[2020 note] Lost content, never posted on account of brog downtime. Moar photos from mythical then-gf and I’s Europe vacation in 2016.
Photos encapsulate our port excursions to Santorini, Greece, the land transportation forgot, which started out great, but ended horribly down the donkey trail. And then there was Olympia, Greece, the home of the OG Olympics, which was much nicer to not have to go down a donkey trail.
After Santorini, I was a little skeptical about the other Greek stop, in Katakolon. But it didn’t require us to wake up at 6 a.m., and the schedule was pretty comprehensive from departure to return, so that meant transportation was taken care of. Katakolon was the destination in name only, since ultimately we were immediately shuttled to Olympia, to visit the site of the very first Olympic games.
As a whole, Olympia was pretty cool to see, and learn about how the first Olympics came to be; there were no trials or any of the niggling politics that corrupt, mire and consume modern day Olympic games, but rather a process of knowing some of the Greek language, and simply thinking you’re better than others at particular events. Like imagine if some nobody walks into the next Olympics, says he can beat Usain Bolt, and then actually does it? That would be pretty mind-blowing, but that’s kind of what the first Olympics was like. It’s a little surreal to stand on the marble starting blocks that have stood for hundreds of years, and a hundred more of tourists all pretending like they’re going to sprint, and knowing that at some point in ancient time, were men sprinting for basically nothing more than bragging rights.
Also, while in Olympia, we ate some actual Greek gyros. They were pretty damn good, coming from the source. After a brief tour of one of the oldest wineries in Greece, we were back on the bus and then back to the ship; unlike Santorini, there was almost no time for independent exploration, much to my dismay.
I would never have predicted it as such, but if it were up to me, I think the shore excursion experience would have been better had they gone in the reverse order. Greece is undoubtedly a cool country rich in history, culture and probably way better food than I was privy to experience, but there’s no denying in my opinion that the quality of the excursions went downhill from the strong start in Croatia.
[2020 note] Lost content, never posted in 2016 on account of brog downtime. Photos of then-mythical gf and I on vacation in Europe, starting with layovers in New York and a visit to Ippudo, another one in Paris, where British Airways lost track of our luggage, and our arrival in Italy, where we spent a single night in Milan, before heading to Venice where we would take port on the start of our cruise.
Gallery encompasses our stops in King’s Landing Dubrovnik, Croatia and Kusadasi, Turkey, which was ironically my first ever foot stepped in the continent of Asia, despite my wanting Korea to have that distinction.
Admittedly, I thought I’d be way worse off coming back from Europe after basically a two-week vacation. Sure, the 22-hour trek that saw two layovers in New York and Detroit before getting back to Atlanta was pretty tiring, but I didn’t have that much difficulty in not using my recovery day, and instead returning to work immediately the next day. Frankly, after two weeks unpaid, it seemed like the smart thing to do.
So Europe. So cruise. Long story short is that the vacation was pretty good, and I had a good time traversing various cities in Italy, and my first cruise ever was pretty enjoyable overall. Maybe not as much relaxation as I’d hoped to have gotten, but I was able to sleep in for a few mornings, and those were quite pleasant. Alternatively, there were a lot of mornings that were on the schedules of either shore excursions or travel deadlines, leading to some jam-packed agendas at times too.
Among the things learned about planning a destination vacation as such, is that in the future, shelling out a little bit of cash in order to have some travel insurance might not be such a bad idea. Mythical gf and I got a pretty decent flight to Europe, but it was pockmarked with several layovers both to-and-from the states, and in the months approaching our trip, there were at least more than one deal that showed up with fewer layovers at a comparable price that made us come to the conclusion that perhaps there is some merit to timing.
[2020 note]: the following is a photo dump that was never accounted for, from my baseball park trip to Cleveland, Ohio, to visit Progressive Field, the home of the Cleveland Indians in 2016.
This was a ballpark that had long eluded me, due to the fact that it was in Cleveland, and there were never many ideal flight options when I had my flight privileges, and after I lost them, it seemed like it might never happen. But seeing as how my dad had gotten a new car, it seemed like a good idea to have some father-son bonding time, and we made a road trip to Ohio from Virginia, and got to knock this ballpark off my bloody list.
Continue reading “Photos: Progressive Field, Cleveland, Ohio”
Like the overcompetitive tryhard psychopath I am when it comes to Willy’s, burritos and competition, when I heard about the Willy’s Road Trip contest, and decided that I was going to do it, naturally it turned into a situation of “ha ha, you’re crazy Danny,” to a degree of planning and execution that really probably makes the people around me crook their head a little bit before looking at me next.
So yeah, when I was giving a lot of thought about how I was going to approach this, I decided that I was going to finish it as fast as possible, and came up with a route that would optimize hitting as many Willy’s on particular days, so that I could achieve this optimal finish.
What I was banking on was the fact that among the 27 Willy’s locations, four of them were within office buildings that had limited, Monday through Friday hours, hours as swift as 2:00 p.m. in one of them. I figure those four would trip up most other psychopaths (if there are any), because the contest started on a Friday, and those most gung-ho about it would have to be as nuts and have as little of a life as I did in order to get them tackled as soon as possible.
Continue reading “The breakdown of the Willy’s Road Trip contest”
Superstition would dictate that I would never share the details of any contest that I was interested in. I know far too many talented people out there whose skills, acumen and tenacity render me the equivalent of like a toddler when it comes to particular contests. Call me selfish, but sometimes I’d rather not have the super-talented people I know in my life not beating the shit out of me in any forms of contest.
But in an ironic sense that because of the server outage, nobody will actually read this until god knows when, I feel like I can talk about this contest whose hat that I’m going to throw my name into. Without concern of jinxing it, or having anyone I know being better than me at it and winning it out from under my nose.
Thankfully this is a contest that I’m fairly certain nobody I know would, much less could, or even want – to challenge me in. Because most people I know aren’t obsessive and insane about burritos, and typically probably have better things to do with their time and lives.
I got an email from Willy’s, the burrito chain that holds a dear spot in my gluttonous heart. Long story short: visit all 27 Atlanta-area (plus one in fucking Athens) Willy’s locations, take a picture of the receipts, and try and be one of five nutjobs to be first to submit.
