Mom, FedEx my Levi´s!

and some chocolate chip cookies....

Well, Im currently shouting at you from Zapala, Argentina, which is the last major town before heading into the vast Patagonia country. I´ll fill you in on the ranch details after I cover the story of our passage thus far. First of all, we had some amazing accomodations on the first bus ride (11 hours). The seats practically folded into a twin bed and the food consisted of a tastly two course dinner, followed by coffee and cookies, and toppped with champagne right before they turned out the lights for the night driving portion. And we were awoken to a crossaint & coffee breakfast---all for $40 USD. The part that I lament is the fact that for here on out our quality of travel will be regressing drastically. I can already hear the torturous chicken bus rides in Bolivia calling my name. But for the moment, the luxury was nice (the U.S. Airlines could take a few notes). I had a very interesting Argentine sitting next to me, whose story included the fact (debateable) that he had developed a computer program that he sold to IBM for major bucks and know did not, and had no desire to work again at age 34.--jackass. The whole ride he was concerned about how he was not going to be able to smoke during the 11 hour ride. I half jokingly made the recommendation that he should go smoke in the bathroom on the bus--a suggestion he took not much later (hey, I may not be able to write a lucrative computer code but at least I think I got this guy on common sense). I told him about our plans to work on the ranch in Patagonia and he and Petro´s Argentine seatmate Lara, both had trouble grasping the reasoning behind it. Hey, we can´t win ´em all...
Tonight we are spending the night in Zapala and will be taking transport of some sort to the frontier town of El Hueco, where we will have to hike for a couple hours to reach the ranch. We just met with the owner of the place, who described the logistics of our existence on the ranch: hard work, isolated beauty, and a lot of goat and sheep eating with the gauchos, who will slaughter the animals on site at dinner when we are working with them in the mountains. We will have the weekends to ride horses, trek, camp, cry, whatever.
Supposedly, the use of spotty internet would be a several hour hike out of the ranch, which, as long as there is a reader I will try and make the journey on the weekends.

I´m all in,

Rusty Quarnstrom

Home on the Range

Immediately after the posting of my last blog, I received an email reply from a guy who runs a horse ranch in the southern Argentina Patagonia area. His reply was a response to an inquiry we sent about the chances of Petro and I finding work there. To paraphrase his reponse: "Yes, you two seem like the most naive boys I have ever heard of. Your trip is destined for disaster and your quest to work on a horse ranch with little prior experience is appalling. Can you start ASAP?" Of course, we said yes and now we are hours away from a three legged journey to get to this remote area called Colipilli. The work as been described as hard manual labor (what i went to college for) such as building fences and cabins. But we will be doing it by working and camping with the gauchos (Argentine cowboys) in the Andean mountains. Should quite an experience. The unfortunate part is that I will most likely be out of communique for most of the time (3 to 4 weeks). But we´ll see, I might be able to find a computer to fire off a blog on the weekends. Or I can dictate something for my sister Erin to write during her post-baby captivity.
Also, I´ll probably have an oppurtunity to update in a day or so the status of our journey getting there.

Our stay in Necochea/Quequen has turned out well (minus the weather). It has also been interesting being in such a populated tourist area with no other gringos in sight (our past two trips to the tourist office here has resulted in pictures being taken with us.) Just call us Johnny and Jimmy Popular.

Your indentured servant,
Brian

Red Lobster

For all those concerned, your pasty friend is no more. Enter the primary stage of bronzedom--a good old fashioned sun burn. No, I´m not at the level of hospitalization but the Argentine dinner table conversation probably went from "who´s that pasty boy" to "did you see that giant lobster crawl out of the sea today!"
Update on the previous night: Our "hotel" has turned out quite nice. We enjoyed our dinner last night in the "dining" room with other Argentine family vacationers. I am pretty sure they routinely made fun of our lack of spanish skills, but at least they pretended to appreciate that we were there. After dinner and our usual routine of two-man poker and drinks (scary side note: A bottle of vodka here is only $2 USD) we cruised the scene. What we stumbled upon is something to be greatly feared as a budget conscious backerpacker: a casino. Suffering from a hereditary weakness for games of chance that normally include losing vast sums of money while chasing fortunes, we decided not to even discuss what we could do with a quick win at the blackjack table. That moratorium on gambling talk was quickly forgotten and we were soon listening to the devil´s whisper (yeah Tiehens, you know what I mean by that) . "Lets just go and watch", we said, hopeing to do just that. It was by far the quietest casino I have ever been in and ever care to be in. Either no one was winning or Argentines have a unique approach to excitement because Petro and I could have had a conversation with each other from opposite sides of the room, which you can barely do shouting next to each other in U.S casinos. Our "watching" committment was quickly shattering when Petro impulsively threw down a 20 peso note (7 USD) on the roulette table. The dealer told us (in sign language) that you cannot just throw money down on a table, you need chips. We took that occurence as a sign that we should just leave the casino quickly, for if we somehow figured out the system of gambling in Argentine casinos, we would surely be doomed. We can´t even seem to win playing in casinos where the spoken language is english, so who knows what we were even thinking stepping into that place. But then again, a big blackjack win would do wonders for our trip...........

