Killing Batteries

In the US, in order to qualify for a home mortgage loan, you need to have “four concurrent open lines of credit” for the previous two years. That means credit cards, car/student loans, another mortgage…

So, to sum up, you need to have copious existing debt in order to qualify for more debt.

Also, if you have the inexcusable impudence to have lived and spent your money abroad for four years, your credit rating comes back saying “no credit”, effectively erasing your previous sterling credit rating and rewinding you back to the financial standing you had when you were 18 years old.

I’ve been a very, very bad consumer and now I’m being duly punished. On the plus side, during those four years abroad, I learned how to curse extravagantly in multiple foreign languages, which has been super handy skill to have lately.

[See the full "What I've Learned" list here. Start at the bottom and read up.]

Folks, I’m just a few hours away from wrapping up my four and five star trip through Chile. But am I sitting back and letting these final hours wind down unproductively? Perish the thought. I’m a professional. When I’m on the road, I work like a miserable dog right down to the final buzzer. That’s what makes an outstanding travel writer people.

As such I am writing to you now with only my left hand. My right hand is holding a generous pour of Carménère, a French wine grape thought to be lost forever until it was re-discovered in Chile in 1994. The rest of me, from the tits on down, is immersed in a Ritz Carlton Hotel signature wine bath. Don’t talk to me about dedication. I am Mr. Dedication. Where’s my goddamn Nobel Peace Prize?

I caved to the wine bath idea after repeated insistence by the hotel’s public relations manager. Strangely, I thought it was just a bit over the top after the one hour relaxation massage, swanky lunch, repeated trips to the whirlpool and three indulgent nights in one of his Club Level Rooms. But I am nothing if not cooperative, so I relented.
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Check to make sure that your very expensive digital camera with numerous delicate moving parts is not in your day-bag before you go to the beach.

[See the full "What I've Learned" list here. Start at the bottom and read up.]

Even if you have a co-conspirator, even if you spill some, even if you’re celebrating something really awesome, three bottles of wine on a Tuesday night is too much wine.

[See the full "What I've Learned" list here. Start at the bottom and read up.]

In clothing optional areas, inevitably it is the people that you would least like to see naked that go the distance. Double goes for Germany.

[See the full "What I've Learned" list here. Start at the bottom and read up.]

Never take directions from a drunk person.

[See the full "What I've Learned" list here. Start at the bottom and read up.]

In Italy “five minutes” means an hour.

[See the full "What I've Learned" list here. Start at the bottom and read up.]

Take care in Romania when you try to use your Spanish language skills to compensate for your lack of Romanian. The very common word “muy” means “very” in Spanish. In Romanian, “mui” is the infinitive of “to give a blowjob.”

[See the full "What I've Learned" list here. Start at the bottom and read up.]

Amsterdam prostitutes do not like to have their pictures taken.

[See the full "What I've Learned" list here. Start at the bottom and read up.]

Immigration officials at Heathrow Airport do not like to hear the words “Well, technically I’m homeless.”

[See the full "What I've Learned" list here. Start at the bottom and read up.]