The Vacation of Schadenfreude

I’m back!!

We had a fabulous time.  I was so damn spoiled and pampered, I felt like Paris Hilton should have been carrying me around in a little expensive purse.

In fact, it was almost embarrassing.  I now know why rich people always wear big sunglasses – because they don’t want to have to make eye-contact with the plebes.

It all started with the upgrade in our hotel in South Beach.  We were upgraded to a suite with a big, private balcony.  It overlooked the pool and the beach.  Here’s a view from our balcony.  Oh, look – there’s me, too!

On Sunday, we headed to the cruise ship.  Bill had surprised me by upgrading us to a deluxe stateroom, which also got us VIP status.  When we walked into the cruise terminal, the lines were incredibly long.   I was sure we’d be waiting for hours but then we saw signs for a separate VIP check-in.  We entered a quiet lounge furnished with overstuffed furniture, cool air, and soft music.  We were invited to sit and relax until our name was called, which took about 5 minutes.  A few minutes later, we were ready to board the ship.  We walked passed those huge lines with a sense of glee and delight cracking jokes about how it’s good to be king.

The rest of the week, we noticed, there were no special VIP lines.  Our punishment for the glee we felt during the boarding process was to have to wait in line with the little people for everything else all week long.  Oh, the humanity!

We spent time in the cruise ship bar.  Oh, look – there’s me again!

I got up solo and did karaoke!  I never had the nerve to do karaoke before, not going up there alone, but given that I knew no one and would never see those people again, I did it.  I sang Simon and Garfunkel’s Cecelia and I rocked it.  Seriously.  (If it shows up on Youtube and it’s determined by popular opinion that I didn’t really rock it, I’ll come back here and edit this post to say I crashed and burned.)

It was the vacation of bikini wearing.  I assume this is what is referred to as a bikini.  The bottoms were full-coverage and, really, that was by necessity.  Trust me on that.  Still, it felt pretty good to be rocking a 2-piece suit for the first time since I was a little kid.

It was, also, the vacation of topless sun-bathing.  OH YES I DID!  I did that on Miami’s South Beach, before the cruise.  The beach itself was not a topless beach, but there were plenty of sunbathers doing it.  And, yes, if they all were jumping off a bridge, I just might have joined them at that too – IF bridge-jumping was something on my bucket list!

It was the vacation of the private cabana at the beach in Honduras.  The cabana had a hammock and lounge chairs and waitstaff service.  Oh, look – there I am again!  And again!

There was a security person who worked the row of private cabanas who would shoo off any interlopers who came from the public beach area and tried to use our chairs.  We had a few people who just wanted to use the hammock for a minute, to take a picture.  I thought we should charge $2.00, but then Bill said if the women flashed him, he’d let them take the photo for free.  See how generous we are to the little people??

It was the vacation of ice cream cones and books and good music from my iPod.  It was the vacation of no phone and no TV and no Blackberry and no Internet.  It was the vacation of eating and sleeping and gambling and relaxing and shopping and reading.

It was the vacation of me looking adorable.

Oh, and yeah – he was there too:

And we were even together in a photo occasionally: