Boil me in my own pudding!
“Why does Scrooge love Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer?
Because every buck is dear to him”. — Unknown
As is well known among those who have long felt an inexplicable desire to suffer my company during the darker months, I am not an enthusiast of the holiday in which we are currently immersed. I don’t erect [...]
Coping with Adversity
For the past week, I have been suffering from flu-like conditions that I apparently picked up secondhand from the current consort of my roommate. Such misery! My throat feels like ground glass when I cough or sneeze – not an infrequent occurrence – and I have plenty of aches of the head, neck, shoulders and, [...]
Alabama
The nudist gathering finished up, mercifully, with one sunny, warm day on which to actually remove one’s clothes comfortably. Though the overall event wasn’t really my scene, fundamentally, I had some fun and met some good people. Among these was Paul, who most people considered my body double though we didn’t think we looked like [...]
Where’s the hypothermia prevention workshop?
I spent the better part of the night freezing and huddled in the foetal position beneath the thin gruel of my $48 linens, enhanced by the meager weight of all my clothes (how many could I have brought to a nudist camp?). The wind was howling and banging doors and windows. I was somewhat surprised [...]
Off with the clothes!
As I may have mentioned previously, I have a commission to produce a couple of articles about an annual nudist gathering for gay men in the Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania. To that end, I picked up a charter bus outside of Fordham University in Manhattan, next to Lincoln Centre, on Friday afternoon. Rather than observe [...]
At least my carpal tunnel is getting better
After almost three weeks at Easton, I’m back on the road again. However, I’m not on the road as originally planned.
The other day, I took a test ride to the local town of Greenwich (that the locals pronounce “GREEN-witch”), not a particularly hilly route, and I did it with no luggage. The round trip is [...]
Rediscovering Community
I arrived at Easton Mountain on the afternoon on Saturday, July 28, after a very pleasant and scenic ride from Albany, northward up the Hudson River valley. Easton Mountain is an “intentional community”, of sorts with an integrated operation that serves to generate income for, and participation in, the community, as well as to promote [...]
Off to an unstellar beginning
Day one of my trip, yesterday, brought me to the dumpy-but-sterile Howard Johnson’s in Jamaica, New York, chosen for the fact that it’s just a mile from Kennedy airport. Here’s the $125 view:
Today, I cycled north through Queens toward the Bronx. On the way, the bumpy Queens streets (rural Saskatchewan backroads are smoother) broke the [...]
It was either this or the Raelians
Despite being overly guarded about being seduced by cults, I have cast aside my principles and willingly signed up for what may be the biggest modern cult of them all: Facebook. I resisted for quite a while, but the number of friends and acquaintances who have opted to join have reached a critical mass of [...]
La Manzana Grande
I arrived in New York as scheduled on Tuesday shortly before midnight.
I am staying at a hostel that has 624 beds, but fortunately, they aren’t all in one room. It’s one of the few places in New York that has rates that I am willing to pay, as even dumpy hotels rent for $150. The [...]
Celsius 232.78
232.78 degrees is the celsius equivalent to, according to Ray Bradbury, “the temperature at which book-paper catches fire, and burns …“. It is assumed that that was the temperature at which my journals burst into flame when I applied a match (and a quantity of corn oil) to them during a late-night beach bonfire last [...]
Back to the coast (for a bit)
After ten days of travel, I arrived back in Puerto Viejo on Monday afternoon.
My meditation retreat went well. It was a retreat organised by a local Brahma Kumaris group and took place in the small mountain town of San Cristobal Norte. The facility used was an old school building operated by a catholic church, which [...]
Into the Mountains
I am now back in San Jose again, after a few days in the cloud forests of Monteverde.
The Monteverde region is, I think, the best of Costa Rica. It is tropical, but rather temperate, and were I ever going to retire here with intended permanence, it would be a likely candidate for my new residence. [...]
He’s got radioactive blood
Well, here I am in beautiful downtown San Jose.
Today, I went to the Mueso del Oro (Museum of Gold) and looked at their collection of gold artifacts that had been made by the original indigenous inhabitants, before Columbus and his countrymen enslaved them all and stole their gold (fairly traded them for valued coloured beads, [...]
How do you spend your evenings?
For the last two months, I have been keeping an eye on two gecko eggs that I keep in a jar on my bookshelf. I found the eggs in the deadbolt slot of the doorframe on my bodega, and brought them in with the intention of seeing them hatch. Gecko eggs, which are white and [...]
Resurfacing, at my peril
My previously announced ambitious resolve to spice things up in this blog has, you may have noticed, failed to amount to anything other than unexplained silence. Despite some valiant attempts (my hard drive is full of half-finished screeds on related subjects), I tried to write something about the current political situation in Canada, but was [...]
The Probation is Over
In two weeks, I will have been in Costa Rica for three months. Because a passport-entry visit is legally limited to three months, this means that some action is required on my part.
The officially required action is that I leave the country, but I am permitted to return after an absence of at least 72 [...]
It’s beginning to look a lot like ‘Selby’…
(Forgive me my judgemental moment of unrestrained snobbery. I’m striving for progress, after all, not perfection.)
It is, apparently, going to be a long two weeks. My new guests appear to be wretched, vile, vulgar, products of the sort of America spawned in a backwoods Tennessee trailer park but, having come into money (through luck or [...]
Death to the white bread!
I was recently working on a new blog entry when I stopped and reviewed some of those I had recently posted. Later, when I had awoken from my boredom-inspired catatonic state, it occurred to me that perhaps I am playing things a little safe. Did I take a vow of relative poverty and travel all [...]
What’s not to like?
Some of my readers are getting the idea that it’s all a life of effortless bliss down here. I suppose this is my fault, as I have been posting pictures of beaches, talking about the sun and the warm ocean, listing wildlife sightings, dropping references to maid-cooked breakfasts, and describing seemingly endless sessions of contemplating [...]
