Thanks for Reading!

Okay first things first. I'm sorry I lied to everyone about when I was coming home. As you may have heard, I (hopefully) will make it home for thanksgiving, my plane arrives in on October 4th at 6:30pm. The whole thing is supposed to be a big surprise for my family, who still think I'm coming home on the 9th, (Honestly, did they really think I'd miss Thanksgiving?). I'm sitting here in Ho Chi Minh (Saigon) Vietnam, it's 10:04pm and my flight leaves tomorrow at six in the morning. I just found out my sister has to work Friday which is perfect because it means someone will be at the house tomorrow when I get there!

Second thing. Thank you all so much for all your encouraging words and I'm glad that those who wrote me enjoyed reading my blog. I had a blast writing it but there were times when I felt I couldn't be bothered and then I'd get a note from someone saying they're waiting for the next post. So thank you. Coincidentally if anyone wants to start their own blog there are lots of sites out there, the site I used was http://www.blogger.com/ but there are lots of others.

Third thing. My sister and her boyfriend and his house are planning a little welcome home party at the Stones Place on the 12th, would be great to see people there, open invitation so invite whoever you want! And yes I do realize that it's Queen's Homecoming that weekend and I won't be offended if you've made prior plans. But you still have to call me and take me out for beers to make up for it.......................By the way, Queen's University sent me an e-mail and when the Dean heard that I wouldn't be attending this year he called an emergency meeting to push the event back a weekend. So don't go making any travel arrangements quite yet.

I'll be up at my cottage this week, relaxing and contemplating what the hell I'll be doing next with my life. I have a rough idea that I'll be moving out west for the ski season come January and after that it's all up in the air. I do know one thing though. I'm not done traveling yet. Europe's calling my name and I wouldn't be surprised if I ended up there next fall. Probably blogging away as usual! Feel free to enlighten me with any insights you may have! (705) 684-9306. Oh and I don't have a cell phone anymore, my home phone is (416) 925-6869. I can't post this until the weekend so I hope you all have a great thanksgiving and I'll see you all soon!

Take 'er sleazy,

Will

P.S. Thanks go to Steve Hull for the pic of me last year at post-camp!

I will post one more blog with video's aswell, (bungey jumping, sky diving etc.)

Singapore (Sept 30-Oct 2)

I finally made it down to Singapore and met up with the girls that I'd met on that bus ride in southern Thailand. After a fun night drinking in Clarke Quay we were famished the next day. Singapore is the international hub of South-East Asia, renowned for its sky scrapers, central business district, shopping centers and gourmet eateries from around the world!!!



So we went to fuckin' "Hooters." While I did feel slightly guilty about this we were so starved by the time we got to the Quay that we ate at the first place we saw. It is IMPOSSIBLE to get a taxi in Singapore, I've never seen anything like it!!! Even the cabs that are empty won't pick you up. Twice I had to get my hotel to call and order me a cab for an additional $2.50 charge and when the cabby got there he asked where I was going, shook his head and just drove off!!!!! Last night I wanted to go to the zoo and see one of the animal night shows and when this cabby heard that he just said "no take." I asked the guy at the front desk of my hotel what this was all about and this is the conversation that followed.

Front Desk: "They're waiting until midnight so they can charge more."
Me: "It's 10:30pm."
Front Desk: "No, it's 10:25pm."
Me: (Biting my tongue.) "How far is it to the zoo? More specifically, how much money could they charge me right now to get there?"
Front Desk: "Sixteen dollars."
Me: And how much can they bump the rates up at midnight?"
Front Desk: "Two dollars extra."
Me:"...........let's figure this out together. It costs about four dollars to get anywhere in the city. You're telling me that a cabby would rather run around trying to find four fares in under an hour and a half when he could make the same amount of money just picking me up, save on gas, and he'd still be done before midnight?" Front Desk: (Blank Stare.)......."You wait outside?"

RRRRRRrrrrrrr!!!!!!What the hell is wrong with these people?



My mind hurt from all the thinking I'd been doing so we decided to hop on the ferry cruise around Singapore.



Singapore is full of weird architecture.......weird, multi-colored architecture.



It sort of looks like Miami Beach in the new Playdough colors.



The cruises coup-de-gras is that the "captain" didn't speak English. He just drove the boat around and played a pre-recorded message at certain points. The voice on the recorder sounded like The Crocodile Hunter on speed and coupled with the fact that this little twenty minute cruise was costing us fifteen bucks we felt like we'd been had.



Singapore means "Lion City." Apparently the guy who founded the city saw a lion on the shore and took this as a good omen. How this could be interpreted as a good omen I have no idea. The founder of the city then went on to form a city-wide taxi company who's corporate logic is considered by some to be a historic throw-back to the past. Westerners on the other hand, might refer to their business logic as "retarded."



That night the girls, (Kelly and Sam,) and I headed out to the Raffle's Hotel, Inventor of the famous drink entitled the, "Singapore Sling."



While the drinks were good, the two Asian men on either side of us and their "dates" for the night proceeded to paw at each other like a couple of junior-high school kids in the back of an auditorium. The men actually got so aggressive with these prostitutes that one of them had to physically remove the guys hands from her thighs. I contempleted throwing peanuts at them but I would have felt guilty if the girls scooped them up off the floor and put them in their purse to feed their children later that night.



Cheers!



Now here's a story. Earlier that day when I was walking back to my hotel I was accosted at the front desk by two woman. They were pleasant enough I guess but they kept asking me questions and wouldn't leave me alone. They asked me where I'd been, what clubs I'd been to in Singapore etc. etc. I was pretty tired and finally I started to lose my patience. I was done with this idiotic chit-chat and as I tried to get by one of the girls she asked me for my room number. I thought I'd given her the wrong room number but apparently not. An hour later my phone rung and here was this Asian woman's voice cooing on the other end. I politely told her that I had a girlfriend staying in a nearby hostel and that I didn't want to be disturbed. Later that evening I was walking down the stairs when I ran into the front desk guy going the same way. "Look," I told him. "I think there was a bit of a language barrier a while ago. I'm sorry if I offended you with that scene earlier today. Let me explain. I DON'T want prostitutes coming up to my room, it was all a huge misunderstanding! If you see that woman again can you tell her not to bother me?" (Not only did I not want some skank scratching around the hallway near my room in the middle of the night but I didn't exactly want to get thrown out of the hotel either!)

