Backstage with Snoop and MIA photo 314658 740 0 right MIA half way through her set on Saturday night One of her dancers looked to be about 12 years old photo A lovely friend of mine was able to get me a pair of backstage passes playfully known as Homie passes to this year s Fun Fun Fun Fest Having never actually gone before I thought this would be the year to check it out My good friend from S o Paulo Brazil also happened to be in town and so naturally he and I took advantage of the access I m undoubtedly the furthest one can be from caring about celebrities and all of that but it s still kind of amusing to see the artists hanging out before major performances Day one was especially amusing I really only went backstage because there were private bathrooms available but was directed over to the trailers with Snoop Dog and company or Snoop Lion whatever four legged creature he may be these days If I d come prepared with the proper organic ingredients I d have walked right over to him just to say it happened But alas I am not that cool We left the show early enough to walk to the State Theater and saw Kyle Dunnigan Doug Benson and Sarah Silverman I think Doug was actually my favorite of the three Day two was pretty cool only because we got there early enough to see a number of bands backstage from the Orange Stage We also accidentally ran into Craig Robinson from the office but didn t actually get to see him at the Mohawk later that night it was absurdly to capacity with a line wrapping the block namely due to Tenacious D We stuck around for most of MIA s show having bribed the backstage attendee with beer thus ensuring we kept a great viewing spot Outside of playing with the band I don t think we could have gotten any better seats

The Space Shuttle Between May of 2009 and May of 2011 I visited Orlando and ultimately Cape Canaveral 13 separate times in hopes of seeing the Space Shuttle lift off With NASA s 30 year Space Shuttle program finally coming to an end this was the last chance I would have to see the spectacle The only thing I ve ever really wanted to do was to become an astronaut and visit space this was as close as I might get I was originally scheduled to see the 3rd to final shuttle launch My friend Dave G and I drove across the country for the opportunity After the launch was scrubbed several times we had to drive back home Dave wasn t interested in trying again but I decided I was going to see the launch regardless of the effort involved I missed the 3rd to last launch due to obligations and the situation grew more dire there were only two launches left After two years of routine trips between Austin and Orlando and after many many thousands of dollars spent and some 60 hours in the air I finally saw Space Shuttle Endeavour lift off on May 16th 2011 at 8 56am EST as part of a href http en wikipedia org wiki STS 134 STS 134 a The story of how it happened is even more amazing iframe width 521 height 293 src https www youtube com embed 2dfLr9O02l0 frameborder 0 allowfullscreen iframe My dear friend Tim had a connection with the NASA visitors team at Cape Canaveral As a hotel executive with the Gaylord Palms he ensured that families and friends of astronauts and other important people connected to NASA had the opportunity to see launches from the 3 mile VIP center photo 22841 564 0 right My visitors badge photo photo 25593 640 0 right The incredible F5 engines on the Saturn V rocket photo Experiencing a scrubbed launch was both frustrating and exhausting The launch process basically consisted of me driving 90 minutes from Orlando towards the outskirts of Cape Canaveral I d then have to board a private NASA bus that would take me from the bus terminal to the visitor s area 3 miles from the launch site I would often sit with families of the astronauts and extremely gifted scientists from around the world That part was wonderful The weather was a different story It was consistently hot and very humid I would be on site for six to eight hours at a time I passed the time by strolling around the NASA museum gazing at the old Saturn rocket series Those spacecraft are absolutely amazing marvels of engineering The launches would usually be scrubbed after about 8 hours of waiting when the clock was down to the last hour It was gut wrenching every time and I d have to spend another 2 3 hours fighting traffic to get back to Orlando I had just flown back to Austin after yet another scrubbed launch and was extremely disappointed This was the 12th launch that I had seen scrubbed I had become pretty well known to many of the officials at Cape Canaveral as Tim s friend from Austin Despite being a bad omen at that point they were very welcoming I hadn t been in Austin but a day when Tim called me up and told me that the launch had just been rescheduled and that he had a seat for me he always got the relaunch dates and times before they were made public I really did not want to make the trip because I was so exhausted of the process but he had a good feeling about it and so I did The catch was that he would be in Jacksonville going on a date with a girl named Courtney she was a friend of a friend I wound up getting to meet her that weekend and attended their wedding the following year I bought a last minute ticket to Jacksonville Tim told me he would take care of everything else He did When I arrived in Jacksonville I had a text message from Tim instructing me to visit the valet in front of the airport I was to show them my ID I did They presented me the keys to a car I got in the car and inside was a post it note on the GPS telling me to follow the directions to the pre programmed destination There was a note instructing me to use a false name when I got to the gate and that I was there to see the Daltons There was also a ticket to the Jacksonville PGA tour Without talking to Tim I drove about an hour to the GPS destination as instructed When I got to the private community gate I told the guard I was Brian Dalton as instructed He welcomed me and directed me to their home When I finally arrived at their home complete strangers to me mind you there was a guy waiting for me on a golf cart with a beer He asked me if I was Kevin and upon confirmation told me to get in and to bring my ticket The beer was for me He drove me on the golf cart to the front of the PGA security gate and walked me in with my ticket He walked me over to Tim hanging out with the girl he had just met and I got to watch all of the famous golfers do their thing I m not much for golfing but it was an enjoyable time getting drunk photo 25619 640 0 right The official clock with about 1hr 20m to go photo We left around 8pm with a bunch of people including Courtney had an incredibly drunken sushi dinner and proceeded to drive to Tim s house in Kissimmee Florida By the time we got there it was around midnight We went to bed woke up at 4 15 in the morning and drove our way to Cape Canaveral with the top down in his car jamming out to Lonely Island We were on our way to see the final NASA shuttle launch of all time Two hours later I saw one of the most spectacular sites of my life It s impossible to describe what a shuttle launch is like in person There is no film I have ever seen that truly captures the power of it I was delighted to check off another bucket list item Tim is a really great friend Even sweeter is that NASA wound up adding one last flight Courtney was there for that one

