Returning Home

A week ago, flying home was the furthest thing from my mind, and now here we are sitting in the airport, waiting to board our flight to Ciudad de Mexico, thence to Nueva York.

Where did the time go?!?

I discovered (or rather, confirmed) a couple of things about myself during this trip:

1. The mere presence of a gaggle of (for want of a better term) "Chelsea boys" is enough to make me break out in hives. Apparently that's literally true, since I actually did break out in hives on the first day of "Latin Fever."
   
   
2. I am terrible at haggling with vendors in the Mercado de Artisans, and had to be rescued by ChickenKurry, who saved me tons of pesos. Apparently he has experience in haggling with the vendors of India, where a negotiation isn't considered complete until someone's either popped a vocal cord from screaming at another party or suffered myocardial infarction from the stress of having been out-negotiated.
   
   By comparison, he notes, "This is easy."
   
   
3. Sun screen with an SPF rating of 55 is a bit of an overkill, and my tan suffers accordingly. Interestingly, however, I think it was the spray-on SPF 30 that I bought as a substitute that actually caused the aforementioned hive outbreak. Who knew those things were delivered with an alcohol base?!? Stingy! And refreshing at the same time. Until, of course, you break out in hives.
   
   
4. I wouldn't have a great deal of trouble giving up the fast-paced good life in New York city for the slower-paced life in Puerto Vallarta. I spent pretty much the entire trip scheming to find a way to stay here permanently. I've met managers of canopy-tour companies, photographers who make their living snapping photos of tourists flying through the trees, people who've opened their own restaurants. All sorts of people just give up the life north of the border and just decide to stay.
   
   Aside from the fact that I enjoy making a crazy city-dweller's wage, I think the only thing keeping me from just doing it would be the fact that The Pants couldn't do anything even remotely related to acting there.

Circuit Party Central

So little did I know, when booking my vacation in Puerto Vallarta, that this week was "Latin Fever" week. This annual circuit party over Thanksgiving weekend attracts thousands of gays and lesbians from all over the world for five days of parties and debauchery the likes of which I generally go to great lengths to avoid.

You see, much to the dismay of my beloved friends, Little B & E, the idea of vacationing in the midst of a gathering of gym-obsessed, sex-hungry, tweaked-out muscle queens and the various pilot fish who swim in their wake is, to me, pretty much the equivalent of a stay on the 457th circle of Hell.

I didn't realize that the beach adjoining my hotel's beach would be the site, this afternoon, of one of the parties for said Event. I was a little taken aback when, as I was out for my customary morning sun, crowds of chiseled bodies started arriving and taking over my beach. Generally, I wouldn't have so much of a problem with this, but when I'm laying naked and exposed in my non-toned pasty whiteness, well, let's just say it brings my insecurities to a boil.

Needless to say, I needed to escape that shite as quickly as possible, so I decided to take one more tour around the town to snap a few more pictures.

It hasn't quite become passe to me, yet, to see so much new construction butt-up-against buildings that can be two hundred or more years old. It really is a wonder.

I have to say that I kinda love the juxtaposition, and I've been thinking a lot about the constant struggle against rot that a town like Vallarta faces. It's surrounded by the jungle, after all, and it's never not humid and hot (which, depending on the level of the humidity, I think is a pretty good thing). But because of the constant decay, the place is undergoing an endless battle against the forces of nature and, for the most part, winning.

It's pretty amazing, though, to watch the struggle. The amount of construction going on here now is amazing. It seems to be everywhere you turn.

The Animals

I'm totally missing this creature:

And this one:

It's Been a While

ChickenKurry and I are enjoying our vacation immensely.

And by "immensely," I mean we're engaging in acts of alcoholic debauchery I've note witnessed or been a part of since, oh, 1985. Last night we decided, having settled in to Puerto Vallarta, that we'd let our hair down a little and, after dinner, visit some "barras homosexuales."

