R&R alpha - (day 14/15) - the end is nigh; ney... the end is here

it's october 14th... tomorrow, TheWayne and i would head our separate ways after an awesome time in germany and the czech republic. but it's not QUITE over yet. we woke up to try to hit "mike's bikes" for a bike tour of munich. it was rainy, and we were a bit late, so we missed the tour. as per usual, we walked a lot but my blisters were doing better now, or my brain had just rewired the "agonizing foot pain" nerves to go to my "let's just get drunk" drive. all was better. we walked to the english garden which is a very nice area of munich. relaxed, greenery, beer, food. speaking of beer, we stopped at the chinese tower in the garden for a sausage and some beer. my facebook profile picture was taken from said been near said tower in said garden (man, that pic is a year old? gotta find a new one i guess). after a nice buzz was packed one, we made out way back towards town. we walked around marienplatz center for a bit. TheWayne was looking for some soccer jersey of some sort. i walked around the store for a brief bit but soon got bored, so i went outside to one of the outdoor restaurants in marienplatz and ordered a beer and some potato salad. normally, i wouldn't remark about potato salad, but i do have to say, this was the best potato salad i'd ever had in my LIFE. fantastic! and brilliant me, i forget the name of the place, and i forget the name of the sports store TheWayne was looking in, but if i could find THAT sports store, i could find this restaurant. TheWayne finished his perusing, so we headed off to near nymphenberg. there is a cool lake we walked around for no apparent reason. there must've been a field trip or something as there were hundreds of french kids running around being all... french. a few beers more, then we made our way back to the hotel and cleaned up for dinner. we went out and ate at the hofbraü haus. it is a famous brewery in germany, and the restaurant was awesome! it was just like the hofbraü haus beer tent at oktoberfest but with more room to move. they even had the brass band playing on occasion! i had a great steak, my first white sausage... a generally awesome meal in a cool environment. TheWayne and i chatted up TheAnnabelle (or was it TheAnastasia)... i don't recall. she was our waitress and very friendly. we had a good time entertaining each other. after dinner, we walked around looking for a place to grab a few beers, but were very unlucky this day. we ended up grabbing a taxi home since (we thought) we'd wandered quite a ways. funnily enough, the taxi driver was spanish, and i was drunk enough to think i could remember enough to speak it. i think he was amused by my attempt... hey, at least he didn't drop us in the middle of nowhere. it ended up we were only maybe 6-7 blocks from where we lived, but i take no responsibility for this navigational error. it is widely known that i have no sense of direction.

we woke up the next day with a heavy heart. it had been a great 15 days and now it was back to real life. TheWayne was back to jersey and his IronMan training, i was back to cairo to close out the job there and move on to alexandria. we grabbed a quick breakfast, packed and hopped on the train to the airport. we partook in goodbye beers, then TheWayne bid me adieu with a tear in his eye. i, myself, had to turn away... and order another beer. looking back, i'm kicking myself for not going this year. if TheWayne is up for it (and anyone else), next year, i think we gotta go again. so there it is... R&R alpha, documented on the blogosphere, completed within 1 day of it's one year anniversary. talk about cutting it close. as a friend recently told me... "for god's sake, finish the blog... you have to let go of the past to allow new experiences into your life.", but one thing before i do that...

take a walk with me down memory lane (soft lawrence welk in the background, bubbles in the foreground, soft filter on the camera...)
TheWayne, throwin' one back

Mmmmm. half-meter sausage

Escalators are like moving chairs when you're drunk

TheTav and TheWayne still sleeping in Berlin

TheTav being a drunk, passed out punk... and TheWayne making sure there is photographic evidence of it!!!

TheWayne at the Olympic Stadium in Berlin

me and one of the lines denoting where the berlin wall used to run

TheTav, TheJen, and TheWayne

Da Boys!

Saw this while waiting to leave germany. REALLY?! "meat wagon" is " car rental" in german? AWESOME!

Havin'a good time at the Hippodrom!!!

Until next time...

R&R alpha - (day 10) - staying in manhattan

wow, it's been a long time, but i REALLY gotta try to get this done before the anniversary. for a recap, check out the previous posts (they were funny, it'll be worth it). the beginning, pfand, drucken, PROST!, fünf, checkpoint charlie, and yalla bina. there, now that you're all caught up, off we go again. keep in mind, all pix are clickable for more detail.


so, it's now 9-October, and we arrive in prague at the main train station around 8:30AM. TheWayne and i had tried to look up some hostels in berlin before we left but met with very little success. we disembarked the train, basically wandering for an exit when a middle-aged, slim lady came up to us handing us two business cards with her name (TheMila) and the name of the hostel she was representing, "manhattan" (on charvatova street, in the middle). she said it was very nearby, TheWayne and i exchanged glances of hesitant agreement, while i thought "hmmm, isn't this how that movie 'hostel' started... we're fucked!". TheMila told us is was very nearby, she gave us a brief overview of the city layout, where to go, etc. i assumed she was a retired hooker because, i mean, come on, prague has a decent redlight district, she was attractive for her age, and she knew hostels. before we knew it, we were being buzzed into "manhattan" and taken to the main office where we met TheMikhail. TheMila made some casual conversation with TheMikhail and left without asking for a tip. i was completely taken aback at this. nowhere in my 8 years of international traveling have i received a service without even a hint of lingering in expectation of a tip. she was cool. TheMikhail was a bit of a hippie with long graying hair and a black punk T-shirt that had "fuck" on it in some form. his english was good, we got a room for 3 days, but didn't have enough cash right off, so we gave a deposit and our passports telling him we'd be back with the cash later and made our way to the room. we were both pretty spent so we crashed for a few hours, then were up to steal some internet (that's a boy, TheWayne), hang some wet clothes, and find a laundromat.

