exit strategy

do you think the way we exit matters? for real, is the exit more important than the entrance. this weekend sitting at dinner, eating some sushi, having some conversations japanese, i thought about exit strategies. strangely connected with a conversation i imposed on stevey last weekend at the cemetary. sometimes i think the exit is more important than the entrance. samurai believed this. that is why hari-kiri (seppuku) was practiced. since they honored the idea of reincarnation, they believed the way you exit life was an important step to continue the way you fought in life and basically lived your life. so if you had somehow dishonored your clan, it was redeemable by an honorable death. interesting practice.

relationships can be the same way. i almost think that it's more important to have an appropriate conclusion to courting than a romantic beginning. you can even salvage a horrible relationship with the right exit strategy. however, the antagonistic approach is just as potent because much of the rush of fun in the beginning will eventually regress, the words/phrases you use during that all-too-painful break-up conversation will linger in the mind of the opposite party for times to come. those critical moments may be etched permanently with potential to taint all other elements of an otherwise good relationship. exits can be telling.


i think there's something to be said about exit strategies. ok so let's consider the spasmodic utterances i forced on stevey as we sauntered through the jfk memorial site last weekend in the district. similar to the way our generation will recall 911, the prior generations can all relate when/where/how they heard about the assassination of jfk. jonny kennedy had roughly 3 years in office and dealt with some historic events like the bay of pigs and the cuban missile crisis. but how much could a president really accomplish in three years that would memoralize him for generations to follow. now, i wasn't alive during that period in history, but did the american people love jfk that much prior to his assassination? or was it the subsequent love affair with jackie and a feeling of societal vulnerability?

take another martyr, the reverend doctor martin luther king jr. i do not want to take away from his legacy at all, but consider this point, what if goerge bush sr. instead of mlk? yeah, he conducted the gulf war and raised a son that would follow his lead, but still went down a rare one-term defeated incumbent. and will his grave sit on a bluff in the nation's most prestigious cemetary and overlook the hill with its glowing momuments of other national heroes? if the first george dubya was brutually murdered would there be middle schools in every neighborhood bearing his name? maybe, maybe not. my point is this. yes, great men. and great men in prominent, conspicuous positions were killed for the cause. but they didn't give their lives, their lives were taken. don't you think its more noble to put your life on the line, like the numerable causalties from all of our nations wars? and yet how many of these men get more than a flag delivered by uniformed men to their doorsteps? i guess my question is this, why does involuntary assassination merit more history honor points than voluntary sacrifice to a cause? but maybe it's true that an ignoble act can and will be redeemed by an approriate exit strategy.

longing for love...d ones

stephen come home to me now. i miss you! in your absence, i've been spending a lot of time with r clark. i hope you don't mind. but it's time we were together again. forget miss i'll-give-you-my-number-but-not-my-name-anonymous-girl and come home to me. in the meantime, i'll will be waiting with r clark...

ps. for those that don't know, road tripped to dc last weekend and had a good time, including the sunday morning stroll through arlington cemetery and posing in front of jfk's memorial site with dc proper in the back.
pss. favorite dc-related song: hands down, it's gotta be "the district sleeps alone tonight." name the band and you win my love and respect and maybe even a monetary reward of sorts.

weekend paradise

so while all my buddies were busy making history here in nyc, by that i mean fighting the record-breaking blizzard that pounded the east coast this last weekend, i was busy trying to make nerve-wracking decisions: beach or pool-side? cause if you go to the beach, you will inevitably end up with sand in your hair and salt water in your mouth. but if you stay at the hotel pool, you don't quite get the richest experience possible. but sun is sun and you can get fried at either location, as witnessed by this lobster shot of our poolside buddy. scale of 1 to 10, how hot is this guy?? (feel free to vote deltar style)

so puerto rico was a weekend in paradise. granted, most of the trip we didn't leave a four block radius, but when your hotel is a block away from the beach and your biggest decision is beach or pool, i guess it all makes sense that we didn't venture out too much. although, the times we did branch out were just as memorable. some of the greatest moments of the trip would have to include discovering a private beach for a private swim in a private cove with, i'm not kidding, perfect sand and the most inviting, subtle waves. sandwich that activity between two sessions on a scooter buzzing coast-side for a couple hours each way. man, it was to die for. other highlights would include spending 30 min trying to talk to night-watch pool guard to turn a blind eye on our late night swim intentions to no avail and being forced to take our midnight swim to the ocean, under to casual light of a perfect full moon. so maybe the guard was doing us a favor. (however, i don't think he was playing that way.) but his stubbornness could only be matched and beat by our own as we snuck back into the pool a couple hrs later to finish out the original plan. nothing in the world can compare with the right late night hot tub. and i will not back down from that statement.

other noteworthies: random indian belly dancers, fried hut food, salsa dancing, white girls dancing with old latin charmers, young latin dudes with old grandmas that can still throw it down, gelatos, 3 hr sleep sessions, getting caught trying to borrow the deck chairs, myth busters, high jacking pool chairs for the homeless, and access to jackbauer (no space) in a foreign land, where he is also somehow protecting us there as well, and all the other classic moments of the weekend.

old san juanny

hotel shot.

"you gotta be kidding me" private beach

best contraption conceivable if you're betting gelatos

it almost finally happened.

we almost did it. but the process we did. we went to the colbert report. it was hilarious. and by almost did it, i mean we almost made it to the daily show. personally, i like the daily show more than the colbert report, but that is not to say, that the colbert report has not nestled itself into a pleasant little cranny in my heart. cheesy? yes. but that's how a feel about the colbert report. and yes, it was as funny if not more so live, than on my daily dose of comedy central via the internet. so stevey hooked up with four tickets and he and i and our two friends, di and ryan (no footage found). it was well worth the wait. how are people like colbert, stewart, and others so funny? i love it

told ya!

here's a game...
try to count and tally all the inside-out umbrellas you see today. suckas!

for those of you that have read or heard my treatise on unmbrellas, you know what i'm talking about.