Monday, April 21, 2014

Buy That Ticket!!!


Hi,

We haven’t spoken before, but I know what you are going through.  You are not alone in this world.  You are not the only one that questions your life every single day.  We've all been taught that we should never question the system we live in and just be happy with our meager existence working jobs we hate, to buy crap on credit cards that we pay off for the rest of our lives.  Being a leader in today's world and making change is dangerous.  This is not how life has to be my friend.  There is a rebellion of free thinkers out there that no one will tell you about because they don’t go along with the system.  These people have found happiness in traveling the world and making experiences instead of buying new coffee tables and cars.  We are out there, but you have to speak first. 

San Diego


Let me tell you my story…For 30 years of my life, I was a typical guy from the Midwest who was more afraid of nuclear war then snake bites and bee stings because cable TV sold me those fears.   Almost a year ago, I basically packed up what clothes and possessions could fit in my car, every “priceless” memory I was holding onto my entire life that could not fit, got thrown away.  This was the hardest moment of my life!  After 5 years of living in Ohio, I escaped to join the rebellion to San Diego, CA.  My trip was unique in that I Couchsurfed (Couchsurfing.org) for an entire month from city to city, 14 in total, but I’ve also seen 37 US states now and 7 countries. 

240 pounds at 22 years old

At my lowest I lost 70 pounds



Let me back up a step.  I started my career in Wisconsin and ended up in Ohio for 5 years and worked a typical boring "Office Space" engineering job for many years.  After becoming jaded with the corporate system over the years in job after job telling me how amazing their workplace was and why I should come work for them, I ended up leaving a 7 month position, very unhappy and unhappy with life overall in the Midwest.  I found that my open mindedness and health conscious decisions made it hard to make friends in Ohio, because if you aren’t from Ohio they don’t want you there.  The same holds true for my hometown friends who still hang out in the same place with the same people they did a decade ago.    



Three years ago, I was fortunate to meet my first French friend in Ohio.  I had no idea, but international people have just as hard of a time befriending Midwesterners.  Through networking parties, I got to hang out with 50+ people at a time.  This was awesome for me actually because where I’m from, no one spoke anything but Spanish.  Now I was surrounded by people from all over the world!  They were very welcoming because they had no friends and had more open minded views. I grew up an overweight kid in poverty in Wisconsin and I had lost 70 pounds back in Madison and now had just quit the highest paying job of my life.  

My second half marathon


After a week, I hadn’t told anyone I left my job for the first time in my life and had no backup.  I was nervous as hell, because this was the first time I had nothing lined up in 7 years.  One thing to note is that in those 7 years I had never really gone on more than a weekend vacation.  A week later after being jaded looking at new jobs that all sounded equally "Office Space"-ish, I was invited out for, as my friend Enrico called it, a "beer that changed my life".  My international friends and I joke about it now.  At the time, I felt down in the dumps for being so careless.  Friday night I get a text from my Italian friend Enrico, didn't want to go out.  I just wanted to wallow in my misery.  Enrico had 4 friends out that said “just come out for one.”

Amalfi Coast, Italy


I joined them at a bar that had the biggest worldwide craft beer selection in town.  Upon entering, to my right I have an energetic Italian couple and to my left a more reserved looking German friend and his Indian girlfriend.  I had hung out with these guys a lot, but this time was different.  Honestly, I was anxious to get home and sulk.  They asked what I was doing and I said looking for jobs.  They were shocked and asked "what the hell man!?"  Over that beer, I told them the full story of how that day came to be. 

Kayaking Barcelona


The story went like this.  For 2 years now I had been trying to escape being an engineer that just sits behind a computer all day and makes 3D computer models.  I am basically a trained monkey.  When you have no challenges at work there is little motivation to work.  In 7 years I NEVER even talked to anyone...I couldn’t even tell you one phone number I ever had at work.  They were all saying “Haha, what?!”  I had started part time grad school a year before trying to become a project manager or sales person, someone that TALKS to people on a daily basis.  Luckily, or unluckily, I got hired as a project manager at a company in a great industry making more money than I could ever imagine!  I thought it was my dream...turns out not.  

Bastille Day in Paris, 200,000 people danced to YMCA!


My dreams were shattered because the only person who could train me, an engineer I met in my interview...he quit the Friday before I started on Monday...and the electrical engineer followed.  This was due to managerial changes that happened before I even started.  Nobody told me that 25% of the staff had just quit...so the first day, the first thing my boss says to me is

"SORRY"..."sorry there is no one to train you in a field you haven't worked in"...My heart sunk!!!  

Selfie near the bottom of the Grand Canyon in Arizona


And from that day on, my every day was like a terrible scavenger hunt to do work, finding files I have no idea what they are named.  Imagine looking for a "widget" and someone called it a "whatzit" and you have to find a needle in a haystack every day.  I won’t say I felt like dying…that would mean I felt something, anything at all, but I didn’t.  My mind went numb for 7 months.  Every day I went in and felt nothing except wanting to bang my head on desk.  This was supposed to be the best job of my life.  I felt like somebody lied to me!

