Cruise Ship Specialties

When most of you think of cruise ships, you probably imagine destination cruises to places like Caribbean islands, Nordic fjords or European rivers. Today you’ll learn about specialized cruises where the ship sails into international waters and drops anchor. Each deck features a different activity; the cruisers sign up in advance and usually stay on that deck for the duration of the cruise.

This idea came to me after seeing an article in the New York Times revealing that some cruise ships now have jails and morgues. Imagine sharing a cruise with a boatload of imprisoned felons. Or exploring the ship and happening upon a door labeled “Morgue.” On the other hand, selecting your trip based on some activity you love and being able to spend a week doing it on the bounding main with others who also love it could have strong appeal. Herewith are my suggestions for specialty cruises.

There will of course be a deck dedicated to yoga, but there will be no goats. Each type of yoga will have its own section of the deck with mats color-coded so that participants don’t accidentally plop their butts in the wrong section. Imagine if a kundalini adherent wound up on a vinyasa mat!

The increasingly popular discipline of wall climbing will also be represented. “Rock” placement will begin with an easy section toward the stern of the ship and become increasingly more difficult as the wall progresses toward the bow. Climbing shoes will be available for rent for those who neglected to bring their own. And no, you can’t show off by climbing barefoot.

An obvious deck will be one devoted to Mahjong. Just imagine rows and rows of tables with perfectly coiffed ladies in gold lamé dresses and sequined ballet slippers! A cruise made in heaven for women who don’t know what deck their husbands are on and don’t care. The men, on the other hand, may very well be on one of the upper decks enjoying the cigar bar and perhaps visiting the tattoo parlor. The cigars won’t pollute the rest of the decks; the smoke will waft out the portals and drift upward.

We expect the deck that is dedicated to line dancing to be over-subscribed, so if that’s one that interests you, be sure to book early. That will also enable you to request your preferred dances. The Electric Slide and the Cowboy Cha Cha will be included even if no one requests them. The Cupid Shuffle will help beginners get into this predictable wedding activity. Rest assured you won’t be subjected to the Macarena or the YMCA.

 

Not surprisingly, there will be a deck dedicated to sun bathing. It will have normal cabins, but a considerable portion will be open to the sky. A secluded section will be reserved for those who want to stretch out in the altogether. In the evening this deck will feature celestial navigation. That secluded section will still be available for nude “relaxation.” If these turn out to be in demand, there will be a sign up sheet for reservations. Please don’t use aliases for this sheet.

 

You might expect to find decks for card games and board games but there won’t be. Those are far too pedestrian. Not to mention how difficult it would be to decide which ones to include and which ones to eliminate. So no poker; no bridge; no canasta; no checkers; no Monopoly; no Clue. Likewise, you can forget jigsaw puzzles and book clubs. Also, we have no interest in competing with other cruise lines, so we won’t have a casino or a pickle ball court.

 

Our final deck is what I call the participation deck. Cruisers who sign up plan either to participate in the entertainment activity or to enthusiastically heckle the performers. This is a shared deck. The stern hosts the stand-up comedy performances. Wannabe comics test their chops here. The bow hosts the poetry slam, where aspiring poets try out their own material. Hecklers can wander between the two areas.

 

Including the prison and morgue, there will be nine decks on these specialty cruises. (The cigar bar and tattoo parlor will share a deck.) You’ll have plenty of choices, but book your passage early to be sure to get the deck with your favorite activity.

 

Copyright 2024 Business Theatre Unlimited

Perverted Pleasuring

There’s one aspect of sexual harassment that has me scratching my head. It’s all these reports about men getting their rocks off by forcing their victims to watch them get their rocks off. Surely these men don’t think women are turned on watching men “pleasure themselves.” Or if they did think this on their first outing, wouldn’t they eventually have figured out that the ladies’ facial contortions did not reflect the throes of ecstasy? After all, based on the reports, these aren’t one-off occurrences.

Obviously it’s the men who are turned on, and the logical explanation is that it’s about control; it’s a power trip. I let this notion percolate a bit. Then I asked myself: If I were a predator and wanted to force a male to watch me do something he’d find repulsive, what might that be? It didn’t take me long to come up with a list. Needless to say, none of the items involve me “pleasuring myself” sexually. That would no doubt be a turn-on for these offenders. My pleasures lie in things sufficiently abhorrent to qualify as payback.

