Tag Archives: travel

It’s the Heat, AND the Humidity

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We siesta’d through the heat of the afternoon, then went out for a most pleasant dinner at a little hole-in-the wall place. It was the most relaxed meal we’ve had here yet, and prices were reasonable. The place had about eight tables but it was early when we got there and at first we had the place to ourselves.

The food was quite good (you may be catching on by now that the eating is good in these parts), and once again we got a little adventurous with one order; we got ricotta-stuffed pasta with cuttlefish ink sauce. (This was partly due to the inspriation of my Cuttlefish Man post a while back.) That dish was merely good rather than great, but visually striking, as the sauce was completely, opaquely, black.

Earlier in the day we went to check out the old Greek theater (right next to the slightly-less-old Roman Theatre), which was all right, but nothing like the photos in the books and on posters. The difference is that the old greek theater is still used for productions, so much of the seating area has wooden benches on it to protect the stone, and there are modern lighting towers and whatnot directed at the very modern set on stage. Nearby there were some cool caves — literally cool, which was a welcome respite from the heat of the day.

We tromped back to the hostel after that, stopping for sorbet on the way. It was good but I was tempted to pour the ice concoction on my head.

Thanks!

Another Big Day

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Today I flirted a bit with a pretty girl, and I showered. Nearly missed the bus, saw some old stuff, ate some good food. Sicily, man, Sicily. It’s easy to get used to being here.

Thanks!

A Big Day

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It was a busy morning, rushing about (well, as well as I was able) getting a few last things done before joining forces with fuego for our flight to Catania, nestled at the foot of Mount Etna. The flight was simple enough, and we hit the ground on time and in good shape. Standing on the tarmac I looked over at the volcano, relatively quiet for a few years now (due?). The air was heavy, shadows softer, not the hard-edged briittle clarity of light I had experienced in Southern Spain. It was certianly plenty warm standing on the airport tarmac, however.

One quick Bankomat score later, we set out to find a place to sleep. The first stop on our quest was the train station, where after some wandering around we found the nicely-camoflaged tourist info center, where they were not able to help us much. A couple of vague suggestions and markings on a frightfully inaccurate map, and it was back into the city proper for us. We were trying to get to one of the main Plazas in town, but where the signs said the busses went seemed to have little relation to where the drivers planned to go. Each driver had his own theories about which of other busses would take us there.

Meanwhile, there was a guy there offering to drive us to the piazza for 10 Euros. Then eight, then seven. “No, that’s OK, we’ll just take the bus.” Finally he gave up. Not log after that we gave up as well, and decided just to walk. The driver chased us down. “Five Euros!” he said, and we relented. We followed him to his car, which was quite obviously not a licensed taxi of any sort. We piled in and while I tried to figure out how to close my door with no handle or anything to pull on, our driver set to work starting the car. For a while I thought we would be walking after all, but he got the thing going, made it a few feet before it died again (my door still open), got it going again and off we went, with me managing to pull the door shut just in time as we joined the thousands of other certifiably insane people on the roads of Catania.

I’m sure you’ve heard about traffic in this part of the world, so I won’t go into detail, except that there was a road with one lane devoted to busses moving in one direction and motorcycles moving the other. You get the picture.

Our private driver dropped us off at a Hostel we had already called, only to find there was no room. There was some confusion, however, that led to us asking again to discover that they did have beds after all. So that worked out well. “I’ve got one dorm that’s almost empty,” the friendly Hostel girl said, but it’s by the bar. It can be loud at night. I assured her (and myself) that we could handle it. There was even a chance we’d be the ones at the bar making noise.

Then we were off to explore the city, and come to understand just how bad our map is. It didn’t help that the guide book mentioned places but street, cross-streets and other landmarks didn’t show on the guide book map or the official tourist map.

Still, in a city like this one, serendipity is the rule. With a single turn you can find yourself in another, unexpected world. It was when we gave up trying to find the Friggatoria that we made our turn.

The street we walked down was quiet, swept but somewhat run-down. The bhildings became more ornate above the ground floor, and the overall feeling was no one of decay but of age, Cats — mangy, awful-looking things — lounged in abandoned doorways. In other doorways we passed older woman, all of them big, most smoking, watching us as we wandered down the street.