I had to explain this to my international friends over a beer and they were shocked as well because I never complained about it.  I never complained because I thought everyone hated their jobs, not just me.  These particular friends of mine were doing cancer research at a local children's hospital and they think very differently than us Midwestern folk.  

The first thing they asked is "why the hell are you still in Cincinnati!?"  

I was a crawfish boil virgin hahaha!  Got my second tattoo here to mark the occassion.


To be honest with you, growing up without money in the Midwest, I was inexperienced with travel. In my mind, traveling to another country is for couples on their honeymoon to do once in their life if they are lucky.   I was single, at 30 years old in Ohio and did not own a home.  If you are not married in Ohio at 30 years old, even if you have a solid career, you failed at life!  I hate to admit, but that has caused some of my depression over the years.  I mean come on, I was a misfit in Ohio and Wisconsin and anywhere I went except Chicago, but that's another story.  

My friends taught me that due to their proximity to each other in Europe, seeing other countries was normal.  Enrico asked “Why don’t you take a vacation somewhere amazing and get out of this terrible place, man!?” 

And I said what I'd said my entire life, “I can't afford it and I don't have anyone to go with.” 

Enrico explained that we have this tendency to want to pair up, with either a significant other or best friend, and never do anything alone, especially introverted engineers like me.  Due to the pairing up aspect of my life, I have been saving money to get married one day and buy a house, so relieve my anxiety, I needed to keep a big down payment in my bank account…like I would magically get married and buy a house overnight or something.  Hahaha! 

So, my friend Enrico broke it down like this, "You don't have a job, you have tons of money saved as an engineer at this last job, you don't have a mortgage, school is out for the summer, you don't have a long term girlfriend, or even a cat? What the hell are you still doing here?! You could die of cancer tomorrow and what will that mountain of riches do in your grave? GO LIVE MAN!!!”   

Real Naples, Italy pizza.  


For personally reason, this broke my heart!  I don’t know why this, out of everything in my life so made me feel like I’ve been living a lie.  Maybe it’s just the enthusiasm Italians speak with, but something in my head snapped.

Right now, I have to admit that I did have a blank passport for 2 years from a previous job.  After some more discussion, and another beer, I went home to my area which had bars and clubs, had several more depressed drinks.  

I kept thinking “why the hell is this so hard to do?!” 

The best sunset of my life taking a ferry off Southern Italy


After hours of contemplation, that night I ended up with a non-refundable 6 week ticket in and out to Napoli, Italia (Naples, Italy) for 3 days later.  Let me repeat, 3 days later and I spent 2000$ since it was double the cost.  When I woke up that Saturday morning, after letting the fear sink in, and there was a LOT of fear, I sent Enrico a text,

"I did a bad thing man!"  

"What?"  He replied.

"I bought a ticket to Italy...in 3 days for 42 nights!"



He came back with "you, my friend, are the craziest American I know!!! Come over Sunday, we gotta make plans!!!"  

Let me point out here, I'd never been abroad, did have a passport, and since I grew up poor, I never in my life had hopes of going to another country.  You just don't do that sort of thing alone.  I did not even have a back pack (I got a solid backpackers bag now).  I also did not have anything but a 42 night ticket in and out of Naples, no hotel, no car, and horror movies on cable TV have given me a debilitating fear of being murdered and dismantled in hostels in Europe!  OUCH!!!  I did not know how public transportation worked or how big Italy was.  I was completely ignorant of the rest of the world.  

Enrico had me buy a travel guide, the "Lonely Planet" travel guide for Italy; he said that was going to be my "Bible".  And it was!  Today, I have a guide for Italy, Western Europe and now the US.  He invited me over and our German friend Toby and his awesome girlfriend Valeria. We went over what I was to do in their hometown of Naples giving me 1 week of plans.  He even set me up with 2 nights in a bed and breakfast and let me use his Italian cell phone on my 6 weeks abroad.  Even having never been abroad, I already had contacts of both of their friends on Facebook and in the phone.  I cannot tell you how much these 2 have changed my life!  Those stories in Naples I could write a book on.  I could also write a book just on the things I screwed up as a newbie traveler.  The only thing I was certain of was that I had a ticket Italy and 2 friends in Paris I met in Cincinnati, Ohio.  42 days in Europe with no plans, and basically unlimited fundage…yup every day I made once in a life time memories!

Giving new friends from around the world a tour of Naples...yup did that!


