Friday, 5 March, and we’re off

The day of our Seville holiday to celebrate my 40th birthday finally arrived. We'd already taken Cat to the cattery the day before and had decided not to work today, in order to be able to pack and make sure we had everything we needed... including, unfortunately, a Jack In A Pack from Millets. This fold-down-into-a-small-bag raincoat is what we used to call a cagoule back in the day. They are super-sad, but those of you who remember the great wet Seville trip of 2008 will know we had to go prepared.

We left home at about 1:30pm after an early lunch, allowing plenty of time to get to Stansted airport. We were due to be there at about 4pm, and it usually takes about 90 minutes, but I wanted to leave an extra hour because the M25 on a Friday afternoon fills me with dread. As it happens, 90 mins was adequate, so arrived an hour early. Still, better early than late, I like to say. We kept as occupied as possible and finally boarded the plane at 5:45. I was the first passenger to board the plane, which I thought was fitting for my birthday trip.

On arrival, since we travelled hand luggage only, we were able to dash through customs (if one can ever really dash through customs) and grab a cab straightaway. While on the ride to the hotel I was able to practise my first bit of Spanish. "No es posible abrir la ventana?" I asked, noticing on this hot evening that I wasn't able to open the window to get some air. It seems he didn't quite understand ventana as car window, so I guess there must be a different word. Even so, he knew what I meant, flicked a switch up front, and I was able to breathe again.



We arrived at the El Rey Moro hotel, checked in, checked out the room, and headed out for food. Cerveceria Giralda, formerly a hammam, is always our first port of call in Seville. By 11:30pm we were eating our first dishes of the trip: tortilla en salsa de comino (delicious), tosta de queso de cabra (also delicious), and huevas fritas. But the huevas fritas don't look anything like the fried eggs we've had there in the past. Bit odd...



Ah, nota bene, my friends: Don't order huevas fritas if you want fried eggs. I've suddenly had the realization that it's a set of bollocks, fried. But they taste weirdly fishy, both in taste and texture. Red decided she can't eat them, but I plough on, aided by another cerveza. But even that didn't help me to finish them. As the waiter came for our plates -- only one of which was unfinished -- I asked him for clarification of what we had only half eaten. "Fish roe," he said in English, possibly embarrassed that I was pointing at my balls. "Ah, fish roe..." Phew!



As we sat there, chilling, we noticed people were starting to get turned away. It was only 11:50, so we guessed they must close at midnight. This was a surprise, but it forced us to get off our arses and have a wander around and back to the hotel. It had been a long day.





On returning, we noticed for the first time that what should have been a double bed was in fact two singles pushed together. This isn't totally unusual in hotels, but they weren't even made up as a double; they were made up as two singles pushed together. A request to reception didn't yield much success due to a lack of Spanish on my part and English on his. "Ask tomorrow," I was told. "I've not been here long."

"Okay." Hasta mañana, then...

I was away, and then I was back... and ill

So, the wife and I went to Italy for a wee summer holiday, 31 August to 12 September. Spent most of the time on the beach but also took a trip within a trip for a return visit to wonderful Venice. The whole experience, as you might expect, was lovely: cycling to and from the beach each day, splashing around in the sea, eating wonderful seafood and pizza and pasta dishes...

Before going, I'd been having a little gyp with a tooth that had recently been filled by my dentist, so in the last couple of days of my hol, I phoned and made an appointment.

We got back on the 12th, and my appointment was for the 16th.

On the 14th, while stretching to see the clock from my position in bed, I put my neck out so booked an appointment with the osteopath for the 15th: I wanted to get it sorted before being asked to open wide the following day.

The train ride to London for the dentist gave me the fear, cos I was right opposite this old dude who just kept coughing, almost for the whole hour of the journey. I just knew I would catch whatever the fuck it was that he was sharing.

And sure enough, two days later I started to get a sore throat. And that developed into a full head cold. I was lucky enough to feel fine within myself but was snotty and sniffy and sneezy nonetheless.

The cold did what colds do and kept me reaching for the Anadin Extra and the Kleenex. And then, on what would be my last day of sneezes, an almighty one wrenched my lower back. I literally could not stand upright without nasty pain. Another booking with the osteopath...

This brings us up to 22 September, and a couple of appointments with him seemed to be doing the job for my lower back.

