Woke up at 8:30am. I think I'm caught up on sleep now.
I took my first dump in three days. I jotted down descriptions of it, but they're so profound and disgusting that decorum prohibits listing them here. (LG, I don't know what you'll enjoy more here--the Neidermeyer quote or the fact that I'm keeping this travelogue relatively doodie-free.) A cleaning lady walked in on my defecation--I hadn't figured out how to work the latch, but the door was closed, so she should have known better. Good thing there was no shrinkage. (I'm just going overboard with the Seinfeld stuff now. Christle, you really need to have this whole thing translated for you.)
This was a cooler day, and for the first time I went out in jeans and with an umbrella. The others told me there was a violent thunderstorm last night that I apparently slept through.
In the end only Jung and Cristy went to Mostar. Buz, Mary Tod and Ruth were somewhat ill. The rest of us went for coffee in the Turkish quarter, in a nice courtyard that I couldn't get a good photo of. I had Coke instead of coffee...it may be Bosnian coffee, but it's still coffee. Same reason I won't eat the Queen's turd. It may be the finest turd in the world, but it's still a turd. The topic of sleep came up and Jeremy cited Da Vinci's strategy of 20-minute naps. I reminded him that Kramer proved that strategy wrong. I should have said that he debunked it. I did make direct mention of Putro's Law: Everything that happens in real life happened on Seinfeld.
After coffee, Gorana went to the Internet cafe, a few people vanished into thin air, and 7 of us continued shopping in the Turkish quarter. Until Jeremy and Hiedi also vanished, and then there were 5. We went back to that coffee courtyard and looked at Persian rugs. Sue was utterly fascinated by them, and took up much of a salesman's time when we all knew she wasn't going to shell out 14,000 KM (US$9,800 or €7,100) for one specimen. We found a spot for lunch and I had cevapi again. After that we ran into Jeremy and Hiedi in the bazaar and got ice cream on their recommendation. Then we all split up.
I returned to the pension to get my jacket, and to post a note about our plan to convene at 7pm to go to dinner at the brewery. I saw Gorana and told her of the plan; she said she'd probably meet us there.
Observation: It's hard to mix with the locals on this trip because of the demographics of the group. There's not much of a group desire to go to bars at night, with Charles being the only single guy other than me, and presumably he's on a bit of a leash anyway.
I went back out to the nearest Internet cafe on the other side of the river. My Boners had finally moved back into a tie for 4th (the money spot) Wednesday night, and were 1 point out Friday night. I replaced Eric Stults who had been pulled from the Dodgers' rotation and noted that Michael Barrett was coming off the DL tomorrow. This is why I check up on my team every couple days when I'm travelling--there are time-sensitive things I need to be aware of, lest I lose ground. I remained neck and neck with The Untouchables and Bang Bros despite not paying daily attention to my team, so that means I'm probably in reality better than those guys. (As I type this on Sep 14 I'm 6 points out of 4th behind The Untouchables, after being at least 11 points out earlier in the day. There's surprising movement in these final weeks of the season.)
I returned to the old town, to the Catholic church where the family with the bike boy first harassed us, and sat out and had some beers. I took advantage of the time to organize my stuff. A beggar girl came to my table. When I wouldn't give her money, she asked for my beer. After two 1/2-L beers (none of which I gave to the precocious little cunt) I walked back to the pension. Along the way I saw that the bumper cars near the pension were in operation. The ozone smell reminded me of summers on the Jersey Shore, and Jersey Girl crept back into my head. Down the shore, everything's all right. And this was Labor Day weekend, so if I couldn't be in Ocean City or Wildwood, at least I was on vacation somewhere.
Past the bumper cars, continuing toward the pension, was Skenderija Centre. This was built in 1969 and expanded prior to the 1984 Winter Olympics. There are a few buildings in the complex and I think it housed the media and the ice-skating competition...I'm having trouble deriving information from the English version of the web site.
Skenderija mostly survived the Serbian bombing (I think a youth center caught fire) but the exterior has fallen into disrepair due to lack of upkeep.
All of the group left to go to dinner at the Sarajevsko brewery, except Buz and Mary Tod who had eaten there earlier in the day, and Gorana who joined us in progress. Music was awesome here...I heard 5 George Michael/Wham! songs in the first 1.5 hours, including the version of Freedom with the trumpets (the Wham! song, not his solo Freedom '90 thing). I had curry chicken for dinner and two full litres of Sarajevsko (one dark, one unfiltered). So good they drove me to the turlet for a followup to the morning's activity.
Most of the group at dinner. Ruth, Veronica, Charles, Cristy, Hiedi, Jeremy, Sue, Jen, Jung.
On the way back to the pension, Jen and I discussed Internet dating, which I and some people she knows have been trying. We talked about honesty in ads and she said I'm an attractive guy so I don't have to lie (thank you), and I mention this only because of the ad I saw yesterday (as I type this Sep 14, so the 13th) in which a girl blatantly lied and said her status was "Never Married". You know who you are. And someone else who's reading this knows who you are, except he doesn't know. And a few other people know what these cryptic comments mean and are chuckling as they read them. Jen also thought I shouldn't mention my libertarianism and atheism since it probably turns off a lot of girls, which was sort of my intention (i.e. weed out the problem girls before the first date), but I've been thinking of changing my strategy. Those advanced concepts may be too intimidating.
On the same topic, as we walked we saw a kitten, who was friendly enough that I was able to pick him up and then gently set him down. I noted that this was the only pussy I was able to pick up on the entire trip.
We got back to the hotel at 11pm. I chatted with the grandson and an Aussie guy who was staying at the pension. They both said Croatian girls were even hotter than what we'd seen so far. Went back to the room, took a horrible dump, showered and went to bed around midnight.