on easy street

So I spent the last 4 days in Montego Bay "working". I have never really spent any time in Mobay before, I've only just driven through the town a few times before so I learnt a few things during my stay there.

• Not to diss anyone but the food there sucks(well the restaurant at my hotel at least and in the town as well). It wasn't just me, I heard someone else from Kingston complaining about the food as well.
• Traffic there is 10x worst than Kingston. The town is always in gridlock cars parked everywhere, a sea of people walking in the middle of the roads and everybody trying to fight their way through the stoplight/sign-less intersections(all 500 of them)
• The local girls there are to die for. I drooled over the girls at work, I drooled over the girls on the road and I drooled over the girls at the hotel. How can any man get any work done over there? I think a few of them were checking me out too, it's a shame I wasn't staying long over there.

I'm not really a big fan of going out by myself so I didn't really do much while I was there. Since I was in a tourist town on the coast I had to go to the beach, so one day I left work at 1pm and went over to the Aquasol park for a swim alone. The "Theme Park" theme must have been boring beach, I never saw what the hype was.

I also went for a stroll on the hip strip alone one night. Every last local there thought I was a tourist, put on their fake accent and tried to talk to me. One lady and her friend tried to stop me to talk(for what reason I don't know). She asked where I was from, I muttered Kingston, she wasn't convinced I was Jamaican, she went on to cuss me for not stopping to talk and shouted that she knows my type as I walked on "you don't talk to people darker than yourself". All I could do was turn around to look at her in amazement and shake my head no as I walked off. Some other things I was approached to buy were: cold beer(top of the list), taxi, souvenir stuff, weed and special "massages" from girls at some club. I need to invest in one of these hats so that they would know that I am Jamaican in my original article outfit.

The North coast highway made most of the 4 hour drive home safe and uneventful. After I passed through Ocho Rios the twisty wet roads along with the single lane than JPS created while cutting down trees ruined somebody's day. The flagmen told us to stop, the man in front, me, the two cars behind all stopped, I heard a loud crash and saw lots of smoke.. some fool crashed into the back of last person. While looking in the rear view mirror still I see this taxi blazing down around the corner in the wrong lane and almost caused a head on collision with vehicles coming up.. damned fool. The next thing about 20 minutes down the road was a first for me, I was issued a traffic survey by the police. At first I saw some bright orange signs saying "Slow down", "Traffic Survey" and laughed to myself thinking they really meant the po-po were timing on that road, then as I turned the corner the police waved me down out of like 6 cars to stop. If I knew that it was really just a survey and they wanted to ask me questions about my journey I would have waved back and just gas it some more.. bastards.

on looking for entertainment

I was talking to a friend the other day and she was trying to understand how/why/what would lead people to dating and getting married to people they meet online. She was totally lost as to how to even meet someone online. I then explained to her that earlier in my more idle days online I used to hang out at a few online communities and I went out once with one of the girls there.

It sounds sad but it was really just for kicks, I had no problems finding girls to go out with. Anyway I met her in Halfway Tree and she brought along a friend for security.. lol. I don't blame her, there are some strange people online. When they got in my car she exclaimed that I was nothing like what she was expecting. I had to bite my tongue not to say that she was everything I expected to get in an online girl.

Since as far as I was concerned I picked up the bad end of the stick in this date I decided that she would be buying me drinks at the bar despite my initial offer of me taking her out to the bar for drinks. She didn't really put up much of a fight when I informed her that she would be treating so we proceeded to the then happening place Escape in New Kingston.

It was cool at first, she bought me my favorite drinks, we hung out and played games. Eventually I noticed that my friends had started to come in and this was a situation that I didn't really see myself explaining anytime soon so I said bye to my date and neatly tucked out of there. I didn't mean to make such a hasty retreat but at that point in time no amount of gin and tonics was worth it.

That being said, I just watched you got mail.. lol she wishes life was like the movies.

Things have changed but we're still the same

My phone beeped and I saw "Strike on friday". Granted that the friend that sent it worked at the NWC the first thing that came to mind that there would be no water on Friday but then my mind flashed back to when used to play counter strike from dusk till dawn. A quick phone call cleared it all up, they were planning a game night on campus for all the old veterans. Those were the good ole' days where we had no worries in the world and would pile up at a friends house or at a lab on campus and play games till we had no sense left.

Eventually we people started to drop off one by one as jobs, girlfriends**, children... etc started taking precedence and we had greater responsibilities to worry about. We were no longer university students and everybody got busy all of a sudden and the only thing we had time/energy left for was a game of dominos every now and then. Of course even the dominos died out after a while so we now gather more then than now to relive life like we were young again.

On the matter of things being the same last Friday I got a call from my ex Mel to remind me to call her for her birthday on the weekend... lol kinda pointless. Anyway we were talking and she complained that I haven't invited over for a long time. So since it was her birthday weekend and I haven't let her stay over in well over a year I invited her over to have a movie night like we often used to have before. Aside from the fact that we didn't actually watch any movies it was just like old times, I guess she will be a friend for a long time to come.

On the Saturday she went to go celebrate her birthday with other friends and I linked up with Barbq and went to an art show in Manor Park. Barbq used to live right beside me at my previous apartment a few years ago and I used to admire her from far as she was always busy with her then ever present boyfriend. Anyway the event itself was pretty small and uninteresting but I still had fun liming with her there. We got a few compliments from people saying how cute and happy we looked together as people seemed to have us confused as a couple.. definitely food for thought :). I asked about the bf and she told me they broke up a while back.. the plot thickens.

