Category: Topics

Travel

Rome, Part 3

(continued from previous entry)

As Karen and I headed out in our Quest, we had to hike across the elegant streets of Rome, covered with cobble stones.

While the street texture may prove difficult to navigate in high heels, Karen and I were able to romantically strode along the Italian streets in our sandals. Along the way, we noticed the excellent parking job of some of these locals.

As we entered the major street of Via Nazionale, we observed the extravagant facade with statues on many buildings…

Also, Rome buildings were often painted with the bright, cheerful portion of the visible spectrum. Home Depot would make a fortune in Rome.

At the end of Via Nationzale, we entered the gigantic Piazza della Repubblica…

There used to be wood furnaces that heated up the water for some serious bath, a long, long time ago. In the center stood the statue of Victor Emmanuel (whoever he is), and surrounding it were four water nymphs (censored).

Finally, we descended into the underground mall of the train station (Termini) in search of the cable, but none of the stores carried it. On the way, I attempted to make an ATM withdraw, but instead of the “Thank you, here’s your money”, I got something equivalent to “No money for you! Card not enabled for international withdraw.” Oh oh. Houston, we got a problem.

At this point we were famished, so we dropped by a self-service restaurant.

My seafood salad was surprisingly delicious…

But Karen got what appeared to be raw Mongolian BBQ platter…

I hope it was really prosciutto wasn’t labeled “E. Coli 7 Euros”.

As we made our way to the cassiere (cashier), a huge advertisement caught my attention: “Speciale: Cappuccino 0.50 Euro”. At such an inexpensive price, we bought one, thinking of sharing the warm, luscious coffee over lunch. Instead, we got this…

The size of the cup proved to be insignificant, and the volume of the content was even more underwhelming. For the record, not a single sip had been taken prior to the photography.

After lunch, we ventured across the land of the terminals to seek the wisdom of the masters at the TI (Tourist Info), who set us out on a journey to the nearest computer store. Finally, a glimmer of hope! After arriving at the store at 3:30, we glanced inside only to stare into darkness. Closed. What self-respecting store is closed at 3:30 in the afternoon! A quick inspection of the sign revealed the hours 8-1, 4-6. Slackers! Apparently it was common for Italians to take a siesta, or an “afternoon nap/rest”.

As we waited impatiently across the street at Piazza Indipendenza, the atmosphere of Europe became evident as the music of accordian surrounded the place…

Finally at 4pm, the store opened. Once again we were met with the disappointment of visiting a store that sold the Ipod but not the cable. A salesperson pointed us to yet another store, extending our scavenger hunt. Along the way, we eyed an European furniture store in gluttany, wishing we could import it all…

After arriving the store, once again we found Ipod, but no cable. At this point were struck with despair, so we returned to the first computer store to salvage our vacation by purchasing their cheapest cable… the one came with an Ipod. As I tried bargaining with the manager to explain the ethical implications of bundling an Ipod with the cable, he replied, “If you need just cable, go to Apple store”. Apple store?! Where!!!

To make a long store short, it was a Mac Store and… without the IPod bundle, it was indeed easier on the wallet. Praise God! Mission accomplished.

On the way back, we noticed the nationalism of the Italians…

And took some random pictures, now that memory space was no longer an issue…

For dinner, we went to the Flann O’Brien Irish Pub, which according to Rick Steve’s Italy Tour Guide, “is an entertaining place for a light meal, fine Irish beer, live sporting events on TV, and perhaps the most Italian crowd of all.” Being a novice at ordering Italian cruisine, I inquired the waitress about their special.

“Lasagna”, she replied.

“Uno Lasagna”, I ordered the authentic italian food by giving her the finger. The index finger.

As a side note, I didn’t realize that the index finger actually meant two in Italy. One would use just the thumb to indicate “one”. Glad she understood, because contrary to what I had ingrained into my mind as Lasagna as early as infancy, the plate that came was…

Ravioli skins in Ravioli sauce?! “Lasagna”, the waitress insisted. Oh… okay.

Now that our first quest is complete, which sights and monuments shall James and Karen uncover? What other Italian cultural nuisances will unfold? What about the ATM situation and the inability to replenish our cash supply? Find out next time… on my blog! 😀

Travel

Rome, Part 2

(continued from yesterday)

Apparently the IPod plug arrived in Europe with us but the USB cable connecting the iPod to the plug itself did not. This Series of Unfortunate Events left us with the need to save space by lowering the picture resolution to those on par with mosaics. Here’s a sample of that…

IMG style=”BORDER-TOP-WIDTH: 0px; BORDER-LEFT-WIDTH: 0px; BORDER-BOTTOM-WIDTH: 0px; HEIGHT: 400px; BORDER-RIGHT-WIDTH: 0px” alt=”” src=”/blogs/images/20060820/mosaic.jpg”>

After struggling with this, we decided against it as it might be a difficult undertaking to find picture frames for our 8mm x 10mm pictures. To salvage this fiasco, we decided to turn our next day into an adventure: “The Quest for the Holy Cable”.

