“In Deformation, We Trust.”

More government waste will be avoided with this motto as it will eliminate bullying in all of our schools. Replacing the current motto with this one will remind that one girl with inverted boobs to be proud of her deformation. That one guy who has to pee with his pants all the way on the ground for some reason when at the urinal will now look up proudly at this new motto and put his hands on his hips and sway proudly as he pees. So your voice breaks wine glasses with it’s high pitch-ness, so what that one testicle is enormously out of proportion to the other, so what your front teeth are perpendicular to the rest, so what your freckles hide your normal skin, so what? With my new motto our already deformed nation will finally have a reason to open up and reveal the truth. Now walk forward America and join me in Washington to show the world exactly what we are and who we trust in.

Deformed and elongated middle toes.

I need this motto to feel good about the two by fours I have been walking around on for the last 28 years. My deformed middle two toes stick out way past my big toe making it virtually impossible to wear normal shoes. It was this deformation that gave me two ingrown toe nails after wearing soccer shoes that were not block foot ready. Did you know insurance wont cover ingrown toe nails because it is self inflicted? With my new motto, maybe the shoe lobbyists will finally get off their wasteful and unneeded pedestals and allow for the creation of square foot shoes.

Evolved hitchhikers thumb

I can’t even count the times that I have been hitch hiking and stuck my deformed thumb out to get picked up and no one would pick me up. “FREAK!” “BEHEMOTH!” “RIGHT ANGLE!” They would scream at me as I cried on the side of the road. So what I have to use my first knuckle to push on things? Who cares that the police have to remind me that they do not want knuckle creases on their finger prints? My deformity is my evolution and it is about time that our nation embraced this and what better way than changing the nations motto?

So on this day of eternal thanks and celebration of temporary peace between murderous white people and native american indians, I want to give thanks, nay, give great celebration to my deformities and to all those of the readers of this deformed blog.

Thank You and Merry Thanksgiving!

Example!

In 2007 I was living in Newport with Watson, Chef, and Sunshine.  Our water heater and electrical system had busted and it was one of those beach town winters where you realize no one insulates anything because “it’s California!” but they forget a 50 degree night + wind has the potential to kill everyone.

Sunshine tried to burn plants in order to keep everyone warm.  I lit candles for Catholic saints.  Watson cuddled with the television.  Chef paced back and forth to keep his body temp up.  The effects of all were middling.

Chef snapped first.  He started screaming about inequities, American rights, and common decency.  He was so worked up he picked up a phone at 11pm and called our landlord.

Now that actually might sound like the rational thing to do, but it’s absolutely not.

As four 21 year old males, it was our goal to keep as far away from the landlord as possible, telephone or otherwise.  In fact, we’d only seen and talked to him once – briefly – when we viewed the apartment, and he’d done nothing but use a lot of swear words while talking about prevoius tenants and their wanton use of “wires”.

Landlord Jack, to us, was the scary man at the end of the bar.

Don’t look him in the eyes.

The phone rang twice before Chef remembered this and hung up.

But we wouldn’t let him off that easy.  All of us wanted to see Chef do what none of us could.  And all of us wanted the heat/electricity turned on.  So we goaded Chef to call back… on speakerphone.

It rang, rang, rang… and thank God it went to voicemail.

Now the outgoing message on the landlord’s machine was where things got strange.  It was longwinded, stilted in punctuation, and my transcript of it is somewhat shoddy due to the fact that I wrote it on paper with only the light of Catholic saints.  But… God’s honest truth… Landlord Jack’s answering machine went like this:

“We’re unable to pick up the phone right now,

But if you’re calling for Lloyd,

It is our deepest regret to inform you

that he passed away

This last Thursday

After his long battle with leukemia.

He will be buried

At Eternal Meadows

On Sepulveda and Beach

At 1pm Sunday.

You may leave a message here

with your fondest memories

of Lloyd.

Thank you so much for your concern

He was the best cat

We’ve ever known.”

BEEP.

Now, you’ve got to imagine that the entire time the phone was ringing, and even while the answering machine clicked on, Chef was rehearsing what sort of message he could leave.

So at what point do you think his plan faded away / shattered into a million pieces?  Lloyd?  Passed away?  Luekemia?  Fondest memories?  Cat?

And the implications…

• Who else had called, specifically or incidentally, for Lloyd?
• What type of phone calls did Lloyd field when he was still alive?
• Where did he find the time? (especially towards the end, in between treatments)
• Can anyone ever truly “know” a cat?

BEEP

Time’s up.  What’s your  message?

I don’t know either.

Chef held his hand over the phone and stared at us with bulged out eyes.  It was either terror or insanity.  Our laughter died down.

Channeled by some unseen force, Chef began to leave his message:

LLOYD…

LLOYD

YOU DIRTY SON OF A BITCH

I KNOW

I KNOW YOU’RE NOT DEAD

I KNOW OK?

GIVE ME MY $50

SERIOUS

THIS IS EDWARD

FROM THE [spearmint] RHINO

YOU’RE FOOLING

NO ONE

…

MEOW.

And that was it.  Next day, swear to candles, our water heater and electricity were fixed.

Before I get into my first Match date, I’d like to say one more thing regarding the profiles. I’ve already ranted about these in my 10 Things I Hate About Online Dating blog, but there’s a new epidemic that needs to be addressed. To quickly add one more to the list . . .

11.  The Dog Pictures

Not the ones of you and your dog, the pictures of JUST your dog. You know who would enjoy seeing photos of the cute terrier spaniel mix you rescued? Other fucking chicks. Not dudes.

Despite a seemingly pessimistic attitude, I still get excited over the prospect of finding my “soulmate”. And so it began.

She was a blue eyed beauty named Kelly0584. She messaged me first, saying how much she enjoyed the documentary King of Kong (it’s in my profile). She had a pale complexion, contrasted with dark brown hair. I thought she looked like Zooey Deschanel, who is easily the most underrated hot celebrity. She was also an aspiring writer who has her own blog. I was in love. Unable to control my excitement, I emailed her picture to my friend Dustin, telling him about the date we were soon to go on. I chose a particular shot in which she especially resembled Zooey, boasting about how I’d found the next best thing. “She’s either hot or she’s not hot” he ambiguously replied. I stared blankly at his words on my computer screen for a minute or so, trying to decipher what he meant by this. Surely there was something in between hot and not she could be, like “cute”.

