The wedding video.

For all our family and friends who couldn't make it to our wedding in Las Vegas (particularly since most of you couldn't travel to the states on short notice), here is a video of our wedding ceremony at A Special Memory Wedding Chapel, a quintessential Vegas wedding chapel, just a few blocks off the strip.

The ceremony was surprisingly quick, but the important part where Simon finally makes an honest woman out of me is in there.

Our wedding was really fun, which is what we wanted. As you all know, we aren't much for pomp and circumstance. In fact, rather than a civilized sip of champagne for our toasts, we did shots of ouzo (to honor our meeting in Greece and to get drunk cheaply and efficiently)!



So I am now Alicia Irene Getchell Dearn. And Fitzroy is now Fitzroy "the Fuzz" Dearn. He's lost a few names and I've gained one.

Fun fact: the wedding immediately after ours was for a couple in a biker gang. Unbeknownst to the chapel, the rival gang had a wedding immediately after that. The two rival gangs decided that being in the same church at the same time justified several stabbings. Awww, the romance. (And the irony! I'm sure God really likes it when people stab one another in church.)

Also for fun: a picture of me doing a little work before the wedding. Because a lawyer can always be billing. (Just kidding. I was working on wedding stuff.)

I've been derelict in my posting duties.

So, I cannot believe that I haven't posted since July!! Time flies. Most of you already know what Team Polar Bear has been up to, though.

Recap: We worked like mad on the boat until mid-September, but were ultimately rained out. Also, I needed to turn my attention to my law practice and to Good Sharks, Inc., so we returned to San Diego. Good Sharks and GetchLaw have kept me fully occupied the last several months, hence the lack of posts. Plus, Simon and I decided to get married and had a blast doing it in Vegas. Then, the holidays.... You get the picture.

So, anyway, I'm not going to bore you with too many details at the moment. Instead, there will be the following posts in short order:

• Our wedding video
• Pictures of the Polar Bear in its current condition
• Pictures of Fitzroy, who is now 7 months old

We hope you all are having a fantastic holiday season and we wish you the best for the new year! Lots of love!!

Alicia, Simon & Fitzroy

Team Polar Bear on Temporary Hiatus

Team Polar Bear continues to be on hiatus, but only for a few more days. We had originally intended to reunite on May 28th. Then June 1st. Then June 8th. Now it is June 10th... set in stone.

So, continuing our saga from where I last left off....

I left Simon in Wales to head back to California to handle some nagging business. (I sold my car just in time for $4 per gallon gas prices. I've got wind power now! Haha, suckers!)

Simon returned to the boat to get it into the water and down to Portsmouth. After several days of work, he finally managed to get it hauled into the water, only to find out that the engine wouldn't start. The starter motor had to be replaced. Rats.

A few days later, he was finally on the high seas! But the engine has a strange knock. After a few days, the knocking got worse and Simon shut it down. Unfortunately, it was 4 am and the tide was against him, bringing him straight to some rocks; the water was too deep to anchor, and there wasn't enough wind to give the beasty boat any power.

Despite the knocking, Simon tried turning on the engine again, but it wouldn't start at all. With no other choice, he called for help and was towed to a mooring buoy up a river in nearby Falmouth. (I can assure you that towing a 13 ton boat in the middle of the night is not a cheap proposition.)

The next day, we spent several hours on the phone together trying to troubleshoot the engine. We were in no position to do it, however, without much experience taking apart and re-building diesel engines. I had bought a book on marine diesels, but it hadn't arrived yet. Plus, I was in California and Simon was stuck on the boat (we don't have a dinghy yet) in Falmouth. We moved to Plan B and paid an engineer to fix it.

The engineer said he would need at least a week, so Simon packed up to go work in Portsmouth. A few days later, the engineer said he needed more time. Simultaneously, Simon was offered work for two weeks in Lanzarote, Spain (the Canary Islands, off the coast of Africa). We decided he should take it while the boat was in the shop. Team Polar Bear's rendezvous was rescheduled for June 1.

In the meantime, I've been going crazy at home. I am renting out my condo, which means I have to move the rest of my stuff out of it. I've packed up stuff that I'm taking with me to the yacht, but it is too much to carry. The rest was going to various storage spaces. I no longer have my car, so I've been renting/borrowing/walking. The logistics began to make me a little nutty, so I decided I needed more time. To be frank, though, as much as I love San Diego, my house, my family and my friends, I cannot wait to get back. I'm tired of running in fifty directions and I look forward to completing my tasks here so I can focus on my business and Polar Bear full time.

Good news, though. Polar Bear is all fixed up. The engine problems turned out to be loose parts, resulting in another small part becoming bent and jamming the whole thing. This was the best case scenario, and also what Simon and I thought might be the issue due to improper winterizing, so we are pleased with that. Simon is currently working again in Portsmouth, but on June 10, we are getting back on track. We have a fun itinerary planned of batting around the West country for about a week before returning to Portsmouth.

So, yes, things are a bit boring right now while we continue in this slow phase of gearing up for extreme nomadism. We're impatient to get going, of course, but at least things are moving along in the right direction.

An American about town: comments on confronting misconceptions and cultural insensitivity as a traveling American.

This Absolut Vodka ad is one of the single-most offensive things I have ever seen. For the first time in my life, I am genuinely going to boycott a product. I urge you all to do the same. It is crappy vodka anyway.

This ad is a tragedy and I hope that it is forgotten quickly and has little actual impact. It advocates hate, malcontent and an “us vs. them” mentality. As a San Diegan, I have always loved our unique blend of American and Mexican culture. To me, being American means not only embracing our diverse cultural roots, but also celebrating our Americanness: we are a unique country of free and varied people. We should be proud to be Americans, all of us, no matter what kind of American; and we are American first. We all know brave Mexican-Americans who fight to protect our country, and an invasion of our country by Mexico (or any other country) is abhorrent to what they fight for. Further, inclusiveness is something that many Americans have fought hard for throughout our entire history. It would be a tragedy for those struggles to be in vain and a culture of separatism to triumph.

