Porthole Magazine
May 1, 2005
Passengers: He Said She Said

From: Matt Hannafin
To: Heidi Sarna
Sent: 1/5/2005, 1:25 PM
Subject: He Said, She Said

So, the next “he said/she said” is due to Porthole January 15. The topic of the issue is "hot hot hot!" It's the swimsuit issue. Now, topic A: I am NOT getting photographed in a bathing suit. Nope. No way. Sorry. Topic B: What the hell are we going to write about? Let's put on our thinking thongs.

From: Heidi Sarna
To: Matt Hannafin
Sent: 1/5/2005, 1:47 PM
Subject: He Said, She Said

Ouch, mine's pinching off my creative juices. Just a sec . . . OK, there, better. Sooo, hot hot hot! . . . jeez. . . . Well, OK, we could focus on passengers, like some of the suits I've seen gals wear. On Radisson’s Seven Seas Navigator they came w/gold trim and were matched to coordinating earrings and sandals. On Carnival they’re totally TMI suits—yeouch. Take those off!

Matt: What’s TMI?

Heidi: “Too much information.” Duh.

Matt: Ah so. But wait, you want them to take their suits off?

Heidi: Oh dear, then everything would sort of just spring out . . . or not, actually. . . . Well, I'd say there are two types of bikini-wearers aboard cruise ships. There's the you-go-girl types who squeeze a ton of flesh into a few inadequate triangles of fabric and there's the too-perfect ones with fake you-know-whats poking through their inadequate triangles of fabric. Maybe I'm just a square, but what happened to taste!!!!

Matt: Hey, it’s the Age of Aquarius, baby. Let it all hang out. My favorite bikini story was last year in the Caribbean. I’d taken one of those booze-cruise excursions that includes a couple hours of beach time. Lots of the women were taking off their tops. This one 50-ish woman near me obviously wanted to. As soon as her husband went in the water she sat up all casual and sort of let it fall to her waist. Tumty tumpty tum. Sitting here with my top down. Then she got nervous and pulled it back up. Looked around again. Let it drop. Tumpty tumpty tum. She did that for about ten minutes. On, off, on, off. Probably the biggest thrill of her life.

Heidi: Yeah, and you were staring at her the whole time, weren’t you? Maybe it was the biggest thrill of your life! Speaking of somebody's thrills anyway, there was this little old coot on Royal Caribbean’s Grandeur of the Seas in the Med a few years back. Halfway through the men's sexy legs contest by the pool, he limped over -- and mind you, one of his legs was a lot shorter than the other -- and asked the cruise director if he could join. She tried to talk him out of it, but he insisted. You should have seen him, grinning like a leprechaun in his bright purple trunks, posing and primping with the rest of the posse. Weirdddddddd . . .

Matt: It’s a formula: Get on cruise ship, lose inhibitions. Back in ’98 I was out on Commodore Cruise Line’s old Enchanted Capri. It had a lounge right below the pool, and there were windows cut so you could see the swimmers. I was talking to a woman from Texas who’d been aboard before. "See the windows?” she said. “That's where my friend Bayard mooned everybody. His wife was soooo mad."

Heidi: I seem to recall you've lost your inhibitions once or twice.

Matt: Nope. Not once. Not ever. I’m Irish, remember? We keep everything bottled up till we pop.

Heidi: OK, guess I was dreaming when I saw you fling yourself onto the bowsprit of Windjammer's Legacy, gripping a bottle of cheap champagne for dear life.

Matt: You’re right, you were dreaming. It never happened.

Heidi: Like you said, though, there's something about a cruise ship that just sucks all sense of decorum right out the door. Like what some people consider formalwear. I’ve seen some really scary bridesmaid dresses . . .

Matt: I’ve got you beat. I once saw a woman shimmy up the water slide on a Royal Caribbean ship wearing her wedding dress and high heels.

Heidi: Get out, you're lying!

Matt: Hand to god.

Heidi: In all fairness, there are also some pretty nicely dressed people too. Some men look pretty darn yummy in a tux. Though fewer and fewer guys seem to be bothering with them.

Matt: Know why? Because you have to pack almost a whole extra suitcase just to bring them: jacket, trousers, tux shirts, suspenders, cummerbund, high-gloss shoes that you can only wear to dinner, shirt studs, cufflinks – it’s ridiculous.

Heidi: Ha, all I need are a couple of black Lycra things, a skirt or two, and a dress. I roll 'em up in ball, cause they don't wrinkle, and shove them into the corner of my suitcase. Takes no space at all. If it really bothered you anyway, you could rent a tux on the ship. Ships do that you know, rent stuff.

Matt: Nah, I’d feel like I was going to the prom. Besides, I really just prefer casual – and the way cruise lines have been loosening up lately, I can get away with one dark sport jacket for the whole week. Put on a tie and poof! It’s formal.

Heidi: Now wait, you could never get a date for your prom, so how do you know what it feels like?

Matt: Au contraire, the smartest girl at my school asked me.

Heidi: Yeah, alright, whatever. But me, I sort of like getting all dressed up once in a while, and a cruise is the perfect place to do it. In fact, when I shop, I keep an eye open for "cruise clothes." Where else can I wear a low-cut dress with gold threads running through it, or some sheer, billowy sort of thing?

Matt: “Cruise clothes”? Yikes. And I used to think you were cool.

Heidi: No way, pal, I’m hot, hot, hot!

Matt: Ooh, good one . . .