We agreed to meet at Bosa Nova, the only restaurant in Hollywood I’m familiar with, even after living there for two years. I pulled up at 7:20, ten minutes before our arranged meeting time, and received a text from my future girlfriend saying, ”Work is crazy ugh! running a little late, can we push it back to 7:45?”. I told her it was no problem and turned the ignition back on so I could listen to the radio. At 7:40, I checked my reflection in the rear view mirror one last time before stepping out and walking down to the restaurant. The hostess who greeted me said there was no wait for a party of two, so I told her I was expecting my date to arrive any minute. She suggested I sit outside. It was a beautiful night.

At 7:50 I received another text. “Moving just as fast as I can! traffic is ridiculous, be there in 15″. Reading this, I felt a wave of relief. For ten minutes I could relax and not worry about doing my best James Dean impression while posing on the wooden benches out front. I slumped into a more comfortable sitting position and stopped checking out every dark haired girl walking by to see if it was her. I looked through the emails on my phone and actually read them instead of just making my cool reading face. Finally, when ten minutes passed, I went back to James Dean mode. Unsure of which direction she might be coming from, and not wanting to look like a spaz jerking his head left to right every two seconds, I popped the collar of my Euro jacket and stared into the distance, furrowing my eyebrows as if deep and meaningful thoughts filled my head. At 8:10, another text: ”So sorry, almost there, 10 more minutes”. I started to grow impatient and care less about my looks.

At 8:20, fifty minutes late and fifty pounds overweight, she arrived. She had a huge, wide, fat head that seemed almost cartoonish. I figured she was an ex-body builder and the gigantism was a side effect of the steroids. She was sloppy, and frumpy, and out of breath from the fifteen feet she had to walk from the valet service. Instead of imagining the song we’d first dance to at our wedding, I now wondered whether she’d be worth calling at 2 a.m. after twelve beers. Deciding that my drunk dialing list could always use another name, I sat down to find out what was in that God-awful large head of hers. Despite being completely turned off by this girl the instant we met face to giant fat face, I still sought her approval. I wanted her to walk away thinking I’m a catch.

They placed us beneath a hot white light that beamed down on the shiny surface of our bright orange wooden table. To the left of us sat an older couple just three feet away, separated by a giant metal heater that raged on with the fires of Mordor. Even though I’d written off this date, I still wanted to maintain my mystique, so I kept my Euro jacket on despite the aurora borealis looming over our heads. I wiped beads of sweat from my forehead and flipped to the back of the menu for the beer selections.

“Can I get you guys something to drink?” our server asked with a midwest accent. Fat Zooey jumped at this, sparking up a conversation about her home town of Alabama, or somewhere around there. They gabbed like old friends, making me feel as if I should offer up my seat to the waitress and see if she was fixin for a nice glass of sweet tea. I sat back watching the two talk and wondered how I could’ve been so deceived by this girl’s pictures. We all try and pick the most flattering images we can find to represent ourselves. I had a lot of shots where I’m doing that 3/4 head turn to conceal my double chin. I also had a few shots taken indoors with the flash, which seems to wash out everything and hide a lot of the unflattering details the spot light above me was sure to pick up. Still though, she was fat. That’s just a flat out lie. I merely manipulated the truth. The equivalent to this would be for me to post a bunch of photos where I have a beanie or a hat on, then show up with a hairline resembling Fraiser Crane’s. She even had a couple full body shots in her pictures, including one with her and all her friends, giving what I thought to be an accurate sense of scale. To make matters worse, in all of her emails she always managed to find a way to slip in the fact that she was about to go to the gym, or just got back from the gym, or “Really sore from this cardio class that totally kicked my ass!” Which seems counterintuitive, like getting a 900 on your SAT’s and defending your low score by explaining that you studied your ass off for months before taking the test.

Our server returned with a large sangria for Fat Zooey and a Corona for me. We sipped our drinks and looked through the menu. “She’s nice.” I said, referring to her new BFF. ” I don’t know how you do that. . . just spark up a conversation with a stranger . . . I’m not very sociable, I usually find it to be a waste of time . . . I mean, you’re never gonna see these people again, so why bother getting to know them?” I asked rhetorically, shrugging my shoulders and taking a swig of my beer. She nodded politely and finished her Sangria in three massive gulps. When a bus boy came by she ordered another one. We still hadn’t received the complimentary basket of bread.

“So, do you know what you’re gonna get?” I asked, trying to cool things down and find a neutral topic. We then discussed the menu – what we wanted, what looked good, what we’ve tried before. Then, I started up again. I told her I lived in Hollywood for two years and this was the only sit-down restaurant I knew of because I usually just eat fast food. She reached for her straw as I continued. “I hate cooking or preparing food, all the meals I eat at home are the pre-packaged stuff you buy in the freezer section of the grocery store. You know, like chicken nuggets or fish sticks. Sometimes I’ll buy a bag of tortilla chips and shredded cheese, but I’ll be too lazy to put the two in the microwave and make nachos, so I’ll just sprinkle some cheese on a chip and eat it like that, usually over the kitchen sink so I don’t make a mess. Actually, I eat most of my meals over the kitchen sink, that way I don’t have to do dishes.” I smiled uncomfortably at her blank reaction and looked back down at my menu. She asked a server walking by (not ours) for another large sangria, her third.

After we ordered she excused herself to go to the restroom. When she was no longer in sight, I grabbed my napkin and wiped down my sweaty greasy face. My jacket was itchy and uncomfortable and the collar chaffed my neck. I desperately wanted to remove it, but I knew if I did that now she’d know I lied when I said I wasn’t hot. After sweating it out for another minute, I finally took the stupid thing off. I doubted she was smart enough to realize I lied anyways.

