Painful Experiences

Random memorable painful experiences (physically):

1) I was a ten year old kid slow sledding in Indiana. My clothes sucked, as we couldn't afford Gortex, and it was super fucking cold. From the sledding, snow was getting under my clothes and melting, making me dangerously cold. Later in life, I heard Bear Grylls say, "you should never be cold cause you can just do 50 pushups!" Or something to that effect anyway. I didn't know this back then, but thankfully made it home with all my fingers and toes. I was really crying though.

2) While I was living in San Diego and bouldering with Ivo Rosbach, I fell onto a sixty degree sloped granite surface and slid down a few feet on my belly. That day I had a really bad sunburn all over my body, and every nerve on my front half fired at once. Excruciating.

3) Six months ago, I was walking down the road and stepped off into the bushes to take a piss. I felt an itching sensation near my left ankle. In the two seconds it took me to look down, the itching had turned into an incredible amount of sensation, pain, itching, fear, as my whole lower leg was covered in thousands of tiny fire ants.

I didn't know what to do; the idea of pissing on my foot occurred to me, but I knew that my leg would stink the whole way home, so I decided to wait it out. The problem now is that I really had to go, and it seemed an eternity before I stopped urinating and could swipe the offending beasts from my ankle.

By that time, I was in so much pain that I was laughing hysterically. My foot was covered in spots and itched like hell for ten days after.

Don't Fall

Last night after having a couple drinks, I came home to find that I did not have my house key. Normally I keep it in my wallet, which I didn't bring with me. Knowing that all the windows were locked, I called the landlord, who said he doubted he knew the location of the extra key.

I put my limited climbing skills to use and studied the architecture under the balcony. I observed a concrete ledge that I could shimmy hand over hand about five meters to the concrete column adjacent to the balcony. From there I might reach across the column to that same concrete ledge, now directly underneath the balcony where I might try to reach up to grab the marble posts of the railing.

But alas the concrete ledge was dirty and slippery and slightly sloped for drainage. If I made my way over hand over hand to the balcony, I would be dangling from the ledge searching for a hand hold on the other side, and the ledge became very narrow at this point. Below me would be quite a way down, high enough to break an ankle or my head if I landed on two different steps.

The railing of the balcony below mine was too low to even try jumping from it to mine. And the concrete columns were too thick to over any assistance. No grip there.

Finally I noticed a window ledge underneath that same ledge leading me to my balcony. I tried this, and discovered that I could stand on the very edge of a lower window ledge from where I made a small leap to grab the bottom of my railing, which is luckily coated in small ornate rocks, giving it a nice grip.

From there I wrapped my arm around a marble post, reaching up to the top railing of the baclony, and slowly pulled one of my slippered drunken feet up to the balcony. One final dynamic move to hop over the railing.

I found that the lock had failed on one of the sliding glass doors and I could gain entry.

It's not so obvious how to climb up my balcony, but I had better find a way to secure my new apartment. And make an extra key.

Lesson: drink just enough to overcome your fear of heights, but not so much that you'll fall to your death.

Tiger Shark Versus Glock

vs.


I was washing the dishes. Above the kitchen sink is a window facing south overlooking the back yard. I see a friendly rabbit nibbling on the grass about 60 meters away near the garden. Unluckily for him, my friend's pump action pellet gun is near the kitchen table. I opened the screen, and slid the barrel out the window.

Snap. A good shot, but right behind the shoulders. Incapacitated, but not dead. I head out to the yard to gather my dinner.

Forgetting my lessons from physiology I kneel down and cut it's head off. Now the headless rabbit is jumping around the yard like an un-pithed lab frog.

With a dinner plate in one hand an butcher knife in the other, I'm a retarded gladiator trying to slay the wild beast. Luckily for me, the neighbors did not see any of this. It would have been hard to explain to the police, since after a few misses with my sword (the damn thing was jumping 2 meters in the air!) my face was covered in blood spurting from the neck of the zombie bunny.

Finally it sat still for a second while I thrust the blade into its side. Finally dead. Again.

My roommate made stew.

I'm not really into killing for sport. I think you ought to eat something if you're gonna kill it.

I'll make one exception though.

I want to hunt a tiger shark with a Glock. Maybe I got the idea from a movie, or from a dream perhaps. I figure the 40 caliber model will do. They're supposed to fire underwater, so pressing the gun right against the head of the shark, right behind the eye, should kill it. Maybe.

