Hope to see you there!

Last year's event was a blast - they had a traditional Indian dance, men in drag (dancing beside Chandler Rainey, our very own 2009 Modern Bathing Beauty Winner and soon-to-receive-official-label-of "Dr. Rainey"!), singing, and the largest group of guitar playing doctors I have ever seen!  (That's Dr. John Ray singing lead there bottom left)

So come out Thursday night - donate a few bucks and enjoy the entertainment - it's for a great cause!

http://www.stvhope.org/

St. Vincent's House is a 501(c)(3) non-profit social service agency providing comprehensive social services and community outreach programs for the entire family. St. Vincent's House serves the disadvantaged, underserved and working poor population of the greater Galveston community with essential programs and services to enhance their mental, physical and spiritual well being.

Our services are designed to meet the real and immediate needs of our clients for food, shelter, healthcare and childcare.

Mikie just returned from such a visit next door, however this time he had some fun news: "A couple is getting MARRIED at foam!"   Wait - you mean there are a few stragglers from a wedding reception hanging out at the bar, right?  Nope.  An actual. for real. CEREMONY - complete with officiant and everything is taking place right. now. at. foam. 

Forgive my lack of photography skillz here, but I was trying to be respectful of the goings-on AND wanted to capture the beer taps in the foreground...  What you can see here is said beer tap, the "Closed, private party" sign on the doors leading to the downstairs part of the bar, and the back of the minister. 

I can see it now:  "I now pronounce you man and wife.  You may kiss the bride....  SHOTS!"

    And here's Amy with the "back up bouquet" just in case.... What a great bartender!

I'd like to point out the use of one of my favorite tools in the above photo: the whacking stick.  It's not just for cartoon snakes anymore.   

For the past 2 weeks, we've had the luxury of traveling to places where English - both spoken and written - is readily available.  We've been spoiled so far and we know it.  That, my friends is about to end - enter the dragon: China!

Another way we have been spoiled until this point is with the weather.  It's pretty much been hovering around the mid-80 degree mark everywhere we've been, but now we're headed to the capital of the People's Republic of China - Beijing - and evidently they just had a massive temperature drop and record snowfall a week ago.  Lucky us. 

Scene: Our plane taxiing on the runway to the arrival gate just after landing in Beijing (local time: 7am)

     me: "Babe, why does everybody on the plane all of a sudden have gigantic puffy coats
            on? " (keep in mind we are arriving from 88-degree Bali and everyone - us included -
            got ON the plane with tank tops and shorts...)  "I thought the weather here was
            going to be in the 60s - I packed 1 sweater."
    mikie: "hmmm...  The ground crews all seem to be really bundled up.  Is that snow on
            the ground?"
     me: "ugggggghhhhhhhh."
End scene.

I grew up with a girl named Amanda.  We met when I was like 5 years old - a bit later we were on the same "co-ed" pitching-machine baseball team and we were the only 2 girls.  We were also in "Indian Princesses" (wow - apparently now they're called "Adventure Guides" - have we taken political correctness too far?  I mean, seriously - we used to be awarded with "BEAR CLAWS" as marks of success.  What do they call them now - "FRIENDSHIP LEAVES"?!?!?!?  When will the madness stop?!  Sorry, I digress...) together and by the time I was 12 or so, we'd play on the Nintendo power pad (the "original" Wii-Fit for those of you who may have grown up after the 1980s) at her house at least 5 nights a week during the summer.  Amanda was always an adventurer and I loved hanging out with her.  After she graduated college, she began travelling around the globe and ended up settling in Beijing.  I am sad to say that we lost touch for a while, but about once a year, we'd somehow manage to get a quick email to each other to touch base. 

Then came July of 2009 when Michael began planning our trip and said "Hey - we have to go to northern China for this trip - would you want to make a pit stop and see the Great Wall while we're in the neighborhood?"  After googling the location of the Great Wall (kidding!), I thought - hey that's near Amanda!  Fast forward to our last day in Bali and I emailed her again and told her we'd be there in the morning.  She gave me her cell, some of the best "local" travel tips, and directions to a place we could meet up after she and her g/f got off work, and we were set.  I was so excited - we hadn't seen each other in a decade - a decade!