And that's when I started to get some cystitis-like sensations: initially stinging/burning, accompanied by a feeling that I needed to pee more often than I normally would. I thought little of it and just hoped it would pass...

Until the point that I woke with severe discomfort in my mid-back on Friday 2 October. It felt different from my lower-back pain, but I assumed it must somehow be connected, so I lay down with a hot-water bottle for a few hours and it seemed to clear up.

The next day, I awoke to the same pain, only worse. I was literally in tears, though I'm not sure if it was really the pain or just the being absolutely fed up with being incapacitated in some way for about three weeks solid. I called my osteo, and he said he was surprised that it had shifted if I hadn't been doing anything strenuous. He asked if there was any chance I was having any other problems. I mentioned the cystitis stuff.

"I think that might be a kidney infection," he said, "without sounding like I want to pass the buck." So I spent the next hour or so trying to speak to a medical professional and eventually got an appointment for the same day. The doctor/nurse (who knows) who dealt with me said there was definitely an infection, based on my sample. By now -- as is always the case -- I was not only feeling better but was also not displaying any of my previous symptoms!

Anyway, today I got the actual test results back. "All clear," I was told. "Huh?" I replied. "How come I was told I had an infection, and yet the exact same sample says all clear?"

"Probably the drugs are clearing it up."
"But I started taking them after I gave the sample."

I don't even know what else to say. But it seems I am finally back to health. Now I need a holiday. And so, of course, does the missus, who has been doing almost everything around the house for this whole time.

Bruges

Bruges knocked it outta the park, man. See more pictures over at my Flickr page's Bruges set, but...

Here's me drinking some beer.



Here's a jurk store.



And here's some nice scenery.



Have a great Christmas everyone and a fabulous 2009!

I went to Berlin

It was awesome. But I've been thrown into a whirlwind of work since coming back, so I have hardly had time to digest and cogitate and all that, much less go through my pics. But I will, I promise, as soon as I can.

I even have pictures of accordions.

Hope all my buddies out there in blogland are well.

Post #800, wherein I share some video from Seville

This footage was shot in the grounds of the Casa de Pilatos. Some sources will tell you that this building has this name because it was built based on the designs of Pontius Pilate's house. That is bollocks, at least according to our guide around the house. It's because -- quick history lesson -- back in the day when they used to have a Stations of the Cross thingumajig through the city of Seville, this location was the one that correlated to Pilate washing his hands of Christ's crucifixion. Don't say you never learn anything here...

Anyway, what is amazing, and what you can't really tell from the way I've had to edit the video, is that so many different beautiful sights are visible from almost any spot you choose to stand in. So much so that it's difficult to know where to point your camera. So I just keep pointing and shooting and cross fingers that something decent will come out in the edit. Hope you see something you like, even it's just the bearded woman breastfeeding a baby.

Post #796, wherein I get to some details about my holiday

So, we were all hopped up and ready for our brief stay in warm and sunny Seville. And then, just a couple of days before we left, it suddenly became apparent that it was going to be rainy and grey. Bugger. What can you do? We'd booked our tickets with hand luggage only, so we were committed to not taking big coats and cool-weather clothing...

"Well," I said, "It's not like weather forecasts are always accurate. Let's take a chance."

It's hard to travel hand luggage only, especially when you are allowed literally only one bag each, and that bag must weigh less than 10kg (22lb), and you want to cram in a video camera and stills camera and a couple of shirts and T-shirts and some spare trousers or two and clean underwear and socks and maybe some spare shoes... Hard, yes, but not impossible.

First things first, though: on arrival at the airport we had to queue at Ryanair's customer-service point to make sure our online-printed boarding passes were okay, since they said we were Irish (which we aren't) and that our passports expired on 1 January (which they hadn't). All fine; problem with the computer system. Phew!

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We arrived late to Seville, and yet it still wasn't dark. That's always nice and summery-feeling. It got me off on the right foot. And with our hand luggage only we went straight to the cab rank and got a car straightaway. He drove like a complete maniac, doing about 130km/h (80mph) on streets that didn't seem built for such speeds, undertaking cars as we went. But at least that meant we got to our hotel quicker than we might otherwise have expected.

We checked in, freshened up, and headed straight out to one of our favourite haunts in the city, the Cervezeria Giralda, where we incredibly managed to bag a table really quickly, after ordering our first round of drinks and tapas, but before we'd managed even a mouthful, I think.

