Category Discover

Travel – self guided walking tours, TRY GPSmyCITY App

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GPSMYWALK AppI’m heading to Munich soon. While I have been there before, I was interested in exploring different areas of the city. As I researched places to see, I came across GPSmyCITY App, which offers self guided city walks.

I haven’t tried this yet, but I thought I would share it with you. It was a brilliant idea. Bypass normal tours and with this APP, do the walk yourself. On their website, they have different tutorials that teach you how to use the App, it seems easy. You can download different walks to use “off-line,” which was great, because my phone drains the battery very quickly and in Europe it is hard to find places to charge your phone.

They also offer articles on each city with the usual, i.e. best restaurants, cafes, museums, historical sites, products to buy, markets to visit, nightlife venues and more. They have self guided tours of 1,000+ locations all over the world.

The reviews for this App are mixed, some people love it, others don’t. Their location is out of Las Vegas. If anyone has heard of and/or used this App, let us know.

Happy touring!

Feeling hungry, look for the CUPCAKE truck in Chicago

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905F0F75-5893-4FB3-930D-252D005604A2Look what I found at lunch recently. “A.Sweets Girl,” cupcake truck. I asked the lady if I could take her picture, she was cute and smiled beautifully as you can see. Turns out the University had hired the cupcake truck to come at lunchtime and give FREE cupcakes to their post doctorate researchers as a “thank you” for hard work.

EAD00C2E-FD2D-46D3-9696-CA8CB6B8A2F4So, passerby’s got good photos, while researchers got their choice of cupcakes!  LOL

Anna Wu, founder and creator of “A.Sweets Girl,” is an experienced pastry chef who decided to bring her cupcakes to the streets of Chicago. Her truck is beautiful and easy to spot. She can be hired for events and supports a lot of community causes.

I’ll be on the lookout for her, so I can try one of her cupcakes. If you see me chasing after the truck, you’ll know it’s “Brilliant Viewpoint,” trying to get a cupcake, so I can do a follow up review!

Florence, Italy… Move over Starbucks, introducing “TSH Collab,” and “The Student Hotel”

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The Student HotelThis is a brilliant concept. Instead of going to Starbucks to get work done, you can now sign up for a membership with TSH Collab, which gives you access to different co-living, co-working spaces in different European cities (Florence, Amsterdam City, Amsterdam West, Dresden, The Hague, Maastricht, Rotterdam, and Vienna/Bologna (coming soon). Their mission is to give people a place to live, work, dine, workout and they say to swim. Sounds great, yes?

However, I think they missed the boat with name, “The Student Hotel,” because their business model welcomes more than just students. They also include travelers, expats, mobile entrepreneurs, and professionals. Unfortunately, for me, the word “student” is restrictive. Maybe by using the word student, they were referring to a clientele between 18-35 years old — not clear, but their business model is something ALL ages want.

Last year, I was in Florence for a few months, not as a tourist, but visiting relatives. I looked for a cafe where I could sit and get work done. Florence does not have coffee shops like we do in America, where you can just camp out for a few hours. Starbuck’s has not been allowed a location in Florence.

So, when I saw this TSH Collab on LinkedIn, it sparked my interest, especially since they are in Florence, where they will have two locations. They are working on the Belfiore location now.

Charlie MacGregor, is the Founder, his concept is fantastic. The funding is coming from an Amsterdam headquartered developer investor. While he says he includes travelers, expats, etc. he is really catering to a “younger student audience,” but maybe that will change, because Florence is a major tourist destination.

FOR SURE, when I am in Florence or any city where The Student Hotel is located, I want to visit, see what the hotel is about and see how it feels. If you happen to visit before me, let us know what you think.

Photography – oops, I’ve been caught…

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bird-on-rocks-1-e1568718773967.jpgThis was a funny and perfect photo. Beautifully captured; however, funny, because the Seagull was giving me a look like, “Hey, who said you could take my photo?”

And then a side angle. bird-on-rocks-2.jpgThe day was a bit gloomy, Fall is settling in. We both had the same intention and that was to enjoy the view of the Lake and the sound of the waves. It was a perfect day!

Writing inspiration from a storm…

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LightningLast night I heard thunder and saw lightening. As a child, when a storm came over Lake Michigan, we rushed outside the house to clear the leaves out of the drains, so there wouldn’t be a flood.

For a writer, a storm brings creativeness in a different way.  If you write, you know what I mean. We feel the need to hunker down, stay indoors and write whatever comes to mind. A storm allows deep emotions to come out in our characters.

I’m off to write. HOW will my character make it out of the…

You see, there are so many possibilities!

Why won’t my bus pass work?

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Yesterday, I was rushing to catch the train as usual.

I scanned my train card and tried to go through the turn style. Negative, the turn style was not moving. Once again, I scanned my train card, and tried to quickly pass through the turn style. AGAIN, it was not working. The night before I had added money to my card, so WHY wasn’t it working. I scanned the card “one more time,” and the turn style would not budge.