The first tip Amanda gave us was that we might have a hard time communicating to get a cab from the airport to our hotel, so we should print the hotel name off the internet before arriving so we could easily just hand it to the cabbie, sit back, and enjoy the ride. Great tip - GREAT.  My comprehension skills - not so much...

Scene: Us walking - bags in tow - to the taxi area outside the airport, me with scrap of paper in hand - both of us shivering...
      me: (hands paper to first taxi driver who looks at it, hands it back to me, stares blankly 
             and says something to me in Chinese) "Holiday Inn Beijing Downtown, yes?"  stupid
             American.
     cabbie #1: "something in Chinese..."
     mikie: (nervous laughter) "maybe we should try another one..."
     me: "hmmm... maybe they can't read English?"
     mikie: "honey, didn't you print out the hotel name in Chinese characters so they could
              read it?"
     me: "......  um......... yeeeeaaaahhhh... apparently that would have been a better idea."
End scene.

Darwin awards here I come.

Amanda tip #2: Take a MULTI-LINGUAL (check.) card from the hotel with the phone number, etc on it (they have little language guides on the back that translate things like "take me here (point to a place on the map)", "I'd like to get out now" or "that fare is too high".  All very helpful suggestions - but a little foreboding...) and hop a cab to HoHai which is a historic neighborhood (she knows what we like!) around a lake.

HoHai was very pretty.  But it was   24 degrees.  The lake was partially frozen over and one poor  lonesome little mallard was still trying to keep the dream alive and stay on his lake - frozen or not. (click on the pic & it'll elarge so you can see him) 

We found a place for lunch and were VERY proud of ourselves for ordering chicken & cashews, rice and beer in Chinese!  Okay, so we also enlisted the aid of the picture-heavy menu and pointed a lot but the fact was that we got what we ordered and it was delicious.  We steered clear of the sheeps head, which I thought was a fish, until Mikie pointed to the picture of a sheep's head.  (Ahh the importance of a well-placed apostrophe.) You know - the thing at the end of a lamb's neck.  On a plate. Yeah.  Yummy.

Beijing is home to over 17 million people and is respected as China's political, educational and cultural center.  (Amanda says there are 1,000 more cars on the road per day.)  They hosted the 2008 Olympics too.  So LOTS of folks are moving in LOTS of different directions at nearly every hour of the day.  Luckily they have a really modern mass-transit subway system the likes of which I haven't seen since living just outside - and working in - Washington, D.C.  And, since the Olympics were here, almost everything in the subway system has English subtitles: heeellllooo, freedom to travel on our own! 

Amanda tip #3: Take said subway to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City.  A 1-way ticket cost $2 yiyuan which is like $0.30 cents.  (Notice the sun at Tiananmen?  It's like 3pm.  Beijing also has a bit of an air-quality issue. I mentioned there are over 17 million people living there, right?)

New masters of the subway, we headed to the east side of downtown to the area where the restaurant was that Amanda and Georgie had made special reservations for us.  We weren't going to meet until 6pm, so Mikie and I began exploring the area.  We found a coffee shop (that I swore was a house of ill repute based on the dim lighting and swagged fabric that was draped over EVERYTHING) and, after some intense study, were extremely impressed with ourselves for figuring out what the Chinese characters were for "coffee" and "whiskey" - with NO help from pictures might I add! 

Amanda, Georgie and their friend Huongwai treated us to a feast.  I've never sat at a table where more varieties of dishes were served.  Chinese cabbage, Peking duck, all kinds of Chinese beer, peanuts, naked oats, fried apple gremlin - and a ton of other stuff I forgot.

  It was also 2 days before Thanksgiving and we knew we'd be on a long plane ride for turkey day, so we figured there wasn't any better time to celebrate early than right then.  It was just like Ralphie Parker's family Christmas dinner in "A Christmas Story", except without the singing...

We headed back to the subway with full tummies, but when we got there we realized that we didn't have exact change for the ticket machine, and it being like 10:30pm, there were no human tellers on duty.  We went back above ground in search of change, happened upon a place we thought was a restaurant but ended up being a burlesque show where all the girls were dressed as Princess Jasmine, were personally invited in by the English-speaking manager who was gracious enough to make change for us, and we were back in business. 

