Santo Do-Mango

I like to consider myself an very environmentally friendly person. I recycle, I always attempt to pick up any trash that I happen to find strewn about. When diving I always gather up any fishing line I find wrapped around coral, or plastic on the reef. So it comes as a big surprise to me, that I was very nearly arrested and locked up abroad...for littering.

It happened in 2009 when I was living in the Dominican Republic. Some friends of mine and I decided to make the 4 hour drive to the capital city Santo Domingo to do some shopping. Taking along our Dominican friend Claudio for protection and his native knowledge of the country, we loaded up on snacks, beers, tunes, and headed out on our adventure.

The first leg of our journey passed uneventfully, we ate our snacks and drank our beers as we cruised across the countryside. Now I'm not sure about the entire country, but from what I experienced, the DR doesn't have any real trash collection system to speak of. Trash is piled up and burned sporadically, or just dumped here or there along the road. Being the Green Eco Friendly person I am, I collected the bottles and bags of chips to throw away when we got back to a gas station, or restaurant or something. Meanwhile, my friends shook their heads at my naiveté and continued to whip their empties out the window. 

When we reached Santo Domingo we did our shopping and were cruising around when we noticed a guy selling mangoes on the side of the road. Claudio pulled up and asked the guy how much they cost. 100 pesos for 10.  That's about $3 for 10 enormous, fresh, juicy, mangoes. We bought all he had and made him go get more.

So the backseat full of mangoes, and us tearing happily away at the bright orange flesh, juice dripping down our cheeks we proceeded to head home. Having earlier found something that resembled a trashcan, I had thrown away my bag of garbage. And after asking Claudio what I should do with my mango peel, he responded, "throw it out the damn window already!"

Seeing as how it was a mango peel and easily biodegradable, I lowered my window and dropped a piece of mango peel onto the street below.

That was about 30 seconds before 2 Dominican motorcycle police pulled up beside us and began banging on my window.

Claudio cursed and lowered the window only to leave me face to face with two irate dominicans screaming at me in rapid spanish. 

My spanish officially having fled in my terror, Claudio took over trying to talk to the police. 
 Here is a translated breakdown on their conversation:

Claudio: I'M SORRY! I'M SORRY!..what did she do?

Police: THIS GIRL IS THROWING GARBAGE ALL OVER THE STREET! WE CAN TAKE HER TO JAIL FOR THAT!

Claudio: I'm sorry! She's Canadian...she doesn't know any better!

Me: but i'm Ameri-

Claudio (to me, in english): SHUT UP!

Police: she wouldn't do that in her own country! what makes you think it's ok for her to do it here?!

Claudio: I'm very sorry, it won't happen again! She knows now.

Police: she is going to have to pay a fine!

Claudio ( to me)  : give me 1000 pesos! hurry! 
(to the police) Here you go... see, no problem. *smiles*

Police: *taking the money and pocketing it while glaring at me* Ok. go away now. 

Claudio wasted no time in getting us the hell out of there. About a mile down the road my friend Julia (who spent the whole morning whipping waterbottles onto the street) turned around and in hysterical laughter sputters out, "you just got publicly flogged for littering a mango peel!!!!!!" 

I failed to see the humor. 

As we left the city, we passed the penitentiary. Laughing, Claudio turned to me and asked, "you sure you no wanna go to to the jail?"

Looking at all the razor wire and armed guards, I'd never been so sure of anything in my life.

