Month: August 2004

NJCoors.com

8-31 The Boat House – Belmar – 10pm

9-2 Spicys – Seaside Hts – 7:30 pm

9-3 Surf Club – Ortley Beach – 10pm

9-5 Donovans – Sea Bright – 10pm

Come Out And Hang!

Click Here For Video Blog 3 (Windows Media Player)

I am BACK from Italy! What a great time had by all! Just wanted to thank all the relatives for showing us a great time! There are so many posts it didn’t fit on one page, so here is the link to all of the posts! –

Rob Fuz’s Italy Blog

I took tons of shots! I edited it down and here is a bunch of shots! –

Italy – August 2004 album

Tuesday night I am at the Boat House for Coors Light for an official unofficial welcome home, going away rain date party!

Come Down!

LAST DAY aweeee

Just finished packing and just relaxing before we head out to the airport. I took most of the days so far updating my journal. We leave around 1:30 to head to the airport. I am not really homesick and could use a few more days to discover Rome so more.

3 hours to go left on our flight. Just typing out this last entry and Watching “Chasing Libery” its ok. Amazingly our flight was ontime and there were no problems. We already planned on Chinese food and fried rice. This trip was truly amazing and I will never foget it. I just read through the journal again andd relived all the amazing times I had. It will be good to be back and move into the end of summer into fall. Please pass the eggroll! Arrivederci!

8/26/04

Another kind of mellow day. After our late night last night we slept in pretty late. Today was finish up day. Anything we wanted to do, Francesco offered to take us too. We pretty much drove in and took a bus right from the start of the city.

Our first stop was the holy steps. They are inside a church where there is to be said is the blood of Jesus on the stairs. People walk up the stairs on their hands and knees.

Then next door we visited San Giovanni “Mother Of All Churches”. This was the chief papal residence until 1309.

We then jumped back on the bus and headed towards the Coliseum.

Pino and I ventured in with no line today, so we got in real easy. This was definitely one of the main highlights of the trip. It was really tough to get a grip on the magnitude and the size of it.

I read it held 55,000 people, from the inside you can see how it did. I bought a book and there was a shot of Gladiators fighting all these wild animals. I commented later to Pino that they just do not do that anymore hehe. I was amazed to learn that in a lot of places including the Coliseum that the would flood the place and stage mock navel ship battles amazing.

From the very first time you walk in to going up to the second level, you see a whole new perspective on the place. Looking down you can see into the labyrinths and corridors that the gladiators and animals were kept. I had majestic music going through my head the whole time. It was the type of music that the play for action movies. Of course we went around and I took a ton of pictures and video. We we went up to the second level, the stairs were very tall and steep. The views looking out to the Palatine Hills were truly amazing as well. It was really great to see a lot of the stadium was well preserved.

I saw a lot of Roman Columns and in the early 1930s the rebuilt a section to show people how a section looked.

We then headed off to see Michelangelo’s Moses. The funny thing is half the time I did not know where a lot of the things were and with the language barrier, a lot of the times I did not know what was going on until we got there. It wound up not being in a museum but in a church, San Pietro in Vincoli (St. Peter in Chains) a church to house the chains that bound St Peter in Palestine. That was not our focus though, Pino’s last mission was to see the statue of Mosses as our guide Francesco told us one of the best statues in the world along side of Pieta and Michaelangelo’s David in Florence. It was a great statue that was off to the side and was part of a wall piece. I love the stories about Michelangelo’s pieces. This story said he was to carve 44 figures but did not get done. Instead the Pope was given a masterpiece. Also there is a self portrait of Michelangelo in Mosses beard. Also we were told that the Pope did not like the piece and in anguish he threw a hammer at Mosses and hit his knee leaving a mark on the perfect statue. A very amazing piece. We found it funny that you can pay 50 cents to light up the subject.

Q: Why does Moses have horns on his head?

A: Michelangelo’s “Moses” has horns because one of the biblical translations of “rays of light” became “horns” in Italian. Because of this mistranslation, depictions of Moses with horns became somewhat commonplace.

Michelangelo Buonarroti

We then headed back and went to dinner with the whole gang.

Not The Real Thing!

Every day in Rome was a great day and it was good to celebrate one last time with the whole family.

Another Awesome Pizza!

A day to relax. Just finished the last 2 days journals, which took the longest of any of my journals ever! We slept in late and we are just relaxing most of the day.

