TO THE HOMELAND

while i'm not actually of mexican descent, i've always had a certain attachment to the country's culture no doubt spurred by my love of their cuisine. so it was with some pleasure that i hit mexican shores a few week's back... actually, that's not entirely true. i have been in a somewhat introverted mood lately -- yes, even moreso than usual. as such, travel has not been sounding too keen to me. yet, i was somewhat excited to visit mexico, as mentioned... though i also knew that i wouldn't be getting an authentic look at the country. you see, the event we were invited to took place in cabo. so unfortunately, my experience was nearly entirely located at the resort in which we stayed: the westin los cabos.

it's pretty grand, as you can surely see from the photos below. it's also quite hot and humid. this fact was never more clear than when i introduced my video equipment to the harsh climate; when attempting to turn on the camera, i was informed that the system had detected condensation... yes, WATER decided to automagically appear INSIDE my camera. fuck that. so far, the permanent effects have been minimal, though there is definitely damage. not cool. then again, i'm sure it didn't help to shoot an hour-long interview with cliffy at the pool-bar either. but it was worth it. the result should appear on gamespy.com (which now has its own video component -- no more fileplanet for me! yip!) within the next few days. abre los ojos.

the first few days were rather enjoyable. the resort had like eight pools. thus we felt it necessary to make like ned merrill and swim the giant, winding river from one side to the other. when quizzed about which pool was the finest, we quickly disregarded all but a single one: the one containing the aforementioned bar. yes, drinking margaritas while floating beats sheer size and silly waterfalls any day of the week.

of course spending all day in the sun drinking -- and all night in a bar drinking -- has its consequences and i spent the next morning vomiting. strangely, i felt otherwise ill as well, though nobody believed me. regardless, i was sick, it was hot, and i had to work. it sucked. but i somehow sort of pulled through and felt better later in the evening. i even made it to the beach bbq. pictures are provided below. oh and thanks to cliff for the heinous-ass image of me scarfing down meat. i hadn't eaten anything all day... but somehow, ribs seemed okay. my continued illness at quakecon during the days following would seem to indicate that that was the case. but guess what? ribs taste good. and yes, i really was that red... no color-correction necessary to look disgusting.

Posted by ryan at August 24, 2004 12:28 AM