Hotter than Potter

I had the totally fortunate opportunity to be on a Greyhound bus from Seattle to Portland a while back, about a week after the the unfortunate beheading incident, and I need to write my experience down before I forget, and more importantly before the world misses their chance with a fine individual. I’m talking about a portly man who invited me to sit next to him as I boarded the bus as one of the last passengers. He wasn’t completely spilling over into my potential seat, and seemed quite well dressed for the Greyhound (no offense meant, I was wearing sweats and flip flops), so I accepted.

Of course when anyone overtly invites you to sit down, you realize quickly that they want someone to talk to at, and I was his new target. And he turned out to be quite delusional. He was on his way to an interview with the Fishery Department of Oregon in Portland, and stressed to me numerous times how this job paid an exorbitant $65,000 per year. He had put his application on the online system, and after getting an interview the next week for a branch in Eastern Oregon, and then the call for an interview the next day in Portland for another branch, he was convinced the Portland branch was trying to hire him out from under the other office. I realize this immediately as delusional, because I know in the government the right hand almost never knows what the left hand is doing. Or however that saying goes.

Also he was on the bus “only because his car broke down,” and he was just hoping his friend would still be there in Portland to pick him up even though we were a good 5 hours late, since “he had some billing issues with his cell phone.” More delusion.

After some light hearted chit-chat, he proceeded to tell me he was a novelist of a trilogy series. Sensing a pause where I was apparently obligated to ask him more details, I inquired further. Apparently he had been planning on Drew Barrymore making the first novel into a movie so that he could get it, and the rest of the trilogy noticed and eventually published. Apparently though, it took a year just to find Ms. Barrymore’s agent, who informed him that you need an agent yourself to submit proposals to the star’s production company. That only took a year to find out.

Sensing another pause, I eventually inquired further into what the books were actually about. And this is the troubling answer, quoted to the best of my poor memory’s ability:

“I’ve been writing and editing these books for the past 10 years. If you ever see my book in the bookstore, you’ll know it. It’s about a white, shape-shifting calico cat, owned by a 6 foot tall blonde girl, in a world where its illegal to be blond, and they are on an epic quest to find their long-lost something-or-other, all while being chased by the evil overlords of the ulterior universe.”

Wow. He continued,

“And it’s been read by over 20 students in 4 different cities, and they all say it’s ‘hotter than Potter.’”

At this point, I’m wishing I have a tape recorder, camera, or anything at all to capture the gloriousness of this moment. Of course I only have my Macbook, which I don’t really know how to work, or realize that it has some program that probably could have been recording this conversation quite surreptitiously. Apparently it’s called GarageBand. Whatever.

Anyways, if you ever see this book, please let me know, as I would be very interested in reading this literary work, that I’m guessing will go in the annals of pedantic history.

Better than I could do with my second-rate imagination though, so more power to him.

Trip around SE Asia

Rush hour in the relatively small city of Rach Gia, Vietnam

Journaling on our “junk” in HaLong Bay

Here is a quick post with some pictures from my month-long tour of Kuala Lumpur, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. Probably the hardest part of this trip was learning how to say “hello” and “thank you” in each new place as we were crossing borders seemingly every day. As the Lonely Planet so insightfully pointed out, this is the best way to endear yourself to the locals, and dare I say it worked.

Special thanks to travel companion Kyle Taylor for all the spectacular pictures.

The beautiful island of Phu Quoc in southern Vietnam

Kyle squared over HaLong Bay, Vietnam

Storm clouds over Phnom Penh

On the Bolaven Plateau, Laos

At the Petronas Tower in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Sunset over the Mekong River, Laos

At the ruins in Champasak, Laos

At the ruins of Angkar Wat, Cambodia

Crossing the mighty Mekong

Check in again soon for more updates and stories as I move to Frankfurt, Germany in early October to enroll in a Masters program!

More SE Asia pics here.