The front desk man looked at me and laughed. "That no lady.......he gay!!!.......he gay!!!!!!.....he want to make business with you....ha ha ah ha!!! Woops. I tried to keep my composure. "Look I don't want any prostitutes, dick or no dick, busting down my door in the middle of the night!!! Understand!?! He laughed and told me not to worry. We walked down to the front desk and I hung out with him for a bit until Kelly and Sam arrived to pick me up. While we were waiting, the guy showed me the surveillance monitor behind the desk that was linked to a camera in the hallway. This camera had a view of everyone walking down the steps towards the lobby. A group of women all primed for the night appeared in one of the monitor's. The front desk man leaned forward and smiled, "ladyboy.......ladyboy........ladyboy!" Boom. The door opened and three "women" walked out. I started to think this old guy was pretty funny. We waited a few more minutes before three more women came down. Again the night clerk cleared his throat and pointed at the screen "Lady boy......ladyboy.......(I took over at this point,) "LADYBOY!!" I screamed. We both laughed our heads off as three more "its" came through the door. This entertained us for a good 15 minutes as we debated who had and had not been under the knife. At one point I suggested that perhaps he should changed the name of the hotel to something more appropriate. He replied, "yah.........the Ladyboy Hotel.....conduct your business elsewhere!" This could have gone on all night but Same and Kelly showed up so we left the lobby and went out to Raffle's.

Now something you should know about Kelly and Sam. The two of them have fallen into the habit of attracting an odd breed of people. Take for example their room at their hostel. On one side of their room, a nun continued to pray for what they told me was somewhere in the neighbourhood of eighteen hours a day. Then there was this hooker named "Rosa" (pictured above) that showed them around town their first night in and after that night she never came back to the room for more than a few minutes at a time and usually slept in her clothes. Rosa also started to hit on Kelly pretty hard, whispering in her ear, asking her if she was attracted to bisexual women yada yada yada.We ran into Rosa on the street one night and she came into a bar with us. We attracted quite a few stares and when the four of us sat down. It was at this point that my trained ladyboy eye happened to notice Rosa's Adam's apple and the fact that her hands were as big as my feet. Rosa then proceeded to tell us that because it was our last night in Singapore she didn't feel ashamed to tell us that she was in fact a transgendered lady-boy who had "the chop" (shudder) six years ago.To which Kelly replied straight-faced, "I really would never have guessed." Sam and I had to hold back the laughter. To top it all off, Rosa was constantly taking hormone tablets that were reacting badly with her immune system and were causing her tongue to turn black and fall out. She was also obviously was still attracted to women but had high hopes that Mr. Right would swoop into town one day and take her away to England to get married one day........Yeah.......... Right....... Keep reaching for that rainbow darlin'!

There were so many questions I wanted to ask:
"When you're really drunk do you ever forget which bathroom is the one your supposed to go in?"
"Do you ever have a dream that its grown back?"
"When someone tells you to go fuck yourself do you just stand there looking confused?"
"At this point in your life, is suicide sort of redundant?"

But I chickened out. I just sat there and mumbled something about being so full from dinner. And then Kelly and Sam responded in turn with comments like......"Yeah.....lots of rice....." and "yeah.......rice with chicken." After about half an hour of conversation the four of us hopped into a cap and headed back to the hostel we were staying at which was in the Little India district.



At the end of the night, I had Sam and Kelly huddled in my bed, too scared to return to their room for fear that they would get molested by a six foot tall Asian transgendered prostitute thing with a complex that would make Oedipus Rex look normal. I need to get out of here.

Kuala Lumpur/Kuantan/Tioman Island (Sept 24- 29)

After finally making it to KL, I was dead tired. In my haste to make a speedy departure from Thailand, I had accidentally left my passport at the reception desk in the hotel at Raiely Beach. Maybe it was because I hadn't been getting enough sleep. Maybe it was because I was hungover. Maybe it was because I smoked the last of my stash that morning so I didn't have anything on me when I did the boarder crossing into Malaysia. I don't know. But when I got near the boarder I figured out what I'd done and was not exactly pleased with myself. My friend Nick Ritchie who I hadn't seen in over three years had booked me my own suite in a five star resort through his company free of charge in Kuala Lumpur and I was going to miss out. To top everything off, I'd made friends on the bus with two lovely British girls who were on the way to KL and the whole time I was bragging about my accommodation and how my friend and I would love to go to dinner with them that evening. Sometimes life just isn't fair.



When I finally got to KL two days later, (oh yeah, Matt took my passport six hours north with him to the island of Koh Pa Ngan and then mailed it to the boarder town which is why it took so long,) I felt like shit. I snapped off a few quick photos of myself in front of the twin towers and the needle to make it look like I'd really got the KL "tourist experience" and then I hopped on a bus to the town of Kuantan which is on the east-coast of peninsular Malaysia to meet Nick.



Ladies and gentleman, this........is Nick Ritchie! I have known Ritchie for years, we attended the same summer camp and clawed our way up the staff ranks together. He is a gem. This is his massage chair which he spends most of his time in when he's at home. I was told to be especially honored because normally he doesn't wear anything at all when in this chair. Thanks Ritchie.



And this is his pad.



It's okay......... I guess.



This is Ritchie's beach. He has been living here for two years and assured me that one day he would actually visit the beach.



This is his pool.........is there a lot of money in the oil business or something?!? Ritchie is the manager for a Canadian owned oil company. I'd be lying if I could give you a complete job description but the gist of it is he's in charge of all the pipe coating for the lines that are run out in this area of the world. While I realized that Ritchie did still have a job to do for the first three days of the week, I really didn't give a shit and made him take me out every night. When we got back from our little outings, I would pass out on the couch and nick would flop into his bed. A couple of hours later, Ritchie would get up, shower, usually puke in the toilet, and then leave for work. He was a lot more fun at night. Right before he was about to head out the door and drive to the office, I'd usually drop a comment somewhere along the lines of, "Would you shut the fuck up?!? I'm trying to sleep!!!!" Or I'd do something like roll over on the couch, stumble into his room, flop myself down on HIS bed, throw on a porno movie and scream at the top of my lungs, "have a GREAT day at work buddy!" Like I said, Ritchie was more fun at night. We spent the majority of our evenings at this one little strip where we'd get wasted with his pipeline crew, (some of which looked like they ate thumb tacks for lack of anything better to do,) and usually ended up at a fast food joint before calling it a night. My favorite memory was when after about a dozen beers Ritchie threw up off the balcony of this one bar and then proceeded to drive us home in the company car. We made a quick stop at McDonalds as Nick was a might peckish and 50 ringget later, (that's around $40 US,) we
lugged a garbage bag full of McCrap up the stairs to his apartment.



