Greetings from NOLA

Good lord it has been forever since I’ve blogged. My bad. It seems I haven’t thought much about blogging this past week. I usually blog as mainly a way to keep friends and family updated on what I’m doing and where I’m going. But see, many of my friends and family were here with me in New Orleans. So it seemed silly to write a blog when I could just tell them to their face what I’m up to and where I’m going. Chances were they were up and going to the same things.

So we are in New Orleans trying to save the world. And eat as much food as humanly possible. The eating takes a long time, you know. And then there is the digestion and the plotting of the next meal. This too has left little time for blogging. I know you understand.

It’s been great to be back here in New Orleans and to be here with so many of my friends and family who came out to build and play. And eat. It’s been a wonderful way to end these past couple of months and a great way to sorta refuel after the draining effects of doing a book tour for 8 weeks. The book tour already feels like a distant memory and I’m glad to have washed it away with some good stuff here in New Orleans. Good people, good work, good food, great drink specials. And so on.

We are having a lovely time here and I am glad that a bunch of people in my group got to come out and see for themselves what is going on out here. It is nearly impossible to comprehend until you come here and see it with your eyes. A New Orleans resident said to me today, “We don’t have post-traumatic stress, because we are still in the trauma.”

I will be back here again, many times in the years to come. I’ve fallen in love with this city. Even in its weakened state it still has a hell of a lot to offer, and I think its people are probably some of the few in this country that would be able to fight back from this. They’ve got fight these folks. But they need other people to fight for them too. I hope to be one of those people for many years.

We will be here for a few more days, then it will be time to pack my suitcase one more time, get on one more airplane, and go home. My sweet home. With its wonderful couch and big screen TV. It’s waiting for me. I hope it remembers me. I know I remember it. Quite fondly actually.

Here is a video of our experience with a travel guide book:

My Driving Teacher

Alarm

It's Friday. That is a good thing.

I have mucho work to do. That is a bad thing.

I have nothing to blog about today (aka: I didn't go into any public bathrooms today and take pictures - I know, I've let you down)

So I give you a video of how Americans announce themselves in Guatemala:

Sushi Place Randomness

I went to sushi tonight with a friend and we went to this trendy place in town. I like the sushi there, but I’m not a huge fan of how cool everyone thinks they are just because they are eating sushi there. I refuse to go there Thursday thru Saturday, because everyone is even more annoying on those days.

One sign of the pretentiousness of this place? They have ads in their menu. This is ridiculous. I took pictures. My friend died a small death when I whipped out the camera and took flash photography of the menu, but she’s known me long enough to be used to being at least sorta embarrassed every time we hang out. It’s kinda a tradition.
Really. Do we need to have Real Estate ads next to the children’s menu? I think no.

This is one of my favorites. It’s got a bunch of smiling people who owe their fabulous smiles to this one dentist guy, “God, everyone in this restaurant has better teeth than I do, I wish there was something I could do about that- oh look! Here’s a guy who can help me! Right next to my sushi rolls!”

And then.

I went into the bathroom.

I might have issues with taking photos in the bathroom. It’s something I might want to deal with at some point. This time I’ve actually graduated to taking video in the bathroom - I need help.

I was going to just take a picture, but I wanted you to fully appreciate what I was trying to show you. But then I was so paranoid about someone walking in I took the fastest video ever and you can’t even really tell what you are looking at. So I’ll explain it.

There is a bathroom. It has two stalls and a couple of sinks. It is a very tiny bathroom. And yet. It still has a huge exit sign by the door. What? Were there people just going into the bathroom and never coming out because they couldn’t figure out how to maneuver their way out of this very tricky bathroom? “Uh, there are three doors in here. But I think only one leads back to the restaurant. I’ll try this one first- Oh damnit! It’s a toilet. How about this one- Geez! Foiled again! If only they would post some sort of SIGN, preferably with LIGHTS, that would save me so much time in here.”

My favorite part of this video is the part where I hear a noise and quickly try to hide the camera from whoever might be entering the bathroom. See, I’m not completely crazy, I know enough to hide the camera if I’m taking videos in the bathroom...

