* Originally from Franz Scheurer (3:714/926) to All.
* Original dated: Sat Oct 26, 15:07

    There was this male engineer, on a cruise ship in the
Caribbean for the first time.  It was wonderful, the experience
of his life.  He was being waited on hand and foot.  But, it did
not last.  A Hurricane came up unexpectedly. The ship went down
almost instantly.
 
   The man found himself, he knew not how, swept up on the
shore of an island.  There was nothing else anywhere to be seen.
No person, no supplies, nothing.  The man looked around.  There
were some bananas and coconuts, but that was it.  He was
desperate, and forlorn, but decided to make the best of it.  So
for the next four months he ate bananas, drank coconut juice and
mostly looked to the sea mightily for a ship to come to his
rescue.  One day, as he was lying on the beach stroking his
beard and looking for a ship, he spotted movement out of the
corner of his eye.
 
Could it be true, was it a ship?  No, from around the corner of
the island came this rowboat.  In it was the most gorgeous woman
he had ever seen, or at least seen in 4 months. She was tall,
tanned, and her blond hair flowing in the sea breeze gave her an
almost ethereal quality.  She spotted him also as he was waving
and yelling and screaming to get her attention.  She rowed her
boat towards him.  In disbelief, he asked, "Where did you come
from?  How did you get here"?  She said, "I rowed from the other
side of the island.  I landed on this island when my cruise ship
sank" "Amazing", he said, "I didn't know anyone else had
survived.  How many of you are there?  Where did you get the
rowboat?  You must have been really lucky to have a rowboat
wash-up with you?" "It is only me", she said, "and the rowboat
didn't wash up, nothing else did." "Well then", said the man,
"how did you get the rowboat?" "I made the rowboat out of raw
material that I found on the island," replied the woman.  "The
oars were whittled from Gum tree branches, I wove the bottom
from Palm branches, and the sides and stern came from a
Eucalyptus tree." "But, but," asked the man, "what about tools
and hardware, how did you do that?" "Oh, no problem," replied
the woman, "on the south side of the island there is a very
unusual strata of alluvial rock exposed.  I found that if I
fired it to a certain temperature in my kiln, it melted into
forgeable ductile iron.  I used that for tools, and used the
tools to make the hardware.  But, enough of that," she said.
"Where do you live?" At last the man was forced to confess that
he had been sleeping on the beach.  "Well, let's row over to my
place", she said.  So they both got into the rowboat and left
for her side of island.
 
   The woman easily rowed them around to a wharf that led to
the approach to her place.  She tied up the rowboat with a
beautifully woven hemp rope.  They walked up a stone walk and
around a palm tree, there stood an exquisite bungalow painted in
blue and white.  "It's not much," she said, "but I call it home.
Sit down please.  Would you like to have a drink?" "No," said
the man, "one more coconut juice and I will puke." "It won't be
coconut juice," the woman replied.  "I have a still; how about a
Pina Colada?"  Trying to hide his continued amazement, the man
accepted, and they sat down on her couch to talk.
 
   After a while, and they had exchanged their stories, the
woman asked, "Tell me, have you always had a beard?" "No", the
man replied, "I was clean shaven all of my life, and even on the
cruise ship".  "Well, if you would like to shave, there is a
man's razor upstairs in the cabinet in the bathroom." So, the
man, no longer questioning anything, went upstairs to the bath
room.  There in the cabinet was a razor made from a bone handle,
two shells honed to a hollow ground edge were fastened on to its
end inside of a swivel mechanism. The man shaved, showered and
went back downstairs.  "You look great," said the woman.  "I
think I will go up and slip into something more comfortable."
So she did.  And, the man continued to sip his Pina Colada.
After a short time, the woman returned wearing fig leafs
strategically positioned and smelling faintly of gardenia.
"Tell me," she asked, "we have both been out here for a very
long time with no companionship.  You know what I mean.  Have
you been lonely, is there anything that you really miss?
Something that all men and woman need. Something that it would
be really nice to have right now." "Yes there is," the man
replied, as he moved closer to the woman while fixing a winsome
gaze upon her, "Tell me ... Do you happen to have an Internet
connection?"







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