americana

during dinner time at costco, people really order their entire family's dinner. 

where does the left hand go?!

when eating at a table.

pet peeve #626

when people use memes wrong.

pet joy #89

the smell of condominium lobbies.

pet peeve #652

buying something from costco at regular price right before you get the pamphlet in the mail and seeing what you bought was going to go on sale.

11 dollars I will never ever get back. 

roof repair

before

after

what to be or not to be

I can be anything I want. astronaut, doctor, musician, painter, actor, pro surfer, businessman.  I can be anything, but not everything, I want to be.

 so, what to be or not to be, is the question. 

as my body rapidly begins to degrade on the downhill part of this mortal experiment... i have to figure this question out before time runs out. 

bitter stew

there are many ingredients to this bitter stew of life

protips

uniqlos airism shirts, earplugs and USA sim card for stupid credit cards two factor authorizations

Mr. Irreverence

what happened to my reverence for irreverence?

update: August 30: flippant irreverence is dangerous when unchecked. 

I'm so cool

I am so cool, smart, interesting, useful, etc.  

it's a big beautiful world to see, do, experience, share, etc.

but I only have one life to live to do it all and so I cannot do it all and I'm past the halfway mark now, 

...life is just one endless opportunity cost decision

for the record

if I'm ever found dead from apparent suicide jump from my window.... it wasn't suicide. it's cuz i accidentally

fell out my non-OSHA-compliant window... almost certainly while drunk.

unless this confession affects pay outs in which case I was definitely not drunk,  but was definitely murdered and/or a victim of an act of God and/or gross negligence by the condo AOAO.

30 days

back home for one month now

was it all a fever dream?  did those things really happen? 

am i what I was before during and after or somebody else since then?

filial fiduciary

I guess one good reason to have kids is that if they turn out to be decent adults, you can trust them and use them as agents to manage your assets when you get old and susceptible to scams. 

blood then bread

uh oh

its the rebound travel lust. the one that made me go to India for four months less than a year after six months in Central America. 

it hasn't even been six weeks...  iceland, mongolia, europe, middle east, south America, Japan again...  hmm...

will I ever feel normal? again?

who will save me from myself?

where does the good go?

its startling how quickly one can fall back into the rhythm and rut of the old pre-africa life.

BeTheLi

Betheli:  (beh-teh-lee), noun. 

definition: an oral language characterized by participants communicating by reading "between the lines".  intended meaning is communicated through inference and subtext, rather than the ostensible, surface-level verbal communication.

a language spoken most often by politicians, corporate executives, amd couples with poor communication skills.

night terrors, every night, 5am, cold sweat, waking up

dear reader, 

since returning home I find myself waking up in the middle of every night. while in itself this phenomenon is not unusual and in fact is my normal sleep quality, what is different is that I wake up in quasi panic and confusion.   

I look around my unrecognizable dark room, lit only by the green light of the power button on my oscillating fan, and wonder where I am.

 I often think I'm still in japan. but then I remember I'm not, I'm not there or indonesia or Africa, i remember that im finally back home.   then I go back to sleep. 

it's been mere weeks but those countries and lives seem so so far away already 

update:  recently I wake up for other reasons.  I must still think I'm in the jungles of indo or the dusty zimbabwe village when go to bed thinking its not that hot here in hawaii. but wake up covered in sweat. 

SelfIdentity v3.0

after an-around-the-world-backpacking-trip, everything else in life got the volume turned down.

it's been 11 days and I'm holding on.

ominous clouds on the horizon

Ujung Bocor

 here I am again.  

don't let things go past you that you shouldnt let go past. 

 

worried shoes

Kaden Os worried shoes was the answer to the still undiscovered question.  but its a good answer. 

hold on

English breakfast, coffee, smokes, dave von ronk hang me and Tom waits hold on.  

then gorge swing and vic falls.

the questions and answers won't come

I dont remember her name. but I remember she was attractive, tall and full bodied, blonde, husky soft voice. french. when we sat together on that beach in Vietnam, her boyfriend a distance away at the bonfire with the other two travelers, we talked about finding the Answer. 

I tried to share with her my paulo coehlo epiphany I had in varanasi india; that you can't find your answer until you have the question, but before I could explain it she finished my sentence for me. 

it's such an obvious insight and basic truth, and simple tactic/strategy... but it never occurred to me until late in my life travels. 

I got her address and promised to send her a postcard.  I never did.... 

the resolutions won't come to me.  I have no questions and no answers, just an amorphous collection of 1st world problems I'm trying to escape from while telling myself I'll figure it all out here.  this midlife crisis of mine. 

of course, hanging over me is the looming fact of old age and death.  I'm past my midlife point.  time and life is running out on me, and that feeling is currently mirrored in my African adventure. I'm halfway done now probably... since I'll probably go to HK and Japan with mom (which is NOT the same as backpacking Africa)

after chisuma village, I am satisfied with my journey.  that whole experience was more than I ever expected or could have hoped for. from hanging with the local boys to the slaughteted goat to the farming to the village life with Lee.  I think there is answer is in there somewhere, i just don't have the question yet.  

maybe I should stop brooding and thinking and join the drunk young people singing so badly out of tune at the hostel bar....