Belfast Cabrones

The Cave pt. 2

2011-03-18T14:48:00.001-04:00

   I take a lot of pictures and I use several cameras to do so. To deal with the output, I've amassed a collection of various Portable Mini Data-Storage Devices that clutter up my scene while enabling me to misplace vast quantities of useful data. All this in a jewel of a device that's just the right sized morsel for a hungry couch, or for that spot in your car between the driver's seat and the center console. The one that your right hand pants-pocket contents gleefully slide into. The crevice, into which it is impossible for a meat fisted fellow such as myself to fit his hand. However, should you have a slender paw and manage to squeeze it in there, the ironic chuckle of St. Jude will ring ironically in your ears. For there is no way you'll be able to grip anything down there in order to extract it. Just like the Monkey Puzzle of the banana in the jar. You'll be able to touch your quarry but your quivering fingertips will only drive it deeper into unreachable territory where it will catch the light and gleamingly taunt you until you are quite dead. But, I digress.
   In addition to a plurality of the ubiquitous USB "thumb drive" (which, I guess, is preferable to a thumb screw; the only screw I don't like) in an array of capacities. I have the equally common SD Cards and their portlier brethren, the SDHC Cards, into which I can cram such a stupefying amount of information that by the time I get around to emptying it, I'm afraid a new Ice Age will set in as I watch the transfer meter crawl across the screen. As an accompaniment to these, I also have a few Micro SD Cards, which look like tinier versions of the SD Cards, and which are meant to be neatly slotted into the ass crack of the interloper onto the scene of true SD Cards: The Micro SD Card Adaptor. Thus disguised, the Micro SD Card that fits into my tiny Cellular-Phone can infiltrate the bustling Data-Metropolis that is my Main Frame. But not without further subterfuge. My Tower will only parlay with those of the USB tribe, and vicey-versey. I need a translator. Enter...The SD to USB Dongle. Yes, that's right. I said "Dongle". And I'm not even blushing. And neither should you, for you have nothing to fear from the "Dongle". It is merely a shell. Lacking any soul of its own, it is outcast, relegated to the fringe compartments where the other Adaptors; The MMC to USB, The XD to SD, The Mini SD to SDHC shuffle wearily into obsolescence. It serves only as a conduit, a go-between from this to that, meaningless without its anode and diode.
   Then, sometimes when I'm traveling, I will avail myself of the dedicated SD Card Slot on the side of my portable that I may use it to relieve the bloated card's contents all over it's insides. Tthe idea is, that when I am home (as I am now), I will use my Central WiFi Network to painlessly transfer these files from my Netbook in the Kitchen to my Tower, upstairs in The Living Room. Unfortunately, even at 10/100Mbps, that takes longer than carrying my netbook upstairs and placing it on my Tower Desk and using one of these aforementioned Portable Storage Devices (PSDs) to manually transfer the data (in chunks mind you. The total amount to be moved is much larger than the capacity of any one of my PSDs.) from one machine to the other, keeping track on a scrap of Note-Paper which folders have been moved. It's confusing, you see, because I can't simply go down the line alpha-numerically and add folders to the Transfer Device, as I feel compelled to efficiently pack the Card as close to its' full capacity as possible, which means picking folders based on size to move in each "trip". This must be logged so as to prevent duplication or (even worse), omission of one or several folders. Hence the Note-Paper. Welcome to The Digital Age. Of course, it still takes a little time to unload the files from the TD into The Main Frame, even when the compatible device is plugged into a USB 2.0 Slot. So while I'm there waiting, I may as well check Face-Book or Wimp or see what junk has been forwarded to my Inbox, and the next thing you know, I'm writing a Blog Entry or wasting time some other way and many hours will have passed.
   That is why it has taken much time and no fewer than 8 pieces of nearly-redundant technology -technology that is stupefyingly sophisticated enough to have not existed a mere 5 years ago- to bring you...The Lost Photos of The Cave that I couldn't find when I posted the first Cave shots. Enjoy.

This image doesn't tell much of a story, so I'll tell you this. The amber colored area around the outside is a large and dark chamber of the cave receding ahead of me. The chamber I'm standing in is, itself, removed from the other main chambers by a dark, arched passage. The blue area in the center is my weak LED light exposing an additional chamber. My light was just strong enough to disturb a dozen or so bats on the ceiling, which swooped and chirped in annoyance. Armed with the knowledge that there are no rabies in Jamaica, I was prepared to press on until I began to hear a sound ( I'll describe it as a moist, whispering rustle) from further into the chamber that really brought my short ones to attention. It was a sound that I'm comfortable hearing synthesized in an episode of the X-Files, but on my own, in a cave, in a remote part of Jamaica, I was not impressed. I tucked my little spelunker's tail and, with as much nonchalance as I could muster, beat feet the hell out of there.

We wuz flexin', y'know, when he jus brukout..

2011-03-14T13:24:00.000-04:00

Wow. Sorry to be so morbid last time. Today, our last day in Jamaica, is a bright and glorious one. Breezy with a slight chance of bullshit. Tomorrow we surrender ourselves, (body perhaps, but not soul, dammit.)into the rough hands of the Gods of International Air Travel! [gestures wildly as the sky trembles]
We moved to a house across the street for the final days of our stay here. We're on the ocean side now, our backyard being only a gate away from the beach. The gate is held to the posts with wraps of electrical wire, so use care when operating. This place is owned by a couple of Indian descent that live here in Jamaica. He works for a hugely popular Jamaican fruit beverage concern and she spends her time, evidently, decorating their vacation beach home as if it were the set of a 1967 Bollywood film. Brocade curtains block the light that gleams off the shiny floor tiles and threatens to bleach the crimson out of the vevleteen living room set. Any thing wood is lacquered and polished to a sheen typically reserved for mirrors. The overstuffed chair in our bedroom actually has one of those little cylinder shaped pillows, I call it a bunting pillow for some reason, with braided satiny ropes dangling off the welts. Somewhere along the way someone fell out of touch with the island vibe.

See that cool stairway going up to the rooftop deck? It's a deathtrap. You heard. In keeping with Jamaican custom, the top step, the "wow" step, the one you never look at because you're focusing on whatever you're about to see on the deck, is a full three inches taller than any of the others (with the possible exception of the third step from the bottom, but let's not confuse the issue). The reason for this custom is that math is hard. A skilled mason will size up a job by eye, decide he's going to create a certain number of steps, and then never deviate from that initial assessment until, when it's time for the last step, it may be as small a rise as 2 inches say, or a toe stubbingly tall 113/4 inches.

Sarah and I have definitely played the tourist role on this trip. I've always agonized over not wanting to feel like a tourist. To somehow display behavior that belies a savvy so undeniable as to fool the locals into thinking I am one of them. So what if I don't know the language. My tattered shorts and studied swagger should prove that I am worthy of acceptance into the tribe. As a result, I end up coming off like a visitor from mars that's just learning how to deal with things like clothing and gravity for the very first time. How liberating, then, to cast off any desire to be considered "cool" with the locals. It's a risk that exists only in my own neurotic brain. After all, we're not in one of the huge all-inclusives in Negril or Ochi. Our hosts have been very helpful in keeping us (me -I'm really the one at risk) out of danger, and I've done my best to heed their warnings. I haven't tried to mix with the crowd hanging around the bars in town, I haven't wandered aimlessly looking for adventure, I haven't sought a "genuine" island experience by spending hours out looking for the "magic" photo or shunning other white folks. I've been content to just let the time pass me by. I'm a white man who, in the countries which I can afford to travel, is well off by local standards. I'm also a polite guy who cares about other people. If I dwell on the latter, hopefully the people I meet along the way will as well.

BarryG and the Robes of Power

The Cave\Dead Man

2011-03-13T17:23:00.001-04:00

The only guy who's tried to hustle some weed on me at the beach was also the only difficult person we've met here. His name was Tony, and he would pitch me on the beach every time we'd show up and get comfortable. I'd run into him at the bar and he'd hassle me to buy his conch shells or get me to buy him a beer. I'd give in because I want to be cool and be accepted by the locals, even if (especially if) it's the local bully. This went on for a few days until one morning BarryG told me he had cut a tourist in the course of a robbery and had taken it on the lam. The cops caught up to him the next day and nows he's cooling it in jail. I guess my meekness was an appropriate strategy. Anyway, the first time he sat himself down next to us on the otherwise deserted beach and settled into his game, "Yeh mon, f'ree-il", I politely turned down his offering of stems and seeds and he asked whether we had been to "The Cave", as though it were the obvious thing one does here in Duncans Bay. We, indeed, had not heard of or been to "The Cave". He eventually moved on and we kind of forgot about the whole thing. A few days after this BarryG announced, over a bowl of delicious chicken squash stew, that he would be taking us to the cave later that day. OK, the cave it is. I like caves.

What's up with cave well?

So we explored and got buzzed by bats and tried to catch a shot of the white owl that lives there. There are wasps and strange beetles roaming the sandy, guano compost cave floor. The bats live in grottoes on the ceiling and swoop out every so often to investigate or maybe they're just stretching their wings.

A guy washed up dead on the coral reef just behind our house this morning. It's assumed he was a local man and was found with a diving mask and snorkel around his neck. He washed up in the same place that Sarah and I had been snorkeling just two days ago. Whole sections of his skin were worn stark white from being pushed against the sharp reef over and over until finally being tossed up onto the shelf. He lay there in the shallow surf for hours, separated from the parade of onlookers by a thin yellow ribbon, until the Medical Examiner and the rest of the officials could get here. I read somewhere how nature is neither kind nor cruel, neither beneficent nor malevolent. Nature is not good or evil, merely indifferent. The Earth trembles, the oceans heave up, the waves swallow our lives. And all this with no judgement or malice, no forethought or reason. It just is. As I watched the team performing their examination, fingerprinting, photographing, washing the body, I was struck by how different the sea looked to me in that moment. Just yesterday the white capped breakers churning endlessly out of the sun-dappled, turquoise waters looked like the most idyllic tropical paradise, not a care in sight. Add a pulped dead man to the scene and the sunlight seems to cool by the time it reaches the figures bent over him. Those same waves appear ominous, their endless crashing drones on like a mantra, a repeated reminder that we are very fragile and very, very temporary.

Ragamuffins

2011-03-11T17:38:00.003-05:00

*NOTE* if you receive this in your email, you must visit the site too see the videos**

Had ourselves a top ten swim and snorkel today. We hit the beach earlier than usual in order to beat the "lunch winds" that kick up every day around 12pm. With the seas nice and calm we were able to explore the small reef wall that sits just up the beach without fear of the current bashing us against the urchin encrusted face or dragging us under the shelf where we would surely drown and our decaying bones would add their calcium carbonate to the reef effort. I'm all for marine conservation, but I'm not willing to make the ultimate sacrifice just yet. The water is constantly surging and ebbing so the visibility is not ideal for fish peeping, but we found some friendly little characters never the less.

You sir, are out of order!

Sea Urchin carries favorite shells, rocks home from day at the Beach

The instant we hit sand, we were suddenly, literally, surrounded by 7 or 8 local youngsters, all off from school on Easter break and running amok on the usually deserted beach. It's just like I've always said. "Never pass up the chance to celebrate the zombification of a white, Jewish Rasta". Anyway, the kids surround and begin clamoring to borrow our snorkeling equipment. We're toting the gear made available to us by our hosts, most of which is in sad repair and most of which is sporting fresh duct tape, courtesy of yours truly. (I know it won't last in the salt water, but it's all I had to work with.) We promised to let them use our stuff when we were finished and they offered to watch our stuff while we were in the water. The irony being that the only people on the beach besides Sarah and I to pose any threat to our stuff were these children, themselves. I hesitated. I can be pretty gullible with people that look innocent to me, and these kids were cute as hell. I've been taken before and I'm not a fan of the experience. I don't feel it enriches the quality of my life. So, I'm a little chagrined to admit that I immediately assumed that by "we'll watch your stuff" they meant "kiss it all goodbye, sucker". But I decided to let my guard down. Besides, the only thing of any value was my camera, which I was taking in the water with me. (A secondary benefit of the new class of water resistant digital cameras.) Well, of course, two of them sat vigil beside our beach bag, barely glancing at it lest they be perceived as becoming curious about its contents. Their eyes were trained only outward, searching for any threats to the safety of their new ward.

They all got a real kick out of the fact that I had my camera in the water in the first place.

This little guy's name is Otis.

The little scamp was content to hang while his pals splashed in the surf. I couldn't understand a word he or any of them said, but I had this feeling he was gonna stick right there as long as Sarah

didn't go anywhere.

And I was right.

Wi gwaan hab a bashment time...All de while.

2011-03-09T18:09:00.000-05:00

Airport-Done.
Customs-Done.
It's Tuesday. We've been in transit for 12 hours. We meet our hosts, Cheryl and Barry-G.
Cheryl's American, been here six years or so. Originally from the Midwest, but she claims to have also done time in good old New England. Not "doing time" in the prison sense, but if you live in New England, you know what I mean. She's married to Barry-G, Rastaman. He traveled once, in the Army, as a younger man, but he wouldn't say where. I can't put a finger on his age...he could be 40, he could be 60. I'm sure he'd find a way to not answer me if I asked him outright.

These are nice folks on the whole, friendly and accommodating (they had no problem fulfilling my extra-curricular request...for information about marijuana usage trends in Jamaica in the last decade.)

Recent study shows what $20 and a smile will get you
photo by Staff

They met us at the airport and led us to their car, a white Toyota wagon in a sea of white Toyota wagons. After giving up a pile of American cash for our rental, down low like a drug deal in the parking lot, we nosed out into Jamaican highway traffic. Cheryl was the only occupant licensed to drive in Jamaica, so while it may seem fortunate that she was at the wheel, I don't think it really made much difference who drove. I was immediately too terrified to think about pulling my camera out to record the moment for posterity. I focused instead on the two little mantras I like to recite when I'm at the mercy of madmen on the roadways. The first one goes something like: "These drivers want to live as much as I do, these drivers want to live as much as I do." This inevitably gives way to the second mantra, "Oh shitohshitohshitohshit".

