Working hard

I'd rather be hardly working.

Lazy Sunday

Good day in PJ's

Boo!

Carrie is a bitchin pumpkin carver.

The daily pint

They stock a healthy variety of bottle conditioned beer. It's like my
own little piece of Belgium in Santa Monica.

In case you were wondering

This is why I'm in Memphis. Congrats Andrea and Victor!

How much

How much time can one couple spend on planes in 3 days?!
This lovely photo, is arrival at Memphis International. (I think they
get to claim that it's an international airport because we came hear,
and we're international travelers)

Just when you thought it was over.

Travel day!
We're on the way to Memphis, TN!
Andrea & Victor are getting married so we thought we'd come, not just
across the country but across the globe, to celebrate with them!

USA

Oh beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain, blah blah
blah. It's good to home.

That's a California sunset

That is the real deal.

Travel day update

Sometimes it's really hard to sleep when jerkwads all around you are
all making a crap ton of noise!!!!

Greenland

Get a look a Greenland, before it's gone from global warming.

GB, GB

GoodBye Great Britin

Travel day

Virgin Atlantic is pretty great. Sure a seat on a plane for 11 eleven
hours. Is a seat on a plane for ELEVEN HOURS, but they do their best
to make it a little bit more pleasent.

Travel day

On the Tube to the airport.

Do you know what that makes today?
Yep, TRAVEL DAY!

Really?

You thought we were getting on a plane today, didn't you? You're
wondering why I'm doing laundry aren't you?

I'm completely out of clothes, and didn't want to be "stinky guy" on
the plane.

Maybe one more tourist stop, then back to the market crisis, election
circus, USA!

Just in case

Least you forget how much bigger the British library is than the local
library (they've got a couple of years head start on their
collection). Here's a scale model. Underground they have 4 floors of
wall to wall books. I think Carrie might want to be buried here.

Laying down the law

We're in London for one night only, and since the library is free, and
Carrie loves books we thought we'd limp over there (Carrie's knee and
my back). They have on display, among other things, originals of
Beowolf, Shakespeare, DaVinci, and 2 of the known 4 copies of the
Magna Carta. They are in a special low light room, behind a crap ton
of bullet proof glass, surrounded by signs prohibiting eating, using
the phone, and taking pictures.
The Magna Carta, just in case you forgot, basically established that
the king was not "above the law". I however, am.
You can feel free to thank me personally for the picture.

Guess what today is?

Travel day! We woke up in Rome. We're going to sleep in London.
Tomorrow, will be more of the same so except long entries about how
bored we are, how excited we are to headed back etc. Until then...more
planes, trains, and automobiles!

Just in case

If you happen to just be "tuning in" I reccomend starting in the
archives to get the whole trip (September 2008 to be precise), most of
you have been here since the beginning, but a few people have just
been added to the list. Enjoy.

Question.

Does it seem to you like we've spent a lot of time on trains in Europe?

Vous etes ici

Half way through the travel of "travel day". It goes like this:
1) return scooter to train station
2) train to Napoli (Naples)
3) local train/metro to Pompei
Tour take, take pictures (You are here)
4) local train/metro to Napoli (Naples)
5) train to Roma (Rome)
6) bus to apartment.
Likey Pompei
No likey travel days.

More Pompei.

So here's the dealio, "they" always talk about the 2000 people buried
alive at Pompei, so I go there kind of expecting to see a bunch of
people crouched in corners frozen still as if they were playing "red
light, green light". I saw two people and a dog.
Here's how they came to be.... Archeologists are digging, they find
voids in the rock, someone sees some bones, head dude yells, "stop!",
everyone stops. They fill voids with plaster and voilà, I see dead
people. Two of them, and a dog.

Pompei

Yep. People buried alive by a volcano!
This poor dude was chillin next to his donkey one minute and the next
minute bam! Kissing his own ass goodbye.

Scooter in Rome Rental

If you ever find yourself in Rome, this is great place to rent a
scooter. Http://www.ecomoverent.com

Sitting, watching, jiggling

What is another travel day?

Seriously, the listen to the book.

The frommer's guide comes through again! 2 nights ago we thought,
"let's just wander down to Campo Di Fior and grab some dinner from one
of those cute places we saw the other night..."
And again, chef boy arde, but last night, we picked a place out of the
guidebook. Perilli's, the guide said not to go without a reservation,
but we have no phone, so we went early, and bam! We got in. It was
again truly delicious.

Nighto Spanisho Stepso

We went down to the shopping area by the Spanish steps last night,
because nothing else is open on Sunday. That's where everyone else
went too.
Luckily for me, we got there just barely before everything closed, so
really all we could do was window shop. Whew!

The Maestro

My husband is a maestro in many ways and for many reasons... Today he
earns this title for his driving skills. I know what you are
thinking... Driving skills? Aren't they in Rome? The city of insane
round abouts, no lane lines,
And never followed speed limits? The city where you are offering your
life to the gods every time you dare to cross the street?
Yes, we are in Rome, and still very much alive due to the awesome
driving and navigating skills of maestro. My contribution? I held on
tight, closed my eyes tight when we Zipped thru traffic, and managed
not to pee my pants once... Not even a little bit.