I know what you're thinking, and I agree. If I actually did see a tiger shark, I'd more likely be fascinated and leave it alone. It's too big to eat anyway.

-james

Human Powered Transportation

This morning, while Charito was cooking the pancakes, I finished reading A Monk Swimming, a memoir of Malachy McCourt, who I've never heard of, but who knew other famous people in the 50's and 60's.

Then I went for a ride on my bike, stopped at Diniwid Beach, a beautiful beach with a SCUBA dive shop, where I talked with Angela, the instructor, about spotting me while I practice freediving, then rode my bike to to Puka beach. It's on the north end of the island and the sand is composed of crushed puka shells.

Then I rode back south, racing the Filipino tourists who rented four wheeled vehicles for god knows what reason. Maybe it's fun. Looks stupid to me. Anyway, they had me on a couple of the steeper hills, but I passed them eventually, even breathing their blue exhaust for a time.

When I lived in California I actually remember thinking about how cool it would be if we actually did run out of oil. Many believe we'll be powering our homes with windmills and solar panels and driving battery powered cars. But don't believe this bullshit. Check the math. It won't work. Duracell doesn't have the technology and bringing wind from spinning turbines to your light bulbs and battery chargers indeed works, but not in the quantities necessary to maintain anything near our current lifestyles.

No sir, we'll all be riding bicycles. And we'll all have tighter asses for it. This is what dawned on me back in California. So many of our huge American asses will be gorgeous, firm and perky from riding bicycles. And we'll be happier because Human Powered Transportation reduces stress and brings us closer to the journey than to just the points A and B. We'll all be traveling rather than just commuting!

While in college, twice I went to Mardi Gras in pre-Katrina New Orleans. The first year I didn't know what to think. It was just crazy. I thought everyone was insane. The second year I was ready. But the weather wasn't. It was raining and chilly. I noticed that the atmosphere was quite different. Everyone was moving, walking "somewhere" trying to keep warm. Not the prior year, with good weather. Everyone was just where they were, having fun, getting drunk, and kissing strangers.

When we're going somewhere, we're all just commuting with no interaction to the journey or our fellow travelers. It's easy to honk the horn and give someone the bird from the anonymity of your car, like it's the titanium cockpit of and invincible tank. Try doing that to someone's face while walking or on a bicycle. It's not the same because it's too personal.

Anyway, I stopped on the way home and bought two chicken's and had them chopped up at the market, stopped at another dive shop to say hello to some friends, and rode home.

After lunch I watched Pontypool. A unique zombie movie set in a radio station studio. I have a near obsession with zombie movies. There are many of these movies out now, but I was hooked back when I saw the remake of Dawn of the Dead, which I watched at a theater in Mexico a few years ago. I was on the edge of my seat and loved it. I've heard that the actor Christopher Walkin also has this same obsession as me, but don't remember really. Anyway, Pontypool's a good one. Not scary, but a very interesting take on the genre.

I also watched a documentary on Richard Feynman, the famous physicist and my biggest role model. Read one of his books, perhaps "Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman." Or "The Pleasure of Finding Things Out." Better read both.

Also installed Alcatesh's BPM Studio jukebox DJ software on my laptop. Highly recommended! Only problem is that it doesn't play .flac files, but perhaps there's a more recent version that does. You can set up multiple play lists and switch back and forth, easy to mix up and switch when your mood changes.

I'm not bored today, and a bit more relaxed since I got my breathing going riding the bike.

I also logged into my old Facebook account, which by doing so re-activated it. I'll have to spend a few minutes to see what the hell I put on my profile. I doubt you'll find anything interesting there, but you can send me a note or something I guess. Search for Carmichael James.

I need to start chilling out my life and getting rid of drama so that I can relax more for diving longer in the ocean. But it doesn't really fit my true desires; What I really want is $20,000, a pound of cocaine, a really good camera, and six weeks in Tokyo. Now that would be fun and I can get in lots of trouble and have great stories. Meditating by the sea is hard to do for any number of days in a row. For me anyway.

I was wondering the other day, can you sneeze while you're asleep? If you're induced to sneeze it's almost voluntary, but I've never been woken up by a sneeze. Anybody have any experience with this?

