The Hobbit set to Led Zeppelin’s “Ramble On”

July 28th, 2008 | By Kelsey | 4 Comments »

One of my favorite songs about travel and one of my favorite books seamlessly merge into a boatload of major geekery. Enjoy:

This seasons hot new travel accessory…BABIES!

July 25th, 2008 | By Kelsey | No Comments »

Joshua Berman, aka The Tranquilo Traveler, recently visited Belize with his wife and sparkly-eyed, smiling infant – Shanti.

She. Is. Adorable.

You have to stop what you are doing right this minute and checkout this photo set or miss Shanti in a Mennonite cart, Shanti making friends at the Jerk Pit, Shanti sucking on a cold beer, and other cutenesses.

(What I imagine to be) Advantages of traveling with a cute baby
- easy to make friends with the locals
- Acceptably butt in line at airport
- Never be bored again

Shanti even has her own passport! Oh, if only Annie would let me get our one year old a passport and take him/her with me wherever I go. The fun we would have. I doubt our baby will be leaving the country anytime soon.

I tend to lose things.

A warning: There be reporters lurking

July 24th, 2008 | By Kelsey | No Comments »

I’ve been warned that I should watch what I write because the media is starting to lurk in these parts.

This is a good thing, but as I watch the number of visitors grow each month a bit of me longs for the day when most of the hits to my blog were me. And since I knew how stupid I could be already, there was no real concern about writing something stupid or posting, say, this photo.

I’m pretty sure I haven’t said anything that stupid or offensive the three years I’ve been blogging. Most of the credit for this should go to Annie who has silently lurked on my blogs from Day One, making sure that I don’t say anything that embarrasses her.

Thankfully she has enough shame for both of us.

I’m sure that in the future (unless the internet implodes) my seventy-year-old self will stumble upon Where am I Wearing? and perhaps even the good ol’ days of Touron Talk and think, “What the hell?”

Social Butterflies

July 15th, 2008 | By Kelsey | No Comments »

I’m not really sure about this whole social networking thing.

I realize that statement is so 2005, but I’m a little late onto the scene here. Now you can be my friend on Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter. And I want to be your friend, especially since my newly opened accounts are relatively friendless. Heck, with only 4 friends, I’m a MySpace hermit.

I guess that my issue is, who really cares what I’m doing this very second? Who am I to think you care?

Look at me trying to have my humble pie and eat it too. You’re reading this on my blog, at the domain name I registered, hosted by a travel community that I pitched an idea to. I have another domain name that’s simply my name: kelseytimmerman.com. And that’s nothing compared to the fact that I wrote a 300-page book where I am the central character.

If that’s not the opposite of humble, what is?

If it weren’t for the book, I don’t think I would have joined many of these sites. I saw the YouTube clip below on my agent’s website. In it an author is being drilled by his publicist to join all of the social networking sites. After watching him squirm, I thought I would circumvent any such conversations. So I joined.

I even downloaded Second Life and flew around a virtual reality world with my T-shirt-clad avatar hoping no one would talk to me because I wasn’t sure how to talk back. That’s 30 minutes of my life I’ll never get back.

Doesn’t promotion look like fun?

Now that I have joined everything from MySpace to Twitter, I’m kinda like…meh. But it’s beginning to grow on me. I admit it is kind of cool getting updates on people that I haven’t seen in a long time and to see when someone has moved cities, or is having a birthday. A few of my friends even have changed their relationship status. I thought about posting a note on their wall congratulating or consoling them, but I didn’t. I’m still waiting for someone to change their gender; that would definitely warrant a “wall-to-wall”. I’ve even made some new “friends”.

I feel a little silly belonging to all of these networks, but I’m a firm believer that everyone has a story, so why shouldn’t they have a Facebook or Twitter account.

If you’ve got one…wanna be my friend?

A thread in which my life is threatened…

July 10th, 2008 | By Kelsey | 2 Comments »

Read my most recent death threat

This is only the second death threat I have received. Ever. The first one was in person.

If you held a gun to my head, and made me decide which type of death threats I would prefer to receive, I would have to go with the ones in year-old blog threads.

