Tag: dad

BLOG: Is This A Wong Kar-Wai Movie?

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Thursday.

Back at the Secret Society, to the surprise of literally no one. I can’t help myself. Hellooooo! Who do you think I am?

Same old, same old. All the old men are here. I’ve decided to take the route of politely nodding hello to them and then otherwise ignoring them completely. Not trying to get friendly with a bunch of old married men!

Gee, I wonder why!

I was definitely here the other night as well. Got wayyyyy too friendly with the Filipino bartender, went to a second location with him, and inevitably made out with him.

I know, but like… What do you want from me? He’s my age, he’s hot, he’s covered in tattoos! It is what it is, okay?!

Luckily for me, he is not here tonight. Unfortunately, all the old men are. They’re celebrating someone’s millionth birthday. I’m pretending I don’t notice what’s going on. I just don’t care.

I actually came up here specifically to see the bartender, but he is not here. I cannot remember his name for the life of me. I don’t even know if I put it in my phone.

I just checked and I definitely did not put him in my phone. I guess the feeling is pretty mutual on that one. Thank god for that. I was genuinely worried. Alright, well, glad that’s all sorted out.

Meanwhile, I watched In The Mood For Love today, aka a Hong Kong Cinema Classic. Yes, I have seen it before, but that was a long time ago, before I lived in a tiny shoebox right door to a hot beefcake who I am definitely very attracted to, probably because he either yells at me or ignores me. Hello Daddy Issues! It is what it is.

Today when I watched it, there were no English subtitles. Welcome to my everyday life! Now you know why I stay in my comfy expat bubble, which isn’t actually terrible because here “expat” means “everyone from all over the world, not just specifically white people.”

So, I knew the plot, but I could not remember exactly what was said throughout the film. Therefore I was focused exclusively on the visuals and the vibes. It was a nice experience, actually. It forced me to put down the iPad and actually pay attention to every little detail in the frame. Just for a brief moment, I remembered how I fell in love with movies in the first place…

Then there was the question of vibes. Oh, the VIBES! I felt ALL the vibes. I was like… yeahhhh… this is how I feel about my hot neighbor right now. Problematic AF, as I’m 90% he is not feeling the same way about me. Either way, he’s an actor, I’m a writer, he’s right next door, and this fantasy is going to be projected onto him whether he likes it or not. It is what it is!

I did have a bit of a laugh though. He was hating on me for not having enough “Authentic Hong Kong Experiences.”

Meanwhile, I’m over here watching this movie like… “Wtf are you talking about, bro? I am having the MOST authentic HK experience right now. What do you even think living next door to someone like you is like for me, especially in this impossibly tiny, cramped space?! You do realize you’re a hot, sexy beefcake AND an actor AND British, right? Like, that’s basically a Triple Threat to me. It’s like the universe served me up my dream man then pulled an MC Hammer on me. Like, ‘U can’t touch this!’ RIDICULOUS!”

Yeah, it was depressing. In the end, I thought to myself, “Hmm… maybe I should go to Cambodia, or not, mostly because the vibe there right now is kinda scary. Soooo maybe back to India for my 300hr YTT course. I’ll whisper your name into a giant temple and then bury it with mud and grass. How romantic!”

And then I’ll just move onto the next hot, sexy beefcake because that’s just how it is these days…

Not that I necessarily want that. I just feel like he’s been pretty upfront about the fact that he finds me REALLY fucking weird and annoying. As I recall, he specifically said, “You are the strangest person I’ve ever met.”

He told me who he is, and I believe him. I learned this about men the hard way. Therefore, it is what it is.

That being said… he hasn’t asked me about his mail ONE TIME since using it as an excuse to unblock and re-follow me on Instagram. Just saying!

I did check for it though, because I’m me. Alas!

Anyway… what else did I do this week? Tried to start out the week productive, failed, then decided to re-watch Reservation Dogs to motivate me. I’ve rewatched it like 5 times now, but this time was different. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s because I’m a year removed from living in SD so it’s not as present in my every day life anymore. It felt like the very strong dose of medicine I needed this week.

If you haven’t seen this show, it’s focused on a group of teens living on the Rez in Oklahoma. It’s one of my favourite TV shows of ALL TIME. It’s fucking beautiful. The main theme of the show is dealing with Grief in various forms. Obviously it hits much different after losing so many family members to death in the last 5 years. I really, really, really needed to watch it way more than I thought. It was so healing. I felt so much better after my re-watch.

Inspired by my rewatch, I decided to go out this morning to meditation with a spirit plate, play the Lakota Ceremonial Songs Playlist, and ruminate on the Sun Dance. I pictured the Tree of Life and relived the memories of the ceremony.

Sure enough, one of my spirit guides appeared at the table. I’m pretty sure I know who she is now. I think she’s the Native woman from Shinnecock Nation my Great-Great-HoweverManyGreats Uncle married. He was a minister who worked with the Montaukett and Shinnecock during a smallpox epidemic that wiped most of them out.

I can prove this by the way. There is a significant record of this. This is not just some random shit I made up. I always felt some kind of connection there, but I didn’t know what it was. She led me to it eventually, but it took me awhile to figure out she was actually related to me and not a random spirit who decided to hitchhike when I was driving down Highway 18 through Pine Ridge and Rosebud.

Anyway, I’m pretty sure it was her because at the end, she said, “Thank you for acknowledging me. You’re the only person in our family who does. The rest of them are out there still pretending to be white. They’re the real Pretendians.”

That made me laugh, tbh.

Anyway, yeah, I don’t feel the need to justify this experience to anyone anymore because I know it’s real. I’m just more comfortable expressing it now that I don’t live in a small town full of crazy people who were determined to burn me alive at the stake every opportunity they got.

I asked her for some practical life advice and she told me to go to the eye doctor. Typical spirit shit, lol. She said, “Bad eyesight runs in your family. You lost your glasses two weeks ago and haven’t replaced them yet. You need to take better care of yourself in that way.”

So I booked an appointment for tomorrow. It’s a different system here. I looked around for the place with the most fashionable frames in HK and made an appointment with the optometrist tomorrow. I admit I’m relieved. Typing this right now without my glasses is actually pure torture right now. Can’t do it anymore. I’m shelling out the money for a prescription this time. That shit is real AF.

I asked her about other things too. Mostly about how to figure out my next step. It’s not like she can “tell me what to do” but she can give me general advice on the best direction to take.

It’s… complicated right now. I just… I don’t know. I don’t know!!!! I mean, I KNOW. I made a new vision board. I just… I don’t know. I feel so stuck.

It is what it is.

That being said, I love Hong Kong. I literally never want to leave this Island. However, I recognize that I am not in the healthiest place right now because of my grief and trauma, and I need to address that before I try to climb the career ladder again. Why not go to the Himalayas and do yoga while I figure it out?

I just have to be more serious this time. Goa was tough because it the first time. Bali felt more like a vacation from reality than anything else. Rishikesh, however… that is The Yoga Capital of the World. It’s very serious. Like… Fuck around and find out!

I need that. I need to be in a place where I can’t sneak out at night in search of alcohol to numb the pain of feeling my feelings. That being said… hook me up with dat Himalayan Kush, fam!

How do they say it in Reservation Dogs, “Weed is the Creator’s medicine, alcohol is the Devil’s work.”

Truth!

—-

Update from later:

Walked into some old man’s bday party. Definitely decided not to get myself involved. After all, I have nothing to say to a group of old married men.

Sat at the bar and minded my own business. Chatted with the bartender for awhile. Luckily, the one I kissed before wasn’t there. thank god. The story she told me was depressing. She was talking about how she has to grocery shop for 6 people in HK without a car. The entire time she was talking, I could not get the picture of my mom loading piles of groceries into the back of the minivan. I used to hate on it a lot, but now I truly appreciate the luxury the American people actually have.

And then we just pissed it away….

—-

Update from later later:

Will tell this part of the story later. To be continued…

BLOG: I Am Not Invisible

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Monday.

I am not in my regular writing routine so I’m just sitting here right now like… where was I?

Ok. I had just finished watching The Season and speculating whether or not my Neighbor would have played the role he auditioned for in a significantly less sleazy manner.

Right.

So what do you think the next choice I made was?

That’s right. I decided to go up to the Secret Society and collect material for my own version of “The Season,” fancy yacht parties not included. Welcome to the Mid-Levels Madness. Here we go.

So, first thing is first. That place is so fucking WEIRD. I cannot describe the vibe up there. I’ve been in there multiple times now as a member, I’ve given it an open mind, and yeah, like… it’s definitely giving “Secret Society” vibes.

The first problem I noticed was that all the regulars clocked me RIGHT AWAY, but no one actually said hello. They all just gathered in the corner and started talking amongst each other. There is nothing unusual about this specific group behavior, but it was definitely giving weird vibes.

I briefly wondered if the married Irishman I just rejected last week was all up in there talking shit. Maybe! Who knows! Not sure why I’m the problem for saying I prefer to have a real relationship with a single man instead of falling for some married guy’s imaginary made up fairytale fantasy… AGAIN. No thanks, bro! That ship has sailed! But sure, do whatever you have to do to ruin my life so you can avoid accountability. I’ve seen it all before.

I decided to ignore it. Maybe they are not talking about me at all.

Eventually, this random lady I had never met before came over and started chatting me up. She was cool enough. I just felt really awkward because she made a comment about my appearance and I had to say, “I’m 37.”

I know that I look young, but rest assured, I’m not some random 23-year-old sugar baby looking for her next daddy. Pretty sick of the whole “predatory older men using me for the own agenda” thing, honestly.

