Slices of Slovenia

Over the weekend we rode out the rest of the Budapest heat wave in an idyllic town (village? jury’s out.) in Slovenia, where my old friend, conductor Steven Loy has lived for the past ten years. It’s a heavenly place, particularly after two 100-degree weeks in one of Budapest’s more polluted and noisy districts.

We Should Be In Slovenia By Now

Here’s a lovely excerpt from today’s weather forecast for Budapest:

Today: Abundant sunshine. High 103F. Winds W at 5 to 10 mph.
Tomorrow: Generally sunny. High 103F. Winds SSE at 5 to 10 mph.
Saturday: Sunny. Highs 99 to 103F and lows in the upper 60s.

So, basically, it’s hot. Too hot to enjoy anything. Right now it’s unbearable in the shade, and torture in the sun. Most people here seem to be taking it in their stride, but I live in San Francisco, where I’m very happy because it rarely goes above 75 degrees.

We’re going to Slovenia for a few days to visit this guy. It’s also hot there, but there’s more natural splendor.

We were supposed to go yesterday, but we missed the train. It’s so embarrassing I thought it would be a good thing to blog about. I’m hard-wired to think like a 25-year-old when I’m here, I guess, so I thought it would be nothing to take a bus and two Metro lines. The combination of traveling with a 4-year-old and the Hadean weather made that a really stupid idea.

They have taxis here.

Fortunately, Budapest has a number of places like this, where we spent yesterday afternoon, after the whole, you know, “train” thing.