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the mini-oregon road trip: day one [hood river]

By On March 1, 2011 In friends, travel With 1 Comment Permanent Link to the mini-oregon road trip: day one [hood river]Permalink

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the Pacific Northwest has always facinated me, probably because it’s the closest thing we have to Ireland. rocky, wet and unforgiving. none of this fancy Southern Californian stuff. a coast for men, of fishing and loss. green hills. good beer. people with facial hair because it keeps them warm and not for fashion. big trees. etc.

so I hobbled back from my sunburn in Australia to join three friends. two of them once spent 6 weeks camping from Los Angeles-to-Anchorage and knew this area well. knew it well enough to move here, if that says anything.

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our first top was the darling town of Hood River. home to 3 breweries [maybe more?] and a setting loved by anyone who stops there for a day. should you ever find yourself thinking about driving from San Francisco-to-Portland, make the detour to both Bend and this spot – well worth sacrificing 3-4 days.

it’s a small town and a nice town and I think you’d like it.

should you be a fancy beer fan, here is how the breweries ranked:

1. Full Sail – forever our ‘go-to’ choice for lager [Session]. a nice, big and clean brewery that balanced dangerously on ‘corporate’, but made for a drinkable amber, and two in-house seasonal makes. Tim also swears by the Session Black.

2. Double Mountain – they make an I.R.A. that we’ve been drinking here in Bend for a while, so no shock we had a few more in the house where it’s made.

3. Horse Feathers – great location [see above], but for some reason, they only had one waitress working the entire joint, so we ended up leaving. after spending 15 minutes online to find a website for them, I gave up. thumbs-down.

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… we spent most of our drinking hours at the very hip little Passport Pub [no website either?]. highly suggested – not to mention Mac and Jack’s African Amber [my #1 all-time favorite beer ever in the entire world period].

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Hood River. again, worth a day in the winter, worth two or more in warmer weather…

next up, Portland.

listomania

By On February 3, 2011 In aric s. queen, friends, photos, travel With 2 Comments Permanent Link to listomaniaPermalink

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[aric has visited 43 countries - 19.1% of the world]

oh man.

you want to keep me busy for hours? give me a map, some paper and a pen.

no kiddin’.

I have done this ever since I was a kid.

a few days ago, Josie made the mistake of asking me about my ‘must see’ places and I tried hard to narrow them down. I think I did a good job, but had one of those cases just like John Cusack in High Fidelity when the newspaper reporter asks him his Top Five Favorite Songs and he ends up calling her back half-a-dozen times with changes.

which means I’m gonna put them down here.

to quiet my head.

plus, with all the dead birds, snow[!] in Oklahoma and Jersey Shore getting picked up for 4th season, the Aztecs might be right about 2012, so why waste time saving money and tenure?

okay:

- 2 months in Ireland: I’ve been a number of times, but never long enough to soak it up as it should be soaked. The Queen [formerly McQueen] family hails from Country Clare, but then again, so does every American’s family.

- Northern Africa: maybe it’s cause the first time I got to first base was the first time I got to second base with [name removed] was while watching Aladdin, but there’s just something about that whole T.E. Lawrence thing [who's unpaid bar bill I got to drunkenly stare at for a large night out in Aleppo once] and the thought of Morocco, Algeria and [for every Star Wars fan] Tunisia, just excites me to no avail.

- Eastern Europe: in a campervan. in winter. yes, yes, I know – it’s cold there. I’ve been to a cold Eastern Europe before. but to think of places like Belarus, Romania, Russia, Lithuania… in the blanket of nothingness. oh man. the photos! the eerie bars. this area just doesn’t have the same feel in the summer, trust me. I’ve seen the Bone Church in both seasons and with sunshine, it just seemed silly. [read: wintertime, I shat myself - of course, that might have to do with a few of us breaking in, but that's more of a deathbed confession.]

- speaking of cold, not since Soleil Moon Frye married have I felt as much jealousy as when I saw Brother Linus’ Antartica photos. oh man.

- Cuba. yes, American’s can get in. yes, we have to be sneaky about it. yes, it’s going to turn into Miami once Fidel dies [if that's possible] and Raul takes over. and lemme tell ya, there is no worse place than Miami. except maybe Houston.

- British Columbia: I am painfully aware of the irony of ending up with a Canadian, so you can leave them chuckles out of this spiel. Tim and Robin camped through there en route to Alaska and still say it’s one of the prettiest places they’ve ever seen - Banff in particular.

- Mexico: shame things are so shit down there. Brother Joe wrote the definitive guidebook on parts of the area and ever since picking it up, I’ve been obsessed. the food! the sights! how can you not want to see Mexico?

- Belgium/Holland: been to both of them before, but last summer in London, Josie and I got talking to a few guys who had a canal boat. think about spending 3 months on one of those lazily making your way from trappist brewery to windmill.

- Easter Island.

- New Zealand: also in a campervan. Collin and Kate are there right now in a campervan and I can tell from Collin’s lack of not being online that it must be stunning.

… now, a few of those can be reached by boat, which excites me even more. I look at used boat sites almost as much as I do maps and I’m finding out that I can buy a big steel tank of a sailboat [if you've ever sailed with me, you know the reason why I need a big steel sailboat] for around $40,000, which ain’t bad, seeing how it’s more-than-live-able. and then a campervan ain’t much either.

speaking of campervans, I’m off on Saturday – flying 11,308 miles [one way] to Perth for Josie’s 29th + 1 birthday driving around Western Australia.

sound like fun? well, lemme let you in on a few secrets:

- I’m flying on a buddy pass. which means if the flights from Bend, Salt Lake City and Los Angeles have room, then I’m welcome. if not, I’m sleeping in an airport.

- but wait! it gets more interesting! since Delta doesn’t fly to Perth, I had to book a ticket from Sydney to Brisbane. and then from Brisbane to Perth. which seems simple enough except that if, for some reason, I can’t get on said flights for 3 days, then I ain’t getting to Perth.

- there’s more! Australia right now is being hammered by Cyclone Yasi. and, sure, that might not seem like a big deal to you, but take a look at some of the news reports. we’re talking complete airport closings and mass evacuations.

… so, sure, sometimes you might see the photos and think ‘my! how exciting!’ to which I’d have to agree with you.

exciting? yes.

there’s a few more words for it as well.

more from that place where the toilets flush funny.

more photos of Bend [Mt. Bachelor]

By On January 25, 2011 In friends, life, photos, travel With 1 Comment Permanent Link to more photos of Bend [Mt. Bachelor]Permalink

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… are up here.

2027

By On January 12, 2011 In books, family, friends, life, my nephew, travel With 3 Comments Permanent Link to 2027Permalink

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if you’ve ever wanted to drive me nuts – I mean, nuts – say something like ‘remind me to tell you something later’. I’m serious, that phrase alone, or one like it, does my head. I go crazy trying to figure out what it was, or what I’ve done wrong. same goes for me, I can’t keep my own secrets – even at Christmas, my parents have to buy presents for everyone else from me, less I end up telling them early what’s in the box.

it’s bad.

in fact, it’s so bad that I can’t even not come clean about the book I’ve started.

the other one is almost done, due early April, so please buy it – my self-validation is still dangerously in the balance.

but this one, this is one I kind of feel I was meant to write – as upmyownass as that might sound. but it’s true and I can’t keep a secret any more.

see, the birth of my nephew affected me so profoundly, I knew something special was happening. and then, this past Christmas, where I finally got to see him in real life, well, it became very, very clear to what my magnum opus was to be.

it’s called ‘dear nephew’ and, due to a certain amount of adult content, it’ll be given to him on his 18th birthday. with each place that I travel, with each fascinating person I meet, with every experience that shapes me and with each mistake I make, I’m writing it down in letter form to him. and, a quick look back on my first year of his first year on this earth will tell you I’m not with lack of content – be it for destinations or screw-ups.

