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

"Papa, sit down!"

This is what my daughter said to me this morning as I was getting ready to leave, and she could tell. Two out of the last three times I've left, she didn't cry. I wish I could visit often enough so that she never did.

But that's all a complicated story, involving temporary insanity, arson, etc. for another time...

I read in the Manila newspaper yesterday that rescue diver's had almost finished working to recover the bodies from a recent boat accident. Over night, the buoy marking the location of the wreckage had been stolen. So forever the rest of the bodies will remain. This is such a typical story for the Philippines that even it holds no irony for me.

After visiting my daughter I returned on the same boat route that killed 12 people six months ago. Thankfully it was mid-day and calm weather and the trip went without incident. Last time I had been on that boat, winds sent random waves to the top and over the plastic tarp that covers the passenger area of the wooden and bamboo banca boat. Many passengers got wet along with some luggage, and a few were throwing up. I was listening to Tool on my cell phone with headphones and watched it all as if in a movie. I luckily got off the boat completely dry and my luggage intact.

I was on a three night trip, first to drop off some heavy luggage at my friend's house and pick up my spear guns. Then a day in Manila to move my drums, documents, and climbing gear from there to another house. Finally, on my way home stayed the night with my daughter. My plan to live here included the hope that I can visit more often. Unfortunately, I cannot stay in this city.

The foreigners here are an ugly breed, over half wearing Puerto Galera t-shirts. I can't figure it out, are they afraid that they'll forget where they are?! Some of the shirts even have a map on the back. I don't understand. Maybe they should come with a compass stitched in the collar.

This place is for a weekend of SCUBA diving and hookers. Neither are on my to-do list.

So moving again! I have a lead on a P15,000 all inclusive apartment or a P25,000 plush house. Not sure which I'll take yet. One thing is for sure, I need to start swimming every day and get into better shape. And play volleyball.

The volleyball and swimming should help me when I go diving in Moalboal.

I stole a Hunter Thompson book from my friend's house. reading him makes me want to make shit up to mix into my diary. Not that I don't think I have anything interesting to write. It's just so interesting to read those outrageous stories mixed in with the memoir. I know I have the opportunity; I've been all over the place and half of the shit I could embellish couldn't be readily checked anyway. But I resist. Everything you read shall be true, if boring at times.

So I have my teachers now. If I could capture the wit of Mark Twain, the sarcasm of Kurt Vonnegut, the ability to explain like Issac Asimov, the clarity of Hemingway, and the outrageous moods of Hunter Thompson, someone might actually read this.

"Like a key hidden in your head." My award winning essay on combination locks is still festering towards greatness in my head. I'm still not ready.


And hopefully my future award winning book is in there as well. The plot of this book is a future world where you're allowed to kill one person a year legally. Mad Max, old west style.

"The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago. The second best time is now." Read that in a blog today.

later...
james

"Mostly cloudy, with a chance of boredom."

Watching TV, I saw Anderson Silva beating Dan Henderson in the 185 pound martial arts middle-weight title fight. Watching the best fighters in the world made me wonder what if I had not quit the Ju Jitsu practice that I started as a freshman in college.

Not that I ever had aspirations to be a competitive fighter, but just for fun and be able to wrestle and talk about it more intelligently. It interests me because of its purity.

Mixed Martial Arts had probably already been popular in Japan for a long time, but for the United States and rest of the world, it really started in the first televised competition when I was a freshman in college. That would have been around 1993.

Prior to that, martial arts, to the layman, always had a mysticism to it not based on reality; that nobody in the world could beat Bruce Lee, (which may have been true); that some martial arts, once you get to the secret levels, taught the Dim Mak death touch that would kill somebody instantly; that Japanese black belt fighters were always the best.

The thing I like is that the sport dispels all this bullshit. Get in a cage, with a limited and good set of rules. Rules evolved over the last decade to make the fights interesting, limit serious injuries, and get the sport certified by the different boxing commissions. Simple common sense fighting rules. No biting off someone's nipple, no breaking off someone's finger, no kicking someone in the nuts, no kicking them in the head when they are down.

