I feel sort of bad for not posting in a long time. The truth is I haven’t gone anywhere since June, so I haven’t had anything to write. I’ve been trying to think of a way to repurpose my blog so that I post to it at least monthly, and I think I’ve finally figured something out.
Instant messaging creates some entertaining conversations. I’ve decided to post up some of the more interesting ones. They’re interesting to me at least. Names have been changed to protect the innocent.
Modern Geeks
me: what's up PPE?
J: jigga what?
purple python evangelist?
tom brady is addicted to disappointing me
micheal vick keeps doing well, and brady keeps trying to chase his tail
me: he and terrel owens must be in the same support group then.
J: yeah, sounds like to has a bobo
you been taunting tammy over her excellant performance so far this week?
me: bastard. first he sucks, then he gets injured.
i'm savign it for tomorrow when the game is finally over.
J: yeah... and I hear he's not a very nice person
me: i'm hoping her rb actually rushes for negative yards.
J: that'd be hip
like what happened for me
me: i'd really love it if i more than doubled her score rather than almost doubled it.
J: I had a wide receiver go for -1 and another for 2
my Wide receivers are crap
me: good showing
J: my back up ones went for 8 and 0
so the 8 sounds like a keeper, the rest are dead to me
so C has a Wide receiver left to weigh in, I still have my defense and tight end... I think I'm going to get buried
me: i've got to figure out what i'm going to do after next week. TO was already going to be out for week 3 due to bye. but i'm thiking i might need to do something about my TE
J: on the plus side, my reserve players so far have 6 more pts than my actives
me: sweet!
could be a tough game for yoru defense
J: rabble
me: but, it could also be really good. i think your d is stronger than the jak d.
J: heres hoping
me: unfortunately, you have to hope for 6-3 defensive struggle
maybe a couple of touchdowns on fumble recovs and interceptions.
J: hmm... tachyon pulse?
yeah that'd be sweet
me: what you don't want is for pit to have a good passing game.
hmmm, were they trying to repel another ship?
or seal up a rift in the space time continuum
J: it's the voyager response for... wtf? "The tachyon pulse" or when things are extremely dire... "The reverse Tachyon pulse"
me: saw a couple eps of tng on friday. they were from season 1 or 2. almost painful to watch.
J: did you see the last episode of enterprise
it's akin to sliting your wrists and sitting in a bathtub of salty water
me: yeah. i hate to admit, but i watched the whole series
didn't miss an episode.
J: me too... a kind of dirty that doesn't wash off easily
me: it was like a little bit of torture every tues (thurs? fri?) night
like a hangnail. you hate it but you can't stop playing with it.
J: I always downloaded the episodes, I might have seen it once or twice on tv
yeah, or a trainwreck
you know you shouldn't look, but you just can't turn away
me: capt sisko
could not stand watching him.
he seriously couldn't sniff pic's jock as far as captaining something.
J: wow the titans defense scored 0 pts
yeah, ds9 was perhaps my least favorite
me: who got stuck with them?
J: I thought of it as really just a soap opera in space
N (ed. Answer to “who got stuck with them”
p. manning netted him 34 pts... what a load
me: i know.
J: C and I spoke this morning about this... I think I need to make some voodoo dolls
me: A vs J2 has potential to get interesting.
if jags have a good game.
J: rooting for A... that's messed up
:)
my defense and her defense can't both score well can they?
me: like me rooting for J2.
if you get the all field goal game rollign they both can.
J: I had one of those in week 1
me: someone had it this week i think.
kc vs someone?
which means my rb wasn't nearly as impressive as he should have been.
bastard.
supposed to break tackles and head for the endzone.
that's your home
don't you want to go home?
J: my kicker scored me 6 field goals in game 2
game 1 rather
me: nice!
wish mine would do that.
J: I'm eating dried cranberries and watching smallville
god bless america
me: hate college kids. they always have too much freedom.
shouldn't you be grading a paper or something?
J: I missed it so much over the summer... waking up early and everything
me: i've missed it every day since 1992 :(
J: ack
go on paternity leave?
me: would rather just wake up early for work.
J: on the last day have something go wrong and the adoption doesn't go through
how much longer till you move into your house?
me: not this thursday but the next.
J: awesome
me: i know. i'm so ready for the saga to be done with.
J: so do you know anything about los cabos?
me: it got hit by a hurricane earlier this month.
J: shit really?
me: the big brother sequester house was there.
they all had to evacuate.
J: (fiancée) and I just booked a honey moon there for next june
me: to a shitty little development in AZ!
should be fine in june.
all inclusive resort?
J: yup
me: sweet!
J: yeah I'm looking forward to it
we almost booked a cruise in the worlds largest cruise ship, but I think that will just have to wait till another day
it just went into service in may... they don't even have pictures of the stinking thing yet
me: i've heard about that one. i think they have a thing on it where you can go surfing.
like up where the rock climbing wall normally is.
J: yup
I've watched the documentary about building the thing
a couple of times...
me: hmm. need to see that.
J: I've never been on a cruise though
me: i've been on one. i loved it. it was a 3 night thing. we're going on a 7 day one in december.
try the royal carrib out of galveston to cozumel.
it was pretty cheap too.
for a vacation.
J: I think I need to lose some weight before I go on a cruise
me: amazing food. 5 star dining every night, and it's included as part of the package.
J: I could totally put on a winter coat after a week of all you can eat
me: you wouldn't be the biggest one there.
J: I might leave that way though
I have dedication and the will of the warrior
I went to an asian market yesterday, they had "Double York" eggs... I took a picture with my camera while (fiancee) was telling me I was making a scene
me: that's funny.
send it to jay?
J: do you know her cell phone number?
me: jay leno? i'm pretty sure it's unlisted.
J: ah I thought you meant (co-worker)
I went to a pho place... it was pretty good
me: what kind of food is that?
J: vietnamese soup
the kind I had was chicken curry or something like that
I think usually pho is a beef soup
me: ugh. i hate curry.
J: poor lil feller
thai curry is good stuff
me: if you like nuclear weapons going off in your mouth, i'm sure it is.
J: well I've dabbled with hot... I tried the spicy diet
a stunning failure
thai curry they mix with coconut milk and then put some chicken and veggies in it... I like adding white rice till it's less like soup and more the consistency of something like mashed potatoes
the curry comes out a little sweet, it's good stuff
one time I had some very spicy wings at buffalo wild wings... and then I drank too much... and then my sinuses got to "enjoy" some very spicy wings as they made their way back into the lime light
me: ouch
that just makes me want to cry
J: didn't exactly thrill me
J: so are you headed to canadia?
me: no. i'm done for the year. i'm working on my own project while they're gone. they're in to their 2nd week of the audit right now.
J: ah nice
Back when I was your age... Pluto was a planet
me: and when i drove i had to steer too!
J: best pickup line ever... "Hey does this rag smell like chloroform to you?"
and the best christmas movie is still bad santa
you should check out santa's slay though
me: next time (gf) is out of town i'm all over it.
J: you have seen bad santa right?
me: yeah. good movie. not as good as christmas vacation.
J: must be a generation gap type thing ;)
me: is taht what you guys are?
i know G and i are both gen-x
if you can believe that
J: well that explains why both of you are delusional about christmas movies
me: #2 is xmas story
everything after that is just filler
snap into a slim jim!
J: G actually came up in conversation during class the other day
was kinda weird
me: (previous company named)?
J: yeah
me: did you name drop?
i would have
J: someone asked if people who blow the whistle are employable... prof mentioned that the head person from (previous co) stuff is doing speaches now, but that G was there and is now working for (current co)
well it was in the class, the one I'm a ta for, so the professor already knows I worked with him
me: yeah, but the other students don't necessarily
you had scoreboard and you didn't point it out.
J: I was enjoying the story, didn't want to interupt, I still don't really know much about what G did there with regards to the hunting
me: he was a manager.
which means he may or may not have done any actual work himself.
if it's like here, he did.
shutting down now. talk to you later.
J: see ya cheif
The War with Dept X
Day 1
J2 says: Are they being nice to you?
Me says: who? Dept X? as nice as they usually are. which is to say they constantly have a look that seems to say "why are you talking? can't you tell it bothers me?"
J2 says: I wonder if we can re-outsource them?
Me says: screw that. let's just invade and pillage them. teach them a lesson. show them who's boss.
J2 says: I agree. You and S start the assult and we will reinforce you when we get back.
Me says: between S and i there won't be anything left for the rest of you.
J2 says: That's the spirit! Remind me to give you a sticker when I get back!
Day 2
J2 says: How goes the battle with Dept X?
Me says: they recruited mercenaries to fight with them (Dept Y). We tried to go for the quick win yesterday with a strong frontal assualt but they beat us back. Many casualties on both sides. I think S broke a nail. We're going to try using J3 in a feint today and go for a flanking attack. Bringing in Dept Y may have postponed their inevitable defeat for a little while, but they will crumble before us yet.
J2 says: I will bring in the big artillary-the Trebuchet, when we get back.
Me says: we interviewed on of the analysts down there for the spot we had open up here. i think we can turn her and have a spy in their midst. I plan on having this war wrapped up long before you return.
J2 says: What methods of introgration did you employ?
Me says: chinese water torture and country music
Me says: the water torture didn't bother her but she cracked like a rotten egg after the 70th listen to "Achy Breaky Heart"
J2 says: Very good.
Day 3
Me says: I have good news and bad news. The good news is that in a daring, early hour op S captured Opal (ed. Dept X leader). We’ve converted your cube into a cell for her and she’s currently being interrogated. With their leader cut off, it’s only a matter of time before they fall into disarry. They’re holed up in their cubes in a defensive posture now. One thing I didn’t count on was D (ed. Consultants). I knew they were working together, but I expected that D would play Switzerland and sit this one out. No such luck. Fortunately, they’re poorly organized and supplied.
Me says: Now the bad news. We lost J3 yesterday. He tried to go over the wall to clear out a nest of holdouts and open up some lanes for attacking. Unfortunately he ran into T. She’s a demon! The atrocities she committed on him are going to be infamous. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to get the image of his mutilated body out of my mind.
J2 says: It was good of him to take one for the team.
Me says: he was a good soldier
J2 says: We will enjoy a beer in his honor!
Me says: and tell lies about women!
J2 says: I will have J4 go up the week after next and put the hurt on T. We will have revenge!
Additionally, I’m going to try to make it a regular feature to include a slang “word of the post”. It will do two things.
1. Entertain me
2. Help me get a few funny slang words to help me entertain others.
This entry’s Word of the Post, courtesy of www.urbandictionary.com , is
Dutch Oven - to fart under covers and then pull the covers over your or someone else’s head
Friday, September 22, 2006
Monday, June 26, 2006
Bella Firenze – June 24-25
Since nothing ever goes as planned, it’s fitting that something went wrong first thing in the morning. I was the one who purchased our tickets to Florence – “dad” and I went together – and somehow I ended up purchasing tickets on two different trains. One left at 9:00 and the other left at 10:00. Luckily, even though my f-up was going to cost us at least an hour of exploring, he’s a pretty laid back guy and didn’t give me any of the grief I deserved from it. I took the 9:00 train and he took the 10:00.
The ride was nice. We went through some very pretty country, including some mountains. Well, they were either mountains or just very tall hills. I was quite impressed actually. It was the kind of scenery you only see in movies. It was a long ride though – 2 hours and 45 minutes. I read and listened to the iPod throughout. I’ve never been a huge music fan, but that little gadget is one of the best purchases I’ve ever made. It’s like it provides a soundtrack for your life.
I got off the train in Florence and looked around the station for a bit. I didn’t really have to wait a full hour for him to arrive since my train was a little late anyway. I spotted our stop for lunch immediately and bought a map of the city from the tourism office. Then I sat down to study the map and wait. After a while his train showed up. I’m standing there waiting for him at the top of the platform when I notice this older, blonde guy with his shirt unbuttoned down to middle of his chest walking down from where he got off the train. I thought the guy looked incredibly familiar, but I wasn’t sure if he was who I thought he was until some Italian guy next to me started shouting “Great performance. Sting! Great performance!” He sort of smiled vaguely and gave a half-wave, but he looked like he didn’t really want to be bothered. I left him alone. He walked by me no more than five feet away. My second celebrity encounter; the first was in December. I swear Sting is following me. I’m being stalked by a rock star! Cool.
Lunch was at the train station McDonald’s. I haven’t had the Micky D’s since I got here, so I was eager to give it a shot. Plus, I was so hungry I would have eaten fresh road-kill, or track-kill, if someone offered it to me. I’d have even paid.
After lunch we started planning out what we wanted to see and where we wanted to go. There were two items on the must list and everything else was pretty flexible. The plan was to start out and head north to the Galleria dell’Accademia to see “David” and work our way south. It was just a plan, but it was a plan that was going to take a lot of walking. We stepped out of the train station, and I looked over at the bus stop and saw the CitySightseeing tour bus. I’ve never been on one of them, but Lisa did it in London and she loved it. That was a pretty good recommendation to me, so I mentioned that I’d heard they were a great way to see the city and that we should check out their itinerary. Everything we wanted to see and more was on there, so we handed over our 20 euros and climbed on board.
The bus has two lines: A and B. We were limited both in the time we had available to spend in Florence (roughly 8 hours) and the closing time of the bus tour. There was apparently some sort of fireworks show happening that night in Florence and the bus line was going to do the last run at 7:00 rather than stay open until midnight. Incidentally, there was also a fireworks show in Milan that night, although it appears that I’m the only one in my group that realizes it, including the native. I hope I wasn’t imagining those sounds. Going to a mental hospital for a couple of weeks sounds restful, but I really don’t want to actually be a nut. Since we were limited, we chose the A line which stayed mostly in the heart of the city, which was fine with us since that’s where everything we wanted to see was anyway.
