TRANSCRIPTION
Brandi Sea: 00:00:00 Hey, I’m Brandi Sea.

Michelle: 00:00:21 And I’m Michelle.

Brandi Sea: 00:00:22 And you’re listening to episode 120 of Design Speaks.

Michelle: 00:00:27 On this episode we are going to be talking about Brandy’s amazing trip over seas, at least overseas for us. To Europe.

Brandi Sea: 00:00:36 Overseas. Over a sea.

Michelle: 00:00:36 Over a sea. A sea. Over Brandy Sea.

Brandi Sea: 00:00:44 Okay, we better stop now.

Michelle: 00:00:47 Yeah, that’s already gotten out of hand.

Brandi Sea: 00:00:48 It’s about to get real out of hand.

Michelle: 00:00:51 So we’ll get to that in a little bit. We got some fun things to talk about. I actually haven’t heard much of your trip. I’ve heard a few like fun little stories that I would not mind you sharing again with me just cause they’re so funny. But.

Brandi Sea: 00:01:06 I know I would say that I was like, no Michelle, we can’t talk cause we’re saving it for the podcast, but I’ve just been jet lagged and sick the past like two and a half weeks.

Michelle: 00:01:16 Yeah, I mean you guys went hard and then came back to, it’s that, it’s the season, so whatever. You know.

Brandi Sea: 00:01:25 The season.

Michelle: 00:01:25 The season to get sick and be like, Oh yes, vitamins.

Brandi Sea: 00:01:29 Plane bugs.

Michelle: 00:01:32 Oh yeah. I guess you were cooped up in a little. What is that? It’s like in it little enclosure.

Brandi Sea: 00:01:37 I mean, you know, it’s a jumbo jet, but it’s just basically it’s a giant germaphobes nightmare.

Michelle: 00:01:44 Yeah. Trains and lots of stuff too.

Brandi Sea: 00:01:46 Planes and trains and automobiles.

Michelle: 00:01:48 Yeah, exactly. That’s exactly what you did.

Brandi Sea: 00:01:51 Well, what have you been up to? Cause I haven’t heard much of your weeks either.

Michelle: 00:01:55 I feel like my weeks have been an actual blur. Um, I’ve done a lot of the normal like take my kid to soccer practice and make sure I have groceries in the house, which I can’t say that I’ve really succeeded at honestly.

Brandi Sea: 00:02:10 Same here.

Michelle: 00:02:12 We’ve had Wingstop a lot lately and I’m just like, I don’t know. I like Wingstop I guess which.

Brandi Sea: 00:02:18 Protein.

Michelle: 00:02:19 I realized exactly. I realized I don’t like eating at Wingstop, but I like eating Wingstop when I eat at, Wingstop.

Brandi Sea: 00:02:28 I get it.

Michelle: 00:02:29 I smell like Wingstop the rest of the day and I’m like, Oh, I think I just like went and bathed in a VAT of grease, like gross. So I don’t like it anymore. Um.

Brandi Sea: 00:02:42 I’ve only, I don’t think I’ve ever, I think I’ve only ever eaten at Wingstop one time. I always get it takeaway.

Michelle: 00:02:48 Oh man, that’s, that is not a bad thing, honestly. I usually eat there with like work people and that’s when the whole office smells like nasty grease the rest of the day.

Brandi Sea: 00:03:02 Oh my gosh.

Michelle: 00:03:02 And that’s when I’m like, “I’m never eating Wingstop again.

Brandi Sea: 00:03:03 They’re like, can we get takeout Wingstop for our lunch break and go eat at the park?

Michelle: 00:03:08 Yeah, please. Anywhere but Wingstop.

Brandi Sea: 00:03:09 Picnic

Michelle: 00:03:12 Picnic at Wingstop. It’d be so good.

Brandi Sea: 00:03:16 Does DJ like Wingstop?

Michelle: 00:03:18 She, you know, if I ask her, she’d say no, but I think that just might be the age that she’s at. I’m like, you like this fpr the smell.

Brandi Sea: 00:03:25 She just likes to be contrary

Michelle: 00:03:27 Yeah, but last night I didn’t get her any food and she ate five of my wings.

Brandi Sea: 00:03:35 Wow.

Michelle: 00:03:35 It’s like, okay, I guess you’re eating. I mean, at least you’re eating so cool. But, um, yeah, I just, I guess she likes it a little bit, but she wouldn’t ever say she did. You know,

Brandi Sea: 00:03:46 Of course.