Think you're unbeatable? Prove it. One strike indefensible knockout punches? Let's see it!

Anyway...
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Our going out of the house last night was not because we looked forward to it, but just so that we would actually get out of the house and not watch television all night.

The only place I enjoy going is this town is Berthold's 'restaurant'. Because I have somebody to talk to. I typically limit that to every other night. The other nights I try to poke around to see if it's possible to make any friends here.

The main problem is that most foreigners here are losers. Or just too old to relate to me.

And I can't find a friendly place to mingle with people here.

I almost stopped in a place last night that could have led to conversation, but I kept walking since the shitty band across the way was blasting the Macarena.

I bought Charito some ice cream, and we stopped in a dive shop bar for two ridiculusly overpriced beers, and to listen to two people at the bar talk about SCUBA diving.

Another reason I won't make friends here. Diving bores the shit out of me, and if I do meet anyone here, it will surely be the topic of conversation. I'd rather go home and watch television.

"People just masturbating about their dive equipment." Who said that? I think it was Aaron Solomons, a freediving instructor in Baja California. I couldn't agree more.

And to teach people to SCUBA dive. Could there be anything more boring? No, could there be anything more boring to talk about at a bar?

I feel that I should dive at least once before I leave this place.

Actually I won't unless I'm nearly guaranteed to see some big animal, it's not work my time and money. I feel lethargic after SCUBA diving, perhaps due to the nitrogen in my system.

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My do to list today:

Fix the sparking refrigerator chord
Swimming
Hiking
Go to music studio
Find a post office
Buy packing tape and some rope

I should just grab my fins and walk down to the beach. That way I get it over with and maybe actually see something nice in the water.
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The books that I boxed up to take away for storage... four books by Paul Theroux that I've read already a couple years ago. And I'm already 'traveling' already.

Three engineering books and my Mathematica programming book. I can read these when I get a job again someday and have to be smart.

Some MENSA puzzle books. I like these, and wish to be good at them, but they distract me from other things I should be doing. So they are just low on the priority list. Not something I want to give up, just a distraction.

The books I kept (worth carrying around):

'A Movable Feast' by Hemingway. A good book, and a two day read anyway if I really keep at it.

'The Universe by Isaac Asimov'. I read some Asimov in high school. And one of my favorite courses in college was 'Philosophy of Physics', which I took to satisfy my rhetoric requirement. This was one of the best classes I've ever taken. 'The Universe' was the type of book that may have been required reading, though it is not as academic as those that actually were. There were seven required books for that course. I didn't get through all of them, and received a B in the course, only due to my weak final paper, which deserved some new material.


I am really bad with new ideas. Maybe I don't have any. Not that I am not creative, just that it never comes from me out of nothing. Many more hours of reading would have been required to get my report to a graduate school level. My report was on Perpetual Motion. I wonder if I had another chance, could I write a better paper?

What if I could write that paper again? What if I could repeat college again? What about my whole life?

Sometimes I ask myself this, and the thought that comes up is that, if I could do it again, I would do everything more or less the same, just keep at whatever I'm doing, don't quit, and stop worrying.

Two things that stop me from continuing things I start in life is my ego and laziness. My ego tells me not to keep playing the drums, and not to play in a band because I am not good enough. Not being in a band makes it a pursuit not fun enough to pursue. I would not enjoying watching a concert where I was the drummer! Ha. That sucks.

Laziness is the other problem. Due in large part to my propensity to get hangovers. At night, rather than continuing to pursue my practices, I turn over to internal and peer pressure and start drinking.

I really wonder what things would have been like if I just kept the alcohol quantity way down since college. High school didn't matter so much. I didn't have any valuable pursuits at that time anyway, except for drumming. I wasn't good at sports. I played baseball in 8th grade and football during my freshman year. I sucked at both.

Anyway, 'The Universe'. I forgot many of the things I learned about Physics, and this is a great concise book on many topics, from Newtonian Physics to current cosmology. The book was written long ago, but big general ideas on Physics haven't changed since then. I've heard that it can take 12 years to earn a PhD in Physics. You have to come up with something new. Hard when the best and most diligent brains in the world have been working on it the last one hundred years.

