Tomorrow Never Comes...

.

So, Penny and I have been kicking around Vientiane for the past 8 days, excitedly awaiting the grand skydive-fireworks-parades-a'-plenty party celebrating 450 years as the nation's capitol. We thought it was supposed to start on the 15th; no wait, that person says the 16th; oh, this other dude's pretty sure it's the 17th.

This is pretty typical of Lao, so as of yesterday, we have purchased bus tickets down to the waaaaaaaaaaaaay south to a place called Si Phan Don (means "four thousand islands"). That's a picture of it above, and from what I hear, that pretty much sums it up. Looking forward to a few days curled up in a hammock with a good book and a box of wine (zip it - don't wanna hear it!) before we cross the border and tackle Cambodia and our journey to Angkor Wat.

Cambodia is a real shit hole - - we've received warnings not to carry bag straps across our torsos because when the thieves on motorbikes come by to slash the bag, they may accidentally slash us as well. Sounds charming, don't it? This better be one hell of a wat!!!!

Angkor Wat looks like this:



And this:



It's where they filmed Laura Croft: Tomb Raider, starring Angelina Jolie. She is both super-mega-hot and she does all her own stunts, so if the actual wat's a bust, there's always that to fall back on!

Last time I was in Cambodia, it was total anarchy...I had the continual uneasy feeling that I might be stabbed at any moment as a matter of course. It's hard for a country to keep it together when everyone with any sort of education has been tortured and killed.
Stupid Pol Pot.

Pol Pot looked like this:




And he did really horrible things to hundreds of thousands of people who now look like this:


Asshole.




Alrighty then - on that note, I'm off to the happy-happy-joy-joy islands!
.

love,
jingles

Deep fried chicken heads dream of Good Personal Hygiene

Hello Friends, 

As promised, here are some disgusting food pictures for your viewing pleasure. I wanted to take one of this splendid array of huge, grey and slimy unidentified organs, but the lady with the very large butcher's knife didn't look all that approachable. Anyway, this should do for now until the next disgusting photo op presents itself...

As you may notice, I lack the necessary blog manipulation skills to make all my pictures behave in an upright manner. So for now, just tilt your head leeward and everything will be just dandy! 

 

Last night I had a dream that I was browsing at REI and I made an impulse buy. Unfortunately, the item in question was a cat. What the hell was I gonna do with a cat - squash it into my backback and feed it chicken heads? It was a no-return policy, too. The lesson here is: don't impulsively buy any felines at REI unless you really mean it!!!

The other day, I finally remembered to wash the sock in which my PStyle resides when not in use. It was a little disgusting (but not in a fried chicken head kind of way), but now it smells like flowers-clad serafim...

Have I told you lately how much I love my PStyle? Life-changing, existence-affirming, pee-off-a-cliff wonderful! It's become such a part of my daily life that I've ceased my once-meticulous photographic documentation of my PStyle usage. 

Seriously, I'd be so sad if anything happened to it...I've peed in alleyways, bus toilets, urinals, public squats, on the side of the road, in the sand, on the rocks; you name it, I've peed on it! I now totally get why you guys just whip it out and do your business whenever the urge arises!

Ladies: hesitate not!

Order a PStyle today!

And I'm not just whistling Dixie!!***

ps - I'm kind of getting tired of looking down at a pink pee canoe all the time, so if you've been asking yourself: "hmm, what fabulous expression of love might I bestow upon Jingles, here's the answer, friends:

PStyle!

PStyle!

PStyle! 

Green, purple, orange (just no blue, please. blue is a stupid color and I refuse to engage in it)

Give one to yourself! Your friends! Your mom and your granny!

Really, y'all - it's that good!

(***this message has been broughty to you by the PStyle Corporate Conglomeration of America. Any similarity to actual peers past or present is purely coincidental. No animals were eaten in the making of this testimonial. All Hail the PStyle!!!)

As a side note, I may have inadvertently developed a non-traditional positioning technique in squat toilet usage. In order to protect the squeamish, I won't go into details here (discretion is the better part of squalor), BUT - if you're willing and able to elucidate on your understanding or personal experience in such matters, let's talk.

I'm off to find some eyeball-free food now...

xoxoxo

jingles 

Rat-on-a Stick

These bamoo grubs were a little snack Penny and I shared recently. They're actually pretty tasty once you get over the idea of putting larva in your cake hole!  However, the rat-on-a-stick that seems to be a favorite here in Laos is just not that appealing. Really, who wants to eat a garbage-eating rodent? (Apparently, a whole lot of Lao...)                           

We have also entered serious dog-eating territory here in Vientiane - there is a reason that there are almost no stray animals here, and I have a theory that the words "buffalo", "beef" and "pork" may be mostly interchangeable with the word "canine-once-known-as-my-dog-fluffy". Pets are clearly marked with clothes, hairdos, manicured nails, and whatever else might distinguish them from food.

Word on the street is that Vietnam will be the most gustatorily adventurous place of all...meanwhile, I'm mostly sticking to eating things without eyeballs, but will make a concerted effort to photograph hyper-disgusting beasties for your viewing pleasure...

The 2-day slow boat trip down the Mekong turned out to be a giant multi-cultural frat party, which kind of sucked for those of us who were hoping for a mellow experience. It was one of those things that you just have to settle into and be thankful for the fact that everything is temporary, like super-long bus rides or sitting through a Catholic wedding!

The boat finally arrived in Luang Prabang, where we stayed for just enough time to find  an excellent crepe place (chocolate mango crepe-mmmmm) and realize that it's basically a Laos Disney Land  for people who don't wanna actually interact with the culture. Such a weird phenomenon.

We've been in Vientiane for a couple of days, exploring the city and starting a visa collection for our onward journey to Cambodia, Vietnam, and back to Thailand.

Vientiane's a trip - there's a baguette shop on every corner and a HUGE replica of the Arc de Triomphe right smack dab in the center of town. The US guilt-gifted a bunch of concrete to Laos to build and airport ("hey man, sorry we carpet-bombed the shit out of you and most of your countryside abounds with unexploded ordenances - here's some cement")  and Laos promptly used above-mentioned concrete to build this thing! It's a big ol' Fuck You, giving America the archy-finger. Airport - ha!

In a few days, Vientiene will celebrate 450 years as the capitol by having a huge 4-day party, kicked off by a shiteload of fireworks, parades, and 100 people jumping from an airplane and spelling out "450 years" with their plummeting bodies...it's gonna be awesome! It's also in the National Stadium, which is right by my new favorite place, a 25-meter damn commie swimming pool, where I have been happily swimming laps on a daily basis, drinking coffee-coconut smoothies with an  ice-cold coconut water chaser, and teaching the locals how to play gin rummy through a combination of French, English, Thai, Lao, and pantomime. Worked pretty well, although the fun really started when we switched to the universal language: Slap Jack.

OK, enough for now...gonna go for a stroll down the Champs D'Elysee and dine al fresco 'neath the arch-port!

love,
jingles

Floppy Necks are People, Too!

Hello, friends!

It's been 3 weeks since my last confession.

I have been avoiding electronic devices in an almost plague-like manner, stopped taking pictures, and started having pure, unadulterated experience.

It's been nice.

However, as I am about to head to Laos and hop on a rickety wooden boat to float down the Mighty (flooding) Mekong river, I figure I'd better post while the posting's good.

I just got out of an 8-day silent meditation retreat at Wat Rampoeng, on top of a mountain outside of Chiang Mai. I spent my days walking reeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaallllllllly rrrrrrrrrrrreeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaalllllllllllllyyyyyyyyyyyy slowly then sitting down and closing my eyes for extended periods of time.

It ain't so easy as it sounds, yo!


Here are a few haikus I wrote before I went off the pen (and thanks to all y'all who responded in kind!).

Bling

Blingy Blingy Wat

Golden-Jeweled Dragons guarding

the gate to Shinesville

Floppy Neck Karen

When Long Neck Karen

removes gold coils she becomes

Floppy Neck Karen

Eating Bugs

The bamboo larva

doesn't squirt juice in my mouth

like stir-fried silk worms

Faulty Logic

If all pies have fruit,

And chiken pot pie exists,

Chicken Pot's a fruit!