So why is this relevant to the Chronicles? This is not a political blog. Nonetheless, this is relevant because I am an extensively well-traveled American and it reminds me that I am often been asked to comment on media-influenced misconceptions about America. (Sometimes I am just asked whether I ever pass myself off as a Canadian. The answer to that is "no.")

This ad is an extreme example of how the media creates misinformation and hatred towards Americans. It also shows how non-Americans can be insensitive to Americans. Absolut, a Swedish company, claims on its consumer inquiry line, for example, that they did not intend this ad to be offensive. They further claim that it is not meant to "advocate an altering of borders, nor does it lend support to any anti-American sentiment." Which begs the questions, what exactly did they think it was saying? How could they be so unaware of how this would make many Americans feel? Are they simply unaware that America is populated by feeling people? Have they been brainwashed by popular images that suggest that America is worthy only of hatred and malcontent?

Even though I travel through places where people make fun of Americans out of ignorance, spite or jealousy, one thing I will never do is apologize for being American. We aren’t perfect, but I can tell you that no place I have been is perfect. All countries have their social, economic and political problems. But to our credit, most Americans try to live up to our ideals of freedom, tolerance and generosity. Sometimes our government doesn't get it right, but although our government answers to us, it is not the same as being us. We are a good people.

I find it incredibly arrogant for other people to think that they can approach me with the assumption that I would be ashamed of being American or that they know better than we do what America should do as a country. Americans aren't the only people capable of being culturally insensitive. But at least this helps me not behave similarly insensitively.

I travel because I believe that it enriches you as a human being. It makes you empathetic and tolerant. It also highlights the "humanness" of people, which exists without exception, culture to culture. I've never been to a country where I didn't like the people or didn't see examples of love, hate, kindness, tragedy, hope, pettiness, humor and struggle. I only wish that more people would actually experience America and Americans before swallowing the media's popular misconceptions.

I believe that we are all brothers and sisters. And, when the questioner is actually interested in my answer and not just asking to feel superior, that is what I tell them.

Peace,

Retro Chronicles: Camping in California

You haven’t lived until you’ve camped amongst the California redwoods in November.

Simon and I drove up from San Diego, through Sonoma Valley and into the Armstrong Redwoods during early November 2007. We came equipped with our three person tent, down sleeping bags, fruit, water, eggs, hotdogs, and a bottle of whiskey, all stuffed nicely into my rucksack. The weather was misty and overcast, but it stayed at a comfortable 60 degrees Fahrenheit. The drive up the mountain was beautiful as we left cell phone reception behind and curled slowly around massive trees.

We arrived at the state run campsite around 3 in the afternoon. The campsites were abandoned and we were able to choose the plot that we felt gave us the best view. There were no rangers in the stations and we paid our fees by leaving money in the appointed box in a damp envelope. I was surprised that we were able to pull my car straight into a space next to our site, as I’ve always had to hike into small campgrounds like this one before. I was also happy to see bathrooms with running water toilets and sinks. We had our camp pitched in about twenty minutes. The camp had a raccoon locker for the food, but no signs of bears. I hid the food away, but wondered if there were also going to be bears in the night, if they hadn’t started their hibernations.

As we put the finishing touches on Casa Getchell-Dearn, a forest ranger pulled up in a truck. “Are you going to camp tonight?” he asked, unable to hide the incredulity.

“Yes,” Simon replied. “It looks like we are the only ones, though.”

“Yeah, it’s not a busy time of year. We get a lot of people during the summer, but not in November. Just so you know, tomorrow morning at around 8 a.m., we’re going to start chipping these piles of wood.” The ranger pointed at piles around the campground of gathered debris from the forest. “It’s going to be an awful noise.”

“That’s OK. We need to get up early, anyway.”

The ranger headed back down the mountain road and we decided to hike up to a clearing, to watch the sun set. The place was silent except for our footfalls and conversation and the occasional bird twittering. After a short hike, we sat along a grassy, craggy clearing above the canopy of trees and swilled whiskey from the bottle. The sun set over the mountains, but was largely obscured by mist around the various peaks. The shadows around the mountains turned the air into deeper and deeper shades of blue and the air grew crisp. We decided to head back to camp and make fire.

On our way back into camp, I noticed a sign that asked that we not gather firewood from the forest, but rather purchase it from the rangers. We had not seen any rangers at the stations, however, and we needed to eat. Conveniently, the rangers had gathered wood up for us and left them in piles for the wood chippers. “We ought to help them out,” I suggested and we used a pile of chipping wood for fire. The fire quickly roared to life while we whittled sticks into points for hotdog roasting and fried some eggs.

Our peace and contentedness was supreme up in the mountains, miles away from anyone else. We shattered the silence by playing David Gray in my car stereo, loudly enough to hear while we stared at the fire and talked about random things, smug in the knowledge that the music could echo off the trees without anyone else hearing it. Falling back into silence, we sashayed off to an early bed.

Our deep, peaceful sleep in the mountain air was punctured only by the frisky chittering of raccoons, who were unable to get our food, despite their best efforts. That is, until the wood-chipper roared to life. Simon and I prefer our mornings to start late and with coffee. We grumbled at each other about the noise and buried our heads deep into our bags. Shockingly, despite the industrial screech of the chippers, which went on for two hours, we both fell back to sleep and did not rise again until after 10. Well rested, we broke camp and headed back down the mountain and into San Francisco. The last 24 hours had been sublime.