The next morning, Karen and I woozily woke up and stumbled our way to the breakfast table. I selected my choice cereal…

…and scooped some milk out of the cocktail bowl.

As I poured it on my cereal, I noticed that the Italian milk exhibited a peculiar lumpy texture, the texture of… yogurt!! Oops. Looks like this bowl is making its way to Karen.

I figured it was time to sober up through the potent aid of caffeine. I approached the coffee machine, depressed the button labeled “Cappuccino”, and voila! Out gushed this cappuccino…

I took a sip. Mmmm…… Not bad. Would have been nicer, though, had there actually been coffee in this cream. A nun later explained (with words none of which I understood), that to get Cappuccino, the cup needed to be filled with expresso first. In America, when I see a button labeled “Cappuccino” and I press it, I expect “Cappuccino”. Apparently the Italians think otherwise.

Then I picked up a couple of Italian breads. They are always deviously served cold and impart a sour taste. Italian bread is versatile, however, as it doubles as a weapon of mass destruction when tossed and can easily penetrate a wall or create an oversized bruise on a human target.

The Nutella has its origins in Italy and tasted just as good as the ones in the States. Then there was the Schinkencreme…

Took one bite. Yup. Cat food. Garfield would love this stuff.

Afterwards, we headed out toward the Main Terminal in search of our treasure. What would we find along the way? Would we find the cable? Find out next time… on my blog! 😛

 

 

Travel

European Adventure

Back in May, Karen and I plucked ourselves from our daily routines and took a three week vacation to Europe. Neither of us had been there, but we’ve certainly heard of its reputation for two things: lots of history… and lots of theft. Many of you have expressed the desire to see our pictures before your grand-kids are born, so let me just take you through our journey through select pictures.

The trip didn’t sink in until we hopped on the Northwest plane and realized we were finally going to take a step in the European soil! The plane definitely had an upgrade in the multimedia system since the last time I rode it.

40+ Movie on demand! This includes Blockbuster movies, Disney movies to quiet those noisy brats, and games including trivia that you can play with other people on the plane! Wow. The ability to pause the movie when the rude pilot interrupted us or when food came was priceless. The geek in me noticed it was a linux system with each screen as a different console, so perhaps there’s some market opportunity for Microsoft here.. Oops, back to our story.

Our connecting flight was in Netherlands, and everything felt like an American airport, aside from the language, until we noticed airport security dressed in green camouflage suits and carried semi-automatic weapons suspiciously resembling the AK-47s. Yeah. I was glad I wrote my will before I left town.

When it came to nature calls, Netherland airport took the cake. As I walked in, soothing ambient music filled the air, and I was surrounded by a gorgeous view of the city… wallpaper. I must give credit where credit is due, as their urinal design is a piece of excellent engineering. The contemporary design of this stall is elegant, and yet the ergonomics of the design provide more splash resistance. Talk about raising the bar.

Now with one panoramic view across all the walls, the entire experience felt eerily like doing a #1 onto someone’s roof, but there was something mysteriously soothing about taking care of nature… in nature. (Jeffrey should know, after that “Ferry” incident. 😀 )

Upon arriving in Rome, Italy, we decided to take the Leonardo Express, a train that connected the airport with the city. Wow, a city that succeeded in building aiport connection rails. I was definitely not in Seattle any more.

Then we took a walk through a good portion of the city and finally found the first place we’re staying, Il Rosario. A convent.

After a short nap for the jet lag, the night had descended and hunger had struck, so we randomly picked a place to dine. One thing I have to say… don’t take American service for granted. The Italian waiter was slow and unresponsive beyond belief! The worst Chinese restaurants in America seemed like Red Robins to this place when it comes to service.

After what seemed like an eternity, we got our orders, a tuna pasta…

and some Italian pizza…

Don’t be fooled by my photography. We were slightly disappointed, as the quality of this food was easily exceeded by Karen’s own cooking, thanks to her private tutor, Giada de Laurentiis on the Food Network. Maybe we hyped ourselves up too much for authentic Italian food, but this stuff was certainly… edible.

After that we headed back to the convent.

