CruiserMel Wins A Platinum Award

Hey guys! It's great to be back on dry land, but I have to say for the millionth time - cruising the high seas is greater than great.

Our adventures began with CruiserMel being awarded Platinum status by Carnival Cruises. I wasn't sure what that meant, but maybe a little speedier service from the bartenders, which would've been fine with me. But no - it meant that I'd spent untold dollars on their ships 10-plus times and thus would garner personalized stationary, petit fours delivered to the cabin, and priority spa appointments, among other things. It even included a free shot at insulting the captain. Yeah, you read that right.

It began with the first rear-end kissing from a staff member who greeted me as if we were old pals and said "Welcome back, CruiserMel. If I can do anything to make your stay nicer, please feel free to call me 24 hours a day." Um....okay. Then the invitation came. "You are cordially invited to a special cocktail party honoring our Platinum members." Okie dokie - free watery drinks and pseudo-warm mini-quiches. What the hell - it's free. I left L at the blackjack table (since it just wasn't workin' for CruiserMel at all) and found I was special. There were all of 8 Platinum passengers amongst 15 uniformed officers and staff-members. And there was real caviar and Moet champagne! The real deal. Was this really Carnival? I quickly found myself surrounded by three officers (cruise director, assistant cruise director, and the chief purser) and they were placing their lips firmly upon my buttocks and well on their way to causing hickies. You'd have thought I was the princess of cruising. [And they would be correct.] Before I knew it we were playing movie quote trivia and giggling from the free Moet.

Pay attention, here's where the insulting comes in.

A nice looking Italian man approached and took my hand in his. He said he was glad to "finally" meet me [what?] and apologized that he needed to excuse himself as he had to have dinner with the employees of the month. Before I could see how many stripes were on his shoulder, I poo-poo'd him away with a flippant "well, isn't that nice of you" and turned my back on him. I saw the faces of the now-snorting and laughing staff members and realized the error of my ways. Yeah, I'd poo-poo'd the captain. And I was their new hero. I was at Queen status now. Luckily I never saw the captain after that. I know what you're thinking, but hey - he should've SAID he was the captain!

L and I had specifically chosen this ship so as to surprise our Romanian friend for his birthday. His triple-take when he first saw us was priceless. So was his face when he opened his prezzie of approximately 10 pounds of chocolate candy. [This particular Romanian will do anything for chocolate and frankly, it's kind of gross how he attacks it.] But the look on his face was more touching than a little kid on Christmas morning. He took us to his favorite Mexican restaurant in Cozumel for great food and several Mexican beers with lime wedges. We window shopped for jewelry. We had a lovely day in port. Soon it was back to the ship for more pampering and fun.

Though CruiserMel left a few pesos (read: alot) on the table in the casino, the trip was a fun one. 5 days, 4 nights of fun and frolic. And hot guys. Very hot foreign guys. One can never have enough of those.

I've been home 48 hours and now have something that seems quite alot like the Tourista. I'm sure it's just a virus, but part of me thinks it's either those limes in my Mexican beers or the captain put a time-released whammy on me. Not fun. Payback can apparently be hell. Believe.

On another note: I killed my camera on my trip to the mid-west in January and didn't get any pictures of CruiserMel's foreign men. Alas, in between my trips to the bathroom today, I mustered up the strength to buy a new one online. And it is sswwwweeeeeet. I can't wait to shower y'all with my photography prowess.

On yet another note, and this one is weird: in checking out the google searches that lead folks to this blog, I've come across one that had me stumped until I watched my recorded American Idol from last Thursday. The search words were "Kelli Pickler Implants." Once I watched the playback, I got it. Good grief - have you seen those things?

Time to go - and by "go" I mean GO.

So get on outta here. Seriously. Arriba!!!!