Random, version: April

bluejayway · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 2:35 pm

I have to go to Italy for work this summer (alas!) and will contrive to extend it by a weekish for a subsidized vacation. Other than the museums in Rome (where I'll start and fly into and out of), what's not to be missed? What's bearable outside in July?

PopTodd · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 2:45 pm

In Rome:
• Café at Sant'Eustachio
• Try to get to dinner here at least once: http://www.ambasciatadiabruzzo.com/ingl ... p?cmd=home
• Have gelato at night and sit at the fountain in the piazza over by the Parthenon. It's wonderful people watching.
• Get over to the Spanish Steps and see the nearby Bocca de la Verite. Just get a panini and eat over there on a bench or something and take in the people watching.

Actually, I think that is the #1 thing about Rome -- the people watching. It's fantastic. Drink it all in.

PopTodd · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 2:48 pm

If you are going away from Rome, check out my favorite place from my short stay there:
Lecce, Puglia.
It's a little university town with great food. Beautiful town. And incredibly wonderful, friendly people. So far off the beaten path (at least for Americans) that you will feel like you are on another planet. But, in a very good way.

bluejayway · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 2:51 pm

Ooh, that sounds good. I am not great in constant crowds, which I fear Rome will have a lot of in July.

rogneeb · **Joined:** Mon Oct 25, 2004 1:07 pm **Posts:** 12618

i also enjoyed Puglia quite a lot. a lot of the small umbrian and tuscan towns are fun to visit.

as far as rome, most of the big tourist stuff is crowded, but most of it is actually worth seeing at least once. just wandering around the streets in rome was fun...hanging at Piazza San Marco, etc. the rome subway sort of sucks and the cab drivers are seemingly out to kill you, though.

PopTodd · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 2:57 pm

bluejayway Wrote:

Ooh, that sounds good. I am not great in constant crowds, which I fear Rome will have a lot of in July.

Lecce is also only about 10km from the Adriatic coast -- Otranto is a nice little town and a good place to spend a couple of days. Beautiful in the old part of the city, but the new city is dilapidated and kinda depressed (at least it was when I was there in 1997). Still it's a nice little day trip from Lecce, if you plan on spending any time there and a fun little place to explore for a day or two. Some pretty cool (and creepy) stuff.
Hell, if you are into Gothic literature at all, then The Castle of Otranto will ring a bell. Check that out and also the Church of the Martyrs. Now, THAT is cool and creepy.

bluejayway · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 3:14 pm

Don't know the book, but I like creepy, obvs...

Thanks for sharing.

PopTodd · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 3:25 pm

bluejayway Wrote:

Don't know the book, but I like creepy, obvs...

Thanks for sharing.

In Otranto:

Quote:

Before dismissing the image as yet another pretty picture of a medieval church, take a closer look. Yes, those are skulls! Instead of the usual altar pictures, there’s a wall of skulls, displayed prominently for the church congregation. Meet the martyrs of Otranto Cathedral in Italy’s Apulia region…

The year was 1480 and the fateful day July 28 when a fleet of 70 to 200 Ottoman ships reached the city of Otranto, then part of the Kingdom of Naples. It was the beginning of the Ottoman wars (1453-1683) in Europe and invader Mohammed II had conquered Constantinople just 28 years earlier. The garrison and the citizens took cover in the Castle of Otranto but as it had no cannons for defense, it was soon conquered and the garrison killed.

On August 12, 800 citizens were taken to the hill of Minerva, now called the Hill of the Martyrs, and beheaded because they refused to renounce their Catholic faith. Their remains were taken to the cathedral and the skulls preserved in the altar piece as a prominent reminder of these 800 martyrs.

Creepy enough?
The pictures don't do it justice. Just to be in that room, is enough to give you chills. And yet, I lingered there for almost an hour, just looking. Closely. Not just creepy, but evocative and one of the rare instances where I came face-to-face the the actual human part of history, where it became more than just stories, but something that I could relate to and (literally) touch. Incredibly moving and beyond surreal.

bluejayway · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 3:26 pm

Like the catacombs in Paris, but done up nicer and less of a damp-n-rotten smell!

discostu · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 4:16 pm

bluejayway Wrote:

I get to go to Italy for work this summer (alas!) and will contrive to extend it by a weekish for a subsidized vacation. Other than the museums in Rome (where I'll start and fly into and out of), what's not to be missed? What's bearable outside in July?

FIXED

bluejayway · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 4:18 pm

Oh, don't think I don't know it.

I've tried to go to Italy three times in the past and been thwarted each time (visa troubles, boy troubles, global environmental politics), so it's the last place on my top-tier must-see list. SUPEREXCITED.

bluejayway · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 8:04 pm

Caldera has a 'holy foreskin'!! Tempting.

Aural Fixation · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 11:04 pm

Juggalos are across the street. And me without my white clown face.

Elvis Fu · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 11:20 pm

Yail Bloor · **Posted:** Fri Apr 22, 2011 11:29 pm

The Easter Bunny really is a ghoul.

rogneeb · **Joined:** Mon Oct 25, 2004 1:07 pm **Posts:** 12618

only thing worse is the "tooth fairy"

pinehurst · **Joined:** Fri Dec 10, 2004 1:45 am **Posts:** 1526

The Top 25 men who look like old lesbians

wenchlette · **Posted:** Sat Apr 23, 2011 10:43 am

pinehurst Wrote:

The Top 25 men who look like old lesbians

Also, this:

Twilightkid · **Posted:** Sat Apr 23, 2011 11:36 am

Elvis Fu Wrote:

crap....i wanna use one of these pics for a future album cover...

Senator LooGAR · **Posted:** Sat Apr 23, 2011 12:32 pm

So, John Voigt's brother wrote "Angel of the Morning" - this realization brought to you by that commercial where the parents ate singing it at top volume with the windows down. Which we always preferred to my dad's penchant for listening to the Moby Dick Book on Tape.

discostu · **Posted:** Sat Apr 23, 2011 12:43 pm

Good ol' Frank

toots · **Posted:** Sun Apr 24, 2011 12:05 pm

Senator LooGAR · **Posted:** Sun Apr 24, 2011 2:32 pm

A Visual Compendium of Haircuts of the Rock and Roll Era

Yail Bloor · **Posted:** Sun Apr 24, 2011 6:17 pm

That reminds me of this board game, I think it was called Mug Shots where you had like hair, eyes, chins and whatnot to matchup.

Also "Slash" looks more like "Thunders" FWIW.

Flying Rabbit · **Posted:** Sun Apr 24, 2011 10:57 pm

I didn't recognize Billy Gibbons without the sunglasses or hat. I'd love to have a tee though with just that beard/hair combo down the front.

Random, version: April

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