I like being in Canada in December because it’s cold. The cold makes me grateful for being warm, which makes the extreme heat around the world easier to bear because I can remember those December days in Canada when I was cold. The cold has other advantages: when it’s cold outside, you feel obligated to do indoor activities like puzzles, cooking, video games, sandwiches, and Simpsons marathons. You can’t do these things on a clear conscience when it’s sunny and warm outside. December in Canada is also a great time to get into the Christmas spirit because there’s likely to be snow somewhere around, and even Christmas markets. Within Canada, Winnipeg (aka Winterpeg) is a perfect December winter destination for all of the above, and the two weeks I spent there with Marce (who could only spend a week), and I spent there The only thing that wasn’t so Christmas-spirited about Winnipeg was the arrival at the airport. Marce and I were treated like narco drug traffickers by the local immigration agents and taken into a back area after picking up our checked luggage. After 20 minutes of answering questions about my employment, proving my finances (logging into my bank […]
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This was another quick stopover in Denver for a few days. Took care of the yearly registration for the green car (my monthly storage cost has increased by 300% over the past year) and had fun showing Marce Casa Bonita and Meow Wolf. Casa Bonita is a historic family restaurant with cliff divers, a music show, face painting, and a shooting gallery (among other attractions) that was recently restored by the creators of the television show South Park, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, at great personal expense after the original venue shut down. The original Casa Bonita had been an iconic destination restaurant during my childhood (and many other Coloradoans, including Trey Parker and Matt Stone). The new owners did an impressive job of not only restoring but surpassing the decor, spirit, and environment of the original Casa Bonita restaurant – it’s much better than it used to be, and it was fun to go there with Marce and my friend Dan, who was there for his first time. Dan didn’t join Marce and me for Meow Wolf, a multi-story art installation you can spend a few hours in. It’s a great place to take photos.
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Every time I stop in Mexico City for a week on my way somewhere else, I’m reminded I should stay longer. The food’s incredible, the city’s endlessly walkable, and I get to use my Spanish. I think I’ve reached the point where there are simply too many places I’m happy to be, and that makes choosing where to stay harder than ever. Maybe that’s the quiet success of all this movement: I’ve already found what I was looking for. So why keep traveling if everywhere I return to already feels like a home? It’s possible that I am actively avoiding feeling at home. As usual, Montezuma found me in Mexico City. I didn’t touch street food this time, so I’m blaming the store-bought lettuce from the homemade salads I’d become obsessed with (see here). At this point, it feels inevitable. Montezuma always knows when I’ve crossed the border. There’s no hiding, not even in my own apartment. Let’s just say I haven’t made a salad at home since. And that’s all I’ll say about that. Thank you, Marce, for saving my life. The rest of my time in Mexico City was great. I also solved a medical mystery that started […]
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I spent Easter in Orlando as a guest of Marce and her family, who were generous enough to host me and show me around. I also made a return trip to Disney’s Hollywood Studios, my first visit since 1993, when I came here with my dad. Some things hadn’t changed at all — Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular, Muppets 3D, even parts of the Star Wars area, though it’s obviously been updated. It was cool seeing the same attractions three decades later, and the only regret I have is that Disney does not sell those giant turkey drumsticks at Hollywood Studios. So, instead, I compensated by eating three ice cream sandwiches. I’ll have to right that wrong on my next pass through Orlando.
