7 Years Almost Not Celebrated in Cozumel

Bill and I decided to take the all too cliche vacation for our seven year anniversary of being around each other all the time, an all inclusive trip to Cozumel. It was one of the obvious choices and behold we found a resort that our friends had recently honeymooned at, the Allegro. Awe yes, eight hours of traveling and we arrive, take a taxi and are dropped off. The ominous look our taxi driver gave us should have given me pause, but dressed in my sweats, hungry and hung over from travel we walked into the entry excited to finally relax.

They tell us our room is not going to be ready for another three hours. No problem, we'll have lunch and hang on the beach who cares, we are in MEXICO!! Where is the Tequila!?? We are directed to a path to the "restaurant". We are stopped by a tiny little woman with the face of grandmother who probably takes in orphans in her spare time. I think wow, they even have Mother Theresa on staff! She smiles and asks us to sit down so that we may learn a little info about the resort. Sure, anything for you Mother Theresa. We sit down, twenty minutes later we know everything about Cozumel and are signed up for a time share presentation at their "beautiful property" next door. I am sweatier and hungrier and feel like I've been slapped in the face by Mother Theresa.

OK, buck up, lets get lunch! Wheres the tequila??? We walk on. We come to the first pool that resembles your basic jumbo water play scape mobbed with about 100 screaming 2-5 year old children and their parents trying to make sense of their children's chaos that is interrupted by the toot of a boat horn that is strapped to the top of a giant pirate head. I start to twitch. Bill is dripping with sweat and the fear in his eyes says everything. We come to the adult pool. It is surrounded by an ugly black nylon fence and it is drained. The sound of impending doom snaps us from our trance on the very sad looking pool. It is the loud speaker from yet another pool, "All you nine year olds, are you ready!!!!??" We come upon one of the strangest scenes I have ever experienced. A pool filled to the brim with 8 - 15 year olds screaming, playing and well you can imagine what else. Surrounding the pool are their parents napping!!! As if this is normal and they are on their own islands with only the sound of birds chirping. What it is going on!? Again, a woman in a booth starts announcing upcoming games, so loud that I can't hear myself go into shock. I look at Bill for an answer. I desperately want to understand. This can't be it. This can't be what will be for the next six days of our life. I go into survival mode. This is not going to happen. By the way, the ocean is literally 10 feet from the edge of this hellish scene and we did not care, didn't even notice in fact. We sit, decide that after we get lunch, we will ask about availability at their "beautiful property" next door. At this point we know we will do anything, pay anything. Deep breaths, we have a plan.

We walk into the "restaurant". Similar to every other scene we've experienced, it is filled with children and parents going on as if nothing is wrong. There is no where to sit. We grab plates to get something at the buffet. We walk through the entire buffet, there is not one thing I would eat. We look and feel like aliens as we put our plate back down. Bill attempts to get a beverage. It is the worst resemblance of a margarita I have ever seen. Not one sip I could handle. We go to the front desk. I ask the woman about availability next door. She gives me an uncertain look. Evidently the look on my face says many things as an upper management employee comes over, Miguel. He is tall and relaxed in the face with a smile. My angel Miguel. He looks and me and smiles "Too many kids?" "Yes, Yes!" I say, thinking perfect I can blame it on the kids! I won't look like an asshole now for pointing out the other horrible facts about the place. Miguel takes over. Hope fills Billy's eyes. Miguel gets us a room at the Occidental Grand for a minimal increase in price. He calls us a taxi. I would have had sex with Miguel.

We arrive at the Occidental Grand . We are given champagne as they check us in. The property is absolutely stunning. I almost cry. They direct us towards the beach club for lunch. A waiter seats us. We have drinks served and eat from a beautiful buffet. Bill has a Christmas morning grin on his face. We look over the beautiful water and feel as though we narrowly escaped a six day hell and arrived at the very antithesis. Our view at that moment: <

We walk to our beautiful room and hear the toot of the far off boat horn that takes our exhausted brains right back to that hellish scene. We squeeze each other's hands. A perfect start to our much deserved celebration of our very special seven years together, through thick and thin, Billy and Meg somehow make it through. Perhaps a higher power gave us that experience to remind us of how lucky we really are to have each other. Through the next six days, we lounged, swam, snorkeled and mostly just enjoyed being with each other, doing nothing. The stars were amazing, but unfortunately our camera couldn't grab them. So you'll just have to go yourself.

Visit from the Gregg

My Dad, Gregg (yes I am one of those people who call their parent by their first name due to a very cold, non-engaging childhood, kidding) came to visit me for the first time in Los Angeles since I've lived here, 5 years now. His excuse for visiting was assisting in the hauling of 8 sport horses to San Juan Capistrano for a horse show. My father is a farrier and his client of several years needed a good strong man to make sure nothing happened on the trip from Cypress,Texas to California. They arrived at the stables at 2am on Monday night. That day my dad had changed two tires on a 15 ton horse trailer in the middle of the desert. Needless to say he was exhausted, but volunteered us to help with the unloading of the horses/ trailer. Bill got a chance to help hay the stalls and yes he even carried horse shit from the trailer that my dad and I mucked. So proud I am that he even came near it.