In a brief CNN.com perusual I noticed the actor Health Ledger died yesterday. With a presidential election coming up and the financial market crumbling, I have deemed celebrity news to be my number one priority--it keeps my cynicism from flaring up, which I think makes Petro want to smother me with a pillow at times.

Heading south tomorrow, not sure where but the sign on the bus we get on should indicate that for us.

Burnt is the new Tan,
Q

Beach Bummin....

Back at you here, now in a Daytona Beach-esque town called Necochea, which is about 7 hours south of B.A. After a night of flipflopping our next destination decision, we woke up trying to pursue a bus ticket to the beach towns Quequen/Necochea. We had heard about a great hostel in Quequen that we emailed the night before to reserve a bed there. At the bus station about 2 hours prior to departure, Petro informed me that he finally received a reply from the hostel owners saying they were booked through the middle of February (its summer vacation for Argentine families right now). And so with visions of street sleeping dancing in our heads, we departed toward the towns with little hope of finding accomodation. Soon to be a victim of spontaneity or a recipient of dumb luck, we were bestowed something in between when we found a campsite for cheap--if we possessed a tent (as of now we do not). We got fleeced with the tent rental as well as our location in the campsite (near a major road, which wouldn´t be a problem if cars actually possessed mufflers here). Striking camp early, we headed towards the main town area located right off the beach. We found accomadation in a moderately priced "hotel" that had a deluxe shower (meaning you can effectively shave, shower, you know what all at the same time--due to shower head being conveniently situated above the toilet. Almost heaven. With a guarantee of shelter, we headed to the beach to savor what little sun was peaking through. The beach was a mob scene, but what the predominately Argentine crowd possessed in numbers, they lacked in swimwear fabric. With Petro´s and I´s strict moral conservatism, we were appalled as you would imagine. But what can you do? Not yet possessing the golden bronze that I usually sport in the summer time, my appearance surely stood out among my fellow vacationers. For certain, many an Argentine dinner conversation tonight will include "did you see that pasty gringo walking the beach today--did he just arrive from Antartica?" Oh well, there is plenty of time to correct that problem. The day spent was an interesting time to see what type of behavior transcends cultures. The most notable of the day was when Petro and I stopped to observe a swimsuit photo shoot that was being shot on the beach. Feeling a bit creepy at our voyeurism we turned away to find a huge crowd of Argentine men of all ages blatantly staring at the girls and taking pictures. Only in order to blend in, we started to take pictures as well. Petro, the shady kid that he is took more, but I will post what I have.


The concensus between the fun committee has concluded that we will probably spend tonight and tomorrow night here in Necochea and then set off for the Patagonia area. We are probably going to have to pull the trigger on a tent tomorrow to faciliate cheaper travel and to ensure we can avoid any ditch-sleeping.
In bad news, I just noticed that the U.S. stock market is failing, which makes the 2nd leg of my trip a lot bleaker. I am already looking for places here to sell plasma. I am also going ahead with the proper steps to acquire non-profit status, in case you are looking for a really fun tax write-off.
Also, my sister Erin has been waging an unscrupulous propaganda campaign to get me to return to the U.S. Her main tactic is sending me pics and movies of my darling niece Kate. I don´t open her emails anymore for fear of sucumbing to the pressure.
Plans for the night include frying up some seafood and checking out the local scene.
Gotta run, I feel a phantom cell phone ring.....

Viajar es a Vivir,

Brian

The End of B.A.

