I love Pete Sinclair

Pete Sinclair is a hero. He is a gentleman scholar, a magnificent bastard of the highest order. Praetor of the 39th Chamber of Funktronic Positivity.

I am currently ensconced in the posh London digs of Pete's buddy Matty S., whom I have never met before today. I called him on the Heathrow Express. I purchased a ticket for the cheap train, the Connect, then just jumped on the Express and claimed ignorance upon ticket-taking-time. Feigned ignorance, I should say. Luckily the train had been much delayed by "technical difficulties", so the staff had bigger fish to fry and all I got was a sigh.
So I call Matt. "Come over," he says. "Any friend of Pete is a friend of mine." He then feeds me some delicious homemade pasta with chicken and inducts me into the cult of Wii. And I actually beat him in baseball.
I'm back in the UK, being cared for by friends and friends of friends, and life feels like it couldn't get better. Hell, they're even ceasing military operations in Northern Ireland. Thirty-eight years of ... operation, not occupation. Hurrah! This engagement ends, just as Kingsley and Becca's engagement will end on Friday - when it becomes a marriage.
Savor the good times, people. Relish them. Pickle them. And yourselves.

Kumo'oana Wana Leia

Eight days. Eight. OCHO. That's how many days of mindless Hawaiian relaxation it took for me to even begin to feel relaxed. The day I leave.

I'm sitting in the airport now, waiting for my delayed flight to redden my eyes en route to a twelve-hour layover in San Francisco. But fret not; I am actually glad to be going. I had enough fun. Just enough.

Somewhere in between watching Roy Disney flattering my little brother, spending time with his team of unbelievably cool and interesting young soon-to-be-famous sailors, and having two beautiful Romanian girls shout at each other in the street while arguing about my misperceived financial responsibilities to a certain Senor Frog, I realized two things:

1: I have a pretty cool life
2: I miss my friends

Yeah, it's great to wander around a tropical paradise where tourists are loathed and easily identifiable thanks both to our skins and our general demeanors, but what's the point in striking out with at least three girls in one night, being carded by bouncers of bars I'm not even going into, or trying not to leer at my brother's 18-22 yr. old female associates without my friends around to jeer at me?

All I'm saying is, next time I do Hawaii, I'm going to have to take some friends along.

That and not share a hotel room with my sister.

JOMOBLOG shakes off the afterbirth

Hello my brethren. My blog has finally arrived. JOMOBlog. What, you may ask, is JOMO? Simply this: Just One Man's Opinion. This is a forum for me, one man, to express my opinions and observations; my take on the world at one particular instance; a snapshot of a magically pathological world-view. There are other men whose opinions need be heard. Justice demands that, one at a time, these singular men express their singular opinions here.

No Girls Allowed

Heh. What I mean is that I want to create a collection of mens' laments, concerns, experiences and difficulties. And rants. Lots of rants. Women are welcome to post comments and peruse the site thoroughly, truly, madly, even deeply, but the meat and potatoes of our subject matter, the starch in our shirt, our raisin debtor (as the French probably wouldn't say) is just this: a collection of men's opinions. Bang. Done.

It's time to kick the tires and fight the liars, people. There's ass to be kicked and my closet's full of shoes. Holla if you need a pair.