Procrastinet

OH, Long Johnson...

filed under: Stuff to laugh at

I almost never, ever say this. But seriously: LOL.

"Oh my dog. Oh Long John. Oh Long Johnson. Oh Don Piano. Why I Eyes Ya. All the Live Long Day."

Trip Report: Tulum, Mexico - Day 2

filed under: Stuff you never, ever needed to know

Max woke up at 6am, just as dawn was starting to peek up over the ocean. It was hazy, with low clouds at the horizon, so no spectacular sunrise, just a gradual brightening and the occasional peek of a blood red disc of sun. We made our way down to the beach and let Mommy sleep a little bit more.

A guy from the cabanas next door, with an impressive, almost Sikh-like beard, came out swathed in a white gauzy robe, sporting an iPod, and meditated while chanting fervently. I wonder how Max’s cries of delight as he started to play in the waves affected the yogi’s meditative state.

I later christened him “the Naked Yogi” when he finished meditating, stripped naked (nice even tan, for a yogi), and run into the surf.

One of the two resident dogs at Hamaca Loca turned out to be an avid early-morning crab hunter, digging furiously until she unearthed one and then snapping at it. The crabs, to their credit, all seemed up for the fight, and gave as good as they got. Eventually, their stoic self-defense would win her over, and she'd mosey off to dig up another while they frantically re-buried themselves:

We futzed around on the beach for an hour or so, then headed out to find breakfast. I decided we should try the “bargainous” Trecelunas.

(notice in the picture above that Mommy is pulling a "don't you dare!" face at the boy, who got a little cranky over his toast)

The breakfast was tasty, if not particularly large portions, and at 80 pesos (~$8) didn’t seem as bargainous as I’d hoped. But the coffee was strong and, once I got the young waiter’s attention, plentiful. I found myself anxious about time, which is a bad idea in a Tulum restaurant, because I wanted to get to the ruins before the buses arrived, and somehow it was already 10:30am (we ran up to the San Francisco to get more pesos before breakfast).

We got to the ruins later than I’d hoped, and there were already four or five buses in the parking lot, and then killed some time wandering the shops at the entrance, where I immediately fell in love with a panama hat (I’m a sucker for grandpa hats). The guy wanted 300 pesos (~$30) which for some reason I balked at. I took Max to the bathroom, with the guy following me the whole way, pointing to other shops and other hats that he represented. On the way back, I stopped to ask if he would “bajar un poco el precio.”

He made a face at me. I suggested, perhaps, “doscientos cinquenta.” He rolled his eyes.

“Because,” he said, crossing himself, “you is my first sale, dos ochenta.”

Lisa came to see how I was doing. “Doscientos ochenta,” I said. She made a face.

“I think I’m okay,” I told the guy, giving him back the hat again, and he looked like I’d kicked his abuela. We walked away.

“Hey!” he called as I got twenty feet away. He waved me back, grudgingly, and looked around as if he was making sure nobody was watching. He clearly wanted me to believe he was giving me an embarrassingly good deal. “I do what you say. Dos cinquenta. Because,” he crossed himself again, “you my first sale today.”

I walked away absurdly happy with my new hat, and absurdly proud at having haggled extensively just to save a whole $5.

(entering the ruins in my new grandpa hat)

(to carry the boy on my shoulders I had to switch back to the Yankees hat)

With the boy along I knew a tour guide would be a waste of money, as we’d spend the whole time wrangling a bored child. Sure enough, he was pretty much a stinkerpants the whole time, and we sort of grumped through the somewhat-crowded ruins. They seemed to be the usual history-tourism combination of amazing and a little boring. After about a half hour, we headed down for the beach.

The beach at the ruins is awe-inspiring, even when clotted with daytrippers. Big limestone formations, beautiful water, cliffs with ruins hanging above – just amazing. It would have been even better if I’d thought to put on my d*mn bathing suit, but there you go.

After an hour or so on the beach, we went back up to the ruins, continuing a feud with our son who insisted on screaming for the opposite of whatever it was we happened to be doing. Finally we headed for the parking lot, stopping to pick up two sorely needed ice cold Cokes from a guy with a cart. When we got to the entrance compound, we discovered a troupe of Mayan dancers getting ready to do the falling-from-the-pole thing I’d seen pictures of. I was so happy to catch it that I gave them the full $10 they requested when they came around passing a hat.

