It's amazing what you can accomplish in under four hours. I spent a good part of Wednesday in and around Cocoa, Florida, getting to know something about the Brevard-Cocoa Beach part of the state. Temps hovered around 60; the sky was blue with some clouds; the sea wind was blowing its fool head off. My tour guide was an ex-karate instructor who specializes in Okinawan styles. We've been correspondents since 1997, both of us writing shit humor and making trouble online. This past Wednesday was the first time we'd met face-to-face. Thanks to the years of exchanges, it was like meeting an old friend. In truth, I was meeting an old friend.
And that's saying something: meeting people whom you've known online as e-friends can go well or poorly. For instance, here's Arn, my new old friend:
This meeting could have gone very, very badly. Arn's got that crafty look, as though he might be storing human remains in his freezer, but you can't be scared of a man who has something like this crawling around his house:
Above is Xena, Warrior Kitty, and she and I got along just fine. Things couldn't have been more comfortable.
Arn snapped a few more pics. Here they are:
"This is how big my left ball was before surgery."
Me and my rental.
And this: how to say a proper goodbye--
Good thing my mother doesn't read my-- oh, wait. Yes, she does.
My flight from Orlando to DC was delayed: thanks to some sort of mechanical difficulty, the 6:50PM departure was moved back to 8:30, so I didn't get home to a freezing NoVA until midnight.
Florida gave me a chance to brush up on my nonexistent Spanish. The airport was like one huge language tape: all announcements were repeated in both English and the Mariachi Tongue. Unlike in DC, no one mistook me for Latino and tried to talk with me in Spanish. That was disappointing. In Korea, I'll get questions in Korean from people too old to see that I'm only half-Korean.
Arn professed his fondness for Koreans*; he needs to sidle over to some Koreablogs and check out the pics of the ladies. The Nomad recently featured a new North Korean invention: ladies who are shrink-wrapped and delivered right to your doorstep. See here--
No strangers to nuclear radiation, these pre-packaged North Korean ladies perform best after being put in the microwave for about two minutes. Check periodically for doneness.
It'll be a treat to have Arn out to Korea at some point; Koreans are already shameless about staring at foreigners, and Arn promises to be the foreigner's foreigner.
A great trip, despite its brevity. Thanks, Arn, for the pics, and especially for your hospitality. Peace, man.
*He also noted some problems with what taekwondo practitioners do with their kicks. He did, however, show more admiration for hapkido, hwarangdo, and t'angsudo.
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