The first time we got off the bus was near the Arno River. We’d spotted the river going through and wanted a closer look, so we hopped off the bus and walked a block to the river. I got a few good pictures of the river and Ponte Vecchio. We crossed the bridge and walked down along the banks to Ponte Vecchio. Ponte Vecchio is, I think, a pretty famous bridge in Florence. Most of the city’s best goldsmith’s have their shops there, and really it doesn’t look anything like a bridge to me. It looks like a large set of townhomes built across the river. Very strange and very crowded. From there we walked over to the Galleria degli Uffizi and the plaza outside of it. There was some great sculpture there, including a replica of “David” and a very nice one of Neptune. I hate to say it, but although I was extremely impressed by “David” I liked the Neptune one far more. There was something regal about it that I didn’t feel from “David”.
I almost got run over by a horse and carriage while taking pictures of the statues and all the buildings. I was backing up to try to get this old church completely in frame when I heard the clip-clop of a horse’s feet. I turned around and there he was with his driver grinning maniacally. Ok, the driver wasn’t really doing that, and I think he was trying to turn the horse so it didn’t run me down, but it paints a more interesting picture that way.
From Uffizi we headed back to the bus stop. We passed another building with a series of sculptures inside and stopped to look. I’m not sure if the building or any of the sculptures were anything famous though. Once on the bus we headed to the Piazzale Michelangelo, which is supposed to have one of the best views of Florence. Unfortunately, thanks to the fireworks show we weren’t able to get the best views. Most of the Piazzale was closed off and the police guarding it didn’t look like the forgiving types.
Back on the bus, we went through some interesting neighborhoods and passed the museum where some of Galileo’s telescopes are housed. I’m kind of sorry we didn’t go in to that one. We rode the bus and listened to the tour all the way back to the train station. From there we had two plans, either of which would have worked for us. Plan A was to wait for the bus from the next line to show up and take that tour. Plan B was to wait for the bus we were just on to start moving again and go visit the Galleria Accademia to see David. We opted with Plan B, so we had some time to kill. We decided to up to this item that was on the map but not near any of the tour stops, the Fortezza Da Basso. On the walk over there we decided to cause an international incident by walking through a restricted area. Ok, I guess it wasn’t really all that bad, but we did get stopped by a security guard who told us that way we were going was not for tourists and for Congress only. Shame on us. Eventually we made it over to the Fortezza, but there was some sort of show going on so we couldn’t go in. I’m not all that disappointed actually. If I’m going to look at forts, I’d rather look at castles and such in Germany or Spain. A fort in Italy, even an old fort, doesn’t hold that much appeal for me.
We made our final stop of the day at the Galleria and stood in line to get in. All the guidebooks I’ve read say that the lines to get in are very long, so you should make a reservation. I’d prefer not to be locked in to certain times, so of course I never make reservations. That kept me from seeing the Last Supper, but it didn’t keep me from David. We waited maybe half an hour before getting inside, which I didn’t think was too bad. Then we had to go through a metal detector. Some deranged art critic tried to take a hammer to David in 1991, so now everyone has to pass through the metal detector and there’s a plexiglass barrier around the sculpture.
Florence is a great place for art lovers, but only if you’re really into Renaissance style paintings and sculpture. I’m not. I can appreciate the mastery of the art form by Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Donatello, etc. – what’s the other TMN Turtle’s name? – but the work itself doesn’t speak to me. I can only take looking at it for a couple of seconds. Put me in front of a Matisse or Picasso and I can hang for a while, but Renaissance art sort of falls on deaf eyes. That being said, David is a pretty awesome piece of work. It’s huge! Easily 20 feet tall not counting the base, which must add another 5 or 6 feet on to that. It’s also very detailed. You can see the veins and tendons in his hands and pick out individual muscles. A definite must see if you find yourself in Florence.
After abandoning the Galleria we walked about a quarter of a mile down the street to the Duomo. I really like this one. Its façade is very different from the cathedrals in London, York, and even Milan. This one looks like something more out a storybook. I wish we had gone in. The innards of a cathedral are usually just as interesting as the outside.
That was it for us. The city was about to close down for the fireworks, and we were both hot, nasty, and tired. I was also sporting a seriously impressive sunburn. We caught the bus back to the train station, changed our reservations to an earlier train, stopped by McD’s for dinner and headed back to Milan. I slept most of the way – well, dozed actually. I doubt anyone can actually sleep on a train unless they’ve got one of the sleeper cars.
Sunday was a day of rest, and by that I mean I didn’t leave the hotel until dinner at 7:45. I actually only left my room once and that was for the five minutes it took for me to go up the executive lounge and snag a couple of bottles of water and a Pepsi to go along with my lunch. I should have gotten out and done a little souvenir shopping, but I didn’t. Oh, well. I’ll find something sometime before I leave.
The ride was nice. We went through some very pretty country, including some mountains. Well, they were either mountains or just very tall hills. I was quite impressed actually. It was the kind of scenery you only see in movies. It was a long ride though – 2 hours and 45 minutes. I read and listened to the iPod throughout. I’ve never been a huge music fan, but that little gadget is one of the best purchases I’ve ever made. It’s like it provides a soundtrack for your life.
I got off the train in Florence and looked around the station for a bit. I didn’t really have to wait a full hour for him to arrive since my train was a little late anyway. I spotted our stop for lunch immediately and bought a map of the city from the tourism office. Then I sat down to study the map and wait. After a while his train showed up. I’m standing there waiting for him at the top of the platform when I notice this older, blonde guy with his shirt unbuttoned down to middle of his chest walking down from where he got off the train. I thought the guy looked incredibly familiar, but I wasn’t sure if he was who I thought he was until some Italian guy next to me started shouting “Great performance. Sting! Great performance!” He sort of smiled vaguely and gave a half-wave, but he looked like he didn’t really want to be bothered. I left him alone. He walked by me no more than five feet away. My second celebrity encounter; the first was in December. I swear Sting is following me. I’m being stalked by a rock star! Cool.
Lunch was at the train station McDonald’s. I haven’t had the Micky D’s since I got here, so I was eager to give it a shot. Plus, I was so hungry I would have eaten fresh road-kill, or track-kill, if someone offered it to me. I’d have even paid.
After lunch we started planning out what we wanted to see and where we wanted to go. There were two items on the must list and everything else was pretty flexible. The plan was to start out and head north to the Galleria dell’Accademia to see “David” and work our way south. It was just a plan, but it was a plan that was going to take a lot of walking. We stepped out of the train station, and I looked over at the bus stop and saw the CitySightseeing tour bus. I’ve never been on one of them, but Lisa did it in London and she loved it. That was a pretty good recommendation to me, so I mentioned that I’d heard they were a great way to see the city and that we should check out their itinerary. Everything we wanted to see and more was on there, so we handed over our 20 euros and climbed on board.
The bus has two lines: A and B. We were limited both in the time we had available to spend in Florence (roughly 8 hours) and the closing time of the bus tour. There was apparently some sort of fireworks show happening that night in Florence and the bus line was going to do the last run at 7:00 rather than stay open until midnight. Incidentally, there was also a fireworks show in Milan that night, although it appears that I’m the only one in my group that realizes it, including the native. I hope I wasn’t imagining those sounds. Going to a mental hospital for a couple of weeks sounds restful, but I really don’t want to actually be a nut. Since we were limited, we chose the A line which stayed mostly in the heart of the city, which was fine with us since that’s where everything we wanted to see was anyway.
The first time we got off the bus was near the Arno River. We’d spotted the river going through and wanted a closer look, so we hopped off the bus and walked a block to the river. I got a few good pictures of the river and Ponte Vecchio. We crossed the bridge and walked down along the banks to Ponte Vecchio. Ponte Vecchio is, I think, a pretty famous bridge in Florence. Most of the city’s best goldsmith’s have their shops there, and really it doesn’t look anything like a bridge to me. It looks like a large set of townhomes built across the river. Very strange and very crowded. From there we walked over to the Galleria degli Uffizi and the plaza outside of it. There was some great sculpture there, including a replica of “David” and a very nice one of Neptune. I hate to say it, but although I was extremely impressed by “David” I liked the Neptune one far more. There was something regal about it that I didn’t feel from “David”.
I almost got run over by a horse and carriage while taking pictures of the statues and all the buildings. I was backing up to try to get this old church completely in frame when I heard the clip-clop of a horse’s feet. I turned around and there he was with his driver grinning maniacally. Ok, the driver wasn’t really doing that, and I think he was trying to turn the horse so it didn’t run me down, but it paints a more interesting picture that way.
From Uffizi we headed back to the bus stop. We passed another building with a series of sculptures inside and stopped to look. I’m not sure if the building or any of the sculptures were anything famous though. Once on the bus we headed to the Piazzale Michelangelo, which is supposed to have one of the best views of Florence. Unfortunately, thanks to the fireworks show we weren’t able to get the best views. Most of the Piazzale was closed off and the police guarding it didn’t look like the forgiving types.
Back on the bus, we went through some interesting neighborhoods and passed the museum where some of Galileo’s telescopes are housed. I’m kind of sorry we didn’t go in to that one. We rode the bus and listened to the tour all the way back to the train station. From there we had two plans, either of which would have worked for us. Plan A was to wait for the bus from the next line to show up and take that tour. Plan B was to wait for the bus we were just on to start moving again and go visit the Galleria Accademia to see David. We opted with Plan B, so we had some time to kill. We decided to up to this item that was on the map but not near any of the tour stops, the Fortezza Da Basso. On the walk over there we decided to cause an international incident by walking through a restricted area. Ok, I guess it wasn’t really all that bad, but we did get stopped by a security guard who told us that way we were going was not for tourists and for Congress only. Shame on us. Eventually we made it over to the Fortezza, but there was some sort of show going on so we couldn’t go in. I’m not all that disappointed actually. If I’m going to look at forts, I’d rather look at castles and such in Germany or Spain. A fort in Italy, even an old fort, doesn’t hold that much appeal for me.
We made our final stop of the day at the Galleria and stood in line to get in. All the guidebooks I’ve read say that the lines to get in are very long, so you should make a reservation. I’d prefer not to be locked in to certain times, so of course I never make reservations. That kept me from seeing the Last Supper, but it didn’t keep me from David. We waited maybe half an hour before getting inside, which I didn’t think was too bad. Then we had to go through a metal detector. Some deranged art critic tried to take a hammer to David in 1991, so now everyone has to pass through the metal detector and there’s a plexiglass barrier around the sculpture.
Florence is a great place for art lovers, but only if you’re really into Renaissance style paintings and sculpture. I’m not. I can appreciate the mastery of the art form by Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Donatello, etc. – what’s the other TMN Turtle’s name? – but the work itself doesn’t speak to me. I can only take looking at it for a couple of seconds. Put me in front of a Matisse or Picasso and I can hang for a while, but Renaissance art sort of falls on deaf eyes. That being said, David is a pretty awesome piece of work. It’s huge! Easily 20 feet tall not counting the base, which must add another 5 or 6 feet on to that. It’s also very detailed. You can see the veins and tendons in his hands and pick out individual muscles. A definite must see if you find yourself in Florence.
After abandoning the Galleria we walked about a quarter of a mile down the street to the Duomo. I really like this one. Its façade is very different from the cathedrals in London, York, and even Milan. This one looks like something more out a storybook. I wish we had gone in. The innards of a cathedral are usually just as interesting as the outside.
That was it for us. The city was about to close down for the fireworks, and we were both hot, nasty, and tired. I was also sporting a seriously impressive sunburn. We caught the bus back to the train station, changed our reservations to an earlier train, stopped by McD’s for dinner and headed back to Milan. I slept most of the way – well, dozed actually. I doubt anyone can actually sleep on a train unless they’ve got one of the sleeper cars.
Sunday was a day of rest, and by that I mean I didn’t leave the hotel until dinner at 7:45. I actually only left my room once and that was for the five minutes it took for me to go up the executive lounge and snag a couple of bottles of water and a Pepsi to go along with my lunch. I should have gotten out and done a little souvenir shopping, but I didn’t. Oh, well. I’ll find something sometime before I leave.
Sunday, June 25, 2006
Return of Ugly Naked Guy and Sting! – June 20-23
The work week went through with no real excitement. Working internationally is a lot like working in the home office, I just happen to be in a different country.
Like I said, the week was pretty unexciting, until Friday that is. Friday at lunch we were sitting there in the cafeteria talking about American television with our Italian translator. CSI is very popular here. So is Lost. The Sopranos is just starting up, which is weird since it’s been around 10 or so years at home. All of the sudden there’s a commotion at the table next to us. Everybody was turning around to look up and out the window and there were a lot of exclamations of surprise and laughing. So I turned around to see what all the commotion was about. I mostly saw sky until I looked at the apartment building next door. There was a guy standing out on his balcony with a newspaper in his tidy whities. I think he’d noticed everyone looking at him because he was looking back at us. But there he was, hanging out on his balcony in his underwear. And lest you think this was some beautiful Neapolitan god hanging out in his underwear, this guy was more of the fat and hairy version than the slim and suave type. It was a good laugh.
I found out on Friday at that same lunch that Sting was going to be in town playing at the plaza around the Duomo. I debated going for a long time, but in the end it was one of those things where you have to say that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and you’d be an idiot to pass it up. So around 9:00, after dinner, I and “dad” caught the subway down to downtown. The plaza was insanely crowded. I couldn’t being to estimate the number of people there, but it was more than 10 and probably less than 100,000. We had to sit through three songs from some random Italian band. I have no idea if they were good or not, since it all sounded pretty jumbled to me. After that we had to sit through an interview with them and them a whole bunch of excerpts from Sting interviews while his roadies set up the stage. Then he got on. We only stayed to listen to three songs, one of which was Message in a Bottle. I don’t know what the other two were even though I was familiar with the songs. It was really crowded and I couldn’t see anything, so we decided to take off. Besides, I needed to catch some sleep before we trained off to Florence.
