gotham -> no pulse

friday night the mongoose and i went to gotham. cute club. empty. had a few drinks. was chilled.

saturday morning was a frantic rush to get everything packed and ready for the vortex. we finally managed to leave around 1 / 2pm, dropped by shadowslight's to pick up the forgotten camera, protoplasm's to pick up camping gear and directions, and then we made the long trip to the venue.

farking beautiful trip. nothing like coming over sir lowry's pass and seeing the mountains rearing up in the rear-view mirror. fantastic.

the mongoose didn't appreciate it very much...

we got stopped by the cops - apparently i just look really suspicious. they went through EVERYTHING. i at least had a bit of fun, stacking their arms with random objects unnecessarily while demonstrating our complete druglessness :P

we arrived around 4pm. the place was PACKED. cars, cars, and more cars, eventually we managed to find a spot about half an hour from the main floor. the neighbours watched our things while we went to check out the place, and we found a campsite right off the main floor - i left the mongoose there and legged it back to the car.

i made it to the new campsite - getting stuck in sand a couple of times and spraying some poor sod and his tent with dirt - and got out the car to discover that the mongoose had almost relinquished control of our area, and it was due to the efforts of a cute girl "next-door" (next-flap? i like the sound of that better). gave her a hug and a promise to return the favour.

set up camp, met some more neighbours (one of whom recognized me from high-school. weird.), and began missioning.

i got the whole freedom vibe right off the bat. in fact, i didn't stop smiling for three days. i went more nuts than most of the trippers, and i was clear-headed to boot. you don't need drugs to be silly, childish, and to dance like a tazmanian devil. or to be friendly and open with anyone and everyone. there's nothing like good muddy fun.

my feet are a little worse for wear though. aside from the standard beating they endured, i stood on thorns on the first night, and only got the damn things out 7 hours later.

during the party i saw my cousins twice or three times each, and they weren't particularly communicative. which kind of sucked, i sort of expected to at least be camping with them.

there were quite a few israeli's, too. i've actually gotten into some very interesting hebrew conversations, and i'm on the wrong side of the globe...

and oh - my - word. there were hundreds, upon hundreds, of dead-sexy, gorgeous, beautiful girls. more eye-candy than the mind can comprehend.

the evening of the 31st - once the music got started, i was barely off the dance floor. the vibe was great from the start - although i daresay i could've used less requests for drugs... that smile of mine scored me a really foxy 33 year-old, and my first time (at age 25) kissing someone during the crossover to a new year. pity she left in the morning.

the mongoose danced a couple of hours, but basically spent his new year's sleeping in the car.

walking between our campsite and the dance floor at night was seriously dangerous. aside from the mud and little pools of what seemed to be sewage, there was a serious drop off an unmarked and unlit bridge - during one of the missions i saw some guy scrambling out clutching a knee. fortunately, the mongoose had found a flashlight in the dam, and i had some light to see by...

about 2am i decided i was ready for bed. i managed about 3 hours of sleep, then got up and bounced the chill off, then went for a swim, danced some more, then returned to sleep. that failed - it was just too damn hot to be in the tent, and i got up and mooched (with a slight stomp) around. protoplasm and his friend (umm. forgot his handle. umm. bob.) met me on the dancefloor, and we walked through to another parking area, where they'd found some shade. we debated a while, then bob and i left protoplasm to hold the fort while we went back to pack up and move sites.

the move didn't take too long - but it did upset the neighbours, who'd gotten quite fond of us. oh well.

we set up the new site really nicely, and spent the early afternoon playing around with the volleyball, drinking, and chilling. i'd left my phone with the mongoose, who'd managed to get it blocked - the new cute girl-next-flap helped us out by being my mom's contact, so we got that sorted out and made a new friend. err. the mongoose made a new friend. ahem.

basically, from 4pm sunday until 4pm monday i was on the dancefloor, with about 2 hours of sleep sometime after sunrise. sunday night bob firedanced, i went absolutely crazy - at 2am i realized that i had a sizeable hole in the front of my boardies... i'd been flashing the entire evening and wondering why people were looking at me funny.

