I’m not sure what was supposed to be there. I’m sure I didn’t find it. Found this instead. | Continue reading
Bulgaria celebrates its independence day today. There were no large crowds because Bulgarians tend to use the national holidays as a reason to go somewhere else. 22nd of September was recognized by the mayor of Sofia, the dude with the red tie. There was a small ceremony with gua … | Continue reading
I took some nice photos today, however disproportionally many of them were cats and decided to share them separately from the rest. So here’s the top 5 cat photos from my daily walk. Which one do you like the most? | Continue reading
Sofia can give you moments of color and beauty that only exist for brief moments here and there, and only to the people who go out and look. Get behind the wheel and none of that exists. Here are a few moments from my morning walk. 2. A semi-abandoned building near Bulgarian Acad … | Continue reading
Most of my effort goes into making sure I know what I need for work, and what’s happening in school or with the kids. That’s the stuff that really matters. Honestly, if there’s an area where I feel I should probably know more, it’s school/kids. I’ve discovered that most news arti … | Continue reading
What if your child suddenly started saying and doing disturbing things – words and actions no kid should know? As a parent, a primal fear kicks in: someone must have hurt them. But who? What if it’s someone from or close to the family? That’s the terrifying premise behind Nicci F … | Continue reading
This little Commelina can work as a life coach. Blooming despite obstacles. | Continue reading
There are two true national holidays in Bulgaria when people actually celebrate and you can sense the spirit in the air. 15th of September and 24th of May. 15th of September is the first day of school, and 24th of May is the Bulgarian alphabet and literacy day. Happy first day of … | Continue reading
I saw a rumor published that Arena Mladost is going to open again. Decided to check if there’s any signs of construction around the cinema. Unfortunately, it looks as if the Zombie Apocalypse happened a decade ago. I’d say this building is unlikely to open as a cinema. It’s unfor … | Continue reading
The book fair is over. I didn’t get as many books as I wanted because I already have too many. I need to be mindful about how much space they take and have not recently donated to the library to free up the shelves. I think I still got some pretty nice books. On the … Continue re … | Continue reading
Our website is live, woohoo! 🎉 29th of November, 2025, Hall 6 of the National Palace of Culture. Join us to celebrate WordPress. | Continue reading
Sofia has no shortage of cats 🐈 Here are a few to brighten your day. | Continue reading
Young people use the reflection of the large glass windows to practice dancing. I like how the new generation can make the environment their own in unusual ways. This is the Largo area – The Cabinet with the large glass windows is on the left, The Parliament in the middle, and Th … | Continue reading
I made it to the book signing with Adrian and got my copy of Children of Ruin signed. Big thanks to the publisher for putting these events together, helps a book blogger gain some good memories, photos, and posts. The event kicked off with a panel exploring just how alien aliens … | Continue reading
Hey, I’m getting famous! Thanks for following me 🙂 My latest subscribers are pretty cool – we’re all melting down is melting down, and Ally in Chapters writes about books, which is roughly what I do here from time to time. And last but not least, My Awesome Blog shares in … | Continue reading
I find it very difficult to make my 10k steps/day while in Greece. The only possible time was late evenings by the beach. Tough life 😊 🌴 | Continue reading
We were in Greece last week. Most tourists were gone, leaving the beach for a small group of guests who were late like us. The water was fine, the rentals were cheap. It was sunny and somewhat hot. Our village had lots of stray cats, and even more dogs. There was a cat family wit … | Continue reading
Not the usual berry I share this time of the year. I was surprised to see them in our region 😳 | Continue reading
These things with a slightly different color and leaves grew up where I grew up and were considered dangerous for kids. I was warned to stay away. I’m not sure I did because I have clear memories how the fruit looks on the inside. The plant is famous for being used for the so cal … | Continue reading
This post has 3 tags and they all start with Bl 😀 | Continue reading
August was a fine month for reading. I managed to finish 8 books, mostly thrillers and fantasy. Best books for the month Worst books for the month | Continue reading
I recently purchased a new set of wired audiophile Fiio FT1 headphones. I haven’t used them enough yet to form a solid opinion on their sound quality, but one thing I can already appreciate is the packaging. The box is surprisingly well-designed — it fits both my SteelSeries Arct … | Continue reading