Sex Dream

Last night I had an 

inappropriate sex dream

about someone's dad

More Dubious Wisdom from Gypsy Grandma

Crystals Activate!

Atlantis rises 10.10.

10...Apocalypse!!!

Bangkok Fish Market

Wading in fish juice.

Doomed frogs half-heartedly hop,

bound by plastic bins

 

Rats

Skinned rat carcass beams

from Ayuttaya food stall...

gustatory bliss?

And now for something (sort of) completely different:

DREAM #1

I had a really fucked up dream the other night while I was at the monastery. You're not allowed to read, write, talk, or otherwise distract yourself, so the subconscious goes ape-shit!

I would change the names to protect the innocent/guilty/myself, but ain't gonna. Ha!

So I'm in an auditorium, on the stage with my mom and there's a bunch of people seated in the audience, like maybe 50 or 75. My old boss strides up to me all smirky-like, and tells me that he has been advertising this event, and that said event is to be me talking about me for an hour or so. After sharing this news with me, he walks away.
I have been totally ambushed.
I have horrible stage fright, y'all - even speaking in front of 2 or 3 strangers scares the shit out of me, never mind a whole auditorium full of them.
fuck.
I've got not choice but to forge ahead. I turn to my mom, who's still on stage with me, and eye-plead for her to HELP! me. She suggests that I start by asking the audience to say something about me so I have a jumping off place for an impromptu speech.
So I go up to the dais and gingerly make this request into the microphone.

Dead silence.
Nuttin'.

double fuck.

So I turn to her - you got me into this, now get me out! So she goes up to the dais and shares that she was hanging out with a couple of acquaintances of mine the other night, and that "they like her more than they think they do"!

Ouch!!!

-the end

DREAM #2

I am scheduled for execution, along with another woman and two men. We are marched into the execution room, where four identical hopsital beds are lined up in a row, with four poison-filled IV bags next to them, waiting to be pumped into our veins.

Just before the injection of the needle, a phone rings. The 'you-just-got-yourself-a-pardon, partner' phone. So we all get up and go to the phone. It's for one of the men, who puts it to his ear, listens for a minute, hangs up, and says "I'm outta here, suckers!". He's been set free, won the stay-of-execution lottery.

The rest of us are not so fortunate.

We are marched back to our death beds.

I think about resisting, but I know it will do no good, will only agitate me, and I'd rather not be agitated and hysterical when I die, thank you. 

I am strapped into the bed, and wake up right before the needle hits my vein.

-the end

Welcome to my current subconscious.

All interpretations are both welcome and appreciated.

Man, I love dreams!

alrighty then - that's all for now!

love y'all, miss y'all, wish you were here, etc. etc. and so on...

xo xo xo xo

jingles

Haiku Frenzy!*

A couple of days ago, I had a sudden burst of haiku creativity. Therefore, here is my trip to date, boiled down to it's essential elements.

These four are from last month at Tassajara...

"Kitten in a Blender"

You make me feel like

a kitten in a blender.

Grind up, rinse, repeat.

"Wake-Up Bell"

Before breaking dawn,

DING! DING! DING! DING! sprints down path.

Stupid wake-up bell

"Fooky Promotion"

I am Fukuten

Wash this! Chop that! Umpon-woo!

Feed monks' appetites

 "Oh Shit this is gonna fuck my car up And How!"

 Out of the Valley

 cursing the dappled sunlight

skewing rock-rut view

"Greyhound Blowjob"

Young meth addicts meet

in the back of the Greyhound.

blowjob soon ensues...

And onward to thailand...

"Ode to Keens"

oh I love my Keens

homely red potato feet

 cushioning my world

"Dogs in Clothes"

Back here in Chiang Mai,

dogs still wearing clothes so as

not to be eaten.

"Monkeys Suck and Here's Why"

Lopburi monkeys

attack! Pineapple war zone!

