Once upon a bright and sunny day in 2018, Yann and I found ourselves before the door of a residential building in Arles-sur-Tech, France. I had the key — previously hidden behind the green shutters of the window to the right —in my hand. I had yet to meet the person to whom this lodging belonged. This stranger had hung the black Reynaud-Bray tote I’d abandoned at the Toulouse-Blagnac airport a few days earlier off the doorknob to make it easy for Yann and me to know which place to rob.
In super-recent, as of two minutes ago, news, my mouse has died. I’m using the touchpad instead, and it’s making me feel self-conscious about my tech skills.
9/11 was supposed to be New Tooth Day. The hygienist asked me how I was doing as I sat down in the dental chair. I was bursting with anxiety and confessed, “I’ve had so many setbacks that I’m afraid this won’t even happen.”
It did not happen.
I buried my face in my hands upon learning the news, trying to make sense of the disappointment. I’d already spent a few days in a cloud of negative thoughts, preparing for bad news. My preparedness did not help: I was still every bit as disappointed as I deserved to be.
Then, I had to go home and explain to my adoring fans why I still don’t have that last tooth. I won’t find out what’s going on with the implant until tomorrow morning, when I’ll see a specialized equipment-having dental specialist.
Continue reading “9/11 wasn’t my day.”It’s a small town in the Okanagan that captured our tourism dollars because it was starting to get dark. I’d reserved a hotel room in exotic Langley. Initially, Jordi and I would spend the night in Vancouver, but hotel rooms cost $400 per night. Langley was marginally cheaper at ~$300, but it was conveniently just off Highway 1.
At 8 p.m., we were three hours away from Langley. After convincing the hotelier in Langley over the phone to waive our booking fee, Jordi asked me to find new lodging before the sun disappeared.
Unbeknownst to Jordi, I’ve slept on a mat in a coed dorm room in Beijing. I’ve slept in a windowless room in Airlie Beach where the only alternate exit in case of fire was a porthole in the ceiling. The Hostelling International accredited hotel in Ghent had black mould in the showers. I’ve stayed at the bizarrely named “Sparkling Dolphin Inn” in Kyoto, where the chairs wore baby socks.
I am a connoisseur of dumpy lodgings.
I pointed to a building just off Crowsnest Highway. “But that’s a motel!” exclaimed Jordi.
???
Continue reading “Princeton: Not just an ivy league school.”The title is unrelated to this post.
As it turns out, the acquisition of a boyfriend–especially one that lives next door–has been a great distraction to my blog.
Look at how cute even the back of his head is:
…than rancid crab juice.
I’d found a claw on the beach and tucked it into my jacket, thinking it’d make a funny photo. It wasn’t funny: I was just high.
The smell didn’t hit me until I’d tossed the claw back on the beach. Usually, crab shells on the beach have been pecked clean by assorted scavengers, but not this one. Rotting crab juice spilled all over my hand with such permeance that rinsing it off with water from my sports bottle had little effect. And plunging my stinky meathooks into icy seawater seemed to lock in the smell.
I needed an artificial means of de-stinking, like alcohol from the spray sanitizer mounted inside the outhouse around our campsite. As soon as the alcohol evaporated, the crab juice was like, “Hello!”
How about wet wipes designed for de-shitting baby behinds? Not even that!
The hand lotion left my hands moisturized yet still fishy.
It wasn’t until the campfire got going that I was able to smoke my hands into oblivion. When I crawled into my tent that night, the only foul odor was that of my shoes tucked into the vestibule. At least that was from my own juices.
The second-biggest failure of this trip was the forgotten plan of stopping at a park somewhere along the Lochside Trail to see whether Burger and I remembered how to do “The Worm.” Stay posted!
Continue reading “I’d rather my hand smell like Mountain Dew.”
squaremeat.com 