after the 2 hour nap, i painted myself from head to toe in funky-coloured zinc sunscreen, and i looked like somebody's art project. the mongoose has great photo's. i caused ripples of laughter wherever i went for the remainder of the afternoon ^_^

after the main party shut down, protoplasm, bob and i went swimming for a couple of hours, and had a fantastic time with a bottle-top and some imagination. i also got to watch a bunch of crazies doing all sorts of weird diving, each one egging on the next to do something sillier. at one point some guy ran, launched himself and spun SIDEWAYS... TWICE... before crash-landing on his head. it was beautiful.

on the way past the just-beginning monday night party, i ran into orbital - that was a serious blast from the past, and a nice breath of fresh air. that aside, the music was absolutely fantastic... but the mongoose (who, by the way, had spent most of the party in the tent reading) had decided that he'd had enough. so we had to leave.

the drive home was stunning, but i was dying and already post-vortex depressed. we showered, ate pizza, and crashed.

yesterday:

yesterday sucked ass. the depression had kicked in solidly. i spent the vortex with a sensation of complete freedom. i was myself, totally and utterly. and it's over for the next year. it didn't help that the mongoose spent the day giving me grief... all he cared about was shopping, and didn't give rocks that there was so much of cape town that he still hasn't seen. so we spent the day in the waterfront.

at the waterfront: i think my niece scaled my smokes and lighter. hmmph. the mongoose got an enormous discount on the jewellery he was buying because the owner knows my mother... we discovered that because the owner is israeli, and the two of us were speaking in hebrew. ho ho.

and the mongoose bought himself these AWESOME remote-controlled infra-red tanks, and he bought me a mystic 8 ball. sweet!

last night my mom took us out to a fantastic (and expensive) turkish restaurant for the mongoose's birthday. great food. very pleasant evening. i'm still amused that the mongoose just couldn't understand that we weren't kidding about the importance table-manners, and the waiter got really frustrated because he couldn't take away the food if his knife and fork weren't together. the look on his face was priceless when comprehension dawned.

we met up with some of my mom's (not-straight) friends, and had some entertaining sheep discussions. one of those friends happened to be the cook hido used to work with, the man ultimately responsible for my taste for seafood. my mom was shocked that we knew each other...

we rented boondock saints, which the mongoose has now finally seen. in the middle i dropped my niece off at a really poncy club... called pulse. she gave me a description of the place that really turned me off the idea.

today:

i got to bed at 2 or 3am, and woke up at 4.30am so that we could take the mongoose to the airport. i gave him the package of pictures and wishes and things that i collected before i left, and he was way impressed with his birthday goodies.

my mom worked her magic, and managed to get him onto the flight. i was sitting outside smoking, and i almost started crying when i thought about going back to israel. i really don't want to leave.

i got home, spoke to orbital, showered, packed for the beach, and went to meet her at llandudno. i got there as they were leaving due to rather shitty weather, and she told me to meet them at pulse tonight. uh uh.

i drove back, emptied the car, took it to the car wash, returned home, returned to the car wash, waited for ages (they had lots of work to do... and they still couldn't get the pretty zinc stain off the driver's seat), parked it back home and went to visit my brother as we'd discussed earlier. i don't know who let me in the front gate, but nobody answered the front door, and i stood there ringing it like an asshole for 10 minutes before giving up.

fuck that.

i rested a half an hour, then drove (exhausted and dehydrated and not having eaten anything the entire day) to fireman's arms (awesome pub) to have drinks with hyperviper and noddiex (joined after a bit by hyperviper's dad). very nice. i thoroughly enjoyed myself. and managed to hold my pint of draught and a suitcase. and i didn't cry from the spicy buffalo wings in tequila and peri-peri sauce.

i then drove to my uncle's (and parked so beautifully that i got several comments) new place, which is stunning, and from there my two uncles and aunt and uncle's girlfriend and mom and i went to eat at ocean basket. which was actually kind of crap, but anyway. i've basically just got home (been typing this drivel for more than an hour), given my nephew a lecture about smoking too much weed and not doing anything with his non-work hours, and been given further reasons not to go to pulse.