Our room was institutional and smaller than those found in most American hotels, but it was immaculate and came with a private bathroom. After Karen took a shower, we realized a design flaw…

The place had nothing for water containment, and the shower drain, partially blocked by the mat, was also partially cluttered. The result…

No, those weren’t shiny tiles. The reflection stemmed from the deluge that escaped the confinement of the bathroom and ventured through the doorcrack into our bedroom. I certainly wasn’t expecting to role-play a hotel maid on our first night in Italy.

After taking care of the floor, I opened my bag and … OH NO! We forgot to bring a critical item, the item so crucial that it would decimate the fabrics of our vacation. Which item was this? And how did we rectify this situation? Find out next time… on my blog. 😛

Home

Chirping Fireplace

In the past month, some flying fiends decided to take refuge in a corner of our roof above the fireplace with no access from the inside.  Fearful of the foul discharges that could transform my siding into a mural, the thought of staging a siege by denying access to their entrance and devoiding them of nourishment had crossed my mind, but my compassionate side suggested otherwise.  Thus we coinhabited with the unwelcomed guests.

Yesterday, a tapping sound and flapping of wings echoed through the acoustics of fireplace.  The mother must have submerged into the abyss of the fireplace fixture.  Without access to the space, I had no choice by to lay still watching TV while she was destined to rot in the confines of the wall gap for all eternity.

All that changed today at noon, however, when she bumped her way through the labyrinth of drywall and 2x4s and made her way to the exit and into our family room.

After arming myself with anti-bacterial device in the form of baseball gloves, we began a 15-minute game of tag going from the family room to the guest room to the living room.  Each time she was able to elude my dragon claws and glide away.  Finally, as the bird jetted its way out of the guest room, Karen executed the spiderman web maneuver and enveloped the rascal with a piece of towel.

So I carried the towel, along with the bird, to the world that she knew before the inadvertant self-captivity, and exposed her to the ray of sunshine she’s yearned to see.  As quickly as she entered, she wisped away with the waves of the wind.  She left no words of gratitude, just some excreta for us to clean up.

Family and Friends

Kenzie!

Sorry for waiting a whole trimester before posting these.  I wanted to share some shots of kingkongrahrahrah’s newest addition to the family, Kenzie:

Congrats for the all-natural birth of their new baby girl!

Home

Door Knock… at 3am!

Knock knock knock knock knock knock knock knock knock knock.  Click click.

In the middle of the night, a loud serious door knocks woke Karen and I up.  It was a constant pattern of around 10 knocks, followed by an attempt to open the door, followed by more knocks.  As I made my way toward the door, I attempted verbal communication with the unexpected guest, but the knocking just continued.  At that point, I decided to bring in professional help: 911.

While the police were on their way and I was on the phone with the operator, and Karen was able to see that the person had long, blond hair.  We had no idea whether this person was drunk, lost, or outright insane.  When the police arrived, I was able to eavesdrop on part of the conversation: her name was Emily and she was 17 years old.  She must have been drunk, and it was freezing outside (31 degrees)!  Well, at least it wasn’t some psycho who recently got released from some mental institution.

The police also asked her about a cut on her hand, and shortly afterwards, the paramedics arrived to tend to her wounds.  A police came to the door to explain the situation, and what I opened the door, I noticed what appeared to be an imagery from a R-rated horror movie…

The police explained that I should clean the door with a bleach solution and while we can press charges for trespassing, there’s no compelling reason to.  He also mentioned to be careful of the broken pieces of glass that she got her cuts from…

Finally after cleaning the mess up, we were able to return to bed.  It certainly was a peculiar event, but at least she’s in good hands now and return to her home, away from this cold, freezing night.

Tech

iPod and Civic

Over Christmas I bought Karen an iPod but quickly we realized one problem–we couldn’t play the music in the car! Short of purchasing a BMW with built-in iPod support, I explored the internet for various options and came up with three different solutions:

  1. Purchase a device that will broadcast a radio signal over FM for $50+, but it’s radio quality and is prone to static and interference.
  2. Use an FM wired modulator, which connects the FM signal directly to the line, but it’s still inferior to even a cassette adapter.
  3. Connect directly to the CD Changer port using a special device called Blitzsafe.

Of course, I opted for the third option.

I purchased the Blitzsafe Honda-To-iPod interface from LogJam, which came with an iPod connector that also charges the iPod, a nice feature if the iPod isn’t charged. Unfortunately taking my car apart wasn’t as straight forward as portrayed on the web. My model has a cup holder, which makes it harder than the regular model, so I carefully spent an hour and made no progress. Hoping not to damage my car, I thought about professional installation, but they all charged $50+ and has a wait of a week. That was too much–I need it NOW! So I met up with my friend John, a Honda Mechanic, and he handed me some diagrams of the lower panel. I came home, took the panel apart, plugged in the cable, and in less than an hour, had the iPod playing over the car stereo in CD quality.

