CHIANG MAI -- WHAT HAPPENED TO DAY 5?

"HEY GUYS!", I HEARD CHUCK SAY. "WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO DAY 5?" "WOW, MAN.", CURT RESPONDED." I DON'T REALLY KNOW, MAN. LIKE THE LAST THING I REMEMBER IS FALLIN' BUTT FIRST OFF AN ELEPHANT." "YOU KNOW WHAT?', I SAID. 'MAYBE THE FOURTEEN HOUR TIME DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BISBEE AND CHIANG MAI HAS SOMEHOW MESSED WITH THE SPACE - TIME CONTINUUM AND LIKE SCREWED UP THE UNIVERSE OR SOMETHIN'." "THAT COULD BE IT.", PEGGY INTONED. "THE SAME SORT OF THING HAPPENED TO ME WHILE I WAS TRAVELING IN IRAN." "WELL, WE HAVE TO FIGURE THIS ONE OUT.", CHUCK STATED. "NOW HEAR ME OUT ON THIS.", CURT CHIMED IN, "MAYBE THIS WHOLE THING WAS CAUSED BY ME FALLING OFf THE ELEPHANT." "NO. I DON'T THINK THAT WAS IT.", PEGGY REPLIED. "I THINK IT HAS SOMETHING TO DO WITH THE MAYAN 2012 PROPHECY." THEN, AS I GUZZLED MY THIRTEENTH XTRA-LARGE CHANG BEER OF THE DAY, MY HEAD SEEMED TO START SPINNING. SUDDENLY THE FLOODGATES OF MY MIND BURST OPEN AND THE MEMORIES OF THE FIFTH DAY BEGAN STREAMING IN. IT ALL STARTED WHEN THE FOUR OF US CHASED THAT OLD BUDDHIST MONK GUY DOWN A RABBIT HOLE. DOWN, DOwn, down we tumbled head over heels. As we continued to fall, I heard Curt exclaim, "Wow man. This is worse than fallin' off the elephant." Then, as we reached the bottom of the rabbit hole, or was it just an old Bisbee mine shaft, we landed smack dab in the Blue Diamond Cafe which should have been in Chiang Mai, but instead had somehow been magically transported to Old Bisbee and planted at the bottom of Brewery Gulch where Santiago's should have been. Suddenly, the four of us (Chuck, Peggy, Curt and myself) were seated at a corner table eating Thai curry and shredded beef tacos and sipping fermented prickly pear cactus juice from gallon size coconuts. I was trying to take in an inane comment Chuck was making about some obscure facet of photographic theory, but was finding it difficult to hear above the incessant chatter of the Mad Hatter seated at the next table. Then an old Asian hookah smoking catterpillar sat down at our table and began telling us how we needed to stop eating beef tacos and become tofu eating vegans because, after all, that was the only way to save the earth from destruction. "Wait just a minute here.", Chuck said. "You're just makin' this up. None of that crap ever happened. I remember now. We didn't do much of anything yesterday except to hang around the hotel all day and edit some of our photos from days three and four." And that's the way it really was when we rested on the fifth day and drank a crap load of beer. Larry Elkins Elkinsphotos