7. July 2010 by Samldanach.

Being able to imagine yourself being successful isn’t enough to make it so, but being unable to imagine it is a genuine handicap. –Theresa Nielsen Hayden

A bend in the road is not the end of the road… unless you fail to make the turn.  –Author Unknown

Ch-ch-ch-changes –David Bowie

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1. April 2010 by Samldanach.

Sorry, boys.  All of your wives are now clearly second-rate.

As you may have heard,  Storm (the taller half of Paul and Storm) is going to make like Jonah, in reverse.  This is part of a challenge to get their Twitter follower numbers up.  And, he’s going to be facing down Fudgie at ThinkGeek headquarters.

Sonya sounded decidedly ambivalent about going to witness this historic occasion.  And, as they were only giving away 36 tickets, I figured I would let it go to someone else.

My wife, though, knew that I wanted to go.  So, she secretly entered the drawing for the tickets.  (”Secretly” being without my knowledge.  ThinkGeek knew she was there.  I mean, she’s awesome, but she’s not some kind of raffle ninja.)

(Raffle Ninja is the name of my Vanilla Ice cover band.)

This morning, we were notified that we won!  We’ve got two of the golden tickets!!!

This may end up being one of the few April Fool’s Days that I actually enjoy.  Assuming, of course, that this isn’t all one big practical joke.   (Speaking of, ThinkGeek has a pretty awesome line-up of AFD specials this year.  I’m wondering if the iCade isn’t going to go the way of the Tauntaun Sleeping Bag, though, because I think it’s actually pretty cool.)

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30. March 2010 by Samldanach.

I haven’t done a proper “where are they now” post in a while, and I have a few things to pop out there.  So, here it is.

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26. January 2010 by Samldanach.

Rather than posting the recap here, I’m just going to redirect you to the site:

http://sites.google.com/site/carducciimmagini/hawaii-2009-2010

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30. November 2009 by Samldanach.

Well, this one is going to be quick. Mostly because I am typing it up Monday morning, and am feeling decidedly ooky. I will spare you the TMI.

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30. November 2009 by Samldanach.

Well, we are Americans. And, in the immortal words of our President, “Yes, we Cannes!”

It’s a good thing you can’t actually throw things at me over the internet.

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30. November 2009 by Samldanach.

Where is Lucca? Yup, I heard you asking that. Lucca is a small-ish city in Tuscany, very near to Pisa and Florence. As a tourist attraction, its most redeeming feature is the old walled city in the middle of town. This is where we spent the day.

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30. November 2009 by Samldanach.

Again with the bright and early. And adventures with setting wake up calls. Le sigh. (That is my signature phrase this week. You like?)

Today, we used the cruise’s tour bus to get us to the city and back (1 ½ hours each way, which they tell us would be 350 euros by taxi!). But, we are doing Rome “on our own.” Which means that Sonya, as the one who has been here before, gets to play tour guide.

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30. November 2009 by Samldanach.

Ah, nothing quite like getting up early while on vacation. At least, if there is anything like it, I don’t like it.

We headed out to see Pompeii. We got to see a tiny slice of Naples along the way. I noticed when we were in Scotland that it looked remarkably like the Appalachian Mountains. And, clearly, that must be why the Scots were so happy to settle there. Naples looks remarkably like New Jersey. Perhaps that’s why so many Italians settled there?

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30. November 2009 by Samldanach.

We woke up early enough this morning to watch the ship come into port, which was totally worth it. Malta is beautiful and impressive. I’ve never seen anything like it. The area has very little real estate, so they compensated by building up. But, unlike the skyscrapers you see in most cities that follow that path, Valletta (the main city on Malta) has multiple levels of buildings, with many areas carved out of the rocky hillsides. It is incredibly dense, which made it a fantastic city for walking around and exploring.

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