We'd ordered every sandwich on the menu because Ritchie insisted that I tried the Malaysian McDick's sandwiches to better culture myself. Also 20 McNuggets, two large orders of fries and two fountain pops. It would have been three fountain pops but I accidentally spilt one all over the hood of his car as I was getting out in the parking garage.The next morning even before I opened my eyes I knew I had the 'ol McStomach Ache. Thankfully I'd removed most of the debris and put it on the other side of the room the night before because I knew if I rolled over and got a whiff of that shit there would be an additional six combo meals for the maid to scrape up off the floor. The maid by the way, was none to impressed with me when I opened the door at about nine that morning scratching my ass, wearing only my boxers and smelling like a deep fryer. Ritchie decided to give her Saturday off anyway as we felt it was time to cause havoc elsewhere for awhile.



On Thursday morning we threw some stuff in a bag and piled into the car.



Road trip baby, YEAH!!!



We had decided earlier that week to head down the coast to the town of Mersing and catch the ferry over to Tioman Island. Mersing is like Hollywood........only not.



The boat ride was pretty uneventful. There were no girls on the ship and the air-conditioning system was set to "make snow" so we just hung out on the bow with the captain and the crew.



And took pictures of our gorgeous selves.



After we got to the island we had a quick bite to eat and then it was time to do some scuba diving!



Ritchie was all excited because a friend of his from work had given him all of his dive gear because he didn't use it anymore. Here's Ritchie checking his dive watch. A dive watch is a device that begins to operate the second it hits the water. It helps you time your dives and shows you things like depth and water temperature. Ritchie was absolutely enthralled by this device and would refer to it constantly throughout the trip whether he was wearing it at the time or not.



After we went over a few quick instructions and a brief run over the hand signals it was time to plunge into the deep.



Sweet!





Ritchie also managed to get a hold of a dive camera and between our sense of mischief and total lack of attention span we had an amazing time!



Here's me enjoying a breath of fresh air underwater!



Ritchie checks his dive watch.



Look! A sea spider!



Ritchie checks his dive watch.



A huge school of fish!!



Ritchie checks his dive watch.



Time for me to take a swim. And to contemplate how to drown Ritchie without the instructor noticing....



Ritchie was signaling me for something here. It probably had something to do with his fucking dive watch.



After a few dives we were back on the boat and headed to shore.



These things were all over the island and helped keep the stray cat population in check. The only bad thing was that once in awhile a half-eaten cat would get away and occasionally it looked like someone was filming a remake of "Pet Cemetery" under your table while you were eating at a restaurant.



I had been so wrapped up in the momentum of travelling that I forgot to focus on the little details once in awhile, like funnelling beer.



Nick had the record that night, under three seconds! That's the "Shanonator" on the right. He was the dive master who was really cool until he started drinking and then he became a dick. You know those people who live on far away remote places, sleazily hit on girls, don't let the government know they're there, and probably are outrunning a rape charge back in their home country? Yeah, well this is what they look like at about forty-five years of age. I'm a strong believer in karma though, and when it comes back to haunt you it does so with a vengeance. The second night we were there he got hammered and ended up hooking up with this chick who looked like an extra from "Dawn of the Dead." I think my favorite quote from Shane was the following:

"I haven't been able to make it home for the last four years so this year my mom's paying for my ticket....." (then he looks at Rob, Nick, and I and says with enthusiasm,"..........RETURN!" Note: If my mother is paying for my ticket home for Christmas when I'm forty-five years of age please kill me.

This was the crew of people we partied with at night. That's Paula and Maja from Sweden and Alex from England. The first time we saw Team Sweden was the previous afternoon when they came into the Internet shack to use the computers but they were all busy. A couple of hours later it was dark out and we happened to see them hanging outside their guesthouse as we were biking by. I screamed out, "INTERNET'S FREE!!!" They jumped up with a start and had no idea who we were even though we'd secretly been eye-humping them all over the island. We biked down the path laughing out loud and promised ourselves to commence proper introductions the following morning. This night was a lot of fun, here are experpts from my two favorite conversations.

Ritchie: "Do you have Swedish Berries in Sweden?"

Maja: "What?"

Ritchie: "Do you know what Swedish Berries are?"

Maja: "No."

Ritchie: "They're delicious."

Crabby Bitch: "HEY!!! Don't throw your cigarette buts on the beach! Don't you know that one cigarette but can kill up to ten turtles?!?"

Nelson: "So you're saying if we ever have a turtle problem in Canada then I should just take up smoking??"

Crabby Bitch: "That's not funny!!! Those our MY turtles!" And he, (points at Ritchie,) shouldn't kill them!"

Nelson: "Yeah, but don't get so excited. When you consider how much oil his company dumps in the oceans each year then really those ten turtles are just a drop in the bucket aren't they?"

She left the bar at that point. Nothing pisses me off more than some eco-friendly, smart-ass, hypocritical tourist who runs out of money and decides to "be one of the locals" by getting a job for a few months. Just because your loud and broke, it does not grant you the god given right to claim that you grew up in the third world. It's called reality whitey, get used to it.

Apparently Ritchie claims these ladies are coming to spend a few nights with him in Kauntan............I would be lying if I said I didn't want to at least film it from a nearby closet.

We didn't want to over exert ourselves so the next day we decided to cancel the diving session when Ritchie's friend Rob arrived and to go deep sea fishing instead.

We didn't catch anything except a couple of red snappers in short-shorts.

This is the bait. It helped me get my line so tangled with Ritchie's that we couldn't fish for half an hour.

This is why Nick Ritchie and I our such good friends. Look closely at that picture folks.

Finally, it was time to say good bye to Tioman.

Nick and I were easily the most recognized/hated people on the island by this point so we felt our job was done and our presence was known. You could almost hear the whole island sigh with relief as our boat pulled away form the harbour.

Rob, Ritchie, and I parted ways at the boat terminal. Ritchie said he was going to church on Monday and that he was going to start concentrating on work and not drink so much. I told him to stop being such a pussy. He also said he had never been more glad to be rid of someone than me but I think he might have been at leat partly kidding. I caught a bus down to Singapore to finish the last leg of my trip and my final country!

Railey Beach (Sept 19-21)

After finally shaking off the Koh Phi Phi Curse, (see previous blog entry,) Matt and I headed to Railey Beach near Krabi to do some serious rock climbing!



This double sided stretch of beach is lined with limestone cliffs that stretch hundreds of meters into the air and overlook the stunning coastline.



In order to prepare ourselves for the assent, (and since we didn't see a single girl in sight,) we decided to gorge ourselves on seafood that night. I have never in my life eaten that much sea food in one sitting. For around $15 US, I was able to procure 200 grams of mussels, 200 grams of clams, 400 grams of prawns, a baked potato, corn on the cob, and four beers.