Starting Price Sheet In an effort to actually help other people plan their own travels around the world I d really like to do my best to keep up with the prices of various components This is the first effort at that World travel isn t nearly as expensive as people think it is at least it doesn t have to be Some of that is based on experience of knowing what needs to be booked in advance and what can be booked on the fly The rest of it generally comes down to flexibility If you only have a specific window for vacation or the like it falls on the high season and you re dead set on that specific location then there s a good chance it s going to be pricier On the other hand if you can mitigate any of those factors then it can be much more affordable strong Travel Expenses strong One way train seat between Kansas City and Chicago Amtrak 61 20 Round trip flight between Chicago O Hare and Bangkok Suvarnabhumi EVA Airlines 679 26 One way flight from Chicago Midway to Kansas City Southwest Airlines 78 98 One way flight from Austin to Barcelona Condor Airlines 539 87 em Total travel expenses 1 359 31 em strong Medical Expenses strong Base cost of travel clinic 55 00 Malarone malaria prevention medication 248 00 Azithromycin traveler s diarrhea medication 4 50 Doxycycline leptospirosis prevention 6 00 em Total medical expenses 313 50 em strong Equipment Expenses strong Lonely Planet SE Asia 20 18 New baseball cap 35 00 Underwater case for iPhone 6 99 International travel plug adapter 12 99 Mosquito coils 14 95 Sport Chaco sandals 104 00 Microfiber quick dry towel 9 88 Earth pak dry bag 18 99 em Total equipment expenses 222 98 em I ll create additional posts for price matches as I make my way

Final Round of Shots In preparation for my adventures around the world I unfortunately had to go back to the travel clinic to get my final round of shots In addition to the typhoid vaccine that I have already been taking orally I had to double up on the hepatitis a and hepatitis b vaccination Unlike the first time this one really hurt In order for them to use the two in one formula it s required that they inject an entire 1ml into the muscle tissue Additionally with my arms already being sore from the previous round of shots well it just hurt photo 629524 740 0 center A little photo montage of the nurse giving me the final injections You can see I m not especially happy with the icepack on my right arm photo br style clear both I whined a bit when the nurse was doing it and so she offered me an ice pack If you find yourself getting these types of vaccinations and one is not offered to you it does really help a lot and I would highly recommend it To be clear the needle didn t bother me in the slightest the liquid formula seeping deep into my muscle tissue did hurt a lot

