TODAY'S RAMBLINGS

Sure, we're in Houston having a crazy time, but why not throw some cold water on your vacation planning? 

I'd like to share the contents of Fodor's No List 2023.  This is the travel website and publisher's annual attempt at discouraging visits to fragile and typically, over-loved, travel destinations.

We've visited a few of the places listed, and I concur they could use a break.  Fodor's assigned each location to one of 3 categories, all of which I present - with an occasional pithy comment - below.  The pictures are from our own visit to the locale in question.

Places Of Natural Beauty That Need Time To Heal

• Normandy Coast (France)
• Calanques National Park (France)
• Lake Tahoe (USA)
  • OMFG yes - there have been not one, but two other giant articles on how Tahoe has been loved to a state of ruin
    • ‘Lake Tahoe has a people problem’: how a resort town became unlivable | The Guardian
    • Tahoe’s epic ski traffic is annoying everyone | The San Francisco Chronicle

• Antarctica

• Venice (Italy)
  • You haven't lived until 7 cruise ships arrive within hours of each other and between 50,000 and 80,000 daytrippers break out the selfie sticks and permeate most every nook and cranny of town; with that said, our visit is still among our best vacation memories

• Amalfi Coast (Italy)
• Cornwall (England)
• Amsterdam (Netherlands)
  • This breaks my heart as it is on our Mount Rushmore of cities in the world
  • In fact, in many ways, Amsterdam is SF managed rationally

• Thailand
  • The entire country?
  • I will await more dispatches on this subject from our reporters presently scouring SE Asia, Arthur and Mrs. Crup

• Maui (USA)
  • Damn - just as my Hawaii jones is peaking

• Rhine River Watershed (Germany)
• Danube River Watershed (Europe)
  • I'll say this:  if you can stomach the politics, Budapest is just a flat-out amazing city - frankly, one of our favorites, Viktor Orbán be damned

• Lake Powell (USA)
  • This is a big Debbie Downer because we've always wanted to go back - our luxury houseboating trip here in 1997 remains an all-timer
• Lake Mead (USA)
• Mendocino (USA)
  • Don't go - no, really don't
  • At least not any time but off- or shoulder-season

• Utah (USA)
  • Like Thailand, it seems a bit drastic to discourage travel to an entire state - but they have a truly big water problem
  • Oh, yeah, and The Great Salt Lake could end up poisoning everyone as it evaporates and its arsenic dust goes . . . everywhere 

But what if you actually are planning a vacation?  Maybe go somewhere else?

Like here.

Or an Adler Resort.  Either way, you'll be just fine.

FROM THE UNWASHED MASSES

Great post on The Rolling Stones.
 
Tattoo You was the first "rock" album I remember getting as a birthday present from a friend when I was 11.  The only time I saw them live was in 1989 at the now-gone Shea Stadium on the Steel Wheels tour.  I went with some friends from college because we all thought "Hey, they're really old and this may be the last time they tour".

Arena shows have become a thing of the past for me.  My last one was Pearl Jam last year, and only because 1) it was Pearl Jam and 2) I actually got decent seats for $110 each.  I registered for tickets to see Springsteen in December at the Chase Center and that only got me an opportunity to buy resale tickets through Ticketmaster, where the cheapest tickets were $400 each.  Who the hell is paying these kinds of prices to see a concert? 

Pretty cool arrangement of one of my favorite title songs of the franchise.

KLUF

Here, on one of a string of albums that captures the mid-century zeitgeist just so, is Quincy Jones and the Textbook Around the World.

This is only the second time an album from what I deem his golden age has been played here on KLUF.  Here is most of my library of his albums, including the one above, for those that wish to dig deeper.  

Each is a cool scene, man . . .