But it’s the ritual of getting home. Luggage gets dumped near the door, the camera bag is dumped near the computer and I can start to shed myself of synthetic clothing and put on cotton. A good shower to wipe the smell and sweat of my travels off of me and it hits me: my journey is over, and I’m back to my normal life.

Photos will be uploaded soon. Honest, I’ll get to them when I can.

I don’t know why it sounded like a good idea to start it. I figured that I needed to read good books since I hang out with authors, but in all honesty, my poor impulse control often gets the best of me. I’m prone to take on stupid projects and not complete them all the way. And the older I get, the less I realize that I know and feel like I’ve forgotten everything I’ve learned except those lessons I’ve paid for in something other than money.

The first volume comprised of three books, the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, John Woolman’s Journal and William Penn’s Fruits of Solitude. Reading about Ben Franklin was amazing. He started as a simple man with a curious mind that was told at an early age to act like if he’s meeting royalty only to meet five kings in his life. He realized that in order to succeed at business, he needed to dedicate himself to business and that the perception meant everything. Instead of going out drinking and gambling, he stayed in late to work and as a result, people noticed how hard of a worker he was and went with him for business.

I was really surprised at the humility he had, and the frankness of the lessons he learned. With his life, he had every right to gloat and to brag about what he accomplished. After all, you don’t go from being a teenager learning the art of printing to being an advisor to practically everyone who mattered in Philadelphia. Men trusted his clarity of mind and judgment.

And his accomplishments: inventions, literature and being the first true Statesmen in the grandest sense of the word. He’s a great man, and I feel richer for having read his autobiography. Lessons he learned are very valid today.

John Woolman’s Journal, on the other hand, was very difficult to read. As a child, he threw a rock at a robin that was defending her nest and killed her dead. Feeling remorseful, he thought it was the merciful thing to do and killed the baby birds. From then on, he wanted to protect life. As a young man, out of principle, he refused to write a bill of sale for a slave. And as a Quaker, he took it upon himself to dedicate his life to abolition, among other things.

However, being deeply religious led for a strange bit of reading – it felt like every paragraph that described an action of his led to multiple pages of “His love” and “His Divine Providence” and other religious sayings. It felt like it would never end. It was rough getting through – and required me to plow through it and take it like I meant it. It was draining.

William Penn’s Fruits of Solitude was a good book. The religious aspect of Penn wasn’t as overt as Woolman, and yet still contained a lot of the wisdom that Franklin had. I’m pretty sure that Franklin liberally borrowed a good portion of Fruits of Solitude for Poor Richard’s Almanack. In contrast, it made Woolman’s Journal seem like child’s play, and I flew through it. I could imagine Penn’s maxims being used by a good parent wanting to impart lessons to his or her children. They’re equally valid now, and I could see giving this book to an impressionable 10 year old instead of the junk that’s being read now.

The best part is that since these books are in the public domain, they’re free or virtually free. So if you’re a Kindle addict, pick them up and read them. My excuse is that I wouldn’t go into a bookstore and buy these books, mainly because I’d look like a pretentious dick reading classic literature in the way that douchebags do it around my neighborhood. Also, being a Kindle lover means I can read classic authors like Jane Austen without being made fun of in public.

Right now I’m almost two-thirds through Volume 2 after taking a week to plow through Plato’s writings about Socrates. When I’m finished, I’ll write about that, but I just have to say that I can totally understand why people think Socrates came across as a dick. His “I know nothing” schtick must have pissed off people galore, while at the same time improved knowledge and discovery. From a philosophical standpoint, yes – I understand it and appreciate it, but Plato’s long winded semi-fictional dialogue of Socrates’ “teachings” (since Socrates was fond of saying he didn’t teach anything) was pretty hard to wrap my head around and find out what actually was said. Plato was a big fan of Socrates and used the Socratic method, albeit less dicklishly. Regardless, when I’m finished, I’ll have to read Xenophon’s treatment of Socrates to compare and contrast.

Three Quarters of Europe Badge:
There are 50 countries in Europe. Have you been to 38 of them?

Two-Thirds of Africa Badge:
Including the islands off of Africa, there are 53 countries. Time to get crackin’! A mere 38 countries – c’mon – you can do it!

