Skip to main content

Posts

Euro Tour Part 11 Castello in Florence

The Castello is at the top of a hill, and in every direction you look, there are lush green hills; it is incredible. The Castello itself does look like an old stone castle. Not a massive fortress a king might live in, but an old greyish brick building a lord might sit in overlooking his countryside. It looks like it has ramparts running around it, but I am not sure, as we never got up that high. When you come in through the iron gate, you step into a large and open courtyard. A few trees, different doors headed off in different directions, but not much else. We were greeted by the host for the evening, who told us the tale of the Pazzi, also pointing out that this courtyard is home to the only remaining legitimate Pazzi coat of arms. Then he started the tour of the Castello. One of the first rooms is the "conspiracy room," where all the planning of the failed plot was done. See my last blog for details of what I mean. The failed Pazzi plot. It is a large, drafty, old wooden r...
Recent posts

Euro Tour Pt 10 Vatican & Florence

 So this is another entry in a long series of travel blogs. We went to Paris, then Italy and Greece. All these entries are about that. You may wanna read the others first but up to you. This one is a bit shorter, I didnt really have a good place to break things off that made sense. So I am going to wrap up Rome and get us to our hotel in Florence.                                                                    Where Caesar met his end I don't know how bus drivers manage to wedge themselves in, down by Vatican City, but they do. The lane ways are very narrow; you can tell they were made hundreds of years ago, or at least laid out before tour buses were invented. Here, we need to make things large enough for oversized trucks to maneuver; however, it does not seem that was a concern wh...

January 1 random thoughts!

I lied, it is clear I wont have a chance to get back to a travel blog this year 2025. Hell it might be 2026 before this is even up! So ending on some more random thoughts. Mostly unedited and well for real last one like this I am doing for a month. At least. New goal for 2026 travel blog out every 2 weeks until last trip is done. Want it to be done before I go to Spain this year!! Oh I am posting this January 2nd. A big chunk right in the middle is Stranger Things with some massive spoilers if you haven't watched final season be warned.  Hockey ended shitty. We finished 3rd in our div. For once it felt like the right div, winning as much as losing. We got a wild card round Bye, then quarter final single game elimination we played a team with only 2 wins. One we handled easily BUT no one showed up. Not figuratively, really. We had a tiny bench and they beat us. The legit season we could have made a good playoff run we lost. I can't say much, I didn't play I was working. I mi...

2002 PT 2

This is the second in a 2 parter. Not really edited so sorry about that. Also maybe you should read part 1 for this to make sense. So were I left off C-girl my roommate had packed her shit and vanished. Or I watched her drive away with no idea why. I went in the townhouse and it was clear why. A couple pair of her shoes sat at the front door chewed to shit. I headed upstairs to her room and she had left more chewed items in the room and a small TV that was smashed on the floor. Those old 13" ones that people had. I assume some how Obie had pulled it down. I went into the basement where my room was. Nothing was damaged but the amount of dog piss and shit was overwhelming. SO I had asked a friend (Black we can call him, see old blogs if you want) to stay at the townhouse and look after the dog. He told me he would but while we were gone he changed his mind. Now he said he did come and take the dog out, which I believe as there was some new dog poop in the backyard but clearly he did...

Notes from an Xmas party

 Christmas my favorite time of the year! This year with things going on in my life it doesn't really feel like it is Christmas but I am still going through the motions. I am doing my Christmas runs for clients, which is actually pretty decent. People bitch a little less about issues and mostly just want a good meal and to say Merry Christmas. Xmas parties are happening and I went to my wifes company recently. SO just some random take aways from that and from the season in general. Again not edited so sorry if reading this hurts your brain. Fucking smile! I was out and about just buying chocolates and liquor to give to customers and everyone was scowling. This isn't even a Christmas party note. I just mean out and about in the holiday season. This is the time of year when we at least pretend to be happy! People smile and pretend they care most years so why is everyone scowling this year!! Also if you can, donate some money. Doesn't have to be much but don't make three Ch...

2002 PT 1

I recently made a post about 2002 just in passing how big the Eminem Show was that summer and it got me thinking about that whole fucking year. The fact is, it was the most insane and probably most formative year of my life. I guess I am gonna get nostalgic for a minute here. I am not really spending much time editing this, so sorry if it is a bit harder to read! Honestly it is kind of filler until I can travel blog again. Before I get to 02 I need to set it up. In summer 2000 I moved to Edmonton from Grande Prairie. I was going to take journalism and you would all be reading my adventures when I was done. Truth be told I wasn't ready. Not responsible enough at 19. I moved down with my best friend Ditch and his girlfriend Shwa. We got a 2 bedroom in Oliver. $600. (Now they start around $1400) I cant blame them, it was my choice to be a meat head but I was terrible in school. I started at GMCC and they did fun shit like go to the water park. Which is an irresponsible kid gonna do? P...