“I know what they’re selling,” I told my brother, “but they sure don’t make it look appealing.” Scattered among the fat old whores were transvestites, equally corpulent, equally tattered and dissolute. . No one spoke to us, but one ot them smiled my way when I said hello to her little dog, which was barking at us. Other than a few more energetic cats, wer ere the only ones moving in that narrow street. On side streets younger men moved, but this street was left to its particular trade. Although the street was long, it did not go through, and it was only after a few twists and turns that we found our way back onto a main street.

Catania has been a busy port for a long time, and I suppose that this street or one like it has been around since Greek times or even earlier. I think some of the whores themselves have been around that long.

“I wonder what that place is like at night,” fuego said, echoing my own thoughts.

We made our way back toward home, stopping for a snack along the way. We got our little fast-food pizzas to go and enjoyed the cool evening relaxiing on a bench in a little park. Around us groups of old men gathered, for all the world like punk-ass kids wasting their time hanging out together, although then we call them gangs and are afraid. (Considering where we were, ‘mob’ might be a more appropriate term in this case.) I commented to fuego, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen this many men just hanging out, withough any alcohol.”

We relazed there for some time before completing our journey back to the hostel to redeem our two-for-one drink coupons at the attached bar. We lingered there for a good long time as well, and as we sat there they began to put the bar into it’s night configuration, which meant filling the entire little piazza with folding tables and chairs. They were ready to have a lot of customers. My confidence that we would be able to tolerate the noise was further eroded when I noticed the big speaker in the window directly below mine. fuego and I began to wonder just how late the bar would be open. Clearly there was only one possible course of action. We took naps.

At nine p.m. when we reemerged into the world, it was still early for most places. The residue of the fish market had been scrubbed away and we had read that some of the restaurants right there had good seafood at a reasonable price. We ended up at a table separated by a rattan curtain from a now (mostly) quiet fish-chopping area, being served by a guy who spoke next to no English, and in the end having no idea whatsoever what we would be getting (except that there would be five of something. Five of what, I had no idea, but the man had been very careful to make sure we wanted five of them.

Five sea urchins, it turned out. Five spiky hemispheres, with trace elements of what I assumed to be food inside. The girl who seemed to be somewhat in charge, and who spoke very good English, gave me instructions when I asked. Squeeze in some lemon, use the little spoon to scoop out the urchin gonads, and eat the trace amounts of goo.

Meanwhile, a host of little dishes began to arrive, all sea delicacies, some of which I could identify and others I couldn’t. The octopus was tender, the calamari was delicious, the eel was mighty tasty, the shrimp/something else dish was excellent, and the tiny clams were far more work to eat than they were worth. Of course, there were also fish dishes. It all added up to a mighty fine antepasto. Then came the pasto. The second dish was mighty damn tasty, but it was just too much. We passed on desert, at which point the girl who spoke English gave us a stern lecture about the importance of a sorbet after a meal — especially fish. “But, it’s up to you,” she finished, in a voice that obviously meant instead, “but, it’s your funeral.” The bill for the evening was quite reasonable, considering what we got.

It was pushing eleven when we got back to the hostel, and things were getting started at the bar. We lingered for one drink (it was too late to redeem our second two-for-one coupon, alas), but while we sat there the piazza filled completely and customers were being turned away. The noise was the usual large-crown murmer, however, and the music wasn’t that loud, so when fatigue caught up I went inside and wrote the first part of this episode and went to sleep.

In fact, I wish the bar had stayed open all night, because when it closed two of the guys staying in our room came in, wasted, and listening to one struggling to snore, breathing with his throat, wetly and irregularly, I thought he might be on the verge of throwing up. Finally he settled into a more regular snore, and after a while even that couldn’t keep me awake.

That, my dear readers, is the condensed version of day one of the Seeger Brother’s Tour of Sicily. Hopefully some of the other days will be less eventful. I have work to do.

Thanks!

Sicily!

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Not sure how updates in these parts are going to go, but tomorrow I’m heading south, to test the good food and fine life in the heart of the Mediterranean. Hopefully somewhere down there I can get my writer’s groove back.

Thanks!

Welcome to Eureka (rhymes with Sligo)

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You can say what you want about Denny’s, but it’s got one thing going for it: No door locks. I was wandering the blustery rustic streets of Eureka, and there was just one thing on my mind. Breakfast. I need breakfast the way a mole rat needs fur. (You see? would I have written that if I was not loopy with hunger and uncaffeinated?)