 After my awesome Ohio friend Deanna dropped me off at the airport at the butt crack of dawn, I boarded the plane alone, and I felt chills down my spine! A layover in NYC and 3 flights later, I had been dropped off in the most beautiful weather I had ever seen in Naples!  The second I stepped off the plane I knew something in my mind snapped or cracked or something.  I was broken…to my old life. 

I was doing something no one I grew up with will ever understand.  My friend got me a bed and breakfast in the historic center of Naples, a very high energy, non-touristy area.  The exhilarating energy was everywhere in the fresh Mediterranean air.  Everywhere, people speaking in tongues I could not understand.  The cab ride to the well hidden BnB was my first hassle with an Italian speaking driver.  It was in what looked like a dark and scary alley you would not go down in the US.  Everything in that area, because it older than our country, looks old and scary and uniquely picturesque! 

Roma!


After reading my “Lonely Planet” Italy guide, I found that it taught me maps, history of the city, speaking some words, hotels, hostels, and ways to get around the city.  It was a life saver many times over!  The first 2 nights I stayed in an EMPTY BnB by myself, and stayed up all night because JETLAG SUCKS!  I had no idea about hostels yet until I randomly ran into 2 French Canadians girls getting yelled at by a guard trying to buy ticket in French but he only spoke Italian.  Luckily, all my French friends speaking in front of me taught me how to catch their language. 

Those girls and I ended up hanging out in this Castle in Naples and then they took me to their hostel after I mentioned I was staying alone.  This changed my life on so many levels.  We walked into what was rated the best hostel in Naples…it wasn’t dark or dreary and scary, but lit up with young, friendly international people sitting on bean bag chairs watching movies and drinking beer!  After that day I brought my stuff with me and spent the rest of my time until Paris in hostels making once in a life time stories with once in a lifetime friends. 



Over the next 6 weeks I wandered aimlessly through 12 cities in 5 countries on my solo trip.  I met people who had similar stories or even better ones and listened in awe of how international people live.  The funny thing is everywhere I went, everyone asked if I was from New York or California, a state I’d never been to, based on my personality. I went to Naples, Rome, Florence, Sienna, Venice, Salzburg, Munich, Genoa (Cinque Terre national park where I almost died cliff diving), Nice, Barcelona (my favorite city), Pamplona ( Running of the Bulls festival), and Paris, where my awesome friend’s family let me stay in a spare room for a week and were amazing at educating me on France.  The countries were Italy, Austria, Germany, France and Spain, with a layover in London twice. 

The most important lesson I learned is how friendly travelers can be to each other, because they know what it’s like to feel absolutely alone and stranded.  While I was in a hostel in Florence, Italy, I was introduced to www.Couchsurfing.org by an Aussie chick.  I joined CS then and there after hearing about it.  The problem is you don’t have much Wi-Fi in Europe so I never used it in Europe.  When I got home in mid-July to Ohio I was already planning escape, but I needed a job to save up money, and I didn’t know where to move?  Basically, I was just throwing a random dart at a dart board at this point. 

I got a job doing aerospace engineering and I forgot about Couchsurfing until August or September, when I got my first request from a young guy from Los Angeles, CA.  The reason I hosted this dude was doing a cross country trip by himself…10 years younger than me, and outdoing me!  I took this as a personal challenge.  He taught me how nice all the people were, but at the end of the day, everyone in the Midwest is the same.  I learned how worldly and traveled the people in California and other coastal cities are.  Based on staying friends with John and another friend who escaped Cincinnati to San Fran, I planned a trip to CA to Couchsurf for my first time. 

During Christmas,  I took my 2 weeks of vacation time and decided to check out CA.  I spent 12 days Couchsurfing in San Fran, Los Angeles to see my first Couchsurfer but stayed with another, San Diego a house away from the beach, and Tijuana, Mexico for my birthday, New Year’s Eve.  The best part of staying on someone’s couch is that you get to know the locals, the hangouts, not just the touristy areas your corporate hotel has been PAID to tell you to visit.  You learn a lot about what’s wrong with corporate America when you travel abroad to hostels and the garbage we get sold here.  I decided that while I loved SF, it rained every day I was there but one, LA is too much fakeness and dirty water on the beaches, and I never even imagined going to San Diego, but a friend I met in a hostel in Europe lived here so I checked it out. 

I stayed on the beach, in December when my hometown is -30 degrees…a 100 degree temperature difference!  It was paradise!!!




I went home, dropped out of grad school, got overtime at my work, worked 7 days a week for months and saved up.  I sold all my worldly belongings except what fit in my car and what planned on being a single city to check out on my way to CA, turned into me seeing 14 places and hitting my 37th state.  I went from my hometown in Wisconsin, where there was 4 inches of ice in April, all the way down to Key West most southern point, and from the Atlantic Ocean on the East coast to the Pacific here in CA.  It was an eye opening experience to be let into others homes and have dinner or be shown around their favorite spots.  I did have to sleep in my car 5 nights, but it was pretty nice weather in May.  My favorite spots are driving across the Florida Keys to Key West and New Orleans for its amazing energy and culture you don’t see anywhere else!  J

My 6000 mile couchsurfing trip on my way San Diego.


