Welcome To Miami!

Hello, Heat-Seekers!

All of the failure and frustration I went through in order to procure my identification turned out to be well worth it.  Miami was the antithesis of grey, dead, slushy Nova Scotia in March.  As soon as I stepped off the plane, the humidity, heat and florid air wrapped around me like an environmental Snuggie.  Everything was vibrant, beautiful and alive.

For the next three days I felt intoxicated.  Probably because I was intoxicated, but sleep deprivation and sensory overload certainly played a part in making the entire trip feel dream-like and surreal.  Keep in mind: our flight had left Halifax at 6:35 AM and didn't arrive in Ft. Lauderdale until 12:30 PM the following day.  To make matter worse, my trepidations about clearing U.S. customs without a passport coupled with my unbridled excitement ensured that I didn't sleep a wink the entire time.

Here's what I do remember about that incredible trip, sketched out bullet-point style to simulate my fractured memory:

• We stayed at the Fontainebleau Hotel, one of the most historic structures on Miami Beach.  In addition to hosting such luminaries as Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley, the hotel has featured prominently in movies like Scarface and T.V. shows like The Sopranos.  Most importantly, the Fontainebleau was the setting for James Bond's first run-in with arch-villain Goldfinger in the film of the same name.
• It was a beautiful day when we arrived so instead of taking a nap like sensible people we immediately changed into our swim suits and ran down to the beach.  Just seconds after diving into the clear, blue, warm ocean one of my co-workers got hit in the head with a flying fish.  It scared the bejesus out of her and we all decided to play it safe and spend the rest of our time poolside.  
• Speaking of "When Animals Attack", my boss at the time almost had a coronary when he was menaced at one point by a crazed...parrot.  
• Mercifully, the only thing we were obliged to do that first day was attend a two-hour opening session hosted by the bigwigs which segued into an Opening Dinner and Cocktail Reception.  For the record, the phrase "complimentary bar" has a different meaning for Maritimers then it does for most other human beings on the planet.
• In order to justify the obscene amount of money the company was spending on this conference, the second day consisted of eleven hours worth of sales highlights, vendor presentations, business development sessions and "MVP Awards".  The next two days cut this schedule down by half and ended around 1 PM, leaving the rest of our time free for decadent levels of sloth and wanton debauchery.  
• The pro-company rallies we were forced to attend had all the propagandic power of a Leni Riefenstahl flick.  In order to effectively trumpet the endless Powerpoint slides which bragged about the annihilation and / or assimilation of our small-fry competition, we were given inflatable plastic tubes to bang together as noisemakers.  One particularly nauseating session about projected profits was capped off with the sacrilegious playing of "Only In Dreams" by Weezer.  Only corporate pinheads could possibly take a sweet, heartfelt song about wistful longing and heartbreak and turn it into a cynical ode to greed.  Not only did this seriously test my gag reflex, I actually thought about contacting Weezer to find out if they'd actually given their permission to use the song.  I decided not to because I would have dumped all of their CD's into the nearest landfill if they were actually complicit in this travesty.
• As a anomalous cadre of boisterous Canadians, I'm pretty sure we were all universally regarded as uncouth, ignorant savages.  But we were also polite, cheery and friendly to a fault.  Eventually we were adopted by a sales rep who kept us in drinks for the entire weekend.  In retrospect, this guy kinda reminded me of Gil Gunderson from The Simpsons.  Every time we'd try to buy him a drink, he'd get pissed off and say "Hey, if I don't use up my expense account, I'll be in deep shit when I get back".  Funny thing is, I'm pretty sure that our company didn't even stock his company's product.
• In the odd chance that we'd recommend their products to our customers, the vendors gave us an obscene amount of free swag.  I'm not gonna name names here but suffice to say that some members of our little entourage got so many free label makers they could have started up their own dot com business.  