It was heaven. We didn't move for two hours.



We were so full that it was all we could do to drag ourselves to the bar closest to our guesthouse and play a few games of connect four. Matt beat me by about eight games to two, but I smoked one more joint than he did so I say we were even.



We woke up the next morning to find that at some point during the night we had accidentally transmorfed into a pair of cats!! Why Matt was in my bed is something that I still can't explain...



After a few more hours of sleeping, we awoke at the crack of 11:30am and decided that if we were serious about this rock climbing business then we'd better hop to it.



This was without a doubt the BEST rock climbing I have ever done!!



The guide realized that Matt and I were intermediate climbers so he led rope well up to the thirty meter mark and away we went!



Woah.



This picture is the same as the one above it but zoomed in, otherwise you wouldn't see me at all from the ground!



Once you finally made it to the cave after the first big assent, it was all you could do to pull yourself into the opening and chill out for awhile.



Here was what awaited you at the summit!!



Bob Marley here was our rock climbing instructor. He only let me fall twice and I only hit the ground hard on one of those falls, thankfully I wasn't to high up at the time. It wasn't his fault though, he's not good at multi-tasking and he was trying to figure out which song to play on his MP3 phone and belay me at the same time. I'd give him the benefit of the doubt and say it was my bad!

That night, we promptly went right back to the seafood restaurant, (we were a huge hit with the staff by this point,) and substituted the baked potato from the previous evening for a 400 gram shark steak! It was cooked so well that it didn't even taste like fish. After dinner we roamed the island, (which we had nicknamed "Couples Hell" at this point,) determined to locate some people who liked to have a good time. After much perseverance, we located these individuals and resorted to doing what we do best.

Koh Phi Phi (Sept 14-18)

Koh Phi Phi!!!! For those of you who don't know, this island is located in southern Thailand on the west coast. I know what you're thinking. "Will..........let me get this straight! Does that mean you're SKIPPING the full-moon party on Koh Pa Ngan? YOU? The biggest party in the area and you're not going? WHAT THE HELL!?!" Let me explain something to you. I'm tired, I'm broke, I helped invent Queen's Homecoming so 10 000 people really doesn't impress me all that much. AND I spent a week in Cancun Mexico so I've done the beach party thing before. Plus I found out that a good friend of mine who I haven't seen in over three years lives in Malaysia so that just seemed like a better option. Plus I will tell two stories in this blog that made me extremely scared to place myself at the mercy of the full-moon party.

Oh and as a bit of a side note!! Koh Phi Phi was one of the worst hit places during the Tsunami of 2004. The island is famous for scuba diving, (some say even better than Koh Tao,) and during my stay here a longboat tipped over and a bunch of tourists were killed, there was a tsunami warning, and a budget airline went down where 88 people were also killed. Thankfully I didn't know anyone on that plane but I'm starting to wonder if maybe God is trying to send me not-so-subtle hints that perhaps it's time I headed home? Either that, or these next two stories are a result of what I have dubbed........"The Koh Phi Phi Curse" (Editor's note: Sorry Mom, but some stories have to be told, I love you and will always be you're baby boy! xo)



The First Story:

On the boat ride over, Matt and I chatted up these two girls and I thought we were off to a pretty good start! When we arrived on the island, we got scammed into taking a longboat to, (ironically as it were,) Long Beach. There are three beaches on the south side of Koh Phi Phi and out of sheer suckerdom we were staying in the guesthouse that was farthest away from the main drag. Now, let me paint you a picture for you. It takes 45 minutes in broad daylight to walk from the first beach to our hostel. Uh oh. On the way, you have to crawl along slippery rocks that are continually being pounded by the surf. Oh no. In between the three beaches you have to hike through the jungle and over a complicated path that in some spots is so steep that there are rope railings. Will, are you kidding me? The path is not lit, and obstacles that dot the way include intricate root systems, dense brush, and mud that got worse and worse from the torrential rains began to pour around 4:00pm that day. This is actually getting kind of funny.......we'll call this alarm bell#1. To top it all off, I hadn't been out drinking in a little while, (alarm bell#2,) we were at a new island that was notorious for it's partying scene, (alarm bell#3,) I was trying to pick up this girl, (alarm bell#4,) I thought it was going well, hence I thought it was inevitable and that I was invisible that night! (alarm bell #5.) DING DING DING!!!!! WE HAVE A FULL BLOWN FIVE ALARM NELSON CATASTROPHE JUST WAITING TO HAPPEN!!!



(No I didn't set myself on fire that night, this is a fire show.) Right before we left our guesthouse I turned to Matt and said, "hey man.....do you think I should bring my flashlight?" His reply? "Naw, you'll be fine." Sometimes my friends and I are so dumb it's simply amazing! The two girls, Matt and I finally navigated out way to a bar on the main strip and met up with a few of our friends who were already on the island. And then we proceeded to drink.........hard. I'm sure I've mentioned buckets before but I think I'd better go into them in detail. "Buckets" as they are referred to are simply that. A child's sandcastle bucket filled with a mixture of ice, coke, syrupy redbull, and about 12oz's of whiskey. Between the redbull and the coke, you can't really taste any booze and you usually drink about three in an hour..........let me rephrase that...........I usually drink about three in an hour, before I realize my mistake and by then it's too late. I have never had a bucket night that has ended well.......ever!



Where was I? Oh right, so I'm drinking excessively, watching the fire show, chatting up this girl, playing drinking games, telling all my funny jokes, (well at least I find them funny, I think a girl actually called me feral at one point.....as in a feral cat? She wasn't really hot anyways so I didn't care all that much at the time.) But seriously, I was on!!! Everything was coming up Nelson! Then the booze started to hit. Then the booze started to hit harder. Then the booze ran over me like I'd just been hit head-on by a dump truck. I have no idea what happened but at around 10:30 I lifted up my head, looked around and realized that I was all by myself. Well.......almost by myself. Somehow I'd engaged this guy Jim in a conversation and he was going on about something that I couldn't understand. Plus I was so many sheets to the wind my vessel had capsized somewhere around 9:45. So what did I do? Did I call it a night? Did I admit defeat? NEVER!!! "Well screw everyone then!" I screamed. "If they don't want to party then I'll party by myself!!" I ran into Jim the next day and he said that when I finally stood up, (with his help,) and uttered my rallying battle cry it really sounded like a kid with down's syndrome quoting Plato. So I went to the bar and ordered another personal whiskey bucket. BOOM! I was done!!!