Never will I tell you this move to San Diego has been an easy transition, since I still don’t have an mechanical engineering job, but after many struggles this last year and having to figure out where I want my career to be, I’m still happier than I’ve ever been!  Everybody here is happier than they’ve ever been back home!  I am in San Diego now and have hosted many people on Couchsurfing from around the world.  Living 3 blocks from the beach has it’s perks, since I take bikes rides on the boardwalk. I live 2 blocks from the most beautiful beach in the country.  I want to go live in Europe in the next few years after my time in SD.  I’ve got 2 years and my new graduate program is up and I’ll take it from there.  I’m no longer afraid to do things alone, because of that “beer that changed my life.”  I recommend you go out and try something you are afraid of today.  Don’t wait because you will never do it!  J


Installing solar panels in San Diego with Grid Alternatives

A couchsurfer from Taiwan I hosted 2 nights.  Home ;)

365 days of great weather.




Friday, March 14, 2014

Buy that ticket and try something you are afraid of...or how I found out about Couchsuring.

Hi,

I am a typical Midwestern 32 year old guy who basically packed up my entire life last year living in Cincinnati, Ohio and escaped to join the rebellion to San Diego, CA but I couchsurfed an entire month on the way, 6 total now. I host and have been hosted many times, as well as AIRBNB.   I'm from Milwaukee, WI and lived in Madison where I went to school for 7 years, my favorite city still.  I ended up in Ohio for 5 years and worked a typical boring "Office Space" engineering job for many years.  After becoming jaded with the corporate system over the years, I ended up leaving a 7 month position, very unhappy and unhappy with with life overall in the Midwest.  I found that my open mindedness  and health conscious decisions made it hard to make friends in Ohio, except international people because they have just as hard or harder time befriending Midwesterners.  They were very welcoming because they had no friends and had more open minded views. I grew up an overweight kid in poverty in Wisconsin and I had lost 70 pounds back in Madison and now had just quit the highest paying job of my life.  I never told anyone and a week later after being jaded looking at new jobs that all sounded equally "Office Space", I was invited out for a "beer that changed my life".  My international friends and I joke about it now.  I didn't want to go out on that Friday night, but I had 4 friends out that said just come out for one.  I joined them at a bar that had the biggest craft selection in town and as I enter I have an Italian couple on my right side, and to my left a German friend and his Indian girlfriend.  I had hung out with these guys a lot, but this time was different.  They asked what I was doing and I said looking for jobs.  They were shocked and asked "why?"  I told them the story, which was that I had been trying to escape being an engineer that just sits behind a computer all day and makes CAD models and NEVER in 7 years got to talk to anyone...boring!  I had started part time grad school a year before trying to become a project manager or sales person, someone that TALKS to people on a daily basis.  Luckily, or unluckily, I got hired as a project manager at a company in the plastics industry designing huge machines, making more money than I could ever imagine!  I thought it was my  dream...turns out not.  It was in an industry that was growing fast and I had never done that type of work and they offered to train me for 6 months in the interview.   I was hired into a group of 8 people, with 1 mechanical and 1 electrical engineer who had 20 years of experience at the company, and I was supposed to get trained by the ME.  The problem was, the ME I met in my interview...he quit the Friday before I started on Monday...and the electrical engineer followed.  This was due to managerial changes that happened before I even started.  Nobody told me that 25% of the staff had just quit...so the first day, the first thing my boss says to me is "sorry"..."sorry there is no one to train you in a field you haven't worked in"...and from that day on, my every day was like a terrible scavenger hunt to do work, finding files I have no idea what they are named.  Imagine looking for a "widget" and someone called it a "whatzit" and you have to find a needle in a haystack every day.  After several months I had become so jaded that the highest paying job of my life was this!  

I had to explain this to my international friends over a beer and they were shocked as well because I never complained about it.  Now, these friends of mine I was having beer with were doing cancer research at a the local children's hospital and they think very differently than us Midwestern folk.  The first thing they asked is "why the hell I was still in Cincinnati!?"  I am a typical Midwestern guy, and I grew up without money, and so I have never gone abroad.  Typically the only time we go abroad is study abroad or on our honeymoons, and I was single,  at 30 years old in Ohio.  Most people get married and start making babies and move to the suburban life around 22 to 25 years old.  I was a misfit in Ohio and Wisconsin and anywhere I went except Chicago, but that's another story.  Since people travel to other countries more in Europe, they asked why I didn't take a vacation somewhere amazing.  And I said what I'd said my entire life, I can't afford it and I don't have anyone to go with.  We have this tendency to want to pair up and never do anything alone, especially introverts like me.  So, my friend Enrico came back saying broke it down like this, "you don't have a job, you have tons of money saved as an engineer at this last job, you don't have a mortgage, school is out for the summer, you don't have a long term girlfriend, or even a cat? What the hell are you still doing here?! You could die of cancer tomorrow.  Go live man!!!”   