• To meet and mingle with our peers, we were randomly assigned to a table for the closing dinner.  Since I'd just been forced to transition from the customer service department within the same company I remember looking around at all the opulence and saying "Wow, I really wish they'd  do something like this for the good folks in customer service".  Well, as soon as the District Sales Manager I was seated with heard this he cleared his throat, looked down his nose at me and said: "Are you kidding?  Customer service wouldn't even have jobs if not for us!"  Needless to say, the resulting verbal donnybrook between us certainly made dinner an awkward affair.      
• Speaking of food, every morning began with a tremendous free breakfast at the hotel, which some members of our group positively despised.  "I wish I could just go to McDonald's and get an Egg McMuffin," they lamented.  That's when I began to suspect that I was different from most people.    
• After buying a $9.00 rum and coke at the Fontainebleau's bar (not a bad deal in today's inflation-ravaged economy) I was forced to down it in one gulp when everyone suddenly decided that they were going out.  As soon as I got outside I kicked myself for chugging down the precious beverage since people seemed to be walking around with open liquor everywhere.  
• We had a blast strolling along Collins and Washington Avenue.  Amidst all of the evocative neon lights and Art Deco architecture, there was a constant parade of tricked-out vehicles and modified human bodies.  Every time I watch an episode of Dexter in which the title character is shown prowling around SoBe I can't help but blurt "I was there!"  Then I promptly shut up 'cuz apparently it's not cool to have experiences in common with a serial killer.   
• My boss got embroiled in a knock-down, drag-out argument with the owner of an Italian restaurant over their inability to split up the bill.  During this fracas I tried to slide down my seat, crawl under the table and disappear into a crack in the sidewalk.
• During our walkabout we encountered a street magician named "Amazing Adam" who wowed us with his David Blaine-like illusions.  On the back of his business card is a quote attributed to "Adam's Mom" which reads: "This guy is really special!".  Ah, Amazing Adam, where art thou now?  
• After stumbling upon the South Beach home of the late fashion designer Gianni Versace we decided to pose for photos on the very same steps where he'd been gunned down by crazed spree-killer Andrew Cunanan.  Pretty ghoulish stuff, and I've been on a Jack the Ripper tour, fer Crissakes!    
• When my boss tried to take a photo of a pimped-out car the owner ducked down in the front seat and yelled "Hey, man, I've got a warrant!"  
• Based on a second hand rumor that "Matt Damon was going to be there", we hung out all night at an open-air bar somewhere on Pine Tree Drive.  Jason Bourne didn't show up but the bar itself was pretty rad. 
• We found out that electrical storms in Miami are both Wagner-esque and omnipresent.  
• When we got back to the hotel from downtown it was pretty late, around 1 AM.  Instead of going to bed like sensible people, we got into our swimsuits and bobbed around in the Fontainebleau's lagoon-like pool and grottos for two or three more hours.  
• We finally decided to pack it in around 3 am.  As we made our trek back through the hotel's expansive and Babylonian hanging gardens we inadvertently stumbled upon a rather boisterous and acrobatic couple "pitching woo" in a hammock.  We tried to sneak by as discretely as possible but as soon as the guy spotted us he leapt off the hammock and scampered off into the underbrush.  Unfortunately the momentum caused by his vault instantly turned the hammock into a wicker centrifuge which spun the poor girl around two or three times before depositing her on the ground.  Dizzy and perhaps slightly tipsy, our girl bundled herself up, swayed to her feet and then stumbled off in search of her fleet-footed Lothario.              

***

Even though this event was centered around a corporate circle-jerk, it kicked off a life-long passion for travel that lingers with me to this very day.  And although I didn't have a lot in common with some of my co-workers it was an incredible bonding experience akin to my time living in residence.  Even today I still feel a close connection with these people.

And although I despise that company for what they represent and what they eventually did to us, I'm still eternally grateful for the opportunity.  Before everything started to fall apart, I was lucky enough to go on one more of these events, which turned out to be crazier then the first.

But that's a tale for another time.    

EPIC HOTEL  Here's the map of the Fontainebleau Hotel which was included in our orientation package.  Man, I sure wish I could pop into "Coconut Willie's" right now...