Rhythm of the night

While I was going to culinary school in Chicago I had the unique opportunity to visit Paris, France. What started as an offhand comment about sunglasses soon turned into a very expensive "learning opportunity". It started when Farra and I were in the library at school, she mentioned that her designer sunglasses were broken and she needed to get a new pair. When I suggested that she go downtown and get some new ones, she looked at me like I'd proposed the preposterous. "My love…you cannot get these sunglasses just ANYWHERE, they are from Paris!"
Now Farra is a short little Filipino firecracker of a woman. Her English is that of someone whom I imagine spent a great deal of time watching American infomercials and QVC as a child, interspersed with exclamations like, "But wait! There's MORE!" and other overly enthusiastic comments about everyday items, "Try this Biscotti, it's EXTRAORDINARY! Hurry this offer won't last long!" Farra could usually be found wearing some sort of high end fashion, at least higher end than whatever I could dig out of the bargain bin at Rag-o-rama, so if she says these sunglasses can only be found in Paris…I'll take her word for it.
"Well then, we'll just have to fly to Paris and get some more," I told her. Turning to our friend Noelle sitting behind us, "Hey Farra and I are going to Paris to buy sunglasses…wanna get in on this?" I joked.
But the joke was on me; Farra went home and talked to a travel agent and came to school the next day with a quote. "My love, I found us a trip to Paris over spring break for the great price of $900, WHAT A DEAL!"
Now to me, a deal is getting a dented can of corn at the grocery store for half off, or haggling down the price of some pots and pans at a yard sale to somewhere under a dollar….$900 was not a deal to me. To my broke and starving 19 year old self, $900 was a fortune….but being an American I have a credit card and an incredibly impulsive personality, so I was actually considering it.
Word spread quickly that we were going to France, and we soon had several people interested in going with us. One morning as I was headed to class I was stopped by one of my instructors, apparently she had spoken to the President of Le Cordon Bleu-Paris and had gotten the ok for us to sit in on some classes. It was the opening I needed. I suddenly had a legitimate reason to go to Paris, and I could use my recently won scholarship money to do so. I called Farra and let her know I was in, we were going to Paris.
Reservations were made, bags were packed, and a few weeks later we were in Paris. Now I wish it had been the learning experience I'd hoped it would be…however I spent most of my trip drinking wine, and eating bread and wandering around Paris without any particular destination in mind. I also fought with the other girls fairly frequently as we could never agree on what we wanted to do or where we wanted to eat. But one thing we did agree on is that we wanted to party, and Farra wanted to go clubbing.
Being the mastermind of our trip to Paris, Farra was put in charge of finding us a club to go to. She told us of this very posh club she had heard about and off we went. On the way we stopped at a bar for a few pre club cocktails. Getting our 19 year old drink on, we proceeded to act ridiculous. Linking straws together we attempted to make an elaborate SUPER STRAW, the drunker we got, the more outrageous our behavior.

Feeling adequately liquored up we decided to head to this "Posh Club" Farra had been talking about nonstop for the past week.
After procuring directions we made our way to the nightclub, or Discotheque as they are referred to in Europe. My first inclination that something was amiss was when we arrived at the club and there was no line. We could hear music blasting from within and were met by a bouncer at the door. He told us it would cost 20 Euros to enter….
Eff that. With the current exchange rate €20 was around $35 USD. No freaking way. So as we decided to split, he stopped us. "10 Euro and free drink!"
That should have been my second clue; no "posh club" I've ever heard of haggles the cover charge…but we decided to go for it.
We followed the thumping music down a hallway to where the club opened up into a lounge area.
It was DESERTED.
Well not completely, there was what appeared to be a homeless person, and apparently a transvestite grooving on the dance floor. Other than that, we were the only patrons.
We burst out laughing.
"Well it is a Wednesday…." Farra stated as we took in the emptiness.
We laughed harder, and then proceeded to get our free drinks. I ordered a rhum coke and was given a tumbler full of cheap spiced rum with the smallest splash of coke inside. It was terrible.

 Below is a picture of the empty club.

Soon enough the homeless man took notice of the 5 American girls huddled in a booth and began to accost us. Grinding on our table and beckoning us towards the dance floor he proceeded to spend the next 45 min chasing us around the bar. If one of us got up to go to the bathroom, there he was. We soon adopted the buddy system and after that proved futile we abandoned the club entirely.
We pounced on Farra, who defended her choice of venue emphatically. "We should have gone on a weekend! It would be much better on a weekend!"
We decided to head back to the bar we were originally at, and after a couple rounds of drinks we were informed that some gentlemen across the bar would like to offer us some drinks. We accepted whole heartedly.
Soon after that we were told that our presence was required at the bar, where we were to do shots. Again, we acquiesced.
Liquors were poured and shots were downed, one after the other. Rainbow shots, taste of hell, and soon absinthe.
"AMERICAN GIRLS DANCE ON THE BAR!"
And we did.
Drinks in hand we danced on the bar, like a less sexy version of coyote ugly.

