Song Challenge: Barbie Lobster Tale

Subject: SONG CHALLENGE: Barbie Lobster Tale
From: Charley Noble
Date: 23 Dec 03 - 10:32 AM

Life can be a challenge along the coast of Maine, especially if you're a member of our State's hard-scrabble lobster fishing community. However, according to our local newspaper, a small group of lobstermen in the Mount Desert Island area are now rising to this challenge in a new and creative fashion:

"BARBIE LOBSTER, ALL DOLLED UP, PROVES EASY TO PICK UP

(AP, Portland Press Herald, 12/23/03, p. 3B)

Mount Desert Island:

A female lobster crawling around off the Maine coast has cheated death at least 10 times, thanks to Barbie and a couple of Mount Desert fishermen.

As a gag, Jim Bright and his sternman, Chris Costello, outfitted the lobster in doll clothes – a blue blouse, a red-and-white checkered shirt and pink high heels – before putting her into a friend's trap in September. "It's a monotony hauling traps day after day," said Costello, "and we just wanted to break it up a little. It totally worked."

Barbie Lobster, as she is known, has been hauled up by various fishermen at least 10 times along the 26-mile channel between Baker's Island and Mount desert Rock. The VHF radios used by lobstermen would buzz with chatter and laughter each time a new sighting of Barbie was reported.

Costello made a special trip to Ellsworth to buy the Barbie clothes. The fishermen had wanted to dress up a jumbo lobster, but it was too fat to fit into the Barbie doll outfit. They choose a svelte 1.5 pound crustacean instead. "They slipped right on, just like Cinderella," Bright said of the tiny pink shoes he and Costello slipped on Barbie. Costello disagreed, saying it was a challenge to put high heels on the little lobster legs. There are four legs on each side, so the men attached the shoes to the center two. "You try squeezing Barbie shoes on a lobster," he said. "That was the most time-consuming thing."

Barbie hasn't been seen since early December and apparently was unkept at the time, with just her pink heels still hanging on. If she and the shoes survive until spring, she may be home free for another season, Costello said. "We have our spring fashions all ready to go," he said.

Maybe there is a ballad here!

Sorry about your morning coffee...

Cheerily,
Charley Noble