we got our laundry done, got spiffy for the fine czech ladies, and went out for dinner. we found a place called TheTrilobite. we had a hot waitress named ThePetra, and there were lots of hot chicks there. i completely forget what the food was like, but i highly recommend it. we tried to get into a place called TheLucerne but all the tables were reserved despite there being MAYBE 10 people in the place! we wandered about because thatis what TheWayne is good at. we accidentally stumbled into the redlight district where guys are outside handing out cards to "their" club... "no committment, just take a look, best girls in town", etc. two guys were REALLY vying hard for us, one guy was trying to hand us a card, while another guy from across the street came up, all chummy, "don't mess with these two, i talked to them earlier, they're coming back to me" despite us never having been there. it was comical. we continued on until we found a bar called Rocky O'Reilly's. there we tied on drinkbag. 2x2 jameson's, stellas, patron tequilas, jägerbombs, and that's where i kept keeping track. i was on a mission. i also vaguely recall hot waitresses, irish girls, possibly on a hen-night, at the table next to us, and then we stumbled home around 1AM.

day 10... we got up around 10 and started out touring of the old town. my feet had blisters upon blisters from the dresden walk. TheWayne went out and found some sort of cream to try to help. i slathered, wrapped my foot with gauze, and prayed for the best. we grabbed lunch at Pivnice Beograd (pussy food? REALLY?!) and had beers. as is usual when i'm on vacation, i rarely have a plan besides taking in the local libations (i should co-host "3 sheets"). if TheWayne asked what we should do next, my ideas ranged from sitting down and having a Pivnice and think about it to sitting down and having Pilsner Urquell and think about it. from there we made our way to the national museum, but after seeing the price for entry, we decided that pictures from the outside were more than enough. the trains in prague are on the honor system as they were in germany. Our next stop was to be the Charles Bridge, so we hopped on the train at the museum and were immediately followed by a shady looking guy in a black jacket who asked to see our tickets. FUCK!!! we stepped off the train, TheWayne asked to see official ID, i tried the "i thought i gave you the tickets" routine, which failed miserably. After hearing about the fine of 700 Czech Crowns (~$40) EACH, TheWayne explained that we'd just go get a ticket now, but that was out of the question, we were nailed, so we forked over the money, and got a receipt which covered us to our next stop. TheWayne was fuming the whole time. i wasn't happy about shelling out the money, but we HAD been lucky up until that time. i was able to see the humor in the situation. the Charles Bridge is pretty cool, lots of caricaturists, painters, local-made crafts. there are some awesome sculptures on the bridge itself (some photos at the end). we made our way to the prague castle (again, more pictures at the end), despite it being a major uphill battle (for big ol' me and my broken feet), but we made it. the view from the castle was pretty impressive as well, looking down on all the red tile roofed houses and off into the misty (possibly smoggy) distance. after the castle, we stopped for a beer, and i decided to have a slivovice.

<ASIDE>the first time i ever had a shot of slivovice was at TheJRod'sWife's grandparents house. i believe it was easter, and i wasn't going home for the holiday, so she was kind enough to invite me to her family's house. her grandfather is a cool dude, really nice to this complete stranger, and funny. after dinner, he brought out some homemade slivovice. being the nice guy he was, he offered me some, though i hadn't noticed the family kind of gathering around. i took the shot and, GOOGLY MOOGLY, i thought i'd burned a hole in my esophagus. it was... an experience to say the least. everyone got a good laugh out of it... 'twas a good time.</ASIDE>

anyways, i figured i was in a country that served proper slivovice, so i'd try it, and again, i wasn't disappointed. TheWayne got a chuckle out of it as well since my face turned several difference shades of red. once my eyes straightened out, we agreed it was time to head back to the hostel to clean up for the evening.

i showered then TheWayne spent like 3 hours shaving his head. around midnight, he was cleaned and smoothed, and i was in agony, my foot was fucked, so i told him to go on without me. i crashed, he went out. i forget when he made it back, but he said it was lame (i know he meant because i wasn't there, hah). next time, you'll find me passed out on the bathroom floor... and, for once, it wasn't my fault!

cool cross embedded in the brick sidewalk at the national museum

TheWayne throwin' his game outside the municipal building

the (sadly) non-functioning astronomic clock in the "old town"

how i saw TheWayne throughout most of the trip.

a close-up of the hanging man sculpture from paragraph 2.

me trying to counteract TheWayne's hostility toward our train fines.

random catchings-up and such

WOW! it's been a while since i've updated. i hate it when that happens because i fear i lose readers, and i LOVE having you readers. so, here's what's been up lately.

• i went to sharm el-sheikh for two days at the end of ramadan. i had fun, but i would've had more fun if there were people to share it with. the first day, i went straight to the beach-side bar, got obliterated, went to my awesome room for a nap at 4PM set to wake up at 7PM to party... i woke up at 2AM, pooh! the next day, i paced myself, swam in 3 of the numerous pools, swam in the red sea, got drunk enough to go para-sailing, but i found out, though it was something new for me, it wasn't nearly as scary/exciting as i thought it would've been. still, it was cool. then back to work.


• several weeks ago, i got a call on my mobile where the name came up as TheElectricalTA. i answer it, but it's not TheElectricalTA. the conversation went a bit like this:

  caller: "do you know who zis is?"
  me: "um... TheElectricaTA?"
  caller: "no, zink a little bit harder, i know zat you can do zis"
  me: (of, fukk, shite, damn... oh, i know it... it's TheGerman who i thought was Dutch when i met him in india, oh fricksticks...) TheDETLEF!"
  caller: "very good, now i'm coming to see you"

  it's a small world in this biz. i just though that it was funny that i haven't work with him in over 3 years, and from what i gather, as soon as he found out TheElectricalTA was from TheGeneral, he asked if i was onsite. i wonder if he does this on every site he goes to. THAT would be weird. we caught up for a bit. he's here for the next year or so. he told me he ran into TheEx in dubai (again, small world), and that shipping his land rover to egypt. it was good to see an old friend. too bad he's been so busy, we haven't been able to catch up over drinks.


