Tag: blog

Slaveykov Square, Sofia

~ Veselin ~ Leave a comment

We went to Slaveykov this Sunday because of @knotty‘s comment about their visit to Sofia in the 90s. Back in the day, the square was a book market. My high school was 15 minutes walking from it so I visited it almost daily for many years. It had crowds of readers and piles of trash. The municipality reformed the area a few times, slowly pushing the booksellers out and to the surrounding buildings.

The building in the back of the first photo is the Sofia Library. The first floor is a ДКЦ – 2nd Diagnostic Center. Go there in case you have non-urgent health issues.

The fountain on the second photo has a sad story. Same spot had another fountain that electrocuted a person and was named “The Killer Fountain”. It was demolished and rebuilt after that.

The McDonalds in the back is the first one opened in Sofia in 1995. The queue was hundreds of people long. I liked it very much, it was a favorite spot in the center before Covid. It has a secret second floor where you can chill over your large Coke and nobody will bother you. One of the few McDonalds that operate somewhat normally, most of them are a shadow of their former glory.

The third photo is the Slaveykov monument. The father, the poet Petko Slaveykov, lived around that place, and the monument is with his son Pencho Slaveykov, also a poet. The heavy use of the bench for photos damaged the shadow, which is now replaced with a more durable but much uglier copy.

Rome

~ Veselin ~ Leave a comment

I visited Rome on a work trip last week. Couldn’t experience too much of it because the trip was brief and the schedule – tight.

I liked their inner gardens and pretty, well dressed people. The food outside of the tourist centre was superb.

I hated the car culture, the swarms of tourists. Almost got run by a motorcycle on the sidewalk. Didn’t see a single cat. The Sistine Chapel was so packed that I wandered if I’ll get out alive.

Had Gelato every day. It was fantastic 🍧

The Alley of Books

~ Veselin ~ 3 Comments

I’ve been a big fan of book fairs ever since I was a child. I hunted for comics and Karl May books, then gamebooks, then sci-fi, and so on. I usually visit them multiple times so that I don’t miss anything. Couldn’t do the multiple-visit tour this year due to my work trip where I damaged my computer and the consequences of that. At least I visited it once.

The Alley of Books’24 is happening right now on Vitosha Boulevard and near NDK.

Here’s my record-breaking harvest:

  • Bion by Satanasov is a comic book. Got the first part. I’ve heard good things about it
  • 2 Gamebooks by Lubomir Nikolov, frequently featured here
  • Dodger by Terry Pratchett. Pratchett influenced me as a youth and is one of my favorite writers. I missed 3-4 of his books, and here we are – filling a void in my Pratchettist degree
  • Travis Baldree’s second book – a fantasy bookstore?
  • Brandon Sanderson’s The Sunlit Man from Cosmere
  • Orconomics vol 2. This time I’ll be prepared for a bloody fantasy rather than a satire.

There were more books I wanted to buy but sitting on the shelves is not perfect. I challenge myself to read 5 out of these 7 by the end of October. I’m the most excited about Bion and Dodger.

How often do you walk or run?

~ Veselin ~ 7 Comments
Daily writing prompt
How often do you walk or run?
View all responses

The daily writing prompt is poking me at my weak spot. I walk every day I can and my goal is to walk roughly 2h per day or 10K steps. I believe that walking makes life better, and cars make it worse. Walking also gives material for blog posts.

Here are photos from my two daily walks today. The first one was part of my trip back home.

A thousand tourists staring at a marvelous tourist creation, like flies attracted by sugary water. Tourists can make the prettiest thing on the planet look undesirable.

Stray white panther from Sofia. Well fed and bored, refused to look at me for the photo. Wouldn’t have seen her without my evening walk to buy food. No tourists around.

Water on Macs

~ Veselin ~ 3 Comments

About 48 hours ago I spilled a glass of sparkling water on my laptop. After a very long wait, I booted it and it works! It’s not out of dodge yet, apparently corrosion issues can appear in the next 2-3 days. I plan to migrate to a backup computer over the weekend and will send this one for repairs.

I think the tactic of turning the computer upside down, turning it off, and then putting it on sheets of paper worked well so far. Rice and silica gel dehumidifiers apparently are not good and can increase the damage.