Here's the Fontainebleau in all her 60's glory, established in this famous helicopter shot at the beginning of Goldfinger:

E(PICS)  I didn't clean up too bad back then, huh?  Wow, I actually look vaguely respectable...

For some odd reason, I didn't have a camera with me, but here's a sample of the Fontainebleau's Shangri-La like pool area:

And here's a rare photo of me molesting one of the Fontainebleau's many dolphin fountains, taken apparently with George Eastman's prototype camera.  In case you're wondering, that's chocolate milk in that cup, BTW.

FAILED JOINT  This annoying-as-f#@k track got played way too many times before, during and after our trip.  Thank Vishnu I had the foresight to bring along my discman (!) and a copy of the Trainspotting soundtrack to cleanse the palate.     

Do Not Passport "GO!", Do Not Collect Any New Experiences

 
Greetings, Red-Tape Wranglers!

Since I'm not making a ton of money right now (read: any) I've cut back on acquiring a lot of superfluous crap.  I no longer buy movies, books, music and games indiscriminately.  I don't eat out five times a week like I used to.  I make my coffee at home, but since I've always got a bag of freshly-ground Fogburner and a french press, this really isn't a big sacrifice.

About the only luxury I can't quit is traveling.  Honestly, I can't wrap my head around Karl Pilkington types who say that they hate to travel and would rather stay home where everything is familiar. You might as well come out and say that you're completely ant totally opposed to the concepts of "new", "different" and "exciting".

Now although I didn't care to much for my last job I absolutely loved the gig that proceeded it.  I haven't talked much about this mysterious enterprise but it was actually pretty rad.  In fact, for a while there, I actually felt as if I had something vaguely resembling a career.

One of the many cool perks with this job were the annual sales conferences.  Up until that point, the most far-flung place I'd ever been to was Toronto or Montreal.  Imagine my surprise when I was told that I'd be going to freakin' Miami just a few short months after getting the gig.

As a "small boy from a small town", I knew this trip would be a transformative experience for me.  But I had to get there first and current events weren't making that easy.  Keep in mind, this was back in 2003, just two short years after 9/11.  U.S. Homeland Security was cracking down on us shifty, subversive Canadian types who were trying to enter their country without sufficient I.D.  If I was going to go on this trip, I needed to get a passport.

I didn't have one at the time but, then again, why would I?  Travel was certainly something I wanted to do in the future but money had been kinda tight up to that point.  But now, with this sales conference looming, I finally had a reason to procure this precious document.  Unfortunately I had very little time to do it.  Given the fact that I only had a few short weeks to get it rushed out to me, my boss gave all of us Friday afternoon off so we could expedite the application process.

Unfortunately, back then, upstanding, hard-working, law-abiding, tax-paying folks who'd known you for most of your life (I.E. your friends) weren't considered trustworthy enough to vouch for your identify.  In fact, only "pillars of the community" like accountants, doctors, lawyers, dentists or priests could be relied upon to verify who you really were.  S'funny, because, to me, this kinda looks like a roll-call for society's worst charlatans and crooks.  

I didn't know it at the time, but that afternoon would soon degenerate into a desperate, existential bid to prove my mere existence.  The first person I went to see was my dentist, in the time in since my last check up, he'd left the practice and vanished off the face of the earth.  This immediately led me to assume that dentists couldn't vouch for themselves.   There ya go, strike one.

I then went to see my family physician, Dr. Pinhead, er...Pinsky.  Granted, I wasn't in the habit of doing annual physicals back then, but I'd consulted with him before and I was pretty sure that he'd vouch for me.  Yeah, I was wrong.

"Sorry, but I'm just not comfortable signing this," he told me flat-out.

"What?  Why?!?"

"Well, you've only been here one time before and that was four years ago.  For all I know you could be a member of Al-Qaeda."

Asshole.

I had only one option left and I wasn't feeling encouraged.  Even though my optometrist, Dr. Gaetan Lang, had successfully cured my of my irrational fear of eye exams, I'd only seen him a few times in the past.  Would he pull a Pinsky and shut me down?

