I’m staying sane between school and work by planning our vacation to Italy. One of the cities we’re staying in is Rome. But, Mr. B’s already been to Rome and I’ve seen it so many times on tv I might as well have been there, so I was looking for some place really special to stay and have an “authentic” Roman experience, as the white people say.
In the beginning of the world, goes the creation story of the Tohono O’odham people of southern Arizona, the First Born arose out of the darkness and created all the plants and the animals. But the plants and the animals didn’t like being in the darkness, so they begged the First Born to create something so they could all see how the other beings lived, and the First Born created the sun.
And then the First Born hightailed it the hell out of there, because people are assholes and don’t really care how other people live. They just want to live better than other people.
New Orleans is amazingly beautiful for an American city and has an very distinct energy around Halloween.
But this is not that post yet.
This is the post about how my dad called me at five in the morning on Sunday to tell me that the world is ending, every flight in and out of the Northeast is getting cancelled, and we are going to die in an airplane.
I am an enormous reader of The Morning News. They have some of the best links and stories online in English today. Sometime last year, they really started pushing this guy Rosencrans Baldwin’s book, Paris, I Love You, but You’re Bringing Me Down, and I was like, who is this dude and his long name and why is he all over my sidebars? before I realized he was the editor of the site.
I’ve been wanting to read it since February, but for some reason I wasn’t in the mood. I was just finishing up Scotland at the time, so I didn’t want to read any travelougues by people who were funnier about them than me. And I’d heard this book was funny. Finally, sometime about three weeks ago I was out of things to read, and Petya mentioned that she’d read this book and liked, and that was enough to push me over the edge.
I’ve figured out the secret to living in Philadelphia. I’m ok with it, as long as I can be outside Philadelphia at least 60% of the time. This time, Mr. B and I were going to go to Japan, but we’re still waiting on Mr. B’s passport, so international travel was out. Which is a shame, because international travel is what I live for.
So, we decided to go to Portland and Seattle, because they’re pretty much as close as you can get to Japan without being arrested by federal agents. Also the sushi’s not bad.
Last time we went to the left coast, we went to California, and it was amazing (video), so we had high expectations. Seattle and Portland did not disappoint. There is something different about the Northwest that makes it feel like it’s not really part of America. It feels fresher, cleaner, and newer.
It wasn’t as gRReat of a vacation as Scotland, but it was a vacation, and it was beautiful.
Seattle is classy, sophisticated, and nautical. Portland is just weird and communist. Mr. Rainier is one of the best things about America.
It was a good trip.
Here are my favorite photos:
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