Michelle: 00:03:46 God forbid. I know we did Halloween. That was lots of fun. I spent literally, um, the weekend before Halloween crafting, which is not my favorite thing to say. Some women, some men.

Brandi Sea: 00:04:02 You’re so suburban.

Michelle: 00:04:02 I know, they love crafting. Some people love it. They’re like, I love Hobby Lobby and Michaels and all of the craft stores and I could go with never stepping foot in one ever again.

Brandi Sea: 00:04:13 I feel like there’s a difference between crafting and making though. Were you crafting or were you making?

Michelle: 00:04:18 I guess I was making, I don’t know the difference

Brandi Sea: 00:04:21 Cause like I don’t consider what Kenny does crafting.

Michelle: 00:04:24 I guess he wouldn’t either.

Brandi Sea: 00:04:25 I’m like, he goes to Hobby Lobby and Michaels, but I don’t think Kenny’s a crafter.

Michelle: 00:04:30 I had to like, like do a trunk for a trunk or treat. Um, and that was like, there was some crafting involved, but I had to make a lot. I had to draw the Cheshire cat. It’s not my.

Brandi Sea: 00:04:43 It was pretty great you guys. It was pretty great.

Michelle: 00:04:46 It was fun. I feel like I could have done better. I mean I didn’t have a lot of notice. Let’s just be honest. I had like 2 days.

Brandi Sea: 00:04:52 For the time you had, it looked fantastic.

Michelle: 00:04:55 Thank you. Thank you. I was sad, but also like, Hey, I did this and this amount of time. So that’s pretty good. Um, and then, so once I finished that, I had to make DJ’s, um, costume for Halloween because she’s like, I had time for this one. Let me just preface, I had time for this one.

Brandi Sea: 00:05:16 She looked incredible. I was like, it was, belongs on a movie set. Who is this girl?

Michelle: 00:05:21 It was so much fun. But let me tell you, she told me like three months ago she wanted to be a mermaid.

Brandi Sea: 00:05:29 So not like The Little Mermaid, just a mermaid.

Michelle: 00:05:31 A mermaid.

Brandi Sea: 00:05:31 So you had like a lot more creative freedom.

Michelle: 00:05:35 Yes. Which I was so thankful for because I did not want to do a little mermaid. I mean it would’ve been fine I guess, but I would rather do what I did. Um, so then like a month ago, I’m like, we’re a month out from Halloween. I should start working on this. And did I? No.

Brandi Sea: 00:05:53 Of course not.

Michelle: 00:05:53 No, I did not start working on this.

Brandi Sea: 00:05:55 Because we work best at the last minute. Right?

Michelle: 00:05:59 Yeah. So, um, at some point I was walking through Target and I don’t usually, like I’ve kind of gotten away from those, like those types of stores. I don’t know what to call them. I don’t know. I don’t.

Brandi Sea: 00:06:15 Um, stores?

Michelle: 00:06:15 Like Target, Walmart, like I don’t know, I spend a lot, when it comes to clothes, I spend a lot of time in thrift stores these days.

Brandi Sea: 00:06:22 Oh I see.

Michelle: 00:06:22 That’s, I don’t know how to, first hand stores?

Brandi Sea: 00:06:24 But Target is just a meandering store.

Michelle: 00:06:26 Yeah. So.

Brandi Sea: 00:06:27 You know, you just go in and you meander.

Michelle: 00:06:29 I was meandering and this exactly what I was doing and I came across this like clearance section cause it’s almost um, fall time obviously. And I um, I see this like really huge mermaid thing that I think is probably meant to put over like a bathing suit or something. And I’m like there that it was like $3 and it was.

Brandi Sea: 00:06:55 That’s just as good as thrifting.

Michelle: 00:06:56 Yeah, exactly. Well, yes. And I’m also gonna reuse it sheets. It’s a, it’s a costume that she can distress up in now. Um, I bought it, it was for a 10 to 12, like it was size 10/12.

Brandi Sea: 00:07:08 Oh goodness, that’s twice her age.

Michelle: 00:07:10 Huge, huge. So I had to like, this is what I, that’s all I did.

Brandi Sea: 00:07:15 Did you sew?

Michelle: 00:07:15 I sewed! And I know how to, so I took home-ec.