Like I said, the week was pretty unexciting, until Friday that is. Friday at lunch we were sitting there in the cafeteria talking about American television with our Italian translator. CSI is very popular here. So is Lost. The Sopranos is just starting up, which is weird since it’s been around 10 or so years at home. All of the sudden there’s a commotion at the table next to us. Everybody was turning around to look up and out the window and there were a lot of exclamations of surprise and laughing. So I turned around to see what all the commotion was about. I mostly saw sky until I looked at the apartment building next door. There was a guy standing out on his balcony with a newspaper in his tidy whities. I think he’d noticed everyone looking at him because he was looking back at us. But there he was, hanging out on his balcony in his underwear. And lest you think this was some beautiful Neapolitan god hanging out in his underwear, this guy was more of the fat and hairy version than the slim and suave type. It was a good laugh.
I found out on Friday at that same lunch that Sting was going to be in town playing at the plaza around the Duomo. I debated going for a long time, but in the end it was one of those things where you have to say that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and you’d be an idiot to pass it up. So around 9:00, after dinner, I and “dad” caught the subway down to downtown. The plaza was insanely crowded. I couldn’t being to estimate the number of people there, but it was more than 10 and probably less than 100,000. We had to sit through three songs from some random Italian band. I have no idea if they were good or not, since it all sounded pretty jumbled to me. After that we had to sit through an interview with them and them a whole bunch of excerpts from Sting interviews while his roadies set up the stage. Then he got on. We only stayed to listen to three songs, one of which was Message in a Bottle. I don’t know what the other two were even though I was familiar with the songs. It was really crowded and I couldn’t see anything, so we decided to take off. Besides, I needed to catch some sleep before we trained off to Florence.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Padre e Figlio – Last Saturday
I just remembered something that happened to me on Saturday that I didn’t put in my update. When we got out of the subway station at il Duomo, we were immediately stopped by some African guy that wanted to give us “friendship” bracelets. I eventually got one because another guy later wouldn’t leave me alone and he was willing to keep walking and tying while I walked away. He got no euros out of me. Anyway, this first guy hounded us for a couple of minute telling us that it was free and it was just for friendship. Whatever.
I’m traveling with two other guys. One of them is in his late 50s or maybe his 60s. I don’t know which. I’m told he’s actually not as old as he looks, but I just find it hard to believe. The other guy is maybe a couple of years older than me. I’ll put the upper limit of his age at 37, and that’s pushing it. So the African guy finally lost us completely when he asked if I wanted a bracelet for me and my father. First of all, what self-respecting 30-something gets matching thread bracelets with his father, in any culture? Second, you might think he was talking about the older guy with me, but you’d be wrong. He was actually calling the guy that’s just a couple of years older my father. He said we look alike. I don’t see it, but maybe that was just his pitch. At first I just felt incredulous that he thought we were that far apart in age. I know I don’t look 33, but I didn’t think I looked like a teenager. I don’t get carded when I go for a drink anymore, so I must look at least older than 25. And “dad” doesn’t look all that old either. Like I said, the upper limit of his age is 37, and I know that would be too high. After getting over the incredulous feeling I started calling him dad, but only for a few minutes. I don’t want to rub something like that in too much.
I’m traveling with two other guys. One of them is in his late 50s or maybe his 60s. I don’t know which. I’m told he’s actually not as old as he looks, but I just find it hard to believe. The other guy is maybe a couple of years older than me. I’ll put the upper limit of his age at 37, and that’s pushing it. So the African guy finally lost us completely when he asked if I wanted a bracelet for me and my father. First of all, what self-respecting 30-something gets matching thread bracelets with his father, in any culture? Second, you might think he was talking about the older guy with me, but you’d be wrong. He was actually calling the guy that’s just a couple of years older my father. He said we look alike. I don’t see it, but maybe that was just his pitch. At first I just felt incredulous that he thought we were that far apart in age. I know I don’t look 33, but I didn’t think I looked like a teenager. I don’t get carded when I go for a drink anymore, so I must look at least older than 25. And “dad” doesn’t look all that old either. Like I said, the upper limit of his age is 37, and I know that would be too high. After getting over the incredulous feeling I started calling him dad, but only for a few minutes. I don’t want to rub something like that in too much.
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
Um… Did the power go out? – June 19
Ok, so it’s not really normal for me to post an entry for a single day. Not enough interesting happens every day on one of these trips. It’s usually the same old routine: get up, shower, go to work, work/lunch/work with liberal surfing inserted randomly (or maybe it’s intense work inserted randomly into the liberal surfing), back to hotel, 2-hour dinner, talk to family, go to bed. Lather, rinse, repeat. But tonight, something a little more interesting happened.
Let’s not get too overtly specific about things, but I was in the bathroom. The door was closed and there I was doing my thing when I hear this loud popping sound right outside the bathroom door and the lights all go out. Of course there’s no window in the bathroom either. It’s on the hall side of the room rather than the outside world side. Good thing I had my cell phone in my pocket or I wouldn’t have been able to see anything. Unfortunately, it didn’t provide enough light for me to get situated to go out in the room area and figure out what the hell was going on, so I fumbled around and got the door opened. I finished doing my business, washed my hands (VERY important, too many people don’t recognize the importance of a little soap and water after any kind of bathroom event) and went out to start flipping switches. I flipped the ones next to the bathroom off and on again a couple of times, nothing happened. I went over to the bed and flipped the switches there a couple of times, still nothing. Finally, I gave in and called the front desk to ask if there was a problem. They said that someone would be right up to look at things. A couple of seconds later, no more than 30 max, the lights all just popped on again. So I called the front desk and told them not to bother sending anyone, everything was apparently cool. They said “ok, thanks” and hung up. I put the phone down, and the lights went out so fast it was almost like they were connected to the handset. So I called the front desk again and asked them to send someone up anyway. Hang up, lights on. Grrrr.
After a couple of minutes, the Mr. Fixit guy shows up. All the lights are off at this point and I’m wandering around in the dark because I’m not smart enough to open up the drapes and let a little natural light in. As soon as I open up the door, the lights come on. He tells me to put the key in the slot next to the door, which I haven’t had to do for the entire first week, and says that it has to be there all the time for the lights to work. Shut door, lights stay on. I pull out the card, and the lights stay on… for just long enough for me to get across the room to the desk and sit down. Then they turned off. So I went back over and stuck the key in the door. Everyone’s happy now that I’ve got the key in the slot. The lights are happy because they have something that says “this room is occupied.” I’m happy because the lights are happy, and I should remain that way until the time comes that I forget to take the key with me when I leave. That’ll probably be tomorrow.
Let’s not get too overtly specific about things, but I was in the bathroom. The door was closed and there I was doing my thing when I hear this loud popping sound right outside the bathroom door and the lights all go out. Of course there’s no window in the bathroom either. It’s on the hall side of the room rather than the outside world side. Good thing I had my cell phone in my pocket or I wouldn’t have been able to see anything. Unfortunately, it didn’t provide enough light for me to get situated to go out in the room area and figure out what the hell was going on, so I fumbled around and got the door opened. I finished doing my business, washed my hands (VERY important, too many people don’t recognize the importance of a little soap and water after any kind of bathroom event) and went out to start flipping switches. I flipped the ones next to the bathroom off and on again a couple of times, nothing happened. I went over to the bed and flipped the switches there a couple of times, still nothing. Finally, I gave in and called the front desk to ask if there was a problem. They said that someone would be right up to look at things. A couple of seconds later, no more than 30 max, the lights all just popped on again. So I called the front desk and told them not to bother sending anyone, everything was apparently cool. They said “ok, thanks” and hung up. I put the phone down, and the lights went out so fast it was almost like they were connected to the handset. So I called the front desk again and asked them to send someone up anyway. Hang up, lights on. Grrrr.
After a couple of minutes, the Mr. Fixit guy shows up. All the lights are off at this point and I’m wandering around in the dark because I’m not smart enough to open up the drapes and let a little natural light in. As soon as I open up the door, the lights come on. He tells me to put the key in the slot next to the door, which I haven’t had to do for the entire first week, and says that it has to be there all the time for the lights to work. Shut door, lights stay on. I pull out the card, and the lights stay on… for just long enough for me to get across the room to the desk and sit down. Then they turned off. So I went back over and stuck the key in the door. Everyone’s happy now that I’ve got the key in the slot. The lights are happy because they have something that says “this room is occupied.” I’m happy because the lights are happy, and I should remain that way until the time comes that I forget to take the key with me when I leave. That’ll probably be tomorrow.
Milan in a day - June 17-18
Much like the title says, I saw pretty much all I wanted and was able to see of Milan in just one day. Significantly less then a full day actually, but what I saw was pretty damn cool.
Being Saturday, my coworkers and I all decided to sleep in a little bit. I hadn’t really planned on having company while I toured, but I’m a flexible kind of guy, and they were willing to go places I suggested, so we got along just fine. The first stop was the Metro station to get a ticket for the subway, underground, metro, whatever it’s called here. There was a little confusion there. First we wanted to buy tickets at the electronic kiosk, but we couldn’t make it speak English. Then there was confusion caused by the person selling the tickets who said that you could only get an all-day pass at the next station up the line. Then he reversed himself when I asked for a ticket to that station. Finally, we got tickets, and proceeded to the next challenge: figuring out which train we needed to take to get down to il Duomo station, which is conveniently located in the plaza right in front of one of Milan’s two most visited tourist sites.
Il Duomo is a fairly large cathedral, and it’s very intricate. There are lots of little carvings on the towers, of which there are over 100 I believe. I think that’s what I read. We walked through the inside. It wasn’t as crowded with monuments and other bric-a-brac as St. Edwards in London or the York Minster, but there was a significant portion of unused space. For such a large building it was actually a pretty small church. The inside was dark, and even after I’d finally figured out why my camera was taking such bad pics and changing the settings a little bit, none of them came out all that great. The flash just didn’t light things up very well. We walked around the inside for about half and hour or 45 minutes being nasty tourists and taking pictures, which I’m sure disturbed the worshippers. If I were one of them I’d be annoyed that these people were trampling through my holy place and taking pictures. I think everybody was being respectful, but you know there’s going to be someone who’s not.
After walking around the inside, we did a quick walk around the outside to take some more shots and then coughed up our four euros each to climb the steps to the roof. It’s free to get in, but you have to pay 4-6 to climb on top of it. In retrospect, it might have been worth it to pay the extra two euros to take the elevator. The steps went on so long that I kind of wondered if I’d died and this was my punishment. Once up top it was all worth it. I have some pictures, which I may put up at some point, but probably won’t. If you’re interested, let me know and I’ll send you some. The top of the Duomo was pretty cool. You get to see the tower carvings closer up, but that’s not really the coolest thing about it. It’s just the way it looks, like it’s out of some sort of fairy tale or something. It all looked very delicate and very cool. We stayed up there for an hour or so just looking around and taking pictures. Rather than climb down we decided to be dishonest and take the elevator. Really though, it makes sense. Make everyone pay to climb – that way they get their exercise – and let everyone take the elevator down. This will prevent some of the backups on the stairs that we had to endure on the way up.
After we got down it was time for a nice bottle of water and some food. So we wandered around a bit looking for a bite and finally settled in this nice little outdoor café where no one spoke a word of English. We had a nice leisurely lunch and I said something about seeing the Parlour of Milan, which everyone sort of agreed to. Truth to tell it was right over by our subway stop, which I knew full well. There’s a fountain area outside the parlour with lots and lots of pigeons. I started walking away from the parlour toward the fountain t get a good look, and picture, of the building. So while I’m there these two guys grab my hand and put birdseed in them. Now I’m covered in pigeons. I had two thoughts going through my head. Thought 1: bird flu. Thought 2: Please don’t let these filthy beasts crap on me. Then these guys start hassling me for money. Apparently the little bit of birdseed and corn pieces they put in my hand warranted 5 euros each. That’s what they thought at least. I didn’t want to argue that much, but I’m not paying that much for the honor of having a bird on my hand. Certainly not when their cost of sales on that one couldn’t amount to more than a couple of cents each. I gave them each two and walked away. Actually, I gave one guy four and let the other guy hassle him about it. That way I only ended up paying $5 to make them go away and guy two was so busy hassling guy one for his share of the take that he let me go without saying anything. I am smart. S-M-R-T.
We stopped at a souvenir stand and I saw a paperweight of the Castello Sforenzo, which was tentatively on my list of things to see. I made a quick suggestion, figured out which stop we needed to get off at and we headed on our way. The castle wasn’t terribly impressive, but I’m glad I went. I like castles almost as much as I like cathedrals. We skipped all the castle museums and just walked around the place a little bit.
After that it was time to try to find the grand-daddy of all interesting things in Milan and probably the hardest to get in to see. It was also the one item on my list that I was least likely to get to see: Leonardo DaVinci’s “Last Supper”. The train stop was only the next one up the line, so we decided to hoof it. We walked, and walked, and walked, and walked. We had a map, but not knowing the lay of the land and me not being a boy scount, it was hard to tell which way was east, west, north, or south. So we’d compare the map to street names to see if we were going in the right direction, which seems logical. I only saw one street name on both the map and the street the entire time until we finally gave up and asked a couple of passing ladies where the Ultima Cena was. Of course I’d led us in the wrong direction. If I say “trust me” about a direction, do yourself a favor and go the opposite way. Well, we found the church where the last supper is, but we didn’t actually get in to see it. There were no tickets available until the end of July. I knew I was going to be here well in advance. I wonder why I didn’t book a spot when I had the chance.
Slightly disappointed, we made our way by foot and train back to the hotel. Sunday was a day of rest. We all stuck to ourselves except for dinner. I pretty much stayed in my room the whole day and read. I’d like to say I did something useful, like CPA studying or something like that, but no, I read. It was a good book, too. I’m pretty glad I did it.
So next weekend I’m considering going to Florence. It’s only a 2-3.5 hour train ride. Tickets appear to cost 28 euros in both directions. I can leave to go at 9am and come back on the 9pm train, which would get me back to the hotel around midnight. I don’t have a whole lot longer to think about it. I’ll probably need to book my reservation no later than Wednesday. At this point though, it’s looking pretty good.
