Dear Diary, Today We Awoke To Gunfire.

Since my last post Paul and I have left Dublin and flown to Helsinki, Finland, and, yesterday, from Finland we flew into Athens, Greece.
Why Helsinki?
Well, the simple answer is because Conan O'brien has been doing a Finland bit for quite some time and so, of course, I wanted to see what it's all about.
Actually, the real reason is because it's one of the places that my ancestors are from and because of that I have some distant cousins that live in the area.
So, we went to the below freezing land of Helsinki and met one of my cousins.
Her name is Pirjo.
Her and her husband, Viktor, made us a very nice Russian/Finnish dinner and afterwards we actually watched the Conan O'brien episode from earlier this month where he visited Helsinki. (They actually had it taped. It's no joke. They really like Conan out there!)

Other things about Finland you may be interested in...
1. The women are mind bogglingly beautiful. If you're into that sort of thing.
2. In almost every restaurant or bar or wherever there's either a poker table, blackjack table, or both.
3. It's cold. All of the time. Cold.
4. It's the leading country in the study of Aurora Borealis.

And then there's Athens, Greece.

Yesterday, we flew into this lovely town. It looks a lot like Los Angeles without tall buildings and absolutely no smog. The weather is about the same and the people are beautiful everywhere you look. Actually the part of town we're in reminds me a lot of Beverly Hills. Like a really old Beverly Hills.
On the hill directly across from the hotel we're staying in (Hotel St. George) sits the ancient Parthenon. Hopefully, we'll check that out really soon.
Today happens to be a big holiday here. It's their version of 4th of July Independence Day for us. Because of this we woke up to canons firing off at 6:30am which then proceeded to fire several times at nearly every hour. So, anyway, we checked out the military parade in front of the parliament building at 11am. It was cool with the jets and helicopters flying by and cool weapons and military personel on display.
I may post the pics o' the day later. Goodbye and happy Independence Day! Freedom or Death! Down with the ancient Turks!