I have to admit here that I did have a passport I never used from a previous job, and after going home to my area which had bars and clubs, had several more depressed drinks.  That night I ended up with a non-refundable 6 week ticket in and out to Napoli, Italia (Naples, Italy) for 3 days later.  Let me repeat, 3 days later and I spent 2000$ since it was double the cost.  When I woke up that Saturday morning, after letting the fear sink in, and there was a LOT of fear,  I sent my friend Enrico a text, "I did a bad thing man!"  "What"  "I bought a ticket to Italy...in 3 days for 42 nights!" He came back with "you, my friend, are the craziest American I know!!! Come over Sunday, we gotta make plans."  Let me point out here, I'd never been abroad, did have a passport, and since I grew up poor I never in my life had hopes of going to another country.  You just don't do that sort of thing alone.  I did not even have a back pack...I got a solid backpackers bag now.  I also did not have anything but a 42 night ticket in and out of Naples.  No hotel, no car, and horror movies have given me a major fear of hostels.  I did not know how public transportation worked or how big Italy was.  I was completely ignorant of the rest of the world.  

Enrico had me buy a travel guide, the "Lonely Planet" travel guide for Italy; he said that was going to be my "Bible".  And it was!  I have a guide for Italy, Western Europe and now the US.  I went to his house and he and his awesome girlfriend Valeria went over what I was to do in their hometown giving me 1 week of plans.  He even set me up with 2 nights in a bed and breakfast and let me use his Italian cell phone on my 6 weeks abroad.  I already had contacts of both of their friends on Facebook and in the phone.  I cannot tell you how much these 2 have changed my life!  Those stories in Naples I could write a book on.  I could also write a book just on the things I screwed up as a newbie traveler.  The only thing I was certain of was that I had a ticket Italy and 2 friends in Paris I met in Cincinnati, Ohio.  42 days in Europe with no plans, and basically unlimited fundage on my credit cards, yup every day I made once in a life time memories.  

 After my awesome friend Deanna dropped me off at the airport at the butt crack of dawn, I boarded the plane alone.  3 flights later I had been dropped off in the most beautiful weather I had ever seen in Naples, and the second I stepped off the plane I knew something in my mind snapped or cracked or something.  I was broken…to my old life.  I was doing something no one could ever understand.  My friend got me a BnB in the historic center of Naples, very non-touristy area.  The energy was the first thing I noticed and the fresh air.  The crazy amounts of people speaking in tongues I could not understand.  I did the stuff on my list and had read a great deal of my “Lonely Planet” Italy guide that taught me maps, history of the city, speaking some words, hotels, hostels, and ways to get around the city.  It was an amazing help!  The first 2 nights I stayed in an empty BnB and had no idea about hostels yet, until I randomly ran into 2 French Canadians girls getting yelled at by a guard trying to buy ticket in French but he spoke Italian.  Luckily, all my French friends speaking in front of me taught me how to catch their language.  Those girls and I ended up hanging out in this Castle in Naples and then they took me to their hostel after I mentioned I was staying alone.  This changed my life on so many levels.  We walked into what was rated the best hostel in Naples…it wasn’t dark or dreary and scary, but lit up with young, friendly international people sitting on bean bag chairs watching movies and drinking beer!  After that day I brought my stuff with me and spent the rest of my time until Paris in hostels making once in a life time stories. 

I ended up in 12 cities in 5 countries on my solo trip.  I met people who had similar stories or even better ones and listened in awe of how international people live.  The funny thing is everywhere I went, everyone asked if I was from New York or California, a state I’d never been to, based on my personality. I went to Naples, Rome, Florence, Sienna, Venice, Salzburg, Munich, Genoa (Cinque Terre national park where I almost died cliff diving), Nice, Barcelona (my favorite city), Pamplona ( Running of the Bulls festival), and Paris, where my awesome friend’s family let me stay in a spare room for a week and were amazing at educating me on France.  The countries were Italy, Austria, Germany, France and Spain, with a layover in London twice. 

The most important lesson I learned is how different and friendly travelers can be to each other.  While I was in a hostel in Florence, Italy, I was introduced to Couchsurfing by an Aussie girl.  I joined then and there after hearing about it.  The problem is you don’t have much Wi-Fi in Europe so I never used it in Europe.  When I got home in mid-July to Cincinnati, Ohio I was already planning on leaving the city, but I needed a job to save up money, and I didn’t know where to move?  I got a job doing aerospace engineering and I forgot about Couchsurfing until August or September, when I got my first request from a young guy from Los Angeles, CA.  The reason I hosted this dude was doing a cross country trip by himself…10 years younger than me, and outdoing me.  He taught me how nice all the people were, but at the end of the day, everyone in the Midwest is the same.  I learned how worldly and traveled the people in California were.  Based on staying friends with John and another friend who escaped Cincinnati to San Fran, I planned a trip to CA to Couchsurf for my first time. 