** of course before I finished typing this post I got a call that it has been postponed due to the admin who was sponsoring us the lab on campus forgot that today was an anniversary for him.

The wingman is back.. the sequel

After many months at sea wingman called and informed me that he will be back in Jamaica before the end of the month. I can foresee the interesting times ahead as a few things have changed which he has no visibility of(yet). The first of which is that noodle and I aren't together anymore. He is very long winded and the last time I told him I broke up with someone that conversation almost lasted two hours(ignoring the fact that he was calling from 1000s of miles away on a long distance call). So I can only imagine the verbal onslaught that will follow when he is back here and notices someone is missing.

My problems are trivial compared to the other item which he is unaware of. At the barbecue I met and chatted with his biggest crush. He has had a thing for this girl for over 7 years now.. I dunno why they never moved from just friends. Anyway we became friends while he was gone and it turns out he didn't know she was pregnant and recently had a baby. She asked me not to tell him, she eventually will, but this blows my mind as to how he was oblivious to it. It will be a hard task not telling him this bit of information but he is very well aware that I will mostly honor peoples requests to keep information under wraps.

Hopefully this will close that chapter of his life as it has been loooong drawn out. Due to the wealth of free time I have now and the pending news of his crush's baby I think he will be more than willing to live up to the name bestowed upon him and a night of debauchery is in order. Hopefully things haven't changed but there was never a shortage of ladies when we are out looking for trouble so this should put our past where it belongs :-p

surviving

It has been a couple of weeks and I am still at square 1. It has been almost 4 weeks since I've slept in my bed, the last night I spent in my bed was the night before I broke up with her. Every night I drop asleep curled up in my futon by the large window, my favorite sleeping spot before she started staying over.

I haven't been back to the supermarket since things came to an end. It's a miracle I could survive so long on the food I had stored up but now there is nothing left.. if I don't go soon I'll probably starve to death.. lol or more realistically lose a few pounds :p. Much to the dismay of the other patrons we were very cozy and had lots of fun at the supermarket... so sad, going back will probably be hard.

Quite fitting the lady cranky posted on the topic the other day stating: Your supposed to bounce back, shinny and new. When they call your supposed to be able to pleasant and unhurt, say nice things, ask nice questions, your supposed to hang up with no regret, or at least hidden regret. I have such a long way to go, every time she calls(ignoring my requests for her to cease and desist) one or both of us ends up hurt.

Also not making things easier are the girls at work. The one who asked if I was gay when I told them I was single last valentines day brought up the topic of girlfriend again and of course to her the answer didn't change.. single. The expression on her face said a million words so I just explained to her I have yet to meet the right person for me and I wasn't going to pick up any slacker off the street to fill the void. Maybe it was how I looked.. you be the judge:
I am not normally too fussy with how I look but when I reached home one day this week I had to take a pic. I am not sure how I ended up with this shirt but I think it used to belong to my father at some point in time many years ago. The thing barely fits me and the wrist cuffs are a bit tight so they normally end up undone. This day I decided at work to just role them up to form this look I am unsure of. I felt like queer eye for the straight guy dressed me. I need to start dressing better and tear myself from my fortress of solitude and go back to my bachelor lifestyle (quite an over exaggeration by Renee)

waterlogged

I'm pretty sure that most of Jamaica is pretty tired of the rain by now. I normally stay high and dry at home during this kind of weather so I had no complaints. It was a sunny morning when I set off for my parents house to have the usual Sunday lunch with the fambily but that quickly changed to a heavy downpour as the afternoon progressed.

It was only natural that the conversation changed to the inclement weather at hand and my sister mentioned her very wet (inside and out) car. Apparently she tried to drive on Mona Rd. last week during one of the bouts of rain and ended up in water half way up her doors. She of all persons should know that you don't drive on that road when rain falls heavily as her husband lost the use of his car for a couple of months after shutting off in floods on that same road a few months ago. It's a miracle she didn't shut off but its a shame she got all that dirty water in her car.

After filling our gut my sister and I were ready to leave so after waiting for the rain to die down a bit I left and she should have left shortly after too. After coming off Red Hills it quickly became apparent that my journey across town to my home would be a long one. The roads, when I could actually see them under the brown water, were torrents that brought traffic to a crawl. At first I made a u-turn when I saw some deep water but the alternative route was just as bad.

I eventually gave up on trying to find alternate paths and wished I didn't leave yet
and tried to call my sister to tell her to stay at the parents or go back there if she had not gotten herself into more trouble yet. By this time I was in water over 12" deep slowly creeping on where I suspected the road to be and wondering what to do. Thinking ahead of the roads I would eventually have to take to reach home the outlook was dismal.

By the time I reached home the undercarriage of my car should have been clean granted the amount of water I was in. The car didn't shut off and no water seeped inside so I was mostly happy. I dropped in a deep pothole once as I crept through some murky water but at 5km/h no damage was done unlike the pothole on the main road outside of my house. Yes the same pothole that was fixed last year was now back with a vengeance claiming over 100 cars in the past month. The latest of which was a Range Rover HSE which some lady managed to blow out two tires in on Saturday. She was waiting for somebody to come change her tires for her and I noticed she called somebody to pack the hole with sand/dirt... lol lets see how long before I hear people tires being blown out again.