Subject: Stranded!
Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 02:13:15 -0400 (EDT)

This comes from my friend Sharon Zohar (even though I saw a hardcopy of
this Wednesday night from somebody else); it would be histerical if it
weren't true...

=============================================================================

An engineer was on a vacation cruise ship when it sank, leaving him the
only survivor on a deserted island for 4 months.  He had nothing to eat 
but coconuts, and each night he huddled under palm leaves he had gathered
in an attempt to stay warm.

One day, as he was looking out to sea wishing he were someplace else, when
he saw a rowboat coming around the corner of the island.  In it was the
most gorgeous woman he had ever seen (at least in 4 months).  She was tall,
sha was tanned, and her blond hair flowing in the sea breeze gave her an
almost ethereal quality.  He started yelling and screaming and flailing his
arms to get her attention; in short order, she spotted him and 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 here 
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 replied, "and the rowboat didn't wash up; nothing else 
made it to shore with me."

"Well then," said the engineer, astonished, "where did you get the rowboat?" 

"I made the rowboat out of raw material that I found on the island,"
replied the woman.  "The oars I whittled from Gum tree branches, I wove the
bottom from Palm branches, and the sides and stern came from a Eucalyptus
tree."

"But, but," he sputtered, "what about tools and hardware--how did you do 
that?"

"Oh, no problem," replied the woman, casually, "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?"

The Engineer was forced to confess that he had been sleeping on the beach
for the past four months.  "Well, let's row over to my place," she said.
So they both got into the rowboat and left for her side of island.

In short order, the woman rowed them around to a wharf that led to the
approach to her place.  When they docked, she tied up the rowboat with a
beautifully woven hemp rope.  They walked up a stone walk and around a palm
tree, and 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, "I think if I have 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 engineer 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 engineer, no longer questioning anything, went upstairs to the
bathroom.  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 down stairs.

"You look great," said the woman.  "Now I think I will go up and slip into
something more comfortable."  And she did; the Engineer 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 seductively, "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," she added as she slid up next to him and
whispered in his ear, "that would be really nice to have right now?"

"Yes there is," the engineer replied, fixing a winsome gaze upon her.  
"Tell me... Do you happen to have an Internet connection?"
============================================================================