We had an incredible dinner at a Puerto Vallarta staple called Cafe de Olla, at which we each drank a magarita the size of my head. Personally, I'm not the biggest fan of margaritas, as I like my alcohol to sneak up on me, and the tequila in the aforementioned concoction is generally too much for me. These, however, were like drinking a frothy yummy, and the sneaking tequila was nowhere to be tasted. Felt later, yes. Tasted, no.

After polishing off our big-headed margaritas, we decided to stroll the "Zona Romantica," as Old Town is euphemistically called, and check out the 'mo establishments.

The first one we happened upon was a dark little outlet called "Los Amigos." The publican there made us -- you guessed it -- giant margaritas the size of my head. I think we only had one, but at this point, we'd had, like, five of the margaritas we might get in the States. Lovely as "Lost Amigos" was, we were driven out into the night once again by the smoking patrons.

They smoke in bars here, you know. When you live in paradise and most of the inhabitants are tanned tougher than old shoe leather, you don't really give a second thought to lung cancer. I'm just sayin'.

Anywho, our next stop was Plazma, an interesting little establishment that, frankly, could have been plucked out of the seediest corner of New York's gay hoods. To reach the "restrooms," one has to brave the darkened labyrinth known as "the jail," wherein all sorts of behaviors of a wild and wooly nature could be witnessed. I had joked when we arrived that when Plazma billed itself as a "video bar," I wasn't expecting VH1 to be playing on the monitors. Literally, we were watching vintage George Michael videos while we played pool.

Little did I know that a whole other world awaited when ChickenKurry and I went to the men's. Suffice it to say that the owners of Plazma are fans of Colt and Kristian Bjorn.

Again, just saying.

Now thoroughly trashed, we refused to give up for the night until we'd sampled a neat-looking little piano bar near our hotel named "Garbo." It was, frankly, kinda dead by the time we rolled in (nightlife in PV is done fairly early, in my experience).

Still, that didn't stop us from slapping down another drink. I had yet another head-sized margarita, and CK had switched to Corona at this point.

Having finished that last drink and resolved to go home, we staggered out and decided to detour onto the beach to look at the stars. That's pretty much all I remember until waking this morning with a hangover. I do remember insisting that I swallow a fistful of aspirin, so it wasn't as bad as it had the potential to be.

And yet I still managed to drag-ass out of bed today, and go for a nice walk around town with the camera. Glory be.

Vacaciones

It keeps popping into my head that I'm on my first vacation in something like fifteen years, but that's just patently wrong. I went on a brief vacation over Memorial Day weekend with The Pants, to California. For some reason, though, since I spent most of that time rushing to catch up with beloved old friends, that seemed a wee bit less relaxing than had I spent a week on a beach somewhere, doing pretty much nothing

That's pretty much what I'm doing now.

While The Pants is off in the Heartland engaging in "gainful" holiday employment, I'm (guiltily) enjoying a holiday in Puerto Vallarta. (It might interest you to know that the abbreviation for "puerto" is "PTO.")

I'm doing my best to keep a photographic record of what the hell I'm seeing, so that you can enjoy it vicariously.

More pictures, hopefully, to follow*.






*I can't guarantee anything. My enthusiasm for documenting my vacation is at war with my innate need to disconnect and document nothing at all.

Avenues Like Arteries

This past summer, when A.Pants was off in Indiana doing his summer gig, I flew out to see him and had the rare opportunity to fly out of Laguardia Airport heading west across the city, flying high above Manhattan and looking south.

Not since 2001, actually, have I been on a flight that flew over Manhattan island, and I was once again struck by just how beautiful the city is when viewed from above, but especially when seen from above at dusk.

The sky above is still a wee bit light, but the avenues, lit by the headlights and brake lights of the cars, look like veins of quicksilver striped lengthwise along the island. And Central Park is this great negative space right in the middle of the island, it's dark heart. The belly of the beast.

It's those moments when I wish I could fly more. I absolutely love the Earth from above.

Of course, that might actually be some sort of editorial comment on my fellow beings, that I like to view them best from a distance.