Bahamas, Baby!

Okay, so I think our home computer is totally viral (probably the bird flu) and I'm not able to download pictures right now. So pics from the weekend trip will have to wait, sorry. But I have some time at work today to fill you in on the details via "my words" so I thought I'd do so. If you have only a short time to read the recap, glance at the "short version," but if you have time to read and absorb, read the "long version."

Short version: Trip was fun.

Long version: We boarded the ship on Friday and got right down to the business of eating and drinking. Before we'd left Miami, I was already pretty buzzed from the bucket of beer my husband and I split, which made the emergency drill a little more bearable (really, would we all be that calm and orderly if the ship were sinking? something tells me there would be panic and chaos). After the lifeboat drill, our ship pulled out of port, and my husband and I went to the spa for our scheduled massages.

I had been anticipating that massage for months, and I was practically giddy just thinking about it. The masseuse, however, was not so pleased with the knots she found in my neck and shoulders (every massage I've ever had has been like this: they always tell me I'm a ball of stress and need more regular massages). She spent nearly half her time kneeding out the build up of lactic acid in my neck and shoulders, and I have to be honest, parts of it were just plain painful -- but, she assured me it was entirely necessary. Later, she did spend some time on the rest of my body, and it felt so good to get my legs rubbed down.

When we were done with the massages, we got ready for dinner, but by then, I was really feeling the boat. On our cruise a year ago, I barely felt the boat move, but Friday night, it was swaying back and forth and by the time we were ready for dinner, I was feeling pretty ill. Still, I soldiered on and took some Drammamine and went to dinner. But while we were waiting outside the dining room for our seating, I felt the wave of barf wash over me and I had to dash back to the room and hurl. And that's how I spent the rest of that evening. My husband ended up ordering room service and watching a movie while I spent the night hunched over the toilet in our tiny bathroom.

Thankfully, on Saturday morning I felt better, but was sore from the massage. Our boat wasn't able to dock in Coco Cay because of rocky surf (apparently, the boat couldn't remain anchored), so we spent the day at sea instead, which was fine, since we had fun aboard ship as well. We climbed the rock wall (harder and scarier than I thought it would be), we lay out in the sun (husband got a little burned) and we napped and read. Oh! And I also found a lucky slot machine in the casino and won some dollars! Saturday was our anniversary so we had a nice dinner with champagne and so forth, and it was quite lovely and appropriately romantic.

On Sunday, we docked in Nassau, Bahamas, and we spent the day walking around town. And one of the best parts of the whole trip was some of the shopping. There were the regular tourist shops (t-shirts, postcards, the usual trinkets) and then there were the usual fancy-pants stores (Gucci, Coach, Cartier), but then we found this place called the straw market, which was a city block chock full of designer purses for cheap! At first, I thought they were knock-offs, but after inspecting the insides, and carefully examining the outsides, I concluded that they were indeed real (but maybe fell off a boat? I have no idea!). So, there was every designer you can imagine: Coach, Louis Vuitton, Burberry, Gucci, Prada, Fendi, Kate Spade, I could go on, and they had all varieties of handbags, wallets, and luggage, and it was all priced to sell!

I walked away with two purses and a wallet for myself: a purse for my stepmom, a wallet for my mom, and a purse for my sister-in-law. It was awesome! I was so excited, I was practically shaking! And as excited as I was at the find, I think my husband was even more thrilled (he loves a good deal, even if it's on stuff he doesn't know or care a rat's ass about). After the high of purchasing so many expensive wares for so cheap a price, I was barely conscious of the rest of the day (kidding, it was fun in the sun!).

Yesterday morning, we arrived back in Miami -- to find that someone had backed into my car and knocked the driver's side mirror off, but what can you do? And I had class yesterday afternoon, so it was back to the grindstone right away. It was a good trip, but now I feel as though I need a couple days off just to sleep (you know how you feel like you need a vacation after your vacation?). Oh well, I'll ease back into the swing of things.

Told you this was the long version.