First, I’d make him sit with me to look at chick flicks on the Hallmark romcom channel. If I were in in a really spiteful mood, I’d then turn to COZI TV and subject him to four back-to-back episodes of the original Will & Grace sitcom. In my area, that show runs from 10 pm to midnight. This seems like an ideal window for a predator to stalk prey, which means a double whammy of two hours of gay humor combined with missing out on prime opportunities for his own predation. I get a tingle just thinking about this torture.

Next, he’d have to look at me eating a huge helping of Breyers vanilla bean ice cream with dark amber maple syrup drizzled all over it. If this sounds like a turn on to some of you, you’ve never seen me dive into a container of ice cream. I don’t have the patience to wait for it to get soft. I attack it with a metal scoop. It’s not pretty. And I don’t share.

If I were feeling particularly perverse, I’d log onto my computer and force him to watch me enter data into the Excel spreadsheet I’ve set up to track what I spend each month. I get excited just thinking about spreadsheets. My columns run all the way to AF and I have close to 1000 rows already. I’d provide a running commentary while formatting breakouts within categories that can be tax deductible (at least until the Republicans pass their new tax plan) and insert subtotals. If your eyes are glazing over right now, just imagine having to sit through it.

At this point, I’d move on to a yoga session. Seeing me wrestle my yoga pants onto my rolls and love handles may not be as revolting as the sight of me excavate myself into a pair of Spanx, but what would come next would be a surefire turn off. My go-to exercise would be the Pawanmuktasana, or as I like to call it: the Breaking Wind Pose. It helps get rid of excess stomach gas. You lie on your back, arms and legs extended; draw your right knee tightly to your chest and clasp your hands around it until you break wind; straighten leg. Reverse and repeat. And repeat and repeat… You get the idea.

Finally, I’d tie him up and practice my saxophone for at least an hour. Ten minutes of this would be observing me wet my reed. While this might get him aroused at first, the next ten minutes while I try to affix that reed to the mouthpiece just so would leave him softer than the reed would be after all that sucking. The remainder of the time—when I would actually be playing—would do him in completely.

Oh, yes. I’m prepared to subject any sexual predator who crosses my path to repulsive pleasuring of my own. I guarantee it will be a long time before he can give himself a happy ending again.

Copyright 2017 Elaine M. Decker

Yoga for Seniors

Are you interested in lowering your BMI (Body Mass Index)? If your lingerie budget is as skimpy as mine post-retirement, before you spring for the caffeine panties I wrote about last week, you might want to look into yoga exercises. They not only relax you and tone your body, they’re purported to help keep your weight under control.

There are quite a few exercises that shouldn’t be too challenging for seniors, but would still provide benefits. Several of them can be done using chairs and walls, and therefore don’t require us to get down on a mat. Or more importantly, to get up from one when we’re done. However, most of the ones I’m sharing today have you at least partly on the floor. You can thank me later.

Yoga helps stretch our muscles, ligaments and tendons. It also improves our flexibility and increases our range of motion, all admirable objectives. According to health.howstuffworks.com, “you don't need to be able to tie yourself in knots to become more flexible.” That’s a relief. I always thought that true yogis needed the ability to turn themselves into pretzels. On that note, let’s try some poses.

We’re starting with the One-legged Breaking Wind Pose to help get rid of excess stomach gas. Lie on your back with arms and legs extended. Exhale, draw your knees to your chest and clasp your hands around them until you break wind. Straighten just your left leg, extending it along the floor. Then bring your left knee back to your chest and hold until you fart again. Release and extend your right leg. Bring your right knee back to your chest and exhale for one final wind breaker. I hope you feel better now.

Legs in Parentheses improves flexibility and has been adapted especially for seniors. Sit on the floor and spread your legs apart as much as you comfortably can. If you’re able to straighten them quite widely, by all means, go for the traditional Legs in V. But feel free to bend your knees slightly into parentheses. Lean forward and feel your leg muscles stretching as you count to ten. Lean back. Repeat.

The Shiva Shiver is an obscure yoga pose that helps you lose weight. Supposedly, if you shiver for one hour, you burn 400 calories. Stand in front of your freezer in your underwear. Open the door and put your head inside. Within a few minutes, you should start to shiver. Stay like this for 15 minutes and you’ll burn 100 calories. Hint: empty the freezer out first, in case you fall in, and set a timer to revive you when you’re done. The Shiva Shiver gives new meaning to the phrase “freezer burn.”

Quarter Spinal Twist is great for women with osteoporosis; it lengthens and strengthens your spine. So put on some Chubby Checker and let’s do The Twist. Sit with the bottoms of your feet under your butt. Then place your left foot flat on the floor next to your right knee. If you can’t reach the floor with your foot flat, touch with just your toe. Twist to the left a quarter turn until your foot comes off the floor, or until your muffin top pinches. Switch feet and legs and twist again.

