Rome-ing

I used this particular Moleskine and a smaller, softcover variant on the trip to Rome. It was the same one I used in London a while back and the same one I used at last year's TIFF festival. I travel with a Moleskine mainly because they're indestructible and fast and only partly because they're cool. They're also efficient: little elastic-y bit keeps loose bits of paper tucked neatly in there, and the sewn-in bookmark brings me instantly to where I need to be.

I used them a lot both during the conferences I was there to cover and to keep track of various thoughts. It was pen and paper, text only. Blazingly fast. I can't even imagine trying to do what I did over there with an iPhone. All that shuttling between applications? Typing with one finger?

No thanks.

Moleskine, baby.

Moleskine.

So, herewith are some of those scribbles thus rendered into the not not nearly as elegant HTML. I can't call them "random," as they're all to do with Rome and my experiences there, but I'm not going to force them into a narrative. Make of that what you will. 

Here goes:

• Nuns on the subway! Nuns on the subway! DA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA Nuns on the subway!
• Raphael - sad eyes looking straight at you through the centuries.
• Writing human stories in the skies. Try to understand it all.
• Even cappucino in a plastic cup tastes better after a trip to the Sistine Chapel.
• Anyone who thought "Inferno" was a work of ficition has never had to travel in Rome by subway.
• I like Coke cans in Italy. They're tall and skinny. Just like me!
• A4. Fucking hell. How can paper be sexy? Well, it is based on the Golden Section, so there.
• It's not that these clothes are "nicer" than what we can buy in Canada. It's like they're woven from some alternate, parallel strand of fashion DNA. 
• I've finally found a way to wear this shirt that doesn't make me regret buying it.
• Europeans have mastered the art of "fall out of bed" sexy. In Canada we just look sloppy.
• Oh, cool - there's one of those spring water fountains. Fuck. Why did I throw out my water bottle?
• Dr. Myerson, I presume?
• Projecting the appearance of competence will take you nearly as far as the real thing. 
• This is my gift to you. Soon I will be gone. Too soon, they will write. What will you leave for them to remember you by?
• I miss ambient coffee.
• In Europe, work never seems the most important thing. Especially at work.
• Why is he playing "El Condor Pasa?"
• Ok. Now I'm hungry.
• Rome is a great locale to help you understand the new world of business. It's noisy, it's crowded, everybody's moving in every direction at once, you're getting bumped from all sides and nothing makes any sense.
• I think i've consumed enough carbs to last the rest of this and at least two subsequent decades.
• Why yes, I'll have the tiramisu.
• Oh Fiat, Oh Peugeot, when are you coming to visit our streets?

More coming, but this was a start.