Where it's at.

Not really much to update on since my last blog.

I've been pretty busy, getting blogs live that had been awaiting sign off, and getting as much planning and instructions ready as possible for when I'm gone to Nicaragua. I went to the post office at CATIE and found a gift shop that sells ice cream, and a playground with a climbing frame, see-saws and swings. It was immense!

Yesterday I started putting my photos into albums on Google+. I've been taking a lot more photos than I've been putting on this blog, and with me going to Nicaragua for a bazillion days, I'll probably take enough there for just one album. I also thought that with the amount of photos I was taking, it would take me months to sort through them after I get back, so I should at least make a start.

Even though it's not the leading social media network, and Facebook is still the social media network of choice for my peer group, when I take photos on my phone or tablet, they automatically get backed up to Google+. It's easier to create albums in Google+ and share the URL than to go uploading stuff again to Facebook. Here's an example with my latest pictures. After expedition, I'll put all the albums onto a single blog post.



OK, that little slideshow has taken almost two hours to sort out. Google+ doesn't give you a code for embedding a slideshow of your albums. How odd? There's a secret URL to a Picasa site that has your Google+ albums and the text is in Polish (?) and you can get your slideshow embed code from there. Except when you put the code in the HTML, you can't see it in the blog until you publish it. If you hover on the bottom right corner of the slideshow and click on the album title, it will take you to the album page on Picasa, but that looks horrible and some of the photo captions don't show up properly because of the Polishness. The album looks much prettier on Google+. Google's products have been so useful during this adventure, I'm not going to slag them off too much, and I'd be very surprised if a slideshow embed code directly from Google+ albums is something they're not working on.

Last night I was on radio duty, so had to spend the night at Fieldbase . As per last time I was on radio duty, I stayed up late with my creative juices flowing. It's probably the only way to get any peace and quiet and privacy on expedition. I recorded quick demos on my phone of two of the songs I've written since I've been here. I decided I didn't like the third and I need to work on it some more. Despite the nice multi-track recording app I got for my tablet, the microphone on it is just too damn awful to record anything.

Here's the first. The idea came from the road trip with the Corcovado trek's food drops after I'd been trekking with them for four days. I was the only one with tunes on my phone, and Oasis was the most agreeable with everyone. Heading up the Pacific coast in the Costa Rican sunshine somehow made these songs that had been with me for years sound different, better. I never imagined anything causing that to happen. I think it's actually more Frank Turner than it is Oasis.



This second one was inspired by a story told by a colleague who shall remain nameless, who spent a few days trekking with Alpha 3, where a puppy followed them, and they decided the logical thing to do was to put it in the toilet in a church they were passing, because somebody would definitely go to the toilet of a church, find the puppy and return it to its owner. This of course led to an onslaught of grief towards my colleague, who was promptly dubbed "The Puppy Slayer". It's a bit Beck I think.



After fighting with the slideshow earlier, I went to the supermarket to get a few bits for the trip to Nica and food for dinner. I was on dinner and asked Sarah to help, because if I didn't she'd only be standing over my shoulder, looking disapprovingly at everything I do, with the occasional condescending question. We had fajitas, with messy pancakes for dessert, then back into sorting stuff for Nica.

I've been thinking about how I really love my work here with Raleigh, but it'd be lovely to be able to go back to my man-cave house with my guitars and my fast computer and my N64 and my Dreamcast after my day's work. Everybody here is great, but private time to do your own thing is almost impossible to come by unless you stay up ridiculously late or get up ridiculously early.

I don't play guitar beyond gentle strumming when people are around, because I want to play, but I don't want to draw attention to myself because people will just want covers I won't enjoy playing, hence I really let rip when I've got the place to myself on radio duty. Living by myself, I don't have to worry about other people, I just do what I want.

I knew that would be an issue when I applied for Raleigh. Christ, it was years before I'd even write songs with my band mates who I played with regularly! But I guess that's another difference. Back in Brum, I mostly hang around with other musicians, so whether it's in the practice room or people in my house, if I'm playing guitar, just messing around, somebody will most likely join in. It might be a 17 minute riff of blues funk, or it might be three chords of silly with a chorus about mushy peas, but it's creative collaborators as opposed to people asking to hear Wonderwall or something. Or putting on an iPod or the TV.

I've been told that I should take a day off each phase. It didn't happen in Phase One, and it's not going to happen during Phase Two. Obviously there'll be a couple of "days off" on project where I won't be working, but I'll still have to be with the group and probably have to get involved in some organised fun. For me, a day off would be grabbing a guitar from Fieldbase and buggering off somewhere with a packed lunch to find a tree to play said guitar under, with my phone fully charged to record demos.

Although I did download a piano app for my tablet before I left. Maybe my creative outlet will be sticking in some earphones and putting some stuff together on that. Ooh. I think I could be on to something there...

Anyway, I've to be on the bus from Turrialba at 5am - that's in just over six hours time. I don't think I'll have access to internet until I get back on 22 March, at least not for long enough to write a good blog, so this will be my last post until at least then. Hopefully I'll have some adventures to share!

Pura Vida!