oops [part one]

tirupati, AP
off the map, off the guidebook,
off compass, off bearings, off axle, off metaphor
...
the country ridgy, red soiled...now friendly and green, now stark and rocky ... not bad
super-friendly waiters, touching to their hearts as you leave... not bad
but... the million strong, unheard-of town... with...thunderous downpour, grubby bedlam streets, blaring lights blaring horns, veg veg veg, dark corners, stinking sewers, friendly folks, stuffy hotel rooms, limbless beggars, colds migraine etc, numbheaded numbum busrides, tomato farms, suicidal dogs, lumps and lurgeys, 1000s of quietly queueing pilgrims up the windy hillroad at tirumala, indiana jones on tv, dr zhivago and last exit to brooklyn in book, cheap cheap cheap, yet another bollocks coffee made in the teapot/pan [hideous], rooms of cot-sleeping men... and more thunderous downpour
oops
so, no hoorah for our dash, via hypochondriacal delays, straight to the rainy season
oops
unerring, triumphant even in its heading for the great wet oops
cos yes we're heading for mal and pondy and what happens?
we find its the bloody monsoon on the south-east coast...
which is right where we're going
oops
so...do we scrap this plan and jump on a 22 hour train to goa?
we probably do
i thought i knew the climate and i didn't... and no-one told me about november being the wettest month
oops
and which rainy season is already deluging upon our sniffly heads
oops
and the weather forecast for the coast says, six days of thunderstorms
yes six
oops
...

my favorite line from withnall and i is

apparently we've come on holiday by mistake

well we've come on holiday by mistake

to make more mistakes when we get there

here

...

oops

and the [part one] in the title of this blog is a cheering piece of self-awareness, don't you think?

especially when you realise how self-awareness has never been my strongest suit

self-deprecation for comic effect has, of course, long been part of all repertoires... on and off stage... but not self-awareness

so... coming sooner rather than later... you guessed it... i-i-iiiIITTTS... [part two]

...

whatever

oops

...