and the best part is that I’m writing it to him and only him. in this last book, I wrote to an audience of friends, but this one is simply uncle-to-nephew… and I’ve never been more excited to write something. granted, I get to spend most of the chapter talking about myself, but in all honesty, ‘me’ is probably the only thing that will hold my written-attention for the next two decades.

and who knows? maybe that’s why I’m here – not just to live it, but to write it down for someone I love.

it’s somethin’ to help me cut back on the whiskey nights and chemical sunrises, that’s for sure.

an early year in review

By On November 21, 2010 In aric s. queen, family, friends, life, my nephew, people, photos, travel, tuesdays with tara, work With 1 Comment Permanent Link to an early year in reviewPermalink

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I had a rather exciting year.

and, as of last Sunday, have spent this past 12 months literally around-the-world.

if this is your first time here, I feel the need to preface this with sure, from the surface, I might come across as an adventurer, which is great – no one hates being called an adventurer… and I do love a good adventure, but if you’ll take the time to read the stories and not just look at the pictures, you’ll see how surrounded I am with very generous, very kind and very tall people who let me stand on their shoulders to see The Big Show…even if that means that they’ll miss it.

and therein lies my gold.

but yeah, 2010…

sheesh.

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14 countries.

32, 168 miles.

and many more highlights that I’m sure are being forgotten.

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it was a good year, as was the last. and the one before that.

but, as stated, if you look closely, you’ll see that I had very, very little to do with it.

pack. repack. but, stay for a while.

By On November 17, 2010 In family, friends, life, travel With 1 Comment Permanent Link to pack. repack. but, stay for a while.Permalink

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I live between a theatre room and a chicken coop. there’s really no other way of describing it.

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4 days ago, I was stabbing my way through the streets of Saigon on a motorbike. and now I’m here, between a theatre room and a chicken coop. in Bend, Oregon.

jet-lag takes great pride in smacking me. what was it Spalding Gray said?  ’I refer to jet lag as ‘jet-psychosis’ — there’s an old saying that the spirit cannot move faster than a camel.’ and I’m feelin’ it, lemme tell you. if I hadn’t had torn down all the mirrors one night in a friend’s apartment and then stood in front of them whilst pissing myself asking ‘what is the matter with you?’, I’d be tempted to drop an Ambien and wake up refreshed – but does anyone feel bad for me?

you shouldn’t, as I’ve only described a small part of the new chapter.

I’m with two of my best friends - no, hang on, I use ‘best friend’ term a lot and, while I mean it when I say it, the two people I’m living with are so far beyond that – they’re family. so I’m living with two extended members of my family in the most ridiculous house I’ve ever set foot in – my room’s location should be an indicator of that. walk out past the theatre room and there’s a fully-stocked bar. to the left is an old arcade game that plays all the old arcade games. and then there’s a breakfast nook where I’m sitting as we speak. behind me is a view that I’m actually holding off on photographing until it’s absolutely clear, just so you can understand the ridiculousness of it.

okay, no – I at least have to show you what it looks like from the balcony at 7 in the morning.

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so yes, I left Ho Chi Minh. it was fine and I was making money and 6 months there would have made me more than enough for the big sailing trip next year, but one night, Josie and I had a wonderful grown-up talk about her not really liking it there and, while we were fine – more than fine, actually, we were really good – there’s no substitute for happiness in the place where you are personally and I cherish finally being of the mental maturity to not take something like that personally. she’s doing a great job of documenting her own journey and I highly suggest you delve into it a little.

she left for a beach and I left for some cold mountain air. the book is the priority as it’s going to pay for my little trip – more on that in a bit as well.