It was really heating up as we headed towards 1pm, so we went back to the cabana to get out of the worst of the heat and relax a little bit.

We wanted to go to Maya Grill for lunch, but it had a sign up saying it was closed (I think for a private event, though it was closed again the next day). A rope was across the entrance, and a uniformed guard waved us on. We were getting perilously close to the cranky level of hunger, but I pushed on a ways up the north beach road, looking for Don Cafetos. The other option was Que Fresco! at Zama’s, which for some reason I had a bias against.

Just as I had given up and agreed to turn around, we got to Don Cafetos. We took a seat all the way on the beach side of the big dining area and ordered the massive margaritas.

They dropped off the salsa and chips, and the bowl of hot veggies and peppers which somehow, despite all of the reading about the various restaurants I’d done, was a surprise to me. It was terrific – hot carrots and potatoes, assorted peppers, and a clove of garlic, all in a spiced oil with cinnamon sticks broken up in it. Fantastic.

I nibbled the corner of one of the peppers, and it seemed innocuous. So I bit off the end. About ten seconds later, I was on my way to deeply unhappy.

I covered my tongue with sugar and then, as one does, convinced my wife to take a bite.

Lunch was great – I had the chicken fajitas:

She had the Mexican Platter, with two enchiladas, two quesadillas, a chile relleno and two rolled fried something-or-others:

Max had the fries. An American kid all the way, our kid. Then he hid under the table.

After lunch, we went down to the big beach there (I’m sure the point has a name, but I’ve been referring to it as “the beach at Don Cafetos”). VERY wide, beautiful beach, which seemed popular among locals. Lots of fishing boats and activity. Worth spending some time on, but my itinerary had us pushing on to Akumal for some snorkeling, so we just took a quick look and headed out.

The drive to Akumal was uneventful, and let us get used to driving the Jeep with the top down (very windy at 100kph!). We parked at Lol-Ha, identified the patch of beach that appears on the locogringo webcam, and rented masks.

Part of my running theme of leaving everything useful behind on this trip (not on purpose, but remarkably thorough): our masks and snorkels, unused since our honeymoon in 2000, were in my mother-in-law’s garage. By the time we realized that, it was too late to go get them. I also left behind our Can-Do Riviera Maya map, my Yucatan Guidebook, the printouts of our car rental and cabana reservations, and our JetBlue itinerary. And then Lisa left the Mexican Spanish Phrasebook on the plane on the flight down. Sigh.

Anyway, I forged out into the choppy water looking for the brilliant snorkeling of Akumal. But I had trouble with the scale of the maps I had seen, and saw nothing but empty sea grass. I came back in and tried somewhere else. Still nothing. The guy at the rental shop had suggested in front of the soccer field at Akumal Beach Club, so I tried there, and resolved to keep going out until I found something interesting.

As I headed for open water, all alone in choppy seas, a fishing boat buzzed past about 30 feet in front of me. I turned back.

Halfway back to shore, I said, possibly aloud, “no g*d d*amnit I’m going to find something” and turned back to the bay. After about five minutes of dogged swimming over barren sea grass, I suddenly soared out over an astounding reef, choked with fish.

The waves were so choppy that there was sand in the water, and the sky was partly cloudy, and the mask was stinky and cheap, but it was still breathtaking. I can only imagine what it must be like under better conditions. Really amazing.

I swam back in to let Lisa have her turn and take my turn on kid duty, where he was in this kind of mood:

In the meantime, I heard a guy nearby talking about where to see turtles, and asked him. He gave me directions and waxed stoner-excited about the experience (“Dude! One was, like, THIS BIG. It was AMAZING. You’ve totally got to go…”). So when Lisa came back I headed where he had pointed.

On the way out I eyed the darkening sky back west of us. The weather reports before our trip had indicated thunder storms on Saturday, and the sky was bruising up pretty good. I hurried out, but as I got most of the way there I turned back to see that the black clouds were right over the beach, and the wind was kicking up. So I reluctantly gave up on the turtles and hurried back in.