• i've been extended onsite until the end of october now, which sucks because i really want to get home to see friends and family, but it's also cool because i get to hang out longer with my hash friends, and after 21-oct, i get a SECOND R&R, so i can take a nice leisurely 16 day route to get home. i get my taxes back after 27-nov, so even if i spill over into november until say, oh, the 11th (which coincidentally would be my 1-year anniversary at this site), then with my 16 days R&R, despite missing thanksgiving, i'll have made my tax exemption criteria, AND i should have a decent argument for getting off through christmas.


• i did say random so... the hotel movie theater currently has showing, along with it's arabic movies: "the final destination", "slaughter", and "the hangover". WTF?! i don't the know EXACT extent of censorship here, but when i watched the last 007 movie, IT was edited for content, and i know 007 isn't graphic. my guess is "slaughter" (having no idea what it's about except from the movie poster) is gory, and will be edited down to a bunch of dark scenes, instilling fear, then cutting to the scene immediately after the "slaughter". i think "the hangover" is going to be about 8 minutes long, yeah EIGHT, and no one is going to have a clue as to how ANYONE dies in "the final destination" due to cuts.


• JUST finished watching "watchmen", and it was fantastic. i envy dr. manhattan. i learned that leonard cohen ORIGINALLY wrote "hallelujah", and i'm glad jeff buckley covered it and improved it immensely because the LC version in the movie is SHITE! i know i'm a bit slow on the uptake here, but malin akerman is HOTTTTT, especially in vinyl and garter-boots.


• this time last year, TheWayne and i were struggling to make it to the last day of oktoberfest and planning on heading to berlin. never worry, i have 4 days left before the anniversary of the last post i wrote. i MIGHT be able to pull it off, but i'm cutting it close.

$1500 for a night at the playboy mansion?

i have a hookup that could've gotten me to the playboy mansion this weekend for $1500. free shuttle from the hotel, all the drink and eat you can handle through the night, full access to the mansion, nekkid ladies everywhere, AND it's a charity event for spinal injuries. now IF i was home this weekend, do you think this would be worth while. granted i'd have to get a hotel for a minimum of one night (around $400/night) and for a maximum of three nights (they have a pre- and post-party the night before and the night after).

i was just curious on your thoughts. like, i never in my life thought i'd ever have a chance to go to the playboy mansion, but now i know i have an "in", so if this might recur next year... should i go?

tell me your thoughts on this idea?

i'm no longer cultural ambassador to egypt

like i ever really was, but still, i think i cemented that several nights ago. TheMech came back to site to help with a small outage we had to do before we could make any more progress on the second unit. since TheSiteManager wasn't sure when i was coming back from R&R, he booked TheMech to come back and assist. i arrived early than TheSiteManager had expected, and thus, while TheMech was booked and ready for his flight, i'd completed the outage. not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, TheMech came to site anyways to see how things were going.

friday night, we did our normal KFC run. i tried to seriously order the entire menu since i'm so bad with decisions (they wouldn't let me), i arm wrestled the manager for $20 (and lost... i've handily lost to him before, so i'm not sure why i wanted a rematch). TheMech, being a former boxer, tried to win the $20 back by daring the manager to pop him in the jaw. so we left. the manager gave me my $20 back and i gave it to the taxi driver (for what is normally a $3-$4 fare).

saturday night, we went to the portuguese club to watch manchester united play tottingham. the taxi dropped us off on the corner, and as we were walking to the bar, i noted a beautiful-eyed muslim girl walking our way (dressed in the niqab like in the picture), and i said TheMech (apparently too loud), "dude, look... a ninja!". by the time i realized she was talking to me, i turned around and she was storming up to me, and all i heard was "...assholes, go back to wherever you came from!". i wasn't trying to be patently offensive, i actually thought i was being witty, but it wasn't taken that way. i apologized as she stormed off, though i don't think she heard me. i mean, if i was in a society of ninjas and i saw one looking rather niqab-y, i think i would've done the similar thing by pointing out the niqab-wearer; only if the ninja took offense, he's just deftly launch his arsenal of shurikens at me, pinning me to the wall, nun chuck the shit out of me, then throw a smoke bomb and disappear. i'd rather taken the verbal tongue-lashing. but i mean, seriously, look at that picture... that IS very ninja-esque. do a google image search for 'niqab', and that's the second one down. she looked almost exactly like that.

sunday, TheMech and i met for breakfast and over a brief conversation decided that we weren't really needed onsite, so we played hookie. we changed out of our work clothes into more golf-appropriate attire, er... at least as best we could. i wore an lube oil stained polo shirt (it was a work accident), brown AE cargo shorts, and white adidas tennis shoes. TheMech wasn't so fortunate, having only packed an overnight bag and not expecting to go golfing. he wore his pink ralph lauren chaps button down (he pulls it off well), tan swimming trunks he'd bought the day before, black socks, and brown leather loafers. we were on guard for the fashion police all day. we got the sporting club and through arduous pseudo-translation and broken egyptian that was finally confirmed by a passing female guest, we determined that security was telling us that the tournament finished yesterday. HAH!!! he thought we looked like we were in a golf tourney. after we cleared that up, we learned that all we had to do was pay an entrance fee. we paid, got our clubs, and we lucky enough to get our favorite regular caddies, TheHassan and TheMohamed. my driving game was on fire. TheHassan gave me some tips on straightening my leading arm which helped, but my irons were so-so, and my putting was way too strong. TheMech had some pretty bad drives but some really awesome recoveries despite being in the bunker most of the day. it was a fun outing if not a sub-100 shot outing. afterward, we had TheDriver take us to the pompey's pillar. after that, we went to the catacombs of kom es-shogafa. this was a really cool visit, as you can go down through the first three levels and almost get lost in the maze of off-shooting galleries. the bottom-most level is roped off since it actually lies below the water table. actually, some of the lower tombs on the third level even had water in them. after the catacombs, TheMech and i went to the pool to catch some rays. we both ended up getting a bit red.

