DAY -9: Miami

Posted by Erik Frey Mon, 07 Mar 2005 15:03:00 GMT

While I was looking for boots at a local outdoor store, a short, wife-beater-clad fellow sidled up and offered me $100 in gift cards in exchange for 80 bucks cash. I asked him why he wanted to get rid of the gift cards and he explained that he’d won them in a raffle, but didn’t like the outdoors much. Predictably, I asked him why he didn’t like the outdoors. He smiled, revealing a hearty row of gold, and said, “I guess I’m just so busy, you know, not that much time…” which seemed vague, but hey, I’ve gotten worse responses in the realm of asking complete strangers probing personal questions. I thought it over for a moment, offered the guy 68 dollars for his $100, and we had a deal! I picked up a good pair of Merrel leather boots and various sundries.

I bought this magnificent, beat up old GI alice pack from a military surplus store in Hialeah that I can already tell is going to serve me well. Tomorrow, I’m going to take it over to a cobbler (man, what a life! I visit cobblers!) to see if he can reinforce some of the frame mount points that look a little worn, but otherwise it’s in great shape.

I really wanted to buy my tickets on Friday, but something told me to wait over the weekend. I’d been looking at fares to Jamaica but my heart wasn’t really set on it – all I wanted was a laid back, tropical country that had direct flights to certain places in the Caribbean. One of the countries I’d looked into was Costa Rica, and I really liked what I’d read, but it seemed too far out of the way. Sure enough, in the travel section of the Sunday paper Loye found an ad for round trip airfare to Costa Rica for $130.

Farren sold my car! Not only did she do so with poise and diplomacy (“I am authorized to negotiate”), but she got a really good price for it, too.

I received a full refund for my apartment deposit!

My camera arrives tomorrow!

Everything is coming together.

usa

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