'The Bantam Book of Correct Letter Writing'

I had the idea of becoming a better communicator, e-mailer, and letter writer a couple months ago, and right after that idea started, I found this book at the used book store. I haven't read it yet. It's going with me.

'Flow' by Csikszentihalyi:
I read this book once a few years ago. More comments on it when I start reading it. Do read it. Should be required reading to be considered human.

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My New Life Rule: When I run out of books, travel somewhere to get a new one. Go to my friend's library. Fly to a bookstore in Bangkok. Go to Cebu and look around. Once I ran out of books to read. No good bookstores where I was. That sucked. I would read the toothpaste ingredients while taking a shit.
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I had good public school growing up. I hear horror stories about the schools in cities like Chicago. But though my teachers may have typically sucked, we had access to good tools and courses in the public schools that I attended. And choices.

My high school had options for music lessons. I can remember playing the xylophone during a required music class. I should have kept that up. I wasn't bad at that one. I just found out that I have a cousin who was a percussionist. Pretty cool.

Our high school auto shop was outstanding. If you wanted to take your car completely apart in there, you could.
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I remember problems with my academic career. I was always naturally above average, which made it so I never failed classes. But I could never be the best. I always forgot everything.

And in engineering classes where the answers came only after a page worth of mathematics, I always made some calculation or assumption error along the way and ended up with the wrong answer.

In high school, when the shop class required us to take apart our parent's lawnmower engine and put it back together, mine never started again. Some error along the way. Some forgotten part maybe, or maladjusted spark plug gap or carburetor adjustment? I never figured it out. In retrospect I should have kept trying. I should have went back after school and tried again.

I really do wish I could do it all over again.

I wish that lawnmower had started! Because I wanted better grades in college? A better job later in life? More money? Actually none of these. I just wished I could get my lawnmower to start! For it's own sake. Because it could have, just with a little more effort on my part.

Damn lawnmower.
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I went swimming earlier today near the beach. Many nice fish and corals. The visibility was just okay, making me thankful that I didn't pay to go SCUBA diving. I still haven't dove in water with incredible visibility like I've seen on television.

While I was swimming a saw some SCUBA divers coming up from their dive. I saw two of them give each other a high-five as they surfaced. How gay. No offense.

This was always a curiosity to me when taking dive lessons. Customers on their holiday would be so excited after their dives. I was always thinking like, whatever! I tried not to tell many people this, especially customers; bad for business. I told Carlos, the owner of the shop this once and he appropriately made fun of me.

But in life, I tend not to get too excited anyway. I went skydiving in college, and I remember thinking it was cool, but no big deal. I didn't 'high-five' anybody.

Whether its swimming rather than SCUBA or riding my bicycle rather than buying a motorbike, traveling under my own power is so much cheaper and better for me. I should stick with it.

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Earlier this morning I ate a piece of toast with Smuckers blueberry jelly. Then later a bowl of oatmeal. The local store had no flavored oatmeal, so Charito put some honey in it so it wasn't so boring. Plain oatmeal would be like eating nothing. Gooey sticky nothing. No pleasure in that.

I just had a piece of bread with Swiss cheese as a snack while Charito is cooking lunch. She's cooking chicken with cashew nuts. Cashew nuts, green onion leaves, chillies, onions, and garlic. Typing the ingredients is making me hungry.

Hemingway talks of hunger in 'A Movable Feast' and how walking down the streets of Paris poor in the 1920's and seeing all the shops and restaurants makes him hungry.

'You got very hungry when you did not eat enough in Paris because all the bakery shops had such good things in the windows...'

"You got very hungry when you did not eat enough in the Philippines because because all the good cooking shows on telivision had such good ingredients..."

For me, watching the beautiful cooking shows on television, especially 'No Reservations' and others in India and Asia make me super hungry and want to move to Singapore or another big city.

Food in the Philippines can be good, but it's also simple and monotonous. You cannot find the kind of markets for ingredients as are in other Asian countries. Grocery stores in Manila have most things, but imported, packaged, and expensive.

