Ramblin Wreck

quote:

---

God bless America and what’s left of the free world. We take for granted how good we have it here, especially compared to most of the world.

---

We recently stayed at a nice hotel in Athens, Greece and they had a sign above the toilet in English that stated “Do not throw paper towels in the toilet”. I was confused since there were no paper towels in the bathroom, only toilet paper. I asked to confirm, they meant not to flush toilet paper. Public toilets in those countries didn’t have seats from my experience, just an open bowl or hole.

quote:

---

that is not what that map shows. This is a map of where you can or cannot flush TP. Not if it is used or not.

---

Well that is why I stated what the map was in the text.

How would you rank these categories for choosing a vacation? Mine are ranked as these are listed.

1. Scenery
2. Historical Significance
3. Entertainment / Relaxation
4. Immersing yourself in a different culture

quote:

---

With the positions I have, I'm not as excited to look at it for September as in previous months. I believe I lost a little of it back to the house.

---

I’m also under this month at the Charles Schwab Casino. The withdraw from the winnings to cover food, drinks and other expenses didn’t help.

quote:

---

Going to Europe today is like going to the Middle East

---

It depends on where you go. I saw about the same number of women in hijabs in Italy as I do here in Birmingham. Not many. Countries and areas in Europe are as different as Alabama is to New York.

quote:

---

I think it’s impractical to not redesign our entire infrastructure around public transportation.

---

I tend to agree, most people here do not live in urban areas. Take for example the bullet trains in Italy. You can go from Rome to Milan in about 3 hours. So you average about 100 miles an hour. If you live there and take the train to visit friends, you probably can easily get on a bus or local train once you reach your destination. Most people live in suburbs here where there is no public transportation. I live in Birmingham and if I wanted to visit friends in Baton Rouge on a bullet train, it probably wouldn’t average 100 mph since the route would be laid out to pick up more places not in a shortest line distance. There also isn’t a bus to take me from the suburb I live in to where a downtown station would be. Once I got to Baton Rouge, I would have to arrange transportation to Prairieville where my friends live. It is a 400 mile drive, so at best let’s say it is a 5 hour train ride. You can add at least 45 minutes on either end of waiting on Ubers and driving. It is a 6 hour drive to Baton Rouge, so no time saved. There wouldn’t be any significant savings on train fare + Ubers. I would also have less flexibility without a car during the trip. If my wife chooses to also go, the cost gets less competitive for the train. The scenario is the same for most cities, even large ones when people live in suburbs.

quote:

---

look for some wwii Italian stuff.. thx. wwiic

---

I was disappointed that I didn’t see old coins, old books, or any type of antiques or artifacts for sale. You see low priced old Roman and Greek coins for sale all over EBay. There was one coin shop I saw in Athens but you had to have an appointment to go in. The lack of those types of items makes me even more doubt of the authenticity of stuff you see on EBay. My son told me that the laws there are very strict on selling that stuff and most of what you see here was brought over prior to the laws being enacted.

As far as WWII, I did have a tour guide point out the only bridge in Florence that the Italians didn’t blow up to keep the Americans out. The shops on it use to be where they slaughtered cows and skinned them to make leather. The guide said they would the throw the carcasses in the river below. I would think historically most cities had a bit of an odor issue.

quote:

---

Take it with a grain of salt, because this is utter bullshite.

---

I’m describing what I did not see and I was there five days in the heart of the city. They may have all been gay but you couldn’t tell by appearance. Not a single rainbow flag was visible either. It didn’t seem to be an agenda. Now Athens was a bit strange in that regard. The same can be said about appearances but every souvenir store had a rack of penis shaped stuff; penis bottle openers of all sizes that appeared to serve a dual purpose, decks of cards with ancient Greek looking pictures of dudes getting it on, beanie baby looking penises, etc. I never saw anyone buying that stuff but it was every where in Athens.

quote:

---

Bruh, I’m surprised you didn’t mention that every fountain, piazza, historical site is packed with international tourists that couldn’t give two shites about the significance of what they are looking at and are only there for the perfectly staged vanity shots “for the ‘gram.”

---

There were a lot of those. I could have also mentioned that there seemed to be about a million tourist there, which surprised me being this late in September. I described to my family that walking through the Vatican Museum / Sistine Chapel was like the entire crowd at “name an SEC stadium” trying to exit out of a single gate. We stopped by Trevi Fountain around midnight and you couldn’t hardly get close to it. I can’t imagine how crowded it is in the summer there.

quote:

---

Italy’s percentage is a little higher than the European average, but air conditioning is still hit or miss across much of Europe.

---

Ductless AC units were very common on the apartment buildings. The shops were similar to the ones in the US with AC’s blasting, especially the clothing stores and high end shops. My experience didn’t match the stuff I was reading on here about the UK. Even in Athens the stores were like many in the US with the doors staying open and AC blasting. They didn’t seem concerned about their carbon footprint.