When she sat back down, I brought up something she mentioned in her latest blog. “So. . . your sister just had a kid?” I inquired. This turned out to be a success as she talked in circles about it for a good five minutes. She gave the same redundant speech every single girl my age gives – ” I want kids, but not now, some day, not today, but I LOVE kids.” I told her that I worked daycare with Parks and Recreation for four years. “I loved the job, except for the kids . . .I hated the kids” I explained. She turned quiet until the sound of her slurping sangria broke the silence. “Well, I didn’t hate ALL of them . . . just most of them . . . When you think about it, kids are just smaller dumber obnoxious versions of adults.” I reasoned, remembering all the brats I got paid minimum wage to babysit. She grew nervous and kept a watchful eye on my hands, as if they had been strangling sweet innocent children earlier. I found this judgment to be a little unfair because when she thinks kids, she’s thinking about the cute four-year-old that calls her Aunty Kelly and asks her to play tea party. When I think kids, I’m thinking about the little cry-baby throwing a tantrum every time he gets out in dodgeball. Just in time to break the awkward silence, our food arrived. Fat Zooey (curious what her nickname for me at this point might have been) ordered her fourth sangria. I knew this to be the exact number because she was too fast for the bus boys and had accumulated a line of three large, purple stained, empty glasses.

We stopped talking and ate. I anxiously awaited the server to come by after my first bite and ask me “How is everything?” because they always do that shit and I can’t really enjoy my meal until it’s out of the way. Knowing you could be interrogated by a stranger at any moment when you have a mouthful of spaghetti doesn’t make for a pleasant dining experience. “How ya’ll doin? everything alright?” Our southern bell asked us with a much thicker accent now, possibly to get a bigger tip. I gave a thumbs up and a smile, my polite way of shooing her away.

After barely finishing half of my food, too full from adrenaline and angst, I pushed my plate away in an act of submission and sipped my water. Fat Zooey took another bite of her chicken and washed it down with the remains of her fourth sangria. Our server walked by and she lifted a hand, then lazily pointed to the empty glass, now ordering through sign language. A fifth sangria quickly found its way next to the bottomless drinking machine. For a second, I thought about ordering a large beer and playing catch up. Maybe if we both got drunk this might turn out okay. I discretely glanced at my cell phone to find it was already past nine. I still had a half an hour drive back to my apartment and this girl wasn’t worth the DUI. We reverted to small talk again, as if we skipped over the first five minutes of the date and needed to make up for them. “Nice night out.” I commented. “Yeah . . it’s nice” she complied. “Did you park far from here” she asked. “No . . . not to far” I replied.

Once our plates were cleared, I found myself alone at the table as she retreated again to the ladies room. This time I got on my phone. I scrolled through my emails and felt a sting when I saw the ones sent from her. What used to be my most cherished notes, notes that would make my heart skip a beat with anticipation before opening to read, were now junk mail. Emails from Netflix letting me know what DVD’s were coming Thursday bared more relevance. My life returned to the mundane routine of work and television. I wanted to hurry this thing up so I could squeeze in a few more episodes of Party Down Season 2.

“Ya’ll save room for desert?” Our server asked when my date returned. I smiled and shook my head no, looking across the table to see if we were in agreement. “Okay, how about another round” she asked, eyeing the line of drinks. Drunk Zooey shook her head in bewilderment, “Nope, I think we’re good” she said casually, as if this were a ridiculous question. The waitress came back shortly and placed a black folder next to me. I picked it up and watched Drunk Zooey look around the patio, avoiding eye contact. I leaned over to pull out my wallet and grabbed the bill. She hesitantly reached for her purse and I blurted out before thinking over the consequences, “I got this.” She said nothing and put her purse back down. I don’t know why I said this, we were two adults that failed to make a connection, the reasonable thing would be to split the loss and go our separate ways. Instead, I signed my name under the $87 tab and started to identify with those girls that complain about feeling cheap and used after putting out the first date. I knew I’d never see this girl again, and more importantly, she knew she’d never see me again, yet she sat in silence and watched me pay for her five God damn sangrias.

Driving home, I thought about my old dating motto of, “You don’t shoot you don’t score” and began altering it to fit my current opinion. “You don’t shoot you don’t miss . . . You don’t shoot you don’t humiliate yourself . . . You don’t shoot you don’t waste 87 fucking dollars on a chick you didn’t really want to score with anyways.” I thought about all the DVD’s I could’ve rented, or Chipotle burritos I could’ve eaten, or 12-packs of Coronas I could’ve drank with that money. I’ve always hated the term “puppy love”. The older I get, the more jaded and pragmatic I become. I feel like love is at it’s purest at 16 and slowly gets diluted with age. The search for “The One” has slowly been replaced with the search for “A cool chick I like hanging out with who doesn’t photoshop her fatass pics and mooch sangrias off me without even thanking me.” From now on, I’m taking all these online floozies to lame ass Starbucks. Zooey Deschanel is no longer my favorite under-the-radar actress.

1) Turning your head more than 15 degrees to either side.

If you are walking straight forward, and you turn your head more than 15 degrees to either side, you better divert your course in that direction or you have just become a slawker. Without a clear field of view in front of you, you cannot be expected to walk without causing chaos.

2) Taking a slow slant across the sidewalk to get to the other side without looking

This is the most efficient way to fuck over the most people in the most amount of time making you the most hated person on the sidewalk. You are not in an inner tube laying on your back, with a bag of beer attached to you cooling in the water, as you kick lazily and flap idioticly with your hands to cross a slow moving current. You are in the middle of a high speed sidewalk so you better know exactly when you are to get off, and make it happen with precision and hastiness.

3) Fail to move a shoulder or turn your body as people approach you when there is not much room.

You are a fucking dick. Have common courtesy for your fellow species. There is no reason you should feel that you are more important than another walker so that you should never have to turn your body or bow your shoulder to let someone fit through a gap. Nor are you the better person to turn and look back at the person who just bumped you. Douche bag.

4) Stopping on a staircase

This is never acceptable, never. It is tiring enough climbing a staircase and it sure as hell is frustrating enough to put both my feet on the same stair as I mentally urge you to walk faster. But when you ignore my mental urgings and stop, and I ram my head into your jello butt that had me hypnotized just enough to slow my reactions down, it makes me want to throw my shoe at you. If you dropped something, forget about it. If you forgot something behind, you will need to use the designated stairs for going down. If you are tired, sack up and get on with it before I push you over.