TheMech and i tried to arrange a final dinner with TheSiteLead and TheSiteManager, but that fell through. TheSiteLead has since moved to cairo because 1) he'll be leaving site soon, and 2) there is more to do down there... maybe i should move too. TheSiteManager was onsite very late trying to get the electrical to fix some of their problems that could have significantly hurt the schedule. we then called TheYoungMechTA to see if he wanted to go, we tried a new restaurant he suggested which was OK, but nothing to write home about (i guess kinda though, i am). the atmosphere was nice, but the food was only 50/50. he then drove us all around to find a drink but the bars/discos don't really open until 11:30PM or so, and it was only 10:30PM so we had him take us back to the hotel. we popped into the bar for a going away drink. TheCoolBartender made us some gin and tonics, then halfway through the second one, he poured three nasty-ass concoctions. a shot of smirnoff black with a splash of grenadine and a splash of hot sauce. he said it was very popular among the russian ladies where he used to work in hurghada, and that it would make us appreciate our G&Ts all the more. boy was he right. that was a FOUL drink. we drunk dialed my mom twice, once so she could talk to TheMech, and then after that call, TheCoolBartender asked who that was, and when i told him he said he'd've like to have talked to her, so we called back. TheMech thanked him for being such an entertaining bartender and tipped him. TheCoolBartender insisted that for him to take the tip, we had to have a drink with him... so we did a tequila shot. maybe he's not such TheCoolBartender anymore.

so that is the end of my weekend, and that is why i'm no longer cultural attache in egypt.

do you really care?

it is commonplace for people to ask "how are you?" when seeing someone for the first time in the day. i don't quite like that. i mean, seriously, do you really care? at one time, many, many moons ago, it was probably used as it was supposed to, but now it's turned into a generic greeting that makes me feel uncomfortable. i prefer "what's up" or "what's going on?". with the former, you can deflect the inanity of the question with a smart-ass reply like "the price of oil", "NOT the market", or the old standby, "the sky". with the latter, you have far more topics to speak about: work, family, money, etc.

i speak of this because here in egypt, EVERYONE asks "how are you" (in arabic, of course), and they ask it EVERYTIME they see you. all of you who read this blog know that i'm not doing well. these people don't really care how i'm doing, it's just a common courtesy to ask, but it wears me down having to lie. i might not be thinking about the shitty things that are going on in my life, i might be truly distracted, but when they ask... it all comes flooding back, and i have to then lie. "i'm doing great", "meyya, meyya" (means 100%).

i'm kind of the happy-go-lucky guy at work. i don't raise my voice, i don't complain much, i curse on occasion if i knock my head on a scaffolding pole or something, but in general, everyone knows me to be in a good mood. with this whole shitty situation, i've had to start wearing masks. some days i might be in a piss poor mood, but someone will eventually come up to me, asking me how i am, and i have to throw on the smile, tell them everything's fine, what do they need. it's exhausting. when no one's looking, when no one's around, i can let the mask fade away, but that isn't very often at work. it's strictly an external facade, i still feel like shite inside. some days i'm at it so long, that i can't take it off even when i go home. i can't embrace my issues because i've been faking all day that everything is OK. they really don't want to hear about my shite. they wouldn't understand, and even if they did, they'd probably think less of me. i couldn't tell them the truth anyways; my throat closes when i even remotely think of having to explain what's going on in my heart and in my head. i want someone to talk to, someone strong enough to know that my flaws only compound this situation, and i'm pretty sure they are hard-wired flaws. there's no changing them no matter how much i want to.

TheElectrical advised that i see a therapist (as well as cutting down on drinking, pity smoking, and i should lose weight, but i digress). i suppose it might not be a BAD idea, but again, there are several genetic predispositions i have against that course of action.

1. i think i'm smarter than them - i minored in psychology in school, i took enough classes to have a decent idea what the fukk is wrong with me. granted, i didn't take the "how do you fix it" classes, but i have a general idea of what they would suggest, i suggest it to myself, my friends suggest it to me, but i'm just closed. it's not like i can't see the door, rather, my hand is on the knob, and i just can't turn it. i had a bad experience with a high school psychologist during a break up then. i'd pierced the bridge of my nose with a safety pin, left it in, and went to school. i was kicked out of just about every class, and the psychologist was called in. she said she knew i was an actor (yes, i joined thespians for my girlfriend at the time), that i might be able to put on a good show, but she felt i was like an orange... hard skin on the outside but juicy just underneath that skin. i'm not making this up. right then and there, i labeled her a joke as a professional, figured she was bottom of her class, and wrote her off. i wasn't impressed. i'm sure there HAS to be better therapists out there, but my first impression left a bad taste in my mouth


2. i broke me, so i can fix me - well, technically, I didn't break me, but i put myself into a position that allowed me to let down my guard to be broken. i've been witness to every little psycho synapse firing in my head, i've felt every heart pang for the most unrelated, benign reasons, it's all documented here in my head in my own proprietary format. there's no way i could explain it coherently to someone outside my head. they don't have the right codecs (i'm such a geek). i need time to analyze the data, but i've not had time to arrange it into an easy, user-friendly format. looking at the raw data, right now, it seems it isn't the product that is flawed (again this is preliminary), it's the process. i think i'm pretty damn good at relationships on the whole. everyone has their shortcomings and such, but in general, i think i have a pretty good handle on how things should go. the process is fukked in that, i just spend that time on the wrong people. i'm blinded by attention, by beauty, by learning about new things from new people, by the excitement of this amazing new person who wants to spend time with me. in doing so i might be missing telltale signs that we may not be compatible. i miss the hints, i miss the suggestions.


3. strangers vs. friends - this guy is a complete stranger. how am i going to open up to him, when i have a hard time opening up to my close friends? i was always the guy who listened to other peoples' problems, the shoulder to cry on. i didn't want to burden them with my problems because mine were so insignificant in comparison, so i tried my best to keep quiet. telling a stranger how crazy i am? come on. therapists are only human. they're trained to be non-judgemental, but we are animals. there will always be a judgment made, an impression formed, even if it's in the remotest hollow of the basal ganglia, i'll be judged. my friends know my good and bad already, they already know that and yet, they're still my friends. they accept my idiosyncracies, or at the very least, they aren't threatened by them. they aren't judging me, they already did that years ago, for free, they STILL stuck around, even if only to see what the fukk this guy is going to do next. these are people i love, i trust, and i still have a hard time letting them know exactly how messed up i am. a stranger who has to learn all my background plus current problems in several 60-minute sessions... i don't know if i'd trust their evaluation for lack of thoroughness.