Being Saturday, my coworkers and I all decided to sleep in a little bit. I hadn’t really planned on having company while I toured, but I’m a flexible kind of guy, and they were willing to go places I suggested, so we got along just fine. The first stop was the Metro station to get a ticket for the subway, underground, metro, whatever it’s called here. There was a little confusion there. First we wanted to buy tickets at the electronic kiosk, but we couldn’t make it speak English. Then there was confusion caused by the person selling the tickets who said that you could only get an all-day pass at the next station up the line. Then he reversed himself when I asked for a ticket to that station. Finally, we got tickets, and proceeded to the next challenge: figuring out which train we needed to take to get down to il Duomo station, which is conveniently located in the plaza right in front of one of Milan’s two most visited tourist sites.
Il Duomo is a fairly large cathedral, and it’s very intricate. There are lots of little carvings on the towers, of which there are over 100 I believe. I think that’s what I read. We walked through the inside. It wasn’t as crowded with monuments and other bric-a-brac as St. Edwards in London or the York Minster, but there was a significant portion of unused space. For such a large building it was actually a pretty small church. The inside was dark, and even after I’d finally figured out why my camera was taking such bad pics and changing the settings a little bit, none of them came out all that great. The flash just didn’t light things up very well. We walked around the inside for about half and hour or 45 minutes being nasty tourists and taking pictures, which I’m sure disturbed the worshippers. If I were one of them I’d be annoyed that these people were trampling through my holy place and taking pictures. I think everybody was being respectful, but you know there’s going to be someone who’s not.
After walking around the inside, we did a quick walk around the outside to take some more shots and then coughed up our four euros each to climb the steps to the roof. It’s free to get in, but you have to pay 4-6 to climb on top of it. In retrospect, it might have been worth it to pay the extra two euros to take the elevator. The steps went on so long that I kind of wondered if I’d died and this was my punishment. Once up top it was all worth it. I have some pictures, which I may put up at some point, but probably won’t. If you’re interested, let me know and I’ll send you some. The top of the Duomo was pretty cool. You get to see the tower carvings closer up, but that’s not really the coolest thing about it. It’s just the way it looks, like it’s out of some sort of fairy tale or something. It all looked very delicate and very cool. We stayed up there for an hour or so just looking around and taking pictures. Rather than climb down we decided to be dishonest and take the elevator. Really though, it makes sense. Make everyone pay to climb – that way they get their exercise – and let everyone take the elevator down. This will prevent some of the backups on the stairs that we had to endure on the way up.
After we got down it was time for a nice bottle of water and some food. So we wandered around a bit looking for a bite and finally settled in this nice little outdoor café where no one spoke a word of English. We had a nice leisurely lunch and I said something about seeing the Parlour of Milan, which everyone sort of agreed to. Truth to tell it was right over by our subway stop, which I knew full well. There’s a fountain area outside the parlour with lots and lots of pigeons. I started walking away from the parlour toward the fountain t get a good look, and picture, of the building. So while I’m there these two guys grab my hand and put birdseed in them. Now I’m covered in pigeons. I had two thoughts going through my head. Thought 1: bird flu. Thought 2: Please don’t let these filthy beasts crap on me. Then these guys start hassling me for money. Apparently the little bit of birdseed and corn pieces they put in my hand warranted 5 euros each. That’s what they thought at least. I didn’t want to argue that much, but I’m not paying that much for the honor of having a bird on my hand. Certainly not when their cost of sales on that one couldn’t amount to more than a couple of cents each. I gave them each two and walked away. Actually, I gave one guy four and let the other guy hassle him about it. That way I only ended up paying $5 to make them go away and guy two was so busy hassling guy one for his share of the take that he let me go without saying anything. I am smart. S-M-R-T.
We stopped at a souvenir stand and I saw a paperweight of the Castello Sforenzo, which was tentatively on my list of things to see. I made a quick suggestion, figured out which stop we needed to get off at and we headed on our way. The castle wasn’t terribly impressive, but I’m glad I went. I like castles almost as much as I like cathedrals. We skipped all the castle museums and just walked around the place a little bit.
After that it was time to try to find the grand-daddy of all interesting things in Milan and probably the hardest to get in to see. It was also the one item on my list that I was least likely to get to see: Leonardo DaVinci’s “Last Supper”. The train stop was only the next one up the line, so we decided to hoof it. We walked, and walked, and walked, and walked. We had a map, but not knowing the lay of the land and me not being a boy scount, it was hard to tell which way was east, west, north, or south. So we’d compare the map to street names to see if we were going in the right direction, which seems logical. I only saw one street name on both the map and the street the entire time until we finally gave up and asked a couple of passing ladies where the Ultima Cena was. Of course I’d led us in the wrong direction. If I say “trust me” about a direction, do yourself a favor and go the opposite way. Well, we found the church where the last supper is, but we didn’t actually get in to see it. There were no tickets available until the end of July. I knew I was going to be here well in advance. I wonder why I didn’t book a spot when I had the chance.
Slightly disappointed, we made our way by foot and train back to the hotel. Sunday was a day of rest. We all stuck to ourselves except for dinner. I pretty much stayed in my room the whole day and read. I’d like to say I did something useful, like CPA studying or something like that, but no, I read. It was a good book, too. I’m pretty glad I did it.
So next weekend I’m considering going to Florence. It’s only a 2-3.5 hour train ride. Tickets appear to cost 28 euros in both directions. I can leave to go at 9am and come back on the 9pm train, which would get me back to the hotel around midnight. I don’t have a whole lot longer to think about it. I’ll probably need to book my reservation no later than Wednesday. At this point though, it’s looking pretty good.
When the moon hits your eye... - June 12-16
Well, after getting a good night’s sleep after my harrowing 17-hour journey from Dallas to Milan, I’m almost, sort of, kind of, maybe ready for work. I’m not committing to anything though.
The week went well, I suppose, considering that once I got here I really didn’t want to be here. I usually feel like I wish I was home when I’m on these trips, but there was more to it this week. Perhaps it was the jet-lag. I was told it would probably catch up to me by Wednesday, but maybe I was experiencing little problems with it throughout the week, culminating with a BIG finish on Thursday. That’s when the jet-lag really reached up and smacked me. Anyway, despite my fatigue and my desire to be someplace else, home, I did get some work done. Probably not as much as I could have, but any little bit of work I get done in week one is work that I don’t have to do in week two.
I’ll mention a couple of things here. Milan is not the prettiest place in the country. Most of the residents have told me that there’s not really a whole lot to see here and that I should probably go visit Venice or Florence on the weekend. Now, that could just be a case of familiarity breeding contempt, but they’re not the only ones that say that. I bought “Italy for Dummies” before I left, and there’s not a whole lot in there about Milan. It’s the financial capital of Italy. It’s the fashion capital, too. In fact, someone said that our last week here is supposed to be fashion week. Someone else also said that fashion week isn’t until August, which makes both a little sense and no sense at all. August is typically vacation month – they say everything shuts down except for things like video and grocery stores. So it would be good for fashion week to be here in August because no one else is. On the other hand, no one’s here! Why would you hold a fashion show in a place where no one was at? See makes perfect sense and no sense at all. That being said, there are a few things out there to see, and I got a brief glimpse of them on Wednesday night. More on that later.
I usually include some sort of commentary on the drivers. I don’t know if I do it intentionally, but I will this time. I was told that driving in Milan was more scary than driving in London, Buenos Aires, or Mexico City. Wrong! Driving in Milan is actually almost sane. They’re reasonably courteous to the other cars, although there is still a sort of “me first” attitude like there have been in all the other places I’ve been. Actually, we kind of have that attitude in Dallas if you look at it. We’re always cutting each other off. Then there are the bikers. I’m going to lump all people that ride motorized two-wheel vehicles under this class. There are some bicyclers, but there are so few and they’re so slow that they don’t really count. In the states, at least in Texas, motorcycle riders have to be extra careful about their surroundings. We live in the land of big cars. It’s hard to see a motorcycle when you’re up in a Hummer. That’s not the case here. I haven’t seen anything bigger than your standard mini-van and very few of those. Most cars around here are probably the size of Honda Civics or Ford Focuses. They have some that are much smaller, like half the size of a Focus, called a Smart car. Wonder when those will make it to America. Anyway, they’re on the same level as the bikers, so that helps. What really helps is the sheer number of bikers. Ok, maybe you could miss the bike ahead of you, but there’s no way you could miss it, the one behind you, the one passing you on the left and the one passing you on the right. And you definitely wouldn’t miss the one that slipped in between you and the car in front of you while you were stopped at the light! I feel like the bikers are like that guy on the bridge in Spiderman who told the Green Goblin that if he messed with one he messed with all of them.
So Wednesday we went downtown to where all the touristy stuff is. I don’t really know why, since I was already planning on going down there over the weekend. We saw il Duomo and the Parlour of Milan. We had dinner outdoors at this little restaurant. More of our dinners have been outside than inside. The weather is perfect for that. I wouldn’t even consider having an 8:00 dinner outside at home. That’s just crazy talk. Anyway, I’ll revisit the tourist stuff in another entry. The sights deserve some love of their own.
The week went well, I suppose, considering that once I got here I really didn’t want to be here. I usually feel like I wish I was home when I’m on these trips, but there was more to it this week. Perhaps it was the jet-lag. I was told it would probably catch up to me by Wednesday, but maybe I was experiencing little problems with it throughout the week, culminating with a BIG finish on Thursday. That’s when the jet-lag really reached up and smacked me. Anyway, despite my fatigue and my desire to be someplace else, home, I did get some work done. Probably not as much as I could have, but any little bit of work I get done in week one is work that I don’t have to do in week two.
I’ll mention a couple of things here. Milan is not the prettiest place in the country. Most of the residents have told me that there’s not really a whole lot to see here and that I should probably go visit Venice or Florence on the weekend. Now, that could just be a case of familiarity breeding contempt, but they’re not the only ones that say that. I bought “Italy for Dummies” before I left, and there’s not a whole lot in there about Milan. It’s the financial capital of Italy. It’s the fashion capital, too. In fact, someone said that our last week here is supposed to be fashion week. Someone else also said that fashion week isn’t until August, which makes both a little sense and no sense at all. August is typically vacation month – they say everything shuts down except for things like video and grocery stores. So it would be good for fashion week to be here in August because no one else is. On the other hand, no one’s here! Why would you hold a fashion show in a place where no one was at? See makes perfect sense and no sense at all. That being said, there are a few things out there to see, and I got a brief glimpse of them on Wednesday night. More on that later.
I usually include some sort of commentary on the drivers. I don’t know if I do it intentionally, but I will this time. I was told that driving in Milan was more scary than driving in London, Buenos Aires, or Mexico City. Wrong! Driving in Milan is actually almost sane. They’re reasonably courteous to the other cars, although there is still a sort of “me first” attitude like there have been in all the other places I’ve been. Actually, we kind of have that attitude in Dallas if you look at it. We’re always cutting each other off. Then there are the bikers. I’m going to lump all people that ride motorized two-wheel vehicles under this class. There are some bicyclers, but there are so few and they’re so slow that they don’t really count. In the states, at least in Texas, motorcycle riders have to be extra careful about their surroundings. We live in the land of big cars. It’s hard to see a motorcycle when you’re up in a Hummer. That’s not the case here. I haven’t seen anything bigger than your standard mini-van and very few of those. Most cars around here are probably the size of Honda Civics or Ford Focuses. They have some that are much smaller, like half the size of a Focus, called a Smart car. Wonder when those will make it to America. Anyway, they’re on the same level as the bikers, so that helps. What really helps is the sheer number of bikers. Ok, maybe you could miss the bike ahead of you, but there’s no way you could miss it, the one behind you, the one passing you on the left and the one passing you on the right. And you definitely wouldn’t miss the one that slipped in between you and the car in front of you while you were stopped at the light! I feel like the bikers are like that guy on the bridge in Spiderman who told the Green Goblin that if he messed with one he messed with all of them.
So Wednesday we went downtown to where all the touristy stuff is. I don’t really know why, since I was already planning on going down there over the weekend. We saw il Duomo and the Parlour of Milan. We had dinner outdoors at this little restaurant. More of our dinners have been outside than inside. The weather is perfect for that. I wouldn’t even consider having an 8:00 dinner outside at home. That’s just crazy talk. Anyway, I’ll revisit the tourist stuff in another entry. The sights deserve some love of their own.
Per piacere e grazie – June 10-11
I am now resting and relaxing in Milan. Or maybe not resting or relaxing, but I am in Milan.
I was a complete moron when planning this trip. I listened to people I shouldn’t have and planned my trip based on their recommendations and advice when I could have saved myself a lot of time and aggravation if I’d just done my research and planned my own trip. I’m so lazy that way. I let other people tell me how I should get somewhere all the time rather than put in a little effort and save myself some trouble later. Anyway, I made it to Milan just fine, and – ginormous surprise – so did my luggage.
The first leg of my trip took me from DFW to O’Hare. That wasn’t too bad. It’s only a four-hour flight. This was the first time I’d ever been to O’Hare airport. I’ve been to Chicago many times – I used to have family that lives there. I got off the plane and started to make my way to the next gate for my connecting flight to London. Turns out there’s a problem with the plane and the flight has been delayed for about 40 minutes. That’s not too bad, at least it means that I won’t have as long of a layover in Heathrow.
So, thinking I had all the time in the world I made my way toward the gate and stopped to get some McDonald’s and a Cinnabon. I love Cinnabons. They’re wonderful. You’ve got doughy bread, sweet sugar, and, the most important part, cinnamon. I had my lunch and wandered over to the gate. After sitting there for a while wishing I could find an outlet near a chair so that I could whip out my computer, I put on my iPod and began to listen to an audiobook. I pulled out a headphone every once in a while when I thought I heard the check-in people say something interesting. They said the plane would be delayed even longer, like until 7:00 or so, so I put the headphones on and stopped paying attention. That was almost a big mistake. After a while I looked up and noticed a bunch of people lining up in front of MY gate. I went over and discovered that they had been boarding for the last couple of minutes. First and Business were already on board, as well as most of the groups. Well, I joined right in and got up to the head of the line. Unfortunately, it seemed that my ticket was no good and I had to go to the desk and get my new ticket.