5) Walking four people wide

Firstly, if I am one of the four, I hate this situation because I cannot hear what the hell is going on. But imagine the 80 meter queue of people behind you and your arm linked friends. Are you playing red rover red rover? Are you trying out for that burlesque dance with the high kicking legs? Are you stopping a crowd as they riot around you? Unless you are doing any of these things, immediately deconstruct your wall of in-passe, and go down to two by two. You will be a lot happier as well as the released flow of people going past you.

6) Wildly flailing your arms as if you have a mental disorder

Maybe more common in South America, especially Argentina. But to think it’s just a “thing that happens” as you back hand slap someone to your side as they are trying to pass you, is just plain wrong, and you are two steps closer to being a salted slug of the earth.

7) Gazing up, browsing around, and looking at this and that

Sudden stops will ruin governments, computers, machinery, and it sure as hell will destroy a sidewalk. When you decide to gander at that cute top or new computer game, you just unleashed chaos and that ain’t cool in my book. Be courteous and look to the side or behind you before making drastic decisions on the sidewalk. But this would break rule one, so even better if you feel uncomfortable breaking rule one, is to put a hand out to the side pointing down and shout out “Slowing!!”

8) Choosing the far left door when you have to turn right or vice versa

Try and think ahead more than five seconds. There are a lot of doors because likely there are a lot of people using them. It is not cool to leave a door and immediately run into your perpendicular adventure that should have nothing to do with me.

9) Not staying to the side on an escalator if you are not walking.

Why? Do you really need a sign every few meters going up to tell you to do this? Just because we are getting a free vertical lift doesn’t mean I am not going to take advantage of the opportunity to feel like I am walking super extra fast.

For sure at some point I have committed some of these errors, but I learned. I learned from my mistakes and saw the misery I caused and I aim to never do them again. Unless you are old, a young child, mentally or physically handicapped, or drunk, you have no excuse to repetitively commit the errors above.

Now don’t get me wrong… I once ordered 25 guys to walk with with an italian walk whenever they saw me or one of my 50 fraternity bothers. An italian walk consists of your hands clasped behind your back, you lean back like you are almost about to lean on something, and walk slowly like there is nothing in the world you are trying to get to. I can appreciate the joy of life and the things there are to see while walking slow. But in general I am an efficiency walker, that’s why I have a motorcycle that takes me around at 175mph and many bicycles that are far more efficient than a car.

I hope I pop into your head the next time someone runs into you on the sidewalk and gives you a look like “gawwd, who the fuck is this slawker?”

Earlier this year, on a very uncomfortable and ball bruising bus in between the Bolivian side of Lake Titticaca and Lima Peru, I shared a bag of coca leaves with a group of chaps who had just finished up a few weeks in La Paz. They told me about “the easiest 6000+ mountain in the world” and I immediately knew that I would be back to La Paz at some point to officially “one up” my American friends for good. My friends and I are constantly trying to outdo each other and “one up” the other. A group of us climbed Mt. Whitney a few years back, the highest mountain in the continental 48 states, and we thought we were cool. But Whitney stands at 14k feet and some change, so to peak a 20k mountain would officially close that one-upping-category with Luke as the clear and away one-upper. The chap’s stories of the mountain were sparse and not very detailed, and it really would not have mattered what they had told me, as I was practically already on the mountain in my mind.

Six months later and the day of my adventure was upon me. I do not even know what the mountain is called and all I know is I need to get to La Paz. I had just packed my way too small JanSport backpack with the following that was supposed to last me eight days and take me to the top of the world.

• 2 pairs of ankle socks
• 1 pair of cycling socks with a giant hole in the heal of one of them
• 1 pair of smart wool socks that I have used so much you can see my skin through the very intelligent wool
• 1 pair of jeans
• 1 thermal cycling shirt
• 1 pair of wool thermal pants. extremely warm.
• 1 pair of slightly homosexual gloves
• 1 scarf
• 2 dress shirts
• 3 boxer brief underwears
• toothbrush but no toothpaste
• sunscreen that I never used
• pen and journal
• thin sweater
• deodorant
• iPod
• $40 digital camera and 2 spare batteries

And I was wearing jeans, a shirt, reebok shoes that have carried me around the world but are in no state to climb a giant mountain, and a thick jacket. As I stood above my backpack wondering if I could remove some underwear, here was the gameplan I was conjuring in my head. Fly to Calama in the northern part of Chile, go to bus station, get bus to La Paz, find party hostel, sign up for the mountain tour, walk up the mountain with ease, then the next day go to Uyuni Bolivia which is a giant salt flat used to take weird perspective photos, pop on over to San Pedro Atacama to sit in some thermal spas, and trot on over to Calama to catch my return flight. Seemed easy enough, so what does that really entail?

I arrived in Calama. Calama is probably the closest main airport to use if you want to see the Atacama dessert in San Pedro. Every chilean will say it is a must see place so I intended to stop by at the end of my trip but I wanted to give myself ample time in La Paz to figure out how to climb the mountain. Calama itself is a one horse town. You truly feel as though you are in a dessert and the terrain is flat with small undulations, brown, and generally lifeless. A miners town that has two main streets, one to go each direction. Every bar is a girly bar and I am pretty sure the inbreeding had begun early here as the population looked “odd.” If you have an old epson printer from the 80′s, it is hear you can find that non-existent print cartridge. Be sure to talk with Andrea at the bus terminal. She will try and impress you with her overly shiny braces and her impeccably wrong advice about her own town. I learned that a bus from Calama to La Paz just doesn’t exist and was reminded for the first time of many reminders that the earth is huge. So I had to take a ten hour bus to Arica, northern Chilean border town where I could then find another six hour bus to La Paz. The first of many bus trips began.

