It’s the apathy of people like me that made the Mayans extinct.

Last week, we did our seven day Caribbean cruise with four excursions.

One of them was Belize.  If you’re like me, you might think that someone totally made up that country to see if you were as dumb as they thought you were.  You might be saying “You’re pulling my leg.  Belize?  You totally made that up, didn’t you?”

Well, you’d be WRONG.  There really is a Belize.  In fact, we came this close to seeing its king.

But, alas, he never came out to wave to the crowd of onlookers so we can only imagine his royalness.

We took a tour bus to the Mayan ruins to look around a little.  (They all pretty much look the same.) (Just in case you wanted to skip that part and go lie on the beach with some Pina Coladas or something.) And then we took a riverboat tour back to the port where our ship was.

Oh, and in the middle of all that, I had a cheeseburger for lunch.

(But I don’t think it was made by the burger king of Belize, just FYI.  It was a pretty mundane cheeseburger.  I expect the ones made by the burger king of Belize would be special, like maybe with some guacamole on them or something.)

Here are the ruins:

OK, now you can go have a drink.  You saw it.  Cool.

My husband is the one who wanted to book this tour.  Me?  I have no culture whatsoever and am kind of boring and apathetic.  It’s part of my charm.  I could have skipped it.  I mean, we were on a bus for two hours.  Do you know how many ice cream cones I could have imbibed in those two hours?  Really.

He said “You could at least ACT interested.  I pretend to like your stuff way better than you pretend to like my stuff.”

That is absolutely true, and there is no better evidence of it than the arena of oral sex.  Ahem.  (Hey!  It’s not your birthday, mister!  Get that thing away from me!)

After the Mayan ruins, we had that cheeseburger and then we boarded a riverboat for a tour down the River Wallace.

It was more boring that the ruins.  The good news was that I got a seat in the back of the boat where the twin outboard motors were and there was a strong gasoline odor back there which sort of got me buzzed.  It wasn’t as good as a Pina Colada, but you have to take what you can get.

We saw alligators:

And iguanas:

And other stuff too.  Monkeys and humming birds and whatever.  But the photos are all boring (I’m not in ANY of them!!) so I won’t post any more.

Every time we saw an alligator, everyone on the boat would run to the side where it was and start taking pictures.  This is how we ended up with 117 pictures of alligators.  And let’s face it – they all look the same.  Oh, I’m sure if alligators understood the English language, they would call me a racist for such a remark but whatever.  I’m not scared of them.

Except that I’m totally scared of them so don’t tell them I think they all look alike, OK?

When people ran to one side of the boat to take pictures, I felt it was my responsibility to keep my weight on the opposite side to keep us from tipping over.  Because if there is one thing I hate as much as getting eaten by sharks, it’s getting eaten by alligators.

Before long, I realized I could make the puppets dance and I would say “LOOK!  Alligator!” and they would all run over and I’d say “Oh, wait.  It was just a stick.”

Eventually they started ignoring me.  I had to up the ante.

“OHMYGOD – an ANACONDA – it must be nine feet long! Holy shit!”

When they’d all run over, I’d say “Oops, you just missed it – it went under the water.”  or maybe “That alligator just ate it.  Next time move faster when I pull your strings.”

Hey, you have to make your own fun when you’re on a tour of the River Wallace in  Belize.  I’m sure the gas fumes were influencing my behavior.

As we came to the end of the river where it pours out into the sea, we even saw a manatee.  Now, sure, it was dead and bloated and stunk to high heavens, but I made Bill take a picture anyway.  Mostly because it was the only time all those other jokers didn’t run over to that side with their cameras, so we finally got a clear shot.

Rest in peace, gentle sea cow.

When I was tallying all the animals we saw, I included the manatee.  Bill said “You can’t count that.  It was dead.”  I argued with him.  “I can TOTALLY count that even though it was dead!!  When I tally up how many countries I’ve been in, I always count Japan even though it was just a flight connection and I was only in one arm of the airport for a few hours and I never stepped foot outside.  If Japan counts, then the manatee counts, too.”

The problem with Bill is that he doesn’t think Japan counts either.  But whatever.  He knows better than to fight the crazy so he conceded the point and the manatee was included in my tally.

Alligators (lots), iguanas (three), monkeys (about a dozen), hummingbirds (I think it was four but it could have been just one doing those hummingbird Jedi-mind tricks where it moves so fast I can’t tell if it’s the same one or not), and manatee (one, dead and bloated).

I thought we were done seeing animals but shortly after that, we saw some dolphins:

If you’re like me, you’re probably thinking “SHARKS!!  Shoot the mother-effers!  Shoot them dead!”  But you might have regretted shouting that out because, dude, they’re dolphins.  But I totally understand your fear because I, too, want to shoot dead anything that might be a shark.  That movie – it did a number on me.

Still, dolphins are cute.  I used to watch Flipper, so I know.  I’m also pretty good at doing a dolphin imitation which I learned from Flipper.  There were dolphins all over Belize – I totally heard them.  “Did you hear that?” I’d say to Bill.  “Dolphins!”  He would roll his eyes and say “That sound came from up in the trees – those were birds.”

Maybe they were mynah birds imitating dolphins.  Maybe.  But they were probably dolphins that had migrated to the trees.  Dolphins are mammals, you know.  Poor Bill – I have to be patient with him.  He’s not as sharp as I am.

All in all, this whole jaunt took us about seven hours and cost a few hundred dollars.  I wanted to tell these people that the Internet is FULL of photos of alligators and Mayan ruins, but the internet cannot bring me a Pina Colada on a tray.  I’m quite sure they wouldn’t have understood – people are kind of dumb.  It’s only life experience that will teach them and maybe someday they will know better and prioritize Pina Coladas over some dumb tour of rubble from people who are dead and a bunch of animals that would eat your legs off if you let them.

To each his own.  That’s my motto.

Of our whole vacation, this is the only day that was overcast and so it was the only day we didn’t slather on sunscreen.  Of course, it was also the only day we got sunburned.  Bill said “We fell victim to one of the classic blunders, the most famous of which is never get involved in a land war in Asia but only slightly less well-known is this:  never spend the day outside without sunscreen even when it’s overcast when SUNBURN is on the line.”

I spent that evening shivering under the covers while my skin emanated enough heat to roast marshmallows.

That’s what I get for being a cynical smart-ass all day.  Perhaps this is the sort of thing that led to the demise of the Mayan culture.

Aw, who cares. Someone bring me a Pina Colada, stat.