We ordered the tortilla al comino, so beloved of our last visit, along with a couple of other old favourites and some new dishes too. We drank beer and took pictures, and we wandered back to our hotel room sated and happy to be back in this great town. Tomorrow we would start our walking in earnest.

We had decided in advance that we would eat breakfast at the hotel. At least on the Sunday morning, anyway, rather than struggling to find somewhere open early enough. So we did, and it was good. Hotel breakfasts in the buffet style are usually good, but when you're paying €14 (£11, US$22) a head, you simply need to make sure you get your money's worth. So we did. Various cuts of ham were consumed, along with bacon, tortilla, doughnuts, coffee, and orange juice. A breakfast in preparation for a day's walking.

And off we set to the Plaza de España, hoping this time that it would be even more wonderful than the last time we saw it. Sadly, this time around a lot of it was boarded up for renovations. We didn't mind too much since we'd seen it before anyway, but it would have been nicer to see in all its glory. It was more unfortunate that the waterway that runs in the grounds was, once again, void of water. I was really hoping to see it in this context this time around. Guess we'll just have to come back again sometime.

But we did see some festive chariots carrying señoritas in their best Feria clothing. That was cool. (Video footage to follow soon-ish.)

And we did get accosted by some gypsies wanting to force rosemary upon us and read our palms. I managed to get away with paying mine only about 80c for her trouble. She didn't seem too pleased with that and seemed to be implying I should pay her €5 for each palm read. I just shrugged like I didn't know what she was saying.

And I'm glad I did. Discussions with my better half just a few minutes later revealed that she indeed had paid €10 for the great privilege of being told our children would be beautiful. Oh, joy!

Of course, just before having our futures read, a vending man had come running up to me screaming before grabbing me by the arm. "Lucio! Lucio!" he was yelling (in that Spanish way, so it sounds like "Loo-thee-oh"). I thought he was on about light or something (luce [loo-che] in Italian, luz [looth] in Spanish), so I just kinda kept walking, shaking my head in bemusement, trying to convey that I had no idea what he was on about. Maybe he was trying to get me to buy one of his fans or something...

Then it became clear. We stopped and started trying to communicate with him.

[One thing about the Spanish we've encountered in both Seville, both times, and Valencia is that regardless of how much you clearly have no idea what they are saying, they will just keep talking. To you or at you, I'm not quite sure. And while this can initially be somewhat frustrating, it's also somehow really very endearing. No amount of incomprehension seems to be an obstacle to their desire to talk to you.]

Over the course of five minutes we established that he liked my tattoos and that the best tattooist in the whole of Spain is Lucio (yes, the word he was shouting at me), who operates at the US base in Rota, near Cadiz. This chap, who told us his name was Fernando, showed me the tattoo of his mother's name and told us that years ago, when he had his done, nobody had tattoos and they were frowned upon by "society". These days, "everybody has them, even babies". He now intends to get his father's name on his other arm and portraits of both parents on his chest. I think we did pretty well understanding all that, being as we're really shit at Spanish!

See, tattoos can bring people together, my friends.

After our walk around the Plaza, we were hungry, so we headed to a little nearby cafe that we'd been to last time around.

The weird thing was, the overhanging trees were insane. Almost everybody sat outside was sneezing as the trees shed their fluffy leafy stuff.

A street musician wandered over to our table just as Red went to the bathroom. He was playing something akin to a guitar but made with twine for strings. He was a black guy, and given the proximity of Africa and its African heritage, I suspect the instrument was African of some time. "You speak English?" he asked, twiddling a little riff on his thing. "Yes," I replied. "Where are you from?" "England."

And that gave him all the ammo he needed to "write" a song for me on the spot. I still remember the lyric fondly. It went something like this:

Englan', Englan', Englan', Englan', Englan'.
Li'erpool, Li'erpool, Li'erpool, Li'erpool, Englan'.
London, London, London.
Li'erpool, Li'erpool, Li'erpool, Li'erpool, Englan'.

Ahhh, those words will stay with me a long time.

Post #795, wherein I make promises that I probably can’t keep regarding how soon I’ll hit my 800th post

Dudes -- I've been a slacker. Sorry and all that, but this week has turned into total fucking mayhem on the work front.

