Remember ‘Encino Man’? An improbable situation happens when a pre-historic caveman is frozen and then- poof- thousands of years later, he thaws out and meets Pauly Shore. Pretty much every single thing he encounters is a mind-blowing deal. (Side: Brendan Fraiser’s best work to date. Seriously. How many actors could have pulled off that role?) Shaving cream. Hot Pockets. Zubaz. Everything is AMAZING.
Granted, 5 days out of the country without cell phones or the internet isn’t comparable to 5000 years. And St. Louis would kill to be Encino California for 3 hours… but still, you’re way further out of the loop than you’re used to. And it’s disorientating.
Big Ben did what?
Boldin went where?
Kyle McClellan struck out how many?
The Rams signed… uh, nevermind.
It’s like every tid-bit of news is out of nowhere and you almost don’t know what to do with the information. Then things settle down. And the grind resumes.
As a public service to those getting ready to go to Mexico, here are 5 things you need to know:
1) US Airways is a terrible, terrible company. I have to admit; I fly Southwest pretty much everywhere I can. So I’m not used to missing EVERY SINGLE DEPARTURE or TAKEOFF TIME. 4 for 4. But they’re so good, they just re-book you on the next flight automatically. You thought you were taking off @ 7:30? HA! You’ll take off at 9. And LIKE IT. To be fair both departures were the first out the cities, so it’s understandable that they were delayed, right? Oh, it’s not? (PS: The 4 mintue US Air Credit Card spiel in flight is just disgusting. How much are you really getting for that? Enough to get you to sleep at night? Let’s hope.)
2) When you touch down in Cancun, be prepared for at least a 90 minute wait in customs. It’s brutal. In fact, after about 2 hours of standing in the worst line ever, I literally was having belly laughs watching all these happy people, so fired up about the 80 degree sunny weather outside coming down that one escalator and then seeing 2 thousand angry people in line, that I was getting dirty looks myself. From pure joy to pure pain in like 2 seconds.
3) The Diet Coke tastes better. Much, much better. I don’t know why. But it does.
4) This isn’t America and Mexicans don’t care about your lawsuits. This lady was getting a ride on a golf cart when the driver took a hard left, tossed her out of her cart and broke her shoulder. You know what their offer was? To pay for her taxi to the hospital. That’s it. They apparently threatened to sue before LITERALLY getting laughed at by hotel management. They encouraged them to try. (Bonus note, the doctor advised her to avoid surgery. Any drawbacks doc, she asked. “You won’t be able to lift your arm over 40 degrees ever again.” I think it could be worse for Obama.
5) Our poor and homeless are not that poor and not that homeless. Good God Mexico has some people that I doubt have ever had more than 10 dollars in possessions… their entire lives! I should take my camera out to the boys in Lucas Park for a pep talk and let them know it’s not THAT bad. Needless to say, there are no Larry Rice’s south of the border.
In related note, here are some pics of where I was staying. Life was tough.
I love you all.
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