I got bumped from Business class… Bumped UP! I made the trip from Chicago to London in style! The seat was spacious. First class holds a maximum of 16 people. The seats lay down flat so that you’re laying down rather than reclining. Very nice. I wonder why I got moved to First instead of someone else. I’m sure there was someone else on the plane that would have been ahead of me in points. Never look a gift-horse in the mouth, the saying goes. I just sat back and enjoyed it all the way across the ocean.
Once in London I swiftly made my way to the Admiral’s Club, or the BA equivalent that is, cursing my phone and T-Mobile all the way. I went out of my way to purchase a phone that would work internationally and gone ahead and paid the extra $20 per month so that I would still be able to send and receive email while I’m in a foreign country, and the damn phone wouldn’t work! No matter how many times I turned it on and off, it still wouldn’t connect to any service, and I know that UK has T-mobile. I almost bought an extra phone from one of the stores there last time I was there just so I would have something that worked.
After relaxing in the club for two hours or so, I finally got to get on with the last leg of my journey. A quick four hours later in what basically amounted to the first-class cabin of a SWA jet and I was in Milan, dirty and dead tired. I fell asleep several times on the way to the hotel, and I don’t think the driver appreciated it too much. Every time I started to nod off he would pick up his cell and call someone, or there was suddenly something he had to listen to louder on the radio, or he would hit the brakes a little harder. He just did something to wake me up.
I got into my room at the hotel and immediately hated it. I had no decent ‘net connection, and that’s vital to me. The room was dark and smelly. I had a lovely view of the roof of the lobby area. It was just a bad room. I stuck with it for about half an hour before I called the front desk and asked them to change me to a different room. And what a difference that makes. It’s no bigger, but it feels lighter. I have a better view, although there’s really not a whole lot to see on this side of town. I guess the connection strength of the ‘net (it’s all wireless, which they tell me I can use anywhere in the hotel) connection gets better the higher you go. I’m just generally happier with it. So, I’m in, I’ve showered (and that’s something everyone around
I was a complete moron when planning this trip. I listened to people I shouldn’t have and planned my trip based on their recommendations and advice when I could have saved myself a lot of time and aggravation if I’d just done my research and planned my own trip. I’m so lazy that way. I let other people tell me how I should get somewhere all the time rather than put in a little effort and save myself some trouble later. Anyway, I made it to Milan just fine, and – ginormous surprise – so did my luggage.
The first leg of my trip took me from DFW to O’Hare. That wasn’t too bad. It’s only a four-hour flight. This was the first time I’d ever been to O’Hare airport. I’ve been to Chicago many times – I used to have family that lives there. I got off the plane and started to make my way to the next gate for my connecting flight to London. Turns out there’s a problem with the plane and the flight has been delayed for about 40 minutes. That’s not too bad, at least it means that I won’t have as long of a layover in Heathrow.
So, thinking I had all the time in the world I made my way toward the gate and stopped to get some McDonald’s and a Cinnabon. I love Cinnabons. They’re wonderful. You’ve got doughy bread, sweet sugar, and, the most important part, cinnamon. I had my lunch and wandered over to the gate. After sitting there for a while wishing I could find an outlet near a chair so that I could whip out my computer, I put on my iPod and began to listen to an audiobook. I pulled out a headphone every once in a while when I thought I heard the check-in people say something interesting. They said the plane would be delayed even longer, like until 7:00 or so, so I put the headphones on and stopped paying attention. That was almost a big mistake. After a while I looked up and noticed a bunch of people lining up in front of MY gate. I went over and discovered that they had been boarding for the last couple of minutes. First and Business were already on board, as well as most of the groups. Well, I joined right in and got up to the head of the line. Unfortunately, it seemed that my ticket was no good and I had to go to the desk and get my new ticket.
I got bumped from Business class… Bumped UP! I made the trip from Chicago to London in style! The seat was spacious. First class holds a maximum of 16 people. The seats lay down flat so that you’re laying down rather than reclining. Very nice. I wonder why I got moved to First instead of someone else. I’m sure there was someone else on the plane that would have been ahead of me in points. Never look a gift-horse in the mouth, the saying goes. I just sat back and enjoyed it all the way across the ocean.
Once in London I swiftly made my way to the Admiral’s Club, or the BA equivalent that is, cursing my phone and T-Mobile all the way. I went out of my way to purchase a phone that would work internationally and gone ahead and paid the extra $20 per month so that I would still be able to send and receive email while I’m in a foreign country, and the damn phone wouldn’t work! No matter how many times I turned it on and off, it still wouldn’t connect to any service, and I know that UK has T-mobile. I almost bought an extra phone from one of the stores there last time I was there just so I would have something that worked.
After relaxing in the club for two hours or so, I finally got to get on with the last leg of my journey. A quick four hours later in what basically amounted to the first-class cabin of a SWA jet and I was in Milan, dirty and dead tired. I fell asleep several times on the way to the hotel, and I don’t think the driver appreciated it too much. Every time I started to nod off he would pick up his cell and call someone, or there was suddenly something he had to listen to louder on the radio, or he would hit the brakes a little harder. He just did something to wake me up.
I got into my room at the hotel and immediately hated it. I had no decent ‘net connection, and that’s vital to me. The room was dark and smelly. I had a lovely view of the roof of the lobby area. It was just a bad room. I stuck with it for about half an hour before I called the front desk and asked them to change me to a different room. And what a difference that makes. It’s no bigger, but it feels lighter. I have a better view, although there’s really not a whole lot to see on this side of town. I guess the connection strength of the ‘net (it’s all wireless, which they tell me I can use anywhere in the hotel) connection gets better the higher you go. I’m just generally happier with it. So, I’m in, I’ve showered (and that’s something everyone around
Saturday, June 03, 2006
Whoa Mexico – April-May 2006
Since around mid-April, I have basically been immersed in Mexican culture.
It started off with a trip with Lisa to Puerta Vallarta. Man, I miss that. Beautiful hotel, beautiful pool, and any place with a beach has got to be good. We spent four heavenly days relaxing by the pool and sipping on froo-froo drinks. We only ventured out once and that was to take a guided tour of the city. That was nice. We saw the cathedral of Maria de Guadalupe, had lunch in the mountains at some place near where they filmed Predator, and took a tour of a tequila factory. Mosty, we just sat by the pool and read. We hopped in every once in a while, but it was mostly just sitting next to it. After dinner every night we kicked off shoes and took a walk along the beach, and then we went back up to the room and sat on the balcony and watched the pool and the ocean. We got a fireworks show every night from this returning pirate ship show that’s offered as an excursion through the hotel concierge. I think they serve other hotels in the area and the cruise ships too. I think it would be hard for the pirates to make a living just off of our little hotel.
Speaking of the hotel, it was by far one of the nicest I’ve ever been in. It was definitely the nicest oceanfront hotel I’ve stayed in. One thing they did that I really liked is have tile everywhere. Most hotels you go into have carpeting in the rooms. That’s great if you’re staying in
So that was my first visit to
Since PV I have spent two weeks in
The final week of my trip to
Less stressful than usual, however, does not mean stress-free. The VP came into town on Thursday. As usual, he asked questions that I never even thought to ask. I spent most of the day Thursday trying to track down answers for him. I shouldn’t feel too bad though. It’s not like the one’s who reviewed my work thought of them either. And it’s not just me that he has that effect on, I think. He seems to ask a lot of questions that other people don’t think to ask. Perhaps that’s why he’s the boss and we all work for him.
The pre-exit dinner was fun, although just a bit on the long side. The Finance Director picked us up from the hotel at
After the dinner portion of the evening was over, we sat around the table until they actually asked us to go to the bar and continue there. So we gathered around a little table next to the piano. It must have been late already because I only remember piano guy playing two songs and then bailing. Tequila flowed freely. There were cigars from a country that I’m not allowed to go to. More conversation, of course. Around
We finally got back to the hotel and I called home. Instead of making it a quick goodnight and gotten to the packing and sleeping, we stayed on the phone for an hour or so. Then I packed and finally got to bed around
So now I’m home. I’ve got about a week before I head out again. The good news is that this next trip is the last I’m scheduled for this year, as the schedule currently stands. The bad news is that it’s three weeks long and no coming home on the weekends. Ok, I guess in all fairness I should say that the other bit of good news is that it’s actually in
Friday, April 07, 2006
Don’t Cry for me, Argentina – March 27 – April 1
The last week has finally arrived. This is always the most hectic of weeks since we’re trying to finish up as much as we possibly can and prepare for the exit on Friday, so it was truly odd for me to actually be bored most of the week. I actually took on extra work that we had previously decided didn’t need to be done in an effort to keep busy and have something, however meaningless, to do.
I didn’t do anything on the weeknights except go to dinner and avoid the pushers of everything from leather to human flesh, mostly flesh. There was one guy who got a little upset with me because I started telling him “no” as he started crossing the street to get to me and before he had even opened his mouth to start his spiel. I knew I didn’t want his services, so why should I allow him to start pushing them on me? We mostly stayed near the hotel for dinner. The quality of the food was significantly reduced, but the shorter travel time made up for that.
On Wednesday the Veep came out to see the operation and look over our work. I’m reluctant to have him look at my stuff, mostly because I’m still not all that confident with it despite being told over and over that they’re very happy with my work. I just keep quiet and don’t offer up anything. If I’ve done something wrong, I’d rather it be caught in review by the lead auditor on the engagement than by the Veep. He only stayed one day. We had another team in Santiago, Chile that he was going to visit on Thursday. So we went to dinner with the unit’s management that night and had a good time. I really liked the General Manager. Nice guy with a good sense of humor. He was from Mexico, but looked nothing like any Mexican I’ve ever known. He was blonde-haired and blue-eyed with skin almost as white as mine.
Friday finally came and it was good to get everything over with. We had the exit in the morning, but the lead decided that instead of going right back to the hotel and enjoying the rest of our day that we should stay at the office until it closed at 3:30 and tidy up the report. He tidied. I surfed the internet. I would have much rather seen some of the sights of Buenos Aires that I hadn’t got around to yet, but my opinion wasn’t solicited.
Back at the hotel the staff started to get restless. We’d had the GM’s assistant call someone at Marriott and arrange for us to check out at 7:00pm that night, but that wasn’t apparently communicated to either the front desk or the housekeeping staff. Our flight wasn’t scheduled to leave until 10:30 that night, so there’s no way that either of us were going to take our bags with us to the office and drag them around behind us all day until then. Almost as soon we got back to the hotel, the phone started ringing and people started knocking on the door. “Are you checking out today, sir?” and “What time will you be checking out today?” were questions that I had to answer multiple times. I eventually left to go take a walk down Avenida de Florida on last time.
I had a specific agenda for my little stroll down the avenue. I wanted to find one of the leather, Indiana Jones-style hats that I’d seen during my shopping trip. The key was that I wanted to find one in the style I liked at a price I could live with. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a whole lot of luck. I saw several that looked right but the price was too high. I saw some others that had the price I wanted but didn’t look quite like what I was envisioning. Eventually, I found one that was just a couple of dollars off of my target price and was in the style I wanted. I had the clerk all excited that she was going to make a quick sale, and then snatched that happy feeling away from her. I look ridiculous in hats. I think I can pull off a baseball cap, but put a real hat on my head and I just look silly. I tried on this beautiful leather creation and laughed myself silly. I looked like Charlie Brown with a round tray on his head. Give up. Just give up.
I did buy a friend a mate. No, I didn’t find him a woman, that’s something he needs to do on his own. It’s pronounced mah-tay. A mate is the name for both a tea and the cup you drink it out of. It’s a pretty cool looking thing. A fat round bowl with a narrow top and lots of silver (more likely aluminum or steel or some other silvery looking metal based on the price I paid) and a metal straw with a strainer on the end. I think it looks like a good talking piece that he can put on his table. I even gave him a story for it. When I was walking around Bs.As. that first weekend I kept noticing all of these young people carrying these cups around. The way the mate works is that you fill it with the water and then you sprinkle this green herb on top of it. The water swirls around the herbs and it basically forms a tea. The strainer keeps you from drinking the herbs while you’re choking down the drink. I understand it’s an extremely popular drink but that it’s also very bitter. I told some of the people at the office that I would try some, but I never really got around to doing it. I really intended to. Honest.
Anyway, back to the story. I’m walking around, and I see all these people with these bowls filled with herb and a pipe stem sticking out of the top. I’ve been in college, and I’ve hung out with musicians, artists and assorted burn-outs before, so I immediately thought that they were walking around with fully loaded bongs. And it wasn’t just one or two people that were carrying these things around. It was like every 4th or 5th person I saw. Nothing I saw said anything about marijuana being legal in Argentina, and I’m of course thinking like an American, so I just thought that all of these people were flagrantly flaunting the law (in front of a highly visible police presence, I must add) and partaking of a bit of Mary Jane. I finally asked about it on Monday when I got back to the office and got the real story, but it was a couple of days where I thought Argentina’s next generation were just getting high on the streets.
None of the rest of the day is very interesting. We left for the airport at around 7:00. Got to the Admiral’s Club at around 9:00 and waited until it was time to go to the gate. The plane was supposed to leave at 10:30, but we didn’t actually get out of there until more like 11:00. The plane ride was fine. There were a few bumps but nothing to get excited about. We had dinner about an hour into the flight. The film for the evening was “Good Night and Good Luck”, which I was really excited about seeing. I reclined my chair and fixed my eyes firmly on the screen with the intention of finally seeing what was so great about this film. I think I may have made it through 10 minutes. I had the best sleep I’ve ever had on a plane. It was amazing. I must have been exhausted. I got up once around 3am to use the bathroom, but I was pretty much out the whole flight. Wish I could do that every time.
I didn’t do anything on the weeknights except go to dinner and avoid the pushers of everything from leather to human flesh, mostly flesh. There was one guy who got a little upset with me because I started telling him “no” as he started crossing the street to get to me and before he had even opened his mouth to start his spiel. I knew I didn’t want his services, so why should I allow him to start pushing them on me? We mostly stayed near the hotel for dinner. The quality of the food was significantly reduced, but the shorter travel time made up for that.
