I Drove All Night - Not the Cyndi Lauper Song

At the 11th Hour last week Juliet and I decided to return to Colorado for 13 weeks prior to our big Europe journey beginning in May. Our reasons are many and suffice it to say, this was a gut-wrenching decision.

We left Houston, TX at 2 PM Friday and made stops in The Woodlands to see Juliet's sis and children, Fairfield, TX for a pasta dinner with my Dad and Swipey (along with some Beaux Freres) and an overnight stay.

At 9 AM Saturday morning we visited my grandmother, slammed some sausage Kolaches and my last donut for at least the next 5 months.

At 11 AM we arrived in Ennis, TX to my Mom and DC's to pack our car.

At 12:58 PM we left Ennis, TX and drove to Saginaw, TX to visit Juliet's sister and future bro-in-law where we enjoyed the largest Chinese buffet I have ever seen.

At 2 PM Saturday we arrived in Saginaw, TX

At 3:30 PM we departed for Denver 865 miles from Saginaw.

After debating stops in Dumas, TX and Dalhart, TX we decided to continue driving. The pervasive aroma of disgusting cattle feces and the disheartening prices of motels along the route kept us driving north.

At 12:25 am we crossed Raton pass and into Colorado. At this point we had to keep going as Denver and our "free" hotel were only 240 miles from us.

After Chinese food at 3pm and 5 very large glasses of iced tea (between us) the only foods Juliet and I consumed the rest of the night were the following : (all from convenience stores)

• A Tijuana Mama Pickled Sausage

• A stale piece of Cracker Barrel Extra-Sharp Cheddar (not finished)

• One sip of a 3 month out of date bottle of unsweet tea (why unsweet? wtf?!!) It tasted like the inside of a refrigerator that had been left unplugged for a year. Bottle was returned to the store for

• A 20oz V8 original with extra sodium

• A few bottles of water

• A very freezer burned F'Real Cappuccino Milkshake.

• At least 4 pieces of gum (just Juliet)

• Some stale Buc-ee's Mixed Popcorn (caramel, cheddar, and butter)

• Some Multi-Grain Crackers to add a health factor

At 3:30 AM Sunday we arrived at the Lakewood, Colorado Extended Stay America. This place was provided by Juliet's employer and it is without question the skeeziest shithole either of us have ever stayed. We are escaping this fuckpile today if it costs us every penny in the bank. What a disgusting place to lay our head after 36 hours of driving madness.

At least I got a damned Grand-Slam Breakfast at 3:55 AM just to complete a total drive of shit-food and make a fond morning of imbalanced rectal discharge.

At least it is a beautiful day today here in Colorado and the hipsters at Crema are providing their usual brand of corny, esteem-damaged humor.

At the end of this I am really happy to be here and cannot wait to find a place to live that does not host regular tapings of COPs so that I can work.

Haiku Sunday - Parties and Celebrations

Freeing her mind fast

was the first thought she had while

not freeing her mind.

A quiet wind blew

not quiet enough for him

he soon quit playing

As the last beer hit

he felt his speed increasing

while the music played

Jill liked all balloons

red, blue, purple, pink, and even

the ones that were not

The economy

was flat and the hopes of change

were easy to drown

At the end of the day

the bright lights have faded to

one drunk pal and guests

Joy is frequently

defined by images of life

although they can lie

Aloha Maui - Our Next Destination

Wailuku, HI is our new home for the next 13 weeks. This has been an ordeal and a half to determine where we were going next and while we diligently pursued options closer to home so that I could focus on my upcoming publications, Maui won us over with, funny as it may sound, the only confirmed offer we received.

We leave this Sunday and you will find us along the beaches of one of America's most iconic locales.

It will be challenging for me to be 11 hours behind my beloved Italia relative to time zone and 4 hours behind our families in Texas.

Please keep our big journey in your thoughts and prayers and we will do our best to bring a little bliss to the Aloha State while absorbing as much of its fascinating culture as possible.

Aloha Adventurers!