And on it continued.
Somewhere around 3 we were informed that the bar was closing…but the American girls could stay.
They kicked out the other patrons, with the exception of the men who had bought us drinks, and locked the doors. We didn't find anything wrong with this situation….at least not immediately.
The party was in full swing and the drinks were flowing. We were on spring break in Paris!
I'd slowed down considerably after they'd locked us in and about an hour later conscious thought began to reform. What the hell were we doing?
It was about this time we got our bar tab from the bartender.
€400!
Ashen faced, I handed the tab to my friends. Eyes bugged out as we whispered to each other at our inability to pay such a high bill….
One my my friends, who shall remain nameless, solved this problem. She grabbed one of the guys and proceeded to make out with him. Another girl followed suit. Soon they were pulling wads of cash out of their pockets and were paying for our bill. The bartender unlocked the door and we were free.
Out into the streets of Paris we stumbled, followed by a group of French men. As my friends untangled themselves from these men, we attempted to flee back to our hotel. Clearly they had other things in mind.
"No, we go back to hotel!"
"American girls come home with us!"
"NOOO go away"
Begging, the men followed after us as we stumbled towards to hotel.
In desperation we began to insult them, batting them away like stray dogs trying to follow us home.
Finally, they gave up and we were free.
Into the hostel we tumbled. The clocks reading somewhere around 5 am.
Our flight home was at 11 am
Alarms were set, and we passed out for our nap.
I have never had a worse flight anywhere than the flight home from Paris. Groggy, hungover, reeking of booze and cigarette smoke.
But I have also never had as much fun at a bar as I did that night.
Yes, I realize that our behavior was stupid and dangerous…but that's part of what made it so much fun. These are the shoulda coulda woulda experiences people are always telling me to seize. It was my one and only college spring break, but it will remain embedded in my mind forever….what I can remember of it at least.

Lessons in Parallel Parking, with Reggie the Homeless Vendor

Before I begin I'd like to apologize to my mother, who also reads this blog. I realize that the events that are about to follow are the results of my deliberate disobedience. Sorry.

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It astounds me how many extremely stupid and dangerous situations I've put myself in, and yet escaped unscathed. Looking back on them I shake my head, and have to laugh at my level of ignorance and disregard for my own safety. I like to treat each of these as life lessons in the school of hard knocks; I mean there's nothing like a little blind terror to hammer the point home.

One of these such occasions occurred in the Fall of 2005. I was in my junior year of High School and had just received my driver's license, I had my own car, and life was pretty good. For the most part, I was a very responsible young woman. I Worked 2 part time jobs, got good grades, I didn't do drugs or party…..I was pretty lame. There are of course a few exceptions, most of which have their own stories which will be told in due time. But the big one, the one that I look back on in such amazement, was the night I learned to parallel park.

I'm not sure how many of you are familiar with St Louis, but it is home to 2 of the greatest things in the world, The first is CITY MUSEUM. Easily my favorite place on earth; an ex shoe factory turned playground. From basement to rooftop this building has been transformed into a fantastical world of caverns and forests, ball pits and tunnels, slides, ferris wheels, circuses, aquariums, and more. This ever expanding, always changing fantasy land is made of recycled materials, and is open till the wee hours of the morning so red faces children and adults alike can run and jump and sweat and fall and laugh the night away.

My second favorite place in St Louis is Mauritzio's Pizza. There isn't much reason for this restaurant to be my favorite; in fact the average person would walk in, take a look around and deem it, to be quite frank, a shit hole. But despite the dark and dingy interior, the pizza is just the way I like it, a good New York style pie in a city that for some reason prefers their pizza served on crackers. It's down the street from city museum, and it's open all the time.

At the time of this particular adventure I'd been to both City Museum and Mauritzio's pizza exactly once; having never driven to either, but having been completely blown away by both. I craved the adventure of city museum, the wonders to be marveled at, the fun to be had, and being the foodie I am I yearned for a hot slice of a good pizza. Now realizing that there was no way in hell my parents would allow me to drive to St. Louis city on a Friday night, my best friend and I concocted a plan….

I realize now that there was a good reason my parents would not want me driving to St Louis City on a Friday night, the city is a hodgepodge of one way streets alternating between numbers and names, the traffic is unpredictable, the locals…unsavory. To those of you that don't know, St Louis is to this day one of the most dangerous cities in America, and in 2005 was deemed by MSNBC, THE MOST DANGEROUS CITY IN AMERICA! I'm not lying, look it up. So it's not really all that hard to understand why they wouldn't want an inexperienced 17 year old driver gallivanting around. But I was 17 and I was master of my universe and I knew everything about everything, and my best friend and I wanted to go to St Louis so goddamnit we were going to St Louis.