4. i'm just too damn proud - there's not much more that can be added to that. i don't want to be fukked up, i don't want to admit that i can't deal with this on my own. i'm not into holistic medicine, i know my boundaries (i think). if i have cancer or a broken arm or a bullet wound... know i can't fix those, but my brain (unless i'm more fukked up that i though) is not injured. it may be chemically imbalanced or dehydrated, but it's not like something is there that shouldn't be. if there is no physical defect, i think i should be able to manage it myself. mind over matter (except in the case of the aforementioned bullets and such).

you know what i just realized? i'm a hypocrite. you didn't even ask me how i was doing, you mightn't even care, and yet i let you have it. i apologize. had i not ranted on about that in the first part of this post, this would be OK as it is my blog and you came here voluntarily. next time i'll give you warning.

i'm going to try to write more on ZUMEL(i put a short post up there today), really, and i'm going to really try to get some vacation pix and stories up for you soon. i give you my word, and that, my friend, is stronger than graphene. please someone corroborate that for me. hah. later kids.

zombie strippers?!

if you were to ask some of my closest friends to list two of my favorite things (besides sex), odds are pretty fair that they might come up with strippers and zombies. so imagine my surprise when i found this trailer online. starring robert englund (freddy kruger from "a nightmare on elm street" fame) and jenna jameson (if you don't know where she's from... i can't help you). the story looks cheesy enough to be not-entirely painful to watch, and there are also good odds there will be bewbz. i'm guessing it'll be straight to video, so i'll have to try to find it when i get home. i can't wait.

i feel this way alllllllll the time

harder, better, faster, stronger - interpretive dance

Daft Bodies - Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger



i like this song, i like the few dances that have come out of late choreographing to it, but this one is the best so far. i really like literal interpretations of songs. the beginning starts out slow and kinda disorganized (i don't think these girls are cheerleaders), but when they get into the lyrics... straight-up bad-assedness.

apparently, that vid was inspired by the "HBFS" hands vid, here.



and it all started with this. here is the first "HBFS" dance vid i saw and i was hooked.

I'M IN EDINBURG!!!!

just not the right one. instead of having a week of vacation then heading to egypt, i was assigned to edinburg, TX, 15 miles from the mexican border in the southern-most part of the state. you can see the plant and location in my "location updater" there in the right sidebar.

it seems the tips of some of the hard steel blades have come off while the unit it running at 3600RPM. this usually doesn't lead to pretty things unless you consider this pretty (you know, by now, you can click on those for big and perty pix). i don't. this means a long outage. fixing the rotating parts usually isn't an issue, we can turn the rotor to get the blade to the top, and "blend" the edges smooth. problem is, there are non-moving blades (stator) as well. upper half and lower half. upper half is no problem because we remove the upper half and fix them on the ground. there is no access to the lower half ones with the rotor in place. if there were no stator damage, this is a 7-day outage, tops; but we see stator damage. that means pulling a bunch more casings, and i MIGHT get done in time for christmas. the good thing is, IF i'm done around christmas, i should be able to see jules for maybe my birthday and/or christmas and/or new years. my revised need date in egypt is now 2-january-08, which should work out quite well, but as you all know, nothing goes as planned in this field with this manager.

that's enough of the technical. sorry about that, maybe it's too much for a personal blog, but that's where i stand. at least i'm finally on dayshift. the only shitey thing about that is there's not really anyone onsite to go out with after work AND it's a bit tought to talk to jules online. because of the time difference, our schedules are almost completely out of sync.

texas is kinda of a weird place, at least this part of texas, since i shouldn't generalize, despite generalizing this PART of the state by the few people i've talked with. so, from the people i've talked to, they hate bush (WOW!!!) and can't wait to get a democrat in office. that really blew my mind, since bush was governor here. they kinda hate mexicans, a bit, even though they are so close to mexico. these are "right to bear arms, pry my gun from my cold dead hands" kinda people. "americans are americans and should speak american (english)" kinda people. one of the guys has a sticker on his hardhat that says "if i shot you when i first wanted to, i'd be out by now". yeah, those kinda people. they talk about guns and big trucks and arm-wrestling and breeding dogs strong enough to bite your head off. pretty much anything manly and violent. i kinda just don't fit in. i own a .22 rifle (basically a BB gun to these guys) that i haven't shot in years, i just bought a big truck but my tires are too little for these guys (and it doesn't have a winch), the only thing i know about arm-wrestling is from sly stallone's "over the top"... when i turn this hat around, it's like a switch, and dogs... i can take 'em or leave 'em. they're nice enough, they tell me to "cowboy up" a lot, though i know their making fun of the yankee. every time us yanks come to the south, we get hazed a bit.

quick story, last night i was at hooters watching the oregon ducks go down in flames to an unranked arizona (better for OSU), when one of the guys from site saw me at the bar. he came up and we talked for a bit, actually maybe an hour and a half or so. there was an attractive hooters girl, TheNaomi, behind the bar very much in earshot, and at one point i was talking about TheYoungerSister complaining about having to be on her feet for 8 hours a day at work, the guy said "well, it's better than working 8 hours on your back!" i couldn't quit laughing and neither could TheNaomi. it was so... just, WOW! she agreed that 8 hours on your feet would be better than working 8 hours on your back, but the pay on your back would definitely be better. then she went on how she doesn't understand how any woman could ever go hungry or be homeless. she's like "we have the power" (gesturing netherly). i couldn't believe it. it was hilarious. i mean, i think a lot of guys would agree but only around other guys. girls would shoot us for talking like that, and when she said it on top of his comment... well, let's just say my ribs were hurting by the time i got finished laughing. TheNaomi, you are cool!

good times, good times. well, back to work, lunch is over.

where my bitchez at?