I got the Jeep covered and we got all the way back to Tulum, the clouds creeping south and east as we went. We were back in the cabana maybe two minutes when a massive thunderstorm rolled in. The soaking rain made a couple of drips through the thatched roof, but not too badly.

We waited it out, then headed out for dinner around 8:30 or 9pm. Max fell asleep in the car, and when we got to Vita e Bella for dinner he stayed asleep.

Dinner at Vita e Bella was somewhat disappointing, despite the lovely atmosphere – the bacon in my penne with bacon and pecorino hadn’t been cooked before going into the sauce, so it was essentially penne with boiled bacon. Eesh. Great drinks, though, and beautiful grounds.

A good, full, second day, especially once I got over the feeling that there were things we had to get done. It’s hard to remember to be on vacation when you’re on vacation.

The Wednesday Night Ambush - An Insta-Primer

filed under: Stuff to be pissed off about

UPDATE: "I decided I couldn't stay, if the Administration was going to engage in conduct that the Department of Justice had decided had no legal basis." - James Comey, 5/15/07, talking about his decision to resign his position as Deputy Attorney General after the Administration renewed approval for domestic wiretaps despite the Department of Justice's refusal to sign off on the program's legality.

Let's make this very clear: the program was illegal. The Department of Justice told the Administration the program was illegal. The Administration CONTINUED the program. The actions involved were felonies.

Cut. Print. That's a f*cking wrap.

More, though, SO much more than the details laid out below, you have to see this man's testimony to get the feeling of what happened. Please, please set aside 20 minutes, and go to the YouTube site here. It is absolutely chilling.

Comey, John Ashcroft, FBI Director Mueller, and Solicitor General Ted Olson clearly believed that their actions that night were in urgent defense of the United States. Against the administration that still holds the Executive branch of our government, including our current Attorney General.

Also: perj has, as requested, added details about the "Ambush" itself, in the comments.

Okay. Read on.

This is a quick and dirty guide, so some details may later need to be corrected - but here is a handy bar-talk cheat sheet for the current storm brewing for the Administration. It hasn't yet fully broken open in the mainstream, but I think it will, so I wanted to do my little bit to help.

- After 9/11, the administration began warrantless domestic wiretaps, including on US citizens, which is illegal

- John Ashcroft, relying on a legal justification memo by the DoJ's John Yoo, approved the program in secret

- He renewed that approval every 45 days for 2 years

- After 2 years, Yoo left and was replaced with (also conservative) James Comey and Jack Goldsmith, who took a closer look at what Ashcroft had been signing off on

- Comey and Goldsmith FREAKED, concluding that, contrary to Yoo's assurances, the wiretap program was manifestly illegal

- Let's repeat that - the program was feloniously, unconstituionally ILLEGAL

- Comey and Goldsmith sat Ashcroft down and walked him through the issue. Ashcroft freaked

- All three told the administration they would no longer sign off on the program. The administration insisted. The men - INCLUDING JOHN ASHCROFT - threatened to RESIGN if forced to approve the program

- The program, still under the last 45-day approval, CONTINUED - despite the stated opinion of the entire upper ranks of the DoJ, including the AG, that it was manifestly illegal

- Ashcroft entered the hospital for dangerous pancreas surgery. Comey was covering his duties as Attorney General. Comey refused to sign the approval, which was due (the 45 days was up)

- Andy Card and Alberto Gonzales were dispatched to Ashcroft's HOSPITAL ROOM to get his signature on the approval (the "Wednesday Night Ambush")

- Card and Gonzales were intercepted as the DoJ rushed themselves AND THE FBI to Ashcroft's hospital room to bar their entry (I'm hazy on these details - perj, if you're reading, can you fill in?)

- The approval unsigned, the program lapsed briefly, before being re-authorized on slightly more restrictive grounds

- The new restrictions included a clause that tapping was allowable PROVIDED one of the participants in the conversation was speculated to be a member of or affiliated with Al Qaeda. Clearly, this limitation was NOT in the original, 2 year long program of domestic spying

- Comey has now testified that the DoJ had grave reservations not only about the legality of the program, but about whether the Executive Branch was even telling them the truth about the scope

In the aftermath of the Comey testimony, the Washington Post has begun consciously using Watergate-esque language in their editorial page, asking pointedly "What Did Bush Know, And When"?