Kayaking the Missouri River As part of my adventure through Kansas City Dave had organized a super badass trip to kayak down the Missouri River with me and our mutual friend Dawn He had actually done a shorter version of the trip before on a canoe with his brother and niece but this particular trip was a three and a half hour tour in kayaks While I wouldn t have thought it would be super difficult I know that my arms and shoulders were sore for two days following and it definitely puts a toll on your back too so it was a lot harder than I d have thought photo 629662 631623 0 center From left to right Dawn Dave me photo br style clear both The Missouri River is enormous for one at certain places it has to be a few hundred yards wide The trip started with the river moving pretty slow but it would certainly pick up at various places There are never really rapids in it per se but there are parts where it turns pretty hard and creates powerful eddies on the surface One of those would eventually get me While the river itself is enough to contend with there is also boat traffic as well as barge traffic There are old graineries strip mines and power plants along the way so it s very much setup to accommodate enormous commercial and industrial traffic When we were about two hours into the float I decided to tackle one of the rapids Getting through the water itself was fine but as I merged back towards the steady flow of the current I wound up getting swept into a giant eddy I didn t have any problem with it spinning me backwards and then twirling me around a little bit but the force of it turned me so quickly that it threw off the balance of the kayak and eventually turned me over into the water Both Dave and Dawn were too far downstream to immediately do anything about it Of course I was also the only of us not to be wearing his life jacket it was extremely uncomfortable wearing it while also squeezed into the tiny compartment of the kayak photo 629534 631623 0 center Shortly after having tipped over twice in the kayak and now soaking wet which felt pretty wonderful in the hot Missouri sun photo br style clear both Given that I had our wallets keys and other valuables in my dry bag my first priority was to make sure that didn t sink It didn t but I ve never owned a dry bag before and so I wasn t sure if it would or not Once I had that in my hand I donned my life jacket from within the water as I was being pulled downstream and started working to flip my kayak back over I quickly succeeded and started to climb back into it Unaware of just how much water it had taken on when it flipped it immediately flipped over again given how unstable it was It wasn t until that moment that I realized I had a real problem I was stuck about 100 yards from the shore in a river swirling with eddies and unable to gain any control of my kayak I finally managed to flip it over again place all of my belongings inside of it and very carefully balance myself on top of it while I slowly paddled orthogonal to the current towards the muddy shoreline It wasn t over once I got there The shoreline was an almost immediate drop off and so it was not particularly easy to pull the boat onto the shore though I was lucky this particular part of the river even had a shoreline at all Once I eventually got it up there I had to flip it upside down and then lift it from side to side in order to evacuate all of the water from it When I finally accomplished that I fixed myself snugly inside of it from the shore and then started throwing my body weight forward to slowly push it back into the water noting again that even a few feet from the shore was way over my head since it s a dredged river Thankfully Dawn had come back to ensure that I was okay while Dave was just too far downstream to fight the current It was actually a lot more comfortable in the boat once I was soaking wet and when I eventually caught back up and re formed our little kayak trio we had a good laugh At me not with me