M&J

Haiku Sunday - Absence Makes the World Seem Larger

Leaves wrapped tightly

at the base of the pyre

for the funerals of liars

At the land of bliss

the toy aisle was loaded

with things I could never have

A pasture on the other side of the tracks

strewn with life-giving logs

belie the slaughter to come

So many schools

taught math with squares

and the people were useless

The cheese had no origin

but its Cheesy-ness

was undeniable

Along a broken stretch of the highway

lived one pig and some goats

they could never agree on the origins of the universe

7 X 7 Link Award - I was nominated for this but I don't know if I win anything

My wonderful longtime friends over at Come due Maiali (Like Two Pigs) nominated me for this award. I love their blog and especially their take on locally grown foods and how they prepare them.

I did some research on the award itself and I could not find any criteria for how to win nor how to even compete. In effect it just seemed like a chain letter or a thinly veiled Pyramid scheme. I also do not see anyway to know that if I nominate fellow bloggers they will not have been previously nominated and will look disparagingly upon my insistence to comply with the rules.

The rules seem also to be a bit odd to me. Typically if someone nominates one for an award it is based upon their existing body of work. For the 7X7 Amway award it appears I have to actually do some work and tell you all some secret about myself. While I enjoy my Blissful followers immensely, giving away some personal secrets seems a bit invasive and especially without a prize involved.

However, I will dutifully tell you a secret about me and I will leave it at that. I am not willing to potentially SPAM my blogging brethren (most of whom only tolerate me a little and some of whom have told me not to quit my day job) and I am equally  reluctant to include links to my top 7 blogs. Sure, I likely could come up with a hierarchy of my work in my own eyes, and at the same time my opinion of myself rarely means much to anyone other than me (which is sometimes a blessing and often a curse)

Two Pigs, I am more than honored you would consider me for this and I really enjoyed your thorough participation in the exercise and especially your stories from your youth. I hope it will not cause you too much consternation that the chain will indeed break from my end and I will not ask all of my friends to post it to Facebook like some evangelical plea to save one's soul.

If the powers that be over at 7X7 can give me some concrete reason why I should blog at their behest or tell me about some 3 day cruise on Costa that I am missing, I will jump on it with fervor akin to a small monkey seeking to remove ants from his anus. In the meantime I offer a juicy little secret to mitigate any disappointment in my lack of participation and because I am a fan of the Two Pigs.

I. Share something about yourself that others don’t know.

The Blissful Adventurer is afraid of flying. That's right I hate to fly and usually have to medicate myself with anti-anxiety meds before I do. I love to travel and I hate to get there. It all began when I watched a documentary years ago on the Lockerbie, Scotland Crash. I had enjoyed flying immensely up until I watched that just a few short weeks before I was to fly to Rome for the first time.

I was always good with plane mechanical issues or engine trouble being something  that a pilot could control; it was the feeling that the side of the bird could just be suddenly pierced apart from a SAM shot from the back of a pack animal or from a duck blind in a covered marsh that got my imagination into overdrive. I always imagine myself enjoying a cocktail and reading a little Hemingway just as the nose of the plane disappears from sight and in that infinitely short forever before the tail falls backwards to imminent death I have the full knowledge that I am about to cease. I don't want to know and at the same time I do.

This is why I would love to be in the cockpit. If I am there as an observer I could at least use my powers of acute human observation to read the faces of the cockpit crew to know if the shit was indeed about to hit the fan. I don't want to be in steerage when the Titanic runs aground. I figure that every time I fly the odds of my demise increase. Yes I know that driving my car is much more dangerous and that I am much more likely to be wiped from the planet in a car crash, and I could give a flying flip about those stats. Fear is irrational and especially fear of flying which in my case is actually fear of being out of control.

So, when I plan trips I consult with my airplane engineer buddy to see which airlines have good maintenance records. I go for non-stop where possible so as to avoid additional take-offs and landings which I am certain increase my chances of a fiery exit. I even get enormously cold feet just before my departure and have lots of dreams about disasters: tornadoes, car crashes, and of course plane emergencies. I always seem to survive my dreams and usually even recognize them as dreams before they end but that does not help to assuage my irrational fear.

At the end of the day, my disdain for flying does not dissuade me from going, it just makes the process much more stressful than it need be. Xanax and 187ml bottles of schlock calm my nerves and ultimately dehydrate the hell out of me; it is what it is adventurers. This is my 7x7 secret shit storm of silliness. I don't want to go down like that nasty Air France flight from Brazil to Paris. I am reduced to a sniveling pansy the night before any flight but by security I am usually high as a 3rd offense meth-head and ready for my closeup with Jesus.

Buon Viaggio!