So the whole conversation was awkward, but I managed to hold my own, as per usual. Living in South Dakota may have fucked up my entire life, but I grew up in the DC area to a father who was a very well-known prominent lawyer. I can hold my own in these rooms whether I want to, or not.

So the conversation was happening, and I just kept trying to steer it towards the fact that I am in the market for a job that is not F&B or teaching. I don’t know how well that went, but I made an effort.

Then shit got really weird. All of a sudden, this one old British finance bro turned around and gave me a huge hug out of nowhere. Everyone in the room just stopped and stared at me while I put on a fake smile and tried to pretend I wasn’t insanely uncomfortable in that moment.

“Oh, you know him?” The lady asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Not well,” I said. “I’ve only met him here a few times. He’s the one who invited me to join.”

Another raised eyebrow. Yes, lady, I know. I’ve seen him out here creeping on young ladies too. I’m not an idiot. I know what’s going on. I ALSO don’t feel comfortable with him randomly putting his arms around me and showing me off to the whole crowd like a prized racing horse who just won him a trophy at Sha Tin.

So icky! Gross! It was just gross.

Somehow, it got worse. Right at that moment, out of absolutely fucking nowhere, the Finance Bro who invited me to snort coke off a dirty bathroom toilet seat and then proceeded to grope me in front of everyone appeared. And not only did he appear, but he, too, embraced me in front of everyone and made me do that obnoxious “kiss on both cheeks” greeting that, honestly, I totally get is cultural, but also… no.

Literally as he was kissing my cheeks, all I could think about was how close his face had probably been to a dirty bar toilet only moments before. Even as I write this… the expression on my face is like… ew… no… disgust… no.

I truly felt so violated in that moment. Once again, he just could not resist putting his grimy paws all over me and grabbing me in places I did not give him express, specific consent to grab.

Then came the most horrifying part: the fact that I CONTINUED TO PRETEND SMILING AND ACTING LIKE NONE OF THIS FUCKING BOTHERED ME EVEN THOUGH ALL I WANTED TO DO WAS RUN HOME AND SHOWER.

It was terrible. Honestly, so terrible. It really put me off going back up there again. Before, I was like, “Well… you know… it might just be me. Maybe I got too drunk, maybe I misunderstood, maybe there’s more to this place than I think, after all… it IS important to be in these types of rooms… you know, for the connections! Networking! This is just how it is. It’s the same in DC, in SD, in NYC, in HK, everywhere. You have to know which rooms are going to help you get where you need to go. This room could help me get where I need to go.”

But then… No. Girl, no! WTF?! Just… no!

For one brief shining moment, I really sat there and asked myself, “What am I doing right now? Why am I coming into this place where I have repeatedly been made to feel unsafe, just to listen to terrible old rich people spew terrible pro-colonialist Old Empire propaganda? All this, just for a blog post 10 whole people might read? Why? To what end? To get a job working for people like this? Why? So I can go back to the comfort of my suburban upbringing and never have to worry about money ever again? Is it really worth it?”

I don’t think it is…

Even now, just recounting this… the look on my face, the feelings I am feeling, everything, all of it. It’s like watching my whole life flash before my eyes.

Just… why?

I don’t know. I think South Dakota ruined me, tbh. All living there taught me how to do was compromise my boundaries and beliefs so I could feel extremely uncomfortable hanging out in rooms full of shitty fucking assholes, political opinions and socioeconomic status irrelevant.

Like… I don’t even know how to find a person I actually like. I have no idea how to have fun. I just think… “This is just how life is, Betsey. You just have to go out there and be around terrible people you don’t like all the time, and that’s just the way it is. You’re the problem for not liking it, Betsey. You need to learn how to turn off all of your feelings and opinions and just watch it all unfold in front of you live in real time. Then you go home and write about it later. That’s what being a writer is. That’s what it means.”

But like… is it?

Should I not be using this life to do something that makes me happy?

Of course!

But like… how do I do that when I legitimately do not know what makes me happy?

There are some things that make me happy. Sitting in a little street-side cafe on a rainy day, writing the afternoon away. Eating a plate of delicious food with the appropriate wine to pair. Snuggling up in bed and watching TV (mostly with my cat, who is sadly no longer with us). Learning new things. Reading. Drawing, painting, coloring. The feeling of hunting through a discount sale or secondhand shop in search for the perfect dress to wear out to dinner by myself just so I can feel beautiful for a night,

None of these things make money or involve a career. The career question is so hard right now. I literally do not know how to not be completely miserable at a job. I’ve mostly had TERRIBLE work experiences because the SD culture is so fucking hostile towards outsiders of all kinds. I can’t remember the last time I had a job I liked. I really thought teaching would be the change I needed, but it’s not.

My dream job is to not have to work in a place where I have to put on a big fake smile and pretend I’m a Disney character every day. I can’t do it. I can’t keep it together. I do not have that ability. I cannot hide my emotional state at all, ever. It is what it is.

I don’t know what’s right for me. Again, we just know it’s not teaching children or yoga, and it’s definitely not serving other people. But those are the only jobs I’ve ever had… and I don’t have the experience on my resume necessary to just switch without going back to school or finding someone to speak for me as a reference.

I just feel so stuck right now. My mind just goes back to the same place it always does: Fight, Flight, Fawn, or Freeze. Right now all I seem to do in HK is fawn or freeze. Now I’m a place where I either have to fight to stay or take flight. If I take flight, it’s very clear that I only have a certain amount of time/money before I end up back in the US, homeless, without meaning, purpose, or direction, and back in my abusive family home. If I stay here, there’s only a certain amount of time/money before my luck runs out and I end up in the same place.

But what if I flee to a yoga shala in India and hide out in the Himalayas until I go cray-cray a la Black Narcissus and jump off a cliff?

Why does that ending seem so inevitable all the time? Ugh. I fully blame my dad for saying dumb shit to me my whole life like, “You could be just like [insert name of writer who killed themselves here].”

Like, yeah, that shit is so real. I don’t even have kids or a husband or a house in the burbs, but I 100% get why Sylvia Plath stuck her head in an oven. You don’t need to encourage more of that energy to grow within me just to prove to your narcissistic ego that yes, you did, in fact, spawn a “misunderstood genius” who may not be accepted in this life, but maybe famous in the next.

Terrible parenting, tbh. 0/10, would not choose to be born to either of these nutjobs ever again.

Who am I? What am I doing with my life? I don’t know anything anymore.

All I know if that today is the perfect day to judge people based on their “umbrella walks,” so that’s what I’m going to do.

The End!

BLOG: Wild Wednesday

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Thursday night.

At the pizza place. Not eating pizza for once.

I am actually on my way to a stand-up comedy open mic that this random Irish guy invited me to last night. I don’t know if I will actually get up there and do a set. I just feel like I should go and do a vibe check. I did prepare some material just in case I do get brave. We’ll see what happens.

Otherwise, last night was ridiculous, as per usual. Yesterday in general was pretty bad for me. My friend and I made plans to go to the beach, but she cancelled, which was really disappointing to me. I didn’t want to go alone, so I stayed home and watched The Darjeeling Limited again and cried about my Dead Daddy Issues. What a great way to spend a holiday! LOL!

I thought maybe it was better to sit with the grief for once instead of trying to drown it out with substances. Painful but necessary.

After a very long nap, I woke up and decided to go out instead of staying home and feeling sorry for myself. I went up to the Secret Society, which was DEAD AF! It was awesome. I was sitting there writing, keeping to myself, enjoying the fact that the playlist on deck was literally all of my mix CDs from when I was a teenager, and that’s when it happened.

Some random older man came in, looked right at me, sat down next to me, and immediately started talking to me. Ugh. First he tried to guess where I’m from. He guessed every country except the US before finally deciding I was Polish. He said he couldn’t figure me out because I wear Pumas and heavy winged eyeliner like they do in the Middle East? Whatever. Finally, I revealed I was American. Then he tried to guess what part of the US I’m from. Then he tried to guess my age. I just sat there messing with him for awhile. It was funny!

He told me he’s from Denmark. Some kind of shipping magnate or something. He didn’t say exactly what he does. I don’t really care anyway. We chatted for awhile about Brazil, which was a pleasant surprise. Then he asked me to come home with him to his gigantic two-story apartment up in the Mid-Levels. He was like, “I promise we’ll just hang out in the kitchen and drink wine.”

Obviously, I said no. As soon as I said no, he was like, “You’re so angry! Why are you angry?” IDK because I was just crying over my dead dad all day and now some creepy old man is trying to lure me back to his apartment so he can Weinstein me? Gee, I wonder!

He followed me on Instagram and the first thing I saw on his page were pictures of his wife and children. Like… really confused about your plan right now, bro. Do you keep your family on the first floor and you mistresses on the first floor? What is happening here?

It gets worse. He wanted my WhatsApp number and when I looked at his picture, he was using a picture of himself from when he was 22! This man is in his 50’s! He has white hair and a giant beer belly! That is literally catfishing! I just can’t with these men and their delusions. How do you even take yourself seriously right now?

Insanity.

Finally, he left, so I went back down the escalator to the Cantina to visit my friend as she closed down the bar. After a brief chat, I set off to walk home. This is when the night finally got interesting.

As I was walking home, I passed the corner bar on Peel Street and saw my favourite “Auntie” standing out front. Everyone knows this lady. I don’t know exactly what she “does.” I always see her working in different places along the escalator. After last night, I’m officially convinced she is some kind of local Gangster Boss who keeps the neighborhood bar scene in line. I love it. Low-key obsessed. Legendary.

I chatted with her for a bit. She got me a beer and went off to do her business, whatever that may be. Right at that moment, a very tall, sexy Aussie beefcake walked across the street, looked at me, looked at her, and immediately came inside to say hello to her and introduce himself to me.