Their was a Filipino drama show on television the other day. I could follow this one because of the subtitles. The theme of the show revolved around cooking. I was thinking how silly, since Filipino cooking is all the same, with vary little variations in taste or ingredients.

Meat, onions, garlic, soy sauce, vinegar. Sometime curry. Actually if you are lucky you can find restaurants with a local specialty with unique flavors. Again, if you are lucky. Order curry at most places and you will just get the taste of the pre-flavored packets that you can buy at the Sari-Sari store. You can just make that at home in twenty minutes.

Where I currently live, I've quickly given up on looking for good restaurants. Not worth the money to search. I was told that Hemingway's Bistro had good food, but you if are unlucky to eat there when the head cook is out, it likely won't be worth it.
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I'm making ankle weights for snorkeling. Actually Charito is making them right now. I'm just finishing and adjusting them. I'm using doubled over black rubber strap with one-inch quick release buckles and fishing weights. The fishing weights are small lead tubes, and I couldn't thread the two pieces of rubber strap through the hole. But Charito figured it out. I was using baby oil and everything was too slippery to work with. Her secret, besides more patience, was to use the baby oil just inside the fishing weight then dry her hands and the strap, then stick it in.

My feet float when I swim on the surface, making it harder to swim. I will try these out tomorrow morning.
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Yesterday there was a loud zapping sound coming from our kitchen and I feared it from the Propane tank under the sink. Fear, because I don't know enough about propane tanks to know if there are any safe noises that they might make. Being cautious, I thought not.

Thankfully, it was the power chord electricuting itself underneath the refrigerator. Thankfully, because these are the sources of such sounds that I am familiar with. I unplugged the refrigerator and got tools from the landlord to fix the chord. Being an engineer also, he even had propper wire strippers! One of three pairs in the Philippines I think.
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I just took a nap. I woke up, sat down with some coffee and started reading gain. I can hear the sound of Charito sharpening our one cheap kitchen knife on the terrace. We bought a sharpening stone in the local general store. There are venders here who walk around with a sharpening contraption built like a stationary bike connected to grinding wheels. But to avail of their services, one would have to have the offending dull knife on their person when they run into the knife sharpening man.

Impossible.

So we bought a sharpening stone. I have a couple great kitchen knives. Somewhere.

I still have a persistant cough. I took some Robitussin this morning. Charito's cough was dispensed with using anti-biotics. But I'm too cheap. And I don't trust doctors. And I'm poor.

I'll let whatever is in my chest to die of natural causes.

On the Robitussin box is a detachable tab, Proof of Purchase. How does this proove you purchased it any more than the fact that it's in your hand?

Sometimes when I sneeze or cough some glob of phlegm flies out and lands on my arm or my book unexpectedly.

We have mosquitos. Thankfully not many, and slow big ones. If you can focus your eyes on them you can snatch them in your hand. They aren't fast, but sometimes elusive and if you miss grabbing them, they get lost depending on the background where you are looking. Paint everything white and they'd be easy to swat.

Charito is arranging our new plants. We snatch them from when we're out on walks. Having few other hobbies, she's our botonist.

She just stole a beautiful palm from the planter right outside our house. I had to tell her that it;s better to steal from the neighbors at least two doors away.

ok,
james

Full of Potential, Overflowing with Procrastination

The power was out again all morning. Where I live in the Philippines it's out about 20% of the times. This is not so common, just a particularly bad utility on this island with no connection to the next. Actually, I think it just came back on, but we don't really use it except for the ceiling fan. And to watch American Idol auditions at night. But then it's a bit dark outside, cloudy. And my computer battery is draining without power.

What to do with our garbage? If I leave it out, it may sit by the side of the road for days with dogs digging through it. If we hang it up, nobody will identify it as garbage, and it may hang there for weeks! I feel guilty about my dead batteries. I know they will just end up in the jungle or ocean.

My girlfriend is cleaning already. She's so clean and organized! I have dry skin today. I wouldn't have noticed if I didn't look in the mirror putting on my contacts. the inside of my eyebrows is peeling badly. It's ugly. I'm look old.

