Sinterklaas is coming!

Instead of Santa Claus the Austrians have Sinterklaas with an evil twist. Through the first week of December children leave their shoes out and Sinterklaas comes and leaves candy for them. On December 5th, Saint Nicholas' Eve, Sinterklaas leaves a present for all the good children. Now here's were it goes a little evil, if you were a bad boy or girl, Sinterklaas' helper, Black Pete will snatch you up and take you back to Spain where Sinterklaas lives during the rest of the year. It's one thing to tell your kid that they'd be getting a lump of coal for Christmas but it's another to tell them they will be spirited away by Black Pete. Even worse Black Pete has a slightly demonic look to him. They had Black Pete's roaming around last night in the city and I was creeped out as an adult I can only imagine what that would be like for a kid to see. I guess I was a good girl this year as there was candy on my door this morning at the hotel and I didn't get any visits by Black Pete last night.

Anyway, I'm not quite doing the Sinterklaas story justice so if you want more on him check out his wiki page, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas .

Spaghetti Cat

Spaghetti Cat is becoming quite the celebrity. I just saw him the other day in Fall Out Boy's new video "I Don't Care". And thanks to the web I found out that Spaghetti Cat also answers to the name of Bowtie Head and can eat food with utensils.

Ciao Italia!

Ciao from Rome! We arrived early morning Monday for meetings this week. The rest of Monday and most of Tuesday was ours to tour around. Monday we took the hop-on, hop-off bus and got the overview of the city. I was amazed to see all the different ruins within the city. Later in the afternoon we saw the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish steps. Tuesday I saw parts of the Vatican and walked around some of the neighborhoods. Here a few of the sights we saw. Sorry for the uneventful post but for once everything has been running pretty smooth! Tomorrow a couple of us are off to Vienna for another meeting.


The church at the top of Piazza Di Spagna (the Spanish steps).




The Trevi Fountains....the story goes if you toss a coin into the waters you will return to Rome.



St. Peter's church