IJMC - A Suite Cruise in the Caribbean

I was driving home tonight and realized, "You know, dave, you're feeling 
particularly dead tonight." I'd like to attribute it to the psychology 
lecture I had just attended, discussing death and bereavement. However, 
no, that is not it. It's just been one of those weeks, and we're not even 
halfway through it. I'm looking forward to next week when I can sit down 
and learn some new programming tools...that's how I feel right now. Ugh. 
Well, here's to next week, have one on me!                          -dave





 There was this male engineer, on a cruise ship in the
 Caribbean for the first time.  It was wonderful, the
 experience of his lifetime.  He was being waited on hand
 and foot.  But, it did not last.

 A hurricane came unexpectedly.  The ship went down
 almost instantly.  The man found himself somehow swept
 up on the shore of an island.   There was nothing else
 anywhere to be seen.  No people, no supplies, nothing .
 The man looked around.  There were some bananas and
 coconuts, but that was it.  He was desperate and forlorn,
 but decided to make the best of it. So for the next four
 months he ate bananas, drank coconut juice and mostly
 looked to the sea for a ship to come to his rescue.

 One day, as he was lying on the beach stroking his beard
 and looking for a ship, he spotted movement out of the
 corner of his eye.  Could it be true, was it a ship?  No,
 from around the corner of the island came this rowboat. In
 it was the most gorgeous woman he had ever seen, or at
 least seen in 4 months.  She was tall, tanned, and blond,
 hair flowing in the sea breeze.  She spotted him also as he
 was waving and yelling and screaming to get her attention.
 She rowed her boat towards him.

 In disbelief, he asked, "Where did you come from?  How
 did you get here?" She said, "I rowed from the other side
 of the island.  I landed on this island when my cruise ship
 sank."  "Amazing," he said, "I didn't know anyone else had
 survived.  How many of you are there? Where did you get
 the rowboat?  You must have been really lucky to have a
 rowboat wash-up with you?"  "It is only me," she said,
 "and the rowboat didn't wash up, nothing else did."  "Well
 then," said the man, "how did you get the rowboat?"  "I
 made the rowboat out of raw material that I found on the
 island," replied the woman.  "The oars were whittled from
 Gum tree branches, I wove the bottom from Palm
 branches, and the sides and stern came from a Eucalyptus
 tree." "But, but," asked the man, "what about tools and
 hardware, how did you do that?"  "Oh, no problem,"
 replied the woman,  "on the south side of the island there is
 a very unusual strata of alluvial rock exposed. I found that
 if I fired it to a certain temperature in my kiln, it melted into
 forgeable ductile iron. I used that for tools, and used the
 tools to make the hardware. But, enough of that," she said.
 "Where do you live?"

 At last the man was forced to confess that he had been
 sleeping on the beach. "Well, let's row over to my place,"
 she said.  So they both got into the rowboat and left for
 her side of island.  The woman easily rowed them around
 to a wharf that led to the approach to her place.  She tied
 up the rowboat with a beautifully woven hemp rope.  They
 walked up a stone walk and around a Palm tree; there
 stood an exquisite bungalow painted in blue and white.
 "It's not much," she said, "but I call it home.

 Sit down please; would you like to have a drink?"  "No,"
 said the man, "one more coconut juice and I'll puke."  "It
 won't be coconut juice," the woman replied.  "I have a still,
 how about a Pina Colada?"  Trying to hide his continued
 amazement, the man accepted, and they sat down on her
 couch to talk. After a while, and they had exchanged their
 stories, the woman asked, "Tell me, have you always had
 a beard?" "No," the man replied, "I was clean shaven all of
 my life, and even on the cruise ship."  "Well if you would
 like to shave, there is a razor upstairs in the cabinet in the
 bathroom."

 So, the man, no longer questioning anything, went upstairs
 to the bathroom. There in the cabinet was a razor made
 from a bone handle, two shells honed to a hollow ground
 edge were fastened on to its end inside of a swivel
 mechanism.  The man shaved, showered and went back
 down stairs.  "You look great," said the woman.  "I think I
 will go up and slip into something more comfortable."  So
 she did.  And, the man continued to sip his Pina Colada.

 After a short time, the woman returned wearing fig leaves
 strategically positioned and smelling faintly of gardenias.
 "Tell me," she asked, "we have both been out here for a
 very long time with no companionship.  You know what I
 mean.  Have you been lonely, is there anything that you
 really miss? Something that all men and woman need.
 Something that it would be really nice to have right now."

 "Yes there is," the man replied, as he moved closer to the
 woman while fixing a winsome gaze upon her, "Tell me...
 can I check my e-mail?"