Brian, get this story from Shannon, something about his brother impersonating, or rather claiming to be the son of Rudy Sarzo. I don't remember the details, but I remember the story actually involved Rudy Sarzo. (bass player for Quiet Riot, Ozzy Osbourne, etc.)

Okay, better go. I still think that Hall & Oats is very underrated.

-james

"What are we going to do today Baby?

A common question in the mornings right after breakfast. I don't know, didn't plan anything yet, and feel the creep of laziness over me again. I'm too relaxed on this island. Still bored, but relaxed, like we're where we belong; much more than what I felt in Cebu or Puerto Galera. Both felt temporary. Both had nothing to do. Mainly no conversation with any other rational human beings.


Either tourists or locals who are out of their minds, but not in a good way. In a "Life is great, drink some beer and sit on the front porch" kind of way. Which is fine, when you're 80 years old or on holiday. But this is my life every day!

Today I will try to exercise and maybe hike up the hill to finally get a better look at the six foot wide fruit bats that live in the trees on a hill nearby.

A trip to the "bat cave" as it's called was canceled since I was told there are kids who live nearby and throw rocks at you for not giving them one thousand pesos to check out the cave. Some kids just need to be shot, unfortunately. And their parents hung from a tree for teaching them to beg and steal from anyone not brown in color. Anyway, these are the small common looking bats and not worth the trouble anyway.

Shit, fucking, son of a bitch. I have internet again, and worse, a slow intermittent signal that not only allows me to waste time searching for weird things in the news, but also to mess around with the computer, moving it here and there and waiting to connect again after losing the signal.

And worse of all, downloading. So many people are pack rats, filling their lives and garages with all kinds of shit from yesterday to twenty years ago, keeping everything that belongs in the landfill in their lives. Me, I collect digital content. I don't know why, like it might go away somehow. Run out of stock. I have hard drives full of more movies than I have time to watch, music, documentaries, and books. No porn thankfully. I was able to cure myself of the desire to collect porn long ago. In in this day of infinite torrents with anything and everything, thank god! Or thank my girlfriend, who looks and acts like a porn star.

And I'm always checking the program, checking the download speed, what's finished, how much space left on my hardl drive? Like I'm waiting for brownies to bake. But then just store them in the freezer rather than eating them. For digital content, I'm a squirrel storing nuts in the tree for winter. I'm out of my mind.

But there's so much good shit out there! I have reggae, baroque, and jazz music on the way, classic Richard Feynman lectures on Physics, Bas Rutten bone breaking instructional videos, and an interview with David Blaine on how he held his breath for seventeen minutes.

And listening to L.A. Guns and Steelheart while I type this without needing my wall covered with cd's like my brother's house.

And my new apartment is clean with hot water, a/c, and a kitchen. We have everything we need here, stores in walking distance, and no reason to leave. But it's at sea level, so we won't make it through a tsunami unless we hear the screaming of people fleeing and are quick enough to get on the top floor.

I'm thankful that I'm finally getting anxious. I'll start looking for a job now very soon. But if I find one that I can't take my girlfriend with me, I'll be in a pickle.

I need more money to build a remote compound with a setback from the neighbors, who always have chickens and roosters. Chickens right outside your window. They need them for economic reasons, because cock fighting is so big here, and because they don't mind because the roosters sound like the people talking in their native language anyway.

What else? Just wish me luck that I'll find a job that's not in Afghanistan!

okay,
james

George Bush Fried Chicken Dream

Had a dream last night that I was lounging in my bed eating raw steak with some other soldiers getting ready for a mission. It was my bed in my room while in high school.

Since I was a contractor working with the soldiers, I felt a slight bit of guilt when George Bush sat down on the bed to talk with us. He was commenting on the food we were eating, saying that we'll likely get sick from eating it. It was now a plate of fried chicken.

After George tried some, was tired and lay down to take a nap. I was thinking how odd that George Bush was napping in my bed. Lazy bastard.

I have strange dreams, some too disturbing to share. I'll surely be locked up or approached by some bizarre movie producer, someone too twisted to talk to. Some dreams remain, but you can never remember them all later, and when I write about those I will inevitably forget, I'll read it later and won't believe what the fuck was in my head.