i got a jacuzzi in my room, so where my bitchez at? i have a king size bed and a sofa bed just in case for the platonicists. i haven't tried it out yet, as i went to the gym yesterday and then showered and ate. maybe today i'll skip the gym and calgon take me away. it's kinda strange that it is in my bedroom instead of the bathroom, and if you do the birthday suit thing... when you get out, you could flash the I-76 turnpike booths (my window faces RIGHT onto the highway, like "stone's throw" close). so that might cause some crashes, bad if they see me, good if they see a hottie in my room. i'm not sure if you can fit two people in there, i'll find out later, it seems kinda small, but i'll keep you all updated, i'm sure you are dying of suspense.

this job is going to be a fluffy, high-calorie, artery-clogging piece of angel cake. i'm here to babysit the machine while they test it. it goes like this. a company in france bought a turbine from TheGeneral and a compressor from another company, the site i'm at. the french customer wants to test our turbine coupled to the compressor before we ship it to yemen. all the mechanical work is done, they actually started testing last week, but there are some electrical/controls issues. so when they do the testing, i just have to make sure all the valves are lined up, no leaks, etc. looks like we might test next week maybe, then when we are done, i get to help them take it apart, box it up, and ship it off IF i'm still here (vacation in 17 days). so until the testing, we are sitting in the control room, playing on the internet. might have to bring my language CDs in tomorrow to keep my brain from rotting. the only bad thing is we are working 5-8's, so no overtime. AND can't recall ever being on a job that is done at 3:30pm. we are working 7A-3:30P. that is craziness. i drove the 30 minutes to the hotel, goofed around on the internet, exercised, showered, AND had dinner all before 6PM. that's unheard of. i felt like the lazy version of the old army commercial (We do more before 9 a.m. than most people do all day). plus, i get the weekend off, hope someone wants to join me in a red's game. come on, do it.

yesterday must've been boob day

i went to columbus this weekend. we played poker on friday night (TheSteadman won), saturday BTVJGJHo and i tried to get TheRedness to go out to a bar to play pool which he suggested the night before, but we couldn't get a hold of him. BTVJGJHo and i ended up at hooters passing the time, grabbed some food and a few pints o' suds. our waitress's name was jenna, she was bubbly to say the least, very friendly and a good salesperson. i ended up buying a hooter's big boob mousepad. can you see me bringing that out at work? i'm a consumer though, so i bought. hooter's also has limited edition hooter's bud lite aluminum bottles. since we were there like 4 hours or so, jenna was nice enough to autograph ours. juddy got one, and i got mine autographed to the BTBz. you can see it over at the BTBz realted post. here is a pic of BTVJGJHo and jenna. there was another jenna working there as well that was quite endowed. it certainly was a good trip to hooter's. and not to objectify the girls. jenna1 was great, funny, pretty, sociable, and we had a great time having her serve us. we weren't lucky enough to get to speak with jenna2, maybe next time.

later, BTVJGJHo and i met up with TheT and TheErin (TheT's fiance) at adobe gilas. there out waitress wasn't so sociable, as it was kind of busy, but she was a good waitress, and she wasn't very hard on the eyes either. she had a low cut top and dare i say, her cups definitely runneth over. i don't want to come off as an ass, but there were some very attractive ladies out this weekend, and i didn't talk to any of them as usual, besides ordering rounds.

i just wanted to post pix. i gave jenna1 my blog addres, and told her i'd post her pic, so i am. who knows if she'll visit or not. we'll see.

"i want to see you," she said

i would have to say, the weekend jules and i shared in salt lake city was probably one of our best.

several days before, she called me letting me know i didn't have to come to the wedding. we both knew what was going to happen out there, and she didn't want me to feel obligated, or to come with false hope. i assured her i wanted to come, i wanted to at least see her one more time, and i wanted to do this in person. i'd said time and time again... "if it doesn't hurt, it didn't mean anything", and i wanted the past 2 years to mean something. breaking up via e-mail, phone calls, and distance hurt, but not enough, not like it should. it would've been too impersonal.

i'd worked up a plan that i had little hope she'd go for, but it was worth a try. we knew what was going to happen, so i wanted, as soon as we met up at the airport (our flights were to land within 15 minutes of each other around 10:30AM friday morning), that we'd go to the hotel, get out the "why's", the "who's", the "how's", we'd talk it all out, then (and here's the part i didn't think would fly), i was hoping we could spend the weekend as a couple, smile, laugh, kiss, flirt, etc., and then "sign the paperwork" at the airport monday, when we caught our separate flights.

that plan didn't go through 100%, but things did end up working out spectacularly. jules was supposed to land at 10:15AM, and i was supposed to at 10:30AM. i'd arrived an hour early, but there was no gate, so we ended up waiting on the tarmac until we got out original gate, that sucked. jules arrived about 15 minutes early, and they actually got to their gate LATE for some reason, so i was in the baggage claim, thinking maybe she'd gone to the rental car desk already, when actually she hadn't gotten off the plane yet. there was a group of missionaries on my flight from columbus to SLC, and they were WAY behind me. i was already in the baggage claim waiting, when i heard of roar of cheers and clapping as the missionaries descended the stairs into the baggage claim. those mormons LOVE their missionaries. well, jules was coming down the stairs around about the same time, and she walked past the crowd over to me. we hadn't seen each other in 3 months, since our rendezvous in the west of ireland, and we kinda knew the situation, so their was a bit of awkwardness as we stood together. we hugged, and i wasn't sure if a kiss was appropriate so that was scratched from the schedule. our bags came quickly enough, and while waiting for them, we'd made plans with a friend of hers in SLC to meet for drinks and brunch. my plan was off-track so soon.

