Sorry for the failure to post your daily dose of the inane, lame, and insane here yesterday. Events superseded my best intentions. But I’m back today with twice the goodness you’ve come to expect at LTG. And yes, I know that is a very low bar.
My intended post that never happened was going to be about my first dartless Tuesday since beginning my retirement from the game. I just took those hours I would have wasted playing darts and devoted them to my other nighttime hobby–drinking beers with lovely ladies who enjoy my company as long as they are earning drink commissions. But as it turned out before I could write that post, I got called away to participate in the end-of-season MVP competition, an event I had explicitly declined to join. Well, one of the players from my team injured his arm, and I felt obligated to at least help his doubles partner avoid a forfeit. So, my afternoon plans of blogging and napping were ruined. I played like shit again, and we went 1-2 in match play, failing to make the finals. I hope that constitutes my final kiss goodbye.
The “big” unreported events from my Tuesday include a visit to the immigration office, where I was granted another 60 days of legal living in this promised land. My time is running out, though; I can only stay on a tourist visa for three years, meaning I need to leave by December. The more I learn about the vaxx, the less I want to get jabbed, but I may have no choice if I want to be able to return to the Philippines. Getting out is not a problem now; many countries have put the stupid scamdemic rules away (for now, anyway). My tentative plan is to visit Cambodia for a few days, then reset my three-year clock when I fly back here. Maybe sanity will return here before I leave, but I’m not counting on it. Get the jab or be locked in a hotel room for a week. I’ve got a couple more months to decide, but I’m leaning towards surrendering and getting the shot.
Instead of playing darts, I got a haircut and then treated myself to dinner at Sit-n-Bull.
After dinner, I went next door to The Green Room to see Maria. She said she needed a customer so she could afford medicine for her child, who has the dreaded dengue fever.
It started raining, but I still wasn’t ready to go home yet. I briskly walked up the highway to Alaska Club, dodging as many raindrops as possible. My favorite there, Karen, was waiting to serve me.
The big news in town this week is that the SOB (Sons of Baccus) dance contest is returning Friday night at Alaska after a 2+ year hiatus. I expect I’ll be first in line. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that Karen will be one of the performers for Alaska. She’s a waitress normally (by choice), so this is really stepping up. I hope I get picked to be a judge!
After the Wednesday Walkers hike (more about that later), I attended a Hash meeting at the VFW. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss and vote on what to do about the Hashmobile. It blew a gasket last week, and the repair estimate is between sixty to eighty thousand pesos. We currently have around eighty thousand in the Hash bank account and are lucky to break even at the Hash events each week. So, repairing the truck would essentially bankrupt the Hash. I argued in favor of scrapping it because it’s old, worn out, and a money pit. It’s also uncomfortable and in my opinion unsafe as a means of transport. We can always rent Jeepneys like we did last week when there is a remote start for the Hash trail. Well, the issue turned out to be more controversial than I expected, but the counter-arguments struck me as being based more on sentimentality and tradition than reason and logic.
It was during this truck meeting that I received the urgent message asking me to play darts. So, I hurried home, took a shower, then headed out to Harley’s on Baloy road to join the competition. As previously mentioned, I sucked. We were eliminated before 5:00 (after a 2:00 p.m. start), and I had business to attend to on the other side of town. I made the long walk to Hideaway Bar, stopping briefly at Shamboli’s:
And of course, one of those girls was my favorite, Joy. She was also the business I needed to attend to. I had promised her that I’d pay for some dental work she needed, and her appointment was the following morning. So, I handed over the required 4000 pesos.
Every little bit helps, I suppose. And I went home feeling like I had accomplished my good deed for the day.
So, that leaves the Wednesday Walkers report. Once again, we took a Jeepney ride out to Subic town to explore new paths. I’m sure Lewis and Clark didn’t always reach their intended destination on the first try, and neither did we.
Quite the adventure, no?
Anyway, that’s the latest update to my story. I’m always ready for the next big thing, whether it be when walking or when drinking. If I could go back and tell that guy in the pink shirt above what lay in store for him, I wonder what he would have said. Well, I hope he would have at least quit smoking before doing the damage this version of myself has to deal with. Oh well, I’m still alive, and that’s good enough for me.
Good to know you’re not dead.
I can only stay on a tourist visa for three years, meaning I need to leave by December.
Didn’t you once mention a retiree’s visa? Why not opt for that?
SRRV
I haven’t heard from her since
A lot of women do this thing where they feel there’s no need to reply. It’s part of their attempt to appear mysterious, and the preservation of mystery is more important than the risk of being rude. So: rudely mysterious. A female coworker of mine got pissed off at me, some years back, and she wrote me an angry email about her perception of my conduct. I did the gentlemanly thing and wrote back with an apology. No reply. Of course. I think the feminine tendency toward mysteriousness, in such cases, is less about being coy and more about vindictively making you stew in your own guilt. It’s a stupid, small-minded tactic, and in my coworker’s case, well, she was an oversensitive bitch with a tendency to play the victim at every opportunity. So, no: my apology wasn’t sincere—it was merely pro forma. There’s no cure for bitchiness like hers. That said, I think women in general just don’t feel the need to reply to messages because, as Jack Nicholson put it in As Good As It Gets, women (many of them, anyway) lack reason and accountability.
Sorry to hear about darts, and if Maria’s gonna complain about “only” two lady drinks when beggars can’t be choosers, well, she can sit on a splintery broomstick. Repeatedly.
Adios, Hashmobile! Here’s to safer vehicles.
Hey Kev, yes, the SRRV was what I originally intended to do. The bureaucratic hassles involved in getting it done put me off to the point of saying fuck it, I’ll just go the tourist visa route. I expected I’d be leaving the country three or four times a year for recreational travel anyway, so the three years wouldn’t be a factor. Then the scamdemic came along. I may still pursue an SRRV in the future, but I’ll use a “fixer” to do all the leg work.
I think the lack of response can be a good thing when the only motivation for contacting you in the first place was self-interest. Why are so many women attempting to get me to break Rule #1 lately? Last night I had to block another one because I got weary of the persistent begging. Like I told her in my final message, “I never hear from you unless you want something. That’s not the kind of friend I want or need.”
Everything changes. I won’t be surprised if the Hash at some point acquires another vehicle, but it makes no sense to keep paying for repairs on a worn-out piece of shit.
Good luck with whatever choice you make with the vaccine. Other than a third arm growing out of my shoulder, I have not had any issues. LOL. (Actually, and I may have mentioned this before, but I have friend whose daughter is a post doc at U of Southern Cal. She has said that one of the common misconceptions is that the vaccine technologies and vaccines themselves were rushed. At least at USC (and probably other universities) they have been researching COVID and researching and testing vaccines for COVID for at least 15 – 20 years.) Anyways, I know passions are high on both sides of this issue so probably not a rabbit hole to go down.
Re: Hashmobile. Yeah, like you guys said, seems like a lot of your group is not rationally thinking. Kind of like someone who buys at $250K motorhome because it will save money on hotel rooms!!!! Ummmm, do the math. How often is the Hashmobile used? Is it used for other purposes? Looking at it from the outside, seems it would just make a lot more sense to hire a jeepney (or other vehicle) when you needed it.
All I really know about the vaccine is that it is ineffective at best and harmful at worse. I’m not afraid of COVID and don’t want the government telling me what I have to do with my body. Reasonable people can disagree of course.
Yes, the Hashmobile has been used to provide assistance in the community, mostly moving household goods. Probably on a break-even basis, so not a money maker. I agree renting a vehicle as needed is the smartest course of action and one we will be trying in the immediate future at least.