With our time here in this city dwindling, Petro and I have been trying to cram alot of experience into limited time. Does this mean we wake up before noon?--rarely, in fact never, but post 2pm we take productivity to the next level. Take this weekend for example. We woke up yesterday and toured the La Boca area of B.A. (as recommended by Nick Decenso in the Comments section) with our fellow housemates Marcia and Carolina from Brazil. As you can see from the above picture and other pics in the album, La Boca is a colorful, artsy area that is near the city´s center. It is also the area containing the Bomberdero soccer stadium, which is the home of the Boca Juniors and the past homefield of the legendary Diego Maradona. Although there was no game going on when we toured the stadium we pretended there was and lit fireworks and threw molotov coctails on the cops passing by. Also toured the Puerto Madero area, which was jam packed with people living well beyond our means, which meant we did a whole lotta staring. The day of sightseeing ended quite interestingly when our foresome exited the subway train and the 40 year old Marcia was harrassed by an Argentine woman who was hellbent on causing some trouble for a foriegn latina. Petro and I were dually shocked to see the mostly mellow Marcia trading serious slang with this woman. Although it was in a mix of Spanish and Portugeuse, I think the gist of the altercation went something along the lines of "excuse me miss, I know this might be rude but I am going to cut off your tongue and shove it up your @ss." The real ingenuity of their conversation will be forever lost in translation but Petro and I sensed the seriousness of it when Marcia put up her fists. Smart enough to know not to get in the way of two latino women, Petro and I started hedging bets. Unfortunately, our lust for violence went unfulfilled and the Argentine woman wisely backed off. We now call Marcia "La tigre (tiger)" and we will never cross her.
You might be wondering how the weather has been lately as the last information conveyed described it as skin-melting and night terror inducing. The last 3 days have been very pleasant, which is the only way I can describe it because the temperature is given here in celsuis, which requires a mathematical equation involving more than one step, thereby rendering the process not worth doing by me.
In health news, we both seem to be in fairly good condition except for a most-likely broken toe Petro is nursing after having a high-heeled girl accidently step on it at the bar. Unfoturnately, we have been telling our fellow housemates that we are medical doctors from the States, which meant that we had to pretend to be able to treat his swollen toe. We are now saying that we are psychiatrists to avoid future exposure.
In people news, the houseguest who left our room for the hospital (for dengue fever or something similar) has not been heard from for the past 4 days. Good luck Mr. Name Unknown. Oh, and by the way we burned your bedsheets and clothes.
We have been spent some time with Irish Brian, mostly examining the idiosyncransies of our respective cultures. Our favorite topic is our colloquial language differences and my new favorite expression is "going out on the piss" (going out to drink). We also said goodbye to our good buddies KK, Emily, and Kevin from Chicago by hitting up a trendy club in B.A. that played 80´s rock videos on jumbo screens. Reflective of our status as the only gringos in the club, we danced with little regard to style and rhythm until 5am. Dancing to Bon Jovi never felt so good. And so, that was it-all in a day´s work.
I haven´t touched on the subject at all in my blogs but the driving in B.A. is something to be feared as a taxi passenger and terrified of walking the streets (the B.A. provincial area is reported to have about 10 driving related deaths DAILY). Check out this movie I shot when we took a crazy taxi ride out of La Boca. Notice Petro in the front with his head out of the window at first and later smartly retracting it as it surely would have led to decapitation.
Today we are feeling a little restlessness and so we have made the decision to pull the plug on B.A. and head to less populated pastures. Haven´t fully decided on the destination but that insignificancy will be figured out at the bus station tomorrow morning. As such, you probably wont hear from me for a couple days. Sorry for the long blog but I had to get some things off my chest.

Stay classy,

Brian Burgundy

Get a Pint For the Boy!

Last night, myself, Petro, and new roommate Irish Brian went out to a reception that was being held at the South American Explorers clubhouse, which is a membership based group (that we joined for cheap) that serves a great resource for backpackers throughout south america. The reception was billed as an "all you can drink," which means that it didn´t take much motivation to get ourselves there. Irish Brian, fresh off the plane, informed us prior to arriving to the party that he was going to drink our pathetic American asses under the table (I think we won b/c I have a vague recollection of Brian speaking gibberish at a bar at the end of the night). The party was great and was jam packed with like-minded foreigners who are in the midst of trips such as ours. Having a room full of interesting characters before me, I of course was drawn to the oldest people in the room. Meet my new Irish parents--Mary and Michael, a 60-ish couple from Dublin who were visit their traveling son in B.A. After a brief chat, I got to the point and told them that I am desperately seeking European Union citizenship, would they adopt me? And since having an American son carries the same prestige as having a dog that can do tricks, they agreed. They are expecting Petro and I to be setting up shop at their house sometime later this year. And so, between our new Irish roommate and my new Irish parents, our lives have became suddenly emersed in Irish culture--in South America. Trying to fulfill Irish cliches, we drank beer and Jamieson like it was the last night on earth. Between Mary´s work on her PhD in linguistics and Michael´s knowledge of American politics, the conversations were very entertaining. The sad irony of the night was the observed fact that Irish Brian (from Belfast) and my new parents were carrying on warmly, but as Mary told me later ¨his parents back home would probably croak if they knew he was chatting up Irish Catholics.¨ Trying to avoid a discourse on the Catholic/Protestant relations, I just thought it was worth mentioning the common denominator in the equation of that conflict as well as most conflicts going on around the world.

I got nothing else except una resaca,
Brian

Hotchey Doggey!

