Murphy O’Brian was the first to die. At five in the morning he staggered home from the bar. On a flight of fancy, he jumped to the railing along the Eastside Bridge. Headlights flashing into his eyes on the left, murky, slow moving water to the right, he was rather proud of his ability to balance. When the giant tentacle wrapped around his waist he assumed it was just his drunken imagination. The second to die was a salesman trying […]
The very first attraction on my tour of Indonesia was a walk through a local market to a mosque in Jakarta. 1. The entrance to the area.
Once Ethan had gobbled down a couple of slices of pizza, his stomach protested. He lingered over the open box, loath to part with it even though eating anything more would probably push him from queasy mortifying. It was too rich to eat in one sitting after so long without food.
Just because I was traveling didn’t mean I wasn’t supposed to continue with the Lifestyle Balance program. Luckily for me it just so happened that the regular meetings dropped from once a week to once a month by the time I left for Indonesia. I only missed one of them. As to everything else….
He told his wife he was going out to buy a pack of cigarettes. That was twenty three years ago. Since then he’d traveled the world a dozen times over performing covert ops for a branch of the government that she wouldn’t know existed. She was never given any explanation for his absence. No calls, no letters, no body. He kept tabs on her. When she remained alone all those years he thought she must truly love him. He passed […]
“Score!!!” While still standing in the dumpster, Jim opened the pizza box so his new buds could all see. “Wow! A whole, perfectly good pizza. I told you Minnesota was the way to go.” Rick smiled with that smug look that made Jim want to pop him. But you don’t go punching the guy who owns the van.
I suppose the place to start talking about my vacation is at the beginning. It didn’t go well. We arrived at the Salt Lake City airport in plenty of time. Unluckily, we made the mistake of using Delta’s Priority check in. We’d have been better off with the machines.
Marge eyed the canoe with misgivings. In Bogotá the rental canoe sank as soon as the man renting it disappeared around a bend. In Alaska it took fifteen tourists paddling hard for two hours to get the heavy canoe across a little nothing of a lake. In Patagonia a whole fleet of fluorescent pink fiberglass canoes that looked stupid in front of such grandeur ruined a lot of her pictures. “What’s the matter, Marge? Never been in a canoe before?” […]
The final count is in. I took 13,852 pictures on this trip. Most of them are trash. For instance: 1. Most of the time I simply lifted the camera and clicked. No looking through the view finder because there wasn’t time. Often the angles or bad.
Nathan only meant to lean into the dumpster and take a look. He just wanted to see if Dangerous Dan had given him false information to get rid of him, or might have shown a shred of humanity in guiding him to this spot. He wasn’t really going to eat anything that had been thrown away. Or so he told himself. Once he got the lid thrown back and smelled the pizza within, he lost control. It smelled fresh. Really […]
I had a great trip. It was exciting, and entertaining, and a time or two a little trying. I suppose some people might even think it was maybe a little dangerous. Yeah, the Komodo Dragons were NOT behind a fence. We were walking freely through their home. Yet I never got the feeling of impending doom. Then I went home.
I went to Indonesia in August. Do I have a lot to talk about! For the next few weeks I’ll be posting all kinds of stuff about the trip and about Indonesia. Yep. I will. Just as soon as I can work my way through the 10,000 pictures I took there. You think I’m exaggerating? I’m rounding down! I picked up the bad habit of lifting my camera and clicking without bothering with the view finder. Too much was happening […]
Alicia followed her Aunt Jane into the apartment. She didn’t like the city as much as she thought she would. Aunt Jane made it sound exciting and wonderful. She kept talking about opportunity and the richness of culture. All Alicia saw was noisy people. “Isn’t this a grand apartment? I love it! It’s the only place of it’s kind.” Aunt Jane gestured grandly. “Really?” Alicia looked out the window into an apartment across the street. She couldn’t tell the difference […]