Awful Monkey

Well, I'm back on island, if you didn't know already. It's nice to be home and back in a primarily English speaking area. It's odd how welcome a "Hello, how are you today" is instead of hearing "Buenos dias, Senor. Como esta?" and having to scramble quickly to think of how to properly reply. Granted, this patrol did help me brush up on my Spanish speaking, but it's nice to just be able to mumble out some common English phrase and not give it a second thought.

I still have not felt much like writing lately. Sometimes words just don't need to be said, and I just feel content sitting out on my lanai reading a book. I've been on "stand-down" for the past week and basically been quite busy running catch-up errands since my return. I paid off my car, I filed my taxes, I replaced my saltwater drenched phone, and I got that blasted Mini Cooper out of my parking space(I'm glad that chapter is finally closed). So all my ducks are now in a row and I feel like I accomplished quite a bit in my "down time". So how did I reward myself? I bought yet another bass guitar! After much shopping around(every store on island, and reading review sites for a week), I decided upon a Epiphone Les Paul Stanard. Yes, it's the economical line of Gibsons, but it received excellent reviews and I got an amazing deal on it.....and it also looked very cool. I will post pictures once it arrives. In order to justify the purchase of another bass though, I have also dedicated quite a bit more time to getting better at playing. I have bought a few books, videos, and CDs to help me in learning technique and reading music, and have been spending a few hours a day practicing. So far I haven't really tackled those aides though, and have resorted to learning tabs for several of my favorite bass lines. You have to start somewhere, right?

I figured in order to write this update tonight, I would need to post a story. What better story than something that is terribly embarassing and I'd rather just as soon forget about? This last patrol I had started the habit of staying up very late and waking up early in the morning. I guess my exercise routine I had implemented had really improved my energy levels; especially compared to the summer patrol. One night I decided it would be wise to drink a Red Bull, some coffee, and a Full Throttle right before going to bed(I really need to lay off the energy drinks). I don't know if these necessarily factored into what happened that night, but I would wager that they did have some effect. I went to my rack around 1 AM and promptly fell asleep. About an hour and a half later I'm having a very strange dream. I dreamt I was doing some mechanical work underneath some sort of vehicle and was angry because no one was assisting me and I kept having to slide out from under the vehicle to retrieve my tools. While I'm stewing over the predicament I notice that the vehicle is slowly lowering on top of me. I guess the jack had released, and there was no stopping it. Oddly enough I'm positioned against a wall and unable to escape quickly because it is lowering at an angle. Sorry if I'm not painting a vivid picture but piecing together a dream, especially one that happened weeks ago, can be difficult. Anyway, I start pushing against the vehicle but it's to no avail and it just keeps getting lower and lower and begins crushing me as I struggle to ward off the inevitable. While this is going on it goes pitch black and I'm futilely screaming for help as I know I'm doomed and fully engulfed by this massive weight. Then a voice "Bill! Are you alright! What the hell is going on?" As I'm drug from my rack and thrown into the walkway of the birthing area and I stand bolt upright only wearing my boxers with a dazed, yet very alert look on my face. Apparently I had been beating quite fervently on the rack above me and pushing frantically to try to escape my impending doom. Oh, and the screaming and yelling in the dream? Yeah, I was actually shouting all this at the top of my lungs in the berthing area at 2:30 in the morning. I was yelling so loud I was actually hoarse the next day. I woke everyone with frantic screams for help and banging on the rack above me. The person above me had thought that his rack had collapsed on top of me and that I was trapped/smothered because apparently he had just at that moment jumped in his rack to go to sleep. He and I had a good laugh about it and went back to our racks. Needless to say I got made fun of for the next few days because of my "Night Terrors." That rack is the perfect environment for that exact nightmare. Pitch dark, very confined space, ceiling merely 2 feet above me. I couldn't have hoped for a better position to have the wits scared out of me.

And that's ONE of my embarassing patrol stories. Oh, by the way, that quote in the topic is from Stranger Than Fiction. This is an excellent movie that comes out on DVD Tuesday.