A Story Told Through Video

Look. I went to work today. And didn't do much else. (Besides catch a cold, it seems) So I don't really have anything to blog about. But last week? I was doing things worth blogging about but I was too busy actually doing them to actually blog about them.

Today I'm tired and cold-y so I'm going to half ass the blog by just posting videos. Writing is overrated.

Basically there was this school in Guatemala. It was at the top of a very big mountain. There were six grades of kids there and only one teacher. They were all really poor kids and our leader asked us if we wanted to have a party with the kids. I said that would be okay as long as some other non-Guatemalans were there as well, so there wouldn't be 200 kids staring at only us.

We decided that instead of toys we would buy the kids shoes, as most of the kids we'd come across on our trek up and down the mountain weren't wearing shoes. We decided to call the party "La Fiesta de los Zapatos" (The party of shoes)

This seemed like a grand idea. Until we actually had to go buy 70 pairs of shoes. In the market. My lord, it was like the most boring version of Amazing Race ever. The Not Even That Entertaining Race is what we were participating in.



Booooring. And that was only like a minute of the HOURS we spent wandering this maze of a market looking for shoes. We had gone to one place initially and they had given us a good price on the shoes. Then, in an effort to increase our buying power, we went back and begged for money from some of the other students at the Spanish school where we were studying. Then we returned to the market with the actual belief that we would be able to find that one shoe seller guy again. We were not correct in this belief. The main problem was that we went into the maze of sellers a different way, then we tried to wind our way through in the direction of where we thought the shoe guy had been. Along the way we found other shoe guys and bought about 10 or 20 shoes at a time at each place.

We left one shoe seller and headed off looking for our original low price shoe seller. We wound through the maze for like 10 minutes, we went outside, came back in, wound around some more and then, miracle of miracles, we found the original place. As we were getting the shoes from the original place we looked over to see a nice woman waving at us. At the place literally right next to where we were standing. She was waving at us because we had just bought shoes from her. Right before we went off on a 10 minute quest for our original shoe guy. Instead of walking 10 minutes we probably could have walked just two steps.

We are not smart.



Finally we got the shoes and made it to the fiesta. When we got there the leader guy asked a couple of the groups if they could sing a song in their language for the kids. We put our heads together and came up with some very inappropriate rap songs. Then we decided maybe the hokey pokey might be a better bet. The group from Canada sang some song in French. And the Koreans said, "I'm sorry, we did not know that there would be a song. We did not have time to prepare, we can't possibly perform."

These Koreans weren't really spontaneous people, on the whole. I sincerely hope they didn't think we had been given advanced notice and still all we came up with was this:




What is it about the butt? It somehow transcends all language and makes everyone laugh. Except the Koreans. They didn't know that there would be laughter, so they didn't have time to prepare for it.

God Bless America

I am on American soil. I love American soil. American soil has ice that I can drink and toilets that flush and Mountain Dew. God Bless Mountain Dew.

There are a lot of things to be thankful for this holiday. Most of all I am thankful for the amount of food I will be able to identify and then eat tomorrow. I am most thankful for the fact that my family agreed to put off Thanksgiving for a day so that I can partake in the mass eating that needs to be done in order to assert my love of my country. And my love of all its food.

We made some videos so far along our trek. My good lord do we look good. We were much cuter in Guatemala, where things take on a slightly less groomed appearance...

Fun with Videos

Today I put siding on a house. It was fun and a little scary that I can just put siding on a house with no real supervision. I guess it’s not brain surgery, but still. I shouldn’t be allowed to just put siding on the side of someone’s house. I’m a graphic designer for god’s sakes.

I took some more videos. I’m sorry that they aren’t very good, but I’m taking them with my photo camera and they are about as good as they are going to get with that little thing.

Here is a video of our condo where we are staying. I am enjoying the spa, to say the least.


The work this time does not seem as bad, because it is not 12453 degrees outside like it was in June and I’m mixing cement by hand like I was in Honduras. Comparatively speaking siding a house is pretty easy.


Not much more to write, I have to go eat some more food. I do enjoy the food in New Orleans, my waistline is not enjoying it very much however. Oh well. Totally worth it.

Traveling is Fun

I really wish someone would get on that whole transporter thing. In which we just get into a tube of some sort and think or something and then end up where we want to be. No planes, no TSA, no layovers, no crying babies. And you can take your luggage in the tube with you, so it doesn’t get left in Texas. I would enjoy a transporter/teleporter thing, for sure.



