Posts Tagged ‘massachusetts

04
Aug
10

USOMFA Tour: Dusk Approaching

On Sunday we went to Rockport, a sleepy little seaside town in Massachusetts and J-Rab and I walked the streets there, ducking into the little shops we found and browsing through the trinkets inside them.

It was a sunny day, one I think we’ll all remember for a long time to come, and walking past a shop window, we saw this shirt:

 

 

Now, with less than 4 days of our holiday left, I’m tempted to take the advice on that shirt and just never go back.

J-Rab and I would drive down south, jump the border to Mexico, find menial jobs to get by and start a new life together. I’d write a lot more in our new life, actually get started banging out some of the scripts inside my head, maybe do some short stories here and there, land a few writing gigs, build my portfolio.

A few years down the track I’d land something legitimate, move back to the States, find that tiny seaside town and rent a flat there.

In summer I’d learn how to surf. Collect a few shells for J-Rab to make some jewelry. Leave the corporate world that I’ve become entwined in so far behind that I’d clean forget I was ever a part of it.

 

 

In about an hour J-Rab’s sister and her boyfriend are both going to leave for the airport and fly back to London and though we still got a few days left, I keep getting this feeling like the best parts of our holiday have already happened and all there is left now is that slow march back onto the plane and back to our day jobs and the thousands of emails that overflowing from our inboxes like a burst sewerage pipe.

Fuck, listen to me, whining like a little bitch. It’s been one of the best holidays of my life and all I’m thinking about is work when it hasn’t even ended yet.

Fuck that shit. I’m going to drink another beer and relax to the fucking max.

Catch you crazy cats tomorrow. Also, NOMINATE ME FOR THE SA BLOG AWARDS (click the badge on the right. Scroll up a little bit, theeeerreee it is…). Or I’ll jab you in the gums with a screwdriver.

Love from your buddy ol’ pal:

 

 

-ST

02
Aug
10

USOMFA Tour ‘10 Update: America is FULL of Viruses

What happens when you don’t blog for awhile is this crushing feeling of guilt sets in and slowly saps the life out of you until you find yourself blind drunk at 4 in the morning, running around the desert in Las Vegas, looking for strippers and cocaine.

Or maybe that’s just me 😉

Thing is, the day after that last post about our flight getting delayed and taking a badass detour on our way to USOMFA, J-Rab’s laptop got hit by about 5 really malicious, bloodthirsty viruses that fucked shit up but good.

Worst thing was I was mid-post when they struck so I look like Mr Badguy, surfing midget porn or something right when shit started going down.

We fought the viruses for a good couple of days during which I put my blogging on the backburner, thinking that it would just be a day or two before we got J-Rab’s machine back to normal. Sad truth is it’s totally fucked in every conceivable way, so I jury-rigged the computer J-Rab’s stepdad uses as their printer server to blog off and here I am, at 10pm on a hot summer night in Massachusetts, finally banging out a couple of words about this crazy trip.

I wish you could see this place, spend a day driving the green and leafy roads that connect one place to the next here because I’m not sure me writing about it is going to do it any justice.

 

 

The houses have no fences here and they’re mostly wooden and have two or three stories. Every third house flies an American flag by the front door and the cars are all fucking huge 4x4s that people drive at considerate speeds down the highways and byways so as not to upset the other drivers.

It ain’t Africa here. You won’t get randomly cut off by some maniac behind the wheel of a taxi and when you stop at traffic lights, there’s no one begging for change or waiting for an opportunity to rob you blind.

Those little things, those are the first things you notice.

When I first got here, I tried to see if I could spot some kind of key differentiating thing between Americans and other people, but came up with nothing. They are no fatter or thinner than people back home, they are no darker or lighter in skin colour and they are no taller or shorter in height.

They’re just people. There’s really nothing distinctly American about them except their accents, but I’m sure there’s a lot more under the surface, but you don’t get that stuff until you live in a place.

We visited Salem on Thursday and checked out the cemetery where the Judge from the Salem Witch Trials is buried, the sick fuck who condemned at least 18 people to death for being ‘witches’.

 

 

Craziest thing is that just around the corner there’s a second cemetery where they’ve engraved a number of stones with the names of the people who were hanged for being witches because they were never given proper graves with headstones.

Among the names I read was John Proctor himself, the protagonist in The Crucible. It was eerie reading his name in stone that day, it was one of those rare moments when the real world and the world of fiction collide and you find yourself in the middle of that collision, changed in some way you can’t quite grasp yet.

And from somewhere deep in my soupy brain, I remembered the words Elizabeth Proctor said to John in The Crucible and smiled.

“You’re a good man John,” she said, “only somewhat bewildered.”

 

 

I’m going to try do this again tomorrow and the next day and the next. My time here is fading fast, I need to capture these crazy days while I can.

-ST

15
Jul
10

SlickTiger Industries Presents: USOMFA Tour ‘10

Guys, some pretty earth-shattering news. Please sit down for this.

In exactly one week’s time, I’m climbing into the belly of a giant steel bird and heading for the United States Of Muthu Fukkin’ America (USOMFA) for the first time in my 26 years of being alive.

I know, crazy hey? They actually gave me a Visa, and not just any Visa, a TEN YEAR Visa motherbitches!

Even more hectic than that is the fact that after nearly 3 years of dating, I’m finally going to meet J-Rab’s parents and twin brothers. We’ll be staying with them over in the USOMFA for a full two weeks – sound like the plotline for a slapstick block-buster comedy starring Ben Stiller and Robert De Nero? You bet your ass!

 

 

While I’m over there, I’ll be launching SlickTiger Industries’ latest initiative: USOMFA Tour ‘10.

Catchy title ain’t it? Yeah, I’m pretty amazing like that.

I’ll be getting to the bottom of this crazy-ass place they call the USOMFA and really figure out what it’s all about, the people, the places, fuck, everything.

Whilst on the USOMFA Tour ‘10, you can expect in-depth interviews and profiles the likes of which have never been seen on this site before. It will be like you’re right there with me, living the life of an actual American, taking in all the sights and sounds and getting to grips with the state I’ll be visiting: Massachusetts baby!

How do I feel about the trip? Pretty damn excited. Am I nervous about meeting the parents? Hell no! I have it on good authority from one of J-Rab’s oldest friends that they’re exactly like the Weasleys from Harry Potter, so I got nothing to worry about.

 

 

This is going to be real-time, real-life, hardcore investigative citizen journalism at its very finest so yeah, just be careful reading it or your head could explode with awesome.

So if you guys have any suggestions of stuffs to check out in Massachusetts (I’ll be staying in Essex), lemme know. And if you happen to live in Essex then fer chrissakes drop a mail to tellthetiger@gmail.com and let’s hang out!*

-ST

*As long as you promise not to kidnap me and make lampshades out of my flesh