Naturally, the first question I asked him was, “So, you are Aussie, huh? Can you wrestle a crocodile?”

He laughed at me and shrugged his shoulders casually. “Actually, I can,” he said.

“Great, then you can definitely handle me!”

He kept laughing at me. He thought I was a riot! We sat for a bit talking and then two Irishmen came into the bar. They knew the Aussie, so we all started talking together. They invited us to go to another bar to watch whatever World Cup game was on TV, so we followed them to the next location. Keep in mind it was like… 1am at this point.

So we get there and everyone is all into their soccer. I don’t personally give a fuck about soccer. I just like the part at the end when they score the winning goal and take their shirts off and run around the field. What can I say? Objectifying beautiful men is its own sport.

I just watched the room instead. There were three die-hard DRC fans wearing jerseys, singing the Congolese National Anthem in French. Lots of people who were there specifically to see England lose and a handful of people who were there to see England win. I guess England won? I don’t really care.

The Aussie guy ordered a beer, didn’t drink any of it, and then just got up and left the table to disappear into the night. Guess he didn’t want to wrestle this crocodile after all.

I started chatting with the Irishmen instead. They told me the place where I traced my Irish ancestry to (County Cavan) is known as the biggest shithole in all of Ireland. I said, “Well, that’s why my family got on a boat and left.” They thought that was the funniest thing they’d ever heard.

As it turns out, one of them does stand-up comedy. He invited me to a comedy open mic night he is hosting in my neighborhood tonight. My friend was THRILLED! She has been pushing me to do it for MONTHS! I don’t know if I will do it. I’m just going for the vibe check.

I prepared something just in case. It’s my “Six Nations” routine, lol. I don’t think it will fit into 3 minutes though. I don’t even know what I could fit into three minutes. That’s why I’m just going to watch for now. I gotta watch how they do it so I can learn. TV comedy specials are great, but you’re seeing a professional, polished product. You’re not seeing them at amateur hour working the crowd and testing out material. That’s where the real learning happens.

Anyway, I used the incident to tell my neighbor to go fuck himself. Like, see? I do more than just get drunk and make out with random guys in elevators! He’s just jealous that he is not one of the guys in the elevator with me. That’s on him.

I still invited him to the 4th of July party in spite of his weird behavior last Saturday night. He doesn’t know I plan on imitating his British accent all night and calling him a “dirty old bird.” I don’t even know what that means. I just saw it in an old British movie this week and now I’m going to call him that forever. Just a bit o’ cheeky banter. Nothing serious. Just gotta give it back to him.

We’ll see if he doesn’t chicken out on 4th of July. In the meantime, I am off to the comedy club now. Let’s see what happens!

Ugh, I know, my site has been offline for two weeks. I need to get back on there and fix it up. I’m all out of sorts right now. It’s just like… ugh.

Okay, okay, I really have to go now. Will update on how it went tomorrow. Ta ta!

BLOG: The Longest Movie Ever

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Wednesday.

I have a job interview today and I don’t want to stress about it, so I am going to talk about something else instead. That something else is the film “Lawrence of Arabia,” which is a journey I went on yesterday in an attempt not to freak out. Let’s unpack this.

I decided to watch this movie because it was one of my dad’s favourite movies. He spent an exchange year in Lebanon way back “before The War” (there’s been many but he was only referring to one, which I can’t remember the dates of) so I guess this film reminds him of that. Cool. I am here to deal with my grief, and if that means watching a movie to do it, sign me up.

There’s only one problem: This movie is THREE fucking house and 47 goddamn minutes long! WHY?! Oh my god! I can’t even imagine sitting in a movie theatre for that. I need more than one Intermission. In fact, I took my first three-hour Intermission about 20 minutes before the actual Intermission. That’s how long this movie is. I still haven’t finished it. I think there’s something like 25 minutes still left? Oh my god. Somehow it literally just never ends!

So right off the bat, I noticed this guy Lawrence is neurodivergent AF. They spend the first few minutes showing how he doesn’t fit in with the other British Officers because he’s too weird. He does weird things like have an Arabic newspaper (no doubt Al Jazeera) delivered to him, which he reads aloud and forms opinions on, much to the shock of his illiterate cohort who can barely read English. He’s also way too happy and way too smiley. There’s definitely something off about this guy, so they send him upstairs to meet with the Big Guns. They’re like, “You’re too weird to be here, we’re shipping you off to Arabia so you’ll have something to do.”

He goes off to the Middle East. There, he meets a lot of white guys with spray tans. It looks like they used some kind of combination of artificial tanner with heavy bronzer mixed with charcoal. Somehow he manages to keep his golden blonde hair perfectly gelled the entire time he’s out in the desert getting his own tan. This part of the film takes approximately 17 million years. Somehow it only amounts to an hour. Not even. How?

Then we meet Sir Alec Guinness as Prince Feisel, which is basically just Obi-Wan Kenobi wearing brown face and a significantly more fabulous traditional robe. He starts babbling on about the Geneva Code, which is a total anachronism because this movie is set during World War 1, aka 1914-1918. The Geneva Convention is a post-World War II creation, having been ratified in 1949.

No one ever actually met any Bedouins, Arabs, Turks, etc etc etc before making this movie. There are also no women in this film. As I said, there’s about 25 minutes left and so far I’ve only seen women twice. The first was during a display of their colorful traveling tents, which shows a woman’s hand peaking out. She is wearing a diamond bracelet. That’s it. That’s the whole scene. Later we catch a glimpse of the women standing above the peak, waving off the men as they ride their horses and camels off to war.

Imagine a world without women! Yes, it’s true. There are no women in this world, at all. That’s when it starts to get sexy. There’s definitely a lot of homoerotic undertones going on in this movie. At first I thought I was imagining it, but then Lawrence comes out of the desert with a teenage boy, heads to Officers’ Club, and demands a bed with sheets and a glass of lemonade for the traumatized teen who just watched his friend get swallowed up by a sandpit. Everyone is giving Lawrence the side-eye like… a bed with sheets just for him, huh? Right. Sure, Jan! We totally believe you.

*wink wink, nudge nudge*

Then we have about 20 minutes of British Officers standing around shaking hands saying, “Well done, well done indeed. We sent you in there to sort things out, and you’ve done it. You’ve gotten it all sorted out. Well done, well done, well done.”

Insert small military parade through the fort here.

Now I finally understand why we’re always going to war in the Middle East. It’s so all these delusional nutjobs can live their best Lawrence of Arabia fantasy. They all really think they’re going to be this guy someday. Wild.

Then after we have an actual male rape scene, where Lawrence is taken prisoner by the Turks, I think? The Big Boss walks down the line, looks him up and down, and starts eye-fucking him like crazy. The soldiers grab Lawrence and strap him down to the bench while the Big Boss preps himself. It’s… a lot. Like, wow. And then they just cut away to his friend listening to the screams outside the prison in horror.

I couldn’t help but think to myself that if this movie had been re-made now, we would all be subjected to a graphic, uncomfortable rape scene. Well, maybe not, because it’s a man, so we can’t show that. But if it’s a woman, definitely. Show the whole graphic scene, just for funsies! UGH!

Then we meet an American journalist named Jackson Bentley. That does not sound like a writer name. That sounds like a male entertainer who comes out dressed like a cowboy for his bit in the Magic Mike Live show. He’s asking all these questions and making comments about how fucked up everyone outside of America is. I finally understand where he’s coming from after moving around Asia for a year. Sometimes I see people doing batshit insane stuff that’s clearly leftover from some five century-old beef and I’m like, “Why?”

Anyway, he turns Lawrence into a celebrity. The parallels with certain political leaders are scary and undeniable. We get subjected to all sorts of crazy photo ops showing Lawrence is crazy AF. Then maybe he gets taken to the Turkish prison? I can’t remember which one happened first. I had to turn the movie off after the rape scene. That was too much for me. Where was the trigger warning, y’all?!

So after they finish, they throw Lawrence outside into the mud and leave him to die. Luckily, his bestie is there to pick him up and say, “Been there, girl. Let’s take you home and get you cleaned up.” After this he is only ever seen wearing freshly-laundered, pure white robes, because he’s an angel, or Jesus, or maybe just a White Savior dressed up in brown face pretending to be a celebrity.

Yep, so, somehow I was watching this movie for like 8 hours and I’m still not finished with it. Wild. I can’t even.

And you know what I didn’t think about? This job interview. I’m probably going to fuck it up, but… if I do fuck up, at least I will fuck up with style and confidence; the American Way!

It’s not actually an interview. They want me to come in and teach a trial class. I am not prepared at all. I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m trying not to stress. I know I’m probably not the best candidate to teach grammar concepts to children. I’m really stiff and uptight and awkward. I’m not fun at all.

I’m not exactly the next Ms. Frizzle, okay? I love her, but I am not her. She is not me. She’s planning outfits and field trips and exciting lessons for her class. I’m watching Lawrence of Arabia and writing a humorous essay deconstructing it from a 21st century perspective. We are not the same.

I have no idea who I am or what I want. I just know that I tried to get on Facebook this morning and I was getting more harassing messages from those idiots back in SD. OMG just leave me alone already! I get it. You hate me. I hate you too. I’m a Hong Konger now. I’m very busy and important. I literally do not have time for your bullshit today, or ever. I have to figure out how I’m going to pretend to be Ms. Frizzle today instead of being my usual awkward self.

I can already feel the pressure to keep this mask on weighing on me. I wish I could find something to do that did not ask me to wear the mask of Neurotypicality. It’s not a mask I can wear. I try, but I can’t help who I am inside, and who I am inside is weird. It is what it is.

