The week in travel: June 18, 2010

Things happened this week! Pertaining to the world of sports! I vaguely understand what they are! But let’s celebrate with horrible cakes!

The New York Times has a great little debate on why Americans just aren’t that into soccer …

I came to my own conclusions after watching part of the Italy/Portugal match. The reasons most Americans don’t care about soccer is this: soccer is very, very boring. And please, don’t tell me it’s not – the correct response from any soccer fan should be “and baseball isn’t?”

And they’d be 100% right. But baseball is a boring sport we’re familiar with.

Still, things could change – despite the fact that nothing happened during the game I saw, I learned something: I can get emotionally invested in anything. Anything. And right now? I’m invested in Italy. And maybe even the U.S. a little bit, too. Forza (red, white, and) Azzurri!

And apparently this dude is emotionally invested in something, too. Power to you, you brave, brave man.

In other news …

You’ve probably heard of the flight attendant who filled in for a sick first officer on a flight from San Francisco to Chicago earlier this week. Fortunately, the captain of the flight was not out-of-commission. And if he had been? Well … just check out Slate’s Explainer column on whether someone can be talked through landing a jumbo jet.

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Who knew the peanut lobby was so powerful? The Department of Transportation is considering banning peanuts from planes, as they can be hazardous or potentially fatal to people with allergies. The last time they considered doing so? Congress responded by threatening to cut their funding. (Salon’s Ask the Pilot)

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Eiffel Tower + sunny day + 8mm camera = WHOA.

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Crack open your “HOLY CRAP THAT’S HORRIFYING!” files for this next one, folks: Apparently Southwest Airlines workers intercepted (and later turned over to police) three rubber totes full of human heads at an Arkansas airport. I understand that weird stuff gets flown around the world all the time – and the heads were headed (heh heh) to a medical research facility. As weird as it sounds, that all makes a lot of sense. What creeps me out is that the heads were traced back to someone’s personal residence. Eeep.

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I have a morbid fascination with ghost stories. And with ghosts stories at sea. (I just read that article before going to bed, and I wonder why I have trouble sleeping.)

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Apparently the city of Lerici is just like the Cinque Terra, minus the tourists. Or, at least, it was before The New York Times did a huge spread about it … now? It’s just like the Cinque Terra. Sigh.

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Congrats to my very good friends who just became parents for the very first time this week. Hopefully, in a few years, your kid will be able to boogie like this. In the meantime check out  Shit My Kids Ruined.

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And since it almost, almost looks sunny out, I’m going to go enjoy the weekend. Have a good one.