Uffizi Gallery

The Uffizi gallery museum is one of the oldest museums of the western world, having begun construction in 1560 (open to the public since 1756).

We packed in as many hours as we could of Italian art and sculpture, including works of very famous artists such as Sandro Boticelli, a painting by Michaleangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael and Carvaggio.

Snack on their roof top patio which was just beautiful.

Birthday dinner

We went to a restaurant that was a small place with 8 tables featuring only ingredients from Tuscany for Cindy's birthday surprise dinner. Unable to decide, we elected for the tasting menu, and of course were not let down. Cindy got a birthday cake with a candle at the end. Cindy's brother also touched up one of our photos of the day!

Firenze!

Firenze, or Florence, has stolen our hearts. That's not a bad thing to have stolen on vacation.

I've been to places with good cycling. I've been to places with accessible language/culture to outsiders. I've been to places with good food. And I've been to a few places with rich history... and Florence has all of them combined, and in quantities beyond what I ever expected. I can't think of a place I loved being anymore than this.

We did some shopping, mostly window shopping, but did get a few things. Huge fashion and shopping district here. Beautiful streets full of people at night. I get why Italians believe in god so much - there was a shop selling whispy scoops of the clouds angels sit on in a hundred different flavours, so we decided to partake in some gelato of unearthly goodness. Wow.

With all the fashion pics everywhere, we decided to part ways for a while with the "look at the camera and smile" approach in exchange for an aloof look of Italian-ness portrayed by models in ads. Cindy is doing her best!

Again, a random spot for dinner was beyond what our taste buds have been used to their whole lives. At home I never really craved going out to Italian restaurants, or even trying at home. Mario Monti has a lot of issues on his plate right now, but he should send in cooks to set Mercato ("Italian" restaurant down the street from our house) straight. A noodle can have layers upon layers of flavour, or it can taste like boiled water with a slight burn. The Italian national food police wouldn't approve. Parmesan cheese in those Kraft cylinders from a grocery store are only an approximation, it's like saying a Wal-mart Huffy and a creation of Ernesto Colnago are the same. Whether its cars, or food, or wine, or art, or fashion, or I'm sure dozens of other things, the Italians have pushed far past adequacy to make utter refinement available as well.

I've splurged a bit on hotels, and this one is the best yet (using one chain in the three cities to simplify reservations). The Relais Santa Croce Florence is a 24 room small hotel that was originally a house the Pope's treasurer Marquis Baldinucci built for himself in the early 1700's. Their web promo photos will do more justice than our phones. Perhaps a second statement of the obvious... but the guy with his hands on the Pope's treasury, in Italy, 300 years ago didn't seem like he was short of money. It's like staying in a museum. But really, all three of their properties we've stayed at are close to where the cool attractions are, only a few minutes walk, so we could skip taxis and stuff in each place we stayed. The top floor has a window showing through to the truss construction that has held the arching ceiling in the music hall up for 300 years. I need to wait for daytime to get a picture for Jon and Craig to see.

When we got back last night from dinner, they had a concert violinist playing in the grand music room, so we sat 15 feet away and listened until he stopped. Simply magical how rich real sound is in a room like that, up close. And watching a violinist play is spellbinding like watching fire. It's so elegant, but making those things not squeal is beyond me... I'll stick to bikes. Makes listening to an MP3 like... well eating Kraft dinner vs. eating here. They said Mozart had played in that same spot too for the Pope and his crew. This was our little taste of old world charm. Cindy says there's nothing Italy could do to be more romantic than it is.

Italian Trains

The trains are quiet and smooth, easy to sleep on. Some are quite fast (160km/h). The coffee is strong and small. The handwipes can't have just soap and alcohol smell, they are perfumed beautifully. The trains are clean and run on time. The ticket checkers on the trains are like quad or quint-lingual and are helpful people. The trains aren't dirt cheap, but if you factor in the practicality of only needing to own one car, and probably a city commuter only, its a very cost effective add to your personal transportation mix. They go so many places - Milan to Rome is under 4h. The overhead luggage space is reasonable, but people also pile stuff up everywhere. There are rules on bikes that are actually workable when you know them, although asserting your rights is not always easy to do (doesn't work half the time in English at an airport either of course). The best 2 answers have been: "really? every other train I've been on said it was fine" and the one that the hotel concierge gave me "when I spoke to the guy, he said this size packing and these rules, so I got him to write his operator number down here - see?". Perfect!

Venice

The history, architecture, engineering, and just the premise of this place are so amazing its hard to grasp. It's very beautiful and unique. While once it was the center of an empire, it's now filled with tourist junk/trinket/fashion shops. That's fine I guess, there's enough unspoilt streets too, but it'd be amazing to see what this was like as a functioning city at the height of it's history. There are other mountains, other cosmopolitan world cities, etc. but there's only one on earth that is Venice. Wow.

We did a bit of a fancy dinner, which was kind of the only thing we ate all day. The food continues to amaze me. If I were a fish/shrimp/octopus in the Mediterranean, I'd be honoured to fill out my organ donor card to subject myself to an Italian chef upon my demise. The refinement of stuff that comes on a plate is just beyond me; I eat for function and sustenance, and here it's such an art what they accomplish with such apparent simplicity.

Causality

Abuse of causality arguments irks me. Media do it often through lazy reporting. Special interest groups do it often to promote their causes to less critical thinkers.

"Marijuana is a gateway drug that leads to x, y, and z harder drug use". Ok sure, sounds plausible. And in a select set of survivor bias cases, it's true.

But it doesn't make the progression true. Scientifically, I'd say there's an solid gazillion Mexican labourers, hippies gone baby boomers (or just boomers in general, regardless if they were hippies), and the people of BC, who haven't gone that A to B route, just the A. X percent of people had whatever in them where they were going to be in pursuit of mind altering substances, and they didn't start with heroin...

It's like saying breast milk and apple juice sippy cups get people started on a path to alcoholism (it's true that alcoholics start as infants and need nourishment of course...), but dumb to think that's causal.

Recipe:
1. Pick precursor you want to harp on.
2. Pick "undesirable" circumstance.
3. Wield poor argument.

French fries. Obesity. People who eat carbohydrates like potatoes will be fat. Sure, if dozens of other conditions are met. Or go check those Belgian cyclists/models dipping their fries in mayonnaise for a counter argument...

Just like we know that pedestrians who get hit by cars all know how to put their own socks on in the morning didn't cause their injury by pedestrianism, we need to know the remedy is adding percent correlation and frequency of occurance statements to a false (implicit 100% correlation) argument.

The trick for perpetrators is to say repeat such statements enough, quick enough, with other facts nearby (perhaps not even associated), such that the causality is swallowed whole. Don't fall for false causality arguments. And call those out who use them - ask if they are actually trying to be deceitfully manipulative or are just simple in the head (perhaps use tact though). And review in your mind what portion of those who complete the precursor don't join the speakers unfortunate ending condition.

Rant over.

Milan to Venice

We learned the ropes/jumped through the hoops of Italian trains with bikes. Made it of course, and got to people watch some poor parenting and 3 little kids that look cute, but turned out to be complete terrors on the way out. Flat countryside, industrial slant to it all. They have cow statues here too. Then... Venice from the train station. And lastly, an elevator that goes only up or right.