I have no idea what happened for the next half an hour or so but at some point the bartender came up to me and suggested that perhaps it was time for me to leave. I don't know how drunk you have to be to get kicked out of a bar in Koh Phi Phi, (or anywhere in Thailand for that matter,) but apparently I had achieved this end. I finally figured out which direction my guesthouse was and I sauntered off. It was tough going. The rain was pouring so hard that the rocks were like big boulders of black ice and after a couple of steps I realized that seeing my feet leave the ground and sail over my head would be a common occurrence on this trip home. At one point I looked down and saw that I'd cut one of my ankles up and that my clothes were so dirty I looked like a fisherman turned hobo. The wind was also whipping the salt water up into my eyes and burning them to add to my displeasure. By some act of God I made it to the first beach and found three people that out of sheer pity gave me a giant beer to share with them on the beach. Thanks assholes, that's what I really needed at that point! After I assured them I knew where I was going, (which I didn't,) I meandered over to the second section of rocks for another assault on nature. After what felt like an eternity of walking and climbing I turned around and realized that it was pitch black and I had no idea where I was! I was cold, soar from falling, and wet from the rain and sea water. For some reason I remember taking a little rock and carving something on one of the boulders, maybe as a marker or perhaps I was making a tombstone, I don't know. I lay down and fell asleep.

I awoke what felt like a few hours later and I was not happy. I was cold, wet, and still ever so drunk. I remember thinking that I had to get off these rocks, pronto as they weren't really doing anything for me or my appearance. So I turned around and plunged into the jungle. After a few minutes my heart leaped as I saw a light! And not just a light, a cabin!!! I stumbled onto the porch and collapsed in a heap, content just to be out of the rain and I passed out again. My sleep was interrupted however, as around what I later figured to be about 6:00am, I bolted up right and projectile vomited all over the flower arrangement that adorned the area right in front of the porch. At this sudden burst of noise, the cabin door opened and out stepped this little haggard old Thai lady. I guess she didn't pick up at the bar either because she was NOT in a good mood. Either that or for some reason was not happy to see a hulking, dirty, vomiting tourist on her front porch as the sun was just beginning to rise and chased me off into the jungle. Great, I was now right back where I started.

I kept walking until I eventually found some sort of road. I continued to follow the road back to town where I surveyed my surroundings. Memories came flooding over me and I realized by my calculation that in my drunken stupor I'd overshot my guesthouse by about three and a half kilometers. I did the 45 minute trek back to our guest house where I screamed and yelled until Matt and the two girls came out. I was pissed, (literally and figuratively,) and I couldn't believe that they'd abandoned me at the bar!!! "What the hell are you yelling about!?!" screamed Matt. "We were at the bar until two in the morning, where the hell did you go?!?" I recounted my little camping trip and much to my annoyance all three of them thought this to be absolutely hilarious. I made a resolution when I woke up at 4:00pm that afternoon. No buckets for three days. And that my friends was the first story of the Koh Phi Phi Curse.



As soon as I woke up the next day I demanded that we move guesthouses. As far as I was concerned, Long Beach sucked and I'd rather amputate my now-infected left foot than go through that Japanese death march again. We found some hospitable accommodation and for the next few days Matt and I laid low and got our PADI scuba diving certification.



Unfortunately I couldn't bring a camera out on the boat as it's expressively forbidden when going for a certification but I will promise you that we had a blast, saw tons of sea life, (sharks, turtles, fish, etc.) and the instructors were phenomenal.



In the afternoons we hung out on the beach, got a tan, read a lot and just chilled out. It was great. Then on our last night, we decided to go out on a bit of a bender. I mean c'mon, we hadn't gone out in like four nights, our guesthouse was close by, what could possibly go wrong?



The Second Story:

Matt was roaming around the island taking in the scene and I was lying in my bed reading when there was a knock at the door. I opened it up and there was "Candypants" the girl from the first night and since it was both our last nights on the island she was wondering if I'd be up for going for a drink. Hot chick wants to drink with me? This one's kind of a no brainer. What I didn't know until I'd finished my forth beer is that Candypants wasn't ordering any alcohol. Fine, whatever. Eight beers later I find Matt, say goodbye to the girls and then Matt and I decide to go for dinner. We hit up one of the restaurants, ordered some food and looked around for some prey.......I mean.........someone fortunate enough to accompany us to a bar that night. We had a few more beers and eventually these three girls sat down at a table behind us. All we needed was a line. And I had one.

I approached their table and even though I was swaying a little I leaned in and said, "excuse me ladies, my friend over there is drinking a bottle of water, and we couldn't help but notice that all of you are made up of around 85% water, so we were wondering if we could join you and drink some more water?"................you're not going to believe this...........it worked!!! They bought it and all laughed and invited us to join them! The night progressed as nights usually do, we all ordered rounds and rounds of drinks, I focused my attention on one particular lass and we traded stories about stocks and bonds. (Sex and booze stories.) Things were going great! Finally one of the girls, (I forget who,) suggested that we move to a more livelier location. We all agreed and headed down to a bar called Apache that had music and a dance floor.

We started horsing around, dancing, yelling, laughing and then we all met up at this one table to order more drinks. "Hey!" one of the girls yelled. "It's two-for-one buckets," do you guys want to get some?" Oh no. "Um..........I don't think so, you see I think I'm getting kind of drunk so maybe I should just stick to beer for awhile!" Did I actually just say that? "Oh c'mon," she said, "don't be such a pussy!" (You know in the movie "Back to the Future" when Buck calls Marty a chicken and he completely overreacts? That's what happens when someone calls me a pussy, especially if my manhood is called into question over the consumption of alcohol.) So we ordered some buckets. And some more buckets. We were all getting really drunk when the girls screamed because some god awful top ten song that they just loved started up and they dragged us onto the dance floor. As we were approaching the dance floor I leaned over to Matt and asked him for a piece of gum. This ladies and gentleman, is what sports announcers refer to as the TSN turning point!

All the girls wanted a piece of gum too and then the group of us hit the dance floor. All those buckets and beer started to hit me really hard and the euphoric feeling of the hunt filled with me with such a sense of lust that I really wasn't paying attention to what I was doing. Without thinking, I walked up to my particular interest that evening and started to grind with her from behind. She was pretty into it so I thought I'd turn the flirt level up a notch. I leaned in and nuzzled her neck ever so softly. What I completely forgot is that I still had a piece of gum in my mouth and when I opened my mouth to kiss her gently the gum dropped out into her hair............................ ooooooohhhhhh, the quarterback drops the ball!!!! Let's see if he can recover?!? I quickly turned her around and looked into her eyes as I pretended to try out a new sexy dance move that involved me stroking the back of her head, all the while feeling around for the gum. Feeling around.........feeling around.........almost.........almost............got it! I gently tried to extract the gum but I wasn't' having much success. This called for drastic action! I figured, (in my drunken stupidity,) that the only way to get it out was one good hard yank, just like a band aid right? I leaned her forward and then as the music was reaching it's climax I pulled..........hard. "AWWWWUUGH!!!!!!!" she screamed! Thinking quickly I retorted, "Oh my god I'm so sorry your hair got caught in my bracelet!" This seemed to satisfy her and after we joked about it we went back to dancing. At this point I realized just how screwed I really was. There were five of us, everyone was chewing gum except me, and one of us, had gum in her hair. I'm not Sherlock Homes or anything but even a three year old could figure this one out. Fuck!