On Wednesday the Veep came out to see the operation and look over our work. I’m reluctant to have him look at my stuff, mostly because I’m still not all that confident with it despite being told over and over that they’re very happy with my work. I just keep quiet and don’t offer up anything. If I’ve done something wrong, I’d rather it be caught in review by the lead auditor on the engagement than by the Veep. He only stayed one day. We had another team in Santiago, Chile that he was going to visit on Thursday. So we went to dinner with the unit’s management that night and had a good time. I really liked the General Manager. Nice guy with a good sense of humor. He was from Mexico, but looked nothing like any Mexican I’ve ever known. He was blonde-haired and blue-eyed with skin almost as white as mine.
Friday finally came and it was good to get everything over with. We had the exit in the morning, but the lead decided that instead of going right back to the hotel and enjoying the rest of our day that we should stay at the office until it closed at 3:30 and tidy up the report. He tidied. I surfed the internet. I would have much rather seen some of the sights of Buenos Aires that I hadn’t got around to yet, but my opinion wasn’t solicited.
Back at the hotel the staff started to get restless. We’d had the GM’s assistant call someone at Marriott and arrange for us to check out at 7:00pm that night, but that wasn’t apparently communicated to either the front desk or the housekeeping staff. Our flight wasn’t scheduled to leave until 10:30 that night, so there’s no way that either of us were going to take our bags with us to the office and drag them around behind us all day until then. Almost as soon we got back to the hotel, the phone started ringing and people started knocking on the door. “Are you checking out today, sir?” and “What time will you be checking out today?” were questions that I had to answer multiple times. I eventually left to go take a walk down Avenida de Florida on last time.
I had a specific agenda for my little stroll down the avenue. I wanted to find one of the leather, Indiana Jones-style hats that I’d seen during my shopping trip. The key was that I wanted to find one in the style I liked at a price I could live with. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a whole lot of luck. I saw several that looked right but the price was too high. I saw some others that had the price I wanted but didn’t look quite like what I was envisioning. Eventually, I found one that was just a couple of dollars off of my target price and was in the style I wanted. I had the clerk all excited that she was going to make a quick sale, and then snatched that happy feeling away from her. I look ridiculous in hats. I think I can pull off a baseball cap, but put a real hat on my head and I just look silly. I tried on this beautiful leather creation and laughed myself silly. I looked like Charlie Brown with a round tray on his head. Give up. Just give up.
I did buy a friend a mate. No, I didn’t find him a woman, that’s something he needs to do on his own. It’s pronounced mah-tay. A mate is the name for both a tea and the cup you drink it out of. It’s a pretty cool looking thing. A fat round bowl with a narrow top and lots of silver (more likely aluminum or steel or some other silvery looking metal based on the price I paid) and a metal straw with a strainer on the end. I think it looks like a good talking piece that he can put on his table. I even gave him a story for it. When I was walking around Bs.As. that first weekend I kept noticing all of these young people carrying these cups around. The way the mate works is that you fill it with the water and then you sprinkle this green herb on top of it. The water swirls around the herbs and it basically forms a tea. The strainer keeps you from drinking the herbs while you’re choking down the drink. I understand it’s an extremely popular drink but that it’s also very bitter. I told some of the people at the office that I would try some, but I never really got around to doing it. I really intended to. Honest.
Anyway, back to the story. I’m walking around, and I see all these people with these bowls filled with herb and a pipe stem sticking out of the top. I’ve been in college, and I’ve hung out with musicians, artists and assorted burn-outs before, so I immediately thought that they were walking around with fully loaded bongs. And it wasn’t just one or two people that were carrying these things around. It was like every 4th or 5th person I saw. Nothing I saw said anything about marijuana being legal in Argentina, and I’m of course thinking like an American, so I just thought that all of these people were flagrantly flaunting the law (in front of a highly visible police presence, I must add) and partaking of a bit of Mary Jane. I finally asked about it on Monday when I got back to the office and got the real story, but it was a couple of days where I thought Argentina’s next generation were just getting high on the streets.
None of the rest of the day is very interesting. We left for the airport at around 7:00. Got to the Admiral’s Club at around 9:00 and waited until it was time to go to the gate. The plane was supposed to leave at 10:30, but we didn’t actually get out of there until more like 11:00. The plane ride was fine. There were a few bumps but nothing to get excited about. We had dinner about an hour into the flight. The film for the evening was “Good Night and Good Luck”, which I was really excited about seeing. I reclined my chair and fixed my eyes firmly on the screen with the intention of finally seeing what was so great about this film. I think I may have made it through 10 minutes. I had the best sleep I’ve ever had on a plane. It was amazing. I must have been exhausted. I got up once around 3am to use the bathroom, but I was pretty much out the whole flight. Wish I could do that every time.
Thursday, March 30, 2006
Psst! Buddy! Need a … - March 25 – 26
This being my last weekend in Buenos Aires, possibly ever, I would be a fool to turn down the shopping opportunities that a strong US dollar and a very week Argentinean peso produce. Seriously, the exchange rate is roughly 30 cents per peso. No one in their right mind turns down that kind of value. And I’ve heard that Argentinean leather is supposed to be some of the very best. All I need this weekend is my American Express card and the ability to say “How much?” in Spanish. (For those of you who are interested, it’s “Cuanto cuesta?”)
Saturday started late. I met the boss around 11:30 and we walked over to a section of town called La Recoleta. This is where the cemetery I visited last week was located. I had intended to go over there alone and give it a more thorough look, but that wasn’t in the cards. We ate lunch at a little sidewalk café and talked about the large and loud group of Americans that got themselves a table soon after. We also wondered about the young guy alone with a pitcher of sangria. Apparently it’s pretty powerful stuff. I don’t think I’ve ever had it.
After lunch we wandered past a church and through a flea market. There wasn’t much in there that wasn’t available elsewhere, and it’s not like I had any cash on hand to purchase anything. I was mostly just curious about it. Our first stop of the day after lunch was the Hard Rock Café. Our department director is a former drummer in a Christian rock band, and he likes to get drumsticks from the Hard Rock in every place he visits. He didn’t know that there was a HRC in Bs.As. so we didn’t go last weekend when we were over in the area. I told him I’d get him some sticks before I left. So we stopped at the HRC’s gift shop and I got his sticks and a couple of t-shirts for Lisa and I. We wandered back to the hotel to drop off our bags and then proceeded out onto Avenida de Florida. I don’t know if it’s that I’m not a good shopper with other people or if it was just bad luck, but I couldn’t find anything decent at a price that I felt was right in any of the stores I went to with the boss. We started off in a mall looking around, and everything was just too expensive. I did try on this one blazer style leather jacket that I absolutely loved. It was in this smooth black leather and I looked awesome in it. Unfortunately, it was way more than I was prepared to spend and even if the store had been inclined to negotiate I couldn’t have gotten it down to a reasonable level. They wanted 1600 pesos for it, which translates to a little over $500. I can spend that much for a jacket anywhere in America. I’m not doing it here.
The mall was mostly a bust for me. I did eventually find a wallet that I liked at a price I was willing to go with. I think it cost me about $13 US, and it would probably go for about three times that at home. I’m very pleased with it. I also managed to find a nice purse for either Lisa or my mother, don’t know which yet, that I was pretty satisfied with. We left the mall and went across the street to another little store. Again, no luck on a decent jacket. The boss abandoned me after that one, and I persevered. As soon as I left that little store there was one of these guys handing out cards that asked if I was looking for a leather jacket. Normally, I’d just brush him off, but I was actually looking for a leather jacket. So he gave me his card and pointed out his store and I headed over there. I had another guy from the same store ask me to ditch the card and take his instead, but I told him I didn’t think that would be fair to the first guy. The store was nice, if a little bit crowded. I found a jacket I liked at a price that I was willing to go with. Actually, I found two jackets: one for me and one for Lisa. And I found another purse, again for either her or my mother, across the street. All in all, a fairly successful shopping trip. There is still one item I’m considering, but I just can’t convince myself to pull the trigger on it yet. I’ve seen some leather, Indiana Jones style hats while I’ve been shopping. I think I look pretty ridiculous in hats, but these are just cool. I’m really wanting to go buy one, but would I ever wear it? I’d have to take my jacket along too so that I could make sure to get one that goes with it. They’re available in black, so that’s an option. I just can’t decide.
That was really it for the weekend. I didn’t do any more exploring on Sunday and the shopping took all day Saturday. I felt like I had seen everything I wanted to see, except Café Tortoni but I didn’t remember that until late Sunday night, and I wanted to get some actual rest. I slept late and surfed and watched many episodes of Stargate. I love that show, and I needed to relax.
Saturday started late. I met the boss around 11:30 and we walked over to a section of town called La Recoleta. This is where the cemetery I visited last week was located. I had intended to go over there alone and give it a more thorough look, but that wasn’t in the cards. We ate lunch at a little sidewalk café and talked about the large and loud group of Americans that got themselves a table soon after. We also wondered about the young guy alone with a pitcher of sangria. Apparently it’s pretty powerful stuff. I don’t think I’ve ever had it.
After lunch we wandered past a church and through a flea market. There wasn’t much in there that wasn’t available elsewhere, and it’s not like I had any cash on hand to purchase anything. I was mostly just curious about it. Our first stop of the day after lunch was the Hard Rock Café. Our department director is a former drummer in a Christian rock band, and he likes to get drumsticks from the Hard Rock in every place he visits. He didn’t know that there was a HRC in Bs.As. so we didn’t go last weekend when we were over in the area. I told him I’d get him some sticks before I left. So we stopped at the HRC’s gift shop and I got his sticks and a couple of t-shirts for Lisa and I. We wandered back to the hotel to drop off our bags and then proceeded out onto Avenida de Florida. I don’t know if it’s that I’m not a good shopper with other people or if it was just bad luck, but I couldn’t find anything decent at a price that I felt was right in any of the stores I went to with the boss. We started off in a mall looking around, and everything was just too expensive. I did try on this one blazer style leather jacket that I absolutely loved. It was in this smooth black leather and I looked awesome in it. Unfortunately, it was way more than I was prepared to spend and even if the store had been inclined to negotiate I couldn’t have gotten it down to a reasonable level. They wanted 1600 pesos for it, which translates to a little over $500. I can spend that much for a jacket anywhere in America. I’m not doing it here.
The mall was mostly a bust for me. I did eventually find a wallet that I liked at a price I was willing to go with. I think it cost me about $13 US, and it would probably go for about three times that at home. I’m very pleased with it. I also managed to find a nice purse for either Lisa or my mother, don’t know which yet, that I was pretty satisfied with. We left the mall and went across the street to another little store. Again, no luck on a decent jacket. The boss abandoned me after that one, and I persevered. As soon as I left that little store there was one of these guys handing out cards that asked if I was looking for a leather jacket. Normally, I’d just brush him off, but I was actually looking for a leather jacket. So he gave me his card and pointed out his store and I headed over there. I had another guy from the same store ask me to ditch the card and take his instead, but I told him I didn’t think that would be fair to the first guy. The store was nice, if a little bit crowded. I found a jacket I liked at a price that I was willing to go with. Actually, I found two jackets: one for me and one for Lisa. And I found another purse, again for either her or my mother, across the street. All in all, a fairly successful shopping trip. There is still one item I’m considering, but I just can’t convince myself to pull the trigger on it yet. I’ve seen some leather, Indiana Jones style hats while I’ve been shopping. I think I look pretty ridiculous in hats, but these are just cool. I’m really wanting to go buy one, but would I ever wear it? I’d have to take my jacket along too so that I could make sure to get one that goes with it. They’re available in black, so that’s an option. I just can’t decide.
That was really it for the weekend. I didn’t do any more exploring on Sunday and the shopping took all day Saturday. I felt like I had seen everything I wanted to see, except Café Tortoni but I didn’t remember that until late Sunday night, and I wanted to get some actual rest. I slept late and surfed and watched many episodes of Stargate. I love that show, and I needed to relax.
Hi Ho, Hi Ho, It’s off to work I go – March 20-24
There is really not a whole lot you can say about the work week. I get up, go to the office, come back, go to dinner, talk to Lisa, and go to sleep. Usually it’s repeat 5 times, but this week it was only repeat 4 times. In a fortuitous turn of events, the week we arrived in Argentina the government declared a national holiday, presumable to celebrate some military coup in the fairly recent past, for Friday 3/24. So, while Monday through Thursday was the seemingly unending cycle described above, Friday was work from the hotel day. I’m sure you can imagine exactly how much work actually got done.
The boss and I agreed the night before to meet at 11:00 so that he could review some of my work. Actually, he said, “What time to you want to get together to talk about your work papers tomorrow?” on Thursday night. My reply was, “ Don’t even think about knocking on my door before 10:30 unless you want to be hurt. And don’t try calling either; I’m taking my phone off the hook.” Fortunately he didn’t press the issue. I slept in late – very late – and had only just finished getting dressed and turned on the computer when he knocked on my door. Good timing. He invaded my space and made a few minor comments on my work. We decided to get together again at 1:30 for lunch, and he went back to his room. I very quickly made the changes he wanted, which took all of about 10 minutes and proceeded to whip out my DVD player and watch some Stargate SG-1. Stargate was a big player on that workday and in my weekend in general. I kept saying “I intend to do this” or “I intend to do that”, but you know what they say about the road to hell…
The boss and I agreed the night before to meet at 11:00 so that he could review some of my work. Actually, he said, “What time to you want to get together to talk about your work papers tomorrow?” on Thursday night. My reply was, “ Don’t even think about knocking on my door before 10:30 unless you want to be hurt. And don’t try calling either; I’m taking my phone off the hook.” Fortunately he didn’t press the issue. I slept in late – very late – and had only just finished getting dressed and turned on the computer when he knocked on my door. Good timing. He invaded my space and made a few minor comments on my work. We decided to get together again at 1:30 for lunch, and he went back to his room. I very quickly made the changes he wanted, which took all of about 10 minutes and proceeded to whip out my DVD player and watch some Stargate SG-1. Stargate was a big player on that workday and in my weekend in general. I kept saying “I intend to do this” or “I intend to do that”, but you know what they say about the road to hell…
Friday, March 24, 2006
Advanced Global Personality Test
Found this while surfing today. Thought it was interesting.