It started with the age old switcheroo; I told my parents I was spending the night at her house, she told hers that she'd be at mine. Classic. Foolproof. We then decided that we'd use her car, since mine was a 1992 Plymouth Acclaim and hers was slightly less god awful. It was also decided that since I am fearless I'd be the driver and she would be my copilot. Such plans we had. We then took off around dark to experience the wonders of St Louis City.

I see now that this plan was doomed from the start; in 2005 neither of us had GPS, or google powered smart phones, all we had was a vague sense of direction and a lingering recollection of the last time we'd been to the city. Neither of us could remember the cross streets of our intended destinations and had no idea how to navigate the endless one way streets. We spent hours going the wrong way down the wrong streets trying to get to City Museum, which we could see thanks to the huge school bus perched on the top of the building. Finally we arrived, paid for parking in the secure lot, and proceeded to spend the next few hours having fun.

When hunger pains finally started to make themselves known, we abandoned the relative safety of city museum for food. Bypassing the closer food options that surrounded City Museum, and the pizza restaurant that is actually INSIDE, we took off for "that one pizza restaurant we went to that one time".

Now it is very easy to get to Mauritzio's from CM on foot, you just go down and over a few blocks and you are there. It is much harder to get there by car, especially when you don't know the cross streets, the name of the restaurant, or which road is one way or two way. Also it helps to know how to parallel park, since you know…almost ALL of the parking in STL is parallel.

But since we aren't STUPID we weren't about to walk around the city at night by ourselves. We'd just figure it out as we went along.

Hours wasted driving the wrong way around the city- Take 2!

Officially lost, but in the general area of the restaurant, we decided to park and commence the rest of the adventure on foot. The problem being I had never parallel parked a car before. I'd seen it done a few times but I'd never attempted it and I'd certainly never attempted to do it in my best friend's car. But seeing how no problem is insurmountable I gave it my best. Over. And over. And over. I was beginning to draw a crowd. Namely an older bedraggled looking African American fellow. After my 15^th or maybe 16^th attempt to get this car into the space he approached my window.

I rolled it down just a crack.

He stuck his whole face in the crack of my window and proceeded to tell me I was doing it all wrong. Followed by how to do it right.

"Now back it up there sweetheart! Yeah, that's right. Now yous needs to get this ting in front of the space….so bring it forwards a bit. Uh huh now bring your wheel allll the way to the left….NO MORE! Ok yeah just like that. Now back it up juss a bit, and start turning your wheel back around. more more HARD RIGHT! Ok. Good. Now forward. Straighten it out there sugar. Ok. Back just a bit. You got this shit!"

A flawless parallel park job.

Hesitant to get out of the car, but desperate to get where we were going I rolled the window down a bit more and asked him, "Hey, we're trying to find a pizza place around here…you happen to know where one might be?"

He scratched is scruff in consideration for a moment then responded, "Muh muh muh- MAURITZIOS!!!!!"

I looked at my friend and we burst out into shouts of glee, "YES! That's the place! Where is it?"

"it ain't far" he replied, "I can take ya there if ya want. My name is Reggie, I'm a homeless vendor for the city of St Louis." He told me as he shoved a laminated permit badge in through the window, followed by his whole hand for me to shake.

I shook his hand and gave him back his badge. Then with a look at my friend climbed out of the car.

"Don't forget to lock the door there honey," he reminded me as we shut the doors, "Now follow me".

AND WE DID.

Down the block, and into an alley we followed this homeless vendor, at two in the morning we followed him into the dark heart of St Louis. This is the point where I realized how incredibly stupid I was. This is also the point where I realized I was likely going to get mugged, or worse. The panic began to well inside of me. I looked to my friend, she seemed unconcerned. I know now she was terrified, but she hid it well.

Through a dark alley Reggie led us, then up another block and there we were. Mauritzios Pizza. Brightly lit, crowded, Mauritzios Pizza. I breathed a sigh of relief.

"Ok ladiesss, now as I was sayin, I am a homeless vendor. I am homeless not helpless, now I'm selling these here magazines and if you could find it in your hearts to help me out as I helped you out tonight, I'd be greatly appreciatin that."

And there I go nodding along, so happy to be alive that I just whip out my wallet, full of money, and give him $5.

Out of nowhere appears some other "homeless vendor" right next to me. He gets right in my face and asks, "Can I has some money too?!"

Terrified and ready to be done with this whole mess I shove a couple dollars at him, thank Reggie and bolt into the restaurant.

Where my friend and I proceed to break down.