I took my 2 weeks of vacation time during Christmas and decided to check out CA.  I spent 12 days Couchsurfing in San Fran, Los Angeles to see my first Couchsurfer but stayed with another, San Diego a house away from the beach, and Tijuana, Mexico for my birthday, New Year’s Eve.  The best part of staying on someone’s couch is that you get to know the locals, the hangouts, not just the touristy areas your corporate hotel has been paid to tell you.  I decided that while I loved SF, it rained every day I was there but one, LA is too much fakeness and too dirty water on the beaches, and I never even imagined going to San Diego, but a friend I met in a hostel in Europe lived here so I checked it out.  I stayed on the beach, in December when my hometown is -30 degrees!  It was paradise! 

I went home, dropped out of grad school, got overtime at my work, worked 7 days a week for months and saved up.  I sold all my worldly belongs except what fit in my car and what planned on being a single city to check out on my way to CA, turned into me seeing 14 places and hitting my 37th state.  I went from my hometown in Wisconsin all the way down to Key West most southern point, and from the Atlantic Ocean on the East coast to the Pacific here in CA.  It was an eye opening experience to be let into others homes and have dinner or be shown around their favorite spots.  I did have to sleep in my car 5 nights, but it was pretty nice weather in May.  My favorite spots are driving across the Florida Keys to Key West and New Orleans for its amazing energy and culture you don’t see anywhere else. 

I am in San Diego now and have hosted many people on Couchsurfing and Airbnb now.  I live 2 blocks from the most beautiful beach in the country.  I want to go live in Europe in the next few years after my time in SD.  I’ve got 2 years and my new graduate program is up and I’ll take it from there.  I’m no longer afraid to do things alone, because of that “beer that changed my life.”  I recommend you go out and try something you are afraid of today.  Don’t wait because you will never do it! 







Friday, February 7, 2014

Fight Club - In Tyler We Trust

"Tyler Durden: All the ways you wish you could be, that's me. I look like you wanna look, I fuck like you wanna fuck, I am smart, capable, and most importantly, I am free in all the ways that you are not."

http://fightclub.wikia.com/wiki/Its_only_after_we've_lost_everything..

I was asked why I quote Fight Club so much, and I'll lay it out here.  First, Fight Club has zero to do with fighting and everything to do with spiritual and physical growth and self development for men raised by women with absentee fathers (yes I'm an atheist who uses "spiritual growth" because fuck you, that's why! )  A "FIGHT" is a metaphore for doing something that scares the shit out of you, and Tyler Durden is the part of you that you are most jealous of and fear (Tyler Durden: All the ways you wish you could be, that's me. I look like you wanna look, I fuck like you wanna fuck, I am smart, capable, and most importantly, I am free in all the ways that you are not.  )  You could replace fight with cage fighting, running a marathon, learning to fucking sing...ANYTHING that you FEAR and put off doing because it's challenging.  We have also been raised to live a lifestyle that some of us don't want, get done with college, get a job you hate, buy shit you don't need and can't afford to build a nest, buy a house, get married to a girl you have no idea how to relate to (MARLA SINGER) because you've never once in your life talked about your FEELINGS because WE ARE MEN and we don't do that shit!  This is the spiritual growth part, we are men and we have feelings we need to share but we are not allowed to because society tells us not to or we are (Oh my god!) women or worse, NOT MEN.

IKEA is the metaphor for buying and building a nest we don't need to get a girl we don't know how to relate to.  Instead of going out and learning to talk to girls and befriending a female friend, (because we FEAR women more than we fear buying a new car)  we buy shit instead of going and traveling by ourselves to foreign countries (which changed my life and is why I finally escaped the MIDWEST).  We buy shit in hopes of a girl liking us for that shit because we are SPIRITUALLY EMPTY and feel we have NOTHING TO OFFER A WOMAN but our material possessions.  I was lucky enough to find the best support group I could ever possibly imagine here in San Diego that has changed my life.  Go out this weekend and SAY HI TO A GIRL!  You might actually find that you like her and she is cool with having sex with you o you might meet a badass new female friend to explain the scary scary females to you.  ;)

Fight Club is a lifestyle choice of permanent self development challenging yourself well beyond  both your physical (getting in shape) and spiritual (feelings) self.  You are always trying to become that man you fear (TYLER DURDEN).

Saturday, August 31, 2013

What else do we even have to talk about?

99% of Americans and foreign tourists only know 5% of what makes up the United States.  