Okay, time to go do some yoga now. I got all the thoughts out of my head and onto the page. Like, really, this is my dad’s favourite movie? Jesus. I can’t even. Men and their delusions. It truly is a special treat to watch… sometimes…

Farewell!

BLOG: The Darjeeling Limited

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Fri-yay!

I am currently hungover AF, which is a shame because I had big plans for today. In addition to the two interviews and dozens of rejections, I had three follow-ups that I definitely planned to follow up on today. Naturally, I self-sabotaged by getting way too drunk while I was at home alone.

Welcome to my life. And here I wonder why no one will ever love me, haha. Hey Betsey, here’s a brilliant idea: why don’t you stop looking at men and look at yourself for a change? Learn to love you and the mess that you are instead of waiting for some hot beefcake to rescue you from your bullshit.

Wow, brilliant, so many lessons learned today. I feel so enlightened now!

Yes, yes, yes, learn to love yourself, blah blah blah, become a strong, empowered woman, and all that jazz!

That being said, I would still very much like to end my days by falling into the arms of a hot, sexy beefcake (preferably with an even sexier accent) who just rescued me from a cockroach. That’s the real dream right there.

Listen, Ewan McGregor divorced his wife, married a woman 20 years younger, got her a job playing a Twi’lek in a Star War. It could still happen for me. I could be Wife #3, you know what I’m saying? There’s still time for me to see what’s really underneath the kilt, ya know what I’m saying?

Lol

Hahaha

Yeah I’m definitely still “off my tits” as they say in… Ireland? Scotland? England? Wales? The UK? I don’t even know anymore. They’re all so different. Is this a colonizer phrase? Who even knows anymore?

Breaking News from the Thai-US Embassy: Your passport will be revoked if you’re not making your child support payments on time.

I love this for all Thai women everywhere. Now let’s do the Philippeans! Stop letting these gross Passport Bros get away with shit! If I’m not allowed to go back to Thailand because I pissed off the local branch of the Irish Mafia, then they definitely shouldn’t be allowed back.

I’m totally kidding, of course. I’m not banned from Thailand. They’re would never ban me. All I do there is spend ridiculous amounts of money, and I don’t even talk to Bar Girls! I just blow it all on staying in a ridiculously overpriced loft with a bad pool just so I can be 5ft from the bar I’m obsessed with and all of the beautiful, wonderful, amazing people who frequent it. Love that for me!

Anyway, so that’s why I had to come back to Hong Kong. Now I blow all my money on a tiny little shoebox apartment where I somehow magically lose things like hair clips and my phone, which makes absolutely no sense. It must be the faeries. When in doubt, always blame the faeries, or the “little people,” as we say in South Dakota. Well, I don’t know if that’s what “they” say, but it’s definitely what Mad Dog used to say!

So yeah, I was definitely supposed to do real, actual, productive things today. Not sure that’s going to happen, which is unfortunate because I have things I really need to get done.

Instead I am sitting here at my favourite brunch place, right on the patio, in the heat, away from the air on like a crazy person, sweating it all out as I watch the world pass me by. I love it.

So many hot beefcakes walking by on their way to and from the gym on their lunch break. I love it. Obsessed with the beefcakes. Gimme gimme gimme a man after midnight! Won’t somebody take the shadows away!

Everyone here thinks I’m so crazy for sitting in the heat instead of the aircon. Like, I get it, the weather is insane, but I really need to sweat it out. I keep telling them I used to live in a very, very, very cold place and now all I want to do is be out in the sun and sweat all my shitty feelings out. They don’t understand me. It is what it is.

Here is my real question: how do I get paid to sit in a restaurant and just watch people on the street? This is the only job I know how to do. Everything else is just, like, so stressful, you guys.

I literally do not know how people exist in the full-time corporate job world. They are all so fucking weird. They have no personal lives, no hobbies, no personalities, nothing. They just work, work, work, and then maybe go to the gym, and then they wonder why they’re all so unhappy, and then they make the rest of us feel bad about not being obsessed with work like that are.

Like, listen, I get it. I hate my family too. Honestly, the majority of them are terrible, narcissistic people who treat other people like shit and literally cannot handle being talked to in the same way. All I’ve ever wanted to do is get the fuck away from them. But I don’t throw myself into a job just to escape from that. That’s how you end up dying in a pile of your own shit, just like my dad. It is what it is.

I still remember the last thing my dad said to me before we all went to bed and I found him almost dead the next day. His last words to me were: “Can you pick me up a chocolate mocha frappachino?”

And then we found him half-dead in bed the next morning and then he was in a coma for two weeks and I had to be the one who called in the medicine man to read him his last rights because my stupid, evil mother was too drunk to literally do anything except be mean to me, and then I had to watch him die in the hospital bed right in front of me.

And then literally everyone in that stupid fucking shithole town was a giant fucking asshole about it, because that’s who they are and that’s what they do. Thanks again for ruining my life, Dad! So grateful for everything??????

Lol, yeah, whatever, at least I get to live in Asia now. Just like I always dreamed. Literally. My life only got better because my dad died. How fucking fucked up and shitty is that? It is what it is.

And this is why I have no idea how to have fun.

This is why men are a problem. They think it’s MY job to provide “fun” for them and then they get mad when they have to do actual emotional labor in the middle of the fucking blackout they put me in by plying me with booze nonstop.

So fucking stupid. Clean up your own mess, bro. I can’t do that for you. I will never do that for you. I am not your fucking mommy, okay? I’m not picking up your dirty underwear off the floor or doing your laundry or cleaning your house or cooking you food. Your job is to stand there looking sexy while fanning me with a giant palm leaf, then carry me away on my solid gold throne. Okay? Okay.

This is why I’m not married. My spirit did not reincarnate multiple times just to serve some stupid fucking man who won’t even wash his own dirty asshole. Fuck you and your fucking patriarchy. I am the motherfucking Queen!

“You don’t have to love me. You don’t even have to like me. But you will respect me. Why? Because I’m a Boss!” -Kelis

SO I had some things to do today. Instead I’m sitting here on the patio writing crazy, unhinged things and having notions. This is exactly why my Irish ancestors got on that fucking boat and came to America. Their dream was for the 7th generation ahead of them to sit on a patio and write and make art and look fabulous while doing fucking NOTHING! No work down by the docks or in the factories or on the farm. No having 18 children, half of which died somewhere along the way. No nothing. I don’t have to do shit now, just like my ancestors dreamed. Yet somehow, I still feel so unfulfilled…

I have definitely sat in the heat for too long. It’s starting to make me sick. I need to go inside and sit by the aircon.

Okay, okay, okay, done done done.

Now inside. The sound of the construction on the Temple is very loud. I like this spot because it’s close to the historic Man Mo Temple. Man Mo is the god of “literature.” I always stop at the gates on my way home to say a prayer. I love the “Under Construction” vibe right now. It makes me feel better about myself. Like, yes, we have stood the test of time and survived, for better or for worse. That being said, sometimes we need to take some time to fix ourselves up for the sake of future preservation. It is what it is. I love it. I’m so here for it.

I should get a job as a bar cat. Like the meme. I don’t work. I don’t care. I just sit in the wrong spot and somehow run the entire place. Like Andrew did at Bloody Mary’s. Is my dream to actually be Andrew? Is that why I was so obsessed with him for like, what, ten years? Who even knows anymore!

That’s the second time this week I’ve thought about Andrew. I haven’t thought about Andrew in a long time. I mean, how could I? Between the Hot Beef Stew and The Russian, my heart, mind, and va-jay-jay has been extremely occupied. There’s very little space for a fictional character these days. I just meet so many attractive men. Sometimes I still look at Andrew’s old pictures and think to myself, “Wow, I really thought this guy was hot.” Goes to show how slim the pickins really are out there on the lone prairie. His catchphrase should be, “Yikes on Bikes!”

I will always remember this chapter as that time I was so desperate to get railed by a hot sexy beefcake that I wrote two whole books about the bartender I thought was really hot from far away, but only in a dark room.

Just kidding. I just thought of him now sitting in the doorway with his mountain man beard, looking mean and old and cranky AF, wearing some ancient fucking t-shirt from some concert he went to in the 90’s, taking off his baseball cap and wiping his forehead in exhaustion, as if he had actually done something productive today. Like maybe he mowed the lawn without the t-shirt and hat on, and then walk down to fetch the mail while I was riding by on my white horse, and that’s why he’s tired, or something? IDK!

Sorry, wow, wait, did it just get hotter in here? Because I’m literally sitting under the aircon right now and I just started sweating again.

I mean… he might not be the Pabst Blue Ribbon winner of the Magic Mike Live contest, but something about that really did it for me. I mean, you don’t see me sitting here writing two novels about The Russian. It is what it is.

I know I love him because I have lived my whole life being screamed at and called crazy, and he’s the only person who ever did that in a way that actually turned me on. I was so into it. I was like, “Please, yell at me more. I don’t know why I like this but I do.”

I don’t like it coming from anyone else, but when you do it, it’s like… somehow the hottest thing ever? No one knows.

Awww, my Andrew. I loved my Andrew. I really did. At least, I thought I did. Let’s be real here. I have never been in an actual, meaningful long-term relationship. I just stare at hot guys from far away and fantasize about what it would be like to have them fan me with a giant palm leaf. I don’t know jack shit about love.

But if you asked me if I’ve ever been in love with anyone… I would tell you it was Andrew, every single time. I loved him. I really did. I don’t know what real love is… but… whatever I felt was pretty close to that. I hope he’s happy now, wherever he is. Maybe Seattle? Who even knows these days? I don’t know. I don’t look for him or check in on him or ask about him. I don’t have to. He just visits me in my dreams…

*sigh*

Anyways, yes, what the fuck was I talking about again? My dad dying? The fact that I moved to the other side of the planet just to be this fucked up all the time? Maybe something about paying child support so your passport doesn’t get revoked? Who even knows anymore!