At this point, I had to move away from the turn style. It was embarrassing, all of the busy commuters looking irritated that I was “holding up the line.”

WHAT was the PROBLEM!

I looked at my train card…  It was NOT my train card. It was my devotional card for Saint Leopoldo of Padua. I visited his shrine in Italy a few years ago. He is known as the Saint who could heal you of your illness. At his shrine, there was a room full of photos that family members had sent of loved ones that they asked Saint Leopoldo to pray and heal them. He had a small room where he would hear people’s confessions. I bought this devotional card and always carry it with me.

So, I did have to SMILE!

This was Saint Leopoldo’s CLEVER way of telling me to slow down. Time for a trip to Padua and Abano Terme. For those of you who do not know, Abano Terme has hot springs and mud baths. People go here to rest and rejuvenate.

Sometimes in life, we need a SIGN to take care of ourselves!

Thank you, Saint Leopoldo. We have a three day holiday coming up, I will rest!

Attention Bloggers, “Are your posts being HARVESTED?”

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Taking articlesI was not surprised when I read Jo Hawk the Writer’s post “Attention Bloggers and Writers,” about a website that is harvesting Blogger’s posts. I encourage you to read her post, where fellow blogger, The Haunted Wordsmith, has been doing research to try and stop this copyright infringement.

Lately, I have had a variety of new Followers. While that seems great, I have gone to visit them only to find they are bogus sites. Many of them have 4 posts they created with photos that seem legit until you scroll down on their home page to see that they keep rotating those same 4 posts.

I did visit this site that The Haunted Wordsmith mentions, www.tygpress.com. I typed in my blog name with quotes around it. Sure enough, it appears like they created a specific section for my Blog’s articles. Of course, it is frustrating to see someone else creating a website based on other people’s written work without asking or telling us they are reblogging our posts.

Fighting this harvesting takes a lot of time and energy away from our main reason for Blogging, which is love of writing. Let’s see if they Blog this post!

A daisy –> He loves me, he loves me not!

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Lately, I’ve noticed that family, co-workers, strangers have been temperamental and on edge. Wasn’t there an eclipse lately? I don’t know much about astrology; however, sometimes it feels like there is a strong force taking place in the Universe making people super moody and setting us up for change in our lives. It’s very powerful, we KNOW when it is at work.

This week as I was dealing with a lot of temperamental people, I had a funny thought. As they were ranting and raving about their terrible life, others giving the cold shoulder, and a few just spewing angry thoughts, a DAISY popped in my mind.

As they were going on, I imagined myself with a vase full of daisys. For each person that was being mean or rude, rather than take on their anger, I “chose” to take a daisy out of my vase. For each petal I pulled off, I would say, “I love you, I love you not… I love you, I love you not…”

I was doing this in my mind while the person was ranting and raving. I found it to be very therapeutic, because I determined that when I got to the VERY LAST petal, THAT would determine whether I kept listening to this person OR politely terminated the hurtful conversation.

It worked! For the unhelpful Home Depot guy, he landed on a “love you not petal!” I politely moved on from him. For a family member, they got lucky, the petal landed on “love you,” so I listened longer. The clerk at the DMV got a “love you,” but a few people in line got a “love you not,” they were saying such mean comments about the clerk, angry that they had to stand in line. Finally, for the neighbor, they got a “love you NOT petal.” Same old dim conversation, nothing ever uplifting – I was DONE!

It’s amazing how we can change our day around with music, exercise, soulful thinking and just a great sense of humor. I could see Seinfeld having a field day with this topic. I miss that show!

Angry people, watch out, you are not ruining my day. I have a truck load of daisy’s to deal with YOU.

5K Mud Run in 90 degree temps

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Mud Run 1I did it! I survived my first 5K Mud Run in 90 degree temps. Run started at NOON hottest time of day — insane. I ran the course, did some of the obstacles, not all of them. See the medal I received.

Mud run 3Sorry, I don’t have good photos of me climbing structures, etc. I didn’t have a GoPro camera, plus at 90 degrees with face bright red from the heat, I was LUCKY to make it to the end. Seriously, I have fair skin, we don’t do well in hot weather, let alone at NOON. Picture me during the Victorian era, strolling the park with my fancy umbrella, that is where I needed to be from 12-2 pm. In Italy that is when they take a siesta.

Questions, “Is it hard and how muddy do you get?”

It’s hard if you are not in shape and have a fear of heights. I was surprised that they didn’t have that many obstacles. You had to run the course twice to make it a 5K. Muddy, it depends on if you are rambo and embracing the mud or like me avoided the truly muddy areas and walked around. Ok, do I deserve my medal? Yes, the 90 degree heat made up for the “few” obstacles I walked around.

Mud run 2There were a few obstacles, like this one (Pixabay.com stock photo), where you see the lady climbing the wall. If it is overly muddy and there are a ton of people, why there is a chance you could fall and hurt yourself.

However, if you are looking for a quick athletic challenge versus a hard to train for triathlon, this would do it! Lots of nice fun people.

BONUS – How can you resist adding a medal to your wall of fame?!