Singapore Master of the Hot Crazy Matrix Singapore is quite possibly the single nicest city that I have ever seen in my life It s so well organized It is unbelievably clean The transit is amazing It s busy and vibrant but not so crowded that you hate walking down the street Even the weather while definitely hot and humid is not nearly as bad as the rest of Southeast Asia it has the convenience of a constant ocean breeze Everything seems to be perfectly ordered People seem to be very happy and friendly It s phenomenally successful in the world market It s also a fascinating to consider that the city is essentially the entire country You can cross the entire city country in about an hour Visible to the north is Malaysia and visible to the south is Indonesia It is truly an amazing city period photo 642092 650776 0 center The famed Singapore Helix bridge photo br style clear both photo 641830 650776 0 center The flags of Singapore photo br style clear both My Uber driver picked me up at the airport and it took us about an hour to get to my hotel due to Friday night traffic Naturally we sparked up a conversation and I let him lead it So after writing all of those lovely things how come the bulk of his thoughts regarding Singapore were him interjecting time and again Fuck Singapore Fuck this place Fuck this fucking country I didn t prompt him for any of that or even get into anything regarding the government I would never do that being unfamiliar with a country s customs Singapore is a land of rules and they are harsh rules While the Japanese seem to have managed immaculately clean and orderly cities while still exercising a fair bit of personal freedom Singapore took a very different route There is no carrot in sight and a whole lot of sticks behind you In fact many people probably remember the famous case of an American who vandalized a car literally getting the stick If you don t know that story it happened in 1994 when I was a freshman in high school An American by the name of Michael Fay was found guilty of vandalizing vehicles in Singapore Allegedly he was actually stealing street signs but the vandalism charge was a better one to be found guilty of who knows but he pleaded guilty to the vandalism charges and was sentenced to six strokes of the cane He was forced to bend over a bar had his hands and feet restrained with irons and was publicly beaten six times over his back with a rattan cane This is one of the methods of punishment administered in both Malaysia and Singapore I think the most interesting part of this story making its way to America is that when most westerners hear or remember the story they immediately assume that Singapore is just a backwards country with brutal legal standards maybe not unlike being told people have their hands cut off for stealing in Saudi Arabia or something similar Regarding Singapore though this simply could not be further from the truth Singapore is all of the things that I wrote above It s very much a first world country with a wonderful and astute population of educated people They just also happen to have some very strict standards that they force people to live to Among those standards is that it s illegal to chew gum It s illegal to spit at least in public Smoking restrictions are extremely strict There are those laws that most countries have but Singapore just happens to take very seriously such as littering jaywalking and etc The city is lined with signs instructing you what you cannot do and in most cases what happens if you re caught doing whatever you re told not to do The fines you ll pay are generally spelled out rather clearly Fishing in an unauthorized spot for example will net you an instant 3000 SD fine about 2 200 USD Smoking in an unauthorized spot even outside will net you an instant 500 SD fine about 365 USD photo 641994 650776 0 center Looking up at the ceiling in a Hindu temple photo br style clear both photo 641976 650776 0 center Outside of the Masjid Sultan Mosque photo br style clear both Strongest of all of these rules however is with respect to drugs While marijuana is classified differently in this case all other drugs including ecstasy cocaine methamphetamine opium and heroin are punishable by death That s right death If you are caught with even a very small amount of any of these drugs though I believe there IS actually a minimum weight it s just very small you will face execution The country reminds its citizens of this in many different ways Not only will you be executed but you will be hanged So my Uber driver is not a fan of his country because as a person who doesn t make a ton of money he is in the class of people that simply cannot pay their way out of the fines or even escape death His illustration of the country is the same thing that happens in all countries that issue fines for relatively trivial matters If you have the money it really doesn t matter to you since it s a regressive system If you don t you re in a lot of trouble again because it s a regressive system For him smoking in the wrong place or getting caught randomly spitting could financially devastate him That all said the system does seem to work The country seems to maintain its order It truly is clean because nobody is going to litter the penalties are just too steep for most people and they don t mess around with enforcement If you get caught you are going to be found guilty and held accountable of the offense So that s the spin to Singapore that I found most interesting It s a gorgeous clean vibrant fast paced metropolis with a wonderful mix of people races and languages It s just not a place where you want to break the law the stick is just too harsh in most every case I should also mention that Singapore has some of the best food in all of Southeast Asia Since the country is such a blend of cultures albeit predominantly Chinese there are specific subcultures all over the city that have set up Hawker Centers areas that sell street food on the cheap Chinatown Little India etc all have some of the most amazing food I ve ever had and it s all relatively cheap probably 3 6 SGD photo 641709 650776 0 center Wan Shan and I eating some BBQ stingray and an assortment of vegetables photo br style clear both photo 641787 650776 0 center Picking out the best durian for my first go at eating one While most westerners think that they smell terribly and don t care for the taste I found the smell appealing and the taste delicious photo br style clear both

Austin Floods of 2002 We had some incredible rain in Austin for almost a week in late June 2002 which left the city in a state of flooding. Dave and I drove out to one of the local greenbelts one afternoon to take a look at what the rain had done to some of our local streams.

Flat Stanley Pictures Tisa's brother, Timmy, asked us if we would take some pictures of Flat Stanley for one of his youth groups (or something to that effect). I don't really recall Tisa doing much with this one, but I went around town and took as many pictures of Mr. Stanley as I could with Dave's Olympus.

Vegas Trip 2005 One of the many Vegas trips that I've made, this one was organized mostly by Dreux. Emerson and I had the pleasure of being roommates in the MGM. We met up with a bunch of Dreux's friends from various parts of the country.

Westslope Aquarium When Dave and I lived on Westslope, one of the hobbies that we invested quite a bit of time into was keeping up with aquariums representative of the local aquatic life. Basically, we would go around to the local streams and rivers (generally near or within the greenbelts) with fish nets and capture some of the local species. Everything from the sand, rocks, plant life, and of course the fish, were specific to the local habitat. Perhaps most interesting of the fish species that we kept were small bass. The only complication with keeping bass is that they are carnivores (technically omnivores I suppose) and so we needed to keep a smaller tank full of minnows to feed the bass with. Every so often we'd make a trip out to one of the streams with a seine to catch more minnows. It was fun feeding them, especially as they would 'learn' when it was time to eat. For the record, Dave Krewet is really the person who got us started in this sort of thing.