We took a trip into one of the towns and did some shopping. We finally came across a movie theater. I do not know if it was a second run cinema or not but they had some pretty old movies.

We had dinner up on top of a mountain with a pretty impressive view.

It was kind of funny it was a roadside restaurant and cars rode through the restaurant.

I got a good group shot of everyone .

After dinner we took a ride into the city at night. We drove by the Coliseum, but it really was not lit up all too well.

We then headed and parked near The Pantheon, which looked even more sinister at night.

Our main stop was to head to the Piazza Navona, a stop we missed and I really wanted to go to. Originally laid out in 86 AD as a stadium, it is a beautiful site to see after dark.

It is comprised of 3 fountains by Bernini. The center one is the Fountain of the Four Rivers whose 4 stone figures symbolize the world’s greatest rivers, the Ganges, Danube, della Plata, and the Nile, who’s face is shrouded because the river’s source was unknown at the time. The fountain is amazing, with its hollow center and discovering different elements of the fountains from different angles, including the rear of a house coming out the other side.

The next statue was the Fountain of Neptune, which the 2 statues are a lot smaller than the center one. This was another great fountain that was restored in 1997 after 2 demented men damaged a tail of one of the sea creatures.

The 3rd statue, Fountain of the Moor was one of my favorites. It has these cool sea creatures blowing out water from these shell horns. I got some great night shots. Pino and Mags got cool drawings of themselves and we headed back home.

UPDATE

I have a guest writer for my Blog, Ilaria

I will miss u a lot see u soon in America

See she misses me already hehe

Just checking in! I am on Ilaria’s computer! She has a written journal and I am showing her how I ad a journal to my Blog! We are taking it easy today! The last 2 days we toured Italy! Yesterday we went to the Vatican and the Rome has been our favorite part of the vacation so far! I have been keeping journals everyday, so like I said I will add them all when I get home next week with all my pictures!

Ok I am off to eat lunch!

Rob From Italy!

Our last day in Sicily. It is definitely time to move on. Sicily is very beautiful, after I got over the language barrier and the ways of Europeans in general, I really had a good time. I just find it funny how things are drastically different here. Someone in our group said this is not a different country, but another world. Commas instead of periods and vice versa in prices, the Euro, the food, the way people drive in tiny cars, with no right of way and everyday things, Sicily is a whole other world.

Off to Rome! Arrivederci! Our hour flight leaves at 3:30 and we are staying at a relatives house outside of Rome or Roma as the locals call it. I am typing for the last time on the beach and I am going to read my books on Rome.

On the plane, on the runway and what do u know, we were delayed at least an hour. hehe The airport is so old school, you get on a bus and walk up the stairs to the plane, front and back entrances. Damiano and the crew got us here in time and we are off to Rome. At least I got a good seat in row 4 window seat.

NEWS FLASH: They actually served a mini gelato on the plane, got to love it we are already descending what a mini flight (about an hour).

Just flew over Rome I’ll put some great shots I took here!!!

We got picked up at the airport by 2 of mamma’s cousins and family. They are 3 brothers, all great guys who I liked instantly. 3 people also speak English as well. As soon as we left the airport I can tell I would really like Rome. We passed a McDonalds on the way to their home, that was also a good sign because I haven’t had a hamburger in a while.

My Angels!

The house we are staying at is beautiful. It is about an hour away from the city in the town of Corcolla. The house is huge with an apartment on the lower level with 3 rooms and 2 bathrooms.

The youngest brother Francesco, the cousin’s house where we are staying, is a photographer. He is also one of the people who speak English so we were instantly talking shop. He showed me a lot of his work and I really like his style. Very colorful and creative.

We had a great huge dinner and we relaxed outside. They have a beautiful garden and a really nice layout between the house and their outside property. They also have a pool and something I have not seen much in Italy, a front yard.

This is the last Full day in Sicily. Very low key.

We went to BaRappa the Rappa’s bakery.

Very cool little place. They really did have awesome food there.

The weather was very overcast and very cloudy but after 8 days not 1 drop of rain, really worked out well for us.

It is truly amazing the lush tropical landscape and amazing fruits they grow here with such little amounts of rain.

Today was also Goodbye day. (quattro Heinekens per favore!)

Francessco!

A lot of Jos’s family came to say goodbye.

My wine of choice!

It’s pretty much the same saying as the Olive Garden, “When your here your family”.