Tomorrow we'd be off to see the Great Wall!

We're right in the middle of it all - for the Dickens 1st Annual Bed Races we had a front-row seat, at the Bike Rally we got to hear the pipes up close and personal, and during the 2nd Weekend of Mardi Gras, the parades will float right on past our front doors!

Although being in the thick of it all does have its perks, with the good come the not-so-good and you're occasionally greeted by something a young reveler who partied a bit too hard left on your doorstep.  C'est dommage.

No problem - Refuse Manager and Certified HAZMAT Engineer Michael is on the scene!

Done and done.

*Note the over-head-level stucco finish on the facade of the building - get a good long look - operation reverse-facadomization (original term coined by our very own Matt Farragher of GHF) will begin the day after Mardi Gras and it will be no more!!!

Bali, located 8 degrees south of the equator (whoohoo - we made it but totally forgot to check if the toilets drain the other direction, although Mikie tells me they all drain the same way), is Indonesia's largest tourist destination and a second home to lots of people from Australia - they say Bali is to Aussies like Mexico is to Americans.  Balinese culture is strongly influenced by the Hindu culture, so there are lots of gigantic, elaborate marble statues all over the Island.   

This is the part of the work trip where we really began to sweat.  We worked from morning until late at night pouring over design ideas, driving for hours to visit the local tiki carvers, and logging all the new products we saw that we want to carry at the shop. 

Okay, so it really wasn't all that HARD of work - I mean, we were on a beautiful Island - but darnit we WERE working!  (Except when we took a day off to visit Uluwatu where there's a temple on the edge of a 300'+ cliff that overlooks the Indonesian Ocean and the home to hundreds of monkeys that you can hand feed bananas.  If you don't, they will steal your sunglasses and run away with them and you'll never see them again, so I'd suggest buying the blasted bananas.  Since we were visiting the grounds of the temple, we had to wear a sarong, hence the matching blue skirts - no, we weren't that matchy-matchy tourist couple everyone makes fun of! - check out the 2 monkeys in the background!)

I'm so bummed that the camera died right when we got to the monkeys at the temple because there was a bit of an incident that I would have LOVED to get on film.  Mikie was trying to feed one of the monkeys from his banana bag and this other, bigger monkey who was obviously a "pretty big deal" among the monkeys kept stealing the bananas away from all the others.  Mikie tried one more time to feed monkey #2 but Alpha Monkey wasn't having any of it.  In an effort to try to stand up for poor little monkey #2, Mikie tried to intervene, but he was too late and (thankfully) aborted the effort.  Alpha Monkey was on to Mikie's tricks, though and just stared - the most hateful little monkey stare he could muster - at Mikie.  Alpha Monkey was on a wall at this point, so he stood about chest-level with Mikie and was about 5' away from him.  I'm fumbling with the blasted camera - which is dead - while pleading with Mikie not to test the little buggers, and all of a sudden, Mikie gives the Alpha Monkey the "finger gun" as if to say "hey, big guy - you intimidate the bejesies out of me but I'm going to try to look tough as I walk away" and in a split second Alpha Monkey lets out this blood curdling scream, the furry mohawk on his head stands straight up, and he lunges towards Mikie in a fit of rage.  My life with Michael flashed before my eyes as I witnessed this would-be-attack-in-the-making and, by the grace of GOD, Alpha Monkey ran out of runway on the wall before he could reach Mikie's head - which I'm sure he was planning on eating.  He came to a screeching halt and just jumped around screaming at Mikie from the ledge.  Our guide looks around really quick to make sure everyone's okay and says in a cool Balinese accent "monkey think: 'you don't kill me - i kill YOU first!'...  you ready go?".  Yup - we ready go.

  Our hotel was right on the beach, and it was beautiful.  Kuta was the area that had a decent surfing break and all the shopping - where apparently the locals' respect for you is directly proportionate to your bartering abilities: if you can walk away having argued the price down to nearly nothing, you're friends for life.

We also saw some things that reminded us of our friends back at home: 

 Even though it's spelled differently, Jhonny's still Yanni or Yanie in any language!