Luke’s Guide to Long Distance Bus Travel

In South America, the cheap, and many times better way to travel, is by bus. The land is dissected infinite times with the veins of a bus network that coarses giant double decker buses with champagne services, fully reclining seats, movies that never made it to cinemas, and smelly anti-deodarant using latinos. In February, my girlfriend and I were in Rio for Carnival and we had the great idea to take busses from Rio to Machu Picchu Peru for our return leg only to find that Machu Picchu wa closed when we got there. That week of 250+ hours in a bus taught me many things that should be shared.

• Always board with a box of cheap wine. Screw top is awesome compared to pushing the cork in.
• Window seats can often times have a draft coming through the windows.
• Always bring a blanket.
• Although human feces is 90% water, it does not mean that you can take a shit in a toilet that says “fluids only”
• The bottom level of a bus will have less swaying movement but will always smell worse.
• Front seats will have good views many times but on an over night bus, who cares. You will also be moving the fastest when turning.
• Back seats have less motion and can be a great place to have sex, but sometimes they will not be able to recline all the way.
• The movies will always suck. Who gives a shit about an argentine girls field hockey team?
• Good luck waking up at four in the morning after drinking a load of wine, stumbling through a jibbing and jiving bus that feels like it is moving at 200 miles per hour, get to the bathroom after putting your hand on three peoples sleeping face’s, and try to take a piss with a boner. I invite you to imagine my position in the bathroom, trying not to fall in to the blue chemicals while still not peeing on the ceiling.

So I arrive in La Paz without a plan or reservation and walk down the hill from the bus station. La Paz is above 3,000 meters elevation (10k feet) and the sneaky altitude will smack you in the face the first opportunity it has. I parused the streets looking for gringos. I found two australian chaps who informed me that the whole world is staying at the Rover Hostel. To the rover hostel I went. An Irish run behemoth of a party hostel with everything you need to make sure you never need to experience any culture while staying in La Paz. English breakfasts, a tab system at the very happening bar, tour office downstairs, WIFI, and ATM not too far away. I paid my $5 bucks and signed up for the 16 person dorm for three nights. Sufficient time I thought to acclimate myself before climbing the mountain.

The first night I found myself involved in a giant gringo trap. The hostel gets everyone drunk with specials and happy hours and then says to everyone that there is a bus outside going to a rave with free entry. Alright!. We all pile into the bus that is ludicrously over capacitated and we are forced to sit four to a two person seat. We drive into the darkness singing songs and cracking jokes from our respective countries. At some point the bus jolts to a stop and we are informed that the bus has broken down. We all spill out through the windows and door to see a crippled looking wheel so I believed them. We were told we could walk the remainder to the rave. After our 30 minute walk, we arrive at the rave to see the measliest looking tent and maybe a dozen people. The music was bad but the drinks were cheap and our arrival brought a little life to this dead rave. That night four digital cameras were stolen, three phones, and two iPods, one of the cameras being mine. For that reason this travel blog will not be a photo blog and I am still waiting to receive photos from friends I made along the way. Despite the lost camera, I enjoyed myself until I wanted to leave. It was 7am and there was no bus. I waited on the road for a taxi that never came. I appeared to be in some remote looking valley with a few mud houses around and not much else. I joined a group of six who were all trying to get back to the city. At this point I felt like I had pneumonia as I did not have a sweater. A truck came down the road and pulled over and waved over to all of us to jump in the back. In the back of the truck sat five bolivians, one probably with my camera, a dirty looking gringo (me) who was uncontrollably shivering, and a giant generator that was not tied to the truck. The truck sped off down this valley at break neck speed as if the guy was not carrying a cargo of six people and a generator that was sliding around uncontrollably. My shivering from cold turned into shivering from fear as we sledded around turns and ran through stop signs. After 30 minutes, he dropped us off at a bus point, where I got in a communal bus, refused to pay, got dropped off about four kilometers from the hostel, and arrive at the hostel just in time for the continental breakfast. Day one in Bolivia.

The next day I set the plan in motion and signed up for the “mountain tour” which cost me about $100. It would have cost more but I lied and said I had years of mountain experience so they said I did not have to go the first day with the rest of the tour. This day is for learning how to use the ice axe and crampons and rope and in general to help acclimate you to the altitude. All of this I had no idea how to do nor was I acclimated, nor would I be after three days in La Paz. Everyone told me I needed two weeks in La Paz to acclimate. I used the excuse that I lived in Santiago and cycled so my heart was strong as a Bolivian llama. While I was in the tour office I decided I would spend the day before the mountain (tomorrow) riding a mountain bike on the World’s Most Dangerous road. Again I paid less than everyone else since I said I only needed the hard tail bike while the rest of the tour got the full suspension. The rest of day two was spent relaxing/recuperating and winning a quiz that got me a free t-shirt.

World’s Most Dangerous Road

For $40 you can rent a high quality mountain bike and descend 60 kilometers on a road that has claimed more lives than any other. The road gets it’s name from the fact that many a bus fell down it’s precariously steep 1,000 foot cliff edges, which meant that all the passengers died, which makes for high death counts. To ride a bike is relatively safe and there have only been 25 deaths in the last 15 years. 14 of those deaths were Israelis who apparently are unruly and uncontrollable. 17 of those deaths were females riding too slow, pfffff. You descend from 4400 meters to 1200 meters over the 60 kilometers going from treeless mountains to hot and humid jungle. The ride was a little slow for me but fantastic none the less and I highly recommend it. You conclude the ride at a remote little hotel with a buffet lunch and a clean pool and a three hour bus back to La Paz. Finished that day at a karaoke place where we received chants of “Grin-GO! Grin-GO!”

Huayna Potosi

The morning of the mountain had come. I was picked up early and taken to a place to get all the gear I would need which was pretty much everything. I was kitted out in a rush, nothing was explained to me, and then I was put into a car which drove me for two hours on a dirt road to a small little house where I was instructed to eat the chicken and rice and not ask questions. The whole time in the car I could see the mountain I was to climb the next day and it was maybe the most beautiful mountain I had ever seen. The weather was perfect and was to be perfect for this entire adventure including a full moon to come in handy during the night time climb.

