You get a landing page!
And you get a landing page!
And I’m still missing so many landing pages. Landing pages for all my photography. Landing pages for my books. Landing pages for all!
And people still view my Britney post and the one with the Beauty and the Geek the most.
Also, the one with Donald Faison. It’s chapter 10 in my book. I’m sure people find that blog post by searching for Donald’s penis (because of SEO reasons, it goes to my blog).
This Britney one. It’s chapter 3 in my book, yet people still just view my blog post from almost a decade ago.
This one about the Beauty and the Geek winner. I’m not sure why people keep finding that blog post. Maybe people are searching to see what happened to him. Nothing. He won a reality show. He moved on with his life. He visited me in Tijuana once and did a tour.
I did a tour this Saturday. I still do tours. But I don’t really announce I do tours. This guy messaged me out of nowhere on Instagram asking if I still did tours. I was missing rent money and what I was missing was exactly my rate.
I charge $150 dollars as a base for anything. Just for getting me out of the house. Rent a friend he called it.
You can rent me as a friend for $150 dollars.
Or a photographer.
Or a business consultant.
Or writer.
Or musician.
Or tour guide.
Or taco truck cashier.
I will be a taco truck cashier this upcoming Friday and Saturday at my friend’s taco truck, Corazón de Torta. He pays me California minimum wage, but that plus tips = usually more than $150 for a 6-hour shift or so. I am more talented than a cashier but is the gig they offer me, it’s the gig I take.
I do all sorts of gigs.
What a gig economy.
I have a photoshoot on the Friday after that one. And I have a tour on the Saturday after that one.
The photoshoot is in Valle. It should be interesting. A family of 27.
The tour is with someone that seems to know Tijuana fairly well, so I’m not sure why she’s hiring me. It’s her birthday party and I will be taking them to breweries around downtown, though they are doing something similar the day before. It feels like Tijuana rent a celeb for that. Or a storyteller.
The tour went great. It’s a married guy with kids in college and a talented wife. He seems happy with all but has an itch to live in Mexico and explore a temporary life here. He read my book, which surprised me. Not that many people have read my book. Not that many people buy my book. I’ve sold two in the last month as my rating falls below the top 100 in my category.
He said he had a tough time finding me, though there are no other Matingas in the world (that I know of). Plus, it’s this website. And in general, I made it easy to find. The title of the book, Tijuana Adventure, is also a website that belongs to me. I tried to make it as obvious as possible.
That website needs to be demolished and start anew. This one does as well. This is a mess. But it’s been my mess for 10 years. And this one can’t be demolished or start anew. The other one can.
Revamping that website and making new landing pages are part of the mountain of shit I have to do. Translating the book is also on that mountain. Finish and article about beer is the pinnacle of that mountain and I’m almost done with it. Writing this stupid blog is at the bottom of the mountain, but here I am.
The tour started at the Grand Hotel. My idea was to take him to Tacos el Jockey, near there, but he requested the classic fish taco. I could have easily just gone to La Cevichería Nais, but instead, he accompanied me to a fish taco truck I’ve been meaning to try in Las 5 Esquinas. The fish taco was similar to Tacos Fenix in Ensenada, which claims to be the first fish taco spot, but better (Fenix is not that good). I drove him around Tijuana showing him potential places where to live while we talk about everything and nothing while getting lost in the hills of houses and more houses. This city is fucking huge.
Like always, the tour ended downtown at Norte Brewing Co. It was followed by a light meal over at Verde y Crema and more beers at Border Psycho (tequila and margaritas for him). He got an Uber and went back to his hotel. When I got to my car, I realized he had left his bag in his trunk.
I saw him the following morning to give him his bag and a coffee, but the hipster coffee shop near me was closed. The tour ended with “you should keep writing more.” And here I am. Writing more.
He also suggested a bunch of stuff including an audiobook of Keith Richards. I should give that a listen while waiting in la fucking línea.
La Fucking línea is fucking brutal at the moment.
I don’t want this border life anymore.