The historic downtown district has been prettied up for the tourists, and I was confident that I would find a nice little café where I could drink a nice cup of tea. The cold rain stung my face as I walked, and I was thankful for my beard. Not too far along I found a place. Closed. I passed some nice-looking places, but they all opened later. Ooooo-kay. Starting to get hungry. Ahead I saw a bagel place. Perfect! It turns out they are open six days a week, but not on Tuesdays. Tuesdays! Around a corner and another block toward the bay was a promising sign. Sorry, closed, out of business, thanks for your support.

So, Denny’s, for almost-right eggs over easy and toast oozing butter. Delicious!

Thanks!

A Dark and Stormy Night

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The design of this little hotel is interesting. The ground floor is for the cars, and the motel above is turned inside-out, with the doors opening onto a central court, lit by skylights. The rafters over the court are covered with spikes to convince our feathered friends that what would otherwise be an ideal nesting place is off-limits. The building is older, with those little signs of decay that are hard to pinpoint but add up to a feeling that of a place that wasn’t that well-built to start with and has seen better days.

I chose to stay in, and I spent the evening reading and eating snack food. The wind whipped around the building and drummed on the roof. It was downright chilly, so I turned on the heater—one of those gas-fired wall units, about five feet high, the enamel darkened near the top from years of use, the kind that emits carbon monoxide if it’s not adjusted properly. I read until I started nodding off, then turned out the light and fell quickly to sleep.

Quickly, but not for long. I awoke to a series of low, resonant clanging sounds noises coming from the heater. They slowed down over the next couple of minutes and eventually stopped. The metal of the heater was contracting, I guessed, after the thermostat had reached temperature and shut it off. I listened to the rain come in squalls, fierce yet brief, hammering the roof and the tin chimney of my heater. The storm was playing the metal pipe like a musical instrument—no, a band, with percussion and woodwinds. Heavy drops rattled and pinged off the metal while the wind resonated in the pipe with low moans and higher whistles. The whole was punctuated by the periodic smack from the bathroom as the vent louvers opened and slapped back closed with the shifting winds.

I lay in the darkness, having just finished one Pulitzer prize-winning novel and started another, and thought of graceful and floral ways to describe the night. This morning I can’t remember any of them. They sure seemed good at the time, though.

Twice more last night I awoke to the clunk-clunk-clunk of the heater as it expanded or contracted. By the numbers, it was not a great night of sleep, but this morning I feel refreshed, perhaps because I decided not to drive today. That’s right, I’ll be returning to the same place tonight.

Thanks!

Delayed by Weather

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The Weather Channel is calling the roads around here “a big mess”, so I’m going to take time out from driving and catch up on some writing. Unfortunately, TWC is also calling for dangerous surf and “rough bar conditions”. I’d better leave the laptop in my room.

Thanks!

Last Places: A Journey in the North

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It is easy to compare Millman to Bill Bryson; both writers travel the back roads and write with humor and grace about what they find there. Although, that’s not entirely accurate, as Millman prefers places with no roads at all. He is drawn to the remote, almost uninhabitable outposts at the rim of the human sphere, the last places. In Last Places he is following (roughly) the migration of the Vikings from Europe, hopping from island to island across the North Sea.

As he travels he meets people. He observes early on that when travelers meet people they know it is only a temporary thing, that they will soon part ways and never meet again. This allows an easy camaraderie, a sharing of intimate knowledge that one would never tell a person you will meet again. I wrote somewhere that when travelers meet they become episodes in the other’s life, chapters in a story with no clear beginning or end. Perhaps those chapters will eventually build into something larger, a structure strong enough to bear themes or (heavier yet) a story.

Millman has many such encounters as he tramps between fjords across lichen-covered rocks. The people he meets have stories and myths to tell, and Millman peppers his accounts with retellings of local legends and folklore. The stories are retold with humor (for they are funny), but with no trace of new-world condescension. When one man points out a rock formation that used to be his grandmother’s older sister, the story is true to Millman in a deeper sense than that of verifiable fact. The stories are an integral part of the last places and the people who live there.

Of course, the noise and clutter of technological life reaches even up there, and the result, to Millman’s mind, is not pretty. Many small towns were depopulated in the 1960’s, their residents relocated by government fiat into larger towns where they could provide labor for the growing commercial fishing fleets and where government provision of social services would be simpler. Lost was the point that the people being relocated weren’t terribly interested in receiving those services. In his travels he meets families who live entirely off the meat of seals; they can no longer sell the pelts because of boycotts, and so they feed them to their dogs. (One such man wrote to a famous movie star explaining the situation, but never got a response. He figured she probably was illiterate.) Millman is watching the death of not one but many remote cultures, and he doesn’t much like what is replacing it. Nuug, Greenland sounds like a really awful place.

