Carmen and Miranda go partying on the high seas
Can you tell us apart?
With apologies to the real Carmen Miranda
My mother used to take cruises with her mother and sister and there was always a hat competition. Mom and Aunt Peggy even won once. So I should have seen the Ocean Diamond’s hat competition coming.
About mid-afternoon, they announced that the contest was an add-on to that night’s planned special event—a barbecue on the pool deck!
It certainly wasn’t pool weather, or even barbecue weather for that matter, but what the heck, the hat competition was on. And the instructions were to create a hat out of anything on board—except safety equipment.
I knew Poor John would find a way to weasel out of participating (he did), but Olivia is highly competitive, and I was not surprised when she dashed up asking for suggestions.
The real Carmen Miranda
‘Honey,’ I said as I linked my arm in hers and headed to the restaurant, ‘have you ever heard of Carmen Miranda?’
Of course she hadn’t. Olivia’s only 18, but that didn’t keep me from dragging her to a giant bowl of plastic fruit—bananas, mangoes, strawberries, apples and more—and explaining Carmen Miranda’s fame as a Brazilian (Portuguese-born) singer, dancer and film star in the 1940s and 50s.
We asked permission before we ransacked the restaurant of fruit, cloth napkins and a couple of plastic lids that fit over dinner plates to keep food warm. Then it was off to our cabin to construct hats that Carmen Miranda would have been proud to wear, and figure out how to keep them on our heads.
Yuly, who looked after our room during the expedition, gave plenty of advice (some of which we ignored) and rustled up a couple of extra hand towels. She desperately wanted us to put shower caps over the fruit to hold it in place, but we reckoned our good posture would suffice.
We sat ramrod straight at dinner (which meant we wore a lot of crumbs on our chests), but we got lots of compliments, thumbs up and an honourable mention for our efforts.
And our picture turned up on the next day’s digital schedule. Thanks for the idea, Carmen! RIP.
Cowboys, Beverley Krillbillys and a Canadian card shark
Where to next? 
Gee Peggy!! I’m absolutely transmogrified with shock that you would enter a fancy hat contest!! Who would have thought!! Now, I think you might be the one with the yellow jacket. Is that right? Or are you the other fetching young thing with the dark, glossy hair? Everything is so confusing sometimes.
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Guess again, we’re both wearing yellow jackets. hahaha
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I think you should have won.
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Aw thanks, but the guy who won did come up with a really good idea, so we can’t complain. Pity I didn’t get a picture of his get-up.
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