I can see that we're driving on the left side of the road, but I keep glancing at BarryG in the left front seat and I catch myself absentmindedly wondering why he's just looking out the window and smoking his cigarette when he should be paying attention to piloting the vehicle. Then I'd remember that the steering wheel is on the right hand side of the car and that wee're not dead just yet. Likewise, whenever we made a turn, I would experience a moment just like the one when you tip too far back in your chair, but catch yourself at the last instant before toppling over backwards. We'd swing wide into what felt like the territory of oncoming traffic and I'd see a car from the other side coming fast, looking for an instant like a terrible side impact collision on the way and, despite myself, I'd get all tight down there. Then nothing happens and I realize we've just executed a perfectly legal and, perhaps, picture perfect right hand turn.

On the whole, the general attitude about driving seems to be "never behind anyone else". You can draw your own conclusions from there. Here's some local driving for you, on the way from here to Duncans town. That's (the Unlicensed) Barry-G lookin' fly at the wheel.

When I saw this at the market I was tempted to abandon our grocery cart full of food and drink and stock us up for two weeks on nothing but. "Added protein" fer fuxsake! I thought Sarah might be into it, but no dice.

Speaking of food, we were treated to the traditional Jamaican breakfast of Ackee and saltfish. Ackee is a little fruit, something like a chestnut, but very soft inside. Cooked, it has the texture of moist scrambled eggs and takes on the flavor of whatever you cook it with. Raw, it is deadly poisonous. It's also poisonous if it's cooked but was harvested too soon, before the shells open. Alone, the Ackees look just like little brains. Hell, for all I know, it could all be bullshit, and we just ate mongoose brains and the joke's on us.

Seriously though, this is delicious stuff. If you have a chance, definitely give it a try. Just make sure the brains are ripe.

Speaking of ripe, here's a fruit at it's peak. Unfortunately, when at the height of it's perfection it smells and tastes like a Slim Jim. I can't remember the name, so I'll call it meat fruit. It grows in the yard right next to the bread fruit. And the cheese fruit.

Barry-G and I try to set his Blackberry to ring with his favorite new track by Khago. It almost came to machetes.

This one of the two yard dogs. She answers to Lucky.

So we just sorta' settled into it. Fresh fruit, Red Stripe, overproof rum, fun and sun at the beach. No crispy ginger yet, but you can keep your fingers crossed if you'd like.

The Wata Jug Beer Cool-arrier

2011-03-09T09:59:00.000-05:00

Here's a scene we've all seen, all too often...

You're going to the beach to have a relaxing day with your friends. You know you'll be wanting a frosty cold beer to wash the salt out of your mouth when you've finished a little snorkeling. ...Problem is, you haven't got a cooler. And you know that beer won't stay cold just sittin' there. What to do?

Weh-hell! If you've got ice, you've got a party!

Introducing the Wata Jug Beer Cool-Arrier, from the makers of The Ball Vice.

Now made with REAL "Duct" tape.

Available in 4, 6 and coming soon, the 18 beer Weekender pack size.

Naa mek mi vex, mon.

2011-03-06T19:52:00.000-05:00

I'LL SWALLOW YOUR SOUL!!!

I'd like to speak for a moment now, if I may, about the modern flight attendant. If you're really interested, you can check out this link on the History of the Flight Attendant. If you're not so interested, I'll tell you this much.
   The first people ever to "attend" to the needs of the first commercial air passengers were the adult children of wealthy financiers who owned the first airlines that offered the first commercial flights. I can see them now, lurching about the cabin from hand-hold to hand-hold, shrieking over the din of the propellers. "Hello, sir! Father says I'm to offer you a biscuit!"
   Then it fell to the hands of the copilot to pop the champagne and fetch blankets until at some point, somebody decided it would be advantageous to keep the copilot near the controls should he have to, oh, I don't know, fly the plane. This wisdom ushered in the day of the Steward. He was handsome and trusty and probably had very handsome and stylish friends waiting for him in every port. Early commercial air travel was noisy, uncomfortable and generally unsafe. So it was decided that female nurses should take the place of the stewards so as to placate any passenger fears or talk of mutiny. I know that, for me, nothing takes the edge off the prospect of occupying a tin can packed full of human sardines, plummeting 30,000ft into the sea, like a nurse telling me to return my tray table to its upright and locked position.
   Along comes Dubyadubya Dos, and all the nurses go off to bolster the war effort. The airlines fill the sudden vacuum with any young, attractive woman that's game for being bullied, sweet-talked, groped, objectified, hit on, picked up, put down, poorly paid and generally maligned. The industry was rampantly sexist. Stewardesses could be terminated for gaining weight, gaining weight that was a husband, gaining weight that was a baby, getting ugly, sassing, or just being a woman. The airlines offered them up as the sexual playthings of the air-traveling elite. They wore paper dresses and joined the mile-high club in the lavatory. Advertisements lured prurient passengers with the "Air Strip" featuring stewardesses shedding layers of clothing over the course of a flight. All manner of sky-borne scandal went on and it was just a glorious time for the passenger, really. Things continued like this for a while. Flying was romantic and fun and there were all those movies that ended with a the hero's triumphant race through the airport to get to the gate just before/after his true love's plane takes off, and if you were a kid like me on Delta airlines, you'd get some little silver wings to pin on your shirt and everyone just loved it. And then the country started to get uptight again.
   By the end of the 80's, the hemlines were down, men had joined the force in numbers enough to throw out the title of "stewardess". The airlines were deregulated and struggling. Passenger perks were tossed out like old luggage and the sky party was largely over. Paul Westerberg of The Replacements even wrote a desultory song about them.
Sanitation expert and a maintenance engineer
Garbage man, a janitor and you my dear
A real union flight attendant, my oh my
You ain't nothin' but a waitress in the sky
You ain't nothin' but a waitress in the sky
You ain't nothin' but a waitress in the sky
   Then came 9\11 and the TSA and it ALL went right to shit. Now the airlines themselves are the gropers, their cash stained fingers fondling airline worker benefit packages and union-proof wage cuts. No more the glamour or elegance that once accompanied air travel. The romance and intrigue have deferred to process and propaganda. Nothing left now but humiliation, indignity and claustrophobia. We passengers shuffle on, shoeless and beltless, through endless lines as we're exposed to strange rays and our nethers are scrutinized by strangers. We're harangued for accidentally stepping into the wrong Tens-A-Belt line by a staff of federal goons who seem as inept and feckless as the hang-dog passengers they are herding. My carry on is flagged because my Co-op packed fat-free, wheat-free fig bars look like a wad of C-4. (I assure you, no substance on the planet is less likely to cause an explosion than fat-free, wheat-free fig bars.) We pay more and more of a premium for lite masochism. We see the abuse, but slowly it comes. One drop at a time, like a water torture. Like smoke, staining the upholstery. You turn around one day and find yourself acting like a lunatic on the sidewalk, waving a weapon among the old couches and dirty, rolled up carpets.
   So it's no surprise that the flight attendants might see some flak once the masses are belted in and sweating it out on the tarmac. The copilot, flight attendant of yester-year, is sequestered behind a reinforced bulkhead, so he's safe with the captain up there. The cabin crew is left to field the slings and arrows of outrageous mis-fortune. That pressure cooker of group frustration has to vent occasionally. Not everybody is as polite as I try to be. I'm in the FSI.. The Food Service Industry, bitches. Before that, I cleaned sewers from time to time. (Yes. I've washed my hands. A lot.) So, I know what it's like to deal with a problem customer. One that's giving you some real shit.
   I've bored you with all of this for one reason: I want you to know that I get it. I understand the plight of the beleaguered flight crew. No respect...long hours...shitty pay. But, welcome to employment in the...well, in any century. Work sucks, that's the deal. That's why it's called work. If we liked it all the time it would be called fucking.
   So... why did you have to be such. A. Bitch? Yeah you. Mizz Flight Komandant. The one with the cheap silk neck-r-chief. The one with your hair pulled back so tight your gobs of blue eye shadow are practically smeared on the wet, pink under flesh that cradles your skyward rolling eyeballs.

You were like this

PLUS...

THIS

What asshole got your asshole so peppered up? Because it wasn't me, it wasn't Sarah and it wasn't even the motor mouthed little old lady in the seat next to mine.

You were so mean to everyone. You stared down on us with a contempt traditionally reserved for rapists and films with Gerard Butler. You answered questions with questions and ignored entreaties for assistance. You openly mocked the heavyset man, on all fours in the aisle, as he hunted under seats, sweating it for his lost passport. You win the Thank You For Flying The Friendly Go-Fuck-Yourself Award. I hope you get airsickness and sit on a tack.

Anyway...at length we enjoyed a gentle landing in Montego Bay with bright sun, temps in the low 80's and a light breeze. We cleared customs and found our ride...

(These pics were supposed to be a hair-raising video

but Blogger's Dashboard is effing up right now)

And ended up here...

CHEERS!

TUNE IN SOON FOR MORE SNARK, PLUS...

WHITE FOLKS ON THE BEACH

Wha Gwan?

2011-03-05T09:44:00.008-05:00

Welcome, dear readers, to the (maybe) return of BelfastCabrones. We're on the travel again, this time to Jamaica. Someday I'll get around to finishing the USA saga, (I made no notes and my memory wanes with each passing month *sigh*) but for now, let's live in the present. And to do that, seeing as it's Saturday and we've been here since Wednesday, we'll all have to live in the past for a few. Back now, come back with me now...to ...to...Tuesday! Yes! Tuesdayyyy!!!

G. Cabrone

Cabrones Co. Intl., LLC.

Duncans Bay, Jamaica

Mar. 5 2011

Ashley Savage, et al.

Freeze Your Tits Off, Maine

049gofuckyourself

Dear Ms. Savage,

Cabrones Co. would like to take this opportunity to personally thank you for driving them to Portland on this Tuesday past, when you weren't even going there anyway. Your actions have saved the Cabrones Co. much discomfort and grief. They would have had to take the stinky old bus at 8am, from a Wendy's. And frankly, they weren't ready for that.

Cabrones Co. would also like to take this opportunity to urge you to enjoy the gasoline and whatever snacks that may have been provided en route. They are offered with the Company's fondest regards.

Cabrones Co. hopes they may call on you again in the future should their asses need to be carted around for free.

Sincerely,

G. Cabrone

Head Goat

Cabrones Co., LLC.

Yes...a lovely evening in Portland. We supped extravagantly on the finest Maine has to offer.

I'll give it to you menu style for impact.

COCKTAIL

Lager- Pabst Blue Ribbon

served in can

PRIMI

Potatoes cut very thin

fried in oil\

dusted with powdered salt & vinegar flavor\

served in cellophane

AMUSE BOUSCHE

Cognac enveloped in chocolat\

enveloped in foil

ENTREE

Potatoes cut very thin

fried in oil\

dusted with powdered salt & vinegar flavor\

served in cellophane

DESSERT

Apples To Apples

played with spite, rancor\

served with chided ego

But first, a little shopping. We hit the hipper stores. You know the ones: Mat'l Objects, Encore, Find, CVS. I've always had a love\hate relationship with clothes shopping. I've been quite a bit heavier in the past and the clothes I want to wear have not been for me. That's the real drawback to thrift store shopping. Not the sticky zippers on old men's pants, not the (sometimes) pungent aroma, not the Aderol addled, hipster clientele. No. It's the simple fact that what you really want...that garment that says soooo much about you and your views on fashion and the world as a whole, really, is always a little bit too small. If this were a new clothing store, you'd pick the next 1\2 size up. But here in the second hand store, it's the only one of its kind. Forever. And it doesn't quite fit YOU. You begin to bargain with reality. "If I don't button the top of the pants, I can wear a belt and a long shirt." Or, "I'll buy it now and it'll make me lose weight." Or, "If I curl my toes real tight I can kinda walk." Or, my favorite; "I'll frame this Fraggle Rock T-shirt and hang it on the wall. How clever it will look." HOG. WASH. None of this shit will happen. Nothing for you here. Move along.

The mirrors at Material Objects are particularly cruel. There's something about the 3 mirror arrangement that forces you see your body as though it were a Mercator projection. "Good God! My spare tire is the size of Greenland!" And then you run away. Nothing looks good in that mirror.

Today though, I made a leap into the world of the sweater vest. We'll see how that works out when I'm not in the throes of a shopping frenzy. I left it in Portland to await my return, so you can all make fun of me in it later.

Many thanks to The Indomitable Kathryn Smith and her band of Merry Men for putting us up for the night.. Our accommodations were lovely and as always, the hospitality was second to none. We cruised around town with Johnny Welliver for a while. Tipped a glass or 3 at Novare Res. It was ass cold, so we called a cab. Old guy shows up in the Crown Vic and we all ooh and aaah at the newness of the interior. Someone mentions this and the cabby pounces on the opportunity to extol the virtues of his cab, his cabbing ability and his cab's cleanliness. It's at precisely this moment that Sarah calls my attention to a decidedly unclean blood smear, right between us streaking across the otherwise spotless beige leather seat. Back to Taxi School, pal. We had occasion to ride this same cab 2 more times this night, each time being quite careful to avoid The Smear. I exited on the driver's side as he let us off for the last time. Quietly, so as not to draw undue attention to our exchange I intoned, "I know you like to run a clean ship so I'll tell ya. Your poopdeck needs some swabbing back there." He spun around in his seat both ways at once trying to see what I was motioning towards. I left him sputtering and picked my way carefully over the ice dams to the sidewalk.

Here's the lovely Sarah wearing a Vizsla lap throw.

3:30 in the damn mornin'!

That's what time we got up to get to the airport.

4:10

That's what time our cabby starts honking the horn outside. ("Shutthefuckupthere'speoplesleepingferChrissake!")

4:12

The old lady across the street is on her stoop making noise about how this is her cab. Sorry, Granny, we called for it the night before. Get your unemployed son, Lionel to come drive you around.

4:49

Shelling out an extra $20 apiece for checked bags. ANY checked bags. ...Thought they mostly gave you one each with the ticket price. I figured that had to be some of the $174 worth of extra fees above the advertised price.

5:12

Through security. I won't even start on The TSA. The gate area smells like an onion bagel.

5:21

As usual, some old lady has to snake Sarah in line. This time it's the bagel-toaster queue. They have one of those commercial grade conveyor toasters on the concessions counter for self-service bagel toasting. This old lady in line behind Sarah can't wait for her bagel to finish toasting so she swoops in and heists Sarah's bagel as it drops down the chute. WTF? is up with old ladies and a rampant sense of entitlement. Is there a "I don't have to follow rules anymore" card that is issued along with membership in the AARP? Cuz if there is, I am gonna abuse the shit outta that privilege, my time come due.