And then there was the lady that crochets EVERYTHING, and of course how can you see crochet-ANYTHING and not think of Heather Sommer who crochets some of the   

most fabulous coozies, (I still covet the one Willthing was given on his birthday) matching scarves and hats you've ever seen - because it's always okay to coordinate.

Day 7
(Singapore, Singapore)

 I suspect a linkage here...  Mikie booked all of our travel for this trip, and let me just tell you the man is the Galileo of 1-way travel planning.  Every leg of the journey was 1-way; no room for error, no room for delays (insert laughter here from the Mumbai International Airport air traffic controllers who tried their best to thwart our schedule at every turn).  The folks working for the Singapore FAA, however must be in bed with the folks running the Visitor's Bureau because no matter where you are going in the world, if you go through the island microstate of Singapore, you can COUNT on a 6+ hour layover. 

Ours was 8 hours.  And, we arrived at like 9am.  Yes, I brought playing cards and mini scrabble on the trip in case of sporadic down-time, but for 8 hours?  No - we had to figure out an alternative plan!

Coincidentally, the Singapore tourism bureau has a rather large kiosk right outside the customs gate that you have to go through when you deplane.  And, surprise - you don't need a visa to visit Singapore, so it's great for a quick weekend getaway.  (not really from the USA, though as it's like a 22 hour flight)  And - another surprise - the luxury coach that will take you on the scenic 20 minute jaunt into town is offered by the Bureau - FREE!  And, they'll lock up your bags for you so you can explore hands-free (which we didn't find out until after we got back to the airport so we hoofed it around the place like pack mules, but that's okay).

I'll admit that they had me at hello from the air, though.  This place was beautiful from above - it appeared to be so green and lush, but there were huge skyscrapers dotted around, climbing above the tree line.  The harbor was massive and there were hundreds of ships awaiting their turn at the port (which, might I add worked in complete harmony with the very navigable, livable, tourist and resident-friendly 274-sq. mile community - hint, hint to our 208-sq.mile Island of Gtown!)

Plus, it was like mid November and the airport was already decked - and I mean DECKED - out in Christmas decorations - and they were playing Christmas music!  I mentioned how awesome I thought that was to one of the flight attendants walking near us and she smiled really big and said "Oh, we started doing that November 7th".  Hello, nurse!  A Christmas freak myself, I knew I was going to like it here already.

The entire town was decorated for Christmas too - apparently they have a ton of festivals year-round and they decorate big-time for most of them.  Above left is the MerLion Harbor Plaza - the sea-lion creature is Singapore's trademark symbol. 

This place has a FLOATING soccer field in the middle of the harbor for crying out loud!!  One of the - literally - largest tourist attractions at 165 meters (over 540 feet) high is the Singapore Flyer - it's basically a gigantic ferris wheel on steroids.  You get into this clear capsule that lets you see an amazing 360-degree view of the city while a pre-recorded narrative talks about the country's (yes, Singapore is an Island, Republic, Country, and City - and member of the United Nations) history, geography and industry.  I also found out here that I'm afraid of heights - and as soon as Michael discovered that fact, he tried to sway our little capsule off its hinges.  Ahh, but that's the Culpepper way:

Some interesting facts about Singapore we learned from our tour guide: 84% of Singapore's population lives in public housing - you can only purchase government property, says the government, if you are married and one of you is from Singapore - OR, if you are single and Singapore, you can purchase property, but only if you're over 35 years old.  Singapore gave aid to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and they "rent" airspace over Oklahoma to practice military training in dropping bombs.

We are happy to report we did not witness any floggings while in Singapore. 

I was remodeling houses in western North Carolina in the fall of 1999.  We had an early winter roll through and, added to that, I was working on top of a house on the very top of a mountain on top of a mountain range in Highlands, NC.  I recall getting to work one day and through thermal underwear, jeans, and a ski suit, I was freezing. I remember thinking "there has to be a better way"  and right then and there I decided that I was moving within 2 months.  I had 60 days to figure out where I was going.

