Kampot Day almost

• 17 December 2025
• blogging

Between now and then we will go. Got some final little things done and decided it’s time now to write a bit. I never really know about what so I will just wander around a bit. I guess it is the best writing for me. I cannot do plans or ideas or goals or drafts really. I did implement the draft support in 11ty which is pretty easy really. I could write draft posts using some front matter stuff. I just cannot find a thing I’d call a draft so I just write like this. So here’s some little notes between now and tomorrow.

Writing the blog and daily diary

I’ve tried many times to just “write more” or different. Tried using obsidian to write wonderful connected notes or branch out into new terrtain with the diary and writing. Truth is I don’t enjoy it. In fact, it frustrates and annoys me. I’m better just writing like this. I also have tried different blogging services or platforms and even different markdown writers. I like a few of them but there’s something that is so pure and basic to me about iA Writer. It just seems to create this flow state for me writing. I can turn on focus mode if I so want. It lets me see a thought on the screen. A sentence. A feeling.

I’ve tried using journaling apps like Day One and Apple Journal. Even Everlog. I like them all. Like what they do and how. I just cannot use them. There is just too much to them. They want to be too much and that takes away valuable screen real estate on the iPhone. With all the little options and switches and knobs and dials, the actual writing area becomes slim. One way I guess to deal with this is to use a markdown editor to write the posts and then copy and paste them into a journal app. My primary question is why. Why should I use two apps to do a thing like this? I can add in photos inline with markdown. Format text. Write in a different direction or take on a new blogpost. All in this single app. I think I would face a dilemma with two apps. I would start wondering why. Why do I pay for an app to copy and paste text into when writing in markdown is so much easier and I can do a variety of things with it.

So what I’m left with is using a single app. Not paying a subscription or one time purchase for a thing that really is not used at a primary level but just to be a receptacle of things. It would be like using Drafts to start something and then running an action to copy it into something else. Why? Why not just type it all into the other app. I get lost with this seeming complexity.

Since I don’t do tasklists or todo items any more, I’ve reached the level of wanting only the writing I do. I don’t care to track what I read, use bookmark or link managers, create rich and wonderful links to things. There is no purpose to it for me.

Kampot in my sights or so

I guess truth be told, I am not really looking forward to going. It’s not the destination. I like Kampot. We used to go every so often but somehow it became Battambang for us to go to the last year. I got kinda burned out going there this last time. I think we simply have gone too often. What I’ve wanted is this trip to Saigon so I can see my friend Lily. This will only be done if I do it alone I am gathering. My wife just does not care to go.

So instead of Vietnam it’s Kampot. It takes some hours to get there. We could do a single overnight sleeper bus but we won’t do that again ever. I guess because we are two old people who did not much like the last time we did that to Sihanoukville. So instead it is two minivan rides. One that leaves at 7am (omg) to Phnom Penh and then the second that leaves an hour after arrival to Kampot. It means we have to be up on the 17th early. The bus service wants us there 30 minutes early for whatever reason. They never really leave on time but that’s the way of it.

This time we stay in a new hotel. It looks nice and I got a nice price break because I am a genius level on booking.com. We end up spending about $20 a night for a nice hotel. Downtown. Easy to walk to places for us. I’ll spend the two full days doing absolutely nothing there. It’s what I do best. I resist these days doing tourist things since I would rather just be alone there I guess and walk. Have some coffee. Walk more.

finally today

Today is gonna be some food ordered on Grab food. I would like pizza from someone. So I think dinner will be something like that. I’ve been somewhat dissatisfied lately with things I feel. So hopefully just going somewhere will let me gently reboot things. We shall see.

I’ll be finishing this up and maybe post it on the blog when we are well on the way tomorrow. I don’t know when I will write up my days and what I do since there are only two of them and I may write up both days in a single post. There’s no preferred way to this for me so I just write as I want. When I want. How I want. The blog conforms to my approach since all the posts are this random collection of ideas, facts, thoughts, bitches and complaints. All of them belong to me so feel like I should write things however. Blend them together or tear them apart.

Anyways, some minivan notes tomorrow. Right in this post. Imagine that ^[1].

Minivan me

Flash forward and it’s 17 December. Going to head out soon for the bus station and our first and longer ride. This one stretches for about 5 hours and goes from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh with likely two pit stops for food and bathroom fun.

And we go. There’s talking to be had and my wife takes advantage. The whole Thai conflict thing is getting old. Talked about forever on Facebook. Glad I don’t do that. Bombing inside Cambodia is just wrong. But the news might be better if both sides agree to just stop. Thailand has named their requirements. It will take weeks to see what happens.

There’s more tourists now coming and going and the buses and vans busier than before. We just cruise along somewhere where on national road 6 or another road.

It’s always a good time to think how I could do things. Like what app I could just use instead. How could my writing be different. There is no better than iA Writer to me. There is just trying other apps. I noticed Mikka has this app called Hule that looks cool. He’s testing it now. Soon I guess to be released. I’ve always enjoyed his writing. We go back some ways to long before. Back to the wonderful and weird Technorati days when blogging was at some other horizon. Been a few iterations of both of our lives. I won’t include a change log 😀.

Back to the business of this can ride now. At some point part 2. That’s a shorter ride.

Part 2 Phnom Penh to Kampot

This took awhile. The service is nice but at one rest stop that was supposed to be 5 minutes it became over 30 as some people decided to order meals. One rather memorable thing was seeing Mikes Burgers there. I used to visit his place in Phnom Penh when I lived there years ago. Mike is originally from Cambodia but lived and worked in the US in the US Postal Service. Seeing his unique sign at some rest stop took me back. I had to have one of his burgers. The classic cheeseburger was fabulous. My wife wants a stop there on the way back so we can both have a burger there.

Then another hour and change and we made it to our hotel. A wonderful bungalow place a bit out of town. I got to walk down quiet evening streets. Feel that strange and wonderful calm that comes from the act of it. Not have the confused rush of thoughts and disaffection with things when I cannot move.

Tomorrow is tomorrow but I know when it becomes today I will move again. It was a long day of sitting and waiting. Hearing the forever drone of conversation and really wishing I could not. I guess I am not much of a social animal. My wife is the talker. Anyone and anytime. From standing in line in a store to the waitress at the Indian restaurant. Anyone that will come close is fair game.

Finales

And it’s the night. The bungalow is very quiet. I had to get food on grab for my wife. I really enjoy just a single meal a day these days. I stretch it though when we travel because then for some reason I like breakfasts.

So here’s to Mike and his burgers and finding the place again so totally by accident. Finding some deep well of patience with the forever talk and Facebook scrolling and even smiling at the right times when my wife showed me something there. I’ll never want it back. It’s ugly now and I don’t like what it does do people here. It’s a replacement world for some. And that’s just fucking sad.

Good night from Kampot. See you in a blogpost that will start tomorrow and probably get posted Saturday. I’ll see how that works.

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