6:00

Remaining seated with my tray table stowed, my seat locked in its upright position, my seatbelt firmly fastened, low and loose on my hips.

6:10

We're informed of a mechanical issue, RE: The Plane. We're assured take-off will follow the imminent return of "The Log-Book".

6:25

We're informed of a mechanical issue, RE: The Plane. We're assured take-off will follow the imminent return of "The Log-Book".

6:45

Take-off. Begin Vacation.

TUNE IN SOON, WHEN YOU'LL HEAR THE BITCHY STEWARDESS SAY,

"But Captain, these Passengers are MY playthings."

Rt. 90, N'awlins and beyond

2010-02-25T17:40:00.027-05:00

Hurricane Katrina was a demented misfit spreading 'roid rage to every corner of the Gulf coast. This was still evident along the roughly 100 miles of the I-90 corridor between Mobile, AL and Lafayette, LA .

Once we had passed through the gaudy and ostentatious rebuilding of Biloxi

Ha! Whadda Douche!!!

(think Hard Rock Cafe on every corner, trucked in sand and awful bronze statues of sea birds) we could still see Katrina's path of devastation all along the bayou. The remnants of what once were homes pepper the north side of the road. The swamp is slowly laying claim to all the concrete pads that once hosted stilt houses. Boats flung over the highway are sinking into the mire where they will be become fiberglass fossils for future generations to unearth and wonder just what the fuck was going on way back when. On the south side...commercial fishing marinas reduced to skeletal remains, like the ribcage of some giant carcass. Salvage and scrap yards and a profusion of new home construction.

Sarah remarked, in less than polite terms, that it seemed an ill-conceived idea to rebuild in such a vulnerable place. Is not the definition of insanity to repeat an action while expecting a different outcome? Listen up!!! Mother Nature thinks your real estate is stupid and she's going crush your shit again!! Anyway, we've all seen pictures of the devastation...I don't need to post any pics for that. The rednecks, on the other hand...Man. We think we know rednecks in Maine. How about these swamp rats with their scrap trailer scavenging the turnouts and inlets for wasted equipment and trash that can be pawned for whatever. This crew of savages from the truck behind us was milling around as we waited for a drawbridge. I didn't take any pictures 'cuz I figured we'd end up in the stew pot by the evening if they caught me. I'll just say there was a congenital issue with eye spacing as well as consistency of leg length and a paucity of teeth. Documentary material for sure.

Despite Sarah's protestations, I insisted we follow 90 through New Orleans. Having never been, I wanted to see what all the hoopla was about. Of course, this happened to be one day after the ritual hosing down of the streets that serves double-duty to clean the drunkards and piss away and as closing ceremonies for Mardi Gras.

I wasn't really looking for that party anyway. And...as predicted by the lovely and intelligent Sarah, to whom I should always listen, we got lost trying to stay on 90. Not trying to find a destination, just trying to stay on one road. Evidently all the street signs in New Orleans got trashed by Katrina as well, because you can't drive for shit around this place. I think whoever designed the city must have been deep in the throes of an hypnotic voodoo trance. Or maybe just asleep at the wheel. So we get lost.

...and we wind up in the 9th ward. The cops don't even go to the 9th ward. Place looks like AP photos of downtown Beirut that I remember from my youth. What's gonna happen when some druglord amasses enough weaponry and zombie-like followers to install himself (or herself, hopefully. That would make a better story.) as the undisputed ruler of everything south of St. Charles? Free from fear of embargo, she'd use the strength of her river frontage to get whatever she wanted, threatening to dam the Mississippi, or pollute it with toxins or copies of "The Anarchists Cookbook" that will be carried to Mexico, inciting first quiet and illicit unrest until, after enough pipe-bombs and failed bridge demolitions, full scale rioting would break out. The Mexican drug cartels, seeing this, would immediately understand her nascent power and seek to join forces. Soon, having acquired Cuba in a game of wits with Castro, her empire will achieve near Nation status and one of two things would happen; Southern Louisiana would be reclaimed by the sea after another devastating hurricane, or the Saints would win the Superbowl mere weeks before Mardi-Gras. But I digress.

We finally got clear of The Big Easy To Get Lost In and headed...hold up, hey, listen. Did you know that in Louisiana, you can go to a "Margarita Stand" and, without getting out of your car (the drive up window is, after all, on the driver's side), purchase and receive two, 98oz. alcoholic daiquiris despite the fact that only two people occupy said car? One of those being the driver. It is legal for the passenger to drink that brain-freeze inducing concoction while on the roadway and evidently, in Louisiana, they don't give a Fat Tuesday fuck if the driver does too. And then the speed limit is goddamn 75. On the secondary and tertiary roads. And on these really spooky cloverleaf highway overpasses nestled real deep in real honest to fuckin'-little-baby-Jesus-said-so swampland where if you went over the Jersey barrier for reason, you may as well be over the side of an oil tanker in the ocean. You ain't climbin' back up, you ain't hollerin' for help, that anyone can hear, and you ain't swimmin' nowhere meaningful before your sorry ass is 'et and shat. I didn't know any of that, and now you do too.

We rocked and rolled our way to Lake Charles for visits with Morgan and Mike, Chris and Taylor at their swell house on the Calcasieu river. I've previously said we were between the River and Lake Charles proper. This is wrong. The Google map of the Caslcasieu River looks like a crude rendering of a portion of the human organ glob area containing the stomach, complete with surface area-increasing rugae, and some other gloppy inside meats. Where we were was between the stomach and the pancreas, (anterior view of course). Glad to clear that up.

What really matters though, is how much these folks like to Party. Capital P-arty.

Well, not all of them. And actually all they do is drink a lot and smoke many cigarettes and play guitars and sing songs until dawn.

And while there is not the kind of Capital P-arty that features a nightly orgy of blood, sex, glitter and drug fueled STD transfer, you had better be prepared to do it again, consecutively for a number of nights, that number remaining TBA. Sorry guys, but you all drink shitty beer. Shiner Bock is the best around and that does not say much. Also, it's ok for a 17 year old to run the door at the music venue/bar and let all his under-age friends in

Morgan and the boys

Call the waah-mbulance for the poor lonely banjo player

who also come to the after party carrying cases of beer and microdots of Ritalin. It's also ok to play old-versus-young Flipcup featuring such classic match-ups as The Diapers vs Depends.

It's also ok to get your wallet stolen out of your car by some drunk 17 year old because the only thing of real value in it at the time is your AAA card. It's also ok to go to Texas.

Something Fishy

2010-02-25T14:36:00.009-05:00

We greet you now from Sunshine Valley, tucked into a mountain basin at 7800 ft a.s.l., 35 miles north of Taos, NM. Warm days, COLD nights and a bunch of snow. Juniper and Josh have been nice enough to host us for a few days and show us around. It's dashed majestic here, mountains jutting skyward from under a blanket of snow and scrub pines. (I really wanted to make some sort of erection reference there, but I'll contain myself.) (Ooops, too late.) Everywhere I turn there's a damn mountain.

But...before I can continue, you'll remember that we left you hanging on the edge of your seat in Tennessee.

Ok, so we get off the highway, lured by the Ripley's Aquarium billboard. Now usually these things are just a few minutes off the interstate, right? Well, not always so. This was a deliberate ruse to get us flies to venture into the depths of the web. The aquarium is actually located in Gatlinburg, at the base of the Smoky Mountains, an hour off the highway at the end of a thundering wampus trail of tourist traps and flapjack joints. They do love their pancakes here in Pigeon Forge, TN. It seems almost pathological, really. Like some poor schlub might waddle out of the pancake house, drive a block to the lazer tag arcade or D-luxe mini golf mountain and suddenly find himself in a debilitating carb deficit. Light-headed and bewildered he looks to the right. Only a Go-Kart track. Across the street...a dinosaur museum in a building no larger than a two car garage (my guess is they made a bunch of shoebox dioramas using tiny plastic dinosaurs from the gas station toy rack, and called it a museum). But, using the last of his waning strength, he swivels that thick ol' southern neck to the left and there, encircled in golden cherubim, bathed in heavenly light, is yet another flapjack emporium. I'm not kidding. These things are everywhere.

This strip is kind of like the hotel zone of Cancun in that all the worst chain restaurants and bullshit that America has to offer line both sides of the four lane street. Plus fireworks, churches of increasingly paranoiac denominations, and elaborately constructed theme playgrounds advertising go-karts, wildwest arcades and tiny amusement parks featuring terrifying apparatus designed to fling small children into the next county. Dollywood is in this area. Don't know what that is? Look it up, chief.

We did finally find the aquarium, a new facility boasting to be America's favorite. How it can be so new and yet so favorite is a handy trick. A nice Aquarium, tho'. The best part for me was the glass tunnel that took us through the largest of the tanks. We boarded a slow moving walkway as sharks, rays and sawfish swam overhead and all around. Sarah was especially fond of the jellyfish. I was hungry for peanut butter.

_________Chompyfish _______Starryfish ____SexyGrandmafish
_____________So which of these do you want to make out with?

A really funny moment for me was when I was admiring the cuttlefish in their tank. A family came up behind me and the mother said "Ooooh, cuttlefish!", to which the 5 year old daughter mused, "They don't look very cuddly to me." Cute. Here's a cuttlefish changing colors. Based on the second fish's reaction I must have been stepping on some territorial toes. Don't mess with a pimp's ho.

We made it out of seaworld unscathed if you don't count the raping our wallets took. $20 bucks for a single admission. Hmphh.

We stick to the back roads and wind our way through the foothills of the Smokies into the heart of Tennessee where we stop in Clevelend for a bite at a place called The Spot. We looked around the town a bit first and found entire blocks of businesses shut down and boarded up. Despite Sarah's kicking me under the table to say nothing, I persist in asking our 17 year old waitress "What happened around here? Why are so many storefronts closed up?" She wrinkles her nose and posts a hand on her hip. "What do you mean? What's a storefront?" She yells to another server, same age. "Do you know why stuff is closed in town?"

"What do you mean?"

She turns back to us. "I didn't notice anything. I guess we just don't pay attention."

She seemed like she might try to offer more help, so to save myself I ordered a BBQ plate with hot slaw. Sarah got a wafer burger. Everything was disappointing except for Sarah's milkshake which was, I have to say, outstanding. The leaden feeling in our stomachs as we left was anything but. I still don't know how "hot slaw" differs from regular slaw, but they should change the name of the place from "The Spot" to "The Stain".

Out of Tenessee into Alabama. Sweet sweet home, Alabama. Nothing much to say here. We had no place, really, to go in Alabama, so after a brief argument about where we were going, Sarah settled in for a nap and I started a four hour burn down the shitpipe center of Alabama. I must admit I felt a bit uneasy as I left the major highway for Rt.43 South. The shift from the busy three lane Interstate to a dark and lonely country road was a little jarring. There were no other cars, and homes only sparsely broke up the the night-time landscape. Adding to my discomfiture was the profusion of high-wattage street lights surrounding every domicile. I imagined that perhaps they were warding off some night-time demons, some slathering chupacabra that prowled the area. Maybe they were just trying to keep their daughters locked down. Alabama.

Well, nothing went "Boo" in the night. The most frightening thing I saw was only a bunny hopping up in front of my headlights. It was armed to the teeth with automatic weapons but I pretended to be southern and he let me go. RT.43 finally dumped us just outside Mobile in, fittingly enough, Saraland, where we paid too much for the privilege of dropping gratefully into a king sized hotel bed.

Who dat?

2010-02-19T14:02:00.014-05:00

Finally-
Finally, some warm weather. Here we are in Lake Charles, Louisiana, way over west near the Texas border. We couldn't really have found a better spot to stay, (thanks to Morgan, Michael, Taylor, and Chris for putting us up and up with us). We're on this finger (middle finger) of land that sticks out between Lake Charles and the Calcasieu River.
One side
The other side

I'm told that this area has the largest population of geese in N. America. It's a different landscape here (duh). I went for a sweaty, stinky hangover run this morning and was marveling at the:
1. flatness
2. wetness
3. Spanish mossiness
4. warmness
5. goosieness
6. pain
But I realize that I'm way ahead of myself. There are roughly 2600 miles between us and my last post. Let's hit the rewind button, shall we? (Having read this, I am acutely aware of my shifting tense. I'm all over the place, I know. But guess what...It's not English class, so suck it up.)

Leesburg, Va.

Cold. Snowy. If anyone is more snow-stunned than Philadelphians it'd have to be the Virginians. These poor folks don't know whether to shit or go blind. Here's a populace that freaks out over a dusting of snow and now they're literally buried under four feet of the damn stuff. Actually, I guess people take it in stride. There wasn't any panic in the streets that I saw. Or maybe they're all just in a state of TV induced narcolepsy that nothing short of a volcanic Armageddon could shake them out of. But, before I get carried away waxing superior, consider this; within view of Sarah's parents house is a mountain in the center of which is a vast underground complex designed to house, in the event of some catastrophe, the President, both houses of Congress and probably a bunch of military advisers and personnel. If I know about this, then it must be a matter of public record, which to my mind makes it an inviting target for anyone bent on serious destruction, such as some sort of explosive missile strike. Which, of course, could provide the disruption necessary to cause even the most soporific denizen of northern Virginia to suddenly look up and say, "Jesus Christ! What's with all this fuckin' snow?!"

Also, the sheep

had some babies.

Mars Hill, N.C.
Cold. Snowy. If anyone is more snow-stunned than Virginians it'd have to be the North Carolinans. These poor folks don't know whether to shit or go blind. Actually, that's not true. I sensed a hardiness from the people there. Nevermind that the only North Carolinans I interacted with were at the grocery store. I could sense it. These are hill folk. Mountain men. ...And women. Don't forget to give the mountain women they're due, 'cause they're mountain women and they'll fuck you up if you piss them off. Now, granted, we're only halfway across the country and have yet to get into the Rockies, but so far, the Blue Ridge mountains are the must stunning bit of terrestrial upheaval that I've seen burped up out the Earth's mantle. I was looking at some notes I had taken while riding and saw where I wrote that if "If the Earth is God's nutsac, the Blue Ridge mountains are the wrinkles on that heavenly nutsac." An arguable point, for sure, but I challenge you to PROVE me wrong. I would have taken some pictures to show you how pretty, but I was driving, so you'll just have to use your imagination.
At this point, we were nearly a thousand miles south of where we started and the temperature had done nothing but fluctuate one or two degrees and I was starting to get angry about it. After wending our way through snow covered passes we pulled into Sarah's friend Alex's mountain farmhouse in time for supper.