I really wanted to do some posts about Seville. And I will. But I had intended to chop together some video footage first, and that shit takes time. Time I don't have right now.

You wanna know how short of time I am? My tattooist called to say that I could have three hours on Friday cos someone had cancelled an appointment, but I had to turn it down cos I'm too damn busy. Believe, when I'm too busy to go and get tattooed, it means I'm FUCKING busy.

And it's some bad work that's keeping me busy. Proofreading is my least favourite of the strings to my bow. It's the being rooted to the spot for so long, so deep in concentration, keeping track of all the editorial style choices. And it pays the least well of the jobs we do, too. That said, this one is a good rate because it's a short-notice, 11th-hour kinda gig.

So, as alluded in the title, I promise to be back soon with some Seville stories before they all seem too late to write about. And some video clips. In the meantime, the missus is writing about it. But if you're really jonesing for a piece of my own words, don't forget you can always go check out my movie reviews (such as they are).

And anyway, my 800th post seems so damn insignificant now in light of Candy Minx's 1,000th. Not to mention furiousBall's 2,000th of a couple of weeks back. Pah! I'll try to get it done by Monday, though...

Valencia: the end of the trip

Sunday, 25 November (continued)
We walked on up into some of the squares and wandered around, as you do, milling about with the crowds and absorbing the laid-back Sunday atmosphere on what was, frankly, a fucking glorious late-November day.

Ultimately our goal today would be to get to the Oceanografíc, a massive aquarium complex within the City of Arts & Sciences, but there was more uncharted ground to cover in the main city beforehand.

This first video is a portrait of the Palacio del Marques de Dos Aguas, a most incredible building in the heart of Valencia. Look out for Red swiftly removing her hands from the facade when told "Non tocar!" by the guard. An hour later, he was gone. If we had so desired we could have touched it to our heart's content.



And here's the last one... for now... The snack we stopped for at the beginning was orxata (aka horchata) for me, a local artisanal cold drink, and hot chocolate -- no, the thickest, chocolatiest hot chocolate in Christendom... literally melted chocolate, I think -- for Red. We each had our own dunking things, too. I finished every last bit of my deliciousness; Red, not so much.

Then dancing people in the square, in "traditional" dress -- so that's where they were going, those folks I mentioned in my previous post! And then, what's that? Shiiiit, ruins of the old city... underwater! How damn cool is that?!



3:45pm-ish
After a lot more walking, we stopped for lunch at the most delicious steakhouse. The front-of-house woman was Italian, so she was able to tell us what was good and stuff! Really great food, even though neither of us was convinced we really wanted a steak, but it was about 3:45pm by now, and all the restaurants in Valencia close no later than 4pm, and many seemed not even to open on a Sunday. We had to take our food where we could find it!

Next up, we grabbed a cab to the Oceanografíc. At some point in the not-too-distant future I will go through that material, too, and post some clips of dolphins and penguins and seals, oh my. There's also some footage of the city by night that's quite cute. But for now, with the festive season right upon us and other things to move on to, it's hasta luego, Valencia. It was a fun ride!

Intermission over: Back to Valencia

Saturday, 24 November (still...)
So after our huge walk down to the port, we had to wait for the America's Cup store to open. And when it did, unfortunately we were unable to buy what Red had wanted for her mother. So while the walk had been for nowt, it had still been a fun one! We looked out for a cab and headed back to the hotel room.

At the time Red was looking at possible hotels, she had read that this one had, in some rooms, only a window separating the bedroom from the bathroom. This sounded like great fun, perv that I am, so we really hoped we got one of those. And we did! It was cool and wacky!

We chilled and nursed our blistered feet before heading our for some food. My tattooist Xam is from around Valencia, and so I had asked him if he could recommend any good restaurants. He had given me a couple of names, one of which is apparently frequented by Spanish stars and royalty. We had to give it a go. So we headed out into the night. We wanted to explore some of the busy streets by night before eating, and we also had to stop in at an Internet cafe to check in online for our return flight.

Once we decided it was time to eat, we got a taxi. It took us all the way back to the port area, but only when we got there did we discover that the restaurant was closed for the season. Fortunately, just a few doors away was the other restaurant that had been recommended.