After the chicken, I was introduced to my guide who spoke no english and used a mixed version of Spanish and some indigenous language I was not aware of. Neither of us learned the other’s name and we both called each other amigo. I was supposed to meet up with an Argentino who had paid the extra amount (normal amount) and was already up at base camp. I took what I hoped to be my final shit and headed up to base camp which was a 400 meter escalation and sat at 5100 meters. I found this initial portion easy, a little too easy, and in fact was pulling the guide up and offering to carry his bags in a sneaky form of mockery. I should not have done that.

Base camp is a rather large two story wooden cabin and two bathroom shacks that were not clean and did not smell good. The cabin was nestled on a ledge that overlooked the mountain range and the view was truly spectacular. Glaciers were slithering all around and clouds would sore right past your nose on their way to wherever it is that clouds go. The earth and rocks were painted by an army of painters who all had their own opinion of what brown was. And ever vigil above us, was the peak of Huayna Potosi in all her glory. The wooden interior to the cabin is covered with the signatures of all the peoples that made it up there. “Bob was here, and Jack was not. Ha.”, “If you have mind over matter, then nothing else matters.”, “MICK FROM IRELAND 2009!” The upstairs was one large room that we were to all sleep in that had one inch mattress’. Downstairs was a few tables, an area to put all our backpacks, and another sleeping area that looked much more comfortable but was reserved for the high paying customers.

It is amazing that a bunch of Bolivians hauled all the materials to build this large cabin. While I was there I watched a Bolivian sprint up about 250 meters of ice and rock to go help some italian one legged climber who was struggling to get down from that days group of climbers. I watched a 12 year old kid wrap a sheet around his back, load it up with two huge bottles of methane gas, and jog up the mountain to base camp, and he was wearing half destroyed sandals. My respect for the guides and their ability to do what they do several days a week grew rapidly as the hours of that first day passed by my slowly weakening eyes.

I arrived at base camp around 2pm to find there was already about 15 other people their with another five guides. Why I paid less to get to this point was becoming painfully obvious as my guide did not speak to me nor offer me any advice, food, and/or water. Everything I learned at this point was from listening to the other guides. The only thing he had told me was that the Argentino had stomach problems and would not be climbing with us and it was just me and him.

The argentine was a jolly chap who was as wide as he was tall. We had some great conversations and I wish he would have climbed with us but it was clear he was suffering when he would suddenly sprint to take a dump. He had brought enough gear to last three months alone on the mountain which came in very handy for me.

The other climbers were all playing some card game and all of them immediately bothered me. Not sure why. It might have been the one douchebag Irish guy and his incessant whining, but who knows. I avoided them and chose to stay outside and take in the grandeur and beauty around me and try out some meditation and a few lines of writing. While the group jammered on in the cabin apparently feeling no effects from the altitude, I was starting to get the first signs of altitude sickness. I shrugged them off at first and went inside for dinner at 5pm.

The plan of attack was to eat dinner at 5pm, go to bed at 6pm, wake up at 1am, eat breakfast, strap on your crampons and walk on a 50% slope for six hours to the summit about 900 vertical meters higher than we were, absorb what oxygen you can steal at the summit for 20 minutes, then descend back to the cabin in a two hour sprint of glory. Sounded brutal to me but no worse than 13,000 feet of climbing on the bicycle. Dinner started to be served and I watched the other groups scarf down their pasta and steaks. The argentine and I were getting anxious and when our guide finally arrived, I wanted to cry. He brought a bowl of rice, two spoon fulls of tuna, and a quarter of a tomato. I attempted to eat, but the stomach was not having it and the pains I was to suffer for the next six hours began. I told the argentine my head was starting to heart and he instantly ran up to his medicine cabinet he lugged up there and gave me four pills to remedy.  I drank a shit load of tea while I regretted the fact that I had forgot the chocolate and peanuts I had bought at the house below base camp. I knew I needed energy but I simply could not stomach the food.

Bed time! You ever try to go to bed at 6pm? Not easy. Especially when it is cold as hell, you are wearing every single layer of measly clothes you have, including a loaned jacket from the argentine, and theres 15 other people around all making noises. When everyone else is wearing a north face jacket, the sound of that material rubbing against itself, becomes internally murderous. I laid down on my mattress which was probably worse than the floor, and put my head phones on to listen to a little Rachmanimov to pump me up. Somehow, dude from Ireland is already sleeping and snoring… loudly. My stomach is twisting itself three times in my stomach and I have to constantly adjust my position to untwist it. The pain was agonizing and I hoped that it was just a giant fart bubble accumulating in my stomach that would eventually escape. I struggled to lick my lips they were so dry and I had only enough water for the climb so I decided to eat Carmex chapstick to lubricate them. I writhed in agony until about 12:15 am and then I lingered in some sort of mild dream state where I imagined I had harnessed the acclimated Bolivians and used them to make t-shirts that we sold to the climbers. No idea how to translate that dream. Then at 1am, four satellite synchronized watches all started blaring and the climb was on.

My breakfast was supposed to be a piece of bread. No butter, jam, or anything… just bread. Thanks amigo. I couldn’t eat it anyways and sucked down on some herbal tea. The stomach pains had gone for the most part thankfully. My guide seemed unconcerned with my lack of digestion and left me on my own to figure out how to put the harness on and the rest of my gear, which I had no idea. I was wearing four layers and found it hard to move properly but it was necessary in the cold that I am sure got colder as we ascended. My rented boots were enormous and I have no idea how I let this mistake happen at the rental place. With all my strength, I could not get these tight enough to not slip. Great. At some point, I appeared to be sufficiently ready and the guide tied a rope to me, and we headed to the start of the trail.

The start of the trail is a vertical ice wall. I have used crampons one other time in my life walking on a glacier in the south of Argentina but that was a joke. This was some serious shit and I began to feel that maybe I should not have lied about my experience on a mountain. I invented a way to put the crampons on to my over sized moon boots, turned on my way under powered head light, clapped my hands, and shouted “Hot Damn! Let’s do this.”