The sad state of my appearance certainly wouldn't help my case.  Since I wasn't expecting a Mission: Impossible-style assignment that day I'd gone to work looking decidedly scruffy.  And now, with my options quickly drying up, we were getting uncomfortably close to the passport office's closing time.  It wasn't just my own application hanging in the balance, my co-workers were relying on me to seal the deal as well.

Without any pretense to civility I bombed into the optometry office, madly raving like a crazed transient whacked out on crystal meth.  Fortunately, Dr. Lang was just finishing up with a patient and stopped to listen to my disjointed request.  Taking note of my disheveled appearance and palpable panic, the good doctor was kind enough to take pity on me.

"Sure, I can sign that for you," he said, gesturing for me to hand over the application.

"Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you..." I wheezed. 

"So, where are you going?" he asked cordially while he filled out the document.

"Mi..Miami..." I panted, giving a thumbs up to my co-workers standing just outside the glass doors.  Helpfully they were standing there, swapping wisecracks and laughing their asses off at me.

"Oh, very nice," he said, handing the completed form back to me.  "That's a great place to be this time of year.  Enjoy!"

I can't quite remember but I'm pretty sure that I hugged him.  With only an hour left before the passport office closed shop for the weekend we all ran to the car and made a beeline downtown.  It was gonna be tight.  Even if we got down there in time, the chances of us finding a parking space was pretty slim.  Mercifully, our chauffeur that day had a legitimate driver disability window sign, which pretty much allowed us to park in the building's lobby.  We all rushed inside, commandeered an elevator, found the office, grabbed a number and began to wait.  And wait.  And wait.   

With only fifteen or twenty minutes to spare, someone finally called my number.  Now that I had all of my administrative ducks in a row, I confidently strode up to the wicket and cast my paperwork down like a gauntlet of challenge.

"I should like to apply for a passport, kind sirrah!"

The clerk started to look everything over.  Suddenly his brow furrowed.

"Do you have a photo?"

My heart skipped a beat but then I remembered something my co-workers had said earlier.

"I was told that I could get one done here.  I know it's a bit more expensive but I really didn't get a chance to..."

"Sure, sure," the clerk muttered, his eyes flicking towards the clock on the wall.  

"I just need to see your birth certificate."

I pulled out my wallet, located the card and dropped it on the counter.  Suddenly, the clerk recoiled as if I'd just thrown a dead rat in front of him.

"Oh," he said, reflexively pushing the card away from him.  "I'm sorry, but I can't help you."

If I recall correctly, this was the very first time that I ever felt my eyeball twitch.  Instantly I found myself fighting the urge to launch myself over the counter and strangle him with a metal pen-chain.  Instead I took a deep breath and tried to form a coherent sentence.

"And why is that?" I managed to say.

"Your birth certificate.  It's not valid."

"Why?!?"

"It's laminated," winced the clerk.

"Wha...who cares if it's laminated?  The information is still accurate!"  

"I'm sorry, but it's not," the clerk babbled, perhaps expecting an errant fist to come his way.  "Record- keeping rules changed significantly in Quebec back in 1994 so any laminated birth certificates issued prior to that are invalid." 

Stunned and dejected I gurgled my thanks and then pushed myself away from the wicket.  A passport wasn't the only thing out of my reach; the only piece of identification I had was about as useful as a peanut-butter-smeared playing card.  The only good thing that happened that day was the money I saved on my passport photo.  Unfortunately, it was taken under considerable duress and I ended up looking like a cross between Raj Binder and John Baird.   

The following Monday I marched into my boss's office to report the bad news.

"That's it!"  I ranted in frustration.  "It's over!  I can't go!"

"Oh, you're going," he said in his own inimitable manner which I still kinda miss.

"IT'S...NOT...POSSIBLE!" I shouted back.  "I have no valid identification!  At all!  From what I've heard, those customs guys really don't need any extra incentive to bust out a cavity search!"

