fun with maps

This map has 4 places marked: Grand Canyon, Boulder CO, Chicago, and Baton Rouge. Which trip do you think is less miles? Which is faster?


Here are the routes mapped:


It appears those pesky Rocky Mountains make that southwest trip a pain in the ass. So what's the verdict?


Well it is closer (by miles) to go from Boulder, CO to the Grand Canynon, but it will take you less time to drive from Chicago to Baton Rouge.

But what if you went on foot?


Walking to the Grand Canyon shaves off over 1/4 of the miles! And it only takes 9 days of walking. Awesome. Though it might be missing some pedestrian paths.

Walking to Louisiana doesn't cut down on that many miles, and now to the increased distance, walking takes considerably longer. Though honestly, if I had to walk either of these routes, I think I would chose the Midwest over walking through the Rockies.

- - -

The inspiration for this post was me hearing about a co-worker's vacation to the Grand Canyon, and my disappointment of how far it was from Boulder, a possible future home.

Original Chicago

So while reading about the new CTA expansion plans, I stumbled across the mention of a Block 37 in Chicago. I wasn't sure if this was a restaurant, an actual block, or a cool developer shorthand for an area like how the condos at Randolph and Des Plaines are marketed as R+D Condos.

Anyways, a little digging turned up this super helpful map.

It shows the original plan for Chicago including 58 numbered city blocks. I typically think of city blocks as being one side of a street, say between Grand and Illinois on State. But it makes more sense when you see this type of map, that they literally are blocks, or squares.

Also, I never really stopped to think about when the cities were laid out, but always thought it was sort of cliche that every town/city has streets named after old Presidents. Well, when you're laying out a city in 1830, I suppose Jefferson, Washington, Madison makes a lot of sense.

Update: Another thing that this map explains, is why State and Madison is the center of the numbering grid system, 0 W, 0 N.

So because I like to do this sort of thing, I made a google map that shows the Original Chicago blocks in blue, along with the current Loop. I assumed there would have been more overlap. Interesting, anyways.


Also, Wacker...not an original street name.

The Panini of a Lifetime

That really is the caption of our 12-day trip to Italy. It almost makes me want to change this site to Panini Central. Almost.

We woke up around noon on Saturday, March 7 in Firenze. We strolled through the street markets buying scarves and ties and necklaces. And then we were ready for lunch. In my internet research I saw that one person said they the best sandwich of their life was in Florence. So of course, I wrote it down and mapped it out.

We walked past the Duomo in the center of town and turned down an alley that isn't marked on any map of Florence. And there it was. L'Antico Noè. (Which I just translated to "the ancient Noah")


When we arrived the line was a bit longer than it is in this picture. On the right wall there is a menu posted of 22 pre-made sandwiches but it seems that people in the know just custom order their own.

So I ordered sausage, spicy salami and provolone in Italian (salsiccia, salame piccante e provolone). Brit got the caprese (tomatoes and mozzeralla) but added spinach.

The first thing he does is slices off some pieces of sausage and puts it on the panini press. Then he grabs this huge chunk of salami and provolone and puts in a slicer, fresh made to order. He then slices a crusty piece of bread down the middle, assembles the sandwich, and put in the press for a good couple minutes. Here's what 2/3 of it looks like.

It was amazing! I've never tasted anything this fresh, this bursting with flavor. Just big, bold taste. It was obvious that the ingredients were local, and so fresh that you just can't get anything like it in the States.

It was so good we went back on Sunday. Only to find shut doors. It seems that a lot of stuff is closed in Italy on Sundays. I guess between football and Church who has time to work?

So Monday was our 4th and last day in Florence, and we had to make it count. Last chance. This time I added peperoni (red peppers) to my previous order, which took it to another level. Also, this day they had round bread. This truly was THE PANINO OF A LIFETIME.


So now you know where to go to get the best sandwich in the world.

L'Antico Noè
Volta di San Piero 6r
Firenze
Tel. 055 234 0838
Closed Sun (and for several weeks in August)

How To Get There

Start at the SE corner of the Duomo and walk east down Oriuolo. San Piero isn't on any maps, so I've placed it in green on this custom map.

Reality from Wasilla Main Street

"I think we need a little bit of reality from Wasilla Main Street there, brought to Washington, D.C."—Sarah Palin during the VP Debate, Oct. 2, 2008

I was skeptical that there even was a Main Street in Wasilla, but sure enough, there it is. In fact, there's three whole blocks of Main Street, before it turns into Wasilla Fishhook Road on one end and Knik Goose Bay Road on the other.


So what kind of "reality" as she put it, is she going to bring from Main Street in Wasilla. Since apparently Google Streetview hasn't had a chance to make it's way up there, I'm relying on Yelp and Google Maps to find out what's really on Main Street.

Of course, there's the A-1 Pawn Shop.

It doesn't get more real than Donut King.

You can't forget about Christina's Boutique.

There's the trusted services of Mullett Craig DDS.

My personal favorite is Flakey's Wake & Bakery.

But the one that I think will prove to be most helpful, especially with in this economic downturn, is the cleverly named Business Computer Solutions.

I sincerely hope that Sarah Palin is able to log on to the Wasilla computer and download some business computer solutions and bring them to the White House! Because if there's one thing that Washington, D.C. needs to run more efficiently, it's pawn shops, donuts, and places to wake & bake.

Living on the Tube

The Tube is the way to get around London. In fact, in five days we rode the Tube 21 times, plus once more on Saturday leaving London. The colored lines are places that we've traveled.


*the colors have been preserved, except for the Jubilee line which is gray, and wouldn't have shown up on the map.

Stats
22 trips
7 of those 22 included a transfer, for a total of 29 lines

By Line
Piccadilly Line: 16
Central: 4
Jubilee: 4
Circle: 3
Victoria: 1
Metropolitan: 1

Our hotel and Heathrow was on the Piccadilly line so it got us around the most. Abbey Road required a round trip on the Jubilee Line. We ended up using 6 out of the 12 lines in less than a week.

Last day in London

I'm flying back tomorrow. Of course, I'm writing this the day before I fly forward. Weird.

Since I don't have much to add, here's a map of where Ludacris has hoes.