My Man Damiano!

Nice to see and to say goodbye to everyone.

Defiantly an action packed day. Probably the most things we fit into one day so far. We had our usual breakfast and headed out to the town of Santo Vito Lo Capo. It was another cute little town that had a cool lighthouse. We settled on the beach and took a walk through the town and visited another cool church. We then took a walk toward the light house and checked that out along with the boats. There was a ton of people on the beach and the temperature rose to a 100 degrees today, by far the hottest day yet. We headed out to our next destination Segesta. As we left we past the marble mines that my father in law worked at. Any drive in Sicily is an enjoyable drive. Not since my trek from LA to Vegas was I in such constant awe over the mountains and scenery that we discovered.

We got to Segesta at 5pm.

Defiantly a lot cooler and this was one of the spots I really wanted to visit.

Unfortunately, the theater part was closed due to a concert being held there. The temple part was still open and it did not disappoint.

It is very amazing how the built something like that in those times.

I read it was never completed and just this shell was done. It is one of the most preserved artifacts in the word.

After this or tour guide, Damiano and his family wanted to take us to the top of Alcamo mountain. We all agree and it was only 5 minutes until we go there. It was a big hike up a steep mountain once u drove to the top.

After getting up there the view was pretty cool and we got to see another pretty cool castle in the process.

Another relaxing day. Starting to miss American food. I forgot to really bitch about the breakfast situation. Warm milk, cold cuts and still no eggs. Really sucks hehe.

Another strange thing we found was we never spotted the moon! What the hell happened to our moon! UPDATE: We got a call last night from Peter Rappa that it was out and I ran out to take a picture.

Must admit I am really still happy with my camera purchase. I have taken 750 shots here with it so far and over 8,000 shots total and I really love it and still recommend it highly.

Tomorrow is another big tourist day, so it will be another good journal day.

Today is our wedding anniversary (Happy 2 Year Anniversary Jos!).

We skipped going to the weekly flea market and just slept in. We hit the beach and just relaxed. Doing dinner at the hotel and just doing some more relaxing. There was a forest fire behind the hotel, so 2 helicopters came and dunked big tanks into the ocean and dumped them on the fire. Interesting

Also noticed how little commercialized Sicily is. I have not seen 1 fast food place. Barely and commercials, hardly any billboards. Their lifestyle is so not in your face fast paced as ours.

Momma’s cousins made us this awesome cake!

We went Ballestrate, another port but opposite the last port visited by like 20 miles on the opposite cost. It was not as nice but it had an interesting square too it. Had my daily gelato, this place had little sugar wafer hats.

Today we got an early start and headed up to Scrapello.

It is an amazing place where people go to swim. At one point fisherman used it, now it is a popular spot to hang out and enjoy the sun.

Hard to explain the area but the pictures should tell the story. This is the area where they filmed Oceans 12.

We took a long swim between all the rocks and ruins.

We met up with the Italian Peter Rappa who shares the same name as his cousin and my brother in law Peter.

He is a good guy and he reminds me of my brother in law Peter. He makes the same sounds and he even shakes hand like him. We had a nice swim and I had the water proof camera to take some shots.

We then went to Mag’s relatives for lunch.

Great food and another spectacular view.

We showered up and off for more adventures.

We headed to Erice.

This is an enchanting medieval city that people actually live in on top of a mountain established some 3,000 years ago.

The views from atop this city 2,500 feet high are amazing.

There are castles and some ruins of old castles that were pretty intact.

I took this amazing picture that I realized was being sold as a postcard, pretty cool. We arrived late so I got a lot of nice shots during the golden hour time (yes I know about the golden hour, as my friend Glen tried explaining to me at some point).

We toured around till it got dark did some shopping and then took off.

Again during our great adventure, another day not to forget.

On the way home, I finally got to eat at a REAL Italian pizza place!

The pizza was awesome! I saw French Fries so I took the opportunity to order some. Lots of pepper on them but an omelet and fries 2 days in a row I am feeling more at home.

After all the excitement yesterday, we decided to keep it low key today. I am amazed how well I adjusted to 6 hour time difference. I fell asleep every night in LA a few months ago but here I am fine. I am laying on my chair at the beach today without a care in the world. I have no clue what’s going on back home. The only news I got was our governor resigned. What an ass. I thought he was doing such a great job and now I hear he was being set up by his gay lover. Got to love politics. O well. The most exciting thing of the day was left over pizza and my daily Gelato!

