It’s called “Write in the Rain” because he is down here to complete his dissertation for his PhD. However, with all the amazing people who live here and present us with wonderful opportunities to procrastinate, I’m not sure how sucessful we will be with focusing on our own projects.

After all, yoga practice, acting opportunities (and here), organic and craft markets, potlucks, tapas nights,and  hiking are activities that are much much more compelling than sitting at our computers writing!

But we battle procrastination and keep our extracurricular activities going while maintaining a balance (we hope) between fun and working toward our goals.

We love food, so in our four nights in Panama City we hit a few restaurants. Below are y impressions of each and the approximate cost for a meal for two.

• New York Bagel Café
  $12 for 2 coffees, omelet and lox and bagel sandwich.
  New York Bagel Café is located near a giant statue of Einstein’s head. Yes, Albert Einstein. The statue is prominently displayed in a small triangular park across the street from the café at LOCATION. We walked from our hostel to the café. By the time we arrived I was drenched in sweat and blissfully happy to discover that the café provided air conditioning. The space itself is a cavernous hanger-like box. There are aluminum tables and chairs in the back, and several comfy-looking couches arranged within convenient conversational distance. The cafe serves a lot of recognizable favorites such as omelets, scrambles, and bagels. Many of the items are in English, though the person who took my order did not speak English. His manager did, though and he was very helpful in clearing up a misunderstanding or two. Apparently ojos does not mean “eggs.” There is wifi.
• Niko’s Cafe
  $6 for 2 plates of 3-4 items each.
  This was my first introduction to what I would soon learn is a beloved Panamanian institution: the cafeteria style restaurant. Score! Not only did it have ice-cold air conditioning, for a traveler on a budget you cannot do much better than these prices. Open at several locations around town, we ate at the one at LOCATION. The food is cheap, plentiful and edible. You grab an orange tray, start at one end and point to what you want. The lunch lady serves you up a big spoon of it and you move along the line. The stewed chicken (pollo guisado), white rice and plantains were good. They had mango juice. Did I mention the air conditioning? Recommended.
• Loving Hut
  $15-$18 for two meals and two weird avocado shakes
  We passed this place on LOCATION while looking for a farmacia. We decided we had to try it because we’ve been in a couple others in California. One in San Diego and one in Palo Alto. Also, we knew the food pretty well (or, thought we did – turned out we were wrong) and we knew that the place was no only vegetarian, which is very hard to find in Panama City, but VEGAN.
  OK, truth be told, the biggest reason we wanted to go n is because we are fascinated by Supreme Master Television and its eponymous founder Supreme Master Ching Hai. As close as I can figure, this is the parent company of Loving Hut and you can read more about it here and here.  The staff was very nice, and the food was fine. We were expecting a more California-style vegan menu with offerings of carefully crafted treats made to be as decadent as their animal-fat infused counterparts. However, the food was basically Chinese stir fry mixtures of veggies. Fine, but not great. We ordered a pair of avocado shakes out of pure curiosity. They were extremely rich and overpoweringly avocado-y. To try to get more of that milkshake decadence and fruit flavor our of them, we added sugar. This helped make them slightly more palatable. Our server told us that she recommended that the owner add sugar, but he said if customers want it sweeter than they can add it themselves. Either way works, but we couldn’t really finish them anyway..Even if the food wasn’t amazing you can’t beat the message: Go veg. Be green.
• Machu Picchu
  $55 for two entrees, two appetizers, four pisco sours and a slice of chocolate cake,
  This place came highly recommended by both travel books we brought with us. They serve Peruvian cuisine. The chef owns two restaurants, one in Panama City and the other in Boquete. We have since been to both. I have been nauseous after each visit. Jonah has not. He rather likes them. For our meal in Panama City we both ordered cold ceviche as the appetizer. The fish was velvety and tart. Delicious. The pisco sours we ordered complemented the ceviche marinade quite well. The drinks were strong and our heads were swimming by the time the entrees arrived. Jonah had the squid and rice cooked in its own ink. I had more fish with rice and coleslaw. There was plenty of food, but I felt it was overly salted.  We ordered the cake for desert because we confused our restaurants and thought it was the warm chocolate cake made with organic chocolate from Bocas Del Toro. It wasn’t. It tasted a bit like Hershey’s syrup over a slab of cafeteria cake. See below for the La Posta review for the cake.
• La Posta
  $80 for an appetizer, two entrees, a glass of wine, two mojitos and two slices of chocolate cake
  HIGHLY RECOMMENDED – OK, I’m writing this nearly a month after eating at this restaurant. To be honest, I don’t really remember what we ordered. However, I do remember that the mojitos were refreshing and filled with fresh mint muddled with local rum and simple syrup. The wine was delightful and the food, whatever it was, was delicious. Yes, it was expensive, but if it’s in your budget I highly recommend this place. The stand-out for me was desert. Warm chocolate cake made with organic chocolate from the Bocas del Toro region of Panama. So good: not too sweet with a prefect crumb.