We sat and ordered food, wine, and water. We were ravenous. We'd not eaten since a small bite at 1pm, and it was now about 9pm if memory serves. The chances are that it was probably later because the restaurant had quite a few people in it, and people eat late in Spain. (When we were in Seville, we found this great steak restaurant. We went there at gone 9pm one night and were the only people there. It started getting busier as we were about to leave. Can you imagine eating a steak at 11pm?! Amazing...)

We ordered paella -- what else, since Valencia is the home of the dish? I must say, I enjoyed mine. Red was a little less convinced. We have an ongoing beef about paella since her birthday in Seville. I won't go into it, save to say that perhaps I made a mistake that we both ended up paying for. Sorry, pet. Kisses!

After dinner, we looked for a cab and headed back to the hotel, I think. We were shattered, and I was probably a bit tipsy, so my memory is unclear now!

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Sunday, 25 November
Next day we breakfasted fairly early so we could get out and pound the streets some more. We both love getting away from our desks, of course, and we love both beach and city breaks. But when we do city breaks, fuck do we do 'em! I mean, we walk our motherfucking feet off. You've got to, though, right? It might be the only time you go to a particular city, so you need to have no regrets about missing anything.

We headed into the old town area and walked the squares and looked at fountains and stuff. Just walking fairly directionless, letting the city be our guide. Well, letting the city and the guide book be our guides. And the map.

We found some crazy dogs playing in the streets. And then some men and women in "traditional" Spanish dress. By traditional, I mean, old-school, dancey, traditional, cos at the end of the day, traditional dress for everyone these days is jeans, T-shirts, jumpers, of course.

Then we stumbled upon a street where everyone was congregating. It was mayhem. Old and young, male and female. What was going on? we wondered. You know what it was...? Trading cards. Everyone was going crazy buying and swapping football cards. Incredible...

Here's the video of this leg of our journey.

Weekend diary, part 4

Saturday, 24 November (It just keeps on giving, right?)
I mentioned a couple of posts ago that we bumped into some more lost tourists on our way from the City of Arts & Sciences... Well, we teamed up with the four of them to find our mutual end destination: the port.

We doubled back on ourselves and, rather than walking all the way back to the Ciutat, we chucked a right, down what looked like a semi-residential area. We walked to the end, which was only a couple hundred metres, and found ourselves at the river. Instinct (with a face all screwed up like George's in Elaine's clasp) told us to go right, along a trail of dirt and bare grass, heading towards the railway bridge that spanned the river. We could see from our map that this was the right general direction. But this was most definitely not the right tourist way.

Then we saw a man stepping down off the railway bridge. "Well, he must've crossed it," we say to ourselves, "so it must lead somewhere." We continue. As the man approached us obvious tourists, one of our number still wheeling her suitcase over the great mounds of dirt, he appeared to have a wry smile on his face...

We got to the bridge and realized it was a pretty crappy affair, certainly not likely to be the major river crossing we were hoping for. Still, it was wide enough for us to walk down without fear for our lives, so we did.

The interesting part was when we got to the other end. Y'see... there was no exit point. The bridge ended, and our way was blocked by a fence. That's right, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, we were fenced in like half a dozen wild animals. Caged in our prime. Well, there was nothing else for it, of course, but to climb...

After our climbing adventure we continued to walk. We passed the place where refrigerators go to die and we threw a right at the next road junction. At this point our merry group splintered. Suitcase Lady, it turns out, was not with the rest of them, and she trucked on alone. Red is a fast walker, so she trotted on ahead while I chased after her coat-tails, and the other three held back to check their own maps rather than be dragged into the Great Unknown by us crazed Ingle types.

But we were right, and as quick as a very very slow flash or quite a quick tortoiose we were at the port. Well, it probably took the best part of another 45 minutes, past various abandoned cars, and more fences where building work was going on, until finally, FINALLY we got to the port, where a guy was offering boat tours around part of the America's Cup course. We declined. By this time, it was about 3:50pm, we'd been awake for about 11 hours, and we wanted to get into the America's Cup shop and buy something for the mother-in-law and get back to the hotel room that we still hadn't even seen...!

Here's the video of these stages of our misadventures:

Weekend diary, part 3

Saturday, 24 November (continued, still)

Not so much to read this time around, but a couple of videos to watch.

The first is yet more walking. We did a lot of that, did I mention? This time through the lovely Turia Park.

The second video is from the jaw-dropping City of Arts & Sciences, just wandering around leisurely.