we made our way to hertz where we picked up a new ford mustang... it's my vacation, too, and i wanted to show off with some american muscle. we throw our bags in, and as i back it out of the spot, something doesn't sound right... maybe brakes rubbing? i pull forward a bit, still sounds strange, i stop and check that the e-brake isn't on, that's ok, so i keep going. the faster i go, the worse it gets, and maybe 1/2 mile outside the rental garage, i ask jules to stick her hea dout and look at the tires... completely flat front right tire. COME ON!!! this is a rental car, i shouldn't HAVE to check that. it was too far (and hot) to leave the car and walk back, and since it was their fault, i wasn't too concerned in driving it around the ring road back to he garage. we get back, i park the car as close to the desk as possible, and go complain. while i'm complaining, the security guard tells jules to move it, it's in the way of such and such, so she gave the guy the keys and told HIM to move it. it's broke, and she's done with it. i tell hertz the issue, and they ask how I got the flat. what!? i've been gone 2 minutes, you gave it to me the way!!! after a bit of debate, they decided to replace the car, but they didn't have another mustang, would i be OK with a dodge charger? that's the car i wanted in the first place, but it was a bit pricey for a weekend where we MIGHT not drive too much. so they gave me a charger (took about 40 minutes to get it there), and we were on our way.

we went to the hotel, dropped the bags, and went to meet TheJo (her female college friend) at a local bar. in SLC, you have to be a member to get into bars... that means you pay an exorbitant fee the first time, you get free t-shirts and drink glasses you forget to take with you the 1st time (and only get on the first time), and you get to bring 7 MORE people everytime you show up, rock on. we went, we drank, we ate, it was a good time. jules and i went back to the hotel and talked about the wedding present. i didn't want to wake up early on saturday to get it, so i offered the choice to get it that day, they had a target registry, let's do it NOW, and save the hassle. we did, i picked the first thing i saw that i thought was great, she agreed but wanted to look, we looked, we decided on my thing, and dropped it off back at the hotel. i'm guessing we went for dinner and drinks, but i can't recall, for the life of me, where. jules, TheJo, and i ended up at ami and chris's (the couple getting married) that night where i met several of the close friend's invited to the wedding. i had a good time, though i was a bit tired/jet-lagged/drunk.

that night we fell asleep talking about "us"... what went wrong? was there any glimmer of hope? was it me? did she find someone else? etc. the answers were, respectively, we were living separate lives - the distance got to be too much for her; not really; it wasn't me; she didn't find anyone else. it was tough for me to accept, but that's the way it had to be: in person, we had to see each other cry over this ending.

the next day, we talked a bit more before starting the day, and she was cool with the breaking up monday thing. that was awesome, cuz i missed kissing her. i missed everything about her. the wedding was a late one, 5PM, right outside our hotel, so we got up and had brunch at a place we'd gone to several times (squatter's, i believe). we went to TheJo's place where the girls talked about outfits and comfy shoes that don't match so well as opposed to 4" heels that'll hurt but look better. girls! after figuring that out, jules and i went back to the hotel with TheJo coming in about 15 minutes. when TheJo got to our hotel room (you needed to put the room key in a slot in the elevator to get to our floor, how cool?), they wrapped the gift we'd gotten, then we goofed around, listened to music, and went to the wedding.

the wedding was really nice. it was outside the hotel in their side courtyard thing. the only thing they might've thought more about was the unity candle as they had a hard time keeping it lit in the wind. it was a bit warm at sunset, but there were water and drinks available to the guests as they were seated. the ceremony was nice and short. it was a mix of denomination-free and hindu wedding rituals, as ami is of indian-descent. the wedding was small, with the matron of honor being ami's sister, pervi, and chris's best man being his brother (i believe). there was an exuberant flower girl who barreled down the aisle and dropped the flowers at the end as an afterthought.

the reception was just a few steps from where the ceremony was held, on the tiered-lawn outside the hotel. the appetizer and food table was set up at one end of the lawn, and the open bar at the other with a nice removable parquet dance floor in between. the food was great, the drinks were flowing, and pervi wanted me to dance. i'm not a big dancer, but i have been dancing quite a bit lately come to think of it. i still need a few drinks to get the joints loosened up, though. pervi asked me to dance, and i told her i needed about an hour. wouldn't ya know it, almost exactly an hour later, she comes up and drags me onto the dance floor as they'd started playing "grease lightning" from grease. i was resisting, but it was futile. as soon as my feet hit the dancefloor, i was breaking it down. it just hit my out of the blue, and we DANCED!!! i don't recall if the floor was empty or we emptied it, but it didn't take too long, and we were the only ones on the floor. my high school theater skills came back en force. pervi and i acted out every line of the song, we danced, we played to the audience, it was craziness. i thought we were done when that song was over, but they immediately played "summer lovin'". we couldn't let our captive audience down, so we did that one too. i'm SOOOO glad i don't have a copy of the movie, but sadly, the bride and groom do, and due to the events of the weekend, odds of me running into ami and chris again are even slimmer now, so i might be lucky enough not to see the movie. everyone we ran into the rest of the night thanked us for the great show, but i still felt bad for being so outlandish. after that, we did the typical reception thing. jules and i danced SOOO much. we slow danced, we two-stepped, we did the "cha cha slide" (the first time in my existence). i even dragged her up to dance a few times. i knew it'd more than likely be the last time, so i had to get my fill. it was a really great wedding/reception, day/night, one of those you want to last longer than it will.

the next day, jules, TheJo, and i went to ami and chris's to take them our gift, since we didn't bring it to the wedding. i figured we'd take it to the reception, but since the reception was immediately after, we didn't have a chance to go to the room. we helped them move their excess alcohol from the garage to their root cellar, we looked at their awesome gifts, and had a few drinks. we talked about where they were going for their honeymoon (crap, i forget... peru, and maybe ecuador, and mexico on the way back. something like that). after talking about what they should eat before they go (indian or sushi, since they won't get either where they were going), we decided to go to get sushi for dinner. i'd only had the supermarket, pre-fabbed sushi before, and liked it so i was game. WOW!!! i'd never had REAL sushi, and it seriously... it was love at first bite (a bit gimmicky, i know). we ordered like 20 plates or something like that and killed them all. it was the best.