There we met his two friends, Jake and Ryvo, both timber-framers who are building him a kiln shed. The interesting part about this is that they both live in Montville. I had even met Jake maybe a year ago at a Tree By Leaf show in Belfast. El mundo pequeno.

Ryvo has a message for you...

So we have some beers, we have some food. We hang out, we have some beers (Thanks for the care package, Gerry), we go to sleep. By morning the temperature has fallen ten degrees and it's snowing. Again.

Now I'm pissed. Really, deeply indignant somewhere in a hot and dark place inside of me.

I feel as though I'm the arse of some galactic fucking joke. I hate the cold. We took this trip to get away from the cold. I don't know if I'll ever be able to do a trip like this again, and somewhere, some cosmic schmuck who thinks this is funny is just laughing his cosmic ass off. I wanted to punch him in his stupid little cosmic lips.
Our exit route should have been I-40, but that was closed to a massive rock slide. (No doubt the work of this cosmic joker again. He's always leaving his toys all over the place. SOOO immature. Like Uh Muh Gawd.) This eventuality forced us to backtrack about an hour and take an alternate route, which is noteworthy for a reason I'll reveal later. The hour's backtrack takes us into the mountains again, where the weather is effing atrocious. Fortunately the highway crews were liberal with the salt, so the roads were wet but not deadly.
Conditions improved some once down from the mountains and slowly the snow on the sides of the road began to thin, however the temps did not rise. We settled back and cruised Highway Whatever for a good number of hours, the car running nicely. Then I saw the billboard for Ripley's Aquarium of the Smokies and, well, I love a good aquarium, so off we go in search of Pigeon Forge Tennessee and the wonders of the sea.

Check back soon for the mind-blowing continuation.
p.s. Leaving comments reminds us that you love us.

Philly Snow Cheez

2010-02-15T15:44:00.018-05:00

Hi. It's me. The goat. Yeah, the goat. I'm in your back yard. I'm rhythmically chewing something. I don't even know what I'm chewing on, but it shore tastes giid. Mm-hmm. I've got those weird goat eyes, like cat's eyes all sideways. I've got those gnarly hip-bones and an awesome pot belly that is sooo distended and hot. Hand me my robe, would you sweetheart? Yeah, the one with the little bunny on it that Hef gave me. Thanks.

Sayonara Suckers!

So we drove south all through the day and the damn temperature never rose more than one damn degree. Though the roads were clear of snow, the highway info signs were still flashing a message to "Use Caution". "Use Caution"? Who says? And where can I get some? Can I buy it at the store or is it handed out during the census? Does it look like a feather duster or does it have that packaging that's been designed to not be opened? Should I wave it around? How do I use the damn thing? I think I'm all out anyway. Caution.
I did see a ton of red-tail hawks on the Jersey Turnpike. That must be a good sign. I think they were looking for disabled motorists, or at least the babies of disabled motorists. Hawks -lone, majestic...hungry for your child.

Philadelphia
34 degrees in Philly and socked in with snow. These people are effed. They really don't know what to do right now. The trash has begun to pile up along with the snowbanks.

I'm told the prevailing vibe has shifted to one of human solidarity, the populace united against a common enemy. I personally helped a little old lady to navigate the slushy drifts as we crossed the street. I figured that should sew up my Karma for the rest of day, freeing me to be a complete asshole. I love traveling.
Here's something fun...This is my rogue's gallery of cars that are snow-fucked. These poor bastards are so jammed and iced in that they won't move 'till the Eagles lose another season.

FUCKED! FUCKED! FUCKED!

You're FUCKED, too!!!

I think this shot really sums up the way Philadelphians feel about their new friend, Snow.

Here's something else that's fun...after sledding in Clark Park, West Philly...

we decided to re-enact the blind taste test from the movie Beer Wars. So we bought a can each of the Lites; Coors, Miller and Bud. And you know what?...Go fuck yourself. Yup, that's right. That's what those beer companies are telling you. Haul off and whiz all over yourself. Or better yet...poop in your glass.

I write this to you know from the bosom of northern Virginia, Loudoun County, where three feet of snow has effectively made this state it's little prison bitch. I'll tell you about that once we get to Asheville, NC some time tomorrow.

Here's more sledding...

Cabrones 2.0: USA

2010-02-13T08:17:00.004-05:00

So Cats n Kitties, Lillies and Germs, The Belfast Cabrones are on the road again, and this time it's personal. Really personal. Like feminine hygiene.

We depart Belfast Fri. Morning under clear skies and bright sun, 35 degrees, a slight wind from the northeast. The Audi's all packed up and tuned, ready for eating asphalt.

We'll be working the Eastern seaboard just a little here. Philly will relinquish unto us her cream cheese, her cheese-steak, her daughters and sons of William Penn. Then we'll visit northern Va. cuz Sarah loves her Mere and Pere. Me? I just want the snow. 3 feet of it. WTF? Now that's just silly.
Anyway, we'll be moving south to the Gulf Coast, which should get us into some warmer weather. Than we'll bang a right and shuffle through bayou territory on our way to Tejas. Then it's on to the mindblowing natural wonders of the "Four Corners" region. If we ever recover from tripping ballz on Peyote in Joshua Tree or some such, we may hit SoCal and dip our toes in the Mighty Pacific. Then it's a mad burn across the country to get home before the money runs out.

This little wonder will be making the journey with us,

so be on the lookout. It'll be like Where's Waldo, but we'll call it "Find the Fucker". (Thanks Kimmy)
I hope you can all join us for the ride.

New Video

2009-12-07T00:02:00.004-05:00

POOR IGGY.
Cold blooded don't mean cold hearted.

Back in the U.S.S.A.

2009-03-19T09:30:00.002-04:00

W.C.
Well, we made it. 60 days in Mexico on roughly 29$ a day. No one puked, no one was arrested and no one died. I'd call that success, wouldn't you? We didn't even spend all our money, nor did we lose anything important through theft or negligence. Ok, we lost a headlamp and the ocean robbed Sarah of her contact lenses and me of my camera, but really, what more could one ask?
It was truly a joy to return home. I was flooded with relief the first time I was asked "How ahr ya?" and didn't have to struggle with my caveman Spanish to formulate a response. My first breaths of crisp Maine air, inhaled in the sunlight of Wed. morning were sweeter than baby's breath and bakery steam put together.

While I realize that Tuesday was St. Paddy's Day and we were all celebrating a holiday that, like most modern holidays, has utterly nothing to do with the reason for the holiday, I felt a little like it was a homecoming party set up especially for us, the returning heroes of leisure. My compliments to the party planning staff. I just happen to look great in green. Oh, and I like beer.
Seriously, though. It was such a pleasure to see you all again. I felt swaddled in warmth, and not just because of my diaper.

At some point in the evening I found myself on the dance floor, suddenly face to face with a 55 or so yr old woman, a stranger, sporting the requisite green plastic bowler hat of the Lucky Charms Irish set. She, drunkenly, but with great gravity, announced that I was "The cutest thing [she] seen all day". And without a breath between, inquired "Are you gay, too?" I smiled and replied only, "Sorry to disappoint you", and then beat a hasty retreat to the relative safety of the bar.

And then I went through my mail and discovered that I've been juried into the Maine Photography Show for the 3rd year running. They liked this shot, taken in Chicago last year...

At this moment, I have yet to pick up my piece from last years show...I'd ask for a ride to Boothbay, but I'll just wait 'till I drop off this year's.

So...Here's to the W.C., here's to being home where we're loved, and here's to you all, for sticking it out through the shit. Cheers!

Mexican't

2009-03-16T12:11:00.003-04:00

Time for one last post before heading to the airport. It's been great having this blog. In the times when I was missing my home and friends it was comforting to be able to communicate...and hear your feedback.
So we're coming home to a black president. What's that like anyway? Ok, so he's not black...ok, so he's not African American, he's half black, half....no, he's....got a really good tan? Seriously though, I'm just excited to take pride in the knowledge that my (first time I've thought that in 8 yrs) president at least has a workable command over the English f'ing language.
Here's something I learned from some fellow travelers, just recently. Let's say you are from Country A (not the USA) and you want to fly to Country C (also not the USA), and to do that, your flight has a layover in a US airport, you must submit to fingerprinting. Fingerprinting! Like when you get arrested! These are not US citizens. These are citizens of nations over which we (the USofA) have absolutely no sovereignty. Said foreign nationals must also alert the US at least 72 hours before said flight that they will be making said layover. WTF, man? Did you know about this? I certainly had no idea. Sure, I may be known to enjoy the occassional left handed cigarette, and maybe my short term memory ain't what it could be, but I simply don't recall ever having voted on said issue. You can rest assured that had I seen this on some ballot, I'd have left no dangling, no dimpled chad to leave doubt as to the negativity of my vote. Just who do we think we are. It's an airport...a sort of neutral territory. Until one passes through customs and immigration, which I'm assuming doesn't happen when transferring from a flight from London, say, to a flight bound for Mexico.
So I'm hoping that some things will change. Like the unilateral power granted certain authorities to devise whatever invasive policies they deem fit without even alerting the American public, much less, allowing us to decide whether we think it's a good idea.
And while I'm ranting...I think it would go a long way towards restoring The USA's place as a favored nation in the eyes of the rest of the world if "W" were brought up on war crimes charges. There, I've said it.

On another note, Mezcal is an evil, evil drug.

So, what do you think, people? This blog was only begun for the purpose of this trip, but I'm not so sure I want to end it. Let me know if you'd be interested in continuing to read my rambling and often addled comments on the world I see. Maybe this won't be the last post, after all.

We gotta catch a plane...

D.F.

2009-03-14T18:27:00.002-04:00

Mexico City

Some random thoughts, notes and remembrances??

The kid that puked on the bus...in the aisle. And the single, wadded Kleenex the mom put in the middle of the puddle to clean it up. Oh, and the guy who stepped in it.

The 4 man band of blind kids playing on the street.

The guy who looked like he had a fish hook lodged in his cheek.

Watching surfing videos in Mazunte while eating sushi.

Being in Mex. City no more than 5 minutes before being offered the sale of "todo tipas de drogas".

Granting an interview in English for a seven yr old kid's school project.

3 legged dogs. Lots of 3 legged dogs.

Buying 22 mangos at 7 cents each.

Having to watch Flightplan with Jodie Foster, dubbed in Spanish on the 17 hr bus ride from Mazunte. Twice.

Museum guards in every room of the Picasso exhibit sporting fully automatic rifles and long barrel .12 gauge shotguns. "Please don't touch the art", indeed!

Showering with a scorpion.

Being the only male in our posse that English Bob didn't get fresh with.

Realizing that I'm too polite to be an efficient Mexican pedestrian. Even the little old ladies will snake your run here.

Picking a shoeshine man based on resemblance to my dead grandfather. (He did a great job.)

Keeping our container of yoghurt cold...in the toilet tank.

60 days...no rain.

See you sooner.

Say Goodnight, Mazunte. "Goodnight, Mazunte."

2009-03-13T19:42:00.009-04:00

Here we are in Pochutla, waiting for the bus. The nightbus. The 15 hour night bus to Mex. City. Endgame, lillies and germs. This is the pudding from whence comes the proof. The decisions we make in the next five minutes will determine the fates of the rest of our lives. What the hell am I talking about. Seems there was a hefty storm somewhere off the coast and today, our usually tranquil playa has been transformed into a frothy monster, inexorably devouring the beach, gulp after sandy wave. The shore is so steep right now that the receding wave crashes into the oncoming one creating a vertical wall of water sometimes 30 or 40 feet high. Otherwise, the waves are doubling up, like siamese twins, attached in lockstep and thundering down on the boogy boarders and those brave (stupid) enough to dance in the surf.
We bid a misty eyed farewell to Elliott and Uwe, the last of our posse this morning and then finally to Mazunte just 45 minutes ago.
Here are some shots of my favorite Mazunte.

This is Punta Cometa, the southernmost point in Oaxaca State...limestone, wind and sea...and millenia

Here we are toasting our last night at Sylvia's Bar...after watching "Point Break" on a bed sheet hung from the palapa. Yes, that "Point Break". "Vayos con Dios, dude."

"...And I was thinking to myself/
This could be heaven/
Or this could be Hell"

I'm onna git'ya

Sarah thinks she's a kitty

The results of...excess

Speaking of excess, I have to tell you about James and Mescalito...But I can't right now. I'll just say that Englishmen could keep to pints and crisps, and leave the Mezcal to them's that knows how. Ahmet and I, late at night, maybe 1am or so. We're pretty mellow, having a heart to heart, when up the stairs comes James of London (Nottingham, really), proper drunk. Highlights of his late night jamboree include a monkey-armed crab dance, feigned seizures and speaking in tongues. The two best gems were directed at a girl on the upper level who stepped out on her balcony to investigate the noise. After an offer of sex was politely declined by the groggy woman, James apologized profusely before becoming suddenly indignant. "Come talk to me when you're perfect.", was gem numero uno. And, in reference to the noise he was making..."It's cheap rooms, innit? Don't forget your fucking earplugs.", was gem numero dos. I'll have to demonstrate the dance for you in person.

One last look

Time to go. A little food and then tuck into the bus. Talk to you from Mex. City.
Ciao

This is Mazunte

2009-03-13T19:34:00.003-04:00

So...It seems pretty crazy, right? But when you think about it, it's all sand, there´s no wharf, and what the fuck? It's fun...

One week left

2009-03-08T15:38:00.010-04:00

Hey everyone...Sorry to be out of touch for so long. I've just been right out straight here in Mazunte. There's so much nothing to do I fear I may never finish. I'm so fucking stressed out. You really have no idea how much nothing has been piling up around me. It's like a Gordian Knot of nothing that could take me forever to unravel and I don't have that kind of time. Seriously, help me. I have no idea how to accomplish this much nothing-doing in only a week.

Yeah...It's pretty mellow here. We've decided to basically say F-you to going anywhere else. We left Oaxaca City after finding out that, due a persistant fever, there would be no Mexican surgery for Phil, and he was choppered to Johns-Hopkins in Baltimore. We've heard no news, so can only assume that he survives and will recover.

I've begged and borrowed and, thanks to the kindness of relative strangers, I have pics for you today. Thanks to Elliott, Karla and Bec.