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Monday, March 20, 2006
On the Balcony of the Casa Rosada – March 18-19, 2006
My explorations in Buenos Aires are a little different than my explorations in London or York. See, I know nothing of this town other than what I learned from the movie Evita, and I don’t really remember much of that except for Madonna chasing a train and her singing “don’t cry for me Argentina….” So I went into this pretty cold turkey. I had a guidebook, but I hadn’t really read it yet.
I woke up Saturday morning around 10:45. Part of me was very tempted to stay in the hotel all day. See, I had a pretty nasty cold last week, and I didn’t really feel ready for a full day of checking out a new city. I forced myself to get out anyway though, and walked down Avenida de Florida. It’s one of three streets that are pedestrian only. There are a lot of shops and street performers and artists out there. I’ll probably go back and get a few souvenirs from there before I leave. I probably walked down Ave. Florida for about two hours just looking at the different shops. I even went in to a few of them. One thing unexpected were the number of people trying to help me find some “companionship.” And they were pushy too. I made the mistake of talking to one or two of them before I knew what they were peddling and getting away was damn near impossible. After a while you just have to be rude and walk away.
After my two hours of fun on Ave. Florida I decided to go back to the hotel and get a little food. While there I whipped out my trusty travel guide and got to reading. What can I see within walking distance? I quickly narrowed down my sights to the Casa Rosada (Pink House), the Cathedral, and the Cabildo. These are all in a little park down Ave. Florida, so I got my camera and prepared to run the gauntlet of pimps and pushers again. By this time, I had passed a few of them multiple times, so they were starting to recognize me. There was this one young guy, that never told me what he was pushing, and I never asked, but every time I went by him he would stop me and ask me another English word, or phrase, or place on a map. He seemed like a pretty nice guy. I taught him what a gypsy was. I told him the English word “regret”. I tried to show him my birthplace on the map, but it’s such a small town it doesn’t really matter and Austin was sitting where I would have put it anyway.
So I finally made my way to the park and got to have a look around. The Casa Rosada is just that, a pink house. You might be wondering what’s so special about this pink house. First, it’s equivalent to the White House. The Argentine president does his daily work there, although I’m told it’s not where he lives. Second, this very humble looking building is where Evita gave her speech that is so famous. I’m sure I actually saw the balcony she stood on. I made sure to take a look at the whole thing just so I could say I saw it, but I couldn’t tell you which one it was. After that I went to the Cathedral. I like looking at Cathedrals. I’m not religious in any way, but you can’t help feeling like a part of something bigger when you go into one of these amazing places of worship. They have these vaulted ceilings that are just amazing to look at. Tiled floors that are made up of these little squares no more than a half inch per side set in these beautiful flower patterns. Then there are all the monuments inside and the praying areas. This cathedral, like all the other ones I’ve gone to, is not only a tourist attraction; it’s a legitimate church. So there were plenty of people praying at the various altars. Compared to the York Minster, St. Edwards, or Westminster Abbey, it’s very rustic. It’s certainly not as grand when compared to them, but the fact remains that it’s a beautiful building on the inside. I highly recommend it. I never made it to the Cabildo, for two reasons. One, I wasn’t sure which building it was; and two, I didn’t know what the significance is. I have since found out that it is basically the birthplace of Argentinian government.
Sunday, I met up with my two bosses for breakfast and dragged them along on my adventure for the day. I didn’t really drag them, to tell the truth. I more or less said “this is where I’m going, and you can come with me or not.” I’m a very decisive explorer. I know where I want to go and I’m not really willing to change up my plan because someone doesn’t like it. Make your own plan, I’m perfectly happy to go here alone. So the plan for the day was the big cemetery in an area known as the Recoleta. It was a pretty long walk, but it was shaded for the most part. One of the other guys stepped in a little bit of dog doo, which gave me and Glyn a bit of a laugh. I told them before we left, I know exactly where I’m going up until about the half-way point and after that I’m sort of like a stranger in a strange city. No problems though. We found our way to the cemetery easily enough. It’s pretty hard to miss actually. I didn’t really feel like I got enough time to adequately explore it though, so I may go back again next week. I did see the final resting place of Eva Maria Duarte de Peron though. I obviously wasn’t the only one looking for that though. There were quite a few people around her family tomb.
The cemetery itself is possibly the prettiest cemetery I’ve ever seen. There are no headstones sticking out of little humps of grass like what we usually see. These are almost full-on houses for the dead. Some of them have multiple levels, and I’m positive that some of them have a downstairs where the majority of the dead rest. There was one that had a casket partially exposed next to a hole in the wall. I made an uncomfortable joke about the zombie trying to escape. We left soon after. In any case, the cemetery is like a little city within a city and I look forward to going through it again.
I woke up Saturday morning around 10:45. Part of me was very tempted to stay in the hotel all day. See, I had a pretty nasty cold last week, and I didn’t really feel ready for a full day of checking out a new city. I forced myself to get out anyway though, and walked down Avenida de Florida. It’s one of three streets that are pedestrian only. There are a lot of shops and street performers and artists out there. I’ll probably go back and get a few souvenirs from there before I leave. I probably walked down Ave. Florida for about two hours just looking at the different shops. I even went in to a few of them. One thing unexpected were the number of people trying to help me find some “companionship.” And they were pushy too. I made the mistake of talking to one or two of them before I knew what they were peddling and getting away was damn near impossible. After a while you just have to be rude and walk away.
After my two hours of fun on Ave. Florida I decided to go back to the hotel and get a little food. While there I whipped out my trusty travel guide and got to reading. What can I see within walking distance? I quickly narrowed down my sights to the Casa Rosada (Pink House), the Cathedral, and the Cabildo. These are all in a little park down Ave. Florida, so I got my camera and prepared to run the gauntlet of pimps and pushers again. By this time, I had passed a few of them multiple times, so they were starting to recognize me. There was this one young guy, that never told me what he was pushing, and I never asked, but every time I went by him he would stop me and ask me another English word, or phrase, or place on a map. He seemed like a pretty nice guy. I taught him what a gypsy was. I told him the English word “regret”. I tried to show him my birthplace on the map, but it’s such a small town it doesn’t really matter and Austin was sitting where I would have put it anyway.
So I finally made my way to the park and got to have a look around. The Casa Rosada is just that, a pink house. You might be wondering what’s so special about this pink house. First, it’s equivalent to the White House. The Argentine president does his daily work there, although I’m told it’s not where he lives. Second, this very humble looking building is where Evita gave her speech that is so famous. I’m sure I actually saw the balcony she stood on. I made sure to take a look at the whole thing just so I could say I saw it, but I couldn’t tell you which one it was. After that I went to the Cathedral. I like looking at Cathedrals. I’m not religious in any way, but you can’t help feeling like a part of something bigger when you go into one of these amazing places of worship. They have these vaulted ceilings that are just amazing to look at. Tiled floors that are made up of these little squares no more than a half inch per side set in these beautiful flower patterns. Then there are all the monuments inside and the praying areas. This cathedral, like all the other ones I’ve gone to, is not only a tourist attraction; it’s a legitimate church. So there were plenty of people praying at the various altars. Compared to the York Minster, St. Edwards, or Westminster Abbey, it’s very rustic. It’s certainly not as grand when compared to them, but the fact remains that it’s a beautiful building on the inside. I highly recommend it. I never made it to the Cabildo, for two reasons. One, I wasn’t sure which building it was; and two, I didn’t know what the significance is. I have since found out that it is basically the birthplace of Argentinian government.
Sunday, I met up with my two bosses for breakfast and dragged them along on my adventure for the day. I didn’t really drag them, to tell the truth. I more or less said “this is where I’m going, and you can come with me or not.” I’m a very decisive explorer. I know where I want to go and I’m not really willing to change up my plan because someone doesn’t like it. Make your own plan, I’m perfectly happy to go here alone. So the plan for the day was the big cemetery in an area known as the Recoleta. It was a pretty long walk, but it was shaded for the most part. One of the other guys stepped in a little bit of dog doo, which gave me and Glyn a bit of a laugh. I told them before we left, I know exactly where I’m going up until about the half-way point and after that I’m sort of like a stranger in a strange city. No problems though. We found our way to the cemetery easily enough. It’s pretty hard to miss actually. I didn’t really feel like I got enough time to adequately explore it though, so I may go back again next week. I did see the final resting place of Eva Maria Duarte de Peron though. I obviously wasn’t the only one looking for that though. There were quite a few people around her family tomb.
The cemetery itself is possibly the prettiest cemetery I’ve ever seen. There are no headstones sticking out of little humps of grass like what we usually see. These are almost full-on houses for the dead. Some of them have multiple levels, and I’m positive that some of them have a downstairs where the majority of the dead rest. There was one that had a casket partially exposed next to a hole in the wall. I made an uncomfortable joke about the zombie trying to escape. We left soon after. In any case, the cemetery is like a little city within a city and I look forward to going through it again.
Money for Nothing… - March 12-17, 2006
It wouldn’t be international travel if I didn’t have some sort of money problem. This time it was a doozy. Recall that back in August I found myself stuck in the UK with credit cards that were useless. Imagine almost the same situation, except I’m in Buenos Aires and I have no credit cards or cash whatsoever. I’m sure you’re asking yourself “How did Larry manage that?” It’s simple: I left my wallet in the car at the airport in Dallas. Worse, if I had caught it while I was in the airport it would have been an easy fix, but I didn’t catch it until the car that picked me up in BA dropped me off at the hotel. That’s a fun feeling. Being stuck in a foreign country with absolutely no money as opposed to very little.
So this week I have been totally dependent on my boss. And I do mean totally. He buys my lunch, he buys my dinner, he gets the taxis, he’s even offered to give me some cash if I need it. Very nice of him, but I’m always reluctant to take money from anyone. Him buying my meals is a completely different story. Under the company’s travel and entertainment policy when two or more people dine together the higher ranked on is supposed to get the bill. It’s because it would otherwise put the higher ranking person in the position of approving expense reports which benefit them.
The days have all pretty much run together, so there’s not a whole lot in the way of things to report. Buenos Aires is a very nice city in some ways and a very shabby city in others. The economic downturn the country has experienced over the last couple of years has really cost a lot of people. I get asked more times for a handout, which I can barely understand thanks to my limited Spanish, between the hotel and dinner than I do all day in downtown Dallas. Granted, my walk to dinner is a lot longer, but there are still exponentially more people asking for money here than there. And there are a ton of people that dig through the trash for plastic bottles. It’s almost like it’s its own little industry. I was really curious the night the trash people came while the diggers were still going through the bags. Thought it would be interesting to see what happened, but it was late and I wanted to be back in my hotel room.
We start our day at 8:30am with a half-hour ride to the office. The cars range from very nice to very not nice. They also have less stringent emissions laws than we do. Actually, I think if the car can still drive it basically passes whatever they consider to be an inspection. There are a lot of very nice parks on the way, and there’s a huge soccer stadium. Looks bigger than Texas Stadium or the AAC. I imagine they can stuff quite a few people in there.
Lunch is at a mall so eerily American that it could be picked up and put down in any suburban neighborhood and blend in perfectly once the signs were changed to English. Or maybe the signs wouldn’t even have to be changed.
At 6:30 everyone leaves and it’s time for another half-hour ride back home. I have come to the realization on this trip that Americans are the only ones that are anal about lines on the road. For the rest of the world those lines, and lights, are just there for decoration. I have seen some truly hair-raising driving in the last week. The people here do stuff that would cause some serious road rage at home. Like the driver we had on Friday… he pulled up in the far right lane of a three-lane road and turned left in front of everyone. And he did it while we all had a red light!
It’s roughly 7:00 when I get back to the hotel and I have 45 minutes to unwind a little bit and be alone. Then it’s dinner time. The most important national commodity the Argentinians have is beef, and they do have some amazing cows. Whether you want a cow for eating or for wearing you can get it here. They have very good leather, at least that’s what I’m told. I still think pleather doesn’t look all that bad. But the steaks are amazing. My doctor would kill me if she found out what I’d been eating while I was here. I’ve had at least three steaks already, and every one of them seems to melt in your mouth. Beautiful food. The only bad thing about dinner is that it takes two hours to eat it. The waiters are no faster here than they are in London or York or Dublin. The food’s definitely better, but the waiters are still very slow and patient people. Then it’s time to go back to the hotel and spend an hour or so talking to Lisa before bed. We’re using Skype for the chatting, and I have to say that it’s one of the greatest inventions ever.
So this week I have been totally dependent on my boss. And I do mean totally. He buys my lunch, he buys my dinner, he gets the taxis, he’s even offered to give me some cash if I need it. Very nice of him, but I’m always reluctant to take money from anyone. Him buying my meals is a completely different story. Under the company’s travel and entertainment policy when two or more people dine together the higher ranked on is supposed to get the bill. It’s because it would otherwise put the higher ranking person in the position of approving expense reports which benefit them.
The days have all pretty much run together, so there’s not a whole lot in the way of things to report. Buenos Aires is a very nice city in some ways and a very shabby city in others. The economic downturn the country has experienced over the last couple of years has really cost a lot of people. I get asked more times for a handout, which I can barely understand thanks to my limited Spanish, between the hotel and dinner than I do all day in downtown Dallas. Granted, my walk to dinner is a lot longer, but there are still exponentially more people asking for money here than there. And there are a ton of people that dig through the trash for plastic bottles. It’s almost like it’s its own little industry. I was really curious the night the trash people came while the diggers were still going through the bags. Thought it would be interesting to see what happened, but it was late and I wanted to be back in my hotel room.
We start our day at 8:30am with a half-hour ride to the office. The cars range from very nice to very not nice. They also have less stringent emissions laws than we do. Actually, I think if the car can still drive it basically passes whatever they consider to be an inspection. There are a lot of very nice parks on the way, and there’s a huge soccer stadium. Looks bigger than Texas Stadium or the AAC. I imagine they can stuff quite a few people in there.