Our drive to Los Angeles was a blur at 3am. Bill got pulled over for speeding but didn't get a ticket due to his unbelievable boyish good looks (yes the cop was gay). They apparently were looking for another bad guy as they shut down the freeway and had helicopters circling. The following three days I led Gregg around my life in Los Angeles. We had lunch at the Abbey, looked at classic cars, listened to Beethoven at the Hollywood Bowl and spent an afternoon at the Getty enjoying the summer garden. Gregg even grabbed my camera and was snapping pics like a pro. Every time I go home to Texas, Gregg tries to convince me to move back. Before he got on the plane back home, Gregg confessed to Bill that he will stop trying to do that. Alas, it only took 3 days in Los Angeles to halt the argument, too bad he didn't come sooner.

A Flushing Dream

Moms house smashed then disconnected old toilet. Meg, Bill, Gar go to Home Depot (in concord concord ave) to Buy a new one to install. The row of display toilets are all missing the tags for purchase so we ask our helper who indicates they are out of toilets. Unbelieving we meander around looking for help. We go to the customer service window and while waiting in line Johnny Sakkis comes in very tall and skinny wearing a striped sweater and sideways cap. You both look so skinny and are wearing sweaters I say hugging Johnny and Gar. “I’m fat”. So then delivery truck of toilets arrives and many workers begin to uncrate and un wrap all these toilets. We begin the selection process, they are all the wrong shape wrong color too expensive etc, one was very plain and still 500 dollars. I’m not paying 500 for a toilet. Where are all the 22-dollar toilets I saw when we got here? Some lady screams hey you wanna buy a toilet I gotta leave so hurry up and pick one; Meg picks a peach colored toilet. That wont work Meg it has to be white. I blow the lady off and find our original helper who is uncrating toilets. This one is 799, 799 it better wipe your ass for you, I think it does he says pointing to the array of buttons on the side. I just want a regular ol fucking toilet. We find one its normal its 56 $. Load it up. I am waiting in the parking lot of a random place smoking a cigarette with the camera and sweaters etc. no one comes for a long time so I walk across the street and Johnny and gar get out of a cab. Where the fuk have you been, where’s Meg, where’s the toilet. We left dude what the fuck this toilet thing is your deal. Fine I walk off across the parking lot through a girls softball game where the third baseman makes a diving catch from the pitcher face first and tags out the runner headed home down the third baseline all in one movement. Awesome. Meg and mom arrive with bags from home depot. Where’s the toilet, its in Megs car. Mom – don’t worry we’ll install it. NO. I’m gonna do it. Its ok you’ve done enough we’ll take care of it. NO. I’ve installed hundreds of toilets I want to do it, if you do it it will probably fucking leak ………

A dream Bill Jacks dreamt on 8.8.08 and wrote down at 5am.
Noted: Bill Jacks needs a vacation.

ZOO TROUBLE

A couple Sundays ago, Bill and I decided to go to the LA Zoo. I have always had a problem with zoos, ya know the whole idea of catching animals and making them live in false habitats, just so we can look at them seems insane. (Its probably due to the white trash circuses that used to come through my home town (Bellville, TX) growing up, of which my mother usually ended up calling the cops on them to report animal abuse. Talk about cool, ugh, "Mom, please don't call the cops yet.") Alas, sometimes you just want to see a fucking elephant.

We arrived at the LA zoo under a cloud of relaxed excitement. In the vast parking lot almost filled up by 1pm, we walked towards the entrance. As we approached a line that wrapped around theatre poles mostly made up of families with lots and lots of children, I thought, "turn around now, we don't have to do this." Bill squeezed my hand and confirmed it would be OK. We would go get margaritas at the back of the zoo if it was too unbearable. That's all I needed to hear. We moved on with the mission. We are through the gates and I'm excited just to see a lone meerkat covered in sweat, looking like he had just been through a meerkat war, living in a habitat resembling a half ass attempt at pvc pipes covered in crappy dirt. Awe, yes I think, I am at the zoo, deep breaths. We come to another habitat, the American alligator, Ok I think, this will be awesome, all those hours I've logged watching Discovery Channel, show me some alligator! Alas, one three foot alligator hiding in the corner that you can barely see past the multiple mothers draped in Mom attire (Tevas, sun hats, lots of cotton, sunscreen) and their children clamping onto zoo retail and sugary foods. I would be hiding too if I were that lil alligator. I think, elephants, thats all I want to see. We move on, only to look up and see plumes of smoke billowing far off on the horizon behind the zoo. We think, no biggie, its LA, there is always something on fire. Eventually, some non concerned zoo employees tell us we must evacuate. We spend and hour in traffic, as there were 4,000 people evacuated from the zoo at once. I am sure the animals came out of hiding and thanked the fire gods. I saw more animals on a truck in the parking lot which displayed monkey, cow and horse hood ornaments.

An end to yet another wonderful "zoo" experience. I am not going to give up. I am currently searching craigslist for private elephant showings.