I left "gummed-up-the-works" and danced over to my buddy Matt. "Dude!" I yelled. I think I'm in trouble!" Matt looked at me curiously, "why, what's wrong?" I explained the situation. Matt looked at me like I was crazy, gum in your hair sucked but it couldn't be that bad. He promptly turned and danced over towards the girl and slowly gyrated towards her back side. All of a sudden his searching eyes focused on something and he stopped dancing. His eyes went as big as dinner plates and his hands went up to his mouth that was probably making one of those, "wooaaaaaa," noises. He didn't dance back, he marched back briskly like a soldier going into battle, looked right at me and yelled over the noise, "What the fuck did you do?" It's smeared all over the back of her head!!!!" "What are you talking about?" I yelled back. "It's just in one spot!"
I danced back over towards her and looked closely. Oh shit. You remember my brilliant plan to just haul the piece out of her hair in one fell swoop? In the failed removal attempt, I'd stretched the gum into one long strand that was now intricately wrapped around several locks of hair. I ran back to Matt. "Dude.....what do we do? Should we just bolt?" (This by the way is what any sensible person would do, but as I have clearly demonstrated I am anything but a sensible person.) Matt's voice of reason kicked in. "Of course we run........ you think going to stick around for this?!? Let's just go!" I don't know why I didn't listen. Maybe because part of me was starting to find this whole situation rather amusing. Maybe because part of me, (the wasted part,) thought I still had a chance to recover and get some ass that night. "No I can fix this!" I yelled back. All of a sudden Matt started to smile and then he began to laugh. He knows me well enough by now that he can see when I'm about to crash and burn and he knows that hilarity usually ensues.

Quickly I formulated a plan. "Give me your packet of gum." I took a piece of Matt's gum out of the package and popped it into my mouth. Then I went up and ordered another bucket. Matt and I then went over to the group of dancing girls. "Hey, I've got an idea!" I yelled over the music to the Stay Puft Marshmallow Head. "Let's have a chug off, just you and me!" She was up for it so we started drinking, only I had about three chugs before I stopped and just pretended to keep chugging, thus I delibrately made her drink all the rest of the bucket. This is like having 7 drinks in the span of about 30 seconds. I looked over at Matt who was beside himself and still didn't know where I was going with this. I waited about five minutes for the alchol to kick in before I walked over and started dancing with her again. Then I dropped the bomb.

"Hey what's this in your hair?" I shouted above the noise. She stopped dancing, felt around and a look of disgust crossed her face. Her friends came over and took a look. One of them pipes up, "it looks like gum!" (Thanks for helping derail my runaway train toots!) This called for drastic action."No....I don't think it's gum," I said while looking up at the roof of the bar. "I think it's ceiling wax!" (At this point Matt was trying so hard to keep from bursting out laughing that he was having convulsions.) The girls tried unsuccesfully to remove the gum from her hair for a few minutes before someone said, "hey......this really is gum, it smells like mint!" Busted!.......or am I? "Well don't look at me," I said indingalty, "my piece is right here!" And I innocently popped open my mouth to reveal to all that I did indeed still had my piece of gum They tried again for a few minutes to remove the gum but to no avail. It really was awful. The oringal piece had split into about eight sections that were all streaked down a few inches to her neck. She sort of looked like some weird version of a fucked up rastafarian with snowwhite dreadocks. Finally, (I think to lighten the mood,) one of the girls jokingly suggested that since it was gum we should try chewing it out.

I don't know why I did what I did. To this day when I look back, it still baffles me that I would do something so weird and depraved. It went against all forms of common sense, self-preservation, and public convention. Even all the alcohol I'd consumed that night isn't an excuse for this one. But I did it anyway. I picked up a wad of her hair covered with gum and plopped it into my mouth and began to chew away. Her friends just froze. Matt's face was a mix of sheer terror and bewilderment. Luckily by this point, (largly due to the bucket chugging,) the playdough porcupine was so drunk that she didn't react at first. And I just kept chewing, mashing more and more of her hair into the gum. Finally after about ten seconds, during which time everyone was compeltey silent, I removed her hair from my mouth and stated, "well..........that's not working.......but it's definatley gum and not ceiling wax........it tastes like gum." No one moved. No one spoke. Everyone was so shocked they just stood there staring at me. Slowly, as if a dawning comrehension was thrown over our little circle like a blanket , the girls all looked at one another and then at me. While they couldn't prove it, I think they started to suspect that I had something to do with the gum in their friends hair.

Eventually one of the girls finally piped up and said something. "I guess we could try burning it out, I've got a buitaine lighter." Oh boy. She grabbed her friends hair, pulled a large chunk out and set fire to the back of her head. It burned away pretty qickly and then for some reason they all turned and faced me. Here was this girl who was so bewildered she wasn't even upset, standing with her friends, (one of which is holding a clump of gum-hair the size of a baby's fist.) Even with that piece of gum gone there's still gum matted in about a half dozen other places, these girls are pretty sure I'm the cause of all this and now the whole bar reeks like burnt hair. The situation had turned tense. They stood there and stared. I stood there and stared back. No one was giving in. After what seemed like an eternity I finally thought of something to say. I looked right into the eyes of the girl who by this point was doing a pretty good impression of Cameron Diaz's character in "There's Something About Mary."

"Hey...........that's a good look for you!" Matt imidately grabbed the back of my shirt and hauled me across the dance floor. We tore down the steps, out onto the beach and ran up the path towards our gueshouse laughing hysterically and trying to breathe while we wipped the tears from our eyes. I can't believe that chick still hasn't called me for a second date.

Bangkok (Sept 8-13)

Ah finally! On the way to Bankok.........where the party never stops and the women have cocks. After a tiring journey, Matt, Damian and I made our overnight train and settled down for a good night sleep. Or so we thought.



God damn it!!! Why did there have to be fun people on the train?!? Fun people who also got kicked out of their car for making too much noise and then helped us start drinking games in the diner car!!



