in which tropical drinks are ordered

On our anniversary last week, Anne and I decided to take a field trip to Disneyland and goof off for the day. It was damn close to perfect: it was warm in the sun and cool in the shade, not very crowded, and the longest we waited for anything was fifteen minutes. We ended the day at Trader Sam’s tiki bar in the Disneyland hotel.

“Do you know what you’d like to order?” The bartender asked us.

“What are you getting?” Anne asked me.

“I was thinking about that shipwreck drink,” I said.

“Me too,” she said.

“Well, then, you get that and I’ll get something different.” I said.

The bartender said, “You guys could both get the same drink, you know…”

“Oh no,” I said, “because that’s the first step to –”

Anne and I said, in unison, “–matching tracksuits.”

Then we laughed like people who had had lots of fruity tropical drinks, even though we hadn’t had a single one.

We ended up getting different drinks, and then shared a drink that was on fire, which is why I can’t remember the name of the drink I got. (Honestly, they’re all variations on the same theme: too much rum, a bunch of sugary stuff and a dash of primary colour served in  a vessel shaped like a skull or a tiki or something that could have once been a monkey, if that monkey was carved from a coconut in 1955.) It was a great day, and the perfectly silly way to celebrate the best day of my life, thirteen years ago.