A flower for you to brighten your day. Willow Gentian, according to the Picture This app. It’s getting harder to post flowers, the fall is near. | Continue reading
A good soul cleaned up the walls of this pedestrian underpass in my neighborhood, accidentally creating a masterpiece. | Continue reading
We returned to the ski zone Malyovitsa last weekend with the hope to go a bit further up the mountain than before. The stars didn’t align to achieve that but we still had a nice and fruitful hike. The fruit: BTW, if you decide to visit the area of Malyovitsa, Hotel Malyovitsa is … | Continue reading
We are going to have a protest for preserving the Bulgarian national currency, the Bulgarian Lev (Lion). The organizers decided to use an AI generated lion for their posters. I’ve never seen a lion with such crooked teeth. He has one mid-tooth at the top, zero at the bottom, his … | Continue reading
From the daily hike. First photo shows a white-blue-white marking for a path long gone. I took it anyway and after some crawling got to the new path, which was clearly marked as seen on photo two. | Continue reading
From left to right and top to bottom. Oleander, Aloe, Paperflower, and some sort of Hibiscus, maybe Swamp rose mallow. | Continue reading
This will be a tough one to read. I’m still half-way through the last one but the buy 2 get 4 books promotion by the local publisher Artline was too good to miss. | Continue reading
One of my favorite parts of Goodreads used to be seeing how my friends are progressing toward their annual reading goals. It was fun and a little competitive in a good way. Last year, Amazon decided to clutter Goodreads with about a hundred new challenges while somehow hiding the … | Continue reading
Given that I keep reading books about Zombies, I think this photo is with the right mood. This is the abandoned pool in Blagoevgrad, in an area called The Beach. It was made like that by a concessionaire for reasons beyond comprehension and is probably not fixable with municipali … | Continue reading
Michael Connelly is one of my favorite crime/thriller authors. I’ve read almost everything he’s written (probably everything but I’m not sure about one book). He is producing high quality books pretty consistently. However, he has flops. Nightshade is one of the books I did not l … | Continue reading
I didn’t know what to expect from this book, but it definitely surprised me. The story follows a young woman who has just been released from prison and starts working as a maid for a seemingly unhinged housewife. She’s given a tiny closet to live in. Looks like it could only be l … | Continue reading
I rarely feature blackberries here because they’re not common around Sofia. I usually have to settle with raspberries and blueberries. Blackberries were very common around the city where I grew up (Stara Zagora) and I spent lots of time picking them and getting scratches. You can … | Continue reading
I wanted to check if there’s a cat down there without kneeling. How many can you spot? | Continue reading
In case you’re still using the Free plan and have always missed the ability to install custom plugins, there hasn’t be a better moment to upgrade to Personal or Premium. WordPress.com is running a promotion that allows plugins and theme installs on both Personal and Premium, avai … | Continue reading
Of course, there has to be a book about zombie vampires. I’ve been reading books about zombies, necromancers, and undead creatures the whole year. I picked the Blood of Eden series by Julie Kagawa because I was at a book signing and this series looked pretty. I had no idea it’s a … | Continue reading
I had the chance to get autographs from Brandon Sanderson and Julie Kagawa, and I may soon have the opportunity to see Adrian Tchaikovsky as well. He’s coming to Bulgaria for a book signing on September 8th. His most acclaimed work, Children of Time, is on my to-read list, and I … | Continue reading
It’s a hot August and the ducks like to be in the shade. | Continue reading
I tried it in an 8h coding session. It performs worse than Claude 4 for me, and it’s slower. It made me wait for 10 minutes at a time. Eventually, I gave up, used my brain to understand the problem properly, and hand held Claude to a solution, which took about 1h. I think I … Con … | Continue reading
I’ve been preparing the next batch of books to read for a week. Tried to use the Marie Condo approach and only ordered books that are likely to bring me joy. | Continue reading
The path to Makedonia hut is marked with QR codes. Somehow, the authors of these brand new signs managed to create trial QR codes and they no longer work. So, for the years to come, tourists will scan these to see spam. At least they point in the right direction. | Continue reading