Ahggg, having trouble writing this morning--my night job of food and spirit taste tester is starting to impede on my A.M. productivity. But the coffee is muy fuerte, so I will be O.K.
Yesterday we got an early jump on the day and went to the Recoleta neighborhood to check out their famous cemetary, where the likes of Evita Peron ("dont cry for my Argentina") are buried in monumental burial chambers set up like a miniature city. It's quite a morbid form of tourism and the ridiculousness of the burial chambers (said to cost $1 million for just the plot) adds a new element to the idea of "keeping up with the Jones." But as someone once said "at the end of the game, the king and the pawn all get returned to the same box." As such, when walking through the cemetary it is hard not to wonder how full life was lived when such priority was placed on where their bones were destined to rot. Regardless, as my life for the past month has been devoid of my usual KC Star obituary readings, this excursion served as my required dose of mortality. Carpe Diem! Also, as much as I am probably worthy of such an ornate and monstrous burial chamber, just burn me up and spread whats left down at the closest thing to heaven on earth: the Lake of the Ozarks. On to brighter things........
There has been a recent influx of Germans at the house that are worth mentioning. In our room there is some shady character who arrived at the house not long after bribing his way out of a hash arrest in Columbia. To add to his unappealing credentials, he also thinks he contracted Dengue Fever there (although usually non-fatal, the two week period of symptoms is said to inspire people to wish it was fatal (don´t worry Mom, its not contagious, i think). Needless to say, everyone is steering clear of that guy. Also, there is the german born 70 y/o Canadian Ziggy, who has decided to live out his retirement "chasing gals" in Buenos Aires. Good luck Ziggy. In other room news, the room union finally said enough and the senior room resident, LA Mike, told the owners to get rid of the kitten farm or there was going to be trouble. The good news is that they removed the kittens but the bad news is that the word is out that they hired a union buster to break some whiney American legs.
Our Spanish lessons are going well and there is a rumor that we "are the best students they ever had." Then again, this was said after we just put a whole bunch of money in their hands. Nevertheless, we are studying unfamiliarly hard and hope to soon master this language soup we are wading in. Speaking of languages, i think i have found my new favorite foreign words, which are what the Brazilians here use: Hipey Hoppey (Hip Hop), Picky-Nicky (picnic), and my favorite Hotchey-Doggey (hot dog), which may replace "Rusty" as the name of my first born son.
Well, its almost the weekend, meaning that the weekend-esque activities commenced here two days ago. No word yet on our next move, however we are crossing our fingers about a possibility that has emerged for us to work on a dove hunting ranch in rural Argentina.

Guns+Gringos=Good Time,
Q

Things that yell "what!" in the night

Well, as I alluded to earlier and as Petro has made known in his blog, there has been some incidents in several of the past nights. Petro calls them "night terrors" but I think a more appropriate name would be "waking up and wondering where in the hell you are at." Basically what has happened is that 3 of the nights we have been in B.A. I have woken up at some point in the night stood up and said something along the lines of ¨what!," sometimes with the assistance of an explective. I don´t recall this part but I do remember what has followed, which is usually Petro yelling from across the room something calming such as "shut the f%& up." Peter is convinced that I must have some paranoia issues or that I am running from someone. I chalk these episodes up more to the unfamiliarity with my sleeping accomadations and the fact that sleeping in 98 degree heat is not quite comforting. Another possible cause, is the fact that since I have been in B.A. i have grown eyes in the back of my head. Having been the victim of scammer and pickpockets before, I have been re-training myself to use window reflections to check who is following me on the street, use the stop and step aside technique to lose tails, and the general rule to trust no one--including the old lady who does my laundry. Over-cautious?-probably, but I am training myself to be ready for my eventual return to the mean streets of KC.

Watch your back,
Q

Ode to Living in a Sauna

Well, the heat has finally gotten to Petro and I. Last night marks the first time that I have ever effectively fallen alseep while maintaining a full out sweat. Our lofted bedroom area doesn´t help matters and air conditioning is impractical at places like this, therefore it is non-existent. "We´ll, I´m sure they would at least have fans there?"--you would think, but that is probably precisely why they don´t have a fan in the rooms--because it makes sense. Just like having a kitten farm in your room is probably ultimately bad for business and therefore doesn´t make much sense to allow (i hinted to the owners about my slight alleregy to cats and their remedy was for me to move rooms, which i didn´t). Don´t get me wrong about our current lodging situation, i actually really like it, but my brain is still operating in a western capitalistic mindset. This shock to my mindset climaxed yesterday when I witnessed a group of B.A. businessmen in suits sleeping in lawn chairs in the shade in the downtown area (pic taken and will be posted soon). Back to the fan problem--To be totally fair, there actually is one portable fan in the residence, which we tried to use two nights prior. It easily dates back to the turn of the 20th century and I am pretty sure the previous model that particular fan company put out before this one was powered by mice running around a wheel. Evidently WD-40 is quite rare around here because I´m sure one shot of that could have corrected much of the racket that fan produced. On to more exciting things...
A couple nights ago a group of us from the house made a foray into downtown B.A. to see what city had to offer in terms of nightlife. To preface the story, clubs and popular bars in B.A. do not really start going until 3 a.m. so you can imagine what sort of condition we were in prior to our arrival there. Once there, your choice of poision is either the one beer brand they carried (Heineken) or one of their liquor concoctions. In keeping with their misinterpretation of many of our American trends, Argentines have created a drink called "Speed & Vodka," which is supposed to be the equivalent "Red Bull & Vodka," however the speed part of the drink is practically near the level of toxity as its illegal namesake, making it about 5 times as strong as a traditional Red Bull and Vodka. Being a man with little regard to personal health, I did see Petro take down a few of these Speed and Vodkas and it did not appear to have much of a detrimental effect on him. Although, I did see him later involuntarily gyrating in a corner of the dancefloor with purplish foam coming from the sides of his mouth. With a vast mental archive of past Petro behavior and not wanting to jump to conclusions, I am hesistant to draw a correlation between Speed and Vodka and Petros erratic behavior. By the way, if you foresee yourself visiting a nightclub in Buenos Aires or in any latin American city in the near future, I would recommend instituting a mental conditioning regimen to help you prepare for the experience--my main advice would be to stare into a strobe light for at least 2 consecutive hours and later increasing the time as appropriate.
This week has started out promising--yesterday we signed up for private spanish classes commencing later today. The agreement called for 10 hours of private lessons each but i think as soon as we can nail down the phrases "I´m sorry but that was not intended as an insult to your family" and "can we talk for the rest of the time in english," than we will probably quit the class.
Also, Petro has alluded to my "night terrors" on his blog, which warrants a reponse and an explanation but I am mentally spent at the moment and will try to address the issue tonight or tomorrow.