Millman is a very good writer. His descriptions often use words that are unconventional but surprisingly apt. It took me a while to put my finger on it, but it is similar at times to the serendipitous word choices made by my Czech friends when speaking English, unconventional connections that reveal unexpected images. Millman speaks Icelandic and Greenlandic and perhaps other languages as well, and I wonder if knowing those tongues has expanded his use of English as well. That’s not to say that Millman’s word use is accidental — there are times that same unusual word or image will come back later, an echo of its previous use, connecting distant parts of the story. I wanna do that.

Traveling, he says at one point, is about delaying getting to your destination as long as possible. (I’d like to quote exactly, but there’s no way I’ll find that remark now.) When you reach your destination there is no mystery left, no anticipation. In this I think we are kindred spirits, he and I, although he is not a big fan of travel by automobile. Each of us is looking for something, though. It’s not a place, yet it can be found by traveling. It is a moment that we seek, a brief tranquility when the noise is gone and the clutter and jumble are forgotten, when something resembling clarity takes its place. It is the time when it would be OK if a Polar Bear rose up from the misty lake and ate you.

 

Note: if you use the above link to buy this book (or a Kindle, or a new car), I get a kickback.

Thanks!

Keyless in Colville

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I sit right now in the parking for Hearth & Home in Colville, WA. I am watching a couple of guys take my car’s passenger door apart. They are looking for a number — a secret number they can use to manufacture a new key for me. At the moment, you see, I have no key.

Just where did that key go? There’s no telling. The number of places it could have gone seems limited; there isn’t much that I did between having the key and not. Not having it has proven to be a more or less permanent situation, however. Fortunately my key is an old-fashioned low-tech one without chips and stuff inside, so given the correct secret code a replacement can be manufactured. But wither the code? Mazda would not give out the code over the phone (a pretty reasonable policy, really), but rumor had it that the code was stamped on the lock cylinder in the passenger door.

The guys from The Key Place are most friendly and helpful. Chalk it up to the small-town vibe (I have honestly not met anyone in this town who is not friendly and helpful), but if you’re going to be stuck and in need of less-than-routine service, this is a good place to do it.

* * *

On the road again, and everything’s fine. I now have not one but three keys.

Thanks!

Island Bar and Grill

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Well, what can I say? I’ve driven more than a thousand miles and now I’m in a ritzy part of Seattle. I’ve come here because a guy I traveled with for a while in Spain reputedly throws a heck of a St. Pat’s bash, and he’s a good guy to boot. It’ll be good to say hello. The only thing is, I’m not really feeling that social right now — certainly not social enough to go to a party where I only know the host.

Sure, sure, I know it’ll be fun once I get there. I’ll meet new people and start each sentence with “In the Czech Republic…” and people will be at least mildly interested in my adventures. Really there’s no down side. That’s what I keep telling myself, anyway.

*   *   *

The sun set, the sun rose, and I’m still in the hotel room. I got very, very close to the party, right in the neighborhood even, but just couldn’t bring myself to do it. Part of it was that I had just gotten back on track with my main project and the scene was building well. The other part was an image of me sitting around as an observer but without the usual antisocial shield of a laptop or a book. I just wasn’t up for it.

Instead I slinked (slunk?) back to the hotel and holed up. I still didn’t get much done, as I was too busy being angry at myself for being a loser and bailing on the party. I think it’s time to drive somewhere.

Thanks!

Worst Nightmare

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For those of you who believe in karma, jinxes, and the like, you might find corroboration as you read about my trip from Dallas to Denver. Hours ago, while sitting at the terminal in Frankfurt, I wrote about how air travel is generally pretty routine these days. It took the Hand of Fate a little time to find me, but somewhere over Greenland the pilot made an announcement that at the time seemed completely irrelevant: Our plane would be arriving in Dallas early. Since I had a very long layover in Dallas anyway, getting there early just meant waiting in an airport rather than sitting on a plane.

