Alex Bain's Blog

King of the road

I was gone a lot this summer. I made it to the Cape 6 times, but without even counting those trips, I was gone 13 separate times. Check out the evidence:

• 5/31: 10 day sailing adventure with my extended family, and my friend, Craig, from HBS.This was my first time in France, and each day we saw sights more beautiful that I could imagine. I still haven’t posted the pictures from that, because it’s been such a challenge to combine them from the 10 different people that were snapping away on digital cameras.
• 6/19: Overnight business trip to Palo Alto, California. I had to meet in person with Zurb, the front-end design team I had hired for my website.
• 6/26: I flew back to the West Coast a week later both to meet and Zurb and also for the to introduce my mother to Lisa’s parents at a cocktail party they hosted for the occasion.
• 7/21: After going almost 3 full weeks without any travel (other than to the Cape), I spent the weekend in NYC for the bachelor party of my friend Lee.
• 7/27: Went back West for a wedding in Monterey.
• 8/4: Attended a cocktail party in Naragansett, RI, for my friend Jared, who got married in Peru and wanted to party with everyone who couldn’t make the trip down there.
• 8/10: Went white water rafting for a bachelor party up in Maine.
• 8/14: Caught the horse races in Saratoga with my Mom, sister, and Uncle Michael.
• 8/17: Went up to Manchester, NH to take in a Counting Crows concert.
• 8/19: Two days later I head back to New Hampshire to run a 10 mile race with a family friend, Linda Madden.
• 8/25: Drove down to Hyannisport for my buddy Lee’s wedding.
• 8/27: After spending a day and a half at my Dad’s place in Woods Hole with business school friends, we set sail for 2.5 days on Block Island.
• 8/31: Went down to DC for Lisa’s co-worker’s wedding. She’s a good friend from MGH, and it was fun to spend 3 days in our nation’s capital.

How Lisa and Alex got their grooves back

Lisa and I went to Italy for 10 days. We split our time between Venice and Florence. I took a bagillion pictures. A couple of key findings from the trip:

• I've flown international in coach, business class, and, now, first class. I spent almost half a million miles to get into first class, but I actually think it was worth it. The ability to fully recline is huge. The food is fantastic. Watching whatever movies you want is great. I said to Lisa that, if I had internet up there and a power source for my laptop, I'd rather be in that first class seat than in my living room.
• I've said this before, but not having ice in the drinks I order when I'm at international restaurants slowly drives me insane.
• Gelato is basically a commodity in Italy. It's the same wherever you get it... except this one place in Florence is far and away better than all the others. It's called Vivoli. Plan a trip around it. It closes at 1 PM, so be careful not to miss it.
• I saw one or two people jogging when I was in Venice, but I don't really understand how anyone stays in shape over there. It's not easy to walk around, let alone find a stretch where you can run. Plus, it's brutally hot throughout the summer. Surprised there wasn't more obesity.
• Seems like it's normal to serve cold cuts with breakfast over there.
• Cafés charge two different prices for their drinks: one for people sitting at their tables and another, cheaper rate, for people who drink standing up at their bar. All the locals simply order espresso, and then slam it at the bar. Lisa and I both thought this took the fun out of carrying around a huge warm coffee drink all morning. I said that drinking a latte while comfortably seated is like a wonderful relationship built on love, and mainlining espresso while upright is like a one-night-stand.