Hands shaking, in panicked voices, we freak out. And then marvel that we are still alive, with most of our money, at the restaurant and not in some gutter somewhere. We order a pizza, scarf it down, and haul ass back to the car. The whole ride home laughing at our stupidity, and marveling at our luck. We decide that since we are the luckiest girls in the world we should buy some scratch off Lotto Tickets; my friend buys them and proceeds to win $2, we are the luckiest girls in the world. Except now it is 4 am, and we have nowhere to go since both our parents believe we are at each other's house. So we head to an older friend's apartment, and after waking him up and telling him all about our near death experience, pass out on the couch. Happy to be alive.

 

To this day I am an excellent parallel parker, and I guess I have Reggie to thank for that. And for you know…not raping me.

 

 

 

 

Late night visitor

It was 2009 and I was living in Punta Cana, working as a Pastry Chef at Club Med.  Since most Americans have no clue what Club Med is and think it’s some kind of health club, let me give you the cliff’s notes. 

Mega Million dollar all inclusive resort chain. French. Veeerry French. Free Booze.  Party. Tons of behind the scenes bullshit. There’s something like 80 different resorts in 30 different countries…

Anyhoo, like I said, at this point I was serving my time in the Dominican Republic, working from 7am till 11pm daily in the bakery. Needless to say, my fellow employees and I liked to throw back a few beers after work and unwind before the next 16 hour day. 

On this particular night I was staying out later than usual, I’d had quite a few drinks and the party was actually pretty fun for once. Around 3 am it started raining and I stumbled back to my room in the employee housing area to pass out.

Allow me to take a moment to describe the fabulous employee housing.

Loft style dormitory, 2 single units each share a bathroom and a shower. So you enter through the front door into a small entry way leading to the toilet and shower area, and then a door leading to each room. Inside each room is a small sink and vanity, a desk, and a cubby shelf along the wall to stuff your clothes in all willy nilly. Along the opposite wall there is a stair case leading up to a small balcony with just enough space for a twin bed. Now I cannot tell you how many times that I accidentally locked myself in that damn hallway after a shower, see the doors locked automatically , and if you didn’t prop it open with something you were left naked in this little hallway with 3 options. Go outside in your altogether and find a housekeeper to let you back in, scream bloody murder till another employee heard you, took pity and got you a key, or kick down the door. I usually opted for the 2^nd option but after a while you just say fuck it….

I digress….

So I stumble home in the rain, toss my makeshift poncho into the trashcan,  take out my contacts, turn out the lights, and climb up and into my bed. Instantly falling asleep.  

I wake up to my lights on…. Odd.  The switch is downstairs and I am upstairs, and while I am still feeling drunk…I am pretty sure I turned them off.  Whatever. 

*Rustle rustle….crinkle crinkle…rustle*

Someone is in my room…..

Now my first thought I have to admit was not intruder. My first guess was that I had overslept and the weekly housekeeper was in my room.  That was until I squinted to see the bedside clock…….. 3:45 AM

WTF!

At this point I have gathered that there is no cleaning lady merely tidying up my space. There is somebody in my room. I lean over the balcony ledge but can’t see anyone, but I can hear them; and whoever it is, is directly below me and screwing around with my safe.  So what do I do? I yell, “HEY!”

LIGHTS OUT

*SLAM* (bedroom door) 

*SLAM* (entryway door)

I fly down the stairs, prop open my door, and rush outside into the pitch darkness only to see NOTHING. Not only am I completely blind without my glasses or contacts, but it’s the middle of the night and dark as hell.  

I return to my room.  My vanity is open, some of my clothes are strewn about, the trashcan had in front of my safe is knocked over and my still wet poncho is on the floor.  Someone was going through my shit. 

I call reception and ask the concierge if he’d given anyone the spare key to my room; he claims he hasn’t and nobody’s been to reception all night. I tell him that someone was just in my room and I’d like him to send security.

That’s when I notice my laptop is gone.

My laptop. My link to the outside world, to civilization. My portfolio, my pictures,  my recipes….GONE. 

I call reception back. 

“MY LAPTOP HAS BEEN STOLEN! SEND ME SECURITY NOW!”

At this point I decide to take inventory; missing from inside my open vanity cabinet: my anti malaria pills that I never remembered to take, some midol, and a cheap water resistant watch from Walmart. My clothes had obviously been rifled through but nothing appeared to be missing and I scooped them up and shoved them back in the cubby. Luckily it appeared as if the safe wasn’t opened because my passport and assorted Dominican Pesos are all still intact. 