Within a week, my list was down these 5 cities:  St. Augustine, Savannah, Charleston, Galveston, and Tuscon.  Notice an odd man out?  Tuscon made the list b/c it is out west and at that time, it had a good housing market.  The others are seaside communities that have a very good historic housing stock upon which to work.

I had friends in Charleston at the time and a room briefly became available.  For two weeks, I was moving to Charleston only to find out that the roomate who was going to move, was now going to stay.  Back to the drawing board.

In a weird way, I think I chose Galveston BECAUSE it was the one city on my list which I had never visited.  I think it is fair to say that, after telling my family of my plans, they thought i had totally lost it.  People were placing bets on how long this move would last.  My cousin and good friend, to my face, gave me 4 months.  Friends and family were telling me to move to Austin and Atlanta, and Ft. Lauderdale.  My sister-in-law's dad lived in Pasedena, TX and told me that if i'm moving to the area, I would like Clear Lake much better than Galveston.  But I had decided and I'd be damned if anyone was going to change my mind.

I can say that, 10 years later, moving to Galveston is among the best decisions of my life.  I met my wife here, started a business here, and began a life here.  There may come a time when we will call another place home.  Until then, I'm an Islander By Choice.

Yep.  It's time again.  Time for 2010 to welcome the "fat Tuesday."

Be sure to investigate the link in the calendar of events section in order to check into all that is Mardi Gras this year.  The weather is clearing up (as I type this the sun is shining), and tomorrow is projected to be top-notch.

Mardi Gras is one of my favorite times of the year on the Island.  But I'm curious.  What's yours?

I remember freaking out that our second container since Hurricane Ike decided to come in about 30 minutes after Mikie got out of surgery (when it rains, it pours, right?) and wondering how in the bloody hell was I going to get this thing unloaded - and then was rescued by the Willthing, Jhonny, and  HLPs Matt and Eddie who I cannot thank enough for being such awesome friends. 

I remember the day Mikie was released from the hospital and got to come home and how excited the dogs were to see their Daddy - and to get back on a regular feeding schedule.  Priorities, people.

I remember the day our friend walked into the shop and I took one look at his face and knew he and his lady were pregnant.  I was so stoked for them and even thanked him for fighting the temptation to post such glorious news on facebook (which I think should be changed to "hijack-and-hack-your-face-off-book" because enough already - what do the hackers that keep invading my account hope to gain by sending fraudulent youtube videos to all of my contacts over and over and over again??!?!?) only to find out that he did, in fact sortof already let the cat out of the bag via facebook and I might have known that had I not been hacked again that day.  Silly me.  

And I remember the day that Michael and I were standing in our house downstairs with the wind howling around our ankles.  We looked around at the place, looked at each other and said "what the heck are we doing with this place?!" and decided then and there that it's time to move on.  In a few weeks, we'll be adding to the for-sale housing stock.  We're certainly not going far - perhaps somewhere downtown?  For sure we'll find ourselves this side of the causeway... 

And I remember the day I realized "holy crap - it is almost the end of January." 

That day was today.  Beach Revue (May 15th is going to come REALLY quick), a March grand opening at the shop (whaaaa?!?!?!), local elections, parking meter debates (ugh). 

Kinda makes you want to hit the pause button every once in a while. 

After a few hours of sleeping in the ER while pantamiming a pretzel, we were informed that I had an appendacitus append... my appendix was broken.  After they informed us that the only remedy was to rip the appendix from the binding of the book that is labeled M_F_CULPEPPER.  Here's about how the next conversation goes:

Doctors walking in on two pretzels sleeping: You have appendecitus.

Pretzel with problem:  Ok when do we need to come back?

Doctors: You don't need to we're going to operate right now.

Hot Pretzel:  You're going to take him right now?

Doctors: No, we're going to let you sleep like pretzels for another 8 hours and we'll operate on him in the morning.

Pretzel with problem:  Thanks so much.

In the recovery room, Adrienne came in to see me and said that the doctors said that everything went to plan.  After two days, a seizure, and a self inflicted enema, I was going home.  Now here i sit with time to blog and no excuse not to.

Oh yea and the missing piece we were told was cut up and sucked out of my body.  One less thing to donate to science I guess. 

Thank you honey for being my wife.