With crampons you can easily scale a vertical ice wall, to my shock, although my moon boots were slipping and sliding and I tried to ignore the images of blisters I would see in ten hours time. Walking at altitude of this nature forces you to breath heavy… always. Walking up a steep glacier with a way too short ice axe to stabilize you and a Bolivian mountain goat urging you to walk faster forces you to pant frantically… always. But I pushed on and felt good. We maintained a good pace and had distanced ourselves from the other groups who could only be seen behind us with their little head lights bobbing up and down. We would walk for a few minutes then would take 30 second breaks. Your steps are about eight inches and at some point I tried to do the math of how many I was to make that day but then my mind exploded and I gave up.

The guide I was pulling up the day before was now putting his hands on his hips and tsk tsk’ing me as my pace began to slow. “How long have we been walking?” I asked at one point, sure that we had at least reached the half way point. “One hour amigo.” I wanted to cry and it was the first of several times that day I wanted to give up. In general, I do not give up. Never. I had come a long way to be in this position and despite it’s sadomasochistic appearance, I had to complete my goal. But this shit was hard. Incredibly hard. Each step was like I had a small child hanging on to my leg. The mountain loomed tall over us the entire time and it was easy to think that we would never make. The thought of telling my girlfriend and friends, “Well, I was really close to the top. Pretty good huh?” ultimately kept me moving.

After four hours the groups had merged and our death march continued. There was no talking. There was no playful banter or funny games you play with someone who is attached to you by a rope. You stare at the ground trying not to fall over and trudge on hoping and wishing that at each turn you are to see a sign saying “Summit, 25 meters.” It never came.

After five hours my hip started to hurt and I demanded to take longer and longer breaks. My lack of food and energy was beginning to show itself in my poorly selected steps. I felt like a zombie and that was necessary as the rational Luke would have only gotten in the way at that point. But sometimes, life has a way of knowing these things and decided to try and help me out. We took a break and I slammed myself down on some ice and began my deep meditative breathing and then I saw it. The darkness was waning and we had the world’s best vantage point to witness the most beautiful sunrise I have ever seen in my life. We were well above a featureless cloud cover that was pierced by four other behemoth mountains in the distance. At the horizon was a giant red-orange ball propelling itself above the cloud cover casting it’s glow proudly over the clouds. The largest mountain top had developed a hat of clouds and was flashing lighting while the sun was doing it’s thing. The full moon could still be seen in the same visual. I panted frantically, but smiled enormously and determined that if I were to lose my legs right now, this would make the climb worth it despite what my friends and girlfriend would say to me.

The final 50 meters to the summit were brutal and by far the hardest. My boots were sliding out of control and I am pretty sure my guide pulled me up for the most part. The summit was not large and sat precariously over a 1000 foot vertical drop to one side. I hesitated to stand on the three meter square summit due to my wobbly nature. I had some Czech guy take a picture of me with his camera and stammered to him that I would find him and get that picture some day. I could have slept there all day after my night of no sleep and lack of nutrition but I had to go as other climbers were starting to fill up the summit. I had done it.

But now I had to get down and I was in no condition to walk, let alone descend this agro-crag. My self motivations previously were only thinking about the one way journey and it did not occur to me that I would need strength to go down. I was wrong. The guide at this point begins to yell at me and explain to me how I am putting him and myself in danger and that I should have eaten something. At this point the fart bubble I had felt the night before was beginning to release itself and I responded to him in loud splattery farts. These farts succumbed to intense pressure to take a shit and I began to weigh the consequences of taking a dump in my four layers of clothes. I told the guide basically to shut the fuck up, in Spanish, and explained that we had no options and I would just go slow. Every 40 steps or so I would have to stop and arch my back backwards to stop my ass from exploding with some Bolivian soup I ate three days ago. I complained to him that I needed to take a dump but he said I had to wait. Finally I gave up and untied the rope, walked 20 feet off the trail all the while rushing to pull off my multiple layers, sat down, and let out the best shit of my life. How I did not get any on my clothes I do not know but I will thank the mountain gods for that. The argentine and his polar sweater should also thank them.

The next two hours were rather uneventful and extremely painful on the blistered feet. I arrived at the cabin exhausted, beaten, and dissolved. The spirits of the other climbers were unusually high and I wish I could have joined them and thrown out some high fives, but I focused on removing my boots and laying down on some rocks. I shared my pains with the Argentine who was very supportive and in general, a great guy. Another 400 meter descent to the first camp, another two hour dirt car ride, and I was back in La Paz. High five Luke.

The Trip Home

I considered shacking up in the five star Hilton in La Paz for a night of recovery but instead opted to go to the bus station and get a 14 hour bus to Potosi to walk around in a mine and try and blow up some dynamite. The dynamite didn’t happen but a few hours hunched over in a mine being the translator for a Japanese guy was pretty fun. Bolivians work in that mine for about $6 a day hauling about ten tons of material ea day, each of them! There is at least one accident every day at that mine which I was not a part of thankfully. The spanish had come there 500 years earlier to force the indians to live in the mine for six months without leaving. When the Indians decided to not work, the Spanish went to Africa to bring in some strong black guys to do the work. They all died after three weeks due to altitude and not being as storng as they looked, poor bastards, and the solution was to build devil figures in the mine and tell the indians that if they did not work, the devils would do bad to them. This worked.

I arrived in Potosi at 6am, left the mine at 12 noon, and decided in a fit of love and passion to make the journey to see my girlfriend in La Serena Chile for a romantic beach holiday in our own private beach house. This journey involved a six hour bus to Oruro Bolivia where you never want to be unless you like watching 34 dogs rampage a town where the entire population is a taxi driver. From Oruro I took a 10 hour bus to Iquique Chile. From Iquique I finished my journey with an 18 hour bus to La Serena to be greeted by the very welcoming arms of my girlfriend.

The weekend with her was amazing and made the lengthy bus journeys a vague and distant memory. Punto del Churo is a must do for anyone visiting Chile. be sure to bring food any money before arrival.

One more nine hour bus ride to Santiago and I was home again. New stamp in the passport and one more box checked off on the list of life I call Luke.