It's been months since I've posted on here and I just wanted to do a quick post to sum up my ideas over the past few months.  I recently saw my Italian friend Enrico who helped talk me into my Europe trip and I owe him so much for opening my eyes to what my life was lacking.  I showed him around Pacific Beach in San Diego.  We talked about this 5% topic.  The real America took me 6000 miles to see, and I don't need to ever go back.  I couchsurfed through www.couchsurfing.org  .  My recent trip took me to Chicago, Madison, Milwaukee, Cincinnati, Atlanta, Charleston, Hilton Head Island, Savannah, St. Augustine, Miami, The Everglades, Key West, St. Petersburg, New Orleans (where I got my second tattoo from my second favorite book), Houston, Austin, Roswell, Flagstaff, The grand canyon, St. George UT, and finally San Diego.  

New Orleans free Jazz Fest.  My first crawfish boil.


The 5% topic is this:  Since most people out there only go to the major cities when they come, New York, LA, Miami, New Orleans, Chicago, SF, Houston, and San Diego, they miss out on the REAL U.S..  The sometimes backwards, NASCAR loving, redneck, middle of nowhere people who hate foreigners with an ignorant passion.  They are sometimes racist, sexist, homophobic, ultra religious, and not accepting of anyone who isn't a white American.  I will say I loved my trip and it changed my life and I met some amazing people out there to whom I owe a lot, but I would not say these places accurately represent the U.S.  I saw what was in the cracks between here and there.  I've driven through most of those deserts across the country and farmlands and saw no living things.  There weren't any animals, just corporate ads for Burger King in the middle of nowhere.  Every city has it's corporate master.  And unless you live out in the Midwest for a while, you'll never experience this.  I'll also add that people in California are pretty fucked up and weird, but I like it.  They do have the problem though that they've never left Cali, but instead gone from SF to LA to SD and think they're knowledgeable about what liberal and conservative or even what being religious really means.  Nobody goes to church here and Scientology runs rampant in LA.    

Key West, FL


Every Yin has to have it's Yang.  You can't have the good without the bad for comparison.  I've learned what I want and need in my life now.  I'm being exposed to ideas I could find nowhere in the Midwest and I'm growing to be a better me everyday out here in SD.  And I know this perfect place is fake, but you know what they say, ignorance is fucking bliss.  ;)  I've earned this shit!

Near bottom of Grand Canyon.


Thursday, April 25, 2013

This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time.


“Have your adventures, make your mistakes, and choose your friends poorly -- all these make for great stories.” 
 
Chuck Palahniuk

Miami where I'll be staying for a week I hope!


It’s been months since I’ve written anything and I’ve been asked to write about my trip, so here goes! 
This month, I'll be trying to hit Chicago, Madison, Milwaukee, Atlanta, Charleston, Savannah, Hilton Head island, Miami, Key West, St Petersburg/Tampa, New Orleans, Houston, Austin, Roswell, Grand Canyon, St George, Los Angeles, and finally San Diego...if I make it out of Miami or New Orleans alive!  Hahaha!  

  It wasn’t easy for me to accept that I’ve been living in Cincinnati for years past what was healthy for me.  It seems at times I was living a lie, and I didn’t know how to escape.  I know that I don’t belong there, and I know that I’ll never find someone to date long term there.  While I have meet many, many awesome people that have helped shape my life, I just don’t belong.  According the city, I am a strange mother fucker!  I’m one of the few single 30+ year old child free people.  Then put on top of that that I’m a liberal atheist too, and I’m all sorts of fucked!   I grew up in Wisconsin and went to one of the most diverse and progressive public universities in the country, UW-Madison.  Men’s health magazine had it as the top healthiest place for young males.   I went back there last week and it reminded me how much I miss those people.  I might sound like a dick, but I can’t date someone that’s not keeping themselves in shape by either diet or exercise and it seems like Cincinnati is the opposite of that.  At most, I lost 70 fucking pounds, and I’ve seen that doing that is contagious.  Other friends got strength from seeing I could do it, so they lost 50, 100, or even 125 pounds, which I am very proud of them for. 

“It’s only after we’ve lost everything that we’re free to do anything”

My possible destinations from northern most WI, to FL, and East GA to West CA!