Hasta Pronto,
Q

Hey from B.A.

So, as I believe I left it, we were making some decisions. And it looks like we will be staying in Buenos Aires for at least the next two weeks. Our original horse ranch idea was temporarily shot down when we found out they were booked with volunteers until sometime in Feb (don´t worry we are looking at other ranches). Also, we came across a very cheap guesthouse in the Montserrat neighborhood that made our decision alot easier. Being familiar with the backpacker scene, I am no stranger to living amongst a diverse crowd, however this place possesses a dynamic I have yet to see prior. The cast of characters includes the cool Argentine family that runs its, a Brazilian mother/daughter traveling duo, three Americans (from Marquette, friends with Megan Quane), our roommate Mike from LA, who is traveling around South America on a mountain bike (yeah, could be slightly nuts), a French family (parents + 2 year old child), and a string of other transients whose names will never be known. The house has an old world feel with 20 ft. ceilings, exposed brick, and an open air structure that makes hanging in the shade in the courtyard oh so sweet. A quick renovation by Schloegel Design and Remodel and this place could easily pass for an Italian villa. Oh, and the best feature, the owners recently decided to make some capital improvements and installed 3 foot deep "pool" in the courtyard.--which is sure to be the site of some fiasco soon. Petro and I´s living quarters are in a room with two bunkbeds on the floor, one of those beds is occupied by LA Mike, and our beds which are on top of a lofted area in the room. Also, we found out yesterday that we share our room with a new litter of kittens, who hide underneath a downstairs bunk bed--ideal, right?. Our first night, a fourth roommate, whose name and nationality were never established, decided to wage a passive/aggressive war against us. Most likely upset that we were carousing loudly with other guests outside our room until 5:30am, Mr. Poopy Pants decided that he would retaliate by continuously shaking his loud paper bag several times in the morning to wake us up. Weak sauce. Mike, Petro, and I had a pow-wow about it later and decided that if this guy was going to pull a stunt like this again, we were going to give him a code red ala´ A Few Good Men. Lucky for him, he departed from the house later that day, thus avoiding the serious beatdown that was sure to ensue. To avoid future episodes with uncool roommates, the newly established room union (Mike, Petro, and I) has decided that next time any potential residents are shown the room, whoever is in it has to pretend to talk to themselves and chew on their arm to discourage any new occupation. This tactic has already failed as when I awoke this morning there was what appeared two women of unknown nationalities residing on one of the bottom floor bunks. Back to the other guests, I´m sure when you read that there was a 2 year old child residing at a backpacker guesthouse, you were slightly appalled as was I, considering that our behavior here so far has been not quite ideal for early childhood development. However, after thinking about it more, this kid does have sort of an envious childhood experience--being exposed to so many different cultures and nationalities (the kid was playing soccer with Petro and I last night at about 1 am). As our house´s mascot, he´s great, however I did have to have a sit down talk with him yesterday--threatening that if woke up the whole guesthouse again with his early morning crying, he was going to have to face the wrath of our dreaded room union. Sadly, probably seeing the arrival to two potential role models for their son, the French family appears to have fled last night.
The schedule of life in B.A. has taken some getting used to. We eat lunch around 4pm, dinner around 10-11pm, and nobody in the city goes to bed before 5am. And so, I have been trying to give myself a pep talk lately trying to convince myself that I am not a bum if I continue to wake up around 2pm. It´s the burden I´ll bear I guess. Another interesting note about B.A., the population is very into themselves--Argentina has the 3rd highest rate of plastic surgery (maybe the first factual statement I´ve made in the blog thus far). In attempt to keep up with the vanity of the local population, Petro and I have been taking proactive steps to blend in, such as: changing clothes at least once every two days, employing a side-part hair strategy, and mainly just affirming Argentines infactuation with themselves by blatantly staring at them. With our incredible staring abilities, one would think that spoken language would be obselete, however we are starting to feel the inadequacies of our spanish skills. But, i could write a page just on that alone and I will later.......

Settling in....or not.

