'Tis the season

In this season of making lists and then, if lucky and provided enough time, the checking thereof, I have compiled a list that is keeping me somewhat occupied. Here is an excerpt:

-Get visa's for Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos
-Make sure that the people who we are renting the apartment to are not serial killers
-Find a place to store a queen sized mattress for 8 months without paying lots of money
-Tracking down blackmarket supplies of anti-rabies drugs so that I don't have to pay 700 dollars for them...

Things like that. While these activites may not be on the lists of most folks holiday chores, they are foremost on mine.

The visa situation has been fairly well remedied I believe, and should some person, perhaps one with some knowledge of world travel try to convince you that getting a Visa for the wondrous country of India is difficult, please direct them to me. It is not difficult and they are liars, exacting their nefarious nature on you, the unsuspecting traveler. Getting to the embassy is another matter entirely and one about which Lonely Planet should devote some pagination, however the machinations involved are rudimentary and the experience far from unpleasant.

As my iminent departure looms large, an ever thickening shadow growing larger (and my mirror informs me, closer than it appears), I'm beginning to think about the manner in which I wish to leave this city. Washington D.C. has been my home for nearly 5 years and despite my many complaints about its inhabitants I will be experiencing memories in the near future that could easily be described as fond. It seems that I have two alternatives to consider in leaving; I can choose to leave quietly, saying goodbye on an individual basis to those closest and dearest, perhaps spending highly charged moments with those people, full of deep introspective words like "life" and "passion" and "chocolate cake." This type of exit would ensure that, though many people would be left out of the process, those who were involved would be better attended to. The other option is to arrange some sort of festivity, an event at which many different people could congregate at the same time to, I don't know, wish me well or something like that. This event would inevitably need to include alcoholic beverages and maybe loud music, period music perhaps. The 80's were a period! In either case there is the opportunity for great, and also terrible outcomes, the consequences of which could last for a very long time.