04.02.11 | Glasgow > Edinburgh | 08:58

I had to wake up a bit early this morning to get my train to Edinburgh. Edinburgh is my favorite city! The train is supposed to leave in two minutes. I can hardly stand it. On my way over here, I stopped for some breakfast at the K.F.C.

When I got to my train, there was a lady and her daughter sitting in my seat. I told her I had reserved this seat. I was very kind and smiled at her. She grabbed her daughter and moved to the seats adjacent. She wasn’t there for two minutes when somebody came up to her and told her that she and her daughter were sitting in their seats. She argued with them for a moment and then grabbed her daughter and had crossed to another position. Then it happened a third time- about five minutes later, a couple showed up and told her that she was in their seat. My question to her is this: What’s the point of getting a seat if she’s going to ignore her seat assignment? This isn’t Southwest Airlines, ma’am, we assign seats here.

I highly recommend Scotrail.com if you come this way. They’re not very expensive to book, and if you add a bus, they’ll take you just about anywhere you need to go. Also, you don’t have the hassle of messing with a rental car. 

Edinburgh, Scotland | 1029

I arrived at my second destination safely. The funny thing: I meant to reserve the same hostel that I stayed in when I was last here last time. I didn’t realize till I was almost at that hostel, that I was booked somewhere else. Whoops! When I tried to check-in, they told me that they wouldn’t allow me to check-in until after 14:00. Now I get to hang out for a couple of hours. I would go and explore the city, but I don’t see a secure place to store my backpack. Perhaps I’ll find a quick lunch nearby. I’ll hold off my major explorations until later.

15:46

Lunch was at Monster Mash, which is where I ate my first haggis, the last time I was in here. I didn’t want to repeat the haggis experience, so I ordered the bangers and mash. The sausages of the day were venison and beef with tomato.

I came back to the hostel and met one of my ten roommates. Yes, there are ten people in the room. His name is Mike, and he’s from Pittsburgh. Mike is a student but he decided to take six months off of his studies and has been tooling around Europe. He says that he was recently in Norway, where he got a job as a construction worker, living with a coworker. He said Norway is still cold, but the weather frequently changes, just like Scotland.

Mike was just sitting up on his bed, looking bored, so I asked him if he wanted to walk up Calton Hill with me. Calton Hill overlooks the city and isn’t too tough of a hike. We made our way over to New Town and then hiked up.

He wanted to get back to find a pub because there was some game that he wanted to watch on T.V. I went to find some soap, a soap holder and a refill for my razor. I’m sure it’s not going to last long. The soap I bought was called Imperial Leather. It sounded manly- and that’s why I got it. I’m a manly man, after all.