• Upgrade Your Health and Fitness Routines this Weekend
• Achieve Your Goals More Easily by Creating Related, Sustainable Habits
• The Stupid Things You Do at Work (and How to Fix Them)

Just one quick piece of advice in case you don’t want to read all the above. Learn how to trick yourself.

I hate to keep you in suspense, so I’ll just blurt it out. We survived. The flight and landing were both pleasant and uneventful. We never even broke out the Xanax. We watched the King’s Speech (thank goodness for noise cancelling headphones) and an episode of Misfits. We read books, joked about the fake dogs in SkyMall magazine and I chatted with my neighbor in broken Spanglish. Boring, I know, but that’s how I like to keep my plane flights. Uneventful.

After we landed we gathered up our luggage and discussed whether our hostel would really have a driver waiting for us. We would be staying at Hostal Urraca. Their website says they can send a driver to pick us up for about $25, which seemed a bit steep to me, but sounded simple. It would be worth it after a long plane ride. If he showed up. Since our arrival time and date had been communicated via telephone, we had our doubts.

We stood with our luggage in one mysterious line to have our passports absentmindedly fondled as the immigration officer yelled over her shoulder at a co-worker and waived us through. We then stood in another mysterious line to have our list of declared items collected and our passports summarily stamped. I loaded my luggage into an enormous machine . No one was attending it, nor was anyone paying any attention, but it seemed like the thing to do, The machine swallowed and spit it out and I was in Panama.

Tocumen airport is far from town

As we rolled out of Tocumen’s secured area my husband scanned the crowd of expectant faces and spotted our driver. He was holding a hand lettered sign with Jonah’s name on it. It made me feel like a celebrity and I decided that I liked this place. I didn’t know it then, but that warm magnanimous feeling would come and go over the next few weeks alternating with intense bouts of irritation. For me Panama is not an easy country to love. For now, though we had our driver. Ricardo was an older Panamanian with an easy disposition and a ready smile. Not too chatty. When we saw our first dog of the trip wandering around in the parking lot (why, WHY is Latin American completely overrun with stray dogs?) Ricardo joked that it was airport security.

Stepping out of the airport into the Panamanian air was like being wrapped in one of those towels they give you for your face at a fancy salon, except all over your body. You know it’s supposed to be relaxing, but it’s really just hot, wet, and a little hard to breathe.

Tocumen is about 20 miles or so from our hostel, so it took longer than I expected to get to the city and I understood the price point for the taxi ride a bit better. We passed through a green tunnel of tropical vegetation. The thunderstorms we’d feared would throw our plane to the ground finally popped up and it was as though someone had turned on a faucet. We were driving 40 miles an hour through a car wash.

Traffic and skyscrapers galore

The rain cleared and the city rose up out of the vegetation. We thought it looked a bit like Vancouver with its rounded condominium towers bum rushing the ocean. It looked like the center of commerce that it is. The gateway between the oceans. That canal sees a lot of traffic and makes a lot of money. With the cranes dotting the city you could tell that there is more money and  more architectural ingenuity and fervor than there are regulations. We were from California, my husband’s parents own real estate in San Diego; he could smell the scent of a housing bubble wafting off those empty skyscrapers.