Me, seven years later

July 1st, 2008 | By Kelsey | No Comments »

In the younger of the two photos I was in Australia on my first ever-extended trip. I was fresh out of college, starting out on an adventure that would eventually lead to a career that seemed unattainable. I was 5 years into a relationship with Annie who was half a world away still in school. I was in the middle of a road trip from Cairns to Melbourne in a Ford station wagon that I bought for a little over $1,000. The camera sat on a file cabinet in the home of the nephew of legendary Aussie adventurer Alby Mangels.

In the older of the two I was sitting behind our house in our landscape before my wife. I was fresh off writing my first book, starting out on an adventure that would surely change me forever – fatherhood. I was 1 year into a marriage to a patient woman who always waited for me to come home. Annie held the camera and was sure to tell me when I was making a “bad face” or “crazy eyes”.

Goodbye to my 21-year old bio photo. Hello 30.

You pick the author’s pic

June 29th, 2008 | By Kelsey | 15 Comments »

Annie and I had a little photo shoot in our backyard today. I’m sure it’ll give the neighbors something to talk about. Anyhow, I need to supply my publisher with an author’s pic and I’m reaching out for a little help.

Vote and let me know which shot we should use for the book - or if you think I look like Quasimodo with my crooked smile in all of them, tell me that too.

Here are our four picks:

#1

#2

#3

#4

High school ME

June 4th, 2008 | By Kelsey | 4 Comments »

Remember high school YOU? The one that went to a Spanish Club meeting once, but once was enough to put it on your list of activities on your college application?

You thought you were so cool. But you weren’t.

Today, my mom was cleaning out some files on her computer and found my list of activities during my four years of high school. I was a Who’s Who (lame give-us-money-to-be-in-our-book scam if there ever was one), alter boy, Quizz bowl, basketball player.

Hell, I was an angel.

Meet High school me! (the formatting is a little screwed up, apparently I didn’t know how to make columns on word)

School and Community Activities

Freshman / Sophomore

Basketball-captain J.V. Basketball - Co.capt.
Student Council Student Council
Golf - “Most Improved” award Art Club
Traveling soccer team - Optimist Club Spanish Club
Statistician-football Science Club
Art Club S.A.D.D.
Spanish Club Quiz Bowl
FFA Who’s Who Boy Scouts Scholastic Team
Alter Boy - St. Mary’s Church Boy Scouts
Timmerman Truss - summer & weekend job Alter Boy - St. Mary’s Church Timmerman Truss - summer & weekend job

Junior / Senior Basketball Basketball
Student Council Art Club
Art Club Science Club
Science Club Spanish Club
Spanish Club - President Literature Club
S.A.D.D. S.A.D.D.
Jr. Class Vice President Quiz Bowl
Quiz Bowl Scholastic Team
Scholastic Team School News reporter - video
Who’s Who Who’s Who
Boy Scouts Homecoming Court
Alter Boy - St. Mary’s Church Boy Scouts
Assistant teacher - Pre-school St. Mary’s Timmerman Truss - summer & weekend job
Timmerman Truss - summer & weekend job

A confession…

May 24th, 2008 | By Kelsey | 2 Comments »

Indiana Jones had more than a little bit to do with my choosing Anthropology as a major in college.

The world’s first interactive travel magazine

May 17th, 2008 | By Kelsey | No Comments »

Eva, all-around blogging goddess and contributor to WorldHum, introduced me to a new social network/travel magazine – Matador Travel. It’s facebook meets bootsnall meets WorldHum.

There’s a little bit of everything in the Matador community.

Do-gooders

Destinations

There’s a page on travel writing and a lot of opportunities for writers and travelers to share their tales and earn some cash (perhaps even more than $7/hour) to put toward that next meal or trip.

Eva contributes to Matador Pulse, which “scours the web for overlooked stories about travel, place, and culture, while also digging deep into our own Matador community to “discover” interesting people and the things they’re doing at home and on the road.” The most recent post touches on DIY aid to Burma.

You should become a member, visit my profile, and friend me. Currently, I only have two friends, which is pretty pathetic.

Read the official press release below the cut.

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