Fred and Valerie

J.K. Rowling’s The Tales of Beedle the Bard was a very quick read and was a nice compliment to the 7-book Harry Potter series. The tales played a large role in Book 7 of the series and reading them now makes me want to go back and re-read the entire Harry Potter series. I’ll do it some day; just not right now.

Next Up: Profiles in Courage by John F. Kennedy

Steve Olson’s Count Down: The Race for Beautiful Solutions at the International Mathematical Olympiad is a great story about many different aspects of mathematics. Using the competition as a backdrop, Olson talks about topics such as the difference between how math is taught in East Asia versus how it is taught in the United States. He also takes on the ideas of genes versus experience and the lack of females in mathematics competitions such as the International Mathematical Olympiad.

Overall, it’s a great book and was a fast read. As someone who always enjoyed math, but found many of the teaching methods used in school to be a bit stiffling, I thoroughly enjoyed Olson’s stories.

Next Up: J.K. Rowling’s The Tales of Beedle the Bard

Stuarts Draft got Streetviewed!

Granted, you can’t quite visit our neighborhood yet, but it’s funny that Stuarts Draft got Streetviewed, just like it got Comcast HD, before Charlottesville.

I made sure to take plenty of panoramic-friendly photographs during our most recent Mediterranean vacation and ended up with seven panoramics worth of posting. Enjoy!

• November 21, 2008 – La Sagrada Familia, Barcelona, Spain
• November 23, 2008 – Monte Carlo, Monaco
• November 24, 2008 – Piazza dell’Anfiteatro, Lucca, Italy
• November 25, 2008 – Trevi Fountain, Rome, Italy
• November 26, 2008 – Ercolano (Herculaneum), Italy
• November 27, 2008 – Palermo, Italy
• November 27, 2008 – Promenade, Voyager of the Seas, Royal Caribbean

I actually finished Phil Doran’s The Reluctant Tuscan: How I Discovered My Inner Italian while we were on our Mediterranean vacation. Doran’s story is how I imagine most Americans would react to Italian life: shock at first, with a slow realization that it’s quite a relaxing way to live.

Doran and his wife settled down somewhere in the Tuscan region of Italy and we had the opportunity to visit Livorno, Pisa, and Lucca, all near the region, while we were on vacation. After visiting the area for the second time — we also visited during our Honeymoon cruise — it’s no small wonder how Doran and his wife fell in love with the area and decided to call it home.

The Reluctant Tuscan is a must-read for anybody who has visited Italy and didn’t really feel like leaving.

Next Up: Count Down: The Race for Beautiful Solutions at the International Mathematical Olympiad

We’re back home from our vacation cruise to the Mediterranean and we’re both home sick (not homesick). Valerie caught the cold first, about halfway through the trip, but it wasn’t too bad until the end. Thankfully, I didn’t catch it until the last night, but we’re both now full-blown sick.

All in all, we had a great trip and can’t wait to travel abroad again. Next time, hopefully with less sickness.