Lunch is at a mall so eerily American that it could be picked up and put down in any suburban neighborhood and blend in perfectly once the signs were changed to English. Or maybe the signs wouldn’t even have to be changed.
At 6:30 everyone leaves and it’s time for another half-hour ride back home. I have come to the realization on this trip that Americans are the only ones that are anal about lines on the road. For the rest of the world those lines, and lights, are just there for decoration. I have seen some truly hair-raising driving in the last week. The people here do stuff that would cause some serious road rage at home. Like the driver we had on Friday… he pulled up in the far right lane of a three-lane road and turned left in front of everyone. And he did it while we all had a red light!
It’s roughly 7:00 when I get back to the hotel and I have 45 minutes to unwind a little bit and be alone. Then it’s dinner time. The most important national commodity the Argentinians have is beef, and they do have some amazing cows. Whether you want a cow for eating or for wearing you can get it here. They have very good leather, at least that’s what I’m told. I still think pleather doesn’t look all that bad. But the steaks are amazing. My doctor would kill me if she found out what I’d been eating while I was here. I’ve had at least three steaks already, and every one of them seems to melt in your mouth. Beautiful food. The only bad thing about dinner is that it takes two hours to eat it. The waiters are no faster here than they are in London or York or Dublin. The food’s definitely better, but the waiters are still very slow and patient people. Then it’s time to go back to the hotel and spend an hour or so talking to Lisa before bed. We’re using Skype for the chatting, and I have to say that it’s one of the greatest inventions ever.
Monday, February 06, 2006
Looking for America… - February 2
I write this from somewhere in Connecticut, or New York, or Massachusetts. To tell you the truth, I don’t know where exactly I am. I’m on a train heading from Providence, RI to New York, NY. We were going through this little town a few minutes ago and I was looking out at the scenery. The iPod (codename: Pdiddy) was jamming away and it suddenly struck me how romantic (not in the “I love you so much” sense) the whole thing is. Perhaps romantic isn’t the right word. Cinematical sort of comes to mind. Almost like the music was the soundtrack for my life. It was No Doubt, and if I had to come up with a soundtrack for my life, they would be heavily featured in it. No Doubt and Cake.
I’m on a four-day tour of some of the coldest places in America. Except that they’re not really all that cold right now. I expected three feet of snow and temperatures somewhere between ridiculously cold and insanely cold. Instead it’s really just irritatingly cold. Actually nothing worse than what we would experience in one of our seasonal cold snaps in Dallas. Kind of disappointing really. I kind of wanted to see what that much snow piled up would look like. Tuesday night and Wednesday were spent in Providence, RI. We were doing some work at a distribution center in Massachusetts, but Providence was sort of an easy place to come and go from. It was interesting to get to see some of the more operational aspects of the company. Fairly cool.
Last night was pretty low key. We went to eat in an are of Providence called Federal Hill, which was highly recommended by our co-workers who had been to the area before. They say that Federal Hill used to be a center for Italian mob activity, so we’d be able to find some of the best Italian food there. Don’t know about the mob stuff, but they were certainly right about the food. Amazing stuff. I recommend Andino’s if you’re ever in the area. It was small, but the plates were huge and the service and food were both excellent.
We’re now on the way to New York, via Amtrak. It’s not my first train trip, but it’s the first one I’ve done in the states. The scenery is different from what I saw on my way from London to York in August. Oh, land looks like land pretty much everywhere, but there seems to be way more stuff on our land, at least in this part of the country, than there was in the UK. I’ve seen some ratty-looking homes perched on the shores of lakes, or they could actually be bays now that I think about it. I’ve also seen some nice homes, but it’s the ratty ones that stick in my mind. It’s obvious that the land is worth a lot; you always end up paying a premium for lots with a view of the water. The houses could do with a little fixing up or, in some cases, tearing down. One thing that’s different, all the houses are wood. They may have siding on them, but they’re definitely not brick. I wonder why brick is so commonly used in Texas but not here. I would think it would be the better building material. Maybe I’ll look that up sometime. Don’t count on it though.
We’re only spending a couple of hours here, 9 at the most, unless we miss our flight. We’re visiting another distribution center. Tonight we hit the air for a visit to Pittsburgh. Great timing for that one, what with the Steelers in the Super Bowl on Sunday. The city should be going nuts. Thank God we don’t have to stay over night there. I can’t stand the Steelers. After that it’s home again. A short trip by our usual standards, but an interesting one nonetheless.
Fast forward a couple of days…
I have now returned from my little adventure. New York was as much as I could have expected from only being there for one day and that spent entirely in a warehouse. Entering was great because I got to see the city laid out in before me on from the train. I love New York. Too bad it’s so expensive. It would be great to live there for a year or so, but I’m not willing to take a cut in my standard of living just to do it. Pittsburgh was a surprise. As expected, everyone had some sort of Steelers’ paraphernalia working, whether it was a hat or a jersey or a sign on a building. The town loves their Steelers. What was completely unexpected was how pretty the city was. The rivers coming in and the high hills riding along side them really contributed to some very pretty landscapes. There were some buildings that were built high enough on the bank opposite of the football stadium that the residents would be able to watch the game for free. I wonder how long that’s going to last. I can’t imagine the owner of any professional sports team allowing people to view his product without paying for it one way (tickets) or the other (advertising on tv). I’ll bet that’s a happy city today. Funny enough, after being there and meeting some very friendly people, I almost feel a cooling of my somewhat irrational hatred of all Pennsylvania sports teams. On the other hand, I am a Cowboys fan, so don’t expect any Steeler-love out of me.
I’m on a four-day tour of some of the coldest places in America. Except that they’re not really all that cold right now. I expected three feet of snow and temperatures somewhere between ridiculously cold and insanely cold. Instead it’s really just irritatingly cold. Actually nothing worse than what we would experience in one of our seasonal cold snaps in Dallas. Kind of disappointing really. I kind of wanted to see what that much snow piled up would look like. Tuesday night and Wednesday were spent in Providence, RI. We were doing some work at a distribution center in Massachusetts, but Providence was sort of an easy place to come and go from. It was interesting to get to see some of the more operational aspects of the company. Fairly cool.
Last night was pretty low key. We went to eat in an are of Providence called Federal Hill, which was highly recommended by our co-workers who had been to the area before. They say that Federal Hill used to be a center for Italian mob activity, so we’d be able to find some of the best Italian food there. Don’t know about the mob stuff, but they were certainly right about the food. Amazing stuff. I recommend Andino’s if you’re ever in the area. It was small, but the plates were huge and the service and food were both excellent.
We’re now on the way to New York, via Amtrak. It’s not my first train trip, but it’s the first one I’ve done in the states. The scenery is different from what I saw on my way from London to York in August. Oh, land looks like land pretty much everywhere, but there seems to be way more stuff on our land, at least in this part of the country, than there was in the UK. I’ve seen some ratty-looking homes perched on the shores of lakes, or they could actually be bays now that I think about it. I’ve also seen some nice homes, but it’s the ratty ones that stick in my mind. It’s obvious that the land is worth a lot; you always end up paying a premium for lots with a view of the water. The houses could do with a little fixing up or, in some cases, tearing down. One thing that’s different, all the houses are wood. They may have siding on them, but they’re definitely not brick. I wonder why brick is so commonly used in Texas but not here. I would think it would be the better building material. Maybe I’ll look that up sometime. Don’t count on it though.
We’re only spending a couple of hours here, 9 at the most, unless we miss our flight. We’re visiting another distribution center. Tonight we hit the air for a visit to Pittsburgh. Great timing for that one, what with the Steelers in the Super Bowl on Sunday. The city should be going nuts. Thank God we don’t have to stay over night there. I can’t stand the Steelers. After that it’s home again. A short trip by our usual standards, but an interesting one nonetheless.
Fast forward a couple of days…
I have now returned from my little adventure. New York was as much as I could have expected from only being there for one day and that spent entirely in a warehouse. Entering was great because I got to see the city laid out in before me on from the train. I love New York. Too bad it’s so expensive. It would be great to live there for a year or so, but I’m not willing to take a cut in my standard of living just to do it. Pittsburgh was a surprise. As expected, everyone had some sort of Steelers’ paraphernalia working, whether it was a hat or a jersey or a sign on a building. The town loves their Steelers. What was completely unexpected was how pretty the city was. The rivers coming in and the high hills riding along side them really contributed to some very pretty landscapes. There were some buildings that were built high enough on the bank opposite of the football stadium that the residents would be able to watch the game for free. I wonder how long that’s going to last. I can’t imagine the owner of any professional sports team allowing people to view his product without paying for it one way (tickets) or the other (advertising on tv). I’ll bet that’s a happy city today. Funny enough, after being there and meeting some very friendly people, I almost feel a cooling of my somewhat irrational hatred of all Pennsylvania sports teams. On the other hand, I am a Cowboys fan, so don’t expect any Steeler-love out of me.
Thursday, January 12, 2006
Yay, Though I Walk Through the Valley… – January 11, 2006
Ok, so this isn’t travel, strictly speaking, but it is travel related, and I thought it was worth mentioning here.
When I got back from Dublin at the end of October I made a very disappointing mistake with my passport. In my rush to get settled in again and start living my life here in the states, I threw all of my stuff in the laundry to get all of those nasty European cooties off of them. I’m sure you can see where this is going already. Usually when I get through customs and everything I just stick my passport back in my bag. I tried to make it a habit, that way I always knew where my passport was and I didn’t really have to think about it. Unfortunately, this time I forgot and I just stuck it in my back pocket. So I washed and dried my passport. I dried it on low heat, so at least it didn’t shrink, but it doesn’t really matter because it was essentially destroyed anyway.
I should have done this back in November, but one thing after another sort of drove it out of my mind. So Monday I finally pulled it out of my bag and started showing it around to some old international travel veterans, and they all said that I would have to get it replaced.
Step one of passport replacement is to find a passport office. Thanks to the miracle of the internet (Thanks, Al! j/k) I was able to find one within half a mile of the office. That doesn’t sound too bad, especially since we’re having such unseasonably nice weather right now. So I took off a little early for lunch on Wednesday and proceeded to walk over to the George Allen, Jr. Courts Building for a visit with my friends at the passport office.
Now, I’m not saying that downtown Dallas is dangerous or anything, just that it’s probably best to walk around down there with your head on a swivel. I swear, the thought ran through my head a couple of times, “is this the day that I’m finally going to get to use some of those self defense techniques?” The majority of people roaming around on the streets were people that obviously worked downtown. There was also a smattering of students from El Centro on their way to and from classes. But there was also that special category of crazy people. Like the very destitute couple walking the same direction on opposite sides of the street screaming at each other. Seriously, he was on the right side of the road, she was on the left. Traffic was flowing between them and they were screaming at each other about something or other. Then there was the random guy that was just screaming at everything. At first I thought he was arguing with someone in particular, but then I noticed that there was no one else around. It was just him and his imaginary friend. I’m not positive about it, but I think his imaginary friend might have been winning the fight. There was also that special group of people that just looked dangerous. These are the people that were evicted from hanging out around the downtown McDonald’s a couple of years ago when it was remodeled. And equipped with guards armed with AR-10s.
So the passport office took me for $97. I had to write a note explaining how my passport got in the condition it was in. I said:
To Whom it May Concern:
I damaged my passport by accidentally putting it in the laundry. Who knew that passports and Tide didn’t mix?
Thanks,
LS
My brief stint with the government taught me one thing: beauracracy does not appreciate humor. At least they don’t at the upper middle-managerial levels. I hope someone gets a kick out of my little note though.
When I got back from Dublin at the end of October I made a very disappointing mistake with my passport. In my rush to get settled in again and start living my life here in the states, I threw all of my stuff in the laundry to get all of those nasty European cooties off of them. I’m sure you can see where this is going already. Usually when I get through customs and everything I just stick my passport back in my bag. I tried to make it a habit, that way I always knew where my passport was and I didn’t really have to think about it. Unfortunately, this time I forgot and I just stuck it in my back pocket. So I washed and dried my passport. I dried it on low heat, so at least it didn’t shrink, but it doesn’t really matter because it was essentially destroyed anyway.
I should have done this back in November, but one thing after another sort of drove it out of my mind. So Monday I finally pulled it out of my bag and started showing it around to some old international travel veterans, and they all said that I would have to get it replaced.
Step one of passport replacement is to find a passport office. Thanks to the miracle of the internet (Thanks, Al! j/k) I was able to find one within half a mile of the office. That doesn’t sound too bad, especially since we’re having such unseasonably nice weather right now. So I took off a little early for lunch on Wednesday and proceeded to walk over to the George Allen, Jr. Courts Building for a visit with my friends at the passport office.
Now, I’m not saying that downtown Dallas is dangerous or anything, just that it’s probably best to walk around down there with your head on a swivel. I swear, the thought ran through my head a couple of times, “is this the day that I’m finally going to get to use some of those self defense techniques?” The majority of people roaming around on the streets were people that obviously worked downtown. There was also a smattering of students from El Centro on their way to and from classes. But there was also that special category of crazy people. Like the very destitute couple walking the same direction on opposite sides of the street screaming at each other. Seriously, he was on the right side of the road, she was on the left. Traffic was flowing between them and they were screaming at each other about something or other. Then there was the random guy that was just screaming at everything. At first I thought he was arguing with someone in particular, but then I noticed that there was no one else around. It was just him and his imaginary friend. I’m not positive about it, but I think his imaginary friend might have been winning the fight. There was also that special group of people that just looked dangerous. These are the people that were evicted from hanging out around the downtown McDonald’s a couple of years ago when it was remodeled. And equipped with guards armed with AR-10s.
So the passport office took me for $97. I had to write a note explaining how my passport got in the condition it was in. I said:
To Whom it May Concern:
I damaged my passport by accidentally putting it in the laundry. Who knew that passports and Tide didn’t mix?
Thanks,
LS
My brief stint with the government taught me one thing: beauracracy does not appreciate humor. At least they don’t at the upper middle-managerial levels. I hope someone gets a kick out of my little note though.
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