Feliz Aniversario de Rio De Janeiro

I decided to skip out on checking out the Galapagos Islands in Ecuador to stay in Rio for my birthday instead. My friend Tyler asked, "Beer and bikinis trump evolution?" and my answer is that the existence of beautiful bikini-clad Brasilian babes is only further evidence that evolution is not just a theory, but a simple fact.

Ben, Itamar and I travelled back to Rio after a week of relaxing on the beaches of Pipa for a week to meet up with Deborah, Ben´s girlfriend. We celebrated our first night in Rio by celebrating Purim, an Israeli holiday that Jewish rabbis declare is a day to drink until you pass out. If I were Jewish, then my past ten months have been one long continuous Purim! We had to dress up in costumes, and unfortunately, we didn´t really have time to buy anything for the evening so we ended up picking through Deborah´s 11-year-old brother´s old costumes. Naturally, none of the stuff fit, but that really didn´t deter me. I don´t really know what I was, nor did I really care!

From Rio

Over the past few weeks I had known Ben, he, with his 22-year old naivete, kept talking all this trash about me being an old man, especially with my 33rd birthday coming up. He said he could run faster than me, so we raced each other and though I´m no Carl Lewis, I beat him handily. He also said he could beat me in basketball, to which I took major offense, given that he´s Israeli, and I´m an American. Fortunately, I avoided any Team USA Olympic-sized embarrassment, and beat him as well. To his credit, he´s not bad at all, and the games were a lot closer than I anticipated. Anyway, some random birthday thoughts:

- One morning, I looked in the mirror and saw an eyebrow sorta askew, just pointing out in a direction it shouldn´t have. Upon closer inspection, I realized that it was a lot longer than I thought, like, almost an inch long! My Humphrey Bogart moment had finally arrived, and with it, a sudden realization that my ear hairs would be next.

- The thought of settling down, getting married, having 2.3 children and living in a tree-lined cul-de-sac in a quiet suburban city is sounding like a great idea these days..... Hah! Yeah right, who am I trying to kid???!!!!

- I truly wonder what I will be doing 10 years from now. Taking a page out of "A Christmas Carol", if 33-year old Daniel had visited 23-year old Daniel and told him everything about this trip, 23-year old Daniel would have probably thought 33-year old Daniel was nuts and never would have believed it. What would 43-year old Daniel say to me now? That I had moved to Africa and started an NGO? I moved to Denmark to open a restaurant? Maybe, that I moved to Mammoth and opened a bed and breakfast? More than likely, I will have moved to Brasil and had 10 kids with a supermodel! Either way, I´d say he was nuts and would never believe him.

-I have also realized that I am truly happy with everything in life. Granted, I have my regrets in life, of course. Like, spending 50K on my Mercedes CLK back when I was 24. I will never do that again, knowing full well that I could take a year off to travel around the world with much less than that.

My Benz gave me… whereas a lesser amount for this trip gave me....
1) countless hours sitting in LA traffic..... breathtaking airplane arrivals and departures.
2) tons of parking tickets.... one ticket to travel through 25+ countries across 5 continents.
3) $8,000 check from Carmax after 8 years of ownership....priceless memories I will never forget.
4) a couple of dates with a few girls... many potential future ex-wife candidates.
5) one life-threatening car accident... one life-changing experience.
6) a crappy sunroof that did not work all the time... unforgettable midnight sunsets in Scandinavia.
7) foglights that burned out every few months... foggy nights (and hungover mornings!)

The list goes on, but the conclusion is pretty clear, next time you think about that car, take a year off instead! Wise words from a 33-year old fart.