I want more gigs.
And get paid more.
My student loans are on my ass. I have no money to pay them. Hopefully, soon I can.
I have more gigs. I still need more. I need to get paid way more. So I can buy more gear. And pay my student loans. And get paid more eventually… to I don’t know. Buy a fucking house. Is that what people do!?
Fucking 35-years-old and life is nothing but a pile of shit in my apartment and me making shit as I go along till at some point, I just die.
Oooeee.
I went to therapy last Friday. I told my therapist that I’ve been self-medicating with Ritalin. Not sure where I got it from. I wrote all of the above after taking 5mg. 5mg is nothing. But it worked with me. Maybe it was a placebo. But it made me work. It made me clean my apartment. It made me write more. And started writing even more in a gazillion ideas that I have.
The only issue is that I shouldn’t drink on it. But I like beer.
I only took 5 mg from Monday to Friday. Then I had 5mgs more on Tuesday. And that’s all the Ritalin I had. I went to a pharmacy to ask for it. They gave me an odd look and told me they didn’t.
I’m going to a psychiatrist next week to run a number of tests to see if Ritalin is right for me.
It feels like it is. I was way more productive and felt great. I felt like what a human should feel. Or what I noticed on other humans. This itch to survive. To work and prosper. To be better in general. Not like how I usually feel. Which is dull. With no expectations. Working for the bare minimum.
It might not be Ritalin. I am not a huge fan of chemicals. But this one maybe it works for me.
I am aware of the risk. And I don’t want a pill to function as a normal being. But I felt great on it and I want to do more work and feel like that more often. I want to have a longing for life.
About that girl I mentioned that I went out on my last blog entry. It didn’t go anywhere. I could tell she wasn’t interested in me. And I was heavily interested in her. It bothered me. I was checking on who was viewing my stories just to see if she had viewed them. And that obsession is unhealthy. So I blocked her late at night and moved on.
She canceled on me because she was hungover from a previous night. I only replied, “haha ok.”
She never said anything again. I don’t know anything from her and just like that… it fizzled out.
It bothers me not.
I want more work.
For the next two days, I have a lot of work. If it wasn’t for the border, I would gladly be going to work with no issues. But the border exists. It gives me anxiety. That’s tomorrow. I have to cross the border around noon to make it to work at 3 pm. Same thing on Saturday… but earlier. And I have more work Saturday night, for the Reader. The last cover. I will end the year with 24 covers I think. That’s the average. My 4th year (and a half) taking cover pictures for them.
I got an email about a tour in Tijuana. He said nothing but “I want a tour.” That’s not how you contact me for a tour.
Not interested.
I just hit send on a massive Tijuana beer guide that I’ve been writing since last year. Or at least it feels that way. I wanted to cover all of Baja, but it was too much. And beer places keep popping up. More and more each fucking week. So much beer.
The article is around 5,000 words including pictures. If accepted, it should be on the cover in early 2022 and hopefully, I get paid. Right after hitting send, the editor responded “great, can’t wait to read.” Compared to the previous editor who wouldn’t respond until weeks later and would inform me if it was accepted or not.
Beer.
And more beer.
Here’s the latest drinking beer with Matingas.
I end the article talking about that beer and the politics of beers… because… YEAH!
Here’s me drinking beer, pictures by my friend Yesenia.
That was at Ramuri’s new tasting room at the end of the city… and the last place I needed to visit. I spoke pretty even and neutral about all the breweries in the article I sent… but here. Here I can tell you it was absolute garbage. I had the hoppy pilsner which tasted like mineral water with hop flavoring. It gave me a slight headache which I knew was bad. I tried a bunch of different ones in tasters and they were undrinkable. I’m sure they had dirty lines or old batches because it was no bueno.
But oh well.
Other photos of me taken by friends were posted on my Instagram.
By the incredible Housewrecker (Joey Lenze):
And the padawan, Angel Terrazas.
And the ones Yesenia took of me at Ramúri.
Matingas 