The Stans Badge:
This is only 7 countries: Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

The Big Ten Badge:
Russia, Canada, China, US, Brazil, Australia, India, Argentina, Kazakhstan and Sudan. Ten bigass countries.

The Tiny Ten Badge:
They are: The Vatican, Monaco, Nauru, Tuvalu, San Marino, Liechtenstein, Marshall Islands, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Seychelles, and Maldives. Passport stamps from these places are truly awesome.

Century Club:
100 countries. And you have to do it legitimately – not this “counting it if I landed in it and transited through” crap.

Axis of Evil Club:
President Bush declared the “Axis of Evil” as Iran, Iraq and North Korea. Bonus points for being PNG‘d out of all 3.

Alphabet Club:
No countries start with an X or W, so you’ve got to visit at least one country with a different letter of the alphabet.

The “57 States” Club:
Going to all 50 states is so passé, and President Obama knows it. Time to hit the other 7: Puerto Rico, Northern Mariana Islands, US Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, the US Minor Outlying Islands and Washington DC.

Sex on Seven Continents Badge:
Why bother traveling to seven continents and bragging about it when you can brag about the wild hot sex you had in Antarctica? Bonus points if you bring that up in your house of worship or in casual conversation.

1) I’m going to Seoul, South Korea in October. Yay.
2) I’ve started reading the Harvard Classics. Apparently reading it got some guy a memoir, but I’m nowhere near that ambitious nor arrogant… and overcoming Lyme disease and a torn meniscus. OH NOES! But that’s enough for a blog post. I’m trying to get through one book a week, but it’s more difficult than expected.
3) WordPress is a pain in the ass. I finally narrowed down some issues to a Bing Maps plugin that I deactivated. I’ll try it later, but right now I can’t be bothered.
4) And I changed the theme to something more minimalist.

Yay. And one month until my birthday. It’s depressing because I’m officially hitting “old man” status and being referred to as “the old man” by my paramour. But I do like having more and more white hairs on the sides of my head – makes me feel older and wiser. Or something.

As of July 29th, 2010, there have been 255 homicides in Chicago. 183 of those have been African-American males. 206 homicides have been due to gunshots, proving how well Chicago’s war on guns has gone. African Americans represents 36.77% of the population of Chicago, but account for being the victim of 80.78% of the homicides this year. Chicago’s neighborhood of Humboldt Park had 18 homicides this year with all of them being African American males. That’s one about every 12 days.

All of this makes me wonder: if River North or Lincoln Park had this many homicides, would the National Guard be on the streets? Or is it that society cares in general when white people get killed?

So, here we go.
I write two blogs, this and my blog over at ChicagoNow. As of July 27, 2010, my blogs have netted me a total of $0.00. That’s right, not a god damned cent. In fact, they’re a net loss, from paying a friend for a design of the header for my ChicagoNow blog to personal web-hosting.

I do have an Amazon referral program on my blog, providing you click through and actually order something. How much has that earned me from this blog? Nothing. Zero. Zilch. Zip. In fact, the only way I was able to make *any* sale was because my friend Tim was nice enough to buy a GPS through one of my links. Thanks Tim. :)

I am a member of Amazon’s Vine program, whereby I’m provided with items to keep after reviewing. Most of those items are given to friends and my mom after I’m done with them. The only real disclosure I have to make is that I sometimes review the books of my friends, who I adore and give good reviews because I genuinely like their books.

I’ve been offered freebies in the past from companies who want me to say nice things about them, and I’ve turned them all down. Why? Because if it sounds cool, I’ll do it. And if it sucks, I can say it sucks because it’s my own hard-earned money spent on it.

I also work for a big company whose name I will never mention. They are not in the travel industry, but are a major employer in my metro area. Suffice to say, my words are my own and do not in any way reflect the thoughts/feelings/intentions of the place that I work for. They’re nice people and I want to stay gainfully employed.

Yay, now I feel all ethical.

USS Arizona Memorial, Pearl Harbor, Honolulu, Hawaii:

USS Utah, Ford Island, Hawaii:

From the USS Arizona Memorial:

Port of Cascais, Portugal:

Amber Fort, Jaipur, India:

The urban sprawl of Los Angeles, CA:

The Danube River, Budapest, Hungary:

I’ve rowed and kayaked before, so I figured, what’s the worst that can happen? I decided that my best position on the raft was to sit up front and call cadence because, fuck it, lead the way. That’s how I roll.