One of my favorite positions is Downward Facing Cat. It helps us strengthen our abdominal and back muscles, improving our balance. Get down on all fours, like a cat. If you’re not sure how this looks, go to your local animal shelter and adopt a cat. Bring it home and watch it for a few hours. Then stretch like your feline friend, rounding your spine, with your head down. DoingA360.com/Basic-Yoga-Poses says: “As you reverse this… the head comes up and the belly droops.” Boy, have I got this position covered!

The unfortunately-named Corpse pose helps you relax at the end of your yoga session. I didn’t need a website to tell me that. I doze off almost every time I do the Corpse. I just never had a name for it. Climbing the Wall is a variation for seniors. Lie on your back on the floor with legs straight up against a wall, arms slightly out from your sides. Then wiggle around. It’s a good way to scratch your back when it’s driving you crazy. It’s also the end of our session.

Master these six yoga poses and you’ll be well on your way to senior Nirvana, with lower blood pressure, better balance and improved flexibility. Some of you will also have a lower BMI and a new cat to keep you warm. I’m here to serve.

Retirement Updates—Sex, Meds and Pain

A collection of recent news items makes me glad I’ve reached retirement age. For one thing, I don’t have to worry about contraception anymore. This is fortunate, since Pfizer just recalled one million packages of several of its popular birth control pills. The pills were put into the daily dispenser packets in the wrong order. That means your hormone levels would be all wack-a-doodle, “increasing the likelihood of unintended pregnancies.” Ya think?

If I were on those pills, I’d be pregnant sure as God made little green apples (and Pats don’t reign in Indianapolis). As it is, I need one of those days-of-the-week containers just to keep my vitamins straight. A manufacturer screw up on the sequence of birth control pills would have meant preggers for certain. Not to mention that my hormone levels are already wack-a-doodle. If I had wack-a-doodle on steroids, my husband would be cleared for instant sainthood—and he’s Hindu.

If you’re feeling smug because you (or your partner) wear a raincoat for protection, keep reading. Some 1.35 million condoms distributed by the ANC in South Africa also were just recalled because the condoms broke during intercourse. That doesn’t mean that ones in the U.S. will also let the rain in (or out), but would you want to take a chance? Just sayin’. That leaves the rhythm method, which, I’m told, will be covered by all insurance plans, regardless of who is elected President in November.

A related news item (or not) is that Japan’s Health and Welfare Ministry projects that its population will decrease 30% by the year 2060 and be aging rapidly—seniors will then account for about 40%. Life spans will be longer (almost 91 for women by 2060) and birth rates lower (1.35 per woman by then). The report was issued just before the Pfizer recall, so expect adjustments to these figures when the next projections come out.

Maybe the Japanese need to practice yoga. My husband drew my attention to a Nightline feature on a new book on the benefits of yoga. The only one he remembered is that yoga increases sex drive. The cobra pose in particular is supposed to improve blood flow to the pelvis, leading to better “yogasms.” Will more yogasms lead to more offspring? Hard to say…

There’s good news for retirees on the medical front. A drug created to treat skin cancer has been shown to reverse the symptoms of Alzheimer’s in mice. More specifically: scientists at Case Western Reserve University have found that bexarotene improves memory function and social behavior in laboratory mice.

I’m a little fuzzy on how they were able to measure these improvements. I’m picturing the control group scampering around willy-nilly, squealing “Who moved my cheese?” Or maybe the ones on the test protocol found the cheese even when it was in the researcher’s pocket.

You have to wonder how they assess social behavior in mice. Are there recordings of the males murmuring, “Hey there, Minnie. Wanna see my etchings?” I did note something in the report about the mice building nests from tissue paper. Isn’t that what they do when they’re pregnant? Hmmm. Maybe they were on Pfizer’s birth control pills. I don’t want to even think about broken mouse condoms.

Another gender-related item: women feel pain more than men do. These findings fly in the face of beliefs that women have a higher pain threshold than men. In a study of 11,000 hospitalized patients with various ailments, women self-reported acute pain more than men did. However, since most nurses were female, men may have sucked it up to seem more macho. One pain women definitely tolerate better is a pain in the butt, especially when it’s caused by men trying to seem macho.

You are now up to date on all the important developments having to do with sex, meds and pain. I aim to serve. But not to learn the cobra pose…