NYC ... Beauty in Concrete and Marble, Part 2

  West 56th St.  Home of Joe G's Italian ristorante.  Some reviews hold it's a mediocre place to dine... For us?  A great little basement eatery with comfortable seating, small menu, good food and great service.  It's become a tradition for us to eat there every time we visit the City overnight.  We get off the train at Grand Central Terminal, walk 15 minutes to our modest timeshare at the Manhattan Club(drop an email if you want more info on this), check in, drop our bags in our quaint Metro Suite and mosey west to Joe G's between 7th and 8th avenues.  If they have the artichoke appetizer as a special, GET IT!  Also order the tomato, basil and buffalo mozzarella with balsamic!
 

View North from the Top of the Rock. Though we've been here,  I borrowed the pic from 

Pam Skillings; former About.com guide.  Thank you Pam!  God bless you

 and your growing family and business!

NYC ... Beauty in Concrete and Marble, Part 1

  Now, I know many are reluctant to leave the world with which they're comfortable, travel to distant lands and observe the folks who live there... maybe even (yikes!) interact with the locals!
  It is scary to think that we might not understand signage,

 misinterpret gestures... fail to grasp the message yelled at us from a behind-schedule city bus driver...
  So, THIS guy        ------------->
He actually knows the language, but, as we can see, the words are blurry...  Understood.

What road are you walking down?

"There will always be a part, and always a very large part of every community, that have no care but for themselves, and whose care for themselves reaches little further than impatience of immediate pain, and eagerness for the nearest good."   Samuel Johnson

Montana at Christmas; and the Elk are amazing

One of the last things I remember was singing 'Play me Some Mountain Music'.

That was New Years Eve 2004.  The end of our week in Montana.  I drank a lot that night.  I'd like to say it was the last time, but it took 5 more years of binge and solitary drinking before I finally hit my bottom, got on my knees and asked God for help.  Been sober since.  Awesome God!

I left off with Christmas stockings last time...  We landed in Kalispell, MT on Christmas Eve.  'Close to midnight' is a time of day we would generally arrive at our destination for every trip we took for the next 8 years!  A tradition I hope we keep!  Here's why:

Step two... Part two

     As this post is mine...I reserve the right to digress on this post from my normal soliloquy...    

Step two to learning to travel like a pro

     Our tour of Italy would NOT have been complete without our Italian tour guide, Elisabetta and our tour bus driver, Biagio.  Biagio didn't say a word the entire two weeks.  Elisabetta spoke plenty for both of them. Each morning after breakfast, we 36 Tourists boarded the bus and waited for number 37... My lovely bride.

step one to learning how to travel like a pro

     On our honeymoon, my wife and I decided to go to Italy.  So, we stopped at the local travel brick and mortar establishment and chatted with a very knowledgeable woman about our plan.  Our plan consisted of one thing... Go to Italy!