As we passed, Ricardo pointed out the Hard Rock café, the Multiplex mall and the new corkscrew tower rising above the lights, the ultramodern cubed buildings and the mud. The traffic moved in surges and eddies. There was a toll booth (luckily the taxi driver paid) along the bridge that passes over the bay of Old Town. We found out much later from a handsome Venezuelan couple, both of whom were architects leaving the rural life in the highlands of Panama for work in the city, that the city had only recently installed traffic lights. This article seems to imply that traffic lights were merely upgraded and several new ones added. Either way, be careful when crossing the street while you’re in the city.

Also, don’t worry if you notice cars honking for no apparent reason. Everybody honks. Seriously, They honk to say hi, they honk if  you’re in the way, they honk if things are taking too long. Jonah figured out that taxis honk at you if they are available. And always remember to ask a taxi driver how much it will cost before you get in the cab. This avoids unpleasant surprises later. There is no standard fare.

Where we stayed

Sandwiched between a pair of those shiny new highrises I mentioned above, I highly recommend Hostal Urraca. However, note that this is a low-end, bare bones choice.  If the term hostel scares you, all I can say is that I feel you. I’m not 25 anymore. But our experience here was low-key and enjoyable. There were even older couples here shuffling to the shower and using the free internet to phone their friends back in France.

We paid for a private room and it thankfully included air conditioning. The staff is attentive and helpful, but most of them only speak Spanish. The grounds are secured by a gate and the staff at reception can buzz you in. The bathrooms are shared and there should be one just a couple doors down from your room. But they are clean and spare, much like the bedrooms. The hostel is located a half block from Parque Urraca in the  Bella Vista neighborhood  near El Cangrejo and within walking distance of clubs, bars, restaurants, casinos, banks and cafes.

We stayed there four nights while we explored the city. In future posts in this series I will review restaurants and sites. Stay tuned!

However, as Adam Serwer of Mother Jones points out,  it’s important to remember that the fight for equality for lesbian and gay people continues.  Many still struggle to build families, careers and friendships because of lingering discrimination in U.S. laws, namely DOMA (the Defense of Marriage Act).

“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell is dead. But the fight for equality in the military is nowhere near finished”

via There’s More to Equality Than Asking and Telling | Mother Jones.

Are you stuck at a transit station waiting for the next bus? I mean ... metaphorically speaking?

It’s been three years since I’ve updated this blog. I give the advice in the title of this first new post since 2008 because it’s something I’ve just done. I’ve wrestled with transferring this site from one host to another, updating WordPress, updating widgets, picking a new theme, sighing and shaking my head at all the junk at the bottom of this blog that needs to be fixed and updated. Where do I find this code?

There has been a lot of sighing and shaking of the head.

However, here I am slogging through the mess I made three years ago. Here I am struggling to string a few words together to describe my experience and share it with the community. I am no slouch when it comes to avoidance. Trust me. So, if I can start this project and let my tendency for self-judgment and perfectionism natter on in a dark corner of my mind while I do the actual work of beginning, then I am sure you can too.

So, if there is something you’re avoiding doing. Anything: home project, research paper, exercise, that phone call, taking out the trash; I encourage you to take those first few stumbling steps toward your goal.

Here are a few links on procrastination you may find interesting and/or helpful. Let us know in the comments section = to the right = what small steps you took toward your goals today. Thanks!

• Procrastination Research Group Home Page
• We’re Sorry This Is Late … We Really Meant To Post It Sooner: Research Into Procrastination Shows Surprising Findings
• Procrastination hack: “(10+2)*5” | 43 Folders
• Help! I’m committing professional suicide!
• Psychology Today: Why We Procrastinate
• The Problem of Procrastination

I’m proud to have been recognized in 2006 as an emerging artist by the Jerome Foundation and SASE/Intermedia Arts, a local arts organization. I was chosen for a poetry mentorship with poet, author and educator Sun Yung Shin. My poems have since been published online.

Here you can find links to nonfiction and journalism clips including features, news, interviews, arts pieces and profiles published in community newspapers and online news sites by Chris Pommier.