On my second cup of coffee now. Spent a couple of pages writing things I remembered from my first homes growing up. I need to get all the facts and memories out of me. Then I can start making shit up. That sounds more fun. Spice it up a bit.

My mouth was just partially open, and I drooled a little bit. Strange. Wide awake and drooling. I'm becoming a zombie.

Today is the day where local expats go to a remote beach and play volleyball. I thought about going, but it's still rainy and cool. More importantly, I feel that this volleyball business is just an excuse to drink. I don't want to drink and socialize all day. I want to play volleyball.

The rain is slowly going away. Charito is cooking. I shaved. I showered and brushed my teeth.

These are my days. I did exercise a bit. But need to start doing some cardiovascular exercise. Still haven't rode my new bike yet.

I sent some SMS messages to friends asking questions, searching and thinking about where to live. I've lost my patience for this place. Maybe. Today at 3pm I have drum lesson. We'll see how that goes. There's a rehearsal studio for me to practice. That is good.

Writing things down from my first homes, was bringing me back into to the past. I need to make the present a time that I look back fondly when I write about it in the future...

Rode to town for my 'drum lesson'. 17 minutes to get there. But lots of hills and because I haven't rode in over three years, it was hard on my ass. I regret selling my bike in California before moving to the Philippines. But my new one is nice. It has hydraulic brakes. My bicycle takes baby oil. Interesting.

At the studio I discovered that none of the 'instructors' were better at drumming than me. So instead we formed a band with the two people they brought playing base and guitar. I named up the Zapplets. When I arrived here, I had to listen to my headphones to avoid being annoyed by all the trike drivers. The only thing in my phone was Frank Zappa's greatest hits. My tribute.

We played a few cheesy covers. Smoke on the Water! The ultimate cliche rock song for bands that suck. I will of course, refuse to play this song in public. I'd rather drink in the back corner of a small smoky quiet bar by myself than have to listen to some assholes play Smoke on the Water.

The power is out again. The power was out at least three times already today and for all of last night and the night before. We have candles, making it romantic. It's raining outside. Medium rain, not too loud. You can hear it in the trees. More romantic.

Thanks.
-James

There's a Mosquito on the Loose

The mosquitoes in our apartment are big. Which is good; it makes them easy to smash. And they are slow. I was told that the small ones, harder to smash because of their quickness, are the ones carrying disease, like Dengue Fever. I don't want that. I live on the top of a small hill near an elementary school, overlooking the small cove full of bars and dive shops. There are no canals nearby, being on the top of the hill. These canals, I was also told, harbor the more dangerous and difficult to get mosquitoes. Canals are not like in Venice. More like small open storm drains.

We leave our door and window open during the day, which is how the mosquitoes get in. At night with everything closed up, there are only the couple of them around to hunt.

My daughter lives on another island and sleeps under a mosquito net. When I visit, I'm covered in bites when I wake up. A hand sticking out from under my pillow was mauled. Not mauled, poka-dotted. These were the small mosquitoes.

Some advice, use a sheet and cover your feet, hands, and neck in baby oil prior to sleeping.

Today is grey again. From where I sit I can look out over a channel between two islands where the boats, a few of them a day, come and go. I can see the white caps in the distance, where the wind has open access to the see. I can also see a small barge making its way through the channel slowly, with waves breaking in front of it.

I now wish for a spotting scope to get a closer look. I own too many things. I used to have a rule, that when I needed something, especially a tool, I'd buy it. A good rule for someone who has a permanent address.

My physical possessions are scattered about. Older things, such as books and old pictures and certificates, are at my mother's house in a few boxes. Some things in Manila, some in California, some at various friend's houses. Some I can't remember.

Having my things spread out feels a bit like diversified financial investments. A friend had many expensive thingsstored with a friend near Manila. Due to some falling outs, his things were picked through and sold by others at wholesal prices. Tools, clothes, construction materials for when he builds a house some day. Expensive things imported from Germany that you cannot buy here. Oops!