On our last day in O.C. we took a day trip to a place called Hierve El Agua...A spring fed trickle has been building up mineral deposits for millenia and has created a cascade, a waterfall of sorts, of hardened calcite and whatever else is in the water. The trip is a little crazy, up a series of mountain switchbacks reaching ear-popping heights. The view after cresting the peak is quite astounding. The are is rarified and crystaline as are the limpid pools that trickle down the limestone cliffs.

That night we loaded up the night bus and made speed back to Mazunte to work on straddling the perilous fence between tans and melanomas.

Since we'll be here, essentially, for the remainder of our trip, I thought it would be nice to share our surroundings with you. Let's begin...

Our Cabaña is on the right with the blue and yellow stripes...

The accomodations...

The view from our hammock...

You don't know these people, but we hang out with them...

A typical family home in Mazunte...

A typical set of wheels...

Here's a place we like to swim called "The Jacuzzi". It's nice for a mid-day swim...

The Crouch...

The Leap...

I competed in a ping-pong tournament the other night at a local bar/hostal...Sporting the Nombre de Guerra of "El Rojo", I won my first round match against a sallow German fellow, but was knocked out in the second by a lightning fast Spaniard.

Ok...that's all I can take for right now. I've been sitting on this hard-ass internet cafe chair for too long and it's hot as hell. So...Tune in soon to hear about the harrowing tale of English James meets Mezcalito, and some photos of my absolute favorite thing in Mazunte...besides this girl...ta.

Oaxac-olate

2009-02-28T12:44:00.002-05:00

Oaxaca City

This place reminds me of Brooklyn. It's a big city. There are lots and lots of people here. There is a certain urban panache, without ostentation, that makes Oaxaca (Wa-haka) feel different from any other place we've been so far. It's a workers' city. An honest place where the flash of Manhattan lights give way to neighborhood joints and bustling indoor markets, festooned with, well...everything. There's the clothing and dry goods market. Wend your way through the maze and you're in the meat section where great slabs of fried pork fat hang alongside endless ropes of spicy chorizo. This gives way to the seafood area, the chicken sellers, Oaxacan chocolate, mounds of mole', mezcal vendors, the produce market, old ladies offering samples of their spicy toasted Chapulines. I ate scorpions on Isla Mujeres but I have yet to bring myself to suck down seasoned grasshoppers. This is all under two connected roofs and is an absolute riot of noise, aroma and humanity.

Checked out a jazz club the other night where a four piece act of mixed heritage was blowin' and smokin' like the old days. The faded velvet couches pulled us in, and the Mezcal kept us there. The walls were done up with these great Xerox inspired murals in a Banksy-ish style. Drinks were pricey though. And that's an issue as we near the finish line of this journey.

Brother Phil is in hospital and awaiting surgery. It was scheduled for yesterday, but he was running a fever, so they had to put it off. For some reason there are no surgeries performed in Mexico on the weekends, so he has to just lie there for another two days and wait. I'd crack a joke about that, but I just don't find it funny. The good news is that rather than spinal and skull fractures, he suffers from dislocated vertebrae which are straining the nerves that extend to his hands. That, combined with a lot of internal swelling, accounts for the paralysis in his arms and the severe pain he's in. The surgery for this is not exactly routine, but should be a walk in the park for the doctor here. Recovery time is expected to be a matter of weeks, not months. Good, good, good.

We're in a cool hostel here, run by three brothers, avid rock climbers all. They have an assortment of animals as pets...two cats, 4 or 5 dogs. Two of the dogs are a pair of aging Basset Hounds that spend most of their time on the rooftop terrace that surrounds the open central courtyard. When they do come down to visit, they get a leash tied between them and they snuffle around the place like some long-eared, four-pawed tandem bicycle. It was explained that they're not exceptionally swift, mentally or physically, and that this arrangement prevents them from slipping out the gate and under the wheels of a city bus.

We've re-united with Elliott from Indiana, who was just about to return to Mazunte when he received news about Phil. So our crew right now consists of us, Elliott, Ahmet the Aussie-Turk ex-intelligence operative, Uwe, the perpetually optimistic German metrosexual (unlike in the States, it's still cool to call oneself metro in other countries), and English Bob from San-Francisco (not English in the least).

I'm reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez's Love in the Time of Cholera right now. He's such an amazing writer that I feel like an absolute pauper who shouldn't have permission to string more than three words in a row. If anyone knows a good necromantic chant I'll see about getting Marquez to "ghost write" the blog from here on out.

We'll remain here in Oaxaca for a few more days before heading back to the beach to soak up as much sun as possible before returning to the hinterlands of Maine. Prepare to fawn over us and our tans. On your knees. Yes. Oh yes.

Trouble in Paradise

2009-02-25T13:47:00.002-05:00

We're leaving Mazunte today, perhaps a little ahead of schedule. There is a couple, Lauren and Phil that we've hung around with here. They're from Warren and I think I mentioned them in the "Small World" post. Something happened to Phil in the ocean yesterday as he jumped into the waves. Sarah and I came upon the scene about a half hour after the incident. Through her tears Lauren could only manage to say that she thought Phil had broken his neck. He was laid out on the beach surrounded by onlookers. A doctor was also there. Two other friends of ours here had seen him floating face down in the ocean and when it became obvious something was wrong, they rolled him over and he gratefully sucked in air. Had they been a moment or two later he would have drowned for sure. There is no doubt that these two, Ahmet and Andreas saved Phil's life. When we arrived he could neither feel nor move anything from his neck down. He was lifted onto a surfboard and carried up the beach to the shade of a palapa while doctors and those with both English and Spanish translated back and forth. There aren't enough ambulances in the area to dispatch one to this remote beach, so a collectivo truck is called. Someone swipes a pile of the foam mattresses from one of the hostels to line the bed of the truck. As we are strapping Phil to the board for the 30 minute ride to Pochutla, he begins to wiggle his toes. A great sign! Soon he has feeling in his arms, legs and feet and then his hands. He's lucid and retains a sense of humor. When asked what the day is he inaccurately replies "the 23rd". It's the 24th and someone mutters "Close enough..." and Phil, caught between a smirk and a grimace replies, "Who knows what day it is here?" I'm telling him to only think about breathing while massaging his arms and legs to keep the blood circulating. His girlfriend fetches all the necessities, passports, money and such and they and Ahmet are off to the hospital in Pochutla. We find out later that he has fractured three vertebrae high up between his shoulders, but there seems to be no damage to the spinal column itself. They need to get him into an MRI to check for blood clots and transport him, via ambulance to Oaxaca City. Yesterday we got into their room and packed up all their stuff which we will drop off when we find the Oaxaca City hospital.

This whole thing has kind of knocked me for a loop. I've been exceptionjally careless with my own safety here; exploring caves, swimming in potentially dangerous waters alone, bounding across rock fields on the edge of cliffs. I'm doing it for the excersize and also to face down some of my own fears, but at what point does pushing yourself become the act of a statistic. I don't even think Phil was doing anything out of the ordinary. I think a wave must have tumbled him just the wrong way. Of course it's pointless to speculate the what ifs. I'm relieved by the news that his injuries, while severe, will most likely not be life changing, but the whole thing has shaken me up. I can't begin to imagine what he felt while laying there in the ocean, face down, unable to move, just hoping that someone will pick his head up before he runs out of air. How scary it must be for his girlfriend, Lauren.
I think I will look into some CPR/First Aid classes when I get home. I'd like to know that I could be usefull in a crisis situation sometime.

Other than that, we're both fine and will keep you up to date with our next move.

Safely yours,
Seth and Sarah

Ahorita

2009-02-22T12:56:00.006-05:00

I had a professor in college that really stressed the importance of reading one's own work many, many times before sending it out in the world. Not just for the purpose of proofreading, but to hear the words as a reader, not a writer. I wish I'd taken his words more to heart. Also at this time, I had to hand write everything, on paper, lowly paper, with a pen or pencil. A stylus was still used to play a vinyl record disc. With the USPostal Service one has the time it takes to walk to the mail drop, having paid good money for the stamp, to ponder the contents of that missive in one's hand. You had to want to send that out and there were many opportunities to back out along the way. Now, with the immediacy of the e-mail and the blog, a new arena of human foible has huffed it's way to the fore. Once that "send" button is pushed there isn't anything in our human grasp that can stop it. Now, there is naught to do but pray for an act of God (who, and this just in...doesn't exist) to smite the ISP's main junction matrix at just the precise nanosecond needed to stop the bytes of impending embarassment, sent on their way buy the careless key stroke of one who has forgotten to read a word of what they wrote, from reaching their destination. I was just reading the last post and I was appalled at the crude writing and peurile subject matter. Some scoundrel must have hacked into the blog and is having one over on us all.

Ahorita

Mexico is "Ahorita".
I'll explain. In Costa Rica, they say Tranquilo. For me this word is the overall summation of the vibe of the country. "If it's amarillo, be tranquilo." If you live in the jungle and you've got a mote of protection from the elements and your family has, collectively, a full belly, Tranquilo. Take a load off. This pervades the pace of everyday life. Buenas is the ambassador from Guatemala to this international label slap. Used as a prefix for almost anything, Buenasis an endlessly optimistic sprinkling of good cheer on every word. Good morning, Good afternoon, Good eatin', Good to see you. Buenas.

Here in Mexico, and because I say so, we have Ahorita. I have yet to nail down two sources in a row that will give me corroborating information as to the precise nature of this word. Near as I can tell, Ahorita means: A few moments ago, right this minute, in a few moments, (which could also mean by sunset, or within the week).
Imagine, if you will, sitting in the bus terminal. Your watch and the clock on the wall are an hour off from each other. But you're pretty sure you've got the right time. But you doubt yourself because this is the bus station. It's a municipal facility that has, as its main purpose, a commitment to operating on a reasonably accurate timetable. And for the most part, it does. So why would the main terminal clock be wrong? Anyway, you have a doubt now and you're straining to understand the soothing female voice fairly shrieking from the overtaxed PA system. (Remember what I said about Mexico and volume knobs?) Between the distortion and the echo of the terminal there isn't a single intelligible word to latch onto. You check your watch and if the clock, the big, red, digital clock on the wall, is correct, your bus should be leaving in one minute. So you grab your bags and head for the attendant taking tickets at the gate. You enquire whether or not the call had been made for the bus you need. You don't speak Spanish well. What you've actually said is, "When bus here Pochutla go?" The attendant rips off a couple of sentences in a lightning fast tongue. He also happens to have a mushy drawl not unlike John Belushi satirizing Marlon Brando's turn as Don Corleone with an orange wedge stuck in his mouth. You don't understand Spanish well. The only words you catch are bus and ahorita. Based on a likelyhood that the attendant understands what you were getting at, you could reasonably infer these three responses.

Response one: "The bus you wished to ride left here ahorita."

Response two: "The bus you wish to ride leaves here ahorita."

Response three: "The bus you wish to ride leaves here ahorita." This one looks the same as two, I know. But this means the bus will be leaving shortly. Or by the end of the week, no need to rush.

Mexico works at a different frame rate than the US. It's HOT here. I can imagine an evolutionary sixth sense that enables a culture to pace life at such a rate as to be non-slacking but restfull. "Yeah, I can do that for you, but it's not gonna get done at a high rate of speed. It's hot out, if you haven't noticed." I can imagine it being just a matter of time before before one who lives here developes a pace by which they balance on a fine line. Walking the tight-rope razor's edge between getting something done and getting killed by the heat. There are lots of unforseen variables in a country like this. Lots of free radicals roaming around. Any one of these could void a contracted time agreement and so, what better way to avoid conflict than to use vaguery as a foundation. The outcome is open to interpretation and wholly contextual. "Ahorita."
It turns out the clock on the bus station wall was wrong.

Have I mentioned that there's a goose living here at the beach? Big, white goose. He waddles around the sand, never in the water. Occasionally he'll pick someone out of a group and take a strong dislike, stretching out his neck low to the ground and with a feral hiss, give chase. The dogs don't fuck with the goose.

Gators!

2009-02-20T15:14:00.003-05:00

This is GreenBack, the Boss of the Swamp...he runs close to 4 meters and probably scales in at 250 to 300 lbs. Wrasslin', anyone?

Who do Voodoo?

2009-02-19T12:34:00.023-05:00

So the camera's toast, but I've got the pics. However, seeing as there is now a finite supply, I'll have to ration them out to you over the next few weeks.

I think maybe Declan is right. Maybe it's a good thing to get my nose out from behind a camera. I mean, shit, I've had a camera with me almost everywhere for the last five years or so, and have probably taken an average of 10 pictures a day for those years. Maybe there's a benefit for me in just enjoying what I see without looking for the most dramatic angle or best lighting to make a composition. Maybe I will see more. But shit, there is so much amazing stuff here that I want to photograph. The round divots, wind-etched into the sandstone cliffs jutting, prow-like, over the ocean. The colorful fish darting around the coral shallows. The lizards, the musicians, the dancers. The regal and downtrodden. The flowers coated with raodside dust, the children and the old men, you name it. Plus, I think I'm getting the shakes, man. C'mon man, just a taste so I can get well, man. C'mon, you said you were my friend. You know I'm good for it. Don't look at me like that, motherfucker. You're all the same. Fine don't help me. The good news is...at this very moment I seem to be having success with my existing pics using a neat little undelete program called "recuva". It's free and a great tool to have for those "Ooops" moments when you erase something you didn't mean to. You Mac users will have to suffer. This one's strictly PC. So...more pics should be forthcoming. In the meantime, let's talk.We're still in Mazunte. This is the kind of place people get stuck in. We've been here 8 days now and I, for one, can't really see a reason to leave. SWaldron has itchy feet, a little bit, but I just love it here. I feel like I can finally start to relax and get in tune with the rythms of the place.

Mazunte is a tiny little beach, well two beaches, sort of. San Augustinillo is the next beach to the south. We go there for body surfing. Bigger waves than the ones here. You can walk the road if you want, but it's a hot 20 minutes. I was feeling adventurous yesterday after discovering the virus, so I swam solo through the rock field that separates the two beaches. Going there was great.

I had the current and it was an easy ten minute swim. Coming back, however, the tide had come in some and the scape was different. I tried to shortcut through the shallows close to the land and got pushed onto some razor sharp rocks. I could feel my bare legs taking a beating and as I pushed out with my right hand to get back into the narrow channel, I came down with my fingers on a sea urchin. He let me know just how he felt about that, and I had some spines to pull when I reached the shore a few minutes later. So, it was a shorter swim, but I paid a price in flesh. Seriously, though, it's just a bunch of little cuts and scrapes. Nothing to worry about. But, I digress. On the north end of the beach is a giant rock face that forms the other end of the beach crescent.