Well, 15 hours of much needed sleep has passed since I last spoke. Right now Peter (Petro) and I spent the night in a hostel near the city center. Great place but the price is not right so we trying to figure our next move, which by the way is looking to be one or a couple of the following--spanish language course with family home stay in Bariloche, AR, a 30 day stint working at a Argentinian horse ranch, or renting an apartment or room in Buenos Aires. Major decisions are to be made today and since it will be decisions that are sure to greatly affect the quality of the trip and therefore are very important, it will be most likely be decided using the most scientific of standards: a coin toss. Yes, the old coin has previously decided who buys the beers, who has to share the hostel bunk bed with the wild-eyed Columbian midget, and now where we will venture next. The excitement is to proceed as soon as Petro and I pull ourselves completely out of our mental fog. Speaking of Petro, I thought I would convey an incident that occured last night and that is sure to have a impact later on in this trip. As we were walking down a well traversed street in dowtown Buenos Aires, we encountered two rabid looking dogs growling at each and getting ready to attack one another. Of course, every reasonable minded passerbys were avoiding the pending snafu, but not Petro. He decided to reprimand the offending dogs with an english spoken "NO!" and a point of his finger. Aside from the fact that homeless, rabid, Argentine dogs probably don´t speak english, the idea that they may take instruction from a human was also laughable. I asked Petro why he had done this because in 4 out of 5 times, a confrontation with these type of dogs would normally result in being attacked--and he claimed that he has "dog whisperer" abilities. I only tell this story not because of its inherent ridiculousness, but that I think it surely will spare me an explanation for a most certain future story. As, in most central and south American countries there is an abundance of street dogs, whom when eventually encountering by my dog whispering travel companion, may respond in a manner that will make one hell of a good story.

Off to save the world,
Q

P.S: Quote of the day: (Petro)-¨"It smells good here--like a Chiefs tailgate."

ScrAmBled Brains

Just arrived in Buenos Aires--two days of sleeping on airport floors and zigzaging two continents has led to severe mental fatigue. Having hard time performing small tasks. Just caught myself licking a window. Bench. duck. Mint...will write as soon as coherency resumes....
QB

Oh Sh*t!, It's Happening........

Back again, blogging for the last time in the good ole US of A. Spent the last two nights hanging with Dave and Tiffany Carey at their sweet pad in Redondo Beach, CA. It was my first night spent in a bed since the trip’s commencement and it was great. As I have been to the LA area couple times previously, any sightseeing was put on the backburner in order to finish last minute tasks before my early morning departure on the 9th. Cousin Beth Carey took me to lunch yesterday in the Manhattan Beach area and later we all met up for dinner (Dave, Tiff, Beth, Damon, & I) at the Carey’s place and participated in a serious marathon of reality TV show watching. This experience revealed a void in my life that I have been so desperately missing. I realized that my calling is not to spend a year traveling the world for social and mental enlightenment, but rather is to dedicate my days to viewing all available reality TV programs, mostly for the pleasure of watching the misery of those involved. And so, the trip has been put on hold for now and I will be camping out at the Carey’s pad until the new Biggest Loser season is over…
Well, I am couple hours away from shipping my laptop away and several from my rendezvous with Pete at the airport for our flight to Buenos Aires. I am ready but I doubt South America is ready for the sh*tstorm of fun that is sure to ensue (author’s note: as a champion of clean language, I will continue to place *&% in place of full curse words in order to avoid full-out swearing, which people familiar with me know I totally loathe).
On a side note, today is a pretty momentous day for me as I just ate the last piece of Wrigley’s Winterfresh gum out of a 15-piece pack. This marks the first time in my very limited recollection that I have ever successfully finished a pack a gum before losing, washing, or throwing it away before its full consumption. Coincidence that I completed this tremendous act on the eve of my adventure?—I’m not really sure but I am very proud of myself for both.

See you on the flipside,
Q

California Dreaming.......