We have made it safely to Louisiana and can I just say that it is a lot cooler in November in Louisiana than in June. Who woulda thunk it? Shocking really. It’s as if there are seasons that can be predicted or something.

Our volunteer housing this time is actually a condo that we are renting and it has a pool and spa. We are enjoying this volunteering housing slightly more than the cots we are usually sleeping on while volunteering. We are staying in about the cutest neighborhood ever, right outside of the French Quarter. There are actual cafes on the corners of our block, little places that you can’t even see in, they just have tiny signs that say café or restaurant. Then you go in and there dining areas and patio areas and bar areas. And everyone knows each other. Adorable. And delicious. New Orleans knows how to make food y’all. My good lord their food is good. I’m a little worried about the consequences of eating all the good food this time and not sweating out 4 gallons every three minutes. I think the sweat was the only thing that kept me under 200 pounds last time. Ruh ro.



When we got off the plane in New Orleans (and while we were waiting to fill out our lost luggage report) I was surprised to see so many people coming off the planes in groups. They were groups of volunteers, still coming to the city. Most of them are church organizations, most older adults, maybe retired. It’s nice to see that people still care and are still coming here. And it’s nice to see how much life there still is here. And more importantly - how much good food.

Frostbite

I do not have good luck with heaters. More specifically, heaters that are meant to heat houses. Big heaters. Of the house variety. My last house had an overall aversion to being warm. It didn’t enjoy being warm. Well, it didn’t enjoy being warm in anywhere other than one single room in the house. This made for an interesting living situation in which one roommate was sweating while the other roommate nearly froze to death. It was quite pleasant.

Now it seems my heating issues have followed me. My heater in my house has very little interest in pumping out warm air. Cool air? It’s all over that. But the warm air it’s not quite feeling ready for just yet. Good lord.

Here is a video I made to illustrate my struggle. I want no comments from you people who choose to live places where ice falls from the sky, I am a Californian and I do not do well in coldness, it is not in my nature.



That was yesterday. I still haven’t figured it out. It is becoming a bit of an issue, as I really feel like I’m a relatively intelligent human being and I should be able to turn on the damn thermostat without assistance. I’ve never had trouble turning on a thermostat before in my life, but this thermostat has chosen to be difficult, and I’m not enjoying our time together thus far. Good lord.

Thank god my dad bought be a Presto HeatDish last year during my Winter of Discontent at my old house. I have pulled it out of the garage where I put it and we all proclaimed, "It will be so nice to not have to use this anymore!" We hugged and cheered and sang songs about warmness coming from the ceiling instead of a disc.

And now. The disc is back. Last night I curled up in my bed to watch tv. I had four layers of clothes on, under my covers, with the disc next to me to provide warmth. And boy does that thing provide some warmth. I woke up this morning nearly naked and the disc was turned off. Who the hell knows what happened to me or the disc during the night, but neither one of us seems to have fared well.


I have to leave for my trip in two days.

I think tomorrow might be time for the trip to Walmart to see what wonder (and cheesy $5 shirts) await me on this adventure. It is really an exciting time. Add in the frostbite and it’s nonstop fun here.

Wonders of the World

I am very busy. I have very much work to do. I am counting down the days until I am no longer in this state and am instead traveling the world in an effort to save it. And an effort to learn Spanish.

It is in times like these, times when I really can’t remember the last day I didn’t work for at least 12-16 hours, that I find joy in the little things. They are the things that make me smile before diving back into whatever it is that I'm supposed to be doing on the computer.

Here are some of the little things that make me happy, and I do hope they make you happy too.

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My Old Roommate and I have a favorite sushi place in town. They know us there. There is a waiter there named Sun. We laugh every time we go in because his name is Sun, my name is Dawn and the Old Roommate’s name is Sommer. We are a bright bunch the three of us. It really never gets old, the whole playing on the name thing.

Anyways, Sun is about the happiest, most friendly guy ever and I just love him to pieces. Last night I ordered a thing called mochi, which is an ice cream-like thing that you can get at sushi places. It is awesome. I asked Sun if I could get it to go because I’d like to eat it while I’m up until all hours of the night making things pretty. You can work up quite an appetite making things pretty.