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After cruising through Canada (Edmonton, Yellowknife, and Calgary), I returned to KC for Christmas. I had the privilege of visiting my brother and his family for both Thanksgiving and Christmas this year. Double holidays, double family, double pumpkin pie. This might become a yearly tradition! I was well-hosted on both occasions, and the opportunities to spend time with my nieces, Caroline and Olivia, and nephew William were very appreciated, along with my mother and step-father. My mother’s birthday is on Christmas, and Olivia helped me find a good birthday present for her, a Stanley mug. Apparently, they are very trendy amongst middle school girls, so I was assured my septuagenarian mother would love it. My mother, in turn, gifted me a funny little man made of felt (see photo, below), which might be an artistic representation of yours truly in a few more years. I would be so happy to have a sweater like he has — it looks very comfortable and warm. Thanks, everyone (especially my brother John), for having me and for your patience in enduring the sprawl of my belongings across the living room, dining room, and stairway as I integrated Amazon deliveries and new gear into […]
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I visited Calgary two years ago and liked it so much that I knew I would come back. I made time for a short stopover after Yellowknife and enjoyed revisiting the same hot yoga venue, restaurants, and asian grocery store (with the biggest Nashi Pears I have ever seen). Increasingly, my favorite destinations are places where I live my daily routine as if I had been living there permanently for a decade. The little differences between each place I stay, like the local gyms, where I buy daily or weekly passes, make it feel like I am transporting myself among various parallel realities (e.g., each with its own local gym offering daily and weekly passes).
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You may already be familiar with the scientific, hemispheric phenomenon known as the northern lights (aurora borealis). If you are not, I describe it as a night-time-sky-thing that is like a shimmery, slowly moving cloud of green or blue. It’s like a night rainbow made of darkness and radiant, translucent clouds of radioactive fallout. I believe a more scientific(-ish) explanation could be that the magnetic field surrounding our Earth, polarized between the northern Arctic and Antarctica, acts as an atmospheric shield protecting the planet from… stuff (“particles”?). Sometimes, some of that stuff hits the magnetic field/shield (like a mosquito in an electric bug zapper) and creates a sort of low-key, mellowed-out, slow-motion melty lava-lamp-in-the-night-sky effect. That’s the northern lights. I prefer to think of the aurora borealis as space magic. It comes from space and looks like a glowing ghost swaying in the sky. I’m mixing a lot of metaphors (or similies?), trying to describe it, which is consistent with the challenges of describing things that are magic, so let’s just call it magic. I traveled to Yellowknife, Canada, to see for myself this space magic. To increase the odds of seeing space magic, ancient texts (the internet) had recommended […]
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Over the past few years, I have been making a concerted effort to explore more of Canada, America’s hat. Edmonton has always seemed like an interesting, blue-collar oil town that I wanted to visit. When I was in Calgary in 2024, I couldn’t fit it into my itinerary. This time around, though, it was a perfect stopover destination on the way further north. I didn’t get much done apart from working. I had tried to get NHL hockey tickets and even decided to invest in some first-row, against-the-glass seats in hopes of using my new camera to catch high-speed action shots. Unfortunately, when I tried to purchase the tickets online, there was an error with the Ticketmaster checkout process that I didn’t realize until game night, a few days later. I had another ticket fiasco, too! I found an orchestra playing Star Wars music in Edmonton, so I bought tickets. In my excitement to secure them, I overlooked that the date was January 11, not December 11. I had bought tickets for the wrong month. The owner of my Airbnb rental was not as appreciative as I would have been if someone had gifted me free Star Wars tickets 6 […]
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On my way into the USA, I spent a couple of nights with my friend, Vince, who hosted me in his mansion. We always have fun eating and drinking too much together. Vince does all the cooking, but it’s okay because I make up for it by doing most of the eating. He is an accomplished amateur chef who has been highly inspired by Anthony Bourdain to both travel the world and become an excellent cook. When I’m lucky, Vince fires up his backyard brick oven to grill steaks or takes out his salt slab to bake chocolate chip cookies. Tiberius (Ti) and Augustus (Gus), Vince’s two Beauceron dogs, are always the additional members of the party. Thanks again for hosting me, Vince. My time at your house really feels like I’m at home, and it gives me insight and awareness into the lifestyle I have forgone (sacrificed?) in order to navigate my own path in life. You are a positive affirmation and influence that someday I might find my own peaceful and happy place with two dogs and an outside brick oven where I can be content to live and also stay.
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