See that cactus sitting on top? That thing is huge. Close to 25 feet tall with a trunk like an old beech tree.

There are a myriad of trails leading to the top where sun lovers, after partaking of the "special cake" being sold on the beach every afternoon, go to bid goodnight to their god.

Dogs roam freely here. Lots of strays. They get stuck together a lot. They'll be expressing the deepest admiration for eachother. Y'know, in the mammalian way, if you will. Wink wink, nudge nudge. The male will try to pull off a move he saw on the internet yesterday, but he'll forget that he's a fucking dog, and you need apposable thumbs for that kind of thing. So he falls off. But he's stuck. Oh, the shame. The embarrassment. "Ok, fluffy, just try to act natural. They're not looking at us. OK, they're looking at us, but we can get through this with our dignity intact." ...Wait a tick, here. I was talking about the unrivaled beauty of this place and somehow I fell into talking about dogs screwing on the beach. I just can't help myself.

So we got our touristy stuff out of the way right off the bat. We were almost immediately accosted by the local pusher. Not the drug pusher, but the guy whose job it is to recruit Gringos for the sealife sightseeing tour. The three hour tour. They drive a hard sell, so we rose early the next day and headed out. Pelicans, turtles and dolphins, Oh My! I had no idea that Manta rays could fling themselves four or five feet out of the water. I certainly didn't know they wanted to. There were dolphins swimming with the boat and trying to impress the girls with their aerial acrobatics. We were also fortunate enough to see a whale breech a number of times. I'm taking all this in and I barely notice Carlos, one of the guides, putting on his swim fins just next to me. We begin a slow approach on a basking sea turtle (they like to just bob along and soak up some sun). Suddenly Carlos throws himself over the side right on top of the turtle. Ambush! So he's got this turtle held fast by the shell and we all jump in the water to check him out. He's having none of this and looks pretty unhappy to have his reveries disturbed.

Imagine having a nice quiet mushroom trip in your sanctum sanctorum interrupted by the J.W.'s, your drunk neighbor and the IRS all at the door at the same time. We mugged with the turtle a little and then the countdown to release. Carlos knows what's going to happen as soon as he lets go. Turtle dives deep, and I think you can just make out his one finger salute to us in this pic.

There's this big (like 120 feet tall, big) rock a little ways ofshore.

I had seen it from the beach and thought, "How majestic". Our guidesn brought us close by it in the boat for a closer inspection. Turns out it's the night spot for all the local frigate birds. The lovely white that sparkles in the midmorning sun...? Guano. That's right, hundreds of years of birdshit. Maybe even thousands. In the afternoon we headed to the next beach to the north, known as Ventanilla.
We took another boat trip, this time into a deep blackwater lagoon to see mangroves,

toucan gris, and the heffe of the swamp, this 4 meter monster gator they call GreenBack. We looked at him, he looked (...and I mean looked) at us. I'm pretty sure he was calculating how much energy he would have to expend to swamp our boat, how many of us he could eat at once and how many he could stash under a log to soften up for later. I guess the math worked in our favor, because he soon became bored with us and moved on. We made it back to the beach just in time to be in on the release of six sea turtle hatchlings...Sarah actually got to set one free and we all cheered them on as they struggled against the shallow waves that would tumble them around on their way down the beach and into the surf.

.

The odds of survival once in the water are not good, but at least the gulls couldn't pick them off the beach like penny candy. By the time all this is finished, the collectivos are done for the day and the only way back to our beach is by taxi. They've got us (eight of us) by the short ones, but one driver affoers to take us all in one shot for ten pesos a person. Sounds great, but this taxi is just, like, a 1986 toyota camry. A five passenger vehicle at best. Elliott and I opt for the trunk ride and we ellicit much mirth from the other drivers and pedestrians as well. Mexico being the land of the speed bump, I fear the driver may have done more damage to his exhaust system than the combined fares were going to pay for.

And this was all just our first full day here. But don't worry. It gets a lot lazier after this

I hate viruses

2009-02-18T13:01:00.002-05:00

My picture card has the same fucking virus again, but no pc repair shop here in Mazunte. So I haven't lost them, I just can't access them. Also my camera broke. Not really so waterproof afterall. Sure, I've got a 5 yr replacement warranty, but not with me and where would they send a new one to anyway?
Fuck.

Sin Palabras

2009-02-17T10:58:00.003-05:00

Northern Folks' Paradise

2009-02-15T12:45:00.013-05:00

Mazunte
Well cats and kitties, lillies and germs...we have arrived. This is it. Paradise. The Pacific coast. Amazing crescent shaped beaches hemmed by towering rock formations. Whales, dolphins, mantarays flinging themselves out of the water just because they can. Hot sun, cold beer and a warm ocean. I'm just gonna show you some pics for now.

Here's a view of "our" beach

Stay tuned for more about our adventures...The net is quite slow right now and the beach calls me. More later.

El Mundo Pequeño

2009-02-13T14:17:00.013-05:00

San Cristobal De Las CasasWhen we split with Mary-Ellen, Tamara and Luz in Merida, they continued south to Tulum while we ventured north to Campeche and eventually to Palenque and from there to San Cristobal. At the bus station on departure morning Sarah started talking with this American fellow also headed to SCDLC (you try typing the whole thing every time...). He mentioned meeting some people from Maine while in Tulum. Can you guess which three fabulous travelers he was speaking of? The first guess is free. I assume you all remember the ice storm of '98, right? ...so I was searching around for a sweatshirt to wear in the evenings and I happen into this second hand clothing store and I'm sifting through the piles of clothes on a big table and what do you think I find? Holy shit! In the middle of Mexico's heartland mountains, there it is. One of those hideous "I survived the ice storm" sweatshirts that were so ubiquitous immediately after the power came back on. I didn't buy. Unfortunately, in a lapse of reason, I also didn't photograph it. Oh well.Back to the story, This guy, Elliot, is from Indiana and he just finished a 27 month stint for the Peace Corps, translating for an eye doctor in Nicaragua removing cataracts from the eyes of some of the poorest people in the world. People who had never before seen their grandchildren. Cheers to you, Elliot.He was headed the same direction as us, we talked a while and boarded the bus. Of course, we had to travel the same treacherous route as the previous days adventures to Agua Azul. This time we were in a big bus and it seemed not so harrowing. The landscape slipping past seemed to me at once so sad and romantic. The people are so poor and eke out whatever kind of living they can. Their lives set against a backdrop of lush jungle and rolling hills. These photos don't do it any justice.Zapatista mural on a school buildingWe pulled into SCDLC and we three were immediately rounded up by a shill for a new hostel. He was like a fervent recruiter for some slacker army and the offer was for him to pay our taxi fare if we would just stay at his new hostel. "Planet Hostel" turned out to be a great place and we fell in with a lovely crowd- One of the nights, 10 of us hit up a bar with cheap tequila and a reggae cover band. We arrived in one wave like a virtual U.N....4 Americans, 2 Canadians, a Spaniard, an Argentine, a Belgian and an Israeli. It's funny. I haven't actually hung out with a single Mexican. The language barrier is a big thing, of course, but on top of that, the hostel circuit is a great way to meet people from all over the world except the place you happen to be in.San Cristobal is a rare beauty. With a citizenry comprised primarily of Mayan descent, rambling colonial architecture, narrow cobblestone streets, grand churches perched at the tops of long flights of limestone steps. All this with high speed internet and vintage VW Beetles.The city sits in a basin ringed by mountains at an elevation of nearly 15,000ft. The air is exceptionally crisp and delicious, but not quite enough of it. I would climb the spiral stairs to the rooftop hammocks above the hostel and find myself oddly short of breath, but with it's warm, sunny days and rapidly cooling nights, it was like the best days of early autumn in Maine.

We passed our time reading in hammocks, walking around the open air market and cooking communal meals in the hostel. Good times, happy times.

And there was this Moto and it's rider who you can just see. He had a matching white leather outfit with the same airbrush motif. You can just see him in one of these.

At this point we seemed to have joined a flow of travelers following the same bi-directional current. Everybody seems to be traveling from or to the same destinations and we see familiar faces everywhere.
From SCDLC we rode the night bus to Pochutla (the jumping off point for travel among the various Oaxaca beaches) with Elliot from Indiana and we are now in Mazunte (a tropical paradise) where we are finding many of the same people from other hostel and spots along our route. Speaking of small worlds, here at this beach we met a young couple, Phil and Lauren, traveling for 6 months who are from Warren in good ol' Knox county, Maine. What's more...those of you who remember the Slack Factory, you will also remember the slack's caretaker, Yosarian who just happens to be Phil's uncle. Weird.

Mexico killed my Flip-Flops

2009-02-12T15:18:00.004-05:00

Success!!!
Photos saved. Virus eliminated!

Elliot was optimistic from the start.

I've added the Palenque photos, so if you've read that entry already, you should go back and check 'em out.

We're in Mazunte on the Oaxaca coast. More about paradise later. First I need to tell you about San Cristobal. Later.

Palenque: Sancho Panchan

2009-02-08T18:46:00.017-05:00

Arriving in Palenque after a long bus ride, our first move was to secure lodging. We hopped a colectivo, one of the ubiquitous late model white vans that carry passengers to common destinations for cheap fares, to El Panchan. A loose affiliation of restaurants, bars, campsites and cabañas for rent, El Panchan is tucked into the jungle conveniently just before the gated entrance to the national park that contains the Mayan ruins at Palenque. A place called El Mono Blano seemed alright and, being weary from the road, we took the first cabaña we encountered, which was a mistake. Look, I'm ok with rustic. I can rough it and I'm not squeamish about acomodations that fall short of those to which we in the "first world" are accustomed. I spent four seasons in a three season cabin in the woods with Jake, Scott and Cody. So when I say this was a shit-hole, perhaps you'll understand. Our next mistake was not removing the dirty mattress from the bed, burning it and sleeping on the slats underneath. Maybe I need to rescind my previous omment about Mexico's lak of irony. The overhead sign spanning the mud path, wreathed in blinking Christmas lights read "Jungle Palace". The irony still stings. We found a much nicer place within the compound for our next night and enjoyed our first truly hot showers in weeks. In the interim we visited the ruins.

More extensive than those at iguana friendly Uxmal, these ruins are set against a backdrop of rolling jungle hills.

From the top of one of the temples the distant low lands spread out like a green see, hooded in clouds.

Spooky underground passageways beckon those who dare enter to ommune with the ghosts of long ago.

We decided to walk back and along the way met some aged American hippies in the VW camper van they call home. After seventeen years on a live aboard sailboat, they are currently on an overland journey to the tip of South America. Ahhhh, hippies. That night we dined like kings at Don Mucho's, one of the eateries in El Panchan. Turns out you can get really, really good brick oven pizza in Mexico. This delightful repast and the tequila that accompanied it was unfortunately followed by a miserable night in the aforementioned cabaña. Our alarm clock was the propane delivery truck pulling in at 6:00am when the driver made every possible effort to create as much din as three gorillas could make with a truckfull of propane cylinders. We dropped off our key, checked into our new digs and hopped another collectivo that would deliver us to Misol-Ha and Agua Azul, two waterfall attractions of stunning beauty. Here's where things get a little crazy.

Misol-Ha(rny)

Route 109 is a steep and treacherous mountain pass, winding like an undulating serpent struggling to devour its own tail. Narrow laned and lacking the comforting existence of a shoulder or gaurdrail it swithes back and forth for miles, cliff face on one side, yawning chasm on the other. Have I told you about Mexican drivers. They seem to be always in a real hurry. Ours this day was no exception. There is no word in Spanish for "tail-gater". If there were, I think these drivers would wear the label proudly, like a badge of courage. I don't mind telling you that my ass grew teeth and left deep bite marks in my seat.

The "Tourist Shot" "Falling" in love

Behind the Falls at Misol-Ha

Agua Azul, a well known tourist destination, boasts crystalline waters in a series of small falls and cascades tumbling down a long mountainside.

There are deep pools along the way in which locals and foreigners alike enjoy a swim.

A community of Mayans resides in the immediate environs and the path along the water is lined with food stands (5 empanadas for 10 pesos. About six cents apiece), and a combination of beautiful handcrafts (The Chiapan Mayans are famous for intricate weaving), and dime store T-shirts with silly logos or pictures of Zapatistas and their leader, Subcomandante Marcos.

The Zapatistas are prevelent force in this area, reportedly liberating the funds of people passing through and distributing it to the locals who have nothing. Fighting the system like a modern day Robin Hood. Not as much fun as the Duke Boys, though.

So it's an hour's ride from Misol-ha to Agua Azul. Same terrible road. One in five hairpin turns has a sign warning drivers of it's dangerous nature, so I'd clench extra every time I'd see "curvo pelligrosa". It was coming around one of these turns that, just as we reached the apex of the bend and could see the road ahead, there was a woman on the side stretching a chain across the road. There was just enough time for everyone aboard to gasp and make some sort of gurgle or squeak before we were on top of it. The driver slowed not an iota. I envisioned the woman's arm being yanked out it's socket. The woman in the middle seat with the three inch long, rhinestone studded pink nails that had been distracting the driver with her prattle for the whole ride shrieked. Then we were past it. The woman had expertly lowered the chain at the last second. While I tried to swallow my heart back down from my throat, the driver told us that it's a common thing on this road. Had we stopped for the phony barricade, he eplained, men would have materialized from the thick growth on the hillside and robbed everyone in the van, the proceeds going to the Zapatistas. Score one for hiring a guide.

Agua Azul
I was just about to take a swim when it became apparent that the screaming of some children beyond some trees was not just play. Someone, evidently, had slipped into the rushing current and was tumbling along the rocks while her frantic daughter watched helplessly from the shore.

Being a gallant type, I plunged in and swam for the far bank to see if I could help. By the time I arrived someone else had reached the dazed woman and was helping her to shore. All I could do at that point was shuffle back and forth in my spot and try to help them off the rocks onto the bank. Ineffectual, but I did try. The woman had a gash on her leg and very frightened, but seemed otherwise ok. The rest of our visit passed uneventfully. One of the little girls selling sweetbreads and bananas from a bowl she carried around became instantly enamored with Sarah and insisted on braiding her hair for a little while.

