Tag: Travel

Revisited

Travels

Ask me again why I love Edinburgh…

Okay, here’s the skinny.  As pretty as that picture may be, Edinburgh is not the place to visit in winter.  It’s witch’s tit cold, a kind of damp, raw cold that seems to defeat even Chicago-strength coats and gloves — ask me how I know this — and it turns any kind of pedestrian touring of its gorgeous streets into a series of short dashes between oases of relative warmth, these being shops and pubs (not that the latter is a terrible option).

That’s the physical part of it.  More depressing is the gloom — daytime in winter is technically six hours long — about 9am to 3pm, but “daytime” in wintry Edinburgh seldom involves “daylight” (as seen from my hotel room at about midday):

…and this largely explains why Scots are, by and large, the gloomiest people on the planet and why Scotland’s largest export is not whisky but people.

All that said, I don’t know any Americans who don’t love the place.  It ranks in the Son&Heir’s (and Daughter’s, and her mother’s) top three favorite cities in the world — and they’ve been to many — and it’s certainly in both my and New Wife’s top five, although we prefer summer or fall because Olde Pharttes.  Ditto Doc Russia and his New Wife, who were there in early November last, and who both want to go back, and soon.

With one regrettable fracas excepted (mine), we’ve all found the people to be as friendly as can be.  I remember Connie once asking for directions, prefacing her question with “I feel like such an idiot asking for help in my favorite city in the world [it was], but…” only to be met with a huge smile, a “Dinnawurry, lassie”, followed by a string of directions that we couldn’t understand at all.  Fortunately, there was a lot of arm-waving and pointing, so we got the gist.

I would go back there tomorrow, and it’s January, FFS.  And for the cold, there’s porridge (“parrutch”) and single malt.  Every man should.

Proper Attire

Business, Corporate Wokism, Travels

Oh FFS, this just takes the cake:

British Airways bosses have apologized for telling cabin crew members what bras to wear under new ‘transparent’ uniforms which led to comments from passengers.
The see-through blouses were issued as part of a new uniform, unveiled earlier this year, designed to ‘take the airline into the next chapter’ and for a non-binary crew.
Last year BA relaxed the rules around its strict uniform policy and went gender-neutral to allow male pilots and crew to wear make-up and carry handbags.

Lemme just deal with the low-hanging fruit first.

  • Companies have every right to create a “uniform” policy, and to dictate what does and does not constitute “proper” clothing under that policy
  • the corollary is that if the uniform consists of “transparent” clothing, they also have the right to set policy for “proper” undergarments
  • but if they do specify transparent clothing, they deserve everything that comes to them.

Now for the ugly stuff.

I’m sick and fucking tired of companies feeling that they have to apologize to their employees for bullshit like this.  Were the topic that of terrible salaries, foul working conditions and in short things that deserve corporate groveling, okay;  but for causing hurt feeewings?  Screw that.

But in to the topic at hand.

Nothing would make me question the capabilities of an airline’s crew faster than the whole thing turning into some kind of costume party, with the “men” wearing clown makeup and the “women” wearing no bra under a transparent blouse (although at first glance the latter wouldn’t seem too bad, please consider that the average age of trolley-dollies now appears to be 50, and all seem to have been recruited from branches of the Ugly Tree).

And frankly, I’m not sure I want to see any of the flight crew wearing transparent clothing, given that said crew will likely include girlymen and butchygirls, all of indeterminate gender.

I don’t know why I bother fulminating about this stuff anymore, considering that my chances of flying at all are minuscule, and on any British airline even less than that.

I’d give this one a try, though.

Travel Tip

Travels

Here’s a little something I picked up on my travels:

Some hotels have some curious ideas about “double beds” — in fact, they’re often just two single beds shoved together, each with a single-sized duvet.  This is fine, unless you and your partner are of the “cuddling” kind.  Also, the duvets are often “European” single-size (i.e. totally inadequate, especially for us fat-ass Murkins).

What I always do now, after my first such experience, is pack a queen-sized duvet cover and about eight safety pins.  Then, if I find the sleeping arrangements as above, I simply pin the two duvets together to make a larger one, and stuff it into the queen duvet cover with the pin mechanism facing up.  Problem solved.

Side note:  Safety pins are an essential travel item anyway. Europeans do not know the concept of “safety pins” (at least, they didn’t in Vienna), and trying to explain what a safety pin is and how it works is in your fractured attempt at a furrin language will just lead to puzzled looks.  Pack your own.

Same Time Next Year

Travels

Apparently there’s this German guy who visits the same city in Britishland each year for his vacation, and has done so for the past several years.  (My Brit Readers can be excused for going “Huh?” when they discover which city has so enthralled our Frequent Visitor.)

Which leads me to ask the question:

Is there any city in the world that you would re-visit for two weeks exclusively each year for the next, say, decade? 

(I’m going to assume long lives for the Olde Pharttes among us, bless ’em, who could always just substitute “…for the rest of my life” if they so choose.)

Give reasons, in Comments.  It could be a furrin city or a Murkin/NorMurkin one, your choice.  In the spirit of the thing, it has to be a city, not a region or a resort.  Play the game.

My choice is below the fold:

Read more

Grand Tour

Drive Time, Travels

As I mentioned in last week’s post about winning a lottery, there would be travel.  Lots of travel.  And I have to say, this one would feature towards the top of the list.

By the way, you’ll want to hit the above link, because (unusually) the article contains some of the most beautiful travel pics I’ve ever seen.

My route would differ only slightly:

…in that I’d leave off Switzerland –great scenery, but horrible people and fanatically-enforced speed limits — and take a trip instead up the Rhône Valley via Nice.

I’ve been to a couple of the places mentioned, and I’d be very happy to see them again (take a bow, Heidelberg and Innsbruck).  The others (Bruges, Liège, etc.) are all on Ye Olde Bucquette Lyste anyway, but I’d add Como (north of Milan) because reasons.

As for which car I’d take?  My current heartthrob, the BMW Z8 (4.9-liter V8 engine generating about 400hp, you betcha):

Nice and reliable, with looks that rival its spiritual predecessor, the 1958 BMW 507.

Or if shipping it over is too much hassle, I’d just buy something Over There that’s modern and boring but equally reliable, like a Mercedes SL:

A fortnight that trip is supposed to take?  Try four weeks, or even longer.