Stay tuned. And spread the word.

Trip Report: Tulum, Mexico - Day 1

filed under: Stuff you never, ever needed to know

I expected to pop out of bed as soon as the alarm went off at 5am, with the excitement of an impending vacation. But the alarm found me groggy and almost unable to move. I trudged out to get the car, double parked and came in to haul Max out of bed, still asleep and whimpering. He balanced precariously at the toilet and asked to go back to bed. “Okay,” I said, “but we’re going to get in the car first…” Still bleary, his eyes mostly closed, he smiled. “Mystery vacation!” he said.

I tried not to tell the family where we were going on our “Mystery Vacation,” though it had slipped to Lisa two days earlier that we were going to Mexico. Max was still surprised, for what it was worth, and Lisa didn’t know we were going to Tulum – she just knew it was “one of those eco-things.”

Max is in love with the AirTrain to JFK. I swear it’s his favorite part of the trip.

Everything was smooth through check-in, but the flight left about an hour late after congestion on the runways. The flight was uneventful, with Max peacefully watching television (bless you, JetBlue).

We were coming in to land, the jungle about 1000 feet below us and the crew in their “prepare for landing” positions, when suddenly the engines screamed back to life and the plane banked up as sharply as it would go. The whole plane took a collective deep breath as we pulled slowly back up into the sky, turning sharply as we went, the engines howling. “Um…” I said to Lisa.

Eventually we leveled off and the captain came on. “Sorry about that folks, someone… um… hit a bird down there, and they’re cleaning off the runway. We figured we’d… wait until it was clean and then come in and try again…” At this point I saw a plume of smoke coming from the jungle near the airport, and worried in the back of my head that whoever “hit a bird” hadn’t made it back into the air.

Okay, so maybe I worried that in the front of my head. Whatever. I wasn’t scared. Okay, yes, it was scary.

So then we landed safely, got through immigration and customs without any hitch, met our America Car Rental rep outside, and were in the van to the office in no time.

The guys at America were great, and the two timeshare guys hanging out at the office (who were flacking a new resort pretty darn hard) were very friendly, and pushy in an easily resistible way. One of the guys had lived for a long time in South Philly, and missed the cheese steaks. Go figure.

(picture with our Jeep, the next day. Yes, I'm aware how pudgy I look.)

We jumped in the red Jeep, got the directions (which I didn’t really need, as it’s basically “turn right on 307, go to Tulum”), told the timeshare guys no three or eight more times, and headed for the Pemex to fill up. Lisa got snacks at the 7-11 (classy and local, right? What can I say, we were hungry – and at least the jamon y queso was on a tortilla…) and we got on the road.

Next stop was an hour and a half later at the San Francisco De Asis supermarket, for beer, ice, a Styrofoam cooler, limes, and a knife to cut them with. I went in while the fam stayed in the car, and was pleased to successfully air my sub-gradeschool Spanish. “Hielo?” I said to the cashier, remembering that one word from somewhere, and then followed his pointing until I found somebody to give me some. The cashier looked about 15. Actually, everyone who worked at the Super looked about 15, or younger.

All the way down the beach road, I kept shouting out the names of the restaurants and cabanas we were passing, because after a month of obsessive reading of tulum.info I felt like they were all old friends. The weather was great, the topes were bumpy, the Jeep was rattly, and we couldn’t stop grinning.

I thought Hamaca Loca was right next door to Dos Ceibas, so I was confused when we went four or five doors past without seeing it. But there it was, just as the southern beach road bends around to the left. We pulled onto the lovely, narrow grounds and parked on the sand.

A guy named Claudio came out to greet us. Claudio is magnificently friendly and speaks almost no English. We established that we spoke very little Spanish (I get by on words strung together, Lisa does better as she at least studied it in school), and after that we mostly just smiled at each other a lot. He helped us carry our bags to the cabana, gave us the key, waved happily, and went away.