I went with the Magnum, a double chocolate ice cream with a layer of fudge in between.

We are being low key tonight and eating at the hotel. One disappointment is that eggs are not a big part of the Italian diet, so I got excited that there was an omelet on the menu for tonight! We will see.

At the house yesterday I got excited they had chickens and I picked an egg, but I didn’t get to eat it.

I was told a chicken lays 1 egg every day. That is pretty amazing. I did get my omelet and did enjoy a lot of vino with Pino.

Ok I will check back when more action happens. We are low key because tomorrow we are going a few key places.

We celebrated the actual holiday (Ferragosto) by going to my mother in laws cousins house. We got an early start an toured the town of Alcamo for a bit.

We stopped at the cemetery where my brother in law was buried. He had died at a very early age and never made it to America. We paid our respects and headed to two of the main churches in Alcamo to check then out. We then went to the main square and saw another castle there.

We then headed over to mamma’s cousin’s house where she had stayed the month before.

View From The House!

His house was pretty far up in the mountains and had an amazing view. We have seen them a lot and they really been taking good care of us and showed us around a lot. At the port we had some awesome white wine.

It turns out it was the wine that momma’s cousin grew grapes for. They took us down and showed us all he grapes and we picked some.

They grew a lot of things and everything was awesome. We had a great time.

I rode a tractor and a Vespa. We had a huge lunch and had a great time all day.

At around 6:30 after my little siesta nap, we headed down to a natural hot spring. The water temperature was hotter than a hot tub and the water was really clean.

The water has some sulfur in it so it has some healing elements to it. It was in the middle of nowhere, but it was a popular spot and it was fairly crowded. I really loved the water fall and although I didn’t last that long, I felt rejuvenated.

After the springs we came back to their house an they made pizza in their own brick oven! What a treat for my very first pizza in Italy.

Pino and I even commented how they do everything right. Their son even set up a disco and had professional DJ equipment and lights for the party. We did have a real good time and even saw fireworks for the holiday.

8/28/04 – Guest robfuz.com Blogger Mags who is giving her recap of the trip. I asked her to write it. She is an awesome writer and I love her dearly!

Hey Rob and anyone else reading this,

This is Margherita logging on. I’m very honored that my uncle Rob asked me to write in his blog. So, let me tell u about my vacation in Italy so far.

Sicily was beautiful and the beach was cool but the people were not so nice. The only people that were welcoming to me was my family. I had a lot of fun mumbling comments about the people to rob. We both felt the same. But, all complaining aside it was fun and very, very beautiful!!!

Now I’m in Rome and I’m having so much fun. Everything I’ve seen here has been something Ill never forget. I wish I didn’t have to walk so much LOL. Both my uncles are taking thousands of pictures!!!!! I like to look at something and move on but they stand there for about ten minutes with every picture or statue and memorize it or take 100 pictures!!!!!

LOL but it still has been a lot of fun and soon we will be home. I can’t wait to go home not that I don’t like here but I just miss things that I’m familiar with. Everyone can understand that, can’t you? Well this is me signing off. Till the next this is Margherita writing from Rome saying Goodbye

PhotoStamps: Home

My Brother In Law Pino and Rob Stamp!

HOW COOL IS THIS! Check out what you can do at stamps.com ! I can see the problems with it now, but hey this site is awesome! Enjoy! Yeah lets see you but a 32 person self portrait on a STAMP! now there is a challenge!

You no longer have to be a dead president to make it onto a US postage stamp. Your picture or even your dog can now be on an official stamp. A new service called Photostamps on stamps-dot-com allows users to create stamps with their own photos. Company president Ken McBride says you can use a picture of just about anything or anyone — within reason. He says they’ll reject offensive photos or graphics. He says they’re seeing a lot of baby and vacation pictures. McBride anticipates the service will be popular for holiday cards and invitations. A sheet of first class photo stamps costs about 17 dollars — or about twice the usual 37-cent stamp.

NJCoors.com New Jersey’s Coors Light Entertainment Site – Welcome: “NJ Coors Events Starting August 11, 2004

Come to my Official , Un-Official Rob Going On Vacation Party @ Martells Tiki Bar TONIGHT! (thanks Gleny) One of my last events of the summer! Come down and wish me fare well tonight! 🙂

Martells Tiki Bar, Point Pleasant – Date: 8-11-2004 – Hours: 9:00 PM – 12:30 AM – Daddy Pop & MCBJ Rock The Boardwalk! Enjoy ICE COLD COORS LIGHTS!