Sun looks at me with worry, “How far are you going?” “Not far, like 10 minutes away.” “Oh, well, they melt very fast, I don’t want them to melt on you. I’ll figure something out.”

Then he comes out with this to-go box. It’s hard to see what it is, but it is my mochi ice cream on ice to keep it frozen. How cute is Sun? I felt like I was transporting an organ for transplant. And to be honest, the pick me up those damn ice cream things gave me at 3 a.m. was similar to an organ transplant. (And please no comments on them actually looking like organs)

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This my dear, dear readers is the best thing I’ve come across in a long time and I need to share it with you because I believe the answer to world peace is to be found in this picture. The reason why I got my mochi to go? Because we decided to try a new dessert in the restaurant: Tempura Ice Cream. Holy crap this is good. I have no idea what is on the outside of it exactly, but I think it’s some sort of batter. The batter tastes like a blueberry muffin. A deep fried blueberry muffin. With strawberry ice cream in the middle. And whip cream on top. Holy crap this is good. As Sommer said, “I was not fully prepared for it to be this good.”

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This is like the Clapper (clap on, clap off, the clapper) for a bit classier bunch. I can turn my light on and off with A REMOTE. The world is full of wonder people.

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I don’t know that anymore needs to be said about this. Other than it is probably the best part of my condo.


Happy Friday everyone, may your weekends be filled with fried ice cream and easy toilet paper rolls.

I Heart Heights

So I took the kid to the rock climbing place tonight. She’s gone a couple of times on the mobile rock climbing thingy’s at community events and she really seemed to like it so I thought we'd try the real deal.

One of my proudest moments with her was a few years ago when she went on the mobile rock climbing thingy for the first time. She was scared out of her skull, but didn’t really want to show it. I told her she would be fine and to go try it out. She made it up about a third of the way and then dropped back down, because she was too scared, "I can’t do it." I looked at her and pointed to the top, "You can totally do it, go all the way up and ring that bell up there, it will be cool, you can totally do it."

She turned back to the wall, looked up at it, took a deep breath and started climbing. It took her forever to climb up that damn wall; she was shaking and sweating and breathing hard (fear of death is a good thing to expose a child to, right? Right.) Then after about 5 minutes of that fear she managed to make it all the way to the top. She reached her shaking hand out and rang the bell and then looked back down to me with the biggest smile I’d ever seen.

She pushed off the wall and repelled back down to the ground. Before she even hit solid ground she screamed, "I DID IT!" I nodded as she raced right back up the wall.

It not that she’s a fearless kid, it’s that she’s a kid that will try stuff even if she is afraid of it. I think that is pretty cool. Then again, I haven’t seen the effects of a teenager with this mentality, so it might lose its coolness soon.

So tonight we went to the rock climbing place to bond and climb and conquer.

Uh, it turns out I’m pretty afraid of heights. I think I already knew that, but I don’t think I’ve ever had the occasion to be quite so high off the ground with only my hands holding me. Hmmm.

See, you go up the wall, and that part I don’t mind. But then you have to repel back down the wall. You’d think that wouldn’t be a difficult thing, seeing as though there is a nice little rope/repeller thing attached to you and you’ve seen that no one else has plummeted to their death while doing this. But then.



See, it’s really not in my natural make-up to throw myself off of walls. Something just didn’t feel right about that. It took me about three climbs before I was able to do it. And after I did it, it was actually kinda fun.

My favorite part of the video is the overwhelming support I received from the child. I promise that when I was encouraging her on the rock wall a mere three years ago I never said, "You suck." They grow up so fast.

Dog Dressing

It is that time again. The dog needed a new outfit for a new month. Mom was running a bit behind on the dressing of the dog, as it is already the 10th and she hadn't changed him yet. The poor guy was still in his bathing suit and innertube. He definitely has a sunburn by now.

I happened to be at the house when Mom changed the dog, so I took a little video. Mom was unaware that my digital camera could take videos and therefore didn't know I was taking a video. I cannot tell you how happy Mom is about me posting a video of her on the internets. Really. She may disown me. Or at least hide the dog from me - which might be worse.