Elderly Funn

We had lunch with an older couple, Gloria and Bill, from Chicago—“well, the suburbs” in the main dining room. It was very hilarious. She was a 5’ tall firecracker who is a real estate broker because she can do it whenever she wants and she is NOT going to retire because “retired people get bored and then they get really negative. We have each other so if the other one starts to get negative, we just say ‘hey! Stop it!’” She also complained of the society of the elderly, insofar as her retired friends “always want to go to 2 for 1 dinners or use coupons or eat at a certain time. Ugh, I just don’t want to do that. So it’s easier to just invite them over. Although they never reciprocate.” She also said about retiring: “I mean how many lunches can you have and how much golf can you play. I mean how many hours can you volunteer.” Which made me want to jump off a bridge.

Gloria informed us that she was very with it, because she has a Treo and also knows how to text message her grand children, which their OTHER grandmother, who is a little YOUNGER than she is does NOT know how to do. She also has over 500 real estate contacts and she also had full braces, which was impressive and made a statement because she had to be like 70 at least. My castmate/coworker/cronie Mark told her he was a vegetarian, which she wanted to discuss to the point of bothering him to talk about factory farming, and then she said she related because she is very concerned about conserving water, to the point that she times her grandchildren’s showers. She was sorry to get a more sophisticated house because before she would go downstairs and turn off the pump. Now she says she walks in there and says “you have one more minute to wash your hair—and you have to say that because they’re just in there writing on the shower door or something.” She says she teaches them all “waste not want not” and informed us that her kids have an artistic bent too and that hopefully we’ll make it big before she hits a wheelchair. They were both very sure of the fact that we have chosen the appropriate time of life to do this.

She was also hilariously sure of her grand daughter’s poor singing ability and told us “well, my grand daughter got cast in the lead of My Fair Lady at her school. She’s not a good singer but I guess she was the best they could find. They’re having someone come in to work with her but I told her to join the chorus.” This made Mark and I laugh out loud and then quickly stop because apparently this was not a joke.

We also covered the Prince of Dubai and the fact that on OTHER ships (people love talking about this) you can get a BUTLER who will bring you coffee and fresh fruit to your ROOM. And on OTHER ships there is an indoor ice skating rink and ice shows and a rock climbing wall. They were NOT happy with our cruise line because they KEPT messing up the coffee order and they even got a towel with holes. They got a cab driver to take them around Zhuatenejo and Ixtapa and wait while they had breakfast and while they got a massage—“you walk right through Senor Frog’s and go right on the beach and there are little huts there where you can get a massage for $15 for half an hour. They gave them to men and women at once—very discreet. Oh we loved Ixtapa.”

Mark and I got off and fully explored Zhuatenejo. When you walk around there for a while, and this is a little tourist coastal town, you find a lot of young army guys with very serious AK-47 type guns. Just, you know, hanging around. We also went into the market, with very few gringos, which was very cool, except for the incredibly large amount of very dead chickens who still had their heads, but no feathers and smelled faintly of fetal pig. Also all sorts of meat hanging from string and pegs or kinda sitting on a counter. The market was very cool, and there is no way in hell I will ever belong in Mexico because I am way too tall and way too white, so I will always wear I AM A TOURIST grade shorts and running shoes because who cares. Unfortunately I would also make an attractive kidnapping. Since like 2,000 whities visit one town at once and the jungle is close by, I am guessing this is why there were so many cops. Or death cops.

Also, while sitting on a side street to rest in the shade briefly, we saw guys coming back to their apartments from fleecing the tourists (with a guitar, or an accordion. One drunken pair consisted of a guy with a level. Obviously.) we also heard a guy shout to another guy “Cabbrone. Vamanos.” Which is “hey asshole, let’s go.” Ah the universal language of friendship.