In the end, it was more work than expected, but totally worth it!

Tech

Return of James the Photographer

After some professional photo gigs for Erick and Huey’s weddings, I took a leave of absence from the world of photography (I took a break from the world of blogging too, but that’s a different story).  Right before Christmas, I decided to vent out the photo bag when I discovered that my family room is filled with snow!

Oh wait… no… my camera just kept overexposing shots!  For the Fuzzy shots, I had to resort to using Full Manual mode, taking 427 tries to get 2 good shots!  I suppose to look on the bright side, we were planning to go to Europe, and finding this problem out in Italy would have been… most unpleasant.

So I headed where everyone else would when they encounter problems like this–the internet.  After a little research, it was apparent this is the precursor to the BLOG problem.  Wait?  BLOG?  No, BGLOD.  It stands for “Blinking Green Light Of Death”.  Apparently all Nikon D70’s shipped in the first 4 months of the product was prone to this issue, even if the camera is sitting untouched collecting dust in its original box.  There’s a recall service advisory for this, but with a catch–to qualify for the free service, the green light has to be blinking.  Unfortunately mine wasn’t blinking.  I had all the symptoms leading up to it, but not the problem itself.

Knowing that this will eventually deteriorate into BGLOD, I placed it back in its bag and went on our Christmas vacation with our old Canon S400.  Of course, having used a D70 for so long, this was like getting used to driving a BMW and then being forced to drive a Corolla (no disrespect to you Corolla owners…  I’m sure it’s a… um…  respectable car).  When I came back…  lo and behold!  Blinking Green Light of Death!  Yes!!!

I promptly sent it in for service, and that was two weeks ago.  I just got my camera back today and we’ll give it some time to see if everything is fixed.  However, for how much I paid for this thing, I expected a little more than a timebomb…  oh well.  At least it’s working now.

Sports

Overnight Bowling Star?

Bowling has been one of those sports that I have had mixed success. On Friday, my team had a morale event at the bowling alley where I showed off my exceptional skills by handily beating the other three players in my lane.  Now had I broken a hundred, it may have been a more satisfying experience, but I’ll take the win.  The second game I did better, scoring about 156.  However, in the third game I once again entered a (very) cold streak, but half way through the game, a coworker who was on a perpetual cold streak told me, “I’m now trying the spin.  It’s really fun… you should try it!”  Because I’m always up for a challenge (and because it would cover up my subpar start), I decided to take the plunge and learned “the bowling secret”.

Talk about night and day!  Not only did I fare better the second half, but before I left, I barely missed getting a turkey by getting “X X 9/” !  Just to check that it’s not a fluke, the next day Kari, Tim, Karen and myself went bowling, and using only spin shots, I played three games and never a game below 110.  Ok, I better stop before this starts sounding like an infomercial.  “If you call in the next 10 minutes, not only will I share this secret, but I’ll give you a free pair of bowling shoes, absolutely free…”

The game of bowling would never be the same again.  Anyone up for bowling?  😉

General

Who Won The Apprentice Tonight?

(warning: spoilers below)

Up to this point, Randal had been a class-act.  In all episodes, it seemed like Randal spoke highly of his peers, was full of integrity, and was full of heart.  He also seemed genuinely founded in his faith, making references to his church.  So tonight, when Trump asked him which project he would like to head, Karen and I fully anticipated him shying away from the Casino.  Wrong.  He fully embraced grandeur of Atlantic City, taking us by surprise.

However, it wasn’t until the final 5 minutes of the 2-hour finale that he had gone from one of my most respected candidate to the least respected.  Half way into the episode, Karen already suspected that Trump will hire both, especially when he foreshadowed it when they chose different projects.  So when Trump seeked Randal’s opinion on Rebecca’s hiring, I thought “here we go”.  Based on his past relationship with Rebecca, I fully expected the response to be, “You know, Mr. Trump, I’ve worked with Rebecca and she’s smart and capable. She will be a great asset to your organization.  I highly recommend her.”  As you know, the episode unfolded with Randal denying Rebecca’s employment by requesting to be the sole Apprentice, and Trump respected his wishes.  Unbelievable.  I understand that Randal wants tonight to be his night, but he has already been declared the winner!  It’s as if Randal grew horns and fangs and transformed into an evil grinch overnight!  I had no choice but to roll my eyes and sigh in disgust.

Who are you?  Where’s Randal and what did you do with him?!?