This page puts it rather well … http://www.break.com/index/ipecac-vomit-prank.html

My University was 140 kilometers from my parents house. Just the right distance. Far enough to feel independent, but close enough to beg for money or eat a few meals. One trip home I found myself scrummaging through the bathroom and I came across one of those things that every single child dreams about. There it was, underneath the sink, nestled inbetween the broken hair dryer and a two foot tall can of hair spray my mom was still milking from her days in the 80′s, was a small glass container no bigger than my thumb in the shape of a milk bottle. There was a thin dirty gray label and whatever was inside might as well have been glowing green as far as I was concerned. I delicately took the bottle out of it’s dark murky cave to have a closer look. The label was hard to read and I had to really rub hard to remove the gray gunk. Underneath was no more than a few words. Some company name, a date from the 70′s, and the word “Ipecac”. I removed the cap with a great twist and inside was an odorless clear liquid and the cap had an eye dropper attached to it. I had struck gold, I had no clue what I had found but I knew that it was awesome.

“Dad, what is Ipecac?” I queried to which he dryly responded, “It makes you vomit.” to which I wetly grinned.

From Wikipedia…

The actions of Ipecac are mainly those of its major alkaloids, emetine (methylcephaeline) and cephaeline. They both act locally by irritating the gastricmucosa and centrally by stimulating the medullary chemoreceptor trigger zone to induce vomiting.

The commercial preparation of ipecac consists of 1/14 of fluedextractum of ipecac root. The rest is composed of glycerin and sugar syrup. Ipecac root itself is a poison but due to the normal strengths used and the inability of the patient to keep the solution ingested it is seldom fatal.

I grew up in Simi Valley, CA, USA. Third safest city in America with a population over 100,000 for years on end. The single republican/conservative city in Ventura County. Haven for retired CIA, FBI, and police officers. Famous for housing Charles Manson and hosting the Rodney King trial due to the lack of blacks that live in Simi Valley. Of my graduating class of 471, I would estimate about 50 immediately went off to find further education, myself included. This latter statistic gave myself a slightly higher respect level when I would return to Simi Valley for a weekend galavant away from my studious University activities. Although I’m not an egoist, it was time to put this fact to use.

Two years out of high school and the house parties had not changed. Someone’s parents were out of town and a few phone calls later and a train of cars about 14 long was formed that descended upon a usually quiet neighborhood. The crowd was the same and the conversations were the same. My position in the party was the same, n the backyard drinking a beer like the guys in King of the Hill and still scared to talk to girls. The fact that I despised the static nature of Simi Valley and it’s inhabitants did not matter at this point as I was carefully selecting my target.

I did not know what would happen or how I would do this. I figured I would put a few drops of Ipecac in someones drink. I would pick someone shamelessly hitting on a girl, they would take a drink, say a few words, then yak all over the girls chest. She would look at him, he would look at her, she would say “Ewwwwww!”, another girl watching would see this and then start throwing up herself, and then another, and another, and I would stand in the middle of this vomit world I had created with both my hands stretched into the air with my head tilted back as I let out demonic laughter as the camera zoomed out from directly above me spinning counter clockwise.

But I did not want to be so obvious so I changed my tactic to maybe the craftiest strategy that I have ever conjured. I chose Grant as my target. Grant was a pleasant guy for the most part and him and I never had any problems. Really, he did not deserve the Ipecac and the only thing I could slight him for was his sometimes overly rude methods with the ladies. It was this fault that I chose to exploit.

“Hey Grant.”… “Ya not bad.”… “UCI… it’s like UCLA but with more computers.”… “Nah, I am playing soccer like six hours a day so I don’t got time for them.”… “Listen, Grant, I want to show you something. Check this out.”… “What’s Ipecac? You’ve never heard of it?”… “Dude, this is the world’s most potent aphrodisiac and male enhancing herb.”… “Dude, I swear. I tried this the other night with HUGE success.”… “Dude. I’m not lying. Just a few drops should be enough.”… “Sure man, give it a try.”

That was the jist of the conversation. It actually took quite a lot of convincing but my sales techniques were on top form that night. I even had a crowd of his friends around me inspecting the bottle, smelling it, shaking it, and everything else. It wasn’t to hard to make the sell as they were all rip roaring drunk and I was relatively sober. I explained that he would take a drink and a few minutes later he would have an uncontrollable urge in his pants and he would notice that every girl around him was ten times more attractive. He would feel like he was exploding out of his pants and his presence near the ladies would excite them. The effects would start only minutes after taking the liquid. In the end Grant was pumped and chugged from the little bottle with vigor. He reported to the curious crowd that it didn’t really taste of much.

After a few minutes Grant reported that he was feeling a very strong sensation in his pants. He would make this face like there was a rodent running around in his underwear, and he liked it. He would start gyrating his hips saying the whole time, “Ya. Yaaa. OOO I like this.” He then started hitting on every girl in the party. He moved quick and fast from group to group. His hips never stopped moving and he looked like he couldn’t control his actions.  All his friends were in shock and disbelief. They looked at me and all I could do was respond with a “Told you so” shrug of the shoulders. They pleaded to have some but I said there was not much left and I was saving it. Grant was now removing his shirt and becoming quite obnoxious with his new found sexual prowess. He reported that his whole body was feeling tingly and he couldn’t control himself. I could not have planned for his actions nor could they have been more perfect. Grant was virtually absolving me of any wrong doing with his attempts at being cool in front of his friends.

Twenty minutes went by and Grant started to slow down. He maintained that his body was tingling all over but it was not an erotic feeling. His friends were giving him a hard time for drinking too much as his face grimaced and contorted in discomfort. “Grant, your fucking up big time man. Your wasting the Ipecac.” He slowly wandered to the front of the house and away from the party. I began to feel bad but I did not want to show too much emotion or risk revealing the truth to my actions. The night passed and the party faded and Grant vomited alone in the bushes. When the witnesses had left I sat with Grant trying to console him making sure he knew he drank too much but also just to give him someone to feel bad with.

Grant became just a fleeting moment in the minds of everyone there that night and I am sure no one remembers what Ipecac is or that it was used by Grant. It was funny and Grant made it funnier with his outlandish sexual response. But this is not to be repeated and Grant, I am sorry. You were arbitrarily chosen to be the butt of a cruel joke and I hope you can forgive me. It’s only slightly poisonous and it’s actually an anti-poison, so in some ways, I was trying to help you.