I really need to eat something. All I had for a dinner was a plastic cup full of olives and feta cheese to go with the two bottles of wine I drank after eating nothing all day.

I think sometimes I act this way because I just want to die and I lack the courage to just jump off the rooftop when the void calls to me. So I just kill myself slowly with alcohol and cigarettes and men instead. It is what it is.

Anyway, I can’t kill myself. I’ve already tried multiple times. It never works. Someone up there wants me to live, to survive, to give something back to this world. I don’t understand. If I’m still alive after all of this, I must have some kind of purpose. I just don’t know what that purpose is. I just know when I look at worksheets about teaching grammar to children, I feel absolutely nothing at all. It means nothing to me. I’m just here for the job, the visa, the paycheck. I can’t make a difference in this world. I’m just a woman, standing here in front of a white board, asking for a steady paycheck without the cost of being bullied at work.

It is what it is.

I really need to eat something. I haven’t eaten anything substantial in like… at least two days. At least.

It is what is.

I like that scene in the Darjeeling Limited at the end when they all leave their baggage behind and board the train, waving it all goodbye. That’s the vibe right now. I just want to leave my impossibly heavy suitcases behind and hop that train to the next shitty little village in India, and do yoga with a giant snake, and just have fun and live life and have a good time.

I wish I was fun. I just want to have fun. Someone, please, teach me how to have fun. I just want to have some fun!

Okay, I’m done now. I really do need to eat something or I will actually pass out in this “brunch concept” of a restaurant right now.

The End!

BLOG: Scars from the Past

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Monday.

My neighborhood and the coffee shop are both dead as a doornail. I asked the barista if there is a holiday I don’t know about today. He said the holiday is next week. He also says Mondays are usually pretty dead for some reason. No one really knows why. It could just be the fact that it’s raining. It is what it is.

I did not do much after writing yesterday. Sat at the brunch place for awhile drowning myself in mimosas, then went home and finished Running Point on Netflix. Sent out more job applications. Creeped on a bunch of Facebook groups to compare my CV to other people’s to see where I can make improvements.

It’s shocking to me how many people just cram their CV with as many words as possible. So many of these pages look so crowded from a visual standpoint. If it were me doing the hiring, I would throw those in the trash and go for something with a more minimalistic style. I myself prefer a more minimalistic style. The less work the person on the other hand has to do, the better.

I’ve made so many versions of my CV now. It’s exhausting. I’m not getting anything back! It’s ridiculous. Like, I have an HKID card. I live here. I lead with that in my cover letter. It shouldn’t be this hard.

I know, I know, the job market everywhere is cooked. Everyone is getting laid off. No one can find a job. Blah blah blah, blah blah blah. Okay, well, I don’t have time for that shit. I need a job, fast. I’ve been at this for months and the only offer I have on the table is an unpaid yoga work trade in Cambodia that doesn’t start until the end of July. That’s ridiculous. What is wrong with the job market right now?

Networking is getting me nowhere. It’s literally just going into rooms full of people who are doing cocaine and only care about getting more cocaine. It’s exhausting. I’m starting to feel like the only person in the world who has no interest whatsoever in doing cocaine and/or drugs of any kind. Alcohol is bad enough for me. We don’t need to add additional things to the mix.

Well, I can’t go back to the States because there’s nothing left there for me. I sold my car, I don’t have a place to go, the job market is even more of a hilarious joke, healthcare and education are impossibly expensive. It’s just not a realistic option.

I need to just be insanely positive to the point of being delusional and focus on manifesting good outcomes. I made it this far in life. I’ve got my first year abroad behind me. I’ve made all the dumbest mistakes out of ignorance I can make. It’s only uphill from here. Just get on that escalator and head on up.

Someone tried to say to me the other day, “If your father was here, he would be so proud of you.” I laughed in their face. I hate that fakeass shit. I get that you’re trying to be nice, but with all due respect, you’re completely wrong.

My father would have thrown a hysterical shit fit, screamed at me, and tried everything he could to stop me from leaving. Then if I left anyway, he and my mother would have given me the silent treatment until a random, important, crucial moment in my life (like a meeting or a class or something special) to call me up and unleash a full tantrum over something completely insignificant that I had nothing to do with, just so they could sabotage my special moment and make me feel bad for ever leaving.

How do I know this? Because this is what they did to me when I wanted to study abroad in France. I wanted to go for a whole year. They let me go for one month and refused to speak to me the entire time I was there. I had to ask for money one time and I got screamed at. Yes, heaven forbid you make sure your child isn’t starving to death while she is away at school. It must be such a burden to you to make sure your children have groceries!

When I went to the Paris Writing Workshop, my mother didn’t speak to me for the first two weeks I was there. Instead, she waited until the day I had my first critique and spammed my phone with messages and phone calls, screaming at me over an emergency purchase I told her I had made two weeks prior.

She also pulled this same tactic when I was living at home during the pandemic. I was taking all these different classes and attending online writing conferences. She spent the entire weekend of AWP constantly barging into my room to scream at me, completely unaware that she was live on camera and the mic was on. I had so many messages from people asking me if I was safe. I didn’t even know how to respond because the answer was no.

Then when I was taking a dance class, she cut off the internet on the day of my recital so I couldn’t perform. Then when I tried to fix it, she was just screaming at me and berating me. I had to leave the group. It was so humiliating.

They had a long history of this. She used to pull the same tactic with me around midterms and finals. Every finals week was a battle of survival for my mental health.

When I wanted to transfer to another school because I was unhappy, I got screamed at. When I wanted to quit to take a break and figure my life out, I got screamed at. When I was offered my jobs at the resorts in Utah and Montana, I got screamed at AND threatened! She said that if I took my car to drive out to either of these jobs, she would report it stolen to the police. Then she would come back in later and scream at me to get a job and move out. Like, I literally would have done that at age 18, but you didn’t want that. In fact, you have literally done everything you can to prevent me from doing well in school, finding a full-time job, and surviving on my own.

This is about the time my father would join in and start screaming at me that I’m an embarrassment and he is ashamed of me and that I make him look bad in front of all the important law people. Well, dad, you’re the one who insisted on making all of my important life choices for me. Now you’re surprised that I’m unhappy and unsuccessful? Well, maybe if you had let me choose where I wanted to go to university and what I wanted to study and let me live the life I wanted to live, you wouldn’t be stuck with a child who makes you feel so much shame.

Do you know why you feel so much shame? Because YOU made these choices for me. YOU chose wrong and it’s not in your programming to be wrong, so now you’re blaming me for the bad choices YOU made. You feel shame because you should be ashamed. You were a terrible father. You failed me every single step of the way. Now you are projecting that shame outwardly onto me, and I’m not going to go along with it anymore.

The logic is not there with these people, okay? They’re not happy for me. They’re not proud of me. They’re mad they lost their scapegoat. I am and always have been a human whipping post for my family in general. I’m not going to pretend otherwise just because my dad is dead.

Anyway, enough about that. That part is over now! My dad is dead and I have permanently cut contact with my mother and the rest of her psychotic family. They cannot hurt me anymore. Every step forward I take from this moment is another step further and further away from them. Soon I will be completely financially idepedent. I will have my own phone plan. I will have control over my own identity documents. I will have my own place. I will be completely free from their influence forever.

The only thing preventing me from achieving my goal of absolute freedom from my family is this shitty fucking job market. Get it together, world. Stop snorting coke and outsourcing your brain power to AI and voting for Trump and just do us all a solid and make the world a better place.

Just reminding myself of all the reasons I am extremely motivated to get my shit together. My priorities are simple: Masters Degree, successful writing career, fabulous apartment, husband/partner who doesn’t suck, travel the world. Okay, okay, done. Your wish is my command.

Okay, I’m done with reflecting on how shitty my parents were now. I have real shit I have to do today, like stop off my clothes at the laundry and clean my apartment and figure out where to buy deodorant because I finally ran out of the year-long backup supply I brought with me from the States with exactly two weeks left to go. Not bad, right? I know! I even have three or four razors left, which is especially surprising. I use the Intuition kind and wasn’t sure if I could get those here, so I brought a backup supply. Somehow I calculated it exactly right, which is awesome. Go me.

Ugh, I just looked over at the book the lady next to me is reading. The page she has open is all about the Thai tradition of taking care of your parents and giving back to them in gratitude for bringing you into this life. LOL, ha ha, yeah right. There’s nothing to give back to them. My mother can sink her claws into someone else and manipulate them into taking care of her in her old age. I have finally broken free from the chains of abuse. I don’t owe her, or anyone else in my fucked up family, jack shit.

Someday I hope to be free from the anger I feel towards my parents. That day is not today. It may never come. Whatever freedom I find from my anger will be for the sake of myself, not for them. I am on a healing journey for me. It is what it is.

Off for real now. Have a good day!

BLOG: Erotic Thriller Inspiration

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Friday afternoon.

Post-yoga vibes. Waiting on my lunch at the healthy place. I am trying to be kinder to myself and embrace the whole “healthy yogi” thing. I like cheeseburgers far too much to ever go full crunchy, but a side of granola every now and then isn’t a bad thing.

The other thing preventing me from going full crunchy is the whole anti-vaxx thing. It’s just not compatible with my world view. Like, at all. Anyway, let’s not get into that. Let’s just say I met way too many people in India and Bali who did not get vaxxed before traveling to a tropical destination and could not understand how they got sick.