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Two boxes are packed and my girlfriend and I stopped to eat lunch before taking them to the shippers. Anticipation; can't relax. Like being high up in a tree. Have to get to the ground before I can relax. Have to get these boxes on their way. Finish what we started. Too much thinking, how about this, what if that? Everything will be easy, and if not, who cares anyway. But anticipation is still there.

Once I'm under way, the mission starts. I can't be on The Amazing Race. I would have a heart attack. Or kill somebody who gets in my way.

I used to drive a steel delivery truck. Owned by the family of a girl I admired. Made more deliveries than should have been possible. Once my truck is loaded, that shit's getting there. Reckless driving, speeding, kicking the steel off the truck and getting the security guard to sign for it if the union fuckers were on lunch. Back to the office. Load my truck. Let's go. 8 hours in a day, pay's the same, but let's make some deliveries.

When I travel now, I'm on steel deliveries again. Let's get it done then have a beer later. My slippers come off, the Nike Air Pegasus go on and get the fuck out of my way.

Don't talk to me when I'm traveling. No way. I'm an asshole.

Off to ship the boxes...

Can you Sneeze While You're Asleep?

Perfect sleep last night. Can't even remember any of my strange dreams. Charito slept too many hours again. Cause she's got the time. No hobbies, nothing big on her mind. At least nothing that she tells me, and nothing that prevents her sleep.

To do today: swim at La Laguna, a beach nearby behind a large rock, separate from Sabang Beach. With actual sand and blue water. So near, but so different. It will be chilly, and a 15 minute walk back to our hot shower. Simple logistics makes us lazy. Need a place with a grass yard and hammock right on the ocean.

Hike to a new place we haven't been to before. Preferably without too many hills to cause my girlfriend to conspire to leave me for flatter pastures.

Get a haircut, take out the trash. Write in my diary. Read. Get some exercise. Half-way through with Songs of the Doomed by Hunter Thompson. The parts supposedly written on mescaline makes me reconsider my up-coming Adderall habit. I should go with it and get some. Writing on alcohol won't cut it, and I'm not excited about alcohol anymore anyway.

If you need to be drunk to enjoy it, it's not worth doing in the first place.

But how many people seem to enjoy themselves half of their lives, drunk and laughing. Idiots, many of them. I need something stronger. Like pure un-cut cocaine. But it's too boring in the Philippines to be on hyper drugs.

Cebu on New Year's made me give up on this place. No culture. No excitement. No quality. No new fun. Always searching for that hidden gem, that perfect island or city with everything you need to live. You can find it, but it will be half-ugly or boring.

So my new life will be this: getting up early. Trying to avoid interaction with people. Jogging and swimming in the morning. Reading in the afternoon. Avoid people in the evening so I don't get drunk every night. Charito getting a job, something to do so she doesn't sleep ten hours a night.

What will I miss about this place? My German friend Berthold. I like the guy, don't know why. Nothing else. Just hanging out here. And no other friends. I like that we have no friends here. No engagements or obligations. Just make fun of anybody that we see.

Ahh, but I met a nice woman on the boat yesterday. An engineer on assignment out of Florida to commission steam turbines in northern Philippines. But she knows people in the main office in Manila and will forward my resume. Nice conversation too, made the boat ride go quickly.

Don't quit my day job. I need a day job in Asia. Move back to middle east? I can save money, but I won't last there. And what if I can't take Charito. I'll be miserable anyway. Not the way to spend your life. Don't want to be miserable. But $130k a year tax free at a no-stress job might balance the miserable a bit. What I really need is a career. In a city that I like. And that's easy to get away from. Singapore here I come!

My life is easy. My health is good, and I'm not too crazy, and have some good ideas. I'm just a bad coach for myself to improve on the things I want to. And I'm sensitive and slightly bi-polar. Need to stay up more of the time, quit worrying and enjoy the day.

No guilt. No worry. I just need to sweat more.

I'll feel better once I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing.

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The other day Charito picked a bunch of hot chilli peppers from the bush outside. She chopped them up to pan fry them for use in recipes later. Doing this effectively filled the apartment with pepper spray. She was crying and I was caughing and laughing and had to go outside on the terrace.

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Went to Puerto Galera town to pick up a CD with the songs I should be practicing. I wasn't charged for the CD nor will I be back to practice. We're leaving here anyway and my band members are only available on Sunday anyway, according to the studio owner. I'll practice putting the songs in notation and memorizing them. I need a notation software though.

Soon on to another island...

-james