At one point Matt decided he was hungry but rather than actually pay for food he just nestled up to some local Thai's and started to pick away. Nice.



He was very proud of himself for obtaining a free meal that evening. What a dick!

I arrived in Bangkok with Damien and we met up with some friends , (Jay, Jamie, and Jason)from Vietnam as well as Jenna, Caley, and her boyfriend Matt...........oh yeah.........and this girl I met on the train down from Chang Mai..........that's not a story for this PG-13 blog however. The evening started with dinner and a few beer towers. (That's one on the left side of the picture.) How these things haven't taken over the world is beyond me!?!

Three litres of beer served in a chilled tube that you are free to pour at your own leisure........

Disaster, thy name is beer tower!!!

For some unfathomable reason, I decided to impress everyone (read: Sandra, the girl from the train,) by ordering a really spicy dish that night. Because after all I am "the man" and "the man" will always try to impress people at the cost of his own personal dignity.

The dish was so hot I almost threw up in a half-empty beer tower. I had to run to the bathroom and chug tap water until my taste buds started working again. As soon as they did, they started tasting Bangkok tap water and I almost threw up again. My favorite part of the meal was when I was in the bathroom and this guy approached me and asked me how I liked Bangkok. "It's okay I guess," I replied. "How do YOU like Bangkok?" The man straightened up and thought it over for a second. "Patia's way better," he said with a grin. "There's a way better selection of women and they're MUCH cheaper." Then he winked at me. For once in my life I couldn't think of anything to say, something along the lines of, "hey pal, do me a favor and don't touch anything else in here before I leave okay?" would have been appropriate but alas, I was flabbergasted and couldn't think straight.

Right, as soon as dinner was over and we felt we'd consumed enough liquor, it was time to head to a dance club. I think we were the only non-Asians there and as such, we felt it was our duty to get everyone up on the dance floor.



Actually Caley's boyfriend Matt and I decided it was our duty to buy each other shots until we were so drunk we couldn't see but everyone else apparently felt like dancing.

The next day Damian and I decided to take in some of the sights. All we managed to see was the MBK center which is this massive mall that's about ten stories high. The movie theaters are amazing, for about $8 you get your own 12 seat theater and you can order food brought right to you........sweet!

The next morning we decided to fully immerse ourselves in the Thai culture and join up for a kickboxing class. I decided to post this picture of Caley since she was the only one that could actually kick properly and make it look cool. Then I remembered that Caley's taken years of kickboxing and that I'd better be careful teasing her because one of those kicks could probably split one of my nuts in half like a car running over a pumpkin.

This is Matt and I pretending to look tough. What we were really doing is trying hard not to throw up.

Muay Thai Boxing is much easier when no one's hitting you back.

Team grease.

After doing battle with Quantas the next day, I exited the airline center and saw a sign that said, "Snake farm." All the whiskey in Ireland wouldn't have prevented me from going in!

The guide informed us that all the people who worked at the farm had been bitten by a poisonous snake at least twice............."look ma, no hand!"

The best part of the show was when one of the guides got bitten by a tree snake. He tried to cover it up and walk casually out of everyone's view but I was standing on the side and got to watch two people try and stop his arm from bleeding all over the floor!

This little girl was to scared to go and hold a snake up all by herself so her dad went up with her. This is probably one of the cutest things I have ever seen in my life!

The whole center is run by the red cross and the experience was pretty educational. Did you know that the anti-venom is mixed with horse blood? Well now you do!

That afternoon we headed over to the infamous Jim Thompson's House.

This guy basically made the Thai silk industry what it is today. He was a bit eccentric and all the different parts of his house were imported from all over the world.

He also devoted his life to collecting all sorts or antiques.

In 1967 he mysteriously disappeared and no one has heard from him since. There are many different theories but no one knows for sure what happened!

And what night would be complete without a Thai boxing match?

The next day we headed to the Royal Palace. After Cambodia I thought it would be a waste of time but man was I wrong!

This place was incredible!!! Here's a picture of all the different Stupas that have influences from all over the region. You can clearly see here the difference between Sri Lanken, Thai, and Cambodian architecture.

And everything was made of 24-carat.....gooooooooooooold! (Said to the tune of "Goldmember.")

Seriously, would you look at this place?

This woman is repairing one of the monuments. Every 50 years there is a huge restoration project that takes place. First they have to cover everything in this tar-like substance before repainting the whole building in.........you guessed it.........24-carat....gooooooooooooooold!

I tried to find out, but no one had any idea how much this place is worth. Or how much the upkeep is. I'd guess somewhere around half a cottage in Muskoka.

Typical Nelson.....just typical.

This is the jade Buddha. You're not allowed to take pictures inside the Wat so this was the best shot I could get! Supposedly lighting struck a temple in some village town and split a Wat in half. When the villagers looked inside they saw a Buddha image and upon further examination it was believed that under all the dust and grime it was made of jade! The image was brought here and is now of such esteemed importance that when a Thai person goes to court they swear on the jade Buddha!

My new drinking buddy.

One of the royal guards, and some dude in a white suit and hat with a gun.

Seriously this place was unbelievably beautiful!

Take your breathe AAAAaaaaaWWWaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAyyyyyyyy!!!! (Sung like the theme from "Top Gun.")



That night Matt and Damian and I decided to party it up again on Koh San Road. We drank a lot, started horsing around and trying to pick up girls, had drinks with the locas and basically acted like a complete bunch of assholes. My favorite point was when we got the Ping-Pong Show guys to go up to a group of American Girls and start making popping noises and rudly gesturing with their fingers. The girls were so disgusted that they ran off screaming down the street and the three of us broke down laughing on the sidewalk with the Ping Pong Show guys giving us high fives!!!

At one point during the night we decided to see how badly we could creep out passing groups of female tourists. Who wouldn't want to get hit on by these two beauties?

Even Ronald thought we were pretty funny although he wouldn't let us into the kiddie pen to play with his balls.

This is what happened when "Pimp My Ride" decided to do an episode on tuk-tuk's.

Okay so here was the deal. As the night wore on, the three of us made a bet that if we got offered to go to a Ping Pong show more than 15 times doing one circut to the end of the road and back, we'd go. I think the tally was 21 times but I'm not sure. (By the way if you don't know what a Ping-Pong Show is then visit this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ping_pong_show.) Hence, around midnight we found ourselves in the red-light district, After the show was over, we left the.....um.......theater.....and proceeded to make our way back to our hotel. The picture above is of one particular lady-boy who took a shining, (with a little prompting from me I might add,) to my buddy Matt.

