Good morning (or good evening here in Bali). Much like yesterday, I really didn't do all that much today besides go to the beach. Due to my sunburn, which has turned a nice shade between purple and red, I tried to stay out of the sun today. I woke up at 8am, got breakfast which consisted of an omelette, two small pancakes with honey, a piece of toast with jam, and a glass of mango juice. Breakfast is easily becoming my favorite part of the day here, I find myself excited at the prospect of shoving tasty food into my mouth. It's not all too different from how I feel every other day though because I really love food. I also really love sleep, which is why I took a mid-morning nap. After breakfast I walked down the street to the pharmacy to get some aloe vera for my sunburn then I came back, lathered it on and slept. I'm horribly lazy.
Part of me gets anxious because I'm not sure I'm using my time wisely here. But then another part of me knows that I'm on vacation by myself and I get to do whatever I want to do, and if that means taking a 1.5 hour nap at 11am, dammit, I'm going to do it. I try not to feel guilty about it. The truth is that while I love it here and I love just lying on the beach, there is a small part of me that is bored and I seriously hate that. I'm in Bali!
I woke up from my nap and headed down to the beach where I sat until sunset. I met my friend Torus there, drank enough Bintang to get me buzzed, and thoroughly enjoyed myself. Torus has a nice camera and likes to take pictures on the beach at sunset so we drove his motorbike back to his apartment to grab his camera and bring it back. While there, I met his neighbor's puppy who's name was Spot. I think Spot is a Beagle and he's soooooooo cute but he pees whenever somebody pets him even if he likes you. I have to admit that I prefer being the passenger of a motorbike than the driver. Torus jokes that he's going to teach me to drive it and I just laugh because I know that's not going to happen for several reasons: 1) after my fall on Monday, I'm still scared and 2) I could barely drive for 5 minutes down an uncrowded alley in Ubud much less a thriving city like Kuta. For the sake of both of our lives, I should probably just stay away from driving a motorbike for a while.
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| This is my third or fourth Bintang today |
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| Spot is so cute isn't he?!?! (sorry, I just really love dogs) |
Watching the sunset on the beach was hands down one of the most beautiful things I have ever watched. The colors in the sky, Mount Agung (an active volcano) in the distance behind the clouds, the way the sand looked like glass, I loved it all. After that, I headed back to my hotel where I got some "Aussie" pizza (it had ham, olives, and pineapple on it).
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| Photo credit: Torus |
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| You can see Mount Agung, the active volcano in the back |
I've been calling my mom pretty much every day for the past couple of days because I find myself a little bored and lonely. But not lonely enough to venture off to the bouncing nightclubs that surround my hotel. I'm not about that life. I just got off the phone with her (it's morning there) and she woke up to a stray cat just hanging out in our yard. We live in the middle of a cornfield in the middle of nowhere Michigan so this is quite common. It's actually how we got my cat Roger. She looked so cute and friendly, she was black and white, and for some reason I decided to name her Ravioli. I name all of our animals, it's kind of my thing. I think the job I would be best at in the entire world would be to name all of the animals at an animal shelter. Sometimes when I go there they have the ugliest names and I'm like "who even named you?! Because I can do better than that!" I have a knack for names and I also have a knack for knowing which type of animal somebody looks like. These skills will get me absolutely nowhere in life but whatever.
Isn't it nuts about the UK?! One of the things I like most in life is keeping up-to-date on the news and one of the things that I like least about traveling is that it's almost impossible to keep up-to-date on the news. But I've been watching CNN and Al Jazeera here every night along with reading newspaper articles on the Internet when I have time. I have to say, I didn't expect the UK to vote to leave the EU and I think it's going to be catastrophic for them. I mostly feel for the younger generation who is going to have to clean up this mess that they inherited. The largest group of people who decided the referendum were older Britons, the group that overwhelmingly wanted to leave. It's ironic to me that the UK, a country which colonized over half of the world, voted to leave the EU largely in part to not absorb refugees accepted by other EU nations and to have to abide by the institution's rules. The xenophobia that drips from this decision is pure irony to me. But then who am I to judge? We have Donald Trump as a serious contender for arguably the most powerful position in the world.
Also crazy is the sit-in the Democrats are staging in the House! Go them! Demand better gun control for the safety of our people. Don't let the NRA buy you and your vote. My god, all of the stupidity I've been reading about this whole gun thing on Facebook is laughable. Nobody wants to take your guns away and nobody is trying to do that. The call for gun control means that if you're on a terrorist watchlist or on the no-fly list, you should not be able to buy a gun. Like can we all agree on that? This should not be partisan politics, this should be plain common sense. Background checks should be necessary for any purchase of a firearm. These aren't insane propositions. But perhaps we should take it further. I don't think any civilian needs to purchase a semi-automatic weapon that can fire 180 rounds per minute, 3 per second. If you're a law-abiding citizen that has a logical argument for why you need a semi-automatic firearm that shoots that fast, please offer it to me now because I'm curious. Dear god, do not say hunting. Because if you are hunting with a semi-automatic there is no sport to that. If you can't agree on sensible gun control laws because you don't want your guns taken away or because it's your American right, I have some choice words for you. Nobody is trying to take your guns away. Like really, not Obama, not your senator, not your congressman, nobody. If you legally obtained a gun and are in a mental condition which allows you to own one, then you shall continue to do so. I think your obsession with guns is a little insane but I believe in your right to own one. I don't believe, however, that if you are a suspected terrorist or not deemed suitable to fly on an aircraft due to suspicious activity that you should be able to purchase any kind of gun. Nor do I think you should be able to buy a gun without any type of background check. Plain and simple. I apologize for the rant, especially if anybody is still reading at this point, but those are my thoughts on recent news stories.
Okay, well it's time for me to watch some CNN and relax. I'm surprisingly tired this evening for having done nothing today so I think I will go to bed soon.
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