Congrats Adam. . . Can't Wait to See You

hey buddy,

congrats on the finishing of your fire season. hope your party went well. i can't wait to see you at christmas.

love
ian

I don't want to be a secret weapon; i want to be an exposed weapon.

well, keith is the only one to have posted on the last entry and he is the last one that i thought would be interested in coming asdfgsehwsedfasdfaf . . . lefty has taken over . . .

keith has asked that i give him a dream itinerary for a week and a half trip to thessaloniki, so i put this one together. I think that it is pretty ambitious, but everything on it is worth doing so we could pick and choose easily.

10 days:
day 1: Arrive, relax, coffee, dinner

day 2: Walking tour of thessaloniki, coffee, dinner with my friends at the house

day 3: Up to anapoli for lunch and a coffee, down to the center for the evening for a walk, a giro, and a good drink

day 4: Day trip to olympos

day 5: Relax, trip to the white tower museum, to soula's house for good food
and drink

day 6: To town for a trip to the big market in the center and a taverna in the market

day 7: Trip to meteora

day 8: Trip to vergina

day 9: Trip to chalkidiki

day 10: Relax and go for a drink and then to the airport

Best Drink: There are many, but perhaps thermaikos
Best hiking: Olympos or meteora
Scootering: Chalkidiki

so, cometh i say; cometh and partake of the wonder and splendor that is thessaloniki. I CAN'T WAIT ANY LONGER, I WANT YOU, I NEED YOU, I LOOOOVE YOU!

come and see,
"howling mad"

as promised . . .

so my parents are planning to come visit me in june; since this is the case, and since i would like more people to come visit me, i am going to post a couple of blogs on traveling to greece and things that you should know and be aware of. i'll try to cover things like, what airports to travel through, things to do based on different trip durations, things to do based on different interests, when to come, a few cultural tid-bits that i have noticed, expenses, and i will try to answer any questions that i get on the comment screens. it'll be like my own little guidebook.

so we'll start from the beginning, flying. first we'll begin with buying tickets and what they should cost.

-tickets are pretty easy, basically you will most likely get a ticket that has two stops, one in the states and one in europe. now as far as cost is concerned, depending on where you are flying from, how inconvenienced you care to be, and when you want to travel, prices can differ by literally hundreds of dollars.

good price: 800-900, if you find prices in this range quit your job sell your house, rob a bank, whatever you need to do, come and visit.

bad price: anything over 1300, i am really not worth this much money; buy yourself something pretty.

-ok next, where to fly to, from, and through.
>best airports
cleveland- small, easy, and on time
columbus- amazingly nice and comfortable
vegas- big but easy
washington d.c. (kinda dingy and dirty, but organized)
munich- small, beautiful, and german efficiency
athens- easy, clean, and good location
thessaloniki- tiny and easy

>worst airports
jfk- disorganized, epically huge, and consistently late (unfortunately a major hub of east coast delta
rome- italian, ummm . . . yeah (sorry if you are offended, there are just a lot of problems; however, it has been redesigned since i went through so it could be a bit better)
frankfurt- hopefully sarah won't hurt me but it is old, dirty, dark and too small for the volume of flights

every other airport i have been to lies somewhere in-between. and this list does not mean that everything will be perfect at the good airports and that everything will go poorly at the bad airport, these are just my observations.

now for the airlines
>best airlines
delta- delta is not actually that great but it is one of the main airlines that flies to athens or thessaloniki.
british airways- nice airline good food (they do charge for multiple bags and they are sticklers about one carry on)
aegean- great all around airline

>worst airlines
olimpic- epically bad (under new management, could be better in a couple of years)
alitalia- again epically bad. they will loose your baggage.

again, these observations really mean nothing you can have good experiences on bad airline and a bad experience on a good airline.

there is the start, you can now shop for tickets with ease and peace of mind. haha that is if you trust my judgment. maybe we'll do important places to visit in greece next. don't feel like you have to wait though, come and see me, i'll give you the personal tour.

peace love and happiness

Just a Quick Something to Think

This is not mine, but i don't know whose it is. it was a comment on a video i was watching and i thought it was interesting.

...what do you call it when a dog shamefully slinks away from a counter he just stole a sandwich from? Or when an ape at a zoo protects a child that fell into an exhibit until it can be rescued? etc?

Isn't it convenient, that you call THOSE actions "instinct" but call it "conscience" when people do it?

More fun. Man I love long weekends . . .

yep four day weekends are great. more fun at the crag. this time in litohoro with dimitri thomas and oscar. school is going well and i am close to buying my motorcylce, well sort of but yeah close. hope you are all doing well. miss you all.