Matt's a pretty smooth talker and he's also a jerk which is how he managed to throw this right back in my face and why I enjoy hanging out with him so much.

While I don't remember this picture being taken I do know it was taken in the wee hours of the morning. I haven't the slightest clue as to what I was doing, where I was or what goal I thought I might be acheiving.

This picture of the three of us in the morning is pretty blurry but then again, so was our vision. I kind of realized that after you stay on Koh San Road for more than a week you cease being a "backpacker" and start to become "part of the problem." We left shortly after and headed south.

Pai (Sept 5-7)

Being a camp counsellor, I have dealt with some pretty disgusting things before. But even when a kid is about to throw up he knows it's coming and you usually get some sort of warning. Not so on the road to Pai. This stretch is notorious for being the windiest route in all of Thailand. On the way up, the guy who was sitting two seats over from me got car sick and let loose all over the window. This is a man who is at least thirty years old and really should have known better. This is a small van and after we'd finally got him all cleaned up, his girlfriend decided she'd join the party but at least she managed to get a plastic bag under her mouth. It was pretty obvious that the two of them had just scarfed down some Thai street food right before they hopped in the van, and as the smell of egg noodles and Pad Thai permeated throughout our vehicle, I couldn't help but hate these people. Worst of all, they kept throwing up, they just didn't stop! I went from being sympathetic, (well no....not really but let's pretend I cared for the sake of the story,) to mildly disgusted, to completely shocked at the volume that was erupting from their oral cavities at regular intervals! It was like they decided to go to an all-you-can-eat buffet and tried every single tray! But the best part is when we stopped for gas, all their little bags of vomit were hung from the back of a seat like some sort of demented bulimic Christmas tree! And they didn't bother throwing them out!!! They just grabbed more bags and hopped right back in the van! What the hell were they doing? Saving it for later? Starting a collection? What the Christ is wrong with some people?!?



"Scooter Monthly" called, they want me. And so do you. As soon as we got to Pai we rented scooters and took off to a waterfall. The "lonely planet" guide book states that the two most common causes of death among backpackers are drugs and scooter accidents. Obviously what I was taking wasn't strong enough so I opted to cheat death via transportation instead. The waterfall was amazing, we met up with a few more buddies and as soon as you get three or more guys in one place you know what happens. "I dare you to..." By the end of the afternoon we were sliding down the waterfall on our asses and at one point I got so much air that I was launched right off the rock slide about halfway down and landed in the pool below. We decided to call it quits after that.



That night, Ian and Derrick made us promise to go to this Shisha bar for a drinking competition. Since I like drinking and competition, the thought of the two of them combined sounded like a good idea and it didn't take much convincing.



I had no idea what I had just agreed to.

So here was the deal. If you could drink 12 shots of either Seagram's 100 Whiskey, Sambuka, or Tequila before midnight then you got a free tee-shirt and depending on how many shots you completed you'd get points for your country as well. Oh boy!

I think we started around 9:30pm that night, which gave us around two and a half hours to complete the task at hand. Twelve shots you say? Big deal you say? Funny........that's what I thought too! There had to be a catch, and you know what ? There was!

The shot glasses were about the size of a schooner! Each shot had to contain at least 2oz.'s of whatever poison you picked that night.

Unless my math is wrong, that's 24 shots of whiskey in under two and a half hours. And "Jim" the bartender called us pussies. Two of my friends dropped out almost instantly but Derrick, Ian and I persevered.

I could give you a play-by-play of what happened before midnight but truth be told I don't really remember anything after about the 8th double shot.

Ian was the first to go. (He's the one who looks like he just took a punch to the nuts five pictures above.) Matt had to give him a scooter ride home and hold him on the seat the whole time. When he got back to the guesthouse he proceeded to vomit all over the walkway. Somehow Derrick managed to find his way back and when he saw Ian puking all over the place he started to kick him in the ass. Ian was so drunk he couldn't put up any sort of defense and eventually Derrick realized he'd have to result to cruder measures. He put his foot on the back of Ian's neck and put all his weight on him until Ian's arms collapsed and he went sprawling into the bushes......all the while still retching. Lovely.

This is Damian, he was one of the soberer ones that night. Where was I during this little escapade you ask? Good question! It turned out that I was feeling just fine and since Matt and Damian were headed out to go on the prowl I thought I'd tag along. This proved to be my downfall. We got to a bar and there were a couple of good looking girls and being the suave individual that I am, (and as the last shot of whiskey was starting to seep into my bloodstream,) I proceeded to go over and dance with them. I was on top of the world! Here I was the only guy dancing with a couple of cute girls while everyone else in the bar just sat around and looked on awestruck and jealous!

Within a half an hour Matt and Damian were carrying me home because at some point I'd gotten onto the topic of religion with a couple of Israelis and I told them how stupid I thought religious people were and how religion was just a ploy to trick people into giving money they couldn't afford to religious groups who didn't deserve it. I'm sure I didn't articulate this point as eloquently as I do now, since I had just drank 24 shots of whiskey in under two and a half hours and was so drunk I couldn't even sit down without sliding off my chair. Matt and Damian decided it was time for me to go..........now! But did I listen? Hell no, I was on a roll! Plus I was hungry! The following definitions are from Wikipedia.com,

Rock:

A rock is a naturally occurring aggregate of minerals and/or mineraloids. The Earth's lithosphere is made of rock. In general rocks are of three types, namely, igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic. Petrology is the scientific study of rocks.

Bottom can refer to:
Bottom is lowest part of an object.[1]
the buttocks

Rock Bottom:

Finishing off your shameful night of drinking debauchery and embarrassing attempts to pick up women by heading to a 7-11 in Thailand and finishing off the last few hot dogs rotating on the counter display case.

The next morning I felt pretty bad, not as bad as Ian and Derrick who didn't get out of bed until 4:00pm but I still felt pretty aweful. So what do I do after a night of evil antics? I decide to clean myself up and go on adventure! Matt and Damian and I grabbed our scooters............(and yes, I do think it's funny that I ended up with the pink one,).........and headed up to the Luang Pong hot springs for some R & R.

Along the way we stopped off at the Thai equivalent of the Grand Canyon but luckily we had the sense to just take pictures as we were all a little tired, the path was only about a foot wide in some places, and the forest floor was some 200 feet below.

Aaaaahhhh! The hot springs!

While the sulphuric water didn't do our many cuts and scrapes much good, once you got in this place was pure bliss!

That night we headed back to the Shisha bar to calculate out total and strut around the bar hoping everyone would be impressed. Turned out that the three of us all got gold medals which meant that we accumulated enough points to knock the US out of third place in the International Competition.

YEAH!!!!