{"id":1219,"date":"2006-06-22T18:00:00","date_gmt":"2006-06-23T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/?p=1219"},"modified":"2006-06-22T18:00:00","modified_gmt":"2006-06-23T00:00:00","slug":"cowboys-and-catalans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/cowboys-and-catalans\/","title":{"rendered":"Cowboys and Catalans"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe src=\"http:\/\/rcm.amazon.com\/e\/cm?t=malesurvival&#038;o=1&#038;p=8&#038;l=as1&#038;asins=0595377165&#038;fc1=000000&#038;IS2=1&#038;lt1=_blank&#038;lc1=0000ff&#038;bc1=000000&#038;bg1=ffffff&#038;f=ifr\" style=\"width:120px;height:240px;\" scrolling=\"no\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" frameborder=\"0\";alight=\"left\";><\/iframe>I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve never given much real thought to taking off and traveling through Europe until I read Charles Sizemore\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s first literary publication, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Cowboys and Catalans \u00e2\u20ac\u201c A Texan Rambles Through Europe.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\nBorn and raised in Dallas, Sizemore is a full time financial analyst and part time world traveler.<br \/>\nBut prior to taking a full-time position with Harry S. Dent, the twenty something author takes off to the London School of Economics for a master\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s degree, and finds his focus is quickly taken from school and directed towards the women, bars and sights of Europe.<br \/>\nReading the book feels like reading letters sent home from a good friend.<br \/>\nThe reader is caught living vicariously through the Texas Christian University graduate as he travels across the continent and studies in London for a year.<br \/>\nHumor and adventure abound as Sizemore learns about Roman debauchery first hand, realizes the difficulties in riding the Eurail and dates an Iraqi girl &#8212; shortly after the American invasion of her home country.<br \/>\n<em>One night we stepped into an Irish pub to get out of the cold. I ordered two Stellas and walked to the table where Leyla was already sitting.<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153You hear that?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I asked, pointing to the Irish band in the corner. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re singing Pancho and Lefty. That sounds weird in an Irish accent.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Pancho and Left?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153You know, the Willie Nelson song.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\nLeyla: <blank stare><br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Never mind. I guess that one didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t make it across the desert.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\nIt was a bit surreal to be sitting with an Arab in a London pub hearing an Irish band play Willie. I pondered this while I waited at the bar for another Stella.<\/em><br \/>\nThe book flows and reads with ease, other than a few spots where Sizemore takes the opportunity to share the extended history of the places he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s visiting.<br \/>\nI\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not saying it was a bad decision to do so &#8212; I personally enjoyed it &#8212; but I can think of numerous friends who will be attracted to the stories of beer and women and likely skim over or stop reading anything to do with history.<br \/>\nSizemore spends much of his time overseas with his newly acquired Spanish companions and the time spent in Spain and with them were some of the most enjoyable and heartfelt reads in the book.<br \/>\nHe also realizes quickly the misconceptions many Europeans have about Texans and at times takes advantage of the stereotype, traveling the country in a well worn pair of Cowboy boots.<br \/>\nNot having traveled overseas myself, I can only imagine the enjoyment this book might be to anyone who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s traveled to Europe on their own, but regardless, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a great read even for those who have only considered traveling to visit our European neighbors.<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Cowboys and Catalans,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d 2006 iUniverse; $19.95 at Amazon.com and other major booksellers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve never given much real thought to taking off and traveling through Europe until I read Charles Sizemore\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s first literary publication, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Cowboys and Catalans \u00e2\u20ac\u201c A Texan Rambles Through Europe.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Born and raised in Dallas, Sizemore is a full time financial analyst and part time world traveler. But prior to taking a full-time position with &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/cowboys-and-catalans\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Cowboys and Catalans<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1219","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pEnSo-jF","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1219","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1219"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1219\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/casadeblundell.com\/jonathan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}