I love the sounds on both of these video clips, just stuff and sometimes chit chat and sometimes industrial clanging or children shouting. But sometimes just an incredible silence that is almost unfathomable in the middle of a huge city. Wonderful.

Thanks for watching. And have a great weekend.

Holiday stories, part 5: Some miscellaneous great things

You may be right to be growing bored of this. I'm dragging it out a bit, but what with one thing and another, it's just taking me a long time. Soz.

Ten random things that were great about Sicily:

1. I cannot say enough good things about the Hotel Villa Carlotta in Taormina. Look at this cool lizard, too, which I snapped at the side of their pool. He rocked. I called him Eddie Lizzard. I called all the lizards that. It never stopped being funny. For me.



2. The breakfasts at the aforementioned hotel, and the great treatment we received from the breakfast staff, including Maria and Loredana. This was the view.



3. The loveliness from everyone there, including also Riccardo and Alfio.

4. The great vibe, day or night, wherever you walked or sat. The people-watching was hugely enjoyable.




5. The statue of Emperor Sideshow Bob in Catania.



6. The water. The water. The water. My God, the water.

7. The views, almost everywhere you went, were simply breathtaking. And I don't mean in the Seinfeld way.



8. This pimped-up satellite dish, which is being used here to represent delicious food, even from cheap takeaway joints.



9. Going somewhere that Phil Keoghan has been for The Amazing Race, the Roman Amphitheatre in Catania.



10. The ceramics. We knew we couldn't come away without buying some ceramics as a reminder of our wonderful holiday. We ended up buying just over £200 worth, safe in the knowledge that we could get them shipped over very cheaply (they quoted us just £35 for shipping including insurance) so we wouldn't have to worry about carrying them ourselves or any damage incurred. Plus they threw in a 10 per cent discount on the ceramics, too. Here are the two pieces I chose outright: a trinacria, the symbol of Sicily; and a Sacred Heart acquasantiera, a holy-water dispenser, which we kind of collect as and when we find nice ones.

Holiday stories, part 4: "The Music and the Mountain"

Street musicians are always fun to watch. These guys caught me off guard, suddenly starting up in the outdoor area of the great La Botte restaurant, but I managed to shoot a bit of footage, albeit from a not-great vantage point. That said, it was nice to capture some of the local colour of people out dining on a lovely evening. I've thrown in some clips of Etna doing her thing, too.

Movie soundtrack fans should listen out for a tune from The Talented Mr Ripley, as well as a snippet or two of "Axel F" from the Beverly Hills Cop movies. Fans of the accordion might get lucky, too. Enjoy!

Holiday stories, part 3

So, yeah, we were at Isola Bella, and it was wicked. Then this happened:



Can you imagine? Shoes. Washing away. Talk about drama!

Then we went for a boat ride around Isola Bella. I've got some cool footage of that too, and I'll upload it soon. I haven't even taken it off the tape and on to my hard drive yet, but maybe over the weekend I'll get around to it.

It was totally awesome. I wore my bandana and looked just like a pirate, specifically I looked just like Johnny Depp. Proper gorgeous I was. We got to this amazing patch of still, clear water (which all of it is) and the skipper turned off the engine and said, in Italian: "Have a swim if you like." There was an older English couple who didn't understand what he said and they were concerned about what was going on.

"I think he said we could have a swim," said the man to his wife.
"Is he joking?" asked the wife of her man.

But I guess they found that he wasn't when people started jumping in. Several people had a go. The water, he told us, was about 30m (100ft) deep. But it was soooo clear that Red could see her feet as she trod water. Insania!

I'm not a great swimmer, and by the time I'd plucked up the balls to have a splash around -- after Red had told me how salty it was, and so how it would be impossible to drown! -- the skip turned the engine back on. Oh well.

After the trip was over we headed for a bite to eat at an unassuming little beachside restaurant. We both ordered seafood dishes, and while we were eating, the waiter came over to the table next to us with three or four fish in his hands. "Which one would you like?" he asked them. "They were caught ten minutes ago by that guy over there," he added, pointing to a fisherman fiddling around with his boat. The fish was that fucking fresh it was alive just minutes earlier! Man... Sicily is rockin' it old school, no doubt.