1. Theater note: People Sittin’ Around Doin’ Shakespeare
   April 23, 2008 TC Daily Planet By Chris Pommier, After watching the play Hamlet II this weekend at the Lowry Lab in St. Paul, may I suggest a change of name for the company that produced it? Rather than People Sittin’ Around Doin’ Theatre, perhaps a more apt name would be People With a Huge Amount of Energy and Commitment to Emerging Artists Jumping Around Stage Doin’ Theatre. Of course, that may be a bit long for a marquee.
2. Watchdoggin’: Top notch reporters & editors share investigative journalism tips for ethnic media
   April 14, 2008, TC Daily Planet By: Chris Pommier, Article Body: This weekend the nonprofit Investigative Reporters & Editors, Inc., a grassroots organization devoted to improving the quality of investigative journalism, brought professional journalists from the New York Times, the St. Paul Pioneer Press and the Wisconsin State Journal to Minneapolis for a two-day conference and workshop. With partners New American Media the Twin Cities Daily Planet and the Twin Cities Media Alliance, IRE provided workshops and networking sessions focused on strengthening watchdog journalism, and building coalitions, among local ethnic media. (Note: this article was originally published on my blog, here.)
3. Bluegrass concert to benefit American Indian women in recovery
   Feb 6 2008, TC Daily Planet By: Christopher Pommier Article Body: Roots music is the name of the game this Saturday night at the Cabooze, a bar and music venue on the Hiawatha Line in South Minneapolis, as the Duluth bluegrass string-based band Trampled by Turtles headlines a benefit concert. The concert will raise money for Kateri Residence, a safe and sober space for American Indian women in recovery.
4. Native American composer Louis Ballard to be spotlighted in benefit concert
   Jan 3 2008, TC Daily Planet By: Christopher Pommier Article Body: In 1988 a group of Native American gay and lesbian people from across North America hosted an event called The Basket and the Bow at the Minneapolis American Indian Center. This summer the event, now called the International Two-Spirit Gathering, will return to Minneapolis to celebrate its 20th year.
5. Theater note: Ballet of the Dolls cracks one tough nut
   Dec 26 2007, TC Daily Planet By: Christopher Pommier Article Body: ‘Tis the season when interpretations of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker abound. Dance companies dust off that old chestnut and try to fill seats, and their coffers, by giving it new life in any way they can. Classical ballet? Check. Modern dance? Check. Post-modern performance pastiche? Check, check, and check. However, if your childhood memories of The Nutcracker include nodding off to sleep as the Sugar Plum Fairy took the stage, I suggest you redeem your faith at the hot pink altar of the local dance company Ballet of the Dolls.
6. Flaming film festival lights up Bedlam Theater this weekend
   Nov 13 2007, TC Daily Planet By: Chris Pommier Article Body: Entering Patrick’s Cabaret last Saturday night for the 7th annual Flaming Film Festival’s preview show, I wasn’t sure what to expect. The Festival is the brainchild of local rocker, artist, director, activist, mentor, and community volunteer Lisa Ganser. Since 1999 she has been encouraging and supporting independent Queer filmmakers from Minnesota and beyond to push boundaries and blur contemporary understandings of “gay” and “lesbian.”
7. Mending Senses (link to pdf LARGE FILE)
   Jan 5, 2007, Lavender Magazine By Chris Pommier”Medicine sometimes snatches away health, sometimes gives it.” – Ovid, Roman Poet (43 BCE-17 CE). Somehow, while growing up, most of us were told that our heath is the most valuable thing we posses. Perhaps we don’t recall precisely who told us, but nevertheless the sentiment became intrinsic to our understanding of the way the world works. After bankruptcy, foreclosure, or a bad breakup, friends their heads and say, “Well, at least he has his health.” When that health is threatened, though, where do we turn? Our primary physician? An alternative healer? God?
8. Out of the Woods (link to pdf LARGE FILE)
   Jan 5, 2007, Lavender Magazine By Chris Pommier It’s winter. Get outside and make some friends. No snow? That’s no excuse. Just because you can’t cut across the face of a mountain with a pair of K2 Apache Recons strapped to your feet, or mangle a pristine meadow under the treads of your Arctic Cat doesn’t mean you have to stay indoors surrounded by the detritus of the holidays as your ass widens and you watch your TiVoed reruns of Desperate Housewives.
9. On a Winge and a Prayer [ Kevin Winge ] Lavender 2006 Person of the Year (link to pdf LARGE FILE)
   Dec 22, 2006, Lavender Magazine By Chris Pommier In a snowstorm in upstate New York in 1983, a young Kevin Winge recently out of college, began a new life for himself far from friends and family in Minnesota. What seemed like a whimsical choice made by a single guy in his early 20s would lead Winge into the vibrant gay scene of New York City, and to new friends and new experiences. It would change the path of his life forever, and, after little more than a decade, would lead him back to Minnesota and eventually to South Africa.
10. 2006 Lavender Fab 50 Awards (link to pdf LARGE FILE)
    Oct 27, 2006, Lavender Magazine By Chris Pommier These are short (approx 150 words) reviews of venues, people, places and things around Minneapolis and the U.S. that made Lavender Magazines top 50 list for 2006. I have highlighted my contributions in yellow. From the description of this year’s awards: “In a download-able, sound bite happy world, instant gratification simply takes too long. But there’s more to life than increasing its speed. So, Lavender’s annual survey of all things fabulous will help you take a few minutes to appreciate the queer and queer-friendly people, places, organizations, and events that make the Twin Cities our kind of town-and yours.”
11. Leaders by Example: The Ann Bancroft Awards (link to pdf LARGE FILE)
    Sept 15 2006, Lavender Magazine By Christopher Pommier Article Body: What do a retied Supreme Court Justice, a South Minneapolis High School student, and a professor have in common? For one thing they are all women who have shown a great deal of vision and the determination to see that vision through. For another, they, along with Perspectives, Inc. – an organization that helps homeless and drug addicted women and their families turn their lives around – are winners of this year’s 10th Annual Ann Bancroft Awards.