I shot quick video clips and enjoyed the look of wonder on her face as I played them back for her. It may very well have been the first time she'd ever seen herself on film, but I can't say for sure.

The ride back seemed not as long. We had some food and, exhausted from the day, fell gratefully into our comfortable bed.

We're getting on a night bus at 7:15 that will take us to Mazunte on the Oaxaca coast. It's a 12 hour ride which sucks but we're eager to get back to the beach. I can use the time to write down your next update, all about the lovely San Cristobal de Las Casas.

Cheers, Ya'll.

Concrete Jungle

2009-02-08T12:20:00.004-05:00

Villahermosa

When I write about cities here, I want to make the picture absolutely clear in your minds. I'm not talking about cities with skyscrapers and mirror glass financial districts. I'm talking about a crazy crush of humanity crammed into an area where every building touches or leans on the one next to it. Nothing is more than three stories high. Electrical wires span over streets and across facades in a mad tangle that looks designed to trap pigeons like flies in a web and then electrocute them. The pavement heaves, the sidewalks are narrow and pedestrianism is a contact sport. Villahermosa is just such a city- seething and pungent.

We arrived in the afternoon, navigated the few short blocks from the bus depot to the Hostal Ochinta II (Ochinta is a cute slang term for a girl), met Daniel the Nicest Hostel Manager in the World, then heded back out to the modern three story supermarket for dinner fixin's and beer. Wow. Evidently we arrived at mercado rush hour. This place was like a super Wal-Mart, selling absolutely everything and the crowd clotting the aisles was hell bent on purchasing it all before anyone else could get their hands on any of it. We got our shit and ran, barely escaping with our lives. Next morning, in preparation for a long bus ride to Palenque we searched in vain for a bookstore that was purported to sell english language texts. On the way I became aware of two things.
1: Mexican fashion and popular culture seems to lack any sense of irony. I'm enchanted by this. Here it is still cool to look like you just walked off the set of West Side Story. The constant self reflection and spirit of one-upsmanship that pervades American pop culture hasn't affected Mexico in the same way. Where we have become jaded and snarky in our search for the new definition of cool, Mexico still likes the 1950's greaser cool. Slick hair and machismo might just get the girl and a hot airbrush paintjob of Bart Simpson as Wolverine slicing through the hood of your car (no joke) won't hurt either.

2: We were the only whities around. Only. Whities. Around. This was cause for some stares. We may as well have been green. Not that I need the company of the white man nor do I need to be catered to as a traveler. It just wasn't the place for us.

Campeche, Uber Alles

2009-02-07T19:29:00.006-05:00

Hey everyone!!
We're still alive and are now in San Cristobal de las Casas. I have much to tell after this brief respite. I'll start with Campeche.

Now as a rule, I'm not a complainer. I make my choices and I deal with the consequences. I never forget how lucky I am to be where I am with all the good things in my life. Having said that, I hope you're all ready for a good, old-fashion bitch fest. Hopefully it'll make you laugh a little.

Campeche
Campeche seemed like a good idea at the time. A city surrounding a city, modern Campeche sprawls around the ancient walled colonial center. Begun as a Spanish port it was repeatedly menaced by pirates until the crown finally ordered a wall built for protection. Limestone, twenty feet high with four main land gates and one actually outside the harbor for ships to enter. It took 50 years to build and was completed in 1687. Narrow cobblestone streets, brightly painted buildings, a huge wall we could supposedly walk on to watch the sun set into the hills, the waters of the Guld gently slapping the shore. Sounds lovely, right? Bunk! What a boring place. The aforementioned sprawl?...Burger King, KFC, monolithic supermecados, a fucking Sam's Club!!? The Gulf waters? Brown. Gently slapping, yes, but also not so gently stinking. No beach. And you can't walk on the damn wall. The colonial center feels as though it has been sanitized for the consumption of fragile old women.
Ok. When I'm in a city there are two things I expect to find in ready supply: Beer and cigarettes. That's right. I want my vices. Well, sorry pal. I had to walk all over the damn place just to find one store that would sell me a six-pack, and that was in a pretty remote part of town. Same thing with smokes. What they do have iun great abundance are shoe stores and clothing shops. Lots of clothing shops selling skinny fashions everywhere. And how do you suppose they fit into these skinny fashions? No fucking food!
Granted, we arrived on some national holiday so the first day most places were closed. Ok, no problem, it's a holiday. That's our bad timing. We'll eat bland tourist food at this over-priced restaurant a block down from our hostel. The rest of the eateries will open tomorrow, right? Wrong! They didn't open because they don't fucking exist. We consult the guidebook: "Author's choice" it says. "Walk 3km along the ocean to a series of palapas for the best in fresh seafood." OK, so we walk. And walk, and walk. Unfortunately the other side of the paved Malecon is the paved highway. Gulf stink on one side, exhaust and maniac drivers on the other. Finally we find the row of cookie cutter seaside restaurants. This food better be worth it.
I could write a book on all the ways this food sucked but I won't bore you with the details. Suffice to say that although it didn't make us sick, we wished it would so we could be rid of it without waiting for it to pass through the natural channels.
There were three cool things about Campeche:
1. I got a nice haircut there. I had clandestinely photographed a gentleman in the park in Merida whose hair I liked and presented the barber with the photo on my camera. "Como este", I said. Great, well done. muy guapo.
2. A fountain near the central plaza that played a colorful nightly display of light and dancing plumes set to some of the greats of classical music.

3. The view of the stunning cathedral from the roof of our hostel at night.

The hostel was ok. Our room had a small balcony from which I enjoyed watching traffic pass by below.
This is an afluent city and like in all of Mexico, if the stereo goes to eleven, it gets set on eleven, whether the speakers can handle it or not. Distortion is nothing to Mexicans. If the speakers in the car can handle it, great. The bass booms. We had a good laugh as one tuned little car with a really heavy sound system cruised the street setting off car alarms as it passed. We laughed the second time it passed. We stopped laughing after the third, fourth and fifth visits. In the morning we left.
Thanks for letting me vent.
Next up: Villahermosa. Tune in soon. We love you.

Ruination

2009-02-01T16:44:00.016-05:00

Before we get started, (and this time it´s we...The lovely Sarah Waldron will be co-authoring (moderating)this entry), I just want to post this pic that Mary Ellen emailed me of the gang on our last morning together in Puerto Morelos.

Yesterday we said goodbye to the lesbians and headed south of Merida to some Mayan ruins called Uxmal.

I found it very difficult to imagine what all this looked like in it´s day...for example, a vista like this...

Might very well have looked like this...

Being that we are the ignorant gringos, we hired a tour guide to show us around. He was a likable fellow but shy and barely said a word.
He had a lovely smile...

He and Sarah hit it off immediately and I admit, I was a little jealous of the rapport they seemed to instantly share.

To keep me occupied, he arranged for the cops to strip search me while he and Sarah explored the quiet recesses of the temple alone. I barely managed to escape but not before shooting their pictures for evidence of my mistreatment...

The ruins were a majestic sight. Many darkened portals lead to dim rooms carpeted with bat guano where the silence was pierced by the clicking and squeeking of what I can only guess were thousands of them waiting to swarm out, Temple of Doom style into the night air.

I´ll tell you what, the hot sun wears my ass out. After several hours of walking around the site of the ruins, then waiting with a dozen other folks for two hours for a bus that didn´t come (we eventually hiked out to the highway and flagged down a "collectivo"), I was happy to sink into the comfort of the shoeshiner's chair in the plaza for my first Mexican shine.

Upon awakening this morning, we discovered that Sunday is the day the Meridans go fucking batshit in the Plaza Grande. It´s like the county fair in the center of the city. Booths festooned with local handcrafts, balloon toys for the niños and hawkers cooking up fresh panuchos, salbutes, serving helado and cold drinks. Most locals prefer the papas fritas (french fries) which are served, inexplicably, with deep fried hotdog florets as garnish. ...and Sarah found another friend.
"Outclassed again", I thought to myself...

In addition to all this, There were performances by clowns with political agendas, acrobats singers and a troupe performing dances from Mexico´s rich history.

I don´t know where these guys are from, but they wouldn´t have pulled this sissy stuff at my school.

Just kidding. It was really great to see this spectacle, especially when I found out that this happens every Sunday. It´s still going on as I write this.

Here´s the EmCee. This guy exemplifies everything that is cool about Mexican cultural fashion.

And to top it all off, I understand there is to be a beauty contest later. Last years winner was present in the audience. Looking at her, I don´t know why I even bother getting dressed in the morning, or out of bed for that matter, she´s so far out of my league. Still, I feel I need to get even with Waldron for her Mayan tryst, so I´m asking this handsome woman out on a date. Her friend can come too.

Thanks for reading, y'all. Stay warm. Tomorrow...Campeche.

Merida

2009-01-30T15:40:00.005-05:00

A four hour bus ride and here we are. Pulled into Merida last afternoon and checked into Hostal Zocala which faces the Plaza Grande (that´s the "Big Plaza" for you non Española-phones). Our room has a tiny balcony hanging over the street looking out onto the plaza.

From the balcony

I understand that when new, this building was a grand hotel. I can see that in what remains, a sweeping circular marble staircase leads up from the small street level reception area. The ceilings are no lower than 12 feet and all the doors, windows and shutters are huge and ornatley carved. Most of which in is a state of somewhat "crumblesome" (if I may invent the term) repair, but remains majestic, nevertheless. It just happens that this week is the fiesta de Maya, a celebration of the Yucatan´s Mayan heritage. Last night the plaza was full of musicians, drummers, street performers and artists plying their trades.

Some street images

For me, coming from the idillyc tranquility of the beach towns we´ve been inhabiting for the last weeks, this was abit of a culture shock. It´s not so acceptable to walk around in shorts and sandals, encrusted with salt from the ocean, drinking beer anywhere I want. I´d become accustomed to relaxing in grand style at a well appointed casa, and suddenly, here in the bustle of an actual city, I feel the need to "do stuff" when really I want to sip a margarita, read my trashy spy novel and take a quick swim before doing it all again. Even though the styles on the street here are several months, if not a year behind our times, I feel hopelessly un-fashionable. However, yesterday as I was re-packing my bag, I lamented the space and weight of the pair of leather soled Cole-Haan street shoes that I had brought on a whim. Were I less of a sentimentalist I would have left them behind. Now I feel they are my saving grace. Nothing like a classic pair of shoes to make one feel a little more at home in a cosmopolitan environment. And I guess that´s what Merida is, although I´m having a hard time reconciling it as such. I know it´s a city. There are students and professionals, nurses and sanitation workers, butchers and cobblers, all that a city needs in order to work. But this is also Mexico and, more specifically, the Yucatan. These are supposed to be impoverished folksy tribal people, pounding tortillas out of raw maize, weaving baskets, not talking on cell phones in Ferragamos. I guess I need to restucture my preconceptions. Oh, the ignorance of the white devil. I don´t know what I was expecting. All my former notions were further shattered today at the contemporary art museum. First we went to a Picasso exhibit at the Cultural Center. These were mostly studies, pencil, charcoal, a few lithographs, from the 1940´s and 50´s, many of the works were variations on the same scene. I like Picasso and can appreciate his mastery of suggestion through economy of line, but I was a little ho-hum. Then we visited the museum of contemporary art. Now they had me at Hola. Again, I´m not sure what I was expecting. The ancient artifacts and examples of Mayan handicraft I had seen in books was never my thing, but I was hoping for the best and I was not disappointed. I feel like an ass, actually. I went to art school, I live with and work with artists every day. I like to think of myself as one. So why was I surprised to find here the same themes with which all artist seem to wrestle. Society, family, religion, technology, sexuality, sense of self or un-self. And all executed in...you guessed it...a "contemporary" manner. Some of it was really fucking great and some of it just was, but it was all recognizable to me in a way that the old artifacts are not. I´m not interested how a feathered god presenting the ancient ones with the secrets of maize, but I am interested in lurid photos suggesting the impact of technology on sexuality, the repetition of the self portrait in various media to convey the multiplicity that exists in us all, a fascination with chairs hanging on nails attached to sedans by thin wires, and yes, eventually, the cultural importance of the hammock and the woman making tortillas. A dark alley lit by a solitary sunbeam is the same here as anywhere. An image of a boy tossing crumbs to a gathering of gulls does not require a translation. It would seem that regardless of geographic, climatic and cultural differences, it is the artist that is entrusted with opening the Pandora´s box buried in us all and showing us that all is the same within.

At the museum´s central garden...Is it art or is it life?

Shnorkeling a goodbye to Puerto Morelos

2009-01-28T19:41:00.017-05:00

Aaahh! Puerto Morelos. I´m anxious for our next destination, Merida which is about 200 miles to the North East near the Gulf coast, but I am a little sad about leaving tiny Puerto Morelos. The house has been great with so many friends and so many delicious home cooked meals. Having a kitchen to use is a luxury I often take for granted and after a couple weeks of not having one it was truly a pleasure to be able to whip up our own yankee renditions of local specialities. I believe some more fish is on the menu tonight. Fish that was swimming this morning.
Speaking of swimming fish, check this guy out...

We had our magical Christmas snorkeling tumor...er, tour this morning. Holy Schitzu!! O.k., those of you who´ve been diving and snorkeling before, pardon me while I gush for a moment. I knew it would be cool, but I really wasn´t expecting the way it made me feel watching these creatures so alien to us. I´m used to seeing fish two places: At the aquarium (I love the aquarium), and on my sushi tray. I was impressed with how unconcerned they were by our presence. Ten people thrashing about just overhead, spying on and photographing their little fishy lives. Maybe they secretly comprehend that, while I´ve consumed many of their brethren on a bed of rice, I was the one out of my element and that there was really no way for me to harm them. I just can´t swim that fast. Or else I would. I´d have eaten that little blue bastard in a heartbeat. I like the silence too. The roar of the waves over the nearby break is reduced to a faint tinkle as the spray rains on the surface, there´s the sound of my own breathing and that´s about it. I want to go again right now.

Our guide, Paz...(dreamy, huh? C´mon girls, Island fever, anyone?))

We set out at 8 or so this morning and motored the 1/4 mile out to the second largest reef in the world, running up the coastlines of Honduras, Guatemala, Belize and Mexico. We were outfitted with Fins, bouyancy gear and masks and snorkels on the way. We tied up to a bouy and over we went.

Into a new realm...