Where the hell is security?! 

I call reception and demand to know what’s taking so long, he informs me that security is on their way and to be patient. He actually told me to be patient.

This is when I decide to call my mother at 3 AM her time, in hysterics, telling her I’ve been robbed….not my smartest move, but what can I say, I was upset.  Just as I finish dropping this bomb on her, security rolls up and I tell her I gotta go, that I’ll call her back.

Security consists of 2 bleary eyed Dominicans; who clearly do not have the patience required to deal with a hysterical American white girl. They tell me to write down what was taken, and to go to the chief of security in the morning to file a report.

I am not okay with this option and I let them know this. I am expecting a full scale search and recovery, complete with fingerprint dust and dogs, and tactical units.  They tell me that there is nothing they can do, but will post someone outside my door for the rest of the night.

I am furious.

There is no way I will be sleeping in that room. I’ve just lost the most expensive thing I own, my space has been violated, and they just want me to go back to bed and sleep. Yeah right.

I go for a walk. 

I sit on the beach for a bit, seething.

I watch the sunrise over the ocean, something I’d been meaning to do but could never wake up early enough for.

It is now after 6 and I decide to head back and get ready for work. Instead of taking the long way through the resort I decide to cut between the tennis courts and through the woods that leads to the employee housing. It’s a bit muddy from the rain but for some reason I take this path.

 I’m about halfway there when I notice something on the ground. It’s a tanktop, and it’s bone dry. 

AND IT’S MINE!

I’m instantly alert. I drop into a crouch and I look around me.  Just at the edge of the woods there is a guy, he’s walking along and carrying a small black laptop bag, ducking under branches and heading towards the road.

It is at this point I would like to stop and admit that here is where something in me snapped. That self-preservation thing most people have…well mine is broken.  What I’m about to do, I do not recommend doing. Especially if you are a 19 year old woman.

I grab the biggest rock I can find, I slide it into the tank top I just picked up, twist it into a nice little weapon and I tear off into the woods screaming at the top of my lungs.

Upon seeing this wild eyed, blonde, crazy person  stampeding thorough the bush just after dawn; the guy calmly sets the laptop down behind a tree and walks up to me.

“que pasa chica?”

Now up to this point I’d have to say my grasp of the Spanish language was tenuous at best. Oh sure, I’d taken 4 years of honors Spanish in highschool, but in practical application, I’d struggled.

Not anymore.

Suddenly I’m fluent, I’m screaming at this guy in rapid fire Spanish. Calling him a thief and a sonofabitch and every other dirty word I’d learned in the kitchen from the Dominicans. I grab my laptop from behind the tree and continue to scream at him. He’s clearly uncomfortable with the situation.

Here is this crazy white girl, screaming obscenities, wielding a makeshift blackjack, and stealing back his stolen property.

I tell him to wait right here!

I run back to employee housing where there is a security guard sleeping in front of my room.

“I FOUND THE THIEF! HE’S IN THE WOODS AND I GOT MY LAPTOP BACK AND HE’S OVER THERE! YOU HAVE TO GO ARREST HIM HURRY!!!!!”

*blink* blink*

Ah yes…language barrier.

<insert choppier version of previous statement in crappy Spanish>

Finally I give up and grab his hand and run back to where the thief was.

HE’S STILL THERE! Waiting, just like I told him to. 

The guard, now catching on a little, radios to his buddies telling them to come to where we are. They arrive and ask him what’s going on. He claims he found this laptop and was going to return it to reception…

My ass.

For some reason security finds this an acceptable answer and tells me to go back to reception and talk to the hotel manager.

The hotel manager tells me that an investigation has been launched and everything will be figured out, to go back to work and not worry about a thing.

Feeling pretty smug with myself, I call my mother back and tell her my story. She’s floored.  Her 19 year old daughter confronted a burglar in the woods with a rock and got back her stuff…..

My story spread around the resort fairly quickly. Reactions tended to go one of two ways; either I was a badass hero, or I was a liar. Whatever, screw those nonbelievers.

About a week had passed since the incident, and all was back to normal. I was in the bakery and happened to look out the window. There was a guy scaling the side of the building carrying a tool bag. I nearly dropped my muffins. It was the same guy who took my laptop!

So I start freaking out, and the other bakers come over to see what’s going on. Turns out the guy is the maintenance man. Maintenance…who has the master key to every room, and every safe.