My yoga session today was more like a meditation session. I did a little bit of stretching, but mostly I sat still and meditated. It felt like the more natural thing to do on this specific occasion. I wasn’t sure why until I pictured myself sitting on a beach and suddenly my dad’s spirit appeared in front of me. He wanted to talk to me. It was very difficult, but I let him speak. He says that he is sorry and he’s watching out for me, blah blah blah, all that lame cheesy shit. Cue the waterworks! Wahhh!

Yeah, it is what it is.

Now I am sitting here at the healthy place, eavesdropping on two Western businessmen having a meeting behind me. One is French and the other one is Italian. Neither of them are living up to the stereotype of Handsome or Sexy. They are doing business in English, so I can understand them. Sort of. I actually have no idea what the fuck they’re talking about. Assets and funds and investments. Snoozefest! Talk about blah blah blah. Is there any subject in this world more boring than finance? Honestly!

Sometimes I think I should just give in to my grandmother’s demands and be boring and go to business school and become a banker/accountant like everyone else on my mom’s side of the family. Then I actually sit here and listen to these Finance Bros talk and I’m like… there’s no way I’m staying awake through an entire semester of this shit. It’s just not for me.

Oh boy. The Italian just started a story with, “Long story short: back in Italy during World War II…”

We’re gonna be here all afternoon at this rate.

Ooh, now it’s finally getting interesting. Apparently this is some kind of Art Deal. Juicy. Show me the good stuff! I need inspiration for my erotic thriller movie starring The Russian. “Shady Art Deal Gone Wrong in Hong Kong” could be just the thing we’re looking for to prop up this otherwise plotless smut!

“Are you going to cancel me for being a big, strong, alpha male?”

No, but I am going to turn you into a character in the sort of 90’s cheesy erotic thriller bored finance bros like you watch alone on a Tuesday night and jerk off to before falling asleep on your ugly leather couch.

“She’s an American secret agent sent to Hong Kong to stop the Triads from a planned heist to steal a valuable, priceless work of ancient Chinese art that definitely belongs in a museum. He’s the Russian agent sent in to see the deal through. How many explicit sex scenes can we put in this film before it gets slapped with an NC-17 rating? Is that even a thing anymore? Find out when we see this big, strong, alpha Scorpio male go full-frontal!”

*giggles*

“I do not consent, Liz.” Ohhh, lighten up already! What’s wrong with using your Hyrox stats to speculate whether or not you can fight a bear without a shirt on? Seriously! I think you need more of this energy in your life, personally. You seem really uptight once that mask comes off.

HAHAHAHAHA

Sorry, I can’t help myself. I live for this shit. What good are men if not to use for inspiration for fictional characters?

Hehehehehehe.

So hilarious. LOL!

Definitely feeling better about life now. This is how I cope with my life. I just wave my magic wand and turn them into fiction. 🙂 🙂 🙂

Oooh, this conversation is getting SUPER juicy! They’re talking about rich art collectors in HK who own all these big businesses in Switzerland. Yaaaassssss this is the material I came here to find! GIVE IT TO ME!!!!

Wow, they own a chocolate factory in Switzerland? Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. I never would have come up with that on my own! Never saw this Willa Wonka-ass shit coming. Crazy.

Name dropping JP Morgan. Oooooooh gurrrrrrrlllllll this is JUICY!

Hmm, I think it would be funnier if The Russian’s character was just the nerdy Finance Guy sent in from Switzerland to deliver the briefcase full of cash and she mistakes him for The Russian Spy. The Russian Spy is actually an American double agent backed by MAGA with a completely different agenda. She just bangs the Russian Guy because she catches him in the middle of his Hyrox routine without his glasses on and discovers he has practical skills beyond crunching numbers and doing paperwork. Practical skills like wrestling bears without a shirt on and riding on a motorcycle! That’s hot!

OMG! What the fuck is this movie and why do I want to write it so bad?

Lol at this conversation. Shoutout to the great nations of Italy and France! Thank you for coming together to collaborate on this amazing post today! I am soooo here for it!

Yes, and then we can get my hot neighbor to play the Double Agent and give him his first starring role! YES! I love this movie! It’s going to be the kind of trash you cancel plans to stay in bed to watch alone with your pets and a bottle of wine!!!

14/10, would watch.

Amazing. Love the French. Love the Italians. If only they knew of the literary genius they’re actively inspiring with their conversation right now. I’m sure they would be very proud. They would be like, “Well, of course we have inspired you. We are French/Italian. That is what we do. We invented art!” And then they would have an argument over who actually “invented” art and we’ll all be stuck here all day.

Lol so funny. The French guy said, “Hmm, this is an interesting concept, but I do not think I will be an investor.”

The Italian guy immediately replied, “Well, fuck you.”

They are still sitting here arguing over it 20 minutes later. Now I understand why both teams wear confusingly similar shades of red and blue in the Six Nations tournament. This argument was never actually resolved, ever. Right. Got it.

They’ve changed the subject now. Boring. Off to find a different conversation to eavesdrop on to fuel the creativity now! Ta ta!

BLOG: Recovery Takes Time

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Here we are! Wednesday in Hong Kong! Sitting outside the coffee shop people-watching, as per usual.

I love people-watching in Hong Kong. The outfits! Le gasp! Hong Kongers have such great style. It’s very comfy, very casual, but somehow also very professional and classy. I could sit here and watch people all day, and I have.

Other sights I enjoy seeing while people-watching (aside from the outfits): influencers in the wild, specifically Mainland Chinese influencers in the wild. They are on some next level shit. I cannot even explain it to you. I’ll be going about my normal day and suddenly I see an influencer dressed up in a $10,000 designer ballgown posing on the stairway in front of some random fruit stand. Like, why? I love it. It never stops being funny!!!!

They get real serious. I saw a full-on team the other day with a camera crew that consists of one guy holding multiple phones, a hair & makeup person, and a manager-type dictating out where the next location was. Honestly wasn’t sure if the influencer in question was an actual celebrity/movie star type or just some rich chick with an Instagram account. It’s hard to tell!

My other current obsession with people-watching? Old Chinese uncles. They don’t give a fuck! It’s amazing! The best place to spot them is in the park when they’re getting their workouts in. Some of these old dudes are RIPPED! They’re out here casually doing a million pull-ups like they’re about to get drafted into the army and sent off to war any day. It’s crazy.

And, of course, they’re doing it all with a hand-rolled cigarette in their mouths, mean-mugging anyone who walks by.

They have two modes: working out in the park, and slumped over staring at their phones. There is no in-between.

Welcome to Hong Kong!

So it is official now: I am not going to Ireland… yet. But it’s fine. When I woke up this morning, I heard a little voice in my head saying, “You know what’s better than going to Ireland? Not being in debt!”

And I thought to myself… that is very Irish, and also very correct. Not being in debt is fantastic. It’s the best way to live your life, truly. So we have to make some short-term sacrifices now. In the long-term, hopefully it will all pay off!

I actually do feel better today. There is definitely something to the Guinness-Irish Stew-Mashed Potatoes-Garlic Bread-Chocolate Brownie with Vanilla Ice Cream combo. That shit was real medicine, ya’ll. I can feel it.

I also did a really intense hour-long meditation last night in the middle of the night. I was trying to sleep but they were fixing something on the street so there was this unbearable drilling going on well into the night. I just put on my headphones and went into chakra cleansing mode.

I asked a question but I did not get an answer. Instead my Irish grandmother showed up as my spirit guide and gave me a great big hug. She just kept repeating to me over and over, “You are loved, you are loved, you are loved.”

She also said my dad wants to talk to me, but it’s really hard for him. I agree with that. It’s still really hard for me to talk to him. She said she doesn’t think we are ready yet, so she’s the one that decided to take over for him. I’m cool with that.

Best we can do right now is the occasional song on the radio and gently pushing the dessert menu my way. It is what it is.

I did say one thing to my dead dad’s spirit last week. It was really cathartic. It was after the LiveNation/TicketMaster verdict came out. This was my dad’s dream case. He was working on it when he died. As soon as I saw the news, I stood up and said very loudly to no one in particular, “I don’t give a flying fuck about TicketMaster, Dad!”

And I don’t. I really, really don’t. I don’t care about my dad’s career at all. I don’t care about his students (many of whom were smarmy, obnoxious suck-ups who I genuinely felt lacked real intelligence). I don’t care about his legacy. I don’t care about any of the cases he worked on. I don’t give a flying fuck!!!!!!!

Now the entire world knows the truth about Betsey Horton, Writer Extraordinaire! I do not give a fuck about antitrust law in any way, shape, or form. Not my circus, not my monkeys. The US is totally fucked and there’s no coming back from it. A lifetime of work, all for nothing. Was it really worth it to hurt your children and destroy their lives over it? I don’t think so!

So yeah, I don’t give a fuck. It felt so great to just say that. Yeah. I do not give a fuck. Just like my dad never gave a fuck about me or what was good for my health or well-being. If he really cared, he wouldn’t have forced me to move to South Dakota. He would have just let me go to live my life the way I wanted to live it. But he didn’t. Instead he held me hostage for my entire adult life, and now I’m finally free.

Unfortunately, I still have no idea what to do with my freedom, except apparently get drunk and fall down the stairs and hit my head so hard I turn into Little Miss Optimist!

It’s okay. I’ve been researching this topic. It takes a lot of time to feel safe again after escaping an abusive situation. As we all know, my trauma is of a very complex nature. It’s taken some time to sort things out.

I had identified 4 areas that were the biggest problems: Relationship Trauma, Family Trauma, Work Trauma, and Location Trauma.

As of right now, I feel that I have done the necessary work to heal the Relationship Trauma and the Location Trauma.

