Next Option: Shall I Go Eat Some Cats? (1)

The affordable pocket Hadrian's Wall tour having been cancelled, and
with it my vague plans for being in the UK for my 50th birthday, I now
have to make a rapid decision regarding another trip which I had
initially rejected for being in the teeth of a Mercury Retrograde: an
easy cycling tour of the Veneto with First Light, circling out of
Vicenza. The tour takes in Treviso, Mestre, Bassano del Grappa and
offers the possibility of a day-trip into Venice, undoubtedly riddled
with tourists at this time of year and not the main attraction to the
spoiled brat who had been there and done that by the age of 12.

http://www.firstlightbicycling.com/tourDays.php?tour=24

A positive use of a Merc Rx could be a return to a place that has
previously figured in one's life. I suppose that could mean Milan, my
home base in my teen and university years, since that seems to be the
focus of Easyjet's air connections from Paris. In fact, I have not been
in Italy since my mother's death in 1986. There are many places that
could do with a revisit, but the main one would be Piazza Sgarallino Uno
in Livorno, where I spent my childhood summers at my grandmother's home,
though all my links to the place died years ago. I am also haunted by
childhood culinary memories of a restaurant called Oscar's in Livorno.
The restaurant is still there, but I do not know whether they still do
my birthday menu, gnocchi alla bava, calamari fritti and il famoso dolce
di Oscar, ladled with Alkermes and topped with crumbled meringue. (I
suppose I could always phone and find out...) I will be hampered by
Flyzipper, who when he is not under me is an extremely cumbersome and
stealable piece of luggage, so I may not be able to move around too much
outside of the tour. I will also have to worry about his propensity to
blow inner tubes and about all the usual transport difficulties which
can attend Merc Rx, and could make Livorno impractical.

(1)How does my father's little rhyme about the peoples of the Veneto go?
Padovani, gran dottori
Veneziani, gran signori
Vicentini, maniagatti
Veronesi, tutti matti

Paduans are great scholars,
Venetians are great lords,
In Vicenza they eat cats,
In Verona they're all nuts

(needless to say my branch of Rosellis are from Verona)

EFR
Ile de France

You've got to love the Italians, they've got a word for "eat some cats"
!

In uk.rec.cycling Artemisia wrote:

The affordable pocket Hadrian's Wall tour having been cancelled, and
with it my vague plans for being in the UK for my 50th birthday, I now
have to make a rapid decision regarding another trip which I had
initially rejected for being in the teeth of a Mercury Retrograde: an
easy cycling tour of the Veneto with First Light, circling out of
Vicenza. The tour takes in Treviso, Mestre, Bassano del Grappa and
offers the possibility of a day-trip into Venice, undoubtedly riddled
with tourists at this time of year and not the main attraction to the
spoiled brat who had been there and done that by the age of 12.

http://www.firstlightbicycling.com/tourDays.php?tour=24

A positive use of a Merc Rx could be a return to a place that has
previously figured in one's life.

Have you found the negative use of a retro Mercury to be unwise in
practice, or are you just following the textbooks?

--
Chris Malcolm +44 (0)131 651 3445 DoD #205
IPAB, Informatics, JCMB, King's Buildings, Edinburgh, EH9 3JZ, UK
[http://www.dai.ed.ac.uk/homes/cam/]

Chris Malcolm wrote:
In uk.rec.cycling Artemisia wrote:

Have you found the negative use of a retro Mercury to be unwise in
practice, or are you just following the textbooks?

I've found it to be a major hindrance by experience. Other factors being
positive it won't ruin a holiday, but it can seriously obstruct anything
having to do with biking (wheels blow, the LBS is closed and you can't
get anything fixed, the rented bike is murderously uncomfortable, the
weather hurls hailstones at you every time you go out, you lose biking
skills and confidence that you previously had, etc., etc.) It also
brings things like transport strikes, delays, missed connections, lost
luggage and lost correspondence.

EFR
Ile de France