T̶w̶o̶ One p̶e̶r̶p̶e̶t̶u̶a̶l̶ ̶e̶x̶p̶a̶t̶s̶ immigrant settling into home country number five.
I have a thing for places whose names start with Å. Take Å, for example, which we visited last year. When I read about a group of islands off of Finland called Åland, I knew I had to go there, too. I can tell you’re impressed with my sophisticated decision-making process. Åland is a group … Read more
Whenever we visit a city, Scott and I both instinctively size it up based on whether we would want to live there someday. Stockholm gets a big “yes” from both of us. It’s big, beautiful, and full of stuff to see, do, and eat. Guess I have a thing for cities built on islands. The … Read more
Still having fun in Finland. The middle tap dispenses something called “Long Drink”. I didn’t try it. We spent an evening at Vaakahuoneen Paviljonki watching the Siberian Teachers, a jazz band. Not sure where they’re from. Turku’s castle proved a nice place to hide out from the sun. When walking down the street in Turku, … Read more
Greetings from Tallinn. We’ve only been here a few hours, but already we are feeling butterflies in our stomachs for this insanely adorable city. The mixture of extremely-well-preserved medieval and recently-updated buildings is irresistible, despite the fact that the place is teeming with tourists.
After months of turmoil, my new computer has arrived. It’s a shiny new MacBook. I’ve gone back to my roots – no more Windows for me! In the process of migration, I have managed once again to lose track of which emails belong in my “reply to” folder. If you have written to me recently … Read more
Every visit it’s the same… not enough meals in the day to eat everything I want to in New York. After briefly considering adding a 4th and 5th meal to my days, I resign myself to the fact that I can’t go to all my old favorites and try lots of new places all in … Read more
Germany loves reality television, especially when it has to do with houses or food. I can’t bring myself to watch most of it (except for when it has to do with singing – those shows are pure awesome), but recently Headbang got us interested in a show called Mein Restaurant. The premise is simple – five couples each get to open a restaurant in their hometown (Berlin, Munich, Cologne, Hamburg, and Leipzig) based on a concept they have developed. Once the restaurants are up and running, they get eliminated one by one, until only the winner restaurant is left. Upon each elimination, the losing couple has 15 minutes to clear out and close down… forever (imagine that said by a spooky voiceover guy).
Just slapping this up here for posterity. You’ve already heard about the kilos of mozzarella balls I scarfed down in the south, but surprisingly there was also room in my belly for other food, too, as we made our way up and down the peninsula. Here’s a little taste: Pumpkin gnocchi with roquefort sauce and … Read more
Our trip to Norway was 10 days long, and we split our time between its cities, fjords, and islands as we made our way up and down this comically long, skinny country. We visited Norway’s three largest cities, all of which felt tiny and adorable compared to, say, Munich (which feels tiny and adorable compared to, say, Berlin or New York). Much like Swiss cities, they were all very clean and safe, and full of friendly yet reserved folks who tended to speak English better than I did.
After Rome, we rented a car and headed north to Niki de Saint Phalle’s Tarot Garden (a definite highlight) and then continued on to Tuscany. While I’d been to Siena and Florence before, this was actually my first time out into the small hill towns of Tuscany. Now that I’ve had a taste, I can’t … Read more