I clearly no longer fear men, sex, or dating, so that’s good. I worked that out! That was really hard for me. I didn’t date through my entire 20’s because I was raped and assaulted and had the entire school/town gang up on me and call me a liar when I wrote about it. Now I see that behavior has nothing to do with me as a person.

Conservatives in general simply love predators and abusers. They love protecting them even more. Look who they worship as their King! That behavior has nothing to do with me. That’s just how they are. They’re a basket of deplorables. Always have been, always will be.

Mystery solved! The End!

It can be hard some days. I still have nightmares and flashbacks about living in the Town. It took me about six months after I left the country for it to really sink in that I finally escaped that place for good and I never, ever have to go back there ever again.

Some days I still wake up in a panic thinking I’ll have to go back there someday. But I don’t have to go back. I never, ever have to go back there ever again. I am marked safe from the state of South Dakota, today, tomorrow, forever, and always.

And she lived happily ever after. The End.

So now that I’ve escaped The Town, aka the source of the Location Trauma, I can date, make new friends, meet new people, and network without dealing with any of that bullshit following me around. I get to live a brand new life, free of the Rape Apologists running an active smear campaign in an attempt to ruin my life. And I get to date much, much hotter guys. BIG, BIG, BIG win for me!

Now the two things that are left are Work Trauma and Family Trauma. The Family Trauma is like an open wound that is just spilling out all over everything. It’s just gushing blood, nonstop. Just an endless well of pain. It feels like I’m trying to put a tourniquet on the wound to stop the bleeding but it’s not working. There is no stopping the bleeding. It’s just going to keep coming out till I die on the floor.

There is NO ACCOUNTABILITY from my family whatsoever. NONE! That is the aggravating part. There is just this total refusal to acknowledge anything that happened or talk about it or try to communicate in a healthy way at all.

Everything just gets dumped on me, and I get blamed for everything, and then I get vilified even more when I stand up for myself and say, “Hey, this is actually unhealthy and wrong. I’m not going to be your scapegoat anymore. Please respect my boundaries.” And then what do we get? More stonewalling and silent treatment as “punishment.” It’s all so textbook. It really is!

So there’s clearly nothing to be done about it, because even though I am the one who is tasked with the job of “fixing everything” because it’s always “my fault,” no one will actually sit down with me or take the time to work out any of it. Yet somehow there is always something new to blame on me or some recently invented problem that is magically my fault even though I had nothing to do with it. Love that.

So yeah, we can’t resolve that. I don’t know how to heal from that or resolve it. Just always be sure to remember why it’s always been my life dream to put an ocean between myself and my family. My goal for the future is to just stay as far away from all of them as possible. They can’t hurt me if they’re not in my life anymore.

Really gotta work out this whole job situation so I can be free of them forever. Too bad my applications keep disappearing into a virtual blackhole while these comic book supervillain tech bros shoot up Special K and blabber on about “replacing everyone with robots.”

Where is James Bond when you need him? Seriously. I’m so tired of listening to these utterly deranged men with no empathy or compassion openly talk about destroying the planet. It’s exhausting.

Like, yeah, I remember when I was 17 and hated everyone and wrote a manifesto about nuking the world. Then I grew up. I went to India and studied yoga and learned how to appreciate art and went out into the world and saw the beauty of it all. I stopped being angry and hating everyone and everything. It really made a difference in my life for the better! Y’all should really try it sometime!

Mitakuye Oyasin, assholes.

This leads us into Work Trauma. Obviously, most of this comes from living in South Dakota and being forced to work with and around some of the worst people on Planet Earth. Every job I had when I lived there consisted of non-stop gossiping, bullying, hostility, stealing, cheating, lying, corruption of all kinds, and a general effort to hurt as many people around they could for their own selfish gain.

It was the worst at Starbucks. Everything they did to me there was 100% illegal under the law and against the code of conduct in the Employee Handbook. Nobody cared because they don’t have values or morals or empathy or anything like that. It’s just uncontrolled mob violence at all times.

I don’t flourish in that type of environment because, again, I’m not a sociopath who is willing to crush anyone and everything around me just to make $.50 more. I’m just not interested in that. I don’t like hurting other people. The idea of intentionally running someone out of a job so they no longer have healthcare or a paycheck is literally the definition of “psychotically evil” to me. Yet to most of the people I encountered in South Dakota, it was considered “fun and games.” They would brag about intentionally creating situations where people lost their housing and healthcare.

Horrible, horrible, disgusting, depraved people. Just awful in every sense of the word.

I saw and heard so many horrifying things when I was working in South Dakota. It was unbelievable. Truly. Sometimes I look back on it and think, “I can’t even believe that shit was real. What the fuck is wrong with those people?”

They’re psychotically evil, they have no soul, they lack empathy, and they are sadists who actively take pleasure in being as mean and cruel as possible to other people. That’s what’s wrong with them. It is what it is.

Unfortunately, it’s a very prevalent attitude in the world right now. The worst people on Earth have now all been emboldened by the Dump Truck to be as shitty and evil as they want with zero consequences. Meanwhile, we’re all just sitting here derping around, letting it happen, like… whatever.

Anyway, this is why I could not tolerate the South Africans once I discovered the truth about how they ran the company I originally came to work for here in Hong Kong. I took one look at that crazy apartheid shit and Noped right out. I’m not dealing with that again.

Same thing as South Dakota, but worse, mostly because South Africans don’t hide their shittiness under a fake nice veneer like South Dakotans do. They’re just out in the open about the fact that they are bad people with extremely problematic world views. And you know what? I’m grateful for it, because I saw all of those red flags waving and got the fuck out before getting hurt again. Now I have all the documentation I could ever need to prove that this was actually the company’s problem, not an issue with me as a human being. Go me!

So now I just want to find a situation where I don’t have to deal with any abuse anymore. It’s a dream, I know, but there must be something out there I can do that doesn’t require me to be at the mercy of someone who can accurately be described as a “comic book villain.” I just cannot have that energy in my life anymore. I’ve been vastly overexposed to it. I have no more tolerance for it at all.

Zero tolerance policy towards sociopaths. Period.

In the meantime, we never did figure out what actually happened on Saturday night. One of the baristas just stopped by my table to chat with me about it. She said, “I don’t think it’s safe for you to go out by yourself anymore. I’m really concerned about you after some of the stories you’ve told me about the people you’ve met. The fact that this has happened to you now three times in a month, and it started happening after you met these guys… are you sure there isn’t someone following you or keeping tabs on you? They do that to journalists here, you know.”

Maybe. Who knows? It could be someone messing with me. It could also just be me drinking too much wine. Either way, she is right. It’s not safe to go out alone after dark anymore. Find a friend and go with them, if I go out at all.

It’s comforting to know that someone cares today. It really is. I needed that today. Some days I just feel so alone on this journey.

Anyway, let’s say someone did drug me and attack me on the stairway and hit me in the head to “teach me a lesson.” It obviously didn’t work! I’ve been following a lot of Irish Heritage pages on Facebook and I’m here to tell you my DNA is unmatched in strength and resilience after 900 years of surviving attempted genocide in various forms. It’s gonna take more than a little push down the stairs to get rid of me!

Besides, I’m not a journalist. I’m a writer on an epic journey of self-discovery across the world, dragging a 3-piece luggage set full of heavy trauma behind me. I’m here to start my life over. I want a fabulous apartment and a job I can tolerate and an actual, real long-term relationship with someone who isn’t an abusive, rapey, narcissistic sociopath. It doesn’t seem like it’s a lot to ask for, and yet…

Anyway, I’m off now. My head still hurts. Gonna lay down in bed again with my ice pack and meditate. It’s okay for you to rest, Betsey. It really is. You’ve been through so much already in life, and now you’ve just taken another beating, so yeah… it’s fine if you want to lay down and rest.

Rest, rest, rest…

Have a nice day, y’all.

BLOG: Irish at SEA

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Tuesday, later in the day. Still in a daze. Somehow made it over to the Kowloon side to hit up the Irish pub. Nothing a bit o’ stew and a pint can’t fix, am I right?

No, you don’t understand. This is not alcohol. This is Guinness. It’s not the same. I can’t explain that! Either way, I know I’m not about to put down six pints of Guinness is one sitting. That’s just not physically possible for me. I might get through a second one if I’m lucky, lol. I might. It’s too heavy for me. That’s why I’m drinking it.

The bartender was very happy to see me. I haven’t been here since St. Patrick’s Day. She asked me how I’ve been. I said, “Oh, ya know, just out collecting ridiculous stories, as always.”

She smiled at me knowingly and answered in her deep Welsh accent, “Well, my dear, you only have one life. Better live it as best you can!”

I gave her a sheepish smile as I imagined myself tumbling down the stairs after getting shitfaced at the bar around the corner from my apartment. It would be funny if it wasn’t sad!

Speaking of sad, I just had to sit down and write my letter to the Galway people explaining that I can’t come up with the money I need for the summer program in time. I explained about my desire to come to Ireland and inquired about longer-term programs with more potential for financial aid I could look at instead.

Maybe we can’t make a month work, but we can make a year work!

We have not given up yet!

And if I can’t make it work, I guess I’ll just fly to Chiang Mai and go live in exile with Hermès, my weirdo black sheep cousin from the North who no one talks to. I’ll be like, “What up, cuz? How you like dem snakes?”

LMFAO! I kid, I kid.

I’m just saying… Thailand *is* still an option, and it’s not the worst option, either! I can still live my best Irish life in Bangkok if I want to. And I would actually get to attend the Emerald Ball. We’re not at the end of this rope yet!

Now that would make a funny book: living in Thailand for a full year, desperately trying to cobble together some understanding of Irish culture from a bunch of people who already got on a plane and left in search of better weather. Then actually go to Ireland and fill in all the gaps I missed. I could call it “Irish at SEA.”