So, this one is simply a list post of eight random things about me that you may, or mat not, know. I’m supposed to tag 8 other people at the end, but I don’t know 8 people who blog. So, I tagged three people at the end. I guess I really need to stop lurking on all those great blogs I read. I hereby resolve to comment more.

#1 I prefer “geeky” to “pretentious.”
I’ve always been a bit of a dork, myself. I have a habit of putting my foot in my mouth, saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, or just geeking out about something that others don’t really find all that interesting. I don’t buy brands, and prefer to shop at thrift stores. I don’t mind a good genre book, or a good sit-com. So, I appreciate geekiness in other people. Really, I see the willingness to be a bit geeky as an aspect of being sincere, which is the trait I truly appreciate. But what do I find the most annoying? Pretentious geeks.

#2 That said, I can be a movie snob.
I hate sitting down to watch a horrible blockbuster. Don’t waste my time with a contrived plot, poor writing and wooden actors. I mean, it’s 2 hours! Two hours when I could be doing something worthwhile with my time. Like folding laundry. Or rotating slowly in place.

#3 I’m visually impaired.
I was born with symmetric horizontal idiopathic congenital nystagmus. This is doctor-speak for: my eyes move back and forth involuntarily, and have done so since I was born. This, coupled with plain old astigmatism and near- (or is that far-?) sightedness pretty much makes me legally blind. That is, my vision is approximately 20/200. What a person with 20/20 vision can see at 200 feet from an object like a street sign, is approximately what I see only 20 feet from the same sign. Blurry, indistinct shapes and colors. This is not correctable with glasses.

I can read 12 point, and even 10 point text, and have always been an avid reader (is this #3.5?), but if it get’s smaller than that I’ll need a magnifying glass. So, yellow pages, white pages, backs of canned fruit, and grocery ingredients generally are a bit beyond me. As is one of my biggest pet peeves: Delis and restaurants that post their menu BEHIND THE COUNTER AND WAY UP THE WALL, and don’t provide a paper menu. Seems insensitive to me. Anyway, my partner (see #4) is a wonderful guy who doesn’t hesitate to read menus, nutrition information, or phone numbers at the drop of a hat.

