Eels, octopi and a great beach getaway

Perhaps because my own twenties were perhaps not well-spent - thank goodness social media had yet to be invented - I believe that we all should be forgiven for that particular decade of our lives.

Case-in-point, Alison Reed brought two pairs of 3-inch heels to our Turks & Caicos trip and paired them with bikinis. That's what she wore to get down to the beach for two of our days there. 

Did we all question her choice? Yes. But I didn't protest and other than shaking our heads, we left her to her own fashion decisions.

We had our favorite spot on the beach - in sight of the Rum Shack and nearly at the end of the resort's property line where we spent most of our days. We had two cabanas there and some evergreen trees for shade when the sun was too much, and one of the most beautiful views in the world. 

Ali would take the heels off at the end of the boardwalk, and walk barefoot through the sand and spend the day sunning, shading, swimming and snorkeling before hopping back into them for the return strut to the other end of the property and our room.

On the last beach day, she wore platform sandals instead of the heels and was stopped by a couple of the resort employees who were manning a photography booth near the end of the boardwalk. "Where are the eels," one called out to her.

"Excuse me," she said, not sure of what he'd said.

"Where are the eels?"

Picturing a pair of wriggling eels, she quizzed him as his companion stared to laugh.

"Your eels!" he repeated, and she finally understood him to be asking where her heels were.

Apparently between her red hair and apparel - which got her kicked out of one restaurant that had an "elegant" dress code for ladies when she paired her heels with too-short shorts - she had made an impression across the resort.

Ah, to be 21 and bikini-worthy...

We had a wonderful time there in what may be our last visit there. Auntie Jen gets major props for bringing a portion of Gary's ashes and our brief but wonderful ceremony where we left a bit of him there in the water near the spot on the beach he'd gifted us with so many times. 

In other vacation news, I made the near fatal mistake of getting a pedicure that included having my callouses scraped off. Being barefoot on my first morning beach walk resulted in a huge blister on the pad of my right foot.

I hobbled around a bit before giving up my fashion sense and wearing my sneakers nearly everywhere, which gave me a bit more padding over the injury. 

After a few days of too many visits to the Rum Shack, I declared a rule that for every two drinks, we had to swim out to the rope - the resort's boundary between the swimming area and open sea. Some of the group followed the rules; some didn't. 

On some of these trips, we'd linger by the rope for a while to rest up before heading back. On one of these swims to the rope, Ali was bitten or touched something that gave her a huge welt and hurt. She was convinced she'd been bitten by a deadly blue-ringed octopus.

Off we went to the nurse's office, me limping because of the blister and her holding her arm above her head like you do when you have a nasty cut to keep the blood loss to a minimum. She was also working herself into a tizzy as the pain and swelling worsened.

"It wasn't a blue-ringed octopus," I kept saying as she kept detailing the horrible death she was in for.
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"Look," I finally said in my most maternally caring way: "If it was a blue-ringed octopus, you'd be dead already."

She stopped on the pathway.

"Really?"

"Really," I said. 

(In addition to being super motherly, I was super confident because of a book series I read that involved said octopus DNA (among other animals) being mixed with a humans in a bid to create super soldiers. Fiction can't be wrong, right?)

We get to the nurse's office, walk in, and Ali holds up her arm. 

The nurse said, "Did you touch the rope?" 

"Yeah," Ali said.

"Yeah, we see this a lot," she said. "Hold on a sec and I'll get you some ointment."

I beamed but then started toward my own tizzy. I had not just touched the rope, but stood on it with my blistered foot, which had broken open the day before, so I had rubbed an open wound all over that damned rope.

The nurse was unimpressed. She cut away the skin, swabbed it until I almost cried from the sting, which seemed akin to octopus venom, and send me away with a tub of zinc oxide. Like Ali, I also did not die from my exposure.

Seems to me that if the nurse could diagnose Ali's welt without blinking, Beaches might need to put up a sign about not touching the rope.  

I'm sure there are tons of other fun stories to relay from Turks, but I had a double whammy of Book Club last night and the Angie's List alumni holiday party. I missed most of the party, showing up with the indulgence of my BC troop, for clean-up.

It's possible I was a little tipsy from the champagne and red wine as cleanup was a lot of fun, and it led to an after party at the Melody Inn where I made the mistake of chasing all that BC wine with some PBR and a Fireball shot.  

As grateful as I am for good friends and opportunities to hang out with them, I am too old for a day-long hangover. It's a good thing I have Monday mostly off work.