“Um… don’t we have to… necessito registrar?” I ventured. This confused Claudio. “Never mind,” I said, and he beamed and disappeared.

Hamaca Loca is that kind of place. If you met some folks while backpacking, and they offered to put you up if you ever came through Tulum because they had a nice guesthouse, it would feel much the same as staying at HL. It’s beyond laid back. It was Sunday night before anyone thought to ask us to pay.

Oddly, the hamacas at Hamaca Loca (“Crazy Hammock”) were pretty tatty – the multi-colored one was torn down the middle with one useable side, and the green one was coming unraveled but had a one-foot-wide section that you could balance on. “These hamacas,” I announced to the family, “sure are loca.” What can I say. I’m a wit.

Priorities: cerveza y playa.

I didn’t know how Max would take to the beach, as in the past he’s been too little and too afraid of the waves. This time, after some hesitation, he fell madly in love with it. The sand, the waves, the clear water, he loved it all.

As the picture caption reads on Flickr, the rules to Max’s new favorite game, Throw Sand at the Ocean, are as follows:

(1) pick up handfuls of sand;
(2) shout;
(3) throw sand at the ocean;
(4) repeat for two hours.

The waves were just big enough to merit boogie boarding, so I went up to find Claudio and see if Hamaca Loca had any around. Claudio was sitting having a cigarette with a woman who also seemed to work/live there (whose name I never got, though we talked many times). Through her mangled English and my even more mangled Spanish, we communicated that yes, everything was just wonderful, yes we loved Tulum so far, and that according to her it was the most beautiful place in all of Mexico. “I believe,” says me, forgetting to add the “lo” in “yo lo creo…”

The whole time, already beach-drunk, I was grinning like a doofus.

So it turned out, to my disproportionate delight, that they did have a boogie board, and I went back to beach and splashed contentedly in the gentle waves for a while.

Now, we had set up a system to try to bribe Max into trying new things on vacation. He’s a boy who usually prefers the familiar, so we were apprehensive about his encounter with all things Mexico. By this system, if he tried nine new things, we’d buy him a tricycle (rank bribery is all that motivates him, what can I say, the kid’s a little capitalist).

I announced with great fanfare that being held in the waves counted as one, playing on his own in the surf counted as a second, and that if he would try boogie boarding that would be three already.

So out we went, the brave little tot clinging to the board.

We had a fun, gentle little ride on a wave or two:

And then Daddy lost hold of the board and the boy, who had in his not-yet-four-years of life never been totally submerged in water, slid off the front and was rolled by a wave. The water was crystal clear, and the image of his little pale body under six inches of water, his face squeezed shut in terror, will be with me forever. Good work, Daddy!

Obviously, he was fine, as I knew rationally he would be – it was just a good dunking, the surf was still gentle, and he kept his mouth shut and didn’t inhale any. He was crying when I pulled him out, and asked to go back to the cabana, and I thought maybe I’d spoiled the beach part of the beach vacation already.

But he bucked up and went right to playing in the waves. Brave little fellah.

Within our first twenty minutes at the beach we had another disaster in the making. I was holding Max in the waves, and decided to sit down in the shallow water with him in my lap so the surf could break right over us. Max was terrified but loved it. The second wave that came our way was bigger than I expected, and I had to life Max over my head while I took the brunt of it on my chest and face. The problem was, I hadn’t expected to be swimming yet, and still had my glasses on.

The wave took them off and swept them away.

Great, I’m thinking, Lisa doesn’t drive a stick, and now we have three more days of vacation with me 1/2 blind. “Take the kid! Take the kid! I have to find my glasses!” I shouted, and Lisa deposited him on the beach and came back out to help me look as I searched around on the sand in a foot or so of rolling water with my hands and feet. Nothing. More waves swept in, and still nothing.

Lisa walked quite calmly along the shore for about eight feet, then shouted “Ah-ha!” and came up with my glasses. Unbelievable. Good job, hon.

We headed up the beach to Dos Ceibas for dinner, arriving at 6:30pm. The one guy in the office seemed bemused to see us. “Cena?” we asked hopefully?

“Not yet, not yet,” he said “7:40. Come back 7:40.”