By the time we got there, I was very enthusiastic about the prospect of getting off the plane. I was sitting next to a toothless old guy from Bombay, which could definitely have been a lot worse. (For the record, Lufthansa’s veggie meals smelled pretty good, and Hindus can drink beer.) The infant two seats over was crying during boarding, but then clammed up for the entire flight. Still, ten hours is a long time to spend in any chair. Off the plane and through immigration quickly and over to the next terminal (with the help of one security guy who went way out of his way to direct me to Frontier checkin), I was in time to hop on an earlier flight from Dallas to Denver. It meant a longer layover in Denver, but it’s always better to grab the earlier flight if you can. As the guy checking me in said, “You never know.”

No, you never do. I settled into 16F, and it looked like I’d have the row to myself. Excellent! Room to spread out!

Just before departure time, a happy-go-lucky guy came bumping down the aisle and asked the attendant, “where’s 16A?” The blonde in 16B looked up in disappointment; she was already spreading out in her row. I got the feeling she was an airline employee of some sort. Much to her relief, he did not sit in 16A, but chose 16D, on my side of the aisle instead. He sat heavily and I realized just how drunk he was. He looked over at me and said, “Dude, I’m just going to fuckin’ apologize right now. I’m fuckin’ wasted. Am I saying fuck too much? This is like your worst fuckiin’ nightmare, isn’t it?”

It wasn’t… yet.

He talked at me for a bit. It turns out he’s a rancher from Wyoming who supplies horses to rodeos. His problem these days, he says, is that his horses are too mean for the new generation of cowboys. He paused at one point to say, “Are we off the ground yet? Good. I can’t get arrested and thrown off the plane. I’m just this side of alcohol poisoning.” Throughout our discussion (he was just as interested in me as he was in telling me about himself), he said, “Just remember the code word. ‘shut the fuck up motherfucker.’ I can’t believe you haven’t used it yet.” The thing was, I was a bit curious about raising horses for rodeo. Eventually, however, I did invoke the code word and a he lapsed into silence. The attendant comped him free access to the directTV broadcast on the screen in front of him, and he lapsed into semi-consciousness.

We were on the ground here in Denver, taxiing to the gate, when he puked. He pulled out the air sick bag in front of him and filled it, and then some. Then he had trouble sealing it up. The blonde across the aisle and I offered supplemental barf bags at the same time. “Double-bag it,” the blonde said helpfully, but our cowboy just didn’t have the motor skills. He looked over at me.

“Almost made it,” I said, as the fasten seat belts sign turned off.

“Almost,” he agreed, then rose from his seat and fled in shame.

Thanks!

So very, very tired

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Air travel is pretty routine these days, despite the best efforts of the security folks to make us feel safer by inconveniencing us more and more. (It was Buggy who pointed out to me that if a terrorist wanted to end all air traffic and cripple the economy of the developed nations, all he would need to do is smuggle a bomb up his butt and get caught. The resulting security checks would end all passenger traffic.) So, while standing in line to get patted down and have a metal detector run over my body in the Frankfurt airport I thought of ways to get dangerous substances past. It still strikes me as frightfully easy.

But other than that air travel is an easy process — you wait around in large building, when instructed you join a few hundred of your (now) closest friends in an aluminum cylinder,

*** We interrupt this blog entry to stand in a new line for a while, to be allowed to come back and sit where I was before, with an extra form to fill out. The United States government promises that the form will be destroyed upon the arrival of my flight in the US. ***

… aluminum cylinder, where we sit for a period of time. There is some noise and some motion; those with windows can see things change outside, and then the noise goes away and we all file out of the cylinder (“deplane” — when we got on, were we “planing?”) and we discover that we are in a building much like the first, but the advertising is in a different language. That, in a nutshell, is modern air travel.

The waiting area I’m in right now is more comfortable than most, and the TV appears to be showing the news right now. There are pictures of a passenger airliner in flames; the tail sticking up from the surrounding burning foliage is the only indication of what it used to be. No one around me seems to connect that flaming aluminum cylinder with the one we will be packing into soon. Then again, I don’t appear to, either.

This is the time of hope and fear, as we all size each other up, and wonder who’s going to get stuck next to the crazy lady whose eyes point different directions and who wants to talk to everyone (about what is not entirely clear), or who’s going to have the seat in front of the hyperactive five-year-old and feel the thump-thum-thump of his little sneakers for ten hours, even while trying to tune out his over-loud complaining. Then there is the pretty girl in the purple sweater. Will she be seated in 20B? The vast majority of passengers, however, are like me, just interchangeable faces, people who are in Frankfurt and would rather be in Dallas. At least, I hope I’m in that group.