I would watch the shit out of that on Netflix. I really would.

I try to choose characters and stories I would be willing to invest time in. I watch way too much TV, as we all know. That’s why I secretly love being unemployed. More time for TV and movies so I can take notes on what’s working and what’s not!

Okay, I’m actually feeling much better about all of this already. I knew coming to the Pub would fix me right up. No problem. I ask you, my fellow Irish, who among us has not taken a bit of a tumble down a hill after too many drinks? You stumble, you fall, you get right back up and climb the hill again. It is what it is.

Exactly!

That’s what I’m saying, fam!

Now you know who I am in my soul. I got a great big kick in the head and I woke up zenned out, peaceful, ready to negotiate on financial aid, making back-up plans for my back-up plans. I still believe in love. I still have a sense of humor. I still believe I can make this ridiculous delusion of becoming a professional writer work.

Fabulous!

I thought I ordered food, but it hasn’t come yet. That’s weird because it’s very empty here. Maybe I wasn’t clear enough? That happens sometimes. I guess I can always try again. Once more, with feeling! And perhaps a side of garlic toast, as well.

Or maybe they saw the look on my face and thought, “This one needs a full pint first today.”

We don’t know what this one needs today. I suspect that if my dad were here, he would say I need to order the chocolate brownie. I suspect my grandmother would say the same.

Who even knows anymore?

Yeah, I don’t think that order got through. No worries! So it didn’t work out the first time around. So what? Next time it will, and it will come with the side of garlic toast and a chocolate brownie for dessert. This is the Irish way of things. Grand! Just grand!

Okay, yeah, I really do feel much better now. Like, actually. Nothing like the comfort of Irish culture to get us through the difficulties of life! 😀

UPDATE: They said no. No Ireland for me this year! Alas! And so I remain trapped in exile with the rest of the snakes. For now…

BLOG: I Think We Lost The Plot

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Thursday. Where did the week go? Oh yes, I know. I spent all day yesterday sucked into Netflix while actively avoiding reality. Nothing like a good true crime docu trio to wake you up to all of the different ways life could go wrong.

I’m not really partial to the murders myself. I like the documentaries about cults and cult psychology. I have watched ALL of the cult documentaries. Unemployment Level 100. I am also fascinated by cult psychology because, as an American, I recognize that my country has been taken over by a very dangerous cult.

This particular documentary was about the FLDS in Utah. It is absolutely terrifying to watch as a woman. I have nothing but respect for Dr. Christine Marie. She is definitely one of my new role models. That documentary was harrowing.

Then I watched the one about the pro cyclist who was murdered by the jealous girlfriend of some loser guy. The girlfriend took off to Costa Rica, where she was hiding out at various yoga retreats. That one definitely made me think a lot. I just looked back at some of the people I met in India and Bali and was like, “WTF were they running from?”

Some of them were really strange and off. As I’ve said before, I’m not sure I would go back to Bali again after what I experienced there. Bangkok, yes. Bali, no.

I found people in Bangkok were generally more open about the fact that they are running away from something. Maybe they won’t tell you what it is, but it’s kinda just the general vibe of the expat community in Thailand. It’s like walking into the Mos Eisley Cantina in Star Wars. You know everyone in there has come from somewhere else to do some kind of shady business. It’s just better not to ask too many questions about it.

In Bali, people are presenting themselves to be something they are not, and what that something is generally involves grifting off of people struggling with mental health, grief, spiritual questions, and a lack of meaning/purpose. I definitely saw some cult-adjacent shit while I was there. I also met people who were just… way, way, way off. Like “maybe they should be in the Hotel California and not running a yoga studio in Bali” kinds of off. Ya know what I’m saying?

It did feel validating in that way. I think sometimes I can be sensitive and take other people’s weird behavior super personally when in reality it has nothing to do with me at all. Like, maybe that lady wasn’t mean to me because I’m a bad person who deserves it. Maybe she killed her husband’s affair partner and went on the run and now she’s hiding out in Bali and she’s worried some writer is going to go snooping around and find out the truth.

Maybe.

Or maybe she was just having a bad day. Either way, this isn’t about me. Don’t take it personally. I’m perfectly grand just the way I am.

Right now I am sitting outside the coffee shop, watching people on the street. I just love Hong Kong. I really do. Every day I wake up and think, “Wow, I can’t believe I get to live here. This is the most incredible opportunity of my entire life. I am overwhelmed with gratitude for it every single day.”

I was meditating last night before bed and the spirit of my Irish grandmother showed up to talk to me. She said, “Do you know what the Irish Dream is? Not the American Dream. The Irish Dream. The Irish Dream is for our children to be free to become writers, poets, artists, musicians, filmmakers. It’s to give them the gift of free time so they can create. You don’t have to slave away at the docks or in the factories or give up your education to take care of a dozen children. We did all of this so you can sit outside on the rooftop and write your book and enjoy life in Hong Kong. Stop feeling guilty about it. Enjoy it. We did it all for you.”

Okay, okay, okay. I get it. My sole purpose on this earth is to Create. I must honor my ancestors by finding a way to become a serious, professional writer. Well, we all know the first two steps: money and a room of one’s own. I have that right now, yes, but how to maintain it over time is a problem.

I don’t know. Somehow I keep making it work. Failing upward, as they say. Perhaps a reminder to focus on manifesting simple things like a fabulous apartment that someone else is paying for so I can just sit there and write all day. Hahaha.

I’m not joking. That’s a real thing. It’s called “patronage.” It’s where rich people give you money and a room of your own so you can create art all day. I’ve actually had several patrons in my life, including my father, my uncle, my aunt, and The Publisher. It really is the best way to go. At least, for now.

That’s what I have to manifest: a patron! Ah, yes, so simple. Why did I not think of it before? Patron, patron, patron.

Brilliant.

Haha, aww, the song “I’ll Be Missing You” just came on the street stereo the delivery guy always plays around this time of day. Definitely a message from my ancestors. My dad always does that. Communicate through music, I mean. Sometimes I’ll just be sitting somewhere random and a playlist comes on that only he would make and I just know he’s there.

Oh yeah, they’re definitely there right now. It just switched to “Empire State of Mind.” Big New York City energy coming in right now. It’s a whole thing.

Now I am sitting here thinking about my book/Netflix show, lol. I’ve been going through my manuscript I made in January and I just hate it. The first half is such a slog. I just want to delete it all, speed up the timeline, and just have the first 10 pages/minutes be a montage of my dad’s funeral, getting fired from Starbucks, car breaking down, losing the house, getting a giant check in the mail, and buying a one-way ticket to India. That’s it. Fuck South Dakota. This is the terrible Prequel series no one asked for. Everything since India is like… my actual real life as I have always wanted to live it finally began. That’s the real story here!

I think we’ve kind of lost the plot a little bit here. Yes, I have meaning. I have purpose. I am a writer. It’s my dream to become a professional writer. That is why I am here. I got on that plane to have a crazy adventure and write it all down. Take whatever comes at me along the way. I did that. I’ve done it. I am actively doing it, even when it comes at a cost, like my little adventure up to the Mid-Levels.

So now we have to figure out how to steer the career into professional mode. I have no idea how to do that. I have no talent for business whatsoever. I need an agent/editor type to guide me in the right direction. Someone who has that eye for business in the way that I don’t and all of the connections I need but don’t have. Again, a patron type.

Okay, I feel like I’m back to normal now after my date with the Russian. Wow, what was that? Hmm. Wild. I don’t actually have anything else I want to say about him here. I just wanted him to know… I could have easily ripped you apart, but I didn’t. But I could. So just… know that.

Honestly, couldn’t even tell ya what he does for a living. You could be water boarding me old school Soviet style and I’d be like, “I swear to you, I don’t know! It sounded so boring. I checked out halfway through his explanation and started examining the crystal chandelier and hanging gardens at the Four Seasons. I can list off every plant and flower in the terrarium. Couldn’t tell ya what he does for work. Something with Finance, maybe? I thought he said he owned his own business. I honestly have no idea.”

The world will never know. Furthermore, the world does not care. The world cares about the part where two Scorpios went on a date to a bar that looks like an old-timey opium den/brothel and it was the most on-brand thing ever for both of them. Show us those terrible red leather couches from the 80’s! That’s what the world really wants to see!

Netflix execs will be like, “How is this even relevant to the plot?”

It’s not, it’s just an excuse to film at the Mandarin Oriental in Hong Kong. Since when do we need a plot for sex? Spoiler alert: there is no plot. This is just a random, gratuitous sex scene with no purpose or relevance whatsoever. Since when do you have a problem including that in your shows?!

They’ll be like, “You’re right. Let’s make sure we get a top-notch intimacy coordinator on board with this production.”

IDK, I think that might be too “woke” for the Russian. I can just imagine the look of outrage on his face right now…

Ha ha ha!

I think I’m hilarious.

Off now. To do what, we don’t know. We know we’re not going back to the Mid-Levels anytime soon!

The battle of Hong Kong Island neighborhoods continues. So far I’ve eliminated Causeway Bay (too busy), Wan Chai (too wild), Central (too expensive), Happy Valley (too far), and the Mid-Levels (too bougie). I’m actually quite happy in Sheung Wan. It’s very… French. Close to everything, but easy to escape from the chaos of the city with a quick trip up to my rooftop.

I think I’ll go do that right now, actually. Then I have to clean my apartment because it’s a mess. All of my clothes are piled onto “the chair” instead of hanging in my closet, where they should be. Alas, I am not fancy enough to have a “helper” or live in an upscale “serviced apartment.” I am confined to my tiny little coffin box with the rats and the cockroaches, living off snacks and instant noodles from 7-11.

It is what it is.