So we walked up the beach all the way to the Ana y Jose Beach Club (garishly lit, with uniformed guards at either side of the beach, and all in all entirely non-contextual, as we say in snotty Brooklyn circles), and all the way back, and managed to kill an hour of the intervening time. We passed several purple man-o-war-esque jellyfish, including one the size of my pinky that Max christened “CutiePie” and spent the whole walk back looking for. Alas, CutiePie had been swept away.

Dos Ceibas has a beautiful, candle-lit garden restaurant. Just smashing, and for the first half hour we had it all to ourselves. Mario, the all-around guy there, brought us our margaritas and took our orders: the grilled shrimp and calamari for Lisa, the fish fillet Tikil Kin (sp?) for me, and pizza for Max (thank heavens for pizza and fries, it kept the kid from starving). Plus a terrific guacamole and quesadilla appetizer that we utterly failed to get Max to try a bite of, even with attempted bribery.

Lisa’s grilled stuff was good, my fish was great (coconut sauce and spices, stuffed with grilled shrimp – just fantastic), the wall of candles-in-nooks was wonderfully romantic. Really couldn’t have been better.

Except when I decided to try a mojito for my second drink. It was a valiant effort on Mario’s part, with tons of fresh mint but not enough sugar, and ended up tasting like iced grass clippings. I was afraid if I didn’t drink it, Mario would think I couldn’t handle my liquor, though. So I surreptitiously poured about 1/2 of it out under the table. I’m classy like that.

Hey, at least it was a sand floor.

Back up the beach in the dark, and to bed for the whole family. Not the *best* night’s sleep I’ve ever had, as Max was restless and the quality of the Hamaca Loca mattresses is… um… not the best. Next time I would bring a battery powered fan, even if it was tiny, just to get some air moving. I got used to it for the next two nights, but that first night was fitful.

Still and all – with one day down of our four day insta-vacation (counting Friday and Monday as full days, which isn’t really accurate), we were having a delightful time.

Future Classics

filed under: Dadditudes

Max's imaginary life, while rich and detailed, makes disproportionate use of numbers and numbering systems. Recently, that manifested in his invention of an album, complete with track numbers and song names, for an imaginary band called "The B70s." He filled in eight or nine of the 20 tracks without any prompting (20 tracks, what is this a double album?) and with some nudging invented names for the rest. Here he is, working diligently at the list:

Herewith, the first album from The B70s:

1. Thrill
2. The B70s
3. Disappointing
4. Ball
5. 5180 (Fifty-one-hundred and eighty)
6. Blue Mark
7. So Blue
8. Big Big Big Big Avalanche
9. For You
10. 21st Century
11. Maricee Street
13. Choo Choo Choo
14. Sleepy Dream
15. Blue Mark (Reprise)
16. Me & You
17. Me & You (Reprise)
18. Clyde
19. Me
20. Ball (Reprise)

We have no idea where he picked up the concept of the Reprise, but he's evidently very fond of it.

w00t! Mini-Vacation!

filed under: Stuff you never, ever needed to know

That's my "ticker" from the message board where I've been fanatically researching our vacation destination this weekend. It's a trip that has been billed to the family only as "The Mystery Vacation," because I kept the location a secret.

Until two nights ago, when apropos of nothing, talking about something else, our conversation went like this:

Me: I can't believe I have to get a show open two weeks after we get back from Mexico.

Lisa: [sits up, blinks, stares at me]

Me: What? [realization] Aw, g*d d*mnit!

So now she knows we're going to Mexico. Flying into Cancun, but not staying there - renting a Jeep (which I'm unduly happy about) and driving elsewhere. And no, despite what the ticker says, it's not Playa del Carmen - that's just the website that hosts the ticker-maker.

Yes, so we're leaving the country tomorrow morning, returning Monday night. Short and sweet, just a chance to plonk down on the beach and complete the decompression that hasn't really had a chance to happen since the huzzurah of the Youngblood show in Feb/March and the end of Lisa's school term (in which she pulled not only a pure 4.0, but the top-of-class award! Way to go, hon, perfect game!)

And, hopefully, some actual Procrastinet posts will come of it...