#4 I’m gay.
Yep. I like guys. Well, one specifically. I’m lucky to be with my partner now for 5 and a half years. He’s handsome, funny, smart, talented and compassionate. I really lucked out on this one. Now, with the California Supreme Court’s ruling, and our pending move back to CA, perhaps there’s a ceremony of some sort in our future? Hm.

#5 I’ve never lived anywhere longer than 7 years
And those seven consecutive years were spent in San Francisco after I moved out of my parents’ home. Before that, my family and I would pick up and move every few years because my step-dad was in the Forest Service. In order to get to be a higher GS level, you have to move to the town where that job is based. So, promotion=moving. Or vice-versa.

I’ve always envied people who still have the same friends from grade school, and those who have really deep roots in a particular place. Well, sometimes I do. Sometimes I’m just happy to get out of Dodge!

I’ve lived in California (Susanville, San Francisco, San Jose, Santa Cruz), Washingotn (Spokane, Seattle), Alaska (Sitka), Montana (Big Timber), Nevada (Elko), and Minnesota (Minneapolis).

#6 I’m a poet
I’ve had a few pieces published, and won an award or two. My first check for writing was $150 won for a poem I wrote. I’m terrified of readings, and have not published a book, or chapbook yet.

#7 I would love to go back to school for an advanced degree
An MFA in Poetry, or an MS, or Master’s in Journalism would be badass.

#8 I can’t leave well-enough alone.
You know what would be cooler than coming up with 8 random facts about yourself? Tagging 8 people to each come up with 4 random facts about you! Or 4 things that would describe your personality. Sure, they’d have to know you a little, but the potential to learn about how other’s perceive you could be fun! Also, dangerous.

Now I’m done. I tag the following people:

Lauren

Luisa

Julien

The rules (as quoted from Crystal’s blog) are:

1. Each player starts with 8 random facts/habits about themselves.
2. People who are tagged, write a blog post about their own 8 random things, and post these rules.
3. At the end of your post you need to tag 8 )or however many) people and include their names.
4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment and tell them they’ve been tagged, and to read your blog.

reacted to the court’s decision in San Francisco.

Uploaded to Flicker on May 15, 2008 by Gay Weddings

The California Supreme Court today ruled that gay and lesbian Californians have a constitutional right to marry. Despite a robust domestic partnership status in California, the Court ruled that denying gays and lesbians the right to call their unions a marriage impinges on our constitutional rights.

After the jump is an excerpt from the conclusion of the ruling. I bolded quite a bit because I’m happy.

A number of factors lead us to this conclusion.

First, the exclusion of same-sex couples from the designation of marriage clearly is not necessary in order to afford full protection to all of the rights and benefits that currently are enjoyed by married opposite-sex couples; permitting same-sex couples access to the designation of marriage will not deprive opposite-sex couples of any rights and will not alter the legal framework of the institution of marriage, because same-sex couples who choose to marry will be subject to the same obligations and duties that currently are imposed on married opposite-sex couples.

Second, retaining the traditional definition of marriage and affording same-sex couples only a separate and differently named family relationship will, as a realistic matter, impose appreciable harm on same-sex couples and their children, because denying such couples access to the familiar and highly favored designation of marriage is likely to cast doubt on whether the official family relationship of same-sex couples enjoys dignity equal to that of opposite-sex couples.

Third, because of the widespread disparagement that gay individuals historically have faced, it is all the more probable that excluding same-sex couples from the legal institution of marriage is likely to be viewed as reflecting an official view that their committed relationships are of lesser stature than the comparable relationships of opposite-sex couples.

Finally, retaining the designation of marriage exclusively for opposite sex couples and providing only a separate and distinct designation for same-sex couples may well have the effect of perpetuating a more general premise — now emphatically rejected by this state — that gay individuals and same-sex couples are in some respects “second-class citizens” who may, under the law, be treated differently from, and less favorably than, heterosexual individuals or opposite-sex couples. Under these circumstances, we cannot find that retention of the traditional definition of marriage constitutes a compelling state interest.

Accordingly, we conclude that to the extent the current California statutory provisions limit marriage to opposite-sex couples, these statutes are unconstitutional.

You go judges.