"Let me tell you something," he replied, matter-of-factly.  "You're going to this.  You see this email here?  It's got seven names on it including yours.  It doesn't say 'maybe David Pretty should come if he can possibly make it'.  This is a work-related event and your attendance is mandatory.  Yeah, you might end up detained in some holding cell  in JFK airport somewhere, but you're gonna try!  So if I was you I'd be gettin' a valid birth certificate pretty damned quick."     

This might sound harsh, Gentle Readers, but it was actually just the kick in the pants I needed to stop feeling sorry for myself and get things done.  Suddenly the glass seemed half-full.  Thanks to my boss and my helpful co-workers, I managed to expedite an application for a valid birth certificate.  In fact, it arrived in the mail just days prior to our departure.

Our flight was at 6:35 AM and I was too excited to sleep.  My boss picked us all up in style around 4:30 AM in a stretch limousine and en route I sipped away at a lethal home-made concoction of rum and coke.  By the time we got to the airport my bladder was the size of a novelty football.  Ah, back when I was young even more stupid then I am now.

Now, I'm not a big fan of wearing logo-tainted clothing but I made an exception on that particular occasion.  En route to the airport, my fellow employees dressed me up in every single company-related garment they could find: hat, jacket, t-shirt, trackpants, g-string: the whole magilla.  By the time we landed in Newark I looked like a corporate-sponsored Heaven's Gate cult member. 

In spite of my thorough disguise, my anxiety shot through the roof as we approached the immigration desk.   

"Stick close to us," my boss whispered.

"Just answer their questions and don't say anything else!" another warned.

"Whatever you do, don't look like you've got something to hide!" a third wailed.

"Shut up!"  I yelled back.  "Jesus, I'm nervous enough as it is!"

As our group fractured and wandered off towards the next available agent my terror level went into the red.  Hoping that I would still blend in as part of the group, I tried to linger behind my boss who was clad in similar apparel.  While everyone else cleared customs without a hitch and then coalesced on the "landed immigrant" side of the queue, I felt a sudden stab of panic when another officer motioned me for me to approach.  With my knees now threatening to buckle, I weaved my way over to him and practically crammed my papers into his downturned face.

"Hello!" I warbled, my voice sounding far too chipper in my own ear.

"Destination?" grunted the agent as he sifted through the sweat-stained documents.   

"Miami," I gulped.

"Purpose of your visit?"

"Business.  Sales conference," I replied.  Was it my imagination or did my voice just break as if I'd suddenly hit puberty?

The agent stopped jabbing his computer keyboard and started giving me the once over.  He finally seemed to notice that I was dressed up like a human NASCAR.

"How's business?" he asked.

My mouth worked silently for a moment.

"I...I'm sorry?"

"Business, how's business?" he demanded, a slight edge creeping into his voice.

"Oh, good, good!"  I babbled.  "I set up small to medium sized businesses with corporate accounts and then hand them over to account managers.  I've been averaging around eleven new registrations every month so things are going pretty good at the moment.  How about you?"

'Shut up, shut up, shut up,' my brain began to chide.

The immigration officer smiled tersely, turned back to his monitor, and clattered a few more keys.  Suddenly I was mired in some sort of weird time nexus, suspended in a prolonged moment of abject chronological purgatory.

Then, all of a sudden, the agent whipped out a stamp, hammered my declaration form, gathered my papers back together and handed it all back to me in a neat bundle.  Despite my initial flinch at the sound of the stamper, I shakily retrieved my documents, mumbled a quick 'Thanks' and then meandered away.

Just as we were all clear of the CHAMBER OF FEAR I was immediately swarmed by my jubilant peers.  For some odd reason, it was one of the happiest and most triumphant moments of my entire life.  I probably would have been even more elated if I knew what was to come.

But that's a story for another time...  

EPICALLY FUNNY In Karl's defense, Ricky Gervais is a bit of a sadist.  
  

EXISTENTIAL FAIL  Ever feel as if your grasp on existence is tenuous at best?