but if we’re going to talk book, then I should mention something that’s been a huge catalyst for my constant revisions of this little memoir I’m penning. see, ever since I was given a nephew, I’ve started realizing who, and what, is important… and it’s him. and while Uncle Aric might have been able to sell 1000 more copies of the book if he left in the original amount of drugs and sex, 1000 copies is nothing when you consider his parents might [rightfully so] not want him to read it. so it’s being cleaned up and I can’t wait – mom and dad will be happy with that. as will some of you.

does this make any sense, this entry? it kind of does to me, but I’m also walking under water right now, what with living in the mountains, being surrounded by people I love, and people who love me, and mircobrews that would make even a non-drinker weep.

so yeah, I’m all over the place.

but the more I write about it, the less I think it’s jet lag.

in fact, I’m sure it’s not jet lag.

my body is just experiencing another vicious case of fortune.

miss [and mr.] saigon

By On September 12, 2010 In friends, life, people, travel With 2 Comments Permanent Link to miss [and mr.] saigonPermalink

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did we move to Ho Chi Minh City last week? yes we did. it wasn’t all about which cuisine to eat, although that did make for a funny little story and hopefully ‘funny’ is what you’ll think of when you think of me as opposed to ‘why is his big toe sticking out of his flip-flop?’ and then ‘maybe because he has freakish feet is the reason he travels’ and then it all gets weird and you stop inviting me over for dinner.

I don’t want that.

so yes, we did move to Ho Chi Minh City. you can also call it Saigon if you want. Vietnam if you’re looking to be really general about the whole thing.

why?

well, it’s like this, see; I like Josie, but she is, unfortunately [in more than one way], Canadian. which meant she couldn’t work in San Francisco. not like I had the thousands of monies to move to San Francisco anyway and so we thought maybe we could stay in England, but what with the most recent entry obstacles and the fact that England is fun and great but crap and shit in the winter, we found ourselves wondering all sorts of things… mostly where the hell to live and make money for next year’s sailing trip.

and then I opened up my email to find a ‘hello, stranger!’ type correspondence from Kate and Collin in Vietnam and then they accidentally said something like ‘we miss you’ or ‘we thought about you’ or ‘how are you?’ and I took that to mean ‘please move here with your new girlfriend and stay with us for a spell’ and so we did just that… ’cause I’m all about appeasing my pals.

so here I sit, typing away in a home with not one, but two catwalks – and not to worry, I’m going to take a few photos of that. we’re going to get our own little place in a few weeks and then work-work-work until next March and then it’s back to England [they might only allow Josie in which means she really needs to brush up on her sailing skills seeing how she'd have to take H.M.S. Absurdity over to meet me in France] and out for another adventure.

wow! you might say, or at least think, if you’re not the person to say ‘wow!’ out loud, Aric sure does like his adventures and then I’d agree, but remind you, again, that this, as are most of my funs, was made possible by nice and generous friends.

all I had to do is show up.

I mean ‘we’ – all we had to do is show up.

got to get used to typing that.

mission l’impossible

By On August 16, 2010 In family, friends, life, music, people, photos, travel With 2 Comments Permanent Link to mission l’impossiblePermalink

we had this one night in Paris

someday I’ll say

and then try to explain everything that went on.

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but it’s not today.

I can’t write that well.

fortunately, my man Nico was taking a few photos.

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none of the 4am bike rides through the quiet streets of Paris

both of us in tears - some for a friend, and some for the bikes.

the most unfortunate accordion player is just a blur

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as was his switching from Edith Piaf to Radiohead without missing a note.

earlier macaroons

and even earlier petanque.

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so you get the pictures.

and can fill in the blanks as you go.

because, well, that’s basically what we’re doing.

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the wall.

By On August 12, 2010 In friends, music, travel With 2 Comments Permanent Link to the wall.Permalink

we went late, at least we though it was.

to the underground storytale that was yesterday’s Paris,

with it’s old walls

and red couches

photos on the wall

of people who probably had no idea someday we’d be sighing at them.

will someone ever see a photo of us on the stinky floor

with the photos behind us,

or were we too late?

I think we were.

they played Count Basie

and we drank things fashionable back then.