Now this stuff, Brain coral is said to grow one millimeter a year...This ball of the stuff was about three feet in diameter, maybe four. Let´s do the math shall we?...

That´s cool, but show me something cooler...how about close-up

And all the while, watching from the nearby haze, the barracudas...This guy was probably 3feet long. They would just hover there, exactly halfway between the floor and the surface...watching with the crazy eye...

So...snorkeling. Lots of fun...we faught some stiff currents and we were all exhausted by the time we reached the beach. Later I took a long walk with max and Sara into the town Colonia, across the highway...no tourists there really. But it was hot and I was tired so I decided to buy a car... A Cadillac...

Nice ride, Huh? What?...What, It´s not cool?

I´ve got to go pack for movement, for tomorrow we bus. looks like it´ll be myself and The Biz, plus M.E., Luz and Tamara rippin up the rails in Merida. It´s a fairly good sized city, so I´m sure I´ll be present here in the "blog-o-sphere" in no time. Until then, from all of us here,
Thumbs up and keep yer snorkel in the air!!

Mi CompleAños

2009-01-27T22:31:00.006-05:00

So as some of you amy or may not know, today is my birthday. That´s right, I´m 36 today in the warm of the Yucatecan sun. The seven of us were scheduled to go on a snorkeling tour this morning, but the weather was not right. At the appointed hour, our guide, Paz askeed if we would mind holding off for another hour, but by then, the harbor master had shut down the port due to wind, so we will shoot for tomorrow now that Luz and Tamara have arrived. I got up this morning early intending to watch the sun rise, but could only watch it illuminate the backside of the enormous thunderheads that cut our coast line off from the far horizon...It was still worth the effort. Considering the weather updates we´ve been receiving, I have to say I´m triply glad to be celebrating my birthday right here. I spent the entire day lounging, puffing a little and sipping beers on our deck, my nose buried in a Clive Cussler novel which has the effect of filming a cheezy B grade action movie in my head. Perfect. We just finished a b-day dinner out at a little place called El Tio, (The Uncle). My belly is stuffed with salbuches, Tostadas de Pescado and soppa de Pollo...

Here´s the town official in his usual spot...

I could come up with something new, but the two finger salute is always a classic..

Senor Max feels the same way...

The Supper...

Well, there you have it...It´s my birthday, I´ve down at the club, got a bottle full of bubs, gonna party, drink Bacardi and...
Oh right!! I almost forgot....So Mary Ellen and I are walking into town tonight before dinner and she takes a picture of me standing under a street light and then she says something about me in my cargo pants, "pockets stuffed with cocaine", which I have none of, but I agreed, yes cocaine and two dollar bills. Two great things that go great together, right? Sure. but then...not twenty feet more do we walk when what should I find on the street?...A Two Dollar Bill. Right!? Spooky, I know. That´s what I said.

¡¿Are you Fucking Kidding Me?!

2009-01-26T11:45:00.011-05:00

So I come down to the internet place and I check my mail...(Thanks for the kind cheer and news of home) and then I have a few minutes to kill and I say "Why not look at the days headlines on the news page that Yahoo shows me when Im just trying to get to my mail", and here is one of the headlines, appearing just after a piece on economic idiocy speculating that California´s 14$Billion $$ deficit might just be like Thanksgiving dinner if you´re in the investment market. (And I quote...) "Study suggests obesity may be 'caught,' like common cold". Uhhh...whatthefuck?. "Caught...?" Really, that´s the best they can do? I guess they´re sending mushroom spores instead of anthrax, because somebody is tripping. Balls."Oh, sorry buddy, my fat roll just sneezed on you, now you´ll wake up with a headache, sore throat and a stuffy, snotty nose and stumble to the bathroom for kleen..., "OH MY FUCKING GOD, I´M OBESE!! Or does it come on slow, like a little tickle in the throat just after lunch that turns into a few sniffles and by the evening you´ve got a spare tire, not too bad, but you know that when you make up you be super fucking fat. May as well call in sick right now. Just this morning I was running on the beach, feeling a little ashamed of my extra roll, y´know, here I am in shirtless beach territory and, because of an injury and some laziness, I lost the good muscle tone I had achieved just seven or so months ago. Not really fat, mind you. No, I´ve got one of those fake spare tires that you find in the trunk of your ´97 accord, not one of those real spare tires you see in the back of someone´s pick-up, but annoying never the less. Now, however, any time I feel bad about it, I´ll just think of all those that have it so much worse than me The poor shmoe that just happened to ride the bus standing next to one of the "infected" and now suffers from full blown Obesity. We truly are a culture of avoidance. We´ll believe anything we´re told as long it absolves us responsibility for any aspect of our circumstance we find distasteful.
Blah, blah, blah. Whew, ...Hay, how are you guys...didn´t see you there.
Let´s see...Mary Ellen arrived, we eat the most delicious homemade taco dinners every night, We´re going on an actual snorkeling tour tomorrow...We saw these guys just hanging around the other day.

Just hanging around...

This place...

Mary Ellen Hitt wants to take your picture...

Sarah Waldron wants to give you a kiss...

These are people you know...

This is where we all live...

And I want to drive this...

Ta!

¡Bienvedos a Puerto Morelos!

2009-01-23T22:15:00.008-05:00

Hola Amigos!
Greetings from sunny Puerto Morelos. Here we are, about 30 clicks south of Cancun in what feels for the first time like a little of the "real" Mexico. Ashley, John, Max and Sarah V. all made it here and we are enjoying having some homeys around. Our last couple of nights on Isla Mujeres were perhaps our best. The hostel PocNa suddenly filled up with young Israeli travelers, and I mean filled. It was actually a little bit redic. Two guys we met, Ori and Shuki got me really, really stoned and at the end of the night I found myself sitting at a table in the main area surrounded by five tables filled with chattering Israelis, cajoling and lamenting in Hebrew. I sat with what must have a bit of a stupid grin on my face just drinking in the cacophony. Some cultural differences outstanding were, for instance, at each table there would be one individual holding court, extolling the virtues of his (always his) wisdom and or adventures, while the rest sat seemingly rapt. Also, any time one Traveling Israeli meets another for the first time it´s as though they´d known each other since birth. Sarah and I spent close to 5 hours playing pool with Ori and Shuki, trading stories, swilling cervezas and cracking jokes. How delighted they were to discover that I was the token Waldo County Jew. They´ve been in San Francisco working for a while now and I made them promise to come East and visit us in Belfast if they can. Here we are with Shuki, Oreanit, Ela, Tama and Florencia enjoying Buen comida at La Negrita. (Best Tacos de Pescado on Isla)

So we enjoyed our Last Island sunset and packed up to leave in the morning for Puerto Morelos.

Although Morelos retains its fishing village roots, it has been hit a little bit by development. There are no big resorts or anything like that, but it definitely has it´s share of pinkies, both residents and turisticas. There is a beach town feel and right now I can here the strains of live music being played in the town´s tiny Plaza al Centro. The sand here is fine as flour and the beach even has it´s own Mayan temple. Under a palm tree. Really.

Upon arrival we met the local Government official, a shy fellow whose name I didn´t catch. You see him here entrenched in important bureaucratic business-

We´ve done a little snorkeling, but haven´t seen much...I did catch a glimpse of a small Stingray and some fish maybe a foot long, but wasn´t able to photograph them. The only thing I´ve been able to do underwater with the new camera is create abstract impressionist images like this one...
Tonight we made a meal fit for Ixtlan...Fish Tacos, Spicy Rice, frijoles refridos, guac and Salsa cruda...then stumbled out, bellies distended for an evening walk. The best part of the day for me was in the fish market when, after selecting the fillets i wanted, the fish monger handed them to me...just the fillets, no wrap, no nada...I stood there stunned for an instant, the fresh fish in my right hand, wondering how in the hell I was going to get my money out of my right pocket. When I requested a bag or something, anything, he grinned, emptied the rest of his fillets into the sink and handed me the bag they had been in. I´m pretty sure it was the only bag in the place. I´m also pretty sure this fish had been grubbing for food off the reef an hour before it made its way into said bag. Hard to beat.
It seems as though this net cafe is about to close, so I will bid you fond farewell for now. I understand it´s really, really cold at home, like loco cold. My sympathies. Also...we´d love to hear from any of you...my inbox only ever greets me with spam. Until next time, from myself and all here, Hasta luego.

Still no Mudbutt!!!

2009-01-19T22:43:00.005-05:00

That´s right lillies and germs, los Supergringos here in May-Heeko. We´ve checked into a hostel, Poc-Ña (No idea what that means) and we rub shoulders with the perpetual traveler types. Last night, more damnable escorpione tequila...this time I ate the big one, along with a few new friends, including Gabe and Mamie from San Fran. The latter has a tattoo on her ankle of the christian fish with a cross bisecting the tail. When Sarah enquired as to its significance it was all I could do not to yell ¨Extra Jesus! Extra Jesus!¨ Nice folks. Also Pat the punk singer from santa cruz and my favorite, Mike from Toronto, Eh? He´s all aboot mexico, eh? Today we walked around the island some. The contrast that exists once away from the tourist zone where new chichi construction abuts crumbling cement homes of relative squalor is pretty eye opening. I cursed the deficiencies of my new point and shoot camera and it´s inability to help me capture the images I wanted. It´s fun in the water though. I was talking with Sarah over a delicious Italian meal this evening about my tourist´s angst and how I´m sure that even though I´m as nice and respectful as I can possibly be, and make the most sincere effort to stumble through using my limited Spanish, the people that I interact with (primarily those in the service industry) must hate my fucking guts. Maybe it´s just that I apologize too much that breeds contempt. Any time I travel I am painfully reminded of exactly why we Americans are so often reviled around the world. What a brutish lot. Oh, white man´s burden. Such a luxury.
I see that my 10 pesos time on the PC is almost up, so I will bid you all adieu for another day or so. Tomorrow we rise early for a walk to the opposite end of the island (3 miles or so) to check out a turtle sanctuary. I leave you with these images.

¡Escorpiones! Get in meh Belly!

2009-01-18T11:41:00.004-05:00

That´s right beehotches! Here in Ol´Meheeko we eat th´damn things, soaked in Tequila (th´Good Sheet)for five days or so. Shoot the juice, chew the pinchy Spider. Not much flavor really, but a delightful crunch. Headed for the beach to get a wicked sunburn...just wanted to let you all know who has Cojones mas Grandes!! Sarah wants me to also say that she ate the bigger scorpion. Like it´s a contest. Sheesh.

¡Hola! from Isla Mujeres

2009-01-17T18:59:00.003-05:00

The sunset over Isla Mujeres

So we made it without any troubles!!! Here we are. A perfect flight, no lost baggage, no explosive dysentery so far. I did get the red light at Mexican customs, but the guy who was going to search my bag seemed really distracted by someone´s low cut blouse and really didn´t try very hard. We had a fun ride to the ferry terminal chatting it up with Alberto the driver about how much he loves turtle soup and his accidental child, then a windy ride across the bay through such remarkably blue waters on what Sarah referred to as "the most ghetto ferry ever". Checked into the Hotel D´Gamor and headed out to explore. And drink beer. Not to make anyone jealous, but I´m naked in the sun right now. Ok, that´s not true, but I could be if I wanted to get thrown in jail. This is a bustling little beach community full of scooters, busted down golf carts and sidewalk taco stands. Oh, and some tourists, but it´s nothing like the Zona Hotelera in Cancun. Holy Shitzu! What have they done? I don´t want to make judgements, so I will just say that when armageddon hits, (We´re talking Book of Revelations here)I´m pretty sure it will start in Cancun, not Megiddo.

I am definitely going to learn to surf while I´m here, but not on the south side of Mujeres. Razor sharp reef jutting out of the crystalline waters, pummeled forever by ten foot foamy tubers that would really just love to wreck a man, or a woman. Also I´m told the riptide will suck you out to Cuba just in time for shark dinner. It sure looks beautiful though-

In other news...Someone please tell Raymelle happy birthday for us. Had a devil of a time figuring out who drunk dialed me at 2o´clock this last morning. So Happy B-Day, Fucker!
I haven´t been able to figure out the international texting thing yet, So if you need to reach us, send an email...bigredvalve@yahoo.com...or try texting me...I have no idea if I can receive.

That´s about all the time I have right now...WallBall and I are about to see if we can light a fire in our gullets with some crazy taquitos or fiery green mole´. Much love to you all, stay warm and in touch!!

Who's afraid of Virginia cold?

2009-01-14T10:26:00.001-05:00

That's right. Leesburg, VA. Cold. Mid 30's and blustery. Oh well.
On the uplifting side, we did not die yesterday. There was a fatal accident involving a wayward van that flipped the median on 295 just south of Portland and took out 3 other vehicles. Fortunately we were a quarter mile back from the action and suffered only by sitting in stalled traffic for 90 minutes. Big deal. Someone else went home in a bag. I don't have a messiah complex, but if I hadn't taken so long that morning to get my hair-do JUST RIGHT, we'd all be dead. Now, Mary, anoint my feet with some of those fragrant oils.

Thanks to Kate for her hospitality. And watching RC walk in his new booties.

So, the lovely Sarah and I will relax here in Leesburg for a few days before flying out. Here she is Portland with the sexysexy RichieC.

One thing that I was thinking about on yesterday's drive as I looked out the window, was how grateful I am to live in a place where you can still go to a restaurant, bar, store, etc. that isn't part of some corporate chain. It seems (and I'm sure this is NOT news to those of you who actually get out of Belfast on a regular basis)that this country is littered with non-towns loosely "clung" (yep, I'm usin' it) around a proliferation of conjoined parking lots and soulless chain stores. The worst are the eateries. Never had a good meal in one of those places. Speaking of not good meals... In a move that was part desperation, part experiential quest, we ate at a Sheetz on route 30 last night. We don't have these in the north. It's fucking Mecca to "bad" cholesterol. The ordering is like playing a video game and the eating is about as gratifying. The voiding, however, was spectacular.

In The Cradle of the Civil War....

Just a test

2009-01-11T11:38:00.004-05:00

Hey, look at that. My own "Blog". I'm one of you. Embrace me. So we leave for Mexico via Virginia tomorrow. I have too much to do to be writing this right now. Gotta go.

_________________"Silly customer, you cannot hurt a Twinkie."
The above photo has nothing to do with anything,
I just think it's funny.
Now playing: The Clash - Rudie Can't Failvia FoxyTunes