Another beautiful day...

Up early,  sun shining,  a breeze blowing and not a cloud in the sky. The potential of the day awaits.  Everyday has the possibility of being absolutely life changing and fantastic.  Or just "another" day.

In the end, it will most likely be something in the middle.  But we won't really know until later. Must steer the ship carefully.

Enjoy your voyage.

The 4th Away from Home...

   From afar, sitting just outside the Swedish capital, the voices of the USA sound like a not so united set of states. Part of that may be the din of the media,  or the louder voices seeming to dominant the airwaves.

   Regardless,  today is a good one to remind ourselves the things that bind us together.  Not only our nation,  and language,  but our shared history of weaving discord and rancor into a rich tapestry binding us ever closer.

   It seems most often that we find the thread which holds us together when we discard, if only for a while, our particular ideology or politics.

   We all want our nation to remain great. We want to live in safety and prosperity. We hope that our children and friends will make it home safe, and that nobody will be telling us someone we value is gone.

  Amidst all the discussion on how we want to go about things, most of us desire the same destination.  If we focus on the destination and work toward common methods of getting there we are much more likely to succeed than if we begin wedged in our "trench".

   Our freedom of speech ought best be used to find our commonality and community. Our strength is our brand. Our brand is our name. We are the United States of America.

   Have a safe 4th of July.

Check out http://alphabetsuccess.blogspot.com/

My new blog...

The book "Alphabet Success" is forthcoming. Starting the drum roll. Please join in the fun.

SUN DON'T SHINE

A while back I ended up as a "producer" in a film called "Sun Don't Shine". Initially my involvement was limited to providing some temporary housing for the cast and crew. My relationship with the director,  Amy Seimetz, was a tangential friend of a friend sort of thing.

Later, my interest piqued,  I ended up a bit more involved in the movie. In addition to the local St. Pete Beach connection, it turned out the film was premiering in Wroclaw where I happen to spend part of the year. The litany of coincidental connections along with the knowledge that the referring friend is a bright person surrounded by similar people sealed the deal. FWIW - "producing" is limited to a financial involvement.  Good thing, as I know nothing about making films.

Fortunately,  Amy knows plenty. Which is why the movie ended up being a great gritty view of the "backstage" of Florida.  If you haven't seen the movie,  do so. You will never look at the Sunshine State in quite the same way afterwards.

While I don't know much more about the film business than when I started,  it is a pleasure to be associated with such an excellent directorial debut. Kate Lynn Sheil and Kentucker Audley in the lead roles, do an admirable job as well.

Along the way Amy has become an increasingly well known name in entertainment. Deservedly so I might add. A simple search for Amy Seimetz will give you the inside scoop on this emerging force in the film business. Go Amy Go!

The film is currently in distribution by Factory 25 - http://www.factorytwentyfive.com/sun-dont-shine/

Back to Stockholm...

After a lovely and productive journey home in Wroclaw, we are off  (with one of my daughters) to Stockholm to see my son and some friends.

As with any journey I am a bit nervous (even after innumerable trips) and excited. My excitement is now two fold.

1) As before I look forward to swimming in the Baltic, seeing friends, and enjoying the lovely (if expensive) environs of Stockholm.

2) It will afford me the opportunity to experience a myriad of business interactions. Some positive, some negative. But all which are likely to appear on alphabetsuccess.blogspot.com.

This is part of my build up to the launch of my book "Alphabet Success". Available in Kindle format for the first 90 days. (Sorry).

My early retirement has frequently prompted the question: "How did you do that?" Now I am attempting to answer the question en masse.

A Bit of Inspiration, and Reflection from Gabriel Byrne

A Prayer for My Daughter

You are born in love and pain.
Given to us for a short time only.
Before we must let you go again, with love and pain.
One day you'll come to know how close they are, one to the other.
You are a treasure, a blessing, a prayer's answer,A jig in my Irish soul.
You are me, and I am you.
You are both of us, the love of your mother and me.
Let me be worthy of you.
Let me lead you to truth, to beauty, to the mystery of the universe.
You will ask me great questions, and sometimes I will not know the answers.
Perhaps we are not meant to know some things.
That is life too... a seeking.
It may be our only purpose here.
All things are changing, always.
Yesterday is dust, tomorrow a dream.Our gift is now.
And so, my sweet angel, may you know love, and be loved in return.
May you know truth, and laughter, and peace, and happiness,And may the great spirit of the universe enfold you in his arms, and keep you safe, for always.

by

Gabriel Byrne

Troll on the move...or watching?

These little folks are located throughout Wroclaw.  Originally a symbolic part of the Solidarity movement,  they seem to be secretly breeding at night. I'll be on the lookout for any that resemble Edward Snowden.  Although the mini-statues may be part of another NSA program. 

Midsummer's Eve Lunacy!

Every summer solstice in Sweden they pay homage to an ancient pagan tradition and have massive celebrations.  This is no exaggeration.  On midsummer eve and day it is akin to Christmas.  Businesses close early on midsummer eve and celebrations carry on from morning and in some instances into the following morning. 

It is worth seeing. Essentially a festival for the sun god (as good as any I suppose). People dance around a fairly phallic pole and sing songs. Many people wear special floral wreaths and occasionally a traditional costume.

As with many celebrations in the western world, it frequently involves a substantial consumption of alcohol. 

If you have a chance to visit Sweden to experience it, I suspect you will find it quite charming.  Even better for those without a local contact would be to reach out through virtualtourist.com or coachsurfing.com and see if you can wrangle an invite to an actual midsummer party.

Have fun....

Turbo traveling.

As those who know me are aware, I travel nearly nonstop. To do so requires financial freedom, or a job without geographical constraints.  But even those with less ambitious travel plans can benefit from getting some basic travel knowledge.

First, sign up for AAA (if you are from the USA) and if you are old enough (50 & from the USA) AARP. You get good discounts and extras which if you travel even reasonably often more than pay for membership fees.

Second, and this requires decent credit, get into the mileage game.  I will offer some extra thoughts later, but plenty of advice can be gotten from: www.thepointsguy.com, www.millionmilesecrets.com and travelsort.com. If you want to see the world these sites help.

Mind you, I prefer to use miles exclusively for business class international air travel. The hassle to get a free ticket in coach isn't worth it to me. Esp. if the flight is less than say four hours.  But if you want to go to Asia,  the Pacific,  Africa or Australia,  a seat you can truly sleep in makes a huge difference.  Forget the "snob" appeal, it is great to hit the road as rested as possible.  A tall order on a 12 to 18 hour flight in coach.

Anyhow,  there is a start. A little homework goes a long way.

Good luck and safe travels! 

More Elk, CA photos. ..

Let the images inform you....

Northern California - Elk

When I book travel for an area that is a bit "off the grid", there is a certain degree of skepticism that floats around in my head.

Nonetheless,  Elk sounded sufficiently interesting so off we went. Our accommodation ended up being the Elk Cove Lodge.  Fantastic.  As is the area.

To me you get the Big Sur experience and views without the throngs of traffic. The downside is that your dining and accommodation options dwindle considerably.  To me, well worth the trade. But everyone has their own personal preferences.

Enjoy!

Mount Rainier

A fantastic final day on our west coast tour of the USA.  Magnificent.

Back with my friendly Android....

With the ability to post smaller notes (not quite of Twitter constraints) perhaps we shall stumble forward with the blog. Facebook remains in the rear view mirror.  Too much for my personal taste.  Obviously a minority opinion.  And so we begin.

Currently renting a house that I sold four years ago.  Still love it. Though love renting it much more than owning it.

Nestled in the archipelago outside Stockholm it is in an idyllic natural setting.  Plenty of walking swimming and wandering in the woods. 

A nice start to seeing the kids for the summer.  We have plenty of memories here. Now we have a week to create even more.

Bye bye Facebook!

It is unquestionably more difficult to maintain this site than Facebook. But the rules and regs have just become a pain in the ass. In addition, there are numerous limitations, both in post lengths and rights that I find objectionable. Then again I have never been a fan of being "hemmed in".

Will keep my account to direct people here. But that's about it.

 In hotel lobby in Mauritius....

In Green Park, London 

Paxton and Whitfield in London. Heaven on earth for cheese lovers.

Me. Being silly in London...

Birthday in Sweden. Custom made shirt from kids. Awesome gift.  

Does the man make the sombrero or the sombrero make the man?

    

Sunset from out terrace in Wroclaw....lovely.

Lola and I in our hotel in Poznan. A gem of a city.

Yet another stunning sunset from our rooftop terrace.

Sylwia's 85 year old grandfather. Former Polish soldier, and survivor of Siberian gulag. If she dumps me, this dude is going to be my wing man. :-)

Prague

Last month my very good friend Steve and I descended upon Prague to celebrate his 50th birthday. It was widely expected to be a long weekend of incessant liver damaging behavior. While we did happen upon that periodically in our agenda, we spent a tremendous amount of time in museums, cultural exhibits and even a couple of chamber music concerts (which I was prescient enough to photograph to provide evidence to unbelievers).

For those who have never been - GO! Prague is truly a treasure. My one caveat - go in the winter if possible. It was still somewhat busy, but having previously visited in October when it was measurably busier, I imagine summer is pretty unbearably crowded.

In any event, here are a few photos to give you some flavor of the city.

More Skiing

This time we stuck to photos since the previously posted movie hasn't worked out as planned. The trip was to a Swedish ski resort called Salen, right next to the Norwegian border. Swedish resorts are at all like those in the U.S. or Canada. Not nearly as glossy, nor luxurious. However, they are much much more child-friendly. You can let your kids roam around, which is the norm.

This particular resort features a long green slope roughly translated into the "Troll Path". There are a variety of amusing wooden sculptures with sounds effects etc. The photo of the kids is in front of a troll in an outhouse. Given all kids seeming obsession with all things "toilet" this was a big hit with the crowds of youngsters.

On an unrelated note, Sofia and I were able to enjoy several lovely meals in the restaurant attached to the building our apartment was situated in. We'd sit down with the kids as they plowed through their buffet meal, after which we were able to calmly nibble away at various gourmet dishes on offer.

All in all a relaxing week.

Enough Waiting....the blog is back

It has been a while. Primarily because we've been running around like maniacs. Anyhow, to kick things off I've managed to edit some of our video footage from early January into a single movie. Then put it onto youtube.com, and pasted the related html code here so you can have a look.

It should actually be working now.

Sailing...

In between Greece and Wales the kids spent a week, for their second year, in sailing camp. They really enjoyed it, and while I don't think they have become exactly sea worthy they're certainly far ahead of any nautical aspirations I may have had in my youth. The only boating I did as a kid involved a 6' boat and a pair of oars.

Alex is clearly enjoying the best part of sailing camp - the ice cream they give them when they graduate.

Surf's Up - IN WALES!

After Crete we briefly returned to Stockholm to enjoy some of the fantastic weather which was a fairly steady phenomena all across Sweden through June, July and most of August. But duty called upon us to venture to Wales for a visit to our new "caravan" and some surfing.

The location we operate from is on the Gower Penisula, which just celebrated its 50th anniversary as the first place in the UK to be named a place of outstanding beauty. While some of the photos may not adequately convey its splendor, I assure you it is breathtaking.

The first photo, as you may have guessed, is the controversial "caravan". Also known as the trailer, that thing, and a host of unmentionables, it served us well during our two weeks there.

The initial journey was the kids and myself, sans Sofia. After traveling to Heathrow, Paddington, and then Swansea we darted off in our rental car as my brain tried to again adjust to narrow lanes and being on what is frankly, the wrong side of the road.

The weather had been sunny until we got to Swansea were there was some cloud cover. But upon reaching the beginning of the Gower penisula, the rain began. So as I fumbled around looking for the windshield washers, face pressed next to the glass, dodging the occasional sheep and cow, enjoying the lively traffic hand gestures the Welsh give special enthusiasm to, I began to contemplate two rainy weeks in 400 square feet of aluminum with three energetic 6-year olds.

With this thought in mind, I pulled into a Tesco and filled a shopping cart with a startling quantity of beer, wine, cider, scotch and a random bottle of vodka. Nick Cage in "Leaving Las Vegas" would have been telling me to stop. Along the way I cheerily added a few frozen pizzas and snack with which to bribe my young tribal travel companions.

My arsenal thus acquired, I returned to the road for the final white-knuckled few miles. "Why white-knuckled"? you might ask. When the mirrors on either side of your car are within a few inches of the hedge, and encounters with surfers traveling rapidly in the opposite direction are frequent, the grip on the steering wheel approaches a force equal to the weight of the car squared, times the number of children screaming.

In spite of some interesting motorized physics experiments, we arrived, stirred but not shaken.

The rain continued to fall as I called Sofia, who at that junture was probably having to surpress her laughter with a large pillow. The weather in Sweden was great I was informed, and with that she wished me the best of times (Very cruel) and was off to enjoy her solitude. During a subsequent call to my Welsh friend Steve, I was encouraged to believe that the weather was, in fact, temporary. Given a dozen prior journeys to Wales, doubt was my constant companion.

Yet, in the morning the clouds had parted and the sun was shining. Blazing in fact. Once the kids were up and dressed I gave them a tour of the grounds. They loved the playground, the sand dunes, the beach and most of all the store at the top of the hill, and its endless supply of candy.

That afternoon we took an extended walk on the beach during which the kids tossed at least fifty starfish back into the water that had been washed ashore in a storm. When Erika ran up to me holding only a dismembered starfish leg; inquiring about its likely survival, I realized it was probably time to head home.

Showing that grit for which I am famous, I asked the kids if they wanted to go to the restaurant in the caravan park for pizza. They graciously agreed.

After our culinary outing, the kids settled in for a movie and I, in turn, for a beer. We were content.

The short version (for which I'm sure you're thankful) is that we had amazingly cloudless skies during the entire trip. Temperatures approached and breached records on several of the days we were there and we went through two bottles of sunblock inside of five days. Sofia arrived at the end of the first week and despite some initial misgivings ended up having a great time. We all enjoyed it so much that next year we are going for three weeks. Best of all - every one was consistently getting up on their surfboard by the time we left.

Amazing!

The balance of the photos...

2) Sunset from our patio
3) Erika and Alex enjoying one of the seemingly endless sand dunes
4) Dad showing the kids the finer points of billiards
5) Alex about to surf
6) Karl riding away

Off to Crete...

The day after the kids got out of school we jumped on a flight to Chania, Crete. None of us had been to Greece before so we were all very excited.

We arrived at almost 11pm, and since we were some distance from the airport, I arranged to have the rental car folks escort us to our rental house in Gavalohori. This ended up being a life saver as we had several miles of twisting and turning up and down hillsides until we got to our house.

When we arrived I was stunned. Generally rental homes which look nice online, look good when you get there, but there is always a mental depreciation calculation made beforehand to avoid being disappointed. This house was absolutely great. In addition, they really went the extra mile to look after us. If you are ever headed to this part of the world I recommend you check them out at www.eladin.gr.

Aside from the photo of the house:
1) The kids looking out at the beach and sea at Almirida. We snapped this while waiting for what ended up being among our best meals in Crete. There is a cautionary tale - in Crete, at least where we went, check out the restaurant before eating there. We found the quality of food and service to be highly variable.

2) The kids playing in the sand at Georgiopoulus. We spent three days at this beach, finding it a little more fun than Almirida, with more dining selections and more to do. Not that the kids noticed the difference much. Although, they do remember the first restaurant we went to and have spoken about it numerous times since. FWIW - there is a small restaurant right on the river (which runs into the sea from behind the beach). The restaurant looks cool and peaceful, which it is. However, the service can only be measured with a calendar, and the food was of a flavor and consistency that could be surpassed using a boiled stone. When your six-year old children tell you that the french fries are bad, there is a serious problem. On a positive note, we did find some lovely places just up the road along the boardwalk with excellent service and food.

3) This is another photo of the kids is from the beach at Georgiopoulus. An excellent beach with dramatic hills to the west and a clean river running diagonal to the beach and cutting across it to the sea. In the interest of doing something new and fun we got the kids inexpensive rafts that they used to float down the river into the sea (and then run back up and do it - again and again...)

All in all a great trip. One of the highlights, for which I could not get a decent photo, was a midsummer celebration they had in the village the final evening...

We were going out that evening to a taverna, where we had become friendly with the staff, one being an Aussie woman and the other a Swedish woman. Our kids had wanted to go there to play with their children. When we arrived to the town square they were building small fires in the road for the children to jump through (much safer than it may sound) as the adults looked on and listened to a small ensemble play Greek folk music feverishly in the background. The frenetic combination of the kids running around, the music, and a large dose of ouzo made for a magical experience. It was capped off with a midnight race up the very steep hill to our house, after which we all had a dip in the pool, dried off and promptly collapsed into our beds.

Speaking of "life" - I think we treasured ours much more after making a daylight trip back the airport. The twists and turns we so breezily sped through on our way to our village were all at the edges of steep unforgiving cliffs. Needless to say, our journey back took a little longer than our evening arrival.