– IT GOT RAINED OUT 🙁 SORRY ALL!

Will be off for a bit but tune in when I am back and I will fill you in on all the fun! HAVE A GREAT REST OF THE SUMMER! – ROB

My main man Shawn AKA the DeadHero has officially entered the race. The only problem is, I have no clue what his number is? I think as Gleny puts it below I have to put an X on it! 🙁 Sorry pal, unless you can count em up and we will verify it! The rule (and I mean rule (the single one hehe) clearly states you gotta see the person’s 2 eyes clearly to count 🙂 Although I do encourage more future attempts and welcome anyone who wants to participate! Thanks pal!

Shawn : Okay boys. – Have fun counting. I’m sending the original, big one, because…well there are a LOT of eyes in this picture. I got up to forty before I gave up. I’ll let the two judges come up with a number. =) – Oh, and let me know what the final count is.

Gleny : Deadhero submitted a self portrait picture for Rob’s contest, but none of the other people’s eyes were at all in focus. so X on that.

Just checking in from Wendy’s with my bud Chris! hehe Also a tiny clip from the Blueclaws game from Friday and A Shout out from Billy Lawlor from the Parker House Last Sunday! I love my new cam! Already sold one of them 🙂 Man I am good! hehe

Click Here For Video Blog 2 (Windows Media Player)

Looking for the Windows XP Service Pack 2 We’ll here it is 🙂

Download the Windows XP Service Pack 2

P2P Saves Windows Users from Viruses!

Get the Windows XP Service Pack 2 This website has been setup by Downhill Battle – Music Activism as a demonstration of how peer-to-peer filesharing technology can help distribute files that are too large for centralized distribution to handle. even Microsoft, which has incredible server resources at their disposal, is limiting downloads of their SP2 release, but filesharing technology can let everyone download it right away (see below). Congress is literally preparing to outlaw filesharing– it is crucial that we rally to defend and promote the technology.

USATODAY.com – Donald Duck gets star on Hollywood walk of fame: “Donald Duck gets star”

God what a SLOW news day! 🙂

I have my new camera with me at all times, so at various moments when I see something that will be funny I jump at it 😉 Here is my head on top of a headless child’s body and me and my separated at birth monkey twin 🙂

We really kicked ass! We were in full vacation shopping mode and got just about everything we needed to get!

I came up with a cool concept I do not know if it exisits!!! My buds have an audio blog so I wanted to try something new 🙂 Check it out

Click Here For Video Blog 1 (Windows Media Player)

Excite: “Funk Musician Rick James Found Dead in LA

Aug 6, 3:32 pm ET – LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Funk music pioneer Rick James has been found dead in his Los Angeles home, police said on Friday. ‘This morning Hollywood officers responded to a radio call of a natural death,’ a police spokeswoman said, and found the body of James. She said detectives were at the scene. James, 56, was best known for his 1981 hit ‘Super Freak.’ ”

Sad day 🙁 I just saw the Im Rick James Bitch thing the other day Finally! I will never forget when he walked my me in NYC when i was 13 with his huge boom box and his posse’

Hey Gang – I will be at shooting at these location this week for Coors Light – www.njcoors.com :

BlueClaws, Lakewood – 8-06-2004 – 5pm – 7:30 PM

Party with The Billy Lawlor Band & The Coors Light Girls in Center Field at The Rat Trap!

Houlihans, Holmdel – 8-06-2004 – 8pm – 10:30 PM

Kick off your weekend with an ICE COLD COORS LIGHT! Meet the CL Girls!

Headliner, Neptune – 8-06-2004 – 10pm – 12:30 AM

Daddy Pop & The Coors Light Girls Party ALL NIGHT LONG!

Parker House, Sea Girt – 8-08-2004 – 7pm – 9:30 PM

The Billy Lawlor Band & The Coors Light Girls ROCK ALL NIGHT LONG! $1.50 CL

Martells Tiki Bar, Point Pleasant – 8-11-2004 – 9pm – 12:30 AM – Daddy Pop & MCBJ Rock The Boardwalk! Enjoy ICE COLD COORS LIGHTS!

Come Join Me! – I am then off to Italy for 2 WEEKS! YA HOO!