Dinky is All Grows Up!

This evening, right as Walter Cronkite was passing, Dinky initiated himself into manhood by humping La Flaca's sister's leg a couple times.



Now, only hours later, he drinks beer and picks his nose and wears Hawaiian shirts. Man, dogs advance so much faster than humans. There wasn't even a Harry Potter-reading age.



by the way, that's my sweatsock over there by the sofa

adios, puppihood.

Jamaica III, Ghosts in the Machines

Man, that Derrick Harriott's got some rockin' tunes. Three times through that Cd, Joe and I listened, while slowly, determinedly, unerringly making our way to Negril on the morning of the 24th. But that story's already been told. So, here we are, in Jamaica, land of the Rastas, Jerk chicken, Bob Marley, Ganga, shitty roads, and white sand beaches.



After all that could be said was said, and after all that could be done was done, we decided enough was enough and it was high time to get back to where we once belonged. Along with Andy, in a relatively matching Yaris, La Flaca and I made for the north coast, dropping Amberlicious at the Montego Bay Aereopuerto at five-o-nothing am, guided by our handy Shell-Station map, while Andy trusted his handy GPS unit (which loved advising little detours, for sightseers, it seems). We crossed the northern coast of Jamaica, west to east with nary a hitch, finally landing in Ocho Rios, which read to be a little resort town. Unbenownst to us, Ocho Rios is a MAJOR little resort town, being a cruise-ship stop. The place was positively thick with tourists and inordinately expensive hotels. However, we found one (hotel) which proved to be a great deal and spent our last night surrounded by chubby white folks with flowered shirts and socks on under their flip-flops (and drunken college kids).



The drive from Ocho Rios back to Kingston, however, was far more--uhhhhh......--interesting than the drive from Montego bay to Ocho Rios. The trip south involved mountains. And if I thought the drive from Kingston to Negril was adventurous, it was absolutely tame compared to Annotto Bay to Kingston. The road was positively nauseating in its curviness and climbi-and-descendi-ness but was eventually conquered, just in time to make our flight and our escape back to the world where I can insult people in English right in front of them without getting punched in the face.



In panama, La Flaca shopped and I walked up and down the mall. Oh, I bought some guitar strings, too.

News Haikus 17, Strange Suicide Pact?

This morning pop culture scientists unearthed this photo of Micheal Jackson, Steve McNair and Farrah Fawcett together at a Nashville Applebee's. Coincidence?

Man, Farrah's neck sure don't match her face.

Haiku:

That poor Karl Malden,
If he'd died banging Britney
Spears he'd have made news.

Jamaica II, the Driver's Paradise.

Jamaica is an Island. It isn't a gigantic Island. There are roads running all around Jamaica. I have driven these roads.


I am pretty sure I have driven a higher percentage of the paved motorways of Jamaica than the paved motorways of any other nation of the world.
In an attempt to make the transition from Kingston airport to the beaches of Negril painless and fun, we rented a Toyota Yaris at the airport in Kingston. This was, and is, a good move.
Since we had wheels and a destination, we informed our pal Joe (flying into Kingston a few hours after us) that we had the wheels and asked if he'd be willing to navigate the way to Negril. (a couple details: 1. La Flaca is very capable and intelligent, but has almost no motoring experience and roughly the same map-reading experience; 2. The guy who owns the house we were to be staying in in Negril responded with horror when I informed him we would be driving from Kingston to Negril. "You'll never make it at night," I think he said.) Anyway, Joe said, hell yes.

Joe's flight got in at 8:0 something or other, so La Flaca and I rented our cool blue Yaris and headed into Kingston, drove around with a map a homeless guy gave us at a gas station and eventually had lunch, missed the closing time of the Bob Marley museum, bought some Cd's for the trip and did a little sight-seeing in Kingston (there is precious little to see, by the way). We also got some cash to fascilitate all that other stuff. It literally took us an hour driving around to find a working cash machine. When we did, I was very happy, got inside, inserted my Colombian cash card and viola, the system was 100% operational, except for one thing, I had no goddamned idea what the exchange rate was, nothing, not an inkling. I didn't even know what the currency was called, pounds, dollars, drachma, rubles, no fucking idea here.
So, faced with the question of "how much cash you want, mon," and not a single option on the screen, I dialed in 500.00 and waited. Three seconds later, bang, 500 Jamaican bucks. All right. I walked back to the car with a feeling of triumph. Once we were driving again, La flaca asked me, "How much did you get?"
"500 bucks," I replied.
"Wow," she said. "Either I just saw some really expensive flip-flops, or you got basically nothing." I wasn't crushed, but it had been a lot of work for six bucks. To make a short story short, we got some more cash, after talking to a nice woman who worked at a bank and we ate our first jerk chicken, listened to the cd of the guy who's face was on LaFlaca's new tank top, and headed to the airport for the 8:00 Joe pickup.
The drive to the airport was completely uneventful, and then we saw the great news that flights out of Miami/Ft. Lauderdale were all being delayed due to weather. We decided to hang around, and around and around. And, once again, to make a short story short, at around 11:30pm, Joe exited the airport with a guard, and explained that he could leave the airport if we could tell him the name and address of the house we were staying at in Negril. I guess that mattered to them.

At 11:58 pm, we hit the road, and we got the hell out of Kingston. At Spanishtown, thirty minutes later, we wondered what the hell all the caution was about, the roads were big, well-lit, fast, and very clear. At Sandy Bay, thirty minutes later, we were both sure we were lost, having mysteriously left the main road. However, with the aid of our new, trusty Shell road-map and the map light of the trusty Yaris, and our two Cd's (Buju Banton's Rasta Got Soul, and Derrick Harriott's Checkin' Out the Hits), we discerned that the itty-bitty, windey, unlit, sometimes single-lane piece of blacktop was indeed the main southern route from Kingston to Negril. Holy Hell. Luckily for LaFlaca, she slept, or feigned sleep, 80% of the five hours we were on the road.

Finally, to, for the last time, make a short story short, we got to our house in Negril as the sun rose, although a policeman had to call the owner of the house and take us there, as we had NO idea where in Negril we were staying.



Thus, the first leg of our trek around Jamaica ended, and we slept, for a couple hours, in the dewy dawn of Negril, thankful that we were done driving, giving no consideration to the return trip.

ttfn,
fpp

Jamaica I. The Reason for the Season.

All right, crackers (and others), we just got our pretty little selves back from Jamaica, which is an island somewhere in the south pacific. It is where Renoir went to paint Polynesians during his Blue period, which is the period immediately before sudden death.



We went there to ride the trail of Lewis and Clark and also to see Brad and Sarah get themselves hitched. Although no one in our party speaks fluent Jamaican, we are relatively sure the wedding really went down. Which is nice, 'cause now they can have sex and kids, and buy a noisy damned dog.

Anyway, Negril was the destination, Brad and Sarah the invitation, their nuptials the occasion, and being all Jamaica-y mellow and throwing around Respect fistpumps the justification.



The management and staff here at FPPInternational would like that extend a big 'ole thanks to brad and sarah for the invite and a bigger 'oler congrats to their sealing of the deal.
many happy returns.

more jamaican adventures to come.

ciao for now.