Archive for August, 2005

The Art Haus hostel in Asheville, NC

Monday, August 29th, 2005

I spent about a day walking around in New Orleans, checking out the French Quarter and downtown. (It feels very strange watching scenes of devastation from New Orleans today on TV, when I was there only a few days ago.) I then made my way to Gainesville, GA., where I would stay at an ecological [...]

Thank you, Memphis!

Thursday, August 25th, 2005

As some of you might know, I had very ambitious plans for yesterday. I was scheduled to leave Fayetteville at 8:15 in the morning, spend a few hours on the bus to get to Little Rock, visit Bill Clinton’s Presidential Library for a few hours, go on to Memphis, spend all evening walking around there, [...]

Frosh nostalgia

Thursday, August 25th, 2005

After having left my luggage safely in the hands of the kind populace of Fayetteville, I trudged into town to explore. I quickly found the main drag, Dickson street, got a free deodorant as a gift to incoming freshman in the bookstore, and chanced upon the university. Not only did they have a very kind [...]

People don’t steal in Fayetteville

Monday, August 22nd, 2005

So I just got off the bus in Fayetteville, Arkansas, a little town half an hour from the Wal-Mart world headquarters, and two hours from Bill Clinton’s presidential library in Little Rock. It’s a tiny bus station, not Greyhound like I’m used to, but Jefferson Lines. I am not meeting my hosts for a few [...]

The Wisdom of Crowds

Tuesday, August 16th, 2005

This was on my reading list for a long time, finally picked it up at the Denver Public Library and read it in one sitting. Here are my as usual cryptic notes. First example: put 750 marbles in a glass and have a group guess independently. The average will be very close to the truth. [...]

Albuquerque Rocks! (And Poetry Slams Too)

Tuesday, August 16th, 2005

Albuquerque I arrived in Albuquerque from Tucson at around 9AM on Wednesday, dumped my luggage and set out to explore. I walked around all day in the sun, eating some great Mexican food at a place where they were even playing one of the most popular songs down in Sinaloa (Que se queda con ganas, [...]

Phone crime and DVD rental

Thursday, August 11th, 2005

Just two small things I picked up on the bus trip from Tucson to Albuquerque. Phone crime in Mexico In Hermosillo, Mexico, criminals called several pharmacies in town, threatening the employees’ lives, and demanding that the employees scratch phonecards and read the codes over the phone (as you know, you don’t need to own the [...]

Los Angeles: the Zen of travelling

Tuesday, August 9th, 2005

Travelling When my family used to travel, they did it very differently than I do now. They’d be working hard all year, saving up vacation days and money, and then we’d often go off on a two week jaunt to for example a Spanish island, spend lot’s of money on hotels, food and airfare, and [...]

Abbrevations

Tuesday, August 2nd, 2005

Just a quickie: Even though I thought my command of the English language was quite good, I was baffled by “PED XING” that was frequently painted on the roads in Palo Alto. Turns out it means Pedestrian Crossing. Doh. Is there really not space to write all of it? I happen to find Xing a [...]

Travel observations

Tuesday, August 2nd, 2005

Here are some quick notes on my travels so far: Getting out of Mexico: The bus was supposed to come to Coyotitan, the little village, at 6 in the morning – but that one never showed up. So I had to wait until 9. I got some tasty chilaquiles at a restaurant across the road, [...]

Login