The last day and night in the Bay area was spent well. In the daytime Luke, Heidi, and I went to an indoor rock climbing gym and they gave me a quick tutorial on mechanics of it before throwing me up on the slab. Once gotten the hang of, rock climbing was a lot of fun and great exercise (which had become increasingly absent from the trip). That evening we ventured into downtown SF to meet up with KC friends Bill Stack, Adam Balentine, Rosemary Wiedemann, and Whitney Arthur. The night comprised mostly of playing a pretty entertaining dice game in the middle of some dive bar and Whitney hustling bar patrons at a Pop-A-Shot game. It was good to see the KC crew still hits it hard, even when removed from our beloved hometown.
The next morning I secured a ride to LA from Craiglist ridshare and spent the morning hanging with Luke and Heidi prior to my noontime departure. This included walking into an Oakland bakery for a pastry and being surprised that there was a 4 piece band playing right in the middle of the people eating Danishes and reading the paper—the Bay area never ceases to amaze me.
My ride to LA was Evan from Napa Valley, who was heading to see friends at UCLA and Shirley, a fellow ridesharer who was a Loyola Marymount student heading back from winter break. The ride went well (ok, almost--more on that later) and for all the dissenters who have expressed the opinion that my ridesharing is going to make me end up dead in a ditch—I pose the question: Do you ever get into a taxi? If so, you know no more than I do about the person driving you and actually that taxi driver could easily be untraceable unlike the email/phone exchanging used in ridesharing. I’ll take my odds with ridesharing and as a great philosopher (or maybe it was my Uncle Joe Schloegel) once said, “it was better to have gambled and lost than not to have gambled at all.” Interestingly enough all occupants in the car were products of Jesuit education. Anyways, I digress, back to why the trip went almost smoothly. Approximately 1 hour outside of LA we were in the Grapevine (mountainous area before LA) and Evan’s 2000-era Jeep Grand Cherokee started to do “funny things” (that is how mechanically illiterate individuals like myself describe car problems). We pulled over in some podunk area and accessed the situation, which could be summed up as three people staring a car engine and shaking their heads disapprovingly. Eventually we wandered over to the town auto garage and the on-duty mechanic “Red”, who easily could have just stepped out of a movie about 3 strangers getting murdered in a small town, informed us in colloquial mechanic language that the Jeep needed to “fart” (translation: our exhaust was clogged and didn’t have the proper airflow). He also stated that technically he could not fix it as the procedure, if not done at a designated site, was a huge federal EPA fine (translation: he would do it for $20 and a case of Busch Light). About this same time another similarly stranded woman informed us that there was a “winter blast” heading straight towards the Grapevine and that they were expected 8 inches of snow fast. “Just freaking great” I muttered and made a heartfelt confession to Shirley that I must be the doomsday talisman traveling the country as there had been a road-closing storm in Colorado, a city-crippling wind and rain storm in San Fran, and now a “winter blast” wherever we were and they all had occurred upon my entrance to the areas. In light of our impeding stranding in BFE, California, we decided to take our chances with a mechanically unsound vehicle and get the hell out of Dodge. And so, by the luck of the rabbit’s foot, we made it safely to or respective destinations. Which for me is cousins Dave and Tiffany’s place in Redondo Beach, CA. (by the way, we watched the night news which showed the highway patrol shutting down the snowy Grapevine highway—disaster diverted again). More on LA later……… for now here is Luke and Heidi singing me a farewell song...

Psych studies, dark solitude, and playing doctor

To catch up---after meeting up with Luke at the pigeonhole bar, we went to North Beach for so quality Italian food. Dinner was also the site of Luke’s much anticipated “experiment.” Basically, with Luke’s M.D., treating it more like a P.h.D, he initiated a quasi-experimental study using a series of questions aimed at getting the gist of my psyche prior to the commencement of this trip, to be followed up with similar questions at the halfway and endpoint of the trip. I have labeled it “wine science” as that is what it took a lot of to keep a straight face during his line of questioning. Regardless, it will be pretty funny to reflect back on my answers a year or more from now (it was recorded). After dinner, went to a pretty eclectic jazz bar in the Mission area. The night ended with me crashing on the couch and eventually Luke’s un-informed-of-my-stay roommate coming home and wondering who and the hell was sleeping on her couch. Like the respectable couch crasher that I have become, I faked asleep to avoid any confrontation. On to the next day….

Wasted Day! Woke up at noon—mostly because every time I got up prior, it was pouring rain, which was going to make me a prisoner inside anyway. Finally, I got up and made the unavoidable introduction to Luke’s roommate (whose expression I believe I accurately read as “get the f*&% out of my house”). Not having the enthusiasm nor desire to charm her, the animosity remained. Later, seeing no end to the rain, I decided to brave it and go buy some lunch material to make some grub for when Luke stopped home on his lunch break. I went out the back door of the house and was alarmed when I shut the door to find it self-locking. Nevertheless, Luke was due back soon so I went to the store and returned not long later, rain-soaked and locked-out (author’s note: Luke’s roommate was home at the time, however, judging from our first encounter, I would rather hang outside in the rain than to have to have her let me in the house—which would be seen as a victory for her). But, as the lucky rabbit’s foot has blessed me with fortune on the trip thus far, it struck again and I found a cooler in the backyard, a remnant of a past party (hopefully within a month’s time ago), that was filled with a couple of luke-warm beers to help pass my rainy lock-out. Eventually Luke did come home, but to add insult to injury, the power was out due to a bad storm hitting the SF area. So, while Luke was back at work, I read a book by candlelight and contemplated my recent bout of misfortune—rabbit’s foot be damned. Later, after several hours of dark solitude, Luke returned and we plotted our strategy for the night…

The plan: my unparalleled access into the happenings of an emergency room trauma center. The setting: an unnamed hospital in the Bay Area. How: using the access tools of a duplicate hospital badge, hospital scrubs, and under the auspices of being a medical student, I shadowed Dr. Luke to get a feel how he interacts in his element (check out the pic of us using the on-call pagers). Having been told by Luke that the night could possibly end up with me stitching a few people up or applying pressure to a sucking wound, I was a bit reserved about where the night was heading. Having shown up at the hospital around 10pm, we sat around earnestly praying for serious trauma to be inflicted on someone so we could take part it the repairing process. To humanity’s benefit and to our misfortune, no one got drunk and stabbed each other that night (probably due to the rain), but we did get to see some legitimate ER action.
Later, as we reflected upon the fact that I have spent the last 5 nights crashing on 5 different couches in as many different locations, we decided that a good goal of the trip would be snap a picture of all my different sleeping locations while on the road. And so, henceforth I will try to do just that.