The first few “easy” rapids were fun – a few class II and III rapids that made for some exciting “oh shit!” moments. Then came the first Class IV. I figured that my job would be to focus and keep paddling until I heard the guide yell stop. Despite being about 10 feet behind me, I couldn’t hear him for shit. So I paddled and down we went – a steep little dropoff and we all got soaked, but we emerged victorious. So we did the paddle “high-five” thing, and I thought, fuck, that was rather simple.

The next Class IV rapid would be my downfall. We took the ready position, hunkered down and ready to paddle our asses off. First came the drop and I heard our guide scream to paddle hard, so I dug in with my paddle and kept crankin’ away like I was some paddling rockstar as opposed to a barely coordinated guy. With the waves, there were strokes where I didn’t catch any water, but I kept paddling like a damn paddling savant. And then came the wave. The next thing I know, I’m leaning backwards, trying to use my foot that was kept under a strap on the boat and crunch my stomach despite my beer gut in order to keep from falling out. I failed, and I was in the drink.

I was about 6 inches under the water, struggling for air. Despite that, I was pretty calm. I saw two of my fellow boatmates reach for me with their paddles for extension, yet all I could think about was handing my paddle back to someone on the boat so we didn’t lose one so I wouldn’t have gotten charged for one. I didn’t float as well as I should have – the sandals, baggy shorts and shirt kept me under water and less buoyant. But I was fine even though I was gasping for air. See, being waterboarded actually helps prepare you for the outdoors. Take that, ACLU!

Eventually, my fellow boatmates pulled my fat ass back onto the boat, and I regained my composure and more importantly, my breath. I was shaken, and my pride took a beating. I shouldn’t have fallen in, and yes, I know, shit happens. I secretly wanted another boat from our tour group to suffer the same fate so I wouldn’t be known as “that fat guy who fell out on our rafting trip.” Ego, I tell you.

We did a few more Class II and easy Class III rapids. Every time I felt something, I took one hand off the paddle, and grabbed the “oh shit” strap on the boat. That screwed up the boat’s orientation, and we’d yaw as a result. I felt bad, but got over it. After all, they didn’t get tossed.

We prepped ourselves for the next series of Class III rapids, and I was anxious to get back going since I felt like crap, and needed a self-esteem boost. Naturally, when you want something, you don’t get it. We hit a fucking rock. Not a tiny rock, mind you, but a god damned Rock of Motherfucking Gibraltar that came out of nowhere. With the current and waves, our boat was pinned sideways against this rock, and I found myself along with my boatmates standing on the side of the boat, leaning against the rock. I don’t know where this rock came from. Our guide didn’t know where this rock came from. So here we are, chillin’ while being pinned against this rock figuring out what to do with ourselves. After a few minutes, the rescue guides said our best bet would be to jump off, get fished out of the drink, and then free the raft. Since I was already drenched and had no pride left after my previous falling out, I figured, fuck, and crossed my arms, closed my eyes, and jumped in. I bobbed along like a pudgy moron and grabbed the back of a kayak and crawled ashore, feeling like a total dick. I know that shit happens, but it felt like at that point, I could fuck up a wet dream – no pun intended.

It took the guides and kayakers a good 20 minutes to free our stuck raft, and in a way, I felt that hey, we got it stuck really good, so this was a freak occurrence. After we got the boat free, we got back on the SS Bad Luck and took a few more rapids before lunch. Lunch itself was quite nice – sandwiches, juice, tea and Costa Rican food. And there were feral pigs too, which made it that much funnier. I wasn’t hungry – I was dehydrated and in need of a beer or six along with some Advil and a hug.

We made it back safe and sound after some floating and relaxing and general fucking around. There were several more Class II and III rapids, and we negotiated those with ease. Our boat’s mood got progressively better, and I felt better despite being achy and sunburnt in weird spots. Eventually, we got back, got cleaned up, and had some beer and talked with my fellow boatmates. All of them were moving on, but I was heading back to San Jose and in less than 12 hours, en route back home. Still, not too bad for a 3 day weekend from work, even if my legs and ass were sore.

A farm along the slopes of Irazu Volcano.

And the Irazu Volcano itself…

Orosi Valley: