Back to the Motherland

Well, I came back to Moscow on Tuesday via an overnight London. It was nice to break up the travel as I was coming from SF, however my bag didn't make it to London. This was a bit of a relief as I didn't want to haul it to the hotel and back the next day. However, they couldn't get it to London in time for my Moscow flight. Now this is where it gets annoying because in ANY other city, the airline would be responsible for delivering the bag to your house. But no, not in Moscow. You have to go to customs and declare your suitcase yourself. Super pain in the ass. Huge. However, it was helpful in getting over the jet lag as I went to get it Wednesday night and the whole process took 3.5 hours. If I had been at home, I'm sure I would have fallen asleep. And being tired, gave me the right level of stubborn cranky determination not to leave the airport without my bag. Bitches.

Oh, and the leaves are already changing and it's only 10 degrees C (50F) here. Fuckity.

Man, apparently I'm still cranky. At least my hair (and pillow and fingernails) is purple.

US Wrap Up

I had an incredible time in SF, seeing many of my friends. I spent the last 4 days with my "cooking" friend, a group that I met through the Cooking Light bulletin board years ago. We've been gathering once a year since 2002(?)! Kayaksoup arrived a day early and we had dinner with Joy! and Nate at Pizzaiolo. She did an amazing dinner write up on here on her blog.


Here's the whole gang. This year we had 2 new awesome additions and were said that a few regulars were unable to join us. I'm not quite sure what was said to crack us up, but there you go:



I'm not sure how well you can see it in the picture, but my hair is dyed purple! Yippee, back to funky colors for me.

On this trip, I also discovered that I'm not as much of a hippie as I used to be . I know, the horror. My dear friend Adam took me to Harbin, a hippie mecca for hot tubing nude. And for doing yoga nude. Having random bullshit conspiracy theory conversations ... nude. You get the picture. And while it was quite liberating to swim laps, yes, nude, I really could have used a pants cannon. That's all I'm saying.

Snorkeling in Honduras

Snorkeling in Honduras
Originally uploaded by Traveling Em

By far the best part of the cruise was visiting Isla de Roatan, Honduras. In the background is a ship wreck, likely from the 1970s, that we snorkeled around. I found us independent tours, this one we were a group of 11 snorkeling and saw no one else the rest of the day for about half the price of a ship tour. If you go on a cruise, do your research people!

PS - After this day even though I'd been wearing 30 spf, I ended up so burned on my shoulders and ass, that's right, I had an ass sun burn. And my poor tattoo. I used to have such a dark complexion, I guess that's what happens when you move to a sunless country.

In Miami

In Miami
Originally uploaded by Traveling Em

Well, I'm off the cruise and have been in Miami Beach the past two days with my sister. Here I am drinking a bellini at an awesome pizza place. I found us great pizza, empanadas and an awesome burger all off the main drag (thank god!)

My thoughts on Miami:
Almost everyone walks around without their shirts. I think it's tacky, but I'm getting more and more crumudgony as I get older. Thankfully about 80% of these topless people have six packs so it's nice people watching.

There are a disproportionately large number of Corvette drivers and gay men, they are not the same.

I saw them filming Burn Notice, eeeeeeee!!!!

It's definitely a multi-lingaul place, beyond just Spanish and English.

Overall, it's nice to visit, but I'm happy to be returning to my reality of San Francisco summers where almost everyone will have on not only shirts, but also likely sweaters.