Turns out he’s not fired.

Turns out, I’m livid.

I head directly to the hotel manager’s office and demand to know why this guy is still working for the hotel when I caught him red handed with my stolen property.

I’m informed that since I didn’t see the burglar in my room, and only found him with my laptop hours later, they gave him the benefit of the doubt.

Hey guess what, where I come from, if you are found hours after a car is stolen with that car…you stole the damn car. Guilty. Do not pass go, do not collect $200.

I was shocked; they seriously let him off scott free.  And here I am still missing random bits of crap from my room. The injustice.

For months I had to see his stupid face. Every time something broke and needed a repair, every night at dinner, all over the resort, there he was. Every time I saw him I gave him the stink eye; and not just my regular stink eye, but my special one…you know the one I reserve for republicans and people who abuse small animals…yeah, that one. Well he got it. Every single day.

The thing was, people began to side with him, they said I was being irrational by holding this grudge against the guy, like he was some poor misunderstood fella. The other pastry chef actually told me that, “He’s a good man, he’s got a family” like nobody with a family had ever stolen anything.  What a load.

In the end I got my comeuppance; a few months after my laptop was stolen this same guy was caught on video stuffing clothes from the boutique down his pants.  Suddenly everyone knew that he was a bad apple and that whole thing with the pastry chef’s laptop…well he should have been fired then, no second chances.

 He was shipped back to Mexico the next day; likely with my 30m water resistant $12 Walmart watch in his bag for his beloved family….but whatever, i'm over it.

Milk Shake

I've decided not to post my stories in any particular or chronological order. I think a flip book of my life makes things a little bit more interesting to the reader and therefore more unpredictable, much like myself.
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I must have been around 12 years old at the time; my family was living in Southern Illinois in a house out in the country. Directly in front of my house there was a small fenced in pasture with an extremely steep hill leading up to the neighbors house and their barn. The neighbor would let his cows out to graze and they would occasionally scale this mega hill to get to the pasture at the bottom. Of course there was a much less steep way to get to the bottom of the hill and the cows did have the option of taking the long way around, but just like humans I suppose there are impatient and lazy cows that rather than take a longer, safer, route will attempt something much more dangerous for the sake of saving a few minutes.

So, it was the Summer of 99 or thereabouts and I was sitting outside on the front porch muching on some chicken nuggets and french fries, drinking fruit punch and just enjoying being outside on a nice summer day. There were a few cows down in the pasture already, and I could see more coming along the fence line and down  another hill up the street a bit. So as I sat there looking at the cows and eating nuggets I noticed another cow up at the top of the very steep hill directly in front of me. Now, like I said, this was unusual since most cows didn't go down this hill since it is so steep. I decided to see how this was going to play out.

It didn't take long before the cow, having gone 1/3 of the way down the hill realized that this was likely a bad route to take, the ground was gravelly and loose and he was sliding quite a bit trying to find traction for his hooves.  I sat in rapture watching this cow, having attempted to sled down this hill the winter prior, I knew what he was in for but could only watch and wait.

Deciding that at this point he was committed to his path, the cow gave up any attempt to go back up the way he'd come and just went for it.  He started down at a jaunty pace and for a moment I thought he was going to make it all the way down without incident. But things did not go so well for the cow. Being the huge, lumbering, top heavy beast he was, he inevitably stumbled in the loose, gravelly dirt.

Gravity did the rest.

Down he went. Attempting the entire time to regain his footing; the cow barrel rolled down the rest of the hill. Mooing frantically, eyes bugging out, he tumbled. And I watched, chicken nugget halfway to my mouth, I sat there mesmerized as this animal rolled down a hill in front of me. It all lasted maybe 3 seconds before he was at the bottom of the hill. He lay there for a moment, dazed, before gingerly standing back up, looking around at the other cows, and then slowly lumbering off towards a tuft of grass.

I don't think I have ever laughed so hard. I sat there, lunch forgotten, and laughed, tears streaming down my face. "I saw that!!!!" I yelled at the cow. But neither he nor the other cows paid me any attention, and I soon realized that nobody but me had seen what had transpired, and sadly, nobody would ever quite understand or really believe me when I told them what happened.

But to this day, even though he is likely a frozen burger patty at this point; I give props to that cow for having the balls to take that hill. For standing up and brushing himself off while someone laughed at him, and for moving on to his intended goal.