Most everything I own fits into boxes.
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I worry about money sometimes, but not obsessively. Lately I think I need to get a job. But what do I want to do?

I want a career in Asia! I can get some nice business suits and some kind of technical job in Singapore. They have great food. I've seen it on television. I don't want to live in Singapore. But it's close to many interesting places.

Maybe I could work in Afghanistan. Shit.
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I cannot write anything by hand. Impossible. My hand gets tired quickly, and my handwriting hasn't changed since kindergarten. If I were to write quickly, I wouldn't know what I wrote later. My computer is my friend. An IBM ThinkPad X31. The best computer ever made. I can take it completely apart and put it back together. I usedto have an X30, and half the parts from that are in my X31.

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Just got back from town. There are too many trike drivers in the town and no regular line for them. So all of them call out to you, "Go to Beach! Trike! Boat!" Before I just dealt with it by wearing headphones and ignoring them. Because they annoy the shit out of me. Today I didn't have headphones, so I just yelled back at them whatever they yelled at me. I got a lot of laughs from other people, not sure if they were genuine. I will keep with this tactic until everyone recognizes me and leaves me alone. Hopefully.

We bought pots for plants, groceries, made a new door key. Made an appointment to take drum lessons at a music studio.

Earlier today I tried on my new wetsuit. It's difficult to put these on, and perhaps due to my having a cold, I felt very tired and congested by trying it. Like putting on a big rubber over your body.
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Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping, into the future. The 17th already! It's hard to believe. What the fuck? I've gotten nothing done yet! Shit. Gotta start training again tomorrow. Got all these books to read. Get rid of them. Send them away. Keep some that I really want to read. Ditch the rest. Don't get sick. Wasting time. I deleted some stuff. Got to learn to stand on my hands. My head hurts. Not too bad, but like a balloon behind my eyeballs.

Watching American Idol auditions from Atlanta. It's funny to see the crazy people that acting out.
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I can remember the first time I started a diary. I bought a typewriter. I was in high school. I remember those first couple of pages that I typed. More or less what was on them. Stuff about myself. Maybe I imagine anthropologist finding my notes someday and a future colleges will have to study me. For sure.

I was sitting in my brother's basement room at our parent's in Illinois. His electric base was leaning against the weight bench and something was causing it to resonate and sustain one of the strings. Resonate. Did I understand what was happening at that time? Actually I did. I'm no Richard Feynman, but I did win an award for top Physics student at Hononegah High School, even after not completing my senior year. I'm cool like that.

And of course I stopped writing after those first few pages. I always stop. And start again. And forget where the time went. A pre-existing condition; I've always been a great procrastinator.
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The Philippine Jeepney. They look interesting and colorful in the postcard pictures. Most of them are junky, most old, rusty, broken down. Bare wires held together by the driver to sound the horn. I've been in a couple of them with a great stereo system.

I've seen then filled with gasoline, the fill valve directly adjacent to the driver, filled in a "gas station" on the side of the rode from a coke bottles, a lit cigarette dangling from the mouth of the attendant.

I've never seen a driver texting while driving. An accident will surely wipe out a month's worth of profits, if not end the driver's 'career'. However, money is taken and change is made while driving, shifting gears, and using to horn every few meters, looking for new fares. Like a video game.

Some jeeps cue in a line, departing when they're full. They are full when nobody can put both cheeps on the seats.

If you're with somebody, better to sit in the front seat. But not if you're along. You'll never know who'll sit with you. There's room for two plus the driver.

The jeeps are hand-made, built with scrap galvanized and stainless steel with a steering column and drive-train taken from junked Japanese passenger vehicles.

For this they do seem reliable. I've never seen one break down. Maybe I'm lucky.

In the passenger compartment, the roof and windows are too low to get a good look outside, so you better know where you are going and when to get off. There's no apparent reason for making the roof so low, as there is never glass in the windows anyway. Just plastic flaps lowered by the driver in the case of rain.

Filipinos are constantly stuffing themselves into small boxes.

Most jeeps are covered with random decorations, Mercedez emblems, and slogans that don't make any sense.

They are both an annoyance and convienence at the same time.