Victory: Jingles

"Gypsy Grandma"

 Gypsy grandmother

waves magic crystal pen o'er

scooter-broken foot

"The Yucks"

Yucks flock to Siam

Dirty old men cruise Thai whores

to get their yucks sucked

"Talking Bones"

Gypsy grandma says:

heed the talking buddha bone

haunting Doi Suthep

Bone or no bone, I'm going to rock some white clothes and meditate for 10 days at the end of the month at Doi Suthep:

http://www.doisuthep.com/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1&lang=en


Meanwhile, after a week in Chiang Mai, Penny and I are heading up to Chiang Rai tomorrow to check out the scene and visit an orphanage up there, then bound for Pai.
Pai-ku will surely ensue.

Well, that about brings us up to date. Pics to follow just as soon as I figure out how the hell to use a computer...

xo,
jingles



*Apologies in advance to all you haiku "must-mention-the-seasons-in-every-poem" purists.

OuT of the WiLdeRnESs!

...and directly into a seriously freak-infested portion of the grid (which some euphemistically refer to as "reno").

Since my last post and subsequent descent into zen-monky-business, a gazillion things have happened. Not being sequentially-minded at the moment, here is a bunch of crap in no particular order:

1) the ocean ate my car keys (and did NOT spit them back up). This, of course, led to a whole expensive and time-consuming series of events involving locksmiths, tow trucks, a park ranger named Tina, a seedy motel, a Honda dealership, a cheeseball, half a Woody Allen movie and a beautiful sunset.

2) aside from the above incident, I spent five days in Big Sur, sleeping in a turnout overlooking the sea (which I soon discovered I was sharing with a dead guy - but really dead and ashy with a plaque and stuff, not all maggoty and decomposing - that would be weird). I woke up every morning to the crashing waves and the sun pushing it's way up through the fog, went down the road and had really good coffee and pastry at Big Sur Bakery. That bakery totally kicks ass and you should go there if you're in the neighborhood.

3) i got married.

4) ha ha - just kidding. That was last trip, silly!
(although, interestingly enough, that accidental nuptial did end up factoring in to my experience at Tassajara... my innards hadn't flinched that much in quite some time)


anyhoo...

I'm off to sleep now in my comfy Reno bed at my fabulous Aunt Sweetie's house, and am reasonably sure that no one is going to run by my head ringing a wake-up bell at five in the morning...damn, that sure does suck sometimes!

more later,
jingles
xoxoxo
 

Truck Stops, Boob Jobs, Hot Dogs and Pee

Hello Friends!

When last we spoke, I was chicken sitting and counting the days until blastoff.

Finally, after much preparation and a satisfying series of goodbyes, I am on the road and well on my way to destination Zen...in fact, at this very moment I am sitting in a coffee shop in Lompoc, California.

In the interest of full disclosure, I must admit that it's a Starbucks, but cut me some slack here, people...I have no idea where I am (yet).

Lompoc is Here

 I left Austin on Monday, drove 16 hours straight, and then discovered the wonders of a little thing called Rest Stops. Did you know that you can park at a rest stop and actually stay there as long as you like and sleep?
True story.

And it looks like this...

Man, I love my Honda Fit. The front seat folds down flush with the back seat, creating a completely comfortable and functional bed. Mix in a little down comforter action, soft pillows, and high thread-count sheets and you got yourself a luxury sleeping scene, folks!

I actually spent a few hours in LA yesterday afternoon, and it was everything I'd imagined and more...grotesquely opulent, decadent, seedy, plastic, boob-jobby, desperate-and-down-at-the-heely, traficky conglomeration of towns with no cohesive identity. The most notable trait in the more upscale neighborhoods  was that everyone was checking everyone else out, seeing and being seen.

Whatever.

I went to Beverly Hills and drove down Rodeo Drive, into Hollywood and up the Sunset Strip, down to Melrose, had a hot dog at Pink's (I had to do something famous-ish) where I spotted what may or may not have been some superhipster rock stars emerging from a BMW, through Brentwood, Venice and then got the hell out of there.
Glad I went, Glad I left.

Last night I drove up Highway 1 until it got dark, pulled into El Capitan state beach and slept in the Fit-bed until morning. I've been waking up really early in California time, so I was up and on the road before the booth people even got back to work...

One more thing before I leave you:

My new best friend...

Christmas is coming, y'all!

        pStyle!
             pStyle!!
                    pStyle!!!



http://www.thepstyle.com/pages/pstyle


 
love,
jingles
xoxoxo