Consider sending a letter to the EPA and your representatives asking them to enforce restrictions on the emissions of toxins (especially mercury) from power plants and to discard the weaker proposal put forth by the administration.
I finished another woodworking project this weekend – a maple box for a friend. I really like how it came out, especially considering I got the wood cheap at the Home Depot. Thanks to Abby for helping me take the nice pictures.
I stayed home last night and scanned in pictures, so you get to see our trip to Italy. Check out the photos here. We really enjoyed our time in Rome and Sorrento!
The Union of Concerned Scientists (by way of a committe of sixty or so scientists including twenty Nobel laureates) has publicly stated that the Bush Administration has systematically distorted facts and ignored important evidence in making policy decisions – check out the NY Times article here. Yahoo has the AP coverage of this issue here, including a list of just a few transgressions.
Shocking? No. Still scary? Yep.
On our flight over to Italy, they showed a Discovery Channel show on tourism in Dubai, and specifically, a new, ultra-luxury hotel there called the Burj al Arab. In the past few weeks, I’ve seen a number of articles on Dubai and the Burj, including this one today in the NY Times. Call it a fantasy, but it’d be pretty fun to splurge (a lot) and stay there for a night.
Check out Found Magazine for all your found-text-viewing pleasure.
Woodcraft (a national chain of woodworking stores with a local branch) has a nice article up about using hand tools (as opposed to power tools) for woodworking. Check it out here. Between my class at the North Bennet Street School and the wimpy circuit breaker in my garage, I’m definitely hooked on the hand tools.
The Center for American Progress has a good, point-by-point analysis of Bush’s recent interview on Meet the Press, backed up by plenty of facts. Check it out here. Cheers to the nice folks over at Regulators.org pointing out the report.
The first round of reprints are back, and I’m glad to report that Cameras, Inc. in Davis did a much better job than Photo Star. The rest will come in by the end of the week – not the instant gratification we were hoping for, but at least they’ll be nice prints.
Well, you’ll have to wait a few more days for photos – the first place I went botched the job pretty soundly.
The not-so-fine folks at Photo Star were rude and completely uninterested in giving any sort of customer service (Sound familiar? Maybe they’re in with the Hotel Savoia folks) when they returned our horrible looking prints. The negatives looked good, and since Photo Star was unwilling to reprint them (they finally gave me my money back), I’ve taken the negatives to another local place. Here’s hoping they come out better the second time ’round.
So here’s the short list for Italy.
First, the not-really-so-bad downers:
- Delayed flights.
- European plumbing.
- Transit strikes (but only for a day).
- The restaurant in Rome Osteria dell’Antiquario (Frommer’s liked it, we hated it).
- The Hotel Savoia in Sorrento. They neglected to tell us about the construction they were doing when we booked, so we were promptly woken at 8 AM by hammering, and had a new hotel (see Hotel Mignon below) by 10 AM.
- Smoking. Many people in Europe smoke everywhere – train stations, hotel rooms, restaurants, etc. It was disgusting.
And now, on to all the good things:
- Damn good cappuccino for less than a buck, especially at our little bar in Rome in the Piazza Mazzini, Le Stelle.
- Sorrento in general.
- All the amazing sights: Hadrian’s Villa, Pompei, the Roman Forum, the Pantheon, the Galleria Borghese, etc., etc., etc. See pictures soon.
- The restaurant in Sorrento, La Fenice. It was amazing! Try the black linguine with zucchini flowers and shrimp – divine!
- Good shopping.
- Great pizza.
- The Pensione Paradise in Rome. Luigi and his staff are great, the rooms are nice (ask for one facing the courtyard rather than the street), the location is ideal, and given all that, it’s a steal of a price.
- The Hotel Mignon in Sorrento. They’re well located, sweet, it’s cheap, and breakfast is wonderful.
- Soccer (football) games. We saw Lazio tie Sampdoria in the Stadio Olimpico.
- The ever-so-convenient (near the airport) and reasonable Fiumicino Hotel Airport Surfhouse.
- The Vatican. Just jaw-dropping, really.
I’m getting pictures back tonight, and will scan them in soon. I’ll also post some more stories from our travels in the next few days.