Poke out your mind's eye

In the midst of more pressing news about Iraq, Terri Schiavo and cloned buffalo in China you may have missed the very small (but comedically exploitable) news story about a shipful of gay and nudist passengers being denied entry into St. Kitts.

I'm certain that this will turn into another referendum on gay rights and I predict that ultimately St. Kitts will have to issue some sort of apology to the gay, nudist community.

Speaking in marketing terms, the passengers of the cruise appear to be "dual category shoppers." In other words, there isn't one nudist section and one gay section of the ship. The passengers seem to be gay AND nudist. Demographically that's a really skinny slice of the pie.

Likewise, the story is unclear about the staff's participation in the nudist and/or gay cruise ship activities. Think about that entry item on a resume... 1999-2005 I served as Activities Director for Barefoot Windjammer Gay,Nudist cruises... Where does your career go from there? Can you name another job where a person might need to know how to organize a nude limbo?

I thought karaoke was bad enough on it's own... imagine a bar full of naked men singing Elton John, Cher and George Michael songs. Yes... with a lisp.

If you have trouble sleeping on hotel sheets because you saw that episode of 60Minutes then imagine getting on a cruise ship where even the railings and the deck chairs came in contact with someone else's naked body.

Sort of makes you wonder what other gay, nudist forms of vacation transportation might be out there... Gay, Nudist Trains... Gay, Nudist Hot Air Ballooning... Gay, Nudist Motorcycle Tours... Gay, Nudist Airlines... Gay, Nudist Safaris... Gay, Nudist River Rafting... Really makes me want to carry my own bottle of Lysol around with me. I don't know if the raft I'm getting on was last used by gay, nudist thrill seekers.

There's a joke that's eluding me right now... it has to do with iced jumbo shrimp, waiting in the buffet line and meeting the captain... if you can put those together in some humorous fashion let me know.