What does any of this have to do with the title for this episode? Well, not much. But I am tired. It’s my defining characteristic right now. The leg of my trip from Prague to Frankfurt was typical in every way, but there was a point where I rose out of deep snooze to some bouncing and jouncing. “Sweet,” I thought. “Already landing.” No such luck; we were taking off.

Thanks!

My lucky day!

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These things I know:

I will be in Dallas on March 7th. I intend to go straight from there to San Jose. There’s a Polkacide concert on the 10th in Oakland that I don’t want to miss. Jet lag and punk polka! Yowza! I need to be back in Dallas on April… um… 8th, I think. Road Trip Day will indeed be celebrated on the road.

I will be in Catania, Sicily, on June 19th.
I leave from Catania, Sicily on June 26th.

I missed out on the 50-cent round trip fare from Prague to Sicily and had to settle for the $5 rate. Of course, after all the airport taxes and other crap were piled on, the tickets ended up costing quite a bit more than that, but still it was just too cheap to pass up. I’m crossing my fingers that Mt. Etna erupts while I’m in the neighborhood (current status is orange, whatever that means). Syracuse is not far, and I’d love to hear other suggestions for places to visit as well.

When booking the flight to Dallas, I looked at the price, decided I could handle it, and went on to make the reservation. On the next page a notification came up. “This is your lucky day! We found a lower fare for that flight!” The amount saved: almost exactly what the tickets to Sicily ended up costing with all the fees and stuff. My lucky day, indeed.

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Thanks!

Travel Plans

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I’ve been talking for quite some time about spending some time in the western hemisphere. This morning, full of resolve once again to sit down and just book the dang tickets, I dialed in the travel Web sites and tried to piece together an itinerary. An hour later I was staring dumbly at the screen, having found a very good London-New York flight, but to and from the wrong airport in London to hook up with the cheap european airlines. Somehow it seems wrong to spend more to go between airports in London than it does to go from Prague (or, cheaper yet, Brno) to London.

That’s about when the fizzy sound started coming out my ears and my eyes began to scan deep discounts to Odessa, Calcutta and Bejing. Once again I failed to book my tickets. I’ll make another go of it later. At least I’ve figured out the requirements:

1) Start in Prague in the early Marchish time frame (unless substantial savings can be realized at another time).
2) Long layovers should be in places I can meet up with people.
3) Multi-day layovers acceptable (and even good) but I won’t be renewing my driver’s license until I get to California, so renting a car is not an option.
4) Through some conveyance, I must end up in Cupertino.

5) Then follows a less structured period of driving around. I would like to visit (not necessarily in this order) western Washington, Colville (rhymes with smallville), Bozeman, the Sacramento environs, Scotts Valley, San Diego, and various spots in New Mexico. Weather may alter the list. Alaska, once again, will have to wait.
5a) I suppose I should warn some of those people that I’ll be in the neighborhood.
5b) The last time I drove around the continent for “about 3 weeks” it took more than seven months. I don’t see that happening this time; I’ll be paying rent over here the whole time.

6) Leave from Albuquerque.
7) Long layovers etc (see above), although now I will be able to drive a car legally.
8) Return to Prague late Marchish/early Aprilish. Road Trip Day on the road? It might work.

It seems there are (at least) two ways to travel. Book tickets to fit specific requirements, which is what I’ve been trying to do – although I suppose if my requirements were more specific things would be much easier. Too many choices. Alternately you can just say, “what the hell, I’ll go there”. Just pick some place that sounds cool, and go when the airline tells you you can do it on the cheap. You have to commit fairly long in advance, but it is possible to do what I have dubbed “impulse planning” – you read a list, make a choice, and off you go.

Anyone want to meet up with me in Bali?

Thanks!

Eddie Rockets

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If ever there were an antithesis of an Irish pub, this is it. Yet for reasons purely logistical here I sit, surrounded by chrome and red and white vinyl, brightly lit by halogens and fluorescents, listing to calculatedly cheery music. The tea has an odd taste to it; I may be forced to switch to Coca Cola (beer only served with a substantial meal, and it looks like the only beer is something modeled on American Swill Beer).

All right, Johnny Cash just came on, so there’s one redeeming facet of this place.

Thanks!