after that, we dropped ami and chris off with a chance of meeting them at a bar later, and we took TheJo home. we hoped ami and chris would make it out, but they had packing and honeymoon stuff to do, so we weren't surprised when they didn't show up. jules and i had gone to this bar before the last time we were in SLC. it was OK, loud music, pool tables, etc. we sat at the bar and talked. we drank and talked and drank and talked. we didn't want the night to end, as this was going to be our last together, so we drew it out as long as we could. it was really nice just sitting and talking, kinda how we started the relationship. it was funny how there were a lot of parallels to how we started and ended. we met each other at the hotel bar in india for work, our last night together, we sat at a bar, talking laughing, etc (but without the tour of the closed park and ATM machine we made during our first encounter). we/i kinda determined our anniversary date would be the night before i left india for red's wedding in 2005. i stopped by her room to drop off my bags the night before i was to leave, but i was invited in and we talked until the sun came up and i needed to catch my ride to the airport. if it weren't for that wedding, maybe we wouldn't've started dating, and we ended it officially at her friend's wedding.

the next day, we woke up, packed, and hit the road. we went to jules' gate where we sat and kinda pondered in silent the end. i'm a romantic, so it was tough for me. i get choked up easily, so anytime i tried to talk, it was more squeaks and fighting back tears. that's me, i can't help it. we had fun together, we were good together, we were DAMN sexy together, and i didn't want it to end, but such is life and love. we hugged and kissed and said our goodbyes as they called her flight. there was no made-for-the-movies change of mind, no heroic running through the terminal to stop a bad decision; it was just her boarding a plane, and me putting my sunglasses on as i walked away to find my way home without making a scene, hah. and that was the end of one of the best weekends we'd ever had. and my... those legs!!! how i'll miss them.

ironically, i finished this post today, 24-july-07, what would've been our 2-year anniversary. i've been struggling over writing this for about 3 weeks now, funny how the timing worked out. jules and i still e-mail on occasion. it's still tough for me, but, again, i'm a hopeless romantic... i have no chance. not so much that i even want it to though, but that is far more than what this post is about. thanks for taking the ride with me.

i don't know...

why...

i've never broken up with a girl.

maybe i've been afraid of being alone

maybe i've been happy no matter the situation

maybe i'm a pushover, or i could figure out what was wrong and dealt with it.

i don't know.

again, tonight, i was with the stars, i LOST orion, but i had the cigs. a bad deal but a sufficient substitute.

maybe...

i know what i want, and it doesn't want me...

weekend vacation

i was going to go to columbus, the regular vacation spot. i have nothing to do so i visit my friends and try to drag them out to a bar or three. then i figured, i haven't talked to TheJay in a while, maybe i'll visit him in cleveland.

then, as i was driving down to TheFBar for wednesday night jitterbug (i don't jitterbug, the oldies have taken over the dance floor for practice on W night), i get a voicemail from TheJay to call him.

i call him, as i'm parking, he wants to know if i want to go to belize!!! hmmm, nothing to do, no work, sure why not. his wife works for an airline and they get the BOMB-DIGGITY hook up. at one time, i thought that either jules and i could quit TheGeneral, and the other could get a job at an airline, and we'd be set. one of us gets the jobs, the other gets the cheap global vacation trips, but things ended before they could begin there. anyways, tomorrow i'm driving to cleve-town, then friday we fly to belize, i feel bad about being a 3rd wheel, but 1) he invited me and 2) i'm good at playing dead when people are having sex next to me or in the bed next to me, so all is good. maybe i'll meet a hot central american, hah hah hahahahahahhhaha.

anyways, that's what i'll be up to until my company screws it up tomorrow. we'll see what happens.

i looked at the stars tonight, they were OVERWHELMING, seriously. we have property "up on the hill" and i wish i was in a state to go up there, pitch a tent, and savor them. stars are so god damned beautiful.

please, go out tonight, try your best to get the bright lights outof your line of sight, and embrace the stars. i want a truck, i want a house, but i want a kick-ass telescope so much more. jules and i went shopping once in columbus, and i saw one i wanted... she said i needed a house first to use it at.

grrrrr.... kinda like needing experience to get a job, but needing a job to get experience. you just can't win. goodnight hank c., thanks for the fingers.

oh yeah, i have a bad habit when talking to people as i get out of the car. i called TheJay, and locked my keys in the car. i didn't realize it until i was leaving to go home. luckily TheYoungerSister answered the phone and brought me my spare keys. as much as we don't get along, i have to thank her. "Thanks". going to bed now. b

home for a few days

i made it home pretty much without incident. edmonton to minneapolis was ok. we boarded the plane in minneapolis, pulled away from the gate, and stopped for about an hour waiting to get on the runway. a big storm had rolled over while we were boarding and all east-bound flights were grounded until it got far enough away to fly over/around it, so i was about an hour late getting into pittsburgh, other than that, not much exciting.

i've looked into flights, and i think on sunday, i'm going to fly to colorado springs, to visit a friend for a few days, then on to salt lake city on friday for a wedding, then back home on monday to wait for an assignment. i might be able to take a longer job than usual depending on how SLC goes. i was trying to get a greyhound or amtrak from colorado springs to SLC, but the timings were just awful for WHEN i need to be where i need to be. since i want to see a variety of people on the trip, the amtrak runs but has me leaving colorado springs far too early and arriving in SLC far too late. the greyhound is a BIT better, but not much. i guess i'll have to pop my train cherry some other time, and get my mass transit bus fix down the road. maybe i can drag someone along with me.

in other news, i'm still in night-shift mode. i want to go to bed but i'm not tired. i tried to go to sleep in canada around midnight to get some sleep, but slept awful through til 4AM, so i was tired the entire flight (when i would've normally been sleeping). now it's 1:30AM, and i'm not a bit tired. this sucks. and being that it is late night, i get to watch some strange things. does anyone know who pastor melissa scott is? she is the hottest pastor i've ever seen. i love her hair. there are some old 80's like pix on that page, but her new calmer yet mussed hairstyle is hot, the glasses are great, and i love the long coat she wears, yummy. i probably shouldn't speak so sacreligiously about a woman of the cloth, but i'm guessing that she gets more viewers than her late husband. i can't find any REALLY good pictures of her, so i guess you'll just have to stay up late like me and find her on late night TV.