I don’t even like Pernod.

but boy, watch them dance

the ones that can

the older black man

with the stubby white woman

he has to duck to get under his own twirl

and her little legs move so thickly

on little feet

but boy, they can move.

we clapped when we were told to

as if someone were watching us from tomorrow.

and the stubby lady kept dancing

I don’t think she gets to much

probably from being stubby

but at least she’s out there

while we watch and drink

dream and clap

all of us were tired

and no one wanted to go home before the stubby lady.

I think she’s probably still there.

next to the photos.

and the stink.

how we wish we could be.

the friday cinco 10 – luke st. germain [author, bell-ringer]

By On July 28, 2010 In books, friends, life, people, the friday cinco With No Comments Permanent Link to the friday cinco 10 – luke st. germain [author, bell-ringer]Permalink

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[I want to tell you of the story about how I met Luke, but he already did... in the form of a novel - so I won't tell you about that. what I will tell you is that Luke has a certain air about him that tells you he's already succeeding at whatever it is you think he'd be good at. and he's a nice boy. so read his book. and find yourself stuck inbetween the hell of going door-to-door selling paper, and, well, the hell of believing that it's about to make all your wildest dreams come true. well done, old friend. and thanks for the mention]

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okay… as annoying as this has probably already become – what is the book about?

The book is about how a beach bum in San Diego became a door-to-door sales cult leader.

and at what point in this ‘career’ did you realize the absurd comedic value, even, book-worthy, of it?

The absurdity is evident on day one, of course- that’s the only way to describe barging into quiet offices and cracking horrible icebreakers. But the deeper into “the biz” you get, the more absurd it becomes, until one day you’re living with twelve strangers in a house with no furniture.

you might cover this in the book, but did you ever find yourself believing the promises of, well, all things promised? a team? riches? nice cars?

I thought I would be a millionaire by the time I was thirty- that I would own multiple houses, and expensive cars, and be able pay off my student loans. In retrospect I was a lethal combination of naivete and ambition.

what was the breaking point?

The breaking point was watching the snow fall through a window and feeling depressed, because it mean that people would quit the next day. Then I realized that I didn’t want to be the kind of person who was depressed watching the snow fall.

poetic. and symbolic. but c’mon – surely it was something said, something you witnessed that made you realize that this might not be all that was promised?

Yeah, that’s the melodramatic answer. It was a gradual decision, though, not one specific event. I saw plenty of problems in the biz, but the real problem was realizing that I didn’t want that lifestyle anymore.

take us back to your prime in ‘the biz’ – were you good? did you make any money, or, as the book echoes – ‘ring the bell’?

Hey, you saw me ring the bell, baby! But yeah, I was good. Killed it in the field, but gave away a ton of money to my team- I made about 25k as a rep. Of course, the real money was supposed to come in management, and there’s the rub. There is no red sports car waiting for you. I made about 55k the year I was nominated for Rookie Manager of the Year.

describe one of the more ludicrous experiences you had while working there.

I gave this guy  in the San Diego office a ride home, and it turned out he lived on a boat. We had some wine on the boat, then I had to drive through the gate of the marina to get out. The next day I went out and rang the bell. Of course.

it was my Uncle’s boat. and your destruction of the marina property got me kicked off. anyway – which is your favorite passage, line or chapter of the book?

My favorite chapter is probably the one that describes one business type after another in the field. I always thought a good book would be “tales from the field,” just interview everyone and put all their best stories together. You never know what you’ll find out there.

so, published author. what’s next? please tell us it still involves writing.

Next is writing scripts (feature length and shorts) and working on the Rapture Club site.

any backlash?

No real backlash to speak of, surprisingly. One person asked me to change her name. So far the only feedback I’ve gotten from everyone is “Yep, that’s what happened all right.”  But who knows, maybe no one has even read the thing yet.

how can people get the book?

Right now it’s only available as an e-book. Either barnesandnoble.com or smashwords.com.

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