Holiday stories, part 2

On one day we headed down to Isola Bella. It was a long walk down the hillside steps, but it was a great walk, too. Almost all the way down the views were stunning, and at every corner you would hear a little scurry or two as you approached. The scurrying was the sound of lizards, which would run away as you neared. Clearly they were loving just lounging in the sun, and we were busting their balls.

Some would return if you stood still long enough, and they'd just stand there, keeping their distance, and stare at you. This one was great, for example: he even allowed me to get this short clip of him, from a long way off, hence the shaky footage!



Once we got down to Isola Bella, wow, what a place. The name means "beautiful island" in Italian, and it is a small island joined to Sicily by a sandbar through shallow, crystal-clear seawater. Sometimes the sandbar is walkable without getting wet. We got there when the tide was a touch higher, so we waded through in our sandals. It was still just ankle-deep.

Once we got to the other side, we waded some more, counting the fish, and swam some, and just sat around dangling our feet in the glorious water:



Lots of people were just hanging around or sunbathing or canoodling or taking pictures of their loved ones.



One little Italian girl was getting her mum or auntie to apply some temporary tattoos. They were stood just across from us. "Look," I heard the woman say to the girl, "at that man's tattoos!" Who, me?


More stories and video clips from this day will follow in the next post...

Post #700: Guess what we saw in Sicily

Among other things, Etna erupting! How cool is that? I took this picture from our hotel balcony. Look at the height achieved by that molten lava, then compare it to the size of the lights of the town below. They said on the local news that the lava was spewed as much as 700m (2,300ft) into the air. Wow! The airport in Catania was closed during part of the night and the next morning due to too much ash in the atmosphere.

Weather and stuff that is related to weather

We've got some washing hanging out on the line. A few bits and pieces that we want to take to Sicily with us. We're praying the weather holds out long enough for them to dry.

Apparently it's 20°C here today. That's 68°F in old money.

And where we're headed it's 39°C, or 102.2°F. Now that is what I call toasty. Something tells me I'll quickly start resembling a lobster. Agghh!

Aloha, baby!

I love Hawaiian shirts. Always have, always will. Winter, spring, summer, or fall, I will wear a Hawaiian shirt gladly.

But there has long been a problem for me where the Hawaiian shirt is concerned: on the sunniest of days when I want to protect my tattoos and yet still look the shiznit (yes, I wrote shiznit; that's how hip hop I can be at times), the Hawaiian shirt fails me. "What I really need," I used to ponder to myself and anyone unfortunate enough to be in the vicinity, "is a Hawaiian shirt with long sleeves."

Wife thought this was ridiculous. She shared my desire with Mother-in-Law, who said that surely no such thing existed.

"Maybe it doesn't," I replied. "But why not?"

So I looked online. This was about five years ago. And while looking for long-sleeved Hawaiian shirts I came across the website of Alohaland. There they proudly proclaim: "Because we make Hawaiian shirts we can do them any way you want them." And right next to this is a clicky button marked "Long Sleeves".

Every summer since then I have gone back to this website, longing for the day I get my shit in order and buy some of their shirts. That day was yesterday, my friends. I placed an order for three long-sleeves and one short-sleeve. They don't come cheap once you factor in shipping charges to the UK from Oregon and the very high likelihood of having to pay up to 25 per cent on top in import duty on arrival, but the way I figure it, (a) I can't buy the suckers over here anyway, and (b) whenever I see a shirt I like over here they always cost about £80-100 (US$160-200) each, and I just won't pay that kind of money.

With the dollar/sterling exchange rate being what it is, it seemed the right time to order. And I'm told the shirts will be with me in time for my hols, which rocks!

“Back to life / back to reality”

Ah, don'cha just love Soul II Soul? I had their debut album on one side of a C90 tape back in the day, and on the other side was Soft Cell's Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret. Good driving-round-town tape that was.

Anyways, back from Italy to a whole fucking shitstorm of work. Add in yet more offers of work and a schedule that has been shortened during the one working day I was away from my desk (how the fuck does that happen?!), and it looks like yours truly is going to have a busy couple of months.

Suddenly having the kitchen done, going to the dentist, and a tattooing appointment all seem to be happening at a bad time...

Well, onwards and upwards.

I'll try to visit all my blogroll peeps and get a few pics and maybe a video clip up in the coming days, but work has to take priority, unfortunately. Hope to catch up with you all really soon...