Hey Merran Owen!!

ps

sorry that's my only digital pic of you and your birthday was on the 23rd, but happy bday anyway! shout out to the prairie.

THIS IS IT! for now

Hey dudes.
I am back in boston and things are a little nuts
so you can count on more Boston it Up DELIGHT!! early September. and it's going to be delightful!, so, as Yoda always says, HOLD ONTO YOUR BUTTS!

peace out
no doubt
ben stout

Top 5 Mysteries of Mexico

5. No Catcalls
(as opposed to constant harrassment in the other countries I've visited)
4. Refridgeration?!!
they have refridgerators, why don't they use them? I don't get it.
3. Horrible/complete lack of Water Pressure
Like, showering in a trickle and flushing 3 times (everytime) to get everything down. I don't know, this is pretty typical for outside of the US, so I guess the real mystery is Why is the US's water pressure so good...?
2. People who actually understand my Spanish (sometimes)
I always feel like I'm getting away with some kind of deception, like a kid making up a fake language, like it's always shocking when people can actually understand and give an appropriate response (and then sometimes I understand THEM and it's crazy!!)
1. Where are all the Burros??!!!!!

this silly little story about my soup

A quick one. Back in Cuernavaca (I'm in Taxco now, which is so much better) it was always such a pain trying to get food. Well I had spent a whole day climbing up and around these pyramids on just the 2/3 of a mango that Fanny, my 80 yearold landlady, always gives me in the morning. When I finally got back to town (after waiting 2 hours for a bus that supposedly runs every half hour) it was late enough that I had to hurry and take my minibus home where there are lots and lots of cheesy ceramic animal shops, but not a lot foodwise. I was so exhausted, but I was also so hungry I kind of slumped around town looking for food. Finally I found a restaurant open and I was so happy. I sat down and they handed me a menu and since I didn't understand any of it I just pointed to something and hoped for the best.
So the waitress brought me a bowl of basically hot chicken water with a few sad carrot slices and cilantro leaves. At the point I started to wonder if maybe I had ordered a meal, like the people next to me and like I've had before here--where they give you little courses and soup is the first course. Afterall I think I pointed to something on the menu involving chicken and surely that meant whatever it was had to actually have some chicken in it. So my dilemma was do I eat all my soup and lots of the free tortillas, assuming this will be my only meal, or do I just eat a little and hope this is only the first course. (You would think I had another option, which is try and figure it all out with the waitress, but my exhaustion and the 80mph spanish of the waitress at this point wouldn't let me).
In the end that sad soup was the only thing I got and if I had known I would have at least eaten all my free tortillas.
That's the whole story. I think Pat and I had very similar experience one hungry, and frustrating, night in Zanzibar. Yeah for world travel and confusion.

Bob Esponja

is Spongebob Squarepants in Spanish

SONETO XLIV

Sabrás que no te amo y que te amo
puesto que de dos modos es la vida,
la palabra es un ala del silencio,
el fuego tiene una mitad de frío.

Yo te amo para comenzar a amarte,
para recomenzar el infinito
y para no dejar de amarte nunca:
por eso no te amo todavía.

Te amo y no te amo como si tuviera
en mis manos las llaves de la dicha
y un incierto destino desdichado.

Mi amor tiene dos vidas para armarte.
Por eso te amo cuando no te amo
y por eso te amo cuando te amo.

Pablo Neruda