They're cousins. Identical cousins.

One of the best things about this cruise was getting to spend some quality time with my cousins. Three of them live in California, and the other two are in Tennessee attending Vanderbilt. I'm the oldest at 29. Diane's next at 27 (okay 26 but rapidly approaching 27). Then Michelle is 23. Kevin's 21, Sean's 20, Steve's 19 and Jason's 18. It seems like just yesterday that they were little kids running around my grandparents' backyard, asking us to play games with them and to pick them up. Now I am taking pictures like this one:














That's Steve on the left and Sean on the right. Steve pointed out that whatever is hanging over the window looked like balls so we took this picture. Talking about balls while drinking alcohol is almost the same as playing Pictionary in Grandma's living room. That's all I'm saying.

When the hell did they grow up? The youngest one, Jason*, is in college now. COLLEGE! And they're all these incredibly bright, articulate, kind and HILARIOUS adults now. It actually caught me off guard. Kevin had his guitar with him because he was going back to school right after the cruise. I asked him if he was bringing it so he could pick up chicks on the boat, and he said, "Yeah because they don't let you bring puppies." What? Did my 3 year old cousin just say something hilarious? Oh no-he's 21 now, Sarah. You're fucking old.

Anyway, you may have noticed something about the picture above. If you look hard enough, you might be able to tell that the two people in that picture are Asian. You would be correct. I don't know these people. I just thought it was a funny picture. Just kidding. My mom has two brothers. One married a Filipino woman and the other married a Chinese woman. The net result is a whole lot of Asian in our family portraits. And they're all beautiful. And they all make fun of us because we have to lay out to get tan. Shut it, cousins.

*This is the one who kept telling people I was 24 and then winking at me. I wanted to put him in my suitcase and take him home with me.

P.S. If there was a world record for the number of strawberry daiquiris consumed by one person over a 5 day period, I would be holding it right now. In fact, I am holding it right now.

P.P.S. I just need to say something about cruises. And I don't know if this was just my particular cruise or maybe Carnival cruise lines in general, but can we please can it with the cheesy line dance music? We weren't even out of the port yet when they started with the goddamn Cha Cha Slide thingie. Then they moved into a remix of the Macarena and the Chicken Dance mixed together. THE MACARENA AND THE CHICKEN DANCE!!!!! There is absolutely no reason for that. If I gave you all the time in the world to think of one, you wouldn't be able to because it's completely assanine. I can't think of two things that don't belong together more. Except for maybe Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes. And me and Sandra Bernhard.

**This post was edited. I originally said that my cousins went to Vanderbilt in Kentucky. I clearly was not smart enough to attend school there because Vanderbilt is in Tennessee. I even wrote Tennessee at first, and then I was like no that's not right you retard. Now who is the retard? Oh-still me. Thanks for the heads up, Steph.