#37 Ben

You asked me not to blow bubbles, which I resented. When I was out for two weeks, another coworker said you missed me. I've decided I don't mind sitting next to you.

I'm in the wrong business

Me: pretzel, please
Pretzel seller: 3 dollar
Me: 3 dollars! Oh come on. I'm a New Yorker.
Him: Okay, 2 dollar.
Me: Okay. Thank you. Do people really pay 3 dollars for pretzels these days?
Him: Vell, yes.

#36 Ben

You were always old to me. Your armchair smelled like pee. You disliked our dogs, but you collected dog figurines made of china. You were my great uncle. I didn't love you.

End of fashion sense

I saw a woman wearing a shiny, black satin jacket with words written across the back in rhinestones. They spelled out "Apple Bottom" above a curvaceous apple (viewed from the side), the top of which did have a rather bottom-esque shape to it. The top also had a stem sticking out of it with several leaves, looking more like a splort than leaves.

#35 Ben

You were my first boyfriend. We met at camp and we saw each other a few times a year. You have a baby. You take us to dinner when you're in town.

#34 Barb

You tried out many faiths -- Protestant, wiccan, Moonies, etc. And then you wound up a UU, where you stuck around. You are a very outspoken Canadian luddite and perhaps a stereotypical librarian.

#33 Babs

You were my mom's boss at the lingerie store, then became a realtor. You had a show cat and poodle. I was too young to understand why I couldn't play with them.

Done and done

Only a few more hours in India. Everything we do here tires us out in record time. Every hour or so today we had to stop to sit and have a snack. This proved slightly problematic since we were so done with Indian food. We finally tried fresh lime sodas today after we found out they have no ice. Turns out they are delicious. I am sad that I did not drink more of them.

I know I keep saying this over and over, but nothing really does prepare you for India. Even reading all about Jen's experience here this fall did not convince me just how much of a trial it is to be here.

Partly, I know that we should have spent less time in Mumbai, but because of the dates of the conference, we could not go anywhere very far or for very long. Staying mainly in Mumbai meant that we did not see a whole lot of beauty. We saw a lot of interesting things, but I would not describe them as beautiful. I realized that I need to experience a little more beauty on my vacations.

I would also prefer to be in a place where we can stroll around and find places to eat. It is infuriating to rely on a guidebook to tell us where any restaurants are and then for none of the cab drivers to understand where we were asking them to go. I'd say we had about 50/50 luck with cabbies not shaking their heads and saying no, they would not take us. Even the cool cab drivers did not know where most things in the book are located. And they would get exasperated at me for insisting on trying to find those places instead of just taking me to a rug store.

We do not regret coming to India at all, but we are so ready to go home.

#32 Audrey

My mom was your best friend. You married a jerk, had kids. He soon left. Then you married a man who made a ton of money and now you have multiple houses.

Y'all have put me under. I'm outta here!

This is not like us. We are ready to come home. We are not travel sissies. I can't believe that India won. We honestly had no IDEA how hard India is. I thought Morocco would have prepared me. It did not. Not at all. It's not the poverty. That, for whatever reason, I can handle. It's just how difficult everything is. You can't take a leisurely stroll ANYWHERE as far as I can tell. There are either no sidewalks or the sidewalk is built over a drainage ditch and is falling apart. Or, the area for strolling is right next to a foul-smelling body of water.

The interesting areas are the ones where we are unwilling to eat or drink or sit or pee or anything, really. The more sterile areas are crawling with tourists and those are the areas that are over-fun with street urchins trying to sell us their dirty drums or men trying to sell us gigantic balloons. I can only handle either area for so long.

India tests how much we are willing to rough it. Are we okay with the non-air-conditioned taxis with the dirty, dirty seats and the drivers who don't speak a word of English? Or would we prefer air-con luxury? Of course we would prefer the latter, but no a/c is okay for short distances.

We are now staying for our last 2 nights at a budget hotel near the Victoria terminus. The cool cabs do not line up outside waiting for the doorman to wave one over. We had it way too easy at the Grand Hyatt. It's not like we ever stay in places like that (except when Jeff's sent somewhere for work). But I have to admit that we got quite comfortable there. Although we really could have been in any country in the world.

The title of this post is from a news item from a month ago about a guy who I believe killed himself publicly and said this right before doing so. Jeff found this very funny and has been saying it over and over, especially these past few days. You have to know Jeff to understand why he finds it funny and why he says it ad nauseum.