trouper so it looks like Sara will keep him.
Juggernaut may be moving to Atlanta to become a Quarter Horse sire, we’ll find out in a few days. Our old filly, Cosmic Song, won by 6 ½ yesterday in her first start at Tampa. We’re still waiting for a race for Cosmic Crown. And Pogo continues to gallop down the road at Barry Eisaman’s training center. Barry has 200 horses down there and occasionally one is passing Pogo going in the opposite direction, which he finds entirely inappropriate. At first, he was shying away dramatically, but he is better now. He should be ready for Calder by May if all goes well.
Our Fedex Man Is Better Than Your Fedex Man
The other day, Siobhan and I were buried with off-the-farm activities and we didn’t return in time to meet Larry, the Fedex man, for the usual batch of blood samples. Larry is permitted to leave most of them, but some require signatures. Included in the latter group was an important package from a new client in California, which required immediate attention. Being Friday, there would be no re-delivery until Monday. I called Fedex and made arrangements to go down there and pick up the box on Saturday morning.
Later that afternoon—approaching evening, truth be told—I got a call from Larry.
“Are you going to be home? I’ll run that box back by,” he offered, thus saving us a 50-mile round-trip next morning and getting the customer an earlier test result.
We don’t know about your Fedex man but unless he’s passing out free drugs and champagne, we’re keeping Larry.
That’s all, folks….