After my Europe trip and the ease with which I made friends everywhere I went and learned that I could be happy elsewhere on a coast where most people are transplants.  My favorite Mark Twain quote is "When the end of the world comes, I want to be in Cincinnati because it's always twenty years behind the times."  And my favorite quote from a person who’s never left this place is “Yes, we’re in a rut, but we like it!”…that is what I need to get away from.  Negativity or simply stagnation in your life, just not doing anything to move forward, is contagious.  For me, since I grew up in the not so religious northern US and especially since I’ve been exposed to big cities like Chicago, I know that there is better out there for me.  I just didn’t know that I could make friends and find a job elsewhere, so I stayed here in Cincy…at the peak of my life…and in a rut.  Hell, I lived in the best, most expensive area in Mt Adams, but at the end of the day it’s not enough.  When I look into downtown from up the hill, at 5 pm the downtown completely fucking empties.  Not a soul to be found and all restaurants close.  This place is a suburban paradise, but I’m a urban center/ public transportation person.  After Europe and not driving for 6 weeks, I fucking hate having to drive so much!  Also, since everyone is in a suburb, they never leave them to explore the world because everything is so far away.  Very few people even know that Over the Rhine fucking doesn’t have race riots anymore!  Everyone has had their same friends since high school or elementary school and has bought a house next to their parents’ house and next to their grandparents house too.  I’ll be honest with you, in 5.5 years I have lived in 8 places around town to see what area I liked…and I still don’t like any so much that I’d buy a home.  I’ve been finding one reason or another to stay here, like a relationship and then grad school or thinking that since it was so hard to live in Cincinnati, the rest of the world must be difficult too, because I hadn’t been exposed to another country.  This city is one of a kind, it’s great in some ways, but most people don’t escape.  There are mostly older people here as well, which makes it hard to find single, young ladies.  And so the attractive ladies have so many guys hit on them, they think their shit smells like roses, because that’s what they’re told even if they only half hot.  It sucks!   It also makes Cincincinnati the most sexually repressed cities I’ve ever been to in the Northern US.  I’ve heard a lot of horror stories during my 100 dates in 2.5 years. 

 One of the most important things that happened in Europe was finding out about was couchsurfing.org .  Couchsurfing is a way to social network like on facebook, but while having a profile that talks about you as a person like a dating website.  You put your couch up to anyone coming into your city, and at the same time you can search any city you want and find someone to host you.  It has the advantage over a hotel of you actually getting to meet a local from the area and learn about their culture and lifestyle.  This site has given me so much independence to travel anywhere around the world.  I don’t know about you, but I love not having to pay for shit!  I used it to find cool people in Cincinnati to hang out with as well who are curious about the world.  When I went to California, I didn’t pay a dime in San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, or Tijuana.  In turn I’ve hosted a guy from LA and one from Beijing. 

My trip to California wasn’t a random trip.  I knew what I was looking for, a city that lands in the best  cities for young people to travel to list, it has a beach, lots of sun, intelligent and open minded young people, jobs, affordable housing, people who stay active year round.  I want to see non-religious, sexually free young people who are in shape and have tattoos and facial piercings.  I want to feel the sand beneath my feet like I did in Europe.  Moving to Europe is on my to do list, but I need to learn a second language first and California gives me that being on the border of Mexico.   When I went to San Francisco I wasn’t expecting to love it as much as I did.  It’s a town full of transplants, has great public transportation, great fresh foods, and is on the water.  The down side is it rained almost every day and the beach was freezing cold.  After that I hit LA’s Long Beach area in the winter and the weather was nice but LA is LA after all and it’s not healthy to live there.  My third city was SD and for me, after my Goldilocks tasting the three bowls of porridge,   my third city was just hot enough and friendly and clean and perfect!   SD is 68 degrees and sunny on my birthday, New Year’s Eve in winter and it never hits 100, so it’s fucking perfect.  It’s in the top 2 or 3 cities for young people to live.  Also, did I mention it doesn’t have hurricanes like the East coast?  Yup, just perfect sunny days! 

So what the hell am I doing then you ask?  I have no fucking idea is the honest truth.  Over the past 2 months I’ve been working a job I HATE almost 7 days a week to make overtime moving money.  This week, I have quit the highest paying job I’ll get in Cincy and 2 months ago left my amazing apartment in the best area of Cincy, Mt Adams.  In January, I dropped out of grad school halfway through, and have no replacement school yet.  I am selling all of my shit and packing up my car with no job and no place to live.  I am truly homeless as of next week and it’s scary as shit, and exciting as hell all at the same time!  I know that after going to Europe for 6 weeks, I didn’t miss my stuff, my possessions.  I enjoyed making new connections, I NEED that in my life.  Also, I’ve found out that I can get a job anywhere in the world, which means I would need at least 1 second language.  I have taught myself over the past few years how to make connections anywhere I go and have them remember me.  I can afford any city in the US, so why the fuck not be a gypsy for a while and learn about the world and about myself and what I’m capable completely alone.   I’m setting up couchsurfers to stay with and OK Cupid “dates” along the way to find out where I belong.  After this trip, I’ll have connections in most major cities in the US. 

Right now I have nowhere to call my home, but an infinite amount of places to lay my head without fear of what comes tomorrow.  I don’t know what the best job I’m capable of getting, or the best city I’m capable of living in, or the coolest chick I’m able to meet, but I’m finally ready to spread my wings!  ;)