You asked for it.

I think a certain someone (you know who you are) asked for a picture
of a dude in a speedo.

The Med

We took a daytrip to the coast today. We rented a scooter (Carrie
wants write about that), and drove out to Ostia. I ordered us "due
Coronas", we sat on the beach, walked along the sand to the pier, got
back on the scooters and came home. Nice way to spend a Sunday.

The Opera

We got tickets to the opera tonight. Cheap tickets. Bad seats. It's a
French opera, subtitled into Italian. I think I remember in "Pretty
Woman" they said that you either love the opera or you just don't get
it, well, something like that, Julia Roberts cried. It was moving.
Not being able to see the stage where performers are singing and
acting an opera I don't understand....not moving.

Inside the Colosseum

If you look really closely, just above my head, you can just barely
see Russel Crowe fight a CGI tiger.

Ceasar's Palaces

We've been to two different Caesar's Palaces on two different
continents. (snap)

This one was downright cool. Okay not really, unless you were in the
shade it was freaking hot! Oh and just like the other one I had
trouble finding my way out.

Ceasar Felinus

On the way to the Forum and the colusseum today we came across this
ruin site. I shall call it the shrine to Ceasar Felinus. Why, you ask?
Because, we counted 17 different cats just chillin' in seperate areas
of this place. Almost to the point of creepy. Huge city. Protected
archaelogical site. Ton of cats. Weird. Think, like, Hitchcocks
"Birds" weird.

Dinner in Rome

On the advice of JG & KG we made reservations at Pier Luigi. They had
been told about it from other friends who loved it, they loved it, it
fact they loved it so much they referred to it as their "best meal in
Italy". What you're asking yourself... "well, was it?"
Honestly, it's tough to call. The food was delicious beyond compare.
However, to give it the same honor of "best meal in Italy" would be an
insult to our friends from Il Latini in Florence.

Ultimately, the two meals were so completely different it wouldn't be
fair to compare. Therefore, I think the only thing to do is to come to
Italy, and decide for yourself.

After all that if you find yourself at pier luigi, definately get
dessert, and definately have the digestif they suggest.

Vatican museum

You probaly thought I'd take a picture of the Sistine chapel didn't
you? Okay, I wanted to but, I was afraid. The museum police were very
strict about the picture taking and "sshh-ing" people. But the only
time I heard them scold people, they spoke in English. Is that because
only English speaking are arrogant enough to think it is alright to
take pictures, or is it because really, secretly, everyone speaks
English.

Personally, I really enjoyed some of the more modern artists in the
museum. They had works by Kandinsky, Van Gogh, Matise, even Dali.
Oh, and a couple of pieces, or rooms/chapels from Michealangelo and
Raphael.

Carrie "Two Thumbs" Williams

Eat your heart out McGruff, there's a new crime stopper in town.
Carrie put the brakes on a crime in progress on the way home today.
Her crime fighting alter ego thwarted a would be pickpocket just as
was reaching into another guys jacket pocket on the tram, Carrie
smacked his arm and yelled "no", at which point the guy just hopped
out of line as to not get on the tram. As the tram pulled away all
this jackass could do was flip Carrie off as she pointed him out to me
(I missed the whole event, I was too busy protecting my own shit). I
just hope we don't see that guy again, I'd hate for anything to go
down in a foreign country. (anybody know how to get in touch with the
A-Team?)

Hook a sister up.

We passed through the clergy's fashion district. I guess even nuns
look to Italy for the latest fashion trends!

The pantheon

This is the building that inspired the Duomo in Florence. It is Rome's
most well preserved antiquity. It was build BC, as in before Christ,
as in more that 2,000 years ago...more than! MORE THAN 2000 Years!
Whew, got a little exited there...yeah it's cool.

Uncle Benny

Uncle Benny sends his best. We found ourselves at Mass today....guess
that explains the line.

The Rock

We came to the Holy See today. So did the rest of the world.
First a word about the posting order...

Normally, the order is backwards, meaning the most recent is usually
on top, which is to say that typically (annoyingly) it would be best
to read from bottom to top. That kind of ruins a lot of the surprise.
Just this once I thought I'd try to switch it up.

So here it goes.
We got to St. Peter's around 10 and found the following line.
Scroll down to see the next 6 pictures then come back... I'll wait

(hums theme to jeopardy)

Great you're back!
That my friends is a line! Don't sweat it though, unlike the Uffizi,
this line moves.

Now back to your regularly out of order posting.

I

II

III

IV

V

The back of the line

We made it!

Any questions.

Tiramisu. Yeah, it's that good in Rome.

Et tu Roma?

Who knew Romans eat frozen pizza too!

It's really hot today.

We're just walking around a little today. And man is it hot today. So
hot that it's like 10 degrees cooler in the shade. So hot we almost
needed an umbrella, but since we didn't pack one, we had to stand in
the shadow of one of the most bitchin' structures ever. The F---ing
(my mom's reading this) Colosseum. Wholly crap that thing is huge!
We're gonna see it for real on Saturday.
Ciao!