Singing in the Rain.....

After my morning excursion around Chinatown I was picked up by my long-time KC buddy Bill Stack, who is currently doing lobbying work in the Bay Area. He showed me around various parts of San Fran and we met up another KC friend, Rosemary Wiedemann, for drinks and to catch up. Later, Bill and I picked up Busch tall boys cans to relive the high school days and talk political shop.
Today, I ventured solo back into downtown SF to fulfill touristy obligations. Read in the legendary City Lights Bookshop, where the likes of Kerouac and other beat writers used to hold court; went through the California Academy of Sciences and briefly toured the Wells Fargo Museum, mainly to get out of the rain. This brings me to the point that once again my comfort has been a casualty of my attempt at minimalism. For like going gloveless in Colorado, I was umbrella-less in San Fran in the midst of a day-long rain shower. Like the budding transient that I am becoming, I wrapped my computer in a newspaper in my backpack to avoid it getting soaked. If things decline to the point where I am using newspapers to do others things such as to make a bed or go to the bathroom, please feel free to participate in the intervention.
For the moment I am killing time in a pigeon hole of a bar called Dave’s in downtown SF waiting for Luke to get off work. The major tool in this time-killing procedure is a new book I received today called “Three Cups of Tea,” which was courtesy of Bill Stack and so far is definitely a recommended read for those of you in the market for that sort of thing.

No bathroom for you!

Spent the last night at Heidi’s place in San Fran as Luke’s landlord has begun a bathroom remodel that is running behind schedule and therefore made the place unlivable (at least by our current standards—soon to change). Luke and Heidi had to report to the ball & chains this morning and so I set off to do a little solo recon mission around the bay area. As a prolific Chinese buffet connoisseur and having studied under legendary binge-eater and “put’em outta business” Matthew Kopp, my natural first destination in Oakland was Chinatown. Of course I didn’t come across any buffets but I was still able to fulfill my lust for of-questionable-origin food. As I traveled around Chinatown I became aware of a disturbing phenomenon that is sure to impede my life for the reminder of this trip: The concept of “restrooms for customers only,” which I once regarded as an effective anti-vagrancy tactic by businesses, is soon to make my life a little more complicated and discomforting as I cannot afford to pay for something every time I need to use the john. When you have a house and/or a job in which you can use the bathroom anytime without thought, life is good. And so here begins my life “operating in the gray.” My skills as a pretend customer/bathroom user are sure to improve and if not I will have to perfect my pretend to view scenery/take a piss in the bushes procedure. Regardless, this phenomenon reiterates the point that maintaining a well kept appearance (i.e. shaving and the like) will probably repay me dividends in the form of bathroom breaks and lack of suspicious looks my way. As so here is the moral of the story---don’t call the police when you see a man peeing in the bushes in a crowded urban area-because it could be good ole’ Brian.

Another point of note: So far my blog entries are frequent and more expanded now as I still have my laptop (soon to be shipped home before my international departure). My future correspondence on the road will be limited by sporadic and costly internet rental. However, due to a recent generous endowment by an un-named philanthropist (Mark Schloegel) this future correspondence has been sponsored—at least for several months. As such, all future toasts on the road will be drunk in Mark’s name. Want to attain the exalted status held by Mark?-email me about sponsorship or talk to my Kansas City financial liaison Adam Bone.

Keeping it real in ’08,
Q

Dancing, Crying, and Selling Out..

Now I find myself in Oakland, California….let me give you a little recap—on New Year’s Eve day, after much deliberation and to my utter dismay, I purchased a plane ticket from Denver to Oakland. The terrible weather, road closings, and absence of rideshare possibilities to the SF/Oakland area ultimately led to the decision. My over-the-road only purest dreams shattered with one swift credit card purchase. I was talked out of my original plan B (the 36+hour train ride) by my more reasonable minded cousins (Schloegels & Flynns), who explained that my already questionable sanity would be really put to the test early on the trip if I took the train. Plus the plane ticket was a lot cheaper- go figure.
Anyhoo, New Years Eve was initially celebrated amongst family (Schoegel bros., Flynn family, Nate Freschel, and Bob & Cecil’s family) and was subsequently followed by Mark, Nato, and I attacking a dance floor in downtown Frisco. Awoke today in a condo rented by people Nato claimed he knew (fact still in question) and spent a hellacious 2 hours stuffed in cousin Luke’s car with 4 others + gear driving to the Denver airport—easily my lowest point of the day and the first time I have cried since Grammy hinted that I may not be her favorite grandchild (if you are reading this Grammy, you’re MY favorite!) Now I am in Oakland, which is very pretty, if you would describe watching a homeless man crap on the sidewalk and taking in a smog sunset as pretty. First time in the Bay Area, so I will probably take in the sights tomorrow, while Luke is away being a doctor. Might see what the corner junkies have to offer… (just kidding Grammy)

Why say no when….
Brian