Brotime

These are my brothers.

Serve and Protect

Have I ever mentioned how much I respect cops? I mean, I especially love the special protection that our corrupt governments allow them when they violate human rights! Hell yeah, cops!

http://socialistworker.org/2009/01/08/anger-building-over-police-murder

I lost all my money that I didn't earn at the cockfights

I found a $50 dollar bill today. No lie.

By the end of the night I spent every last penny of it on other people. 1 lunch, 3 dinners, and drinks for 2 more. I like to think that I made 6 different people a little bit happier.

That is what I am talking about.

Pensive

Once again time finds me at a strange point in my life, this time as I cope with the stress of assimilating into a structured adult life. My creative energy quelled by the time and psychological constraints of school, I often feel overwhelmed with a desire to pursue an epic adventure. Thus, I have determined that I owe it to myself to embark on some sort of ridiculous journey this summer after I graduate. South America is in my sights, and I hope to make it the focus of my planning over the next 7 or so months.

Tomorrow I head to California to visit my brother in California. I'm absolutely excited to be skipping town since I have hopes of clearing my head, but I am more excited about seeing my brother, who also serves the role of my best friend. We have a brief plan of what to do over 5 days, but in any case I am sure we will entertain ourselves and anyone else who crosses our path. We may be going to Santa Cruz, for no other purpose than just to go and see something new.

I also decided that I am going to partake in my own weekend adventures. I want to revisit Charleston and Washington DC among other places, mainly for their nostalgic value. Plus, I have had dreams of storming DC on bike for 2 years now and instead of just talking about it I am going to up and do it by the end of the year (yes I am setting a personal goal). Then I am also hoping to go to Montreal in January simply because I have a hell of a lot of time for winter break and feel it would best be spent out of the country. Spring break should yield a ski trip in Colorado. The idea of being mobile enthralls me, as the reader probably already knows since it is all I talk about.

Perhaps one day I will write something more interesting and less involving my agenda. I feel motivated to write beautiful things, or at least to write about beautiful things, all of the time but it never materializes. Perhaps if I could escape my little Chapel Hill bubble more often...

How I will pursue happiness

Yes, my bicycle is complete and is begging to be ridden. How far will I go and where will I go? Who knows.

Summarizing Summer

"Finding a sleeping" in my driveway. For the months of June/July, we probably camped out about 60% of the time- sometimes with only one person and with the maximum being 12+. Great times underneath the stars.
Shirtless bros on the way to the beach.
A coaching session on the lake.
We pulled down our drawers and did handstands on the beach. Good people and good times.

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/08/bioko-primates/morell-text


This expedition was what I did in January of this year. Cool stuff.

Weekend and Life: A photo essay

First of all: all of these photos courtesy of Ryan Sides.

The purpose of these photos, which were taken of the course of the last 4 days, is primarily to chronicle the summer of 2008. Lots of hanging out with bros doing ridiculous things.

I am fascinated with handstands these days and I am actually starting to improve my capabilities.
Slip and slide gathering with Stefan's dirty self in the foreground.
I rode Stefan down the slide a few times.
This is a popular picture and for good reasons.
My neighbor tried to throw this suitcase away. I claimed it and it has inspired traveling and laughter.
This scenes says a lot about our trip to the motains: shirtless bros, depants-ing, and scenery.
I true brotherhood picture.
A bro pic with a real life bro (see far right) whilst waterfall jumping.

Reaction

So, contrary to what I expected, I have been neglecting this thing since I stopped traveling, which I think is pretty weak so I am not even going to bother with excuses.

My life these days consists primarily of working. I am a construction materials testing technician at the same engineering company that my mother works for. Its a pretty legitimate hustle and I have been enjoying it thus far. At the least it keeps me busy since I try to work Saturdays in addition to the workweek. My primary role in the company so far has been to transport concrete samples between job sites in Chapel Hill and the laboratory in Greensboro. I also play with soils to ensure their competency as building materials.

When I am not working I am likely hanging out with friends. Lots of basketball, shooting the breeze, and sleeping outdoors. Since I have been back I have been sleeping in my driveway on a mattress on a regular basis because I just love sleeping underneath the stars and the weather has been nice. This week my brother and I started an experiment to see how many consecutive days we can sleep out- today marks #5 and I don't have any intentions of stopping just yet. Most nights we have friends of some sort joining us. So far the record is set at 7 people but this Monday we are trying to break 10 people. We are easily amused. I think the fact that I choose to sleep outside at my own house says a lot about my character...

So besides working 6 days a week and hanging out with excellent people, I haven't really spent much time by myself, which is fine. I haven't even been watching movies the way that I used to. Not much book reading either which I agree is pretty weak.

Next weekend I am heading to western NC to do some camping with a friend. We have hopes of tasting native edible plants and building primitive shelters. Somewhere in there I intend on swimming in a lake because its been too long since I jumped in a natural body of water (although none of the lakes in North Carolina are technically "natural").

As always, life is good. I am embracing it for all that it is worth and I am more than content. No big plans for the rest of summer yet but I am convinced that everything will work out perfectly. Cheers.

Churchmouth

I am in Casablanca at the moment counting down the minutes until I get out of here. Morocco is a beautiful country but I honestly don't care much for the people that inhabit it. So many people try to cheat and scam us that it really leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Not to mention other aspects of their culture/religion that really annoy me such as how women are neglected and animals are mistreated. I have enjoyed my time here but I am in no rush to come back, or to visit any Arab country for that matter. Of course, I also say this at the end of my trip when I haven't been home in over 4 months.

So tomorrow I shall be living in up in Madrid and then I will be on my way home to the good old NC. Until then, enjoy these photographs.


The high atlas mountains.
The autonomous Spanish city of Ceuta, in Africa. My favorite city on my "Moroccan" journey.
Chefchaouen, a white wall city in Northern Morocco.
A nice little lagoon in Moulay Bousselham, where we spent a night.