Posted by xKinetiCx at 08:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I haven't updated the site in a while for a number of reasons. One, because this patrol has had me rather busy. Two, I just haven’t felt much like writing. I've felt rather worn out lately; unable to form coherent enough thoughts to warrant writing them down. As I've said before, I keep drama out of my life, but my life is constantly surrounded by drama. There has been so much silly, pitiful, high school like drama happening onboard lately, and somehow I seem to get dragged into the middle of it. It makes me feel like the innocent bystander that catches a stray bullet. Granted, I’m usually a mediator or a shoulder to cry on, but even that can take its toll on a person. In the end, it has left me too drained to really say anything of worth on here.

This has been a very long patrol. The departure from Honolulu two months prior seems like a lifetime ago. We were talking about it the other day how the three day break we had back in Honolulu a while back seems like an entirely different patrol since we have been out here for so long. I know, I know, this is a reasonably short patrol, but there are certain factors that occurred that have exacerbated matters. Needless to say, I am very ready to return home and begin my very, very busy inport(many schools, many projects, and little time to do them).

Anyway, enough with my complaining. I'm not depressed or melancholy, or anything of the like, I'm just tired and wanted to explain my reluctance or inability to update as of late.

Most recently I visited Golfito, Costa Rica. It was definitely a ray of sunshine in this rather bleak patrol. It felt like I took a vacation to a tropical resort, which is hard to fathom considering I live on Oahu. But it was definitely a very welcome retreat. Golfito has been my favorite port call this patrol, and I think I accredit that to the fact that I played this port call right, unlike the others. On the recommendation of a friend, I checked into a certain hotel. This was the key point to my relaxation. I stayed at the Banana Bay Hotel, which is owned by two retired Coasties that actually served onboard the CGC RUSH. This place was exactly what I was looking for. It only had four rooms, which were all rented by crew from the CGC RUSH(crew that I didn't see the majority of the time I was there, which was key). There was a bar, full service restaurant, and a jacuzzi. I ate almost every meal there, relaxed in the air conditioned room(Golfito was excessively hot), chilled in the Jacuzzi, and spent my nights at the marginally attended bar(that is to say there weren’t 100 drunken sailors around pissing me off). My days were spent exploring. Those that know me, know that I like to walk around a new place I'm visiting for many miles on end. I probably walked well over 50 miles in the four days I spent in Golfito. I saw many sites, visited many shops, and just tried to take in as much of the culture as I could. I certainly look forward to visiting Golfito again in the future and just having a very relaxing time.

The only real “event” that occurred while I was in Golfito was a community relations project….that went terribly wrong. Those that know me know that I'm rather particular about doing volunteer work. But, the First Class Mess onboard decided to coordinate doing some volunteer work for the community while we were in Golfito, and I certainly wasn't going to be the only one not participating. Well, we gathered many volunteers and had many projects ready to go, but then one of the heaviest rainstorms I've ever seen decided to drop in on Golfito that day. So they loaded MY group into a pickup truck(I'll emphasize that my group was the ONLY group that actually headed out that day), and they drove us to another city up in the hills about an hour away. When we arrived we ended up picking up garbage along a strip of road and ended up looking like a prison chain gang. The people were very appreciative of the help we provided, but it wasn't exactly what I expected because we were originally going to help do some renovations on an elementary school. I did my work, but I felt a little bitter in the end. I guess I just felt that our time could have been spent better elsewhere.

Well, it's only a few more days till I'm back home and can start unwinding from this patrol. I actually miss my little apartment; my tiny fortress of solitude. I'll work on posting some pictures from the trip, but as I've mentioned before, it takes quite a while for me to upload them all while I’m still at sea.

My refuge	First Class Pizza Night	Pulling into lovely Golfito
Costa Rican CG Academy	Relaxing after a long hike	The view from the bar
Relaxing get-away hotel	The view from outside my room	Downtown Golfito Street
Rusty old locomotive	Community relations team	Workin' hard

Posted by xKinetiCx at 05:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)