Brandi Sea: 00:07:18 But knowing how and actually doing it are totally different.

Michelle: 00:07:25 I have one like one thing down, like I don’t know if you call it a stitch.

Brandi Sea: 00:07:29 You have one needle?

Michelle: 00:07:30 A stitch, one stitch down. Like I have a,

Brandi Sea: 00:07:33 I have a needle.

Michelle: 00:07:35 I have a needle. No, I have a lot of sewing stuff. It’s weird, but I don’t have like a sewing machine.

Brandi Sea: 00:07:41 I do. And I have a sewing machine that I never use and Kenny uses it and then it broke. So.

Michelle: 00:07:46 They’re, Oh, see they’re a little, um, scary to me. They’re intimidating. Sewing machines are, so just give me a sewing needle and some thread and I’ll make.

Brandi Sea: 00:07:56 And a few hours.

Michelle: 00:07:57 In a few hours. Yes. So I, um, she wasn’t here when I did this because DJ around anything sharp is like asking for it, um,

Brandi Sea: 00:08:07 Asking for a trip to the ER.

Michelle: 00:08:08 Yeah. And I don’t have time. Like I’m already doing this last minute, you know? And so she went to soccer practice. I didn’t take her. Kelly did. And I sewed and I sewed this thing that’s like, that was perfect for her and I ended up gluing it hot glue was my best friend.

Brandi Sea: 00:08:26 Hot glue is everyone’s best friend if they know it.

Michelle: 00:08:29 Yes. And I hot glued her costume together like a pro. Um, and so her costume, like I sewed like the dress to a shirt, a pink shirt that she had that was also for like a size. It was like a size 10 as well. I’m like, where do I get all these huge clothes, this huge clothing. Like what am I doing? Um, and so

Brandi Sea: 00:08:50 It looked great.

Michelle: 00:08:52 It was fun. Yeah. So I sewed it all together. I went, made a trip to the dollar tree and glued a bunch of stuff on there, found some shells and looked up and easy. I literally typed in easy DIY mermaid makeup.

Brandi Sea: 00:09:06 Oh my gosh. It looked incredible.

Michelle: 00:09:08 Do you want me to tell you my secret?

Brandi Sea: 00:09:10 I mean, obviously.

Michelle: 00:09:12 It’s not a secret. It’s literally on YouTube. Um, I stretched a fishnet stocking over her head and did make up.

Brandi Sea: 00:09:19 Oh. Like she just did regular makeup with a fishnet over her face.

Michelle: 00:09:24 Um, yeah, sort of. So I had a little bit of costume makeup, like the cream and I put that on first. Like I just dabbed it on.

Brandi Sea: 00:09:31 Like a primer almost.

Michelle: 00:09:33 No, it was, it was really, really, um, the cream that I had was purple.

Brandi Sea: 00:09:38 Oh okay.

Michelle: 00:09:38 So it was like a purple cream, like it was for Halloween makeup.

Brandi Sea: 00:09:43 Got it.

Michelle: 00:09:43 Um, and I just had that like I didn’t have to go on buy that. I saved it from last year, so I don’t know if it was safe.

Brandi Sea: 00:09:49 Oops. Well she didn’t die so it was currently safe.

Michelle: 00:09:52 She didn’t die and I would have used it on me. I don’t know. Um, and so I just dabbed it on her and then I did like fun colored makeup, like TEALS and greens on her and that’s the result I got. So.

Brandi Sea: 00:10:05 Well, I’m going to try really hard to get this photo into our show notes. So you need to send that because.

Michelle: 00:10:11 I will.

Brandi Sea: 00:10:12 Your description just does not do it justice. I came upon it and I was,

Michelle: 00:10:16 Like there was glitter.

Brandi Sea: 00:10:16 What is happening? Did you do that? Did you pay somebody to do this? What’s going on in this world?

Michelle: 00:10:22 I just did it and I said, stay still a lot. So.

Brandi Sea: 00:10:24 Oh my goodness. And then the way she posed for that picture, I was like, Oh, get out of here.

Michelle: 00:10:30 She like just held up. That was her treat for doing so well at dollar tree while I was shopping for all, like the shiny stuff to put on her costume was she got to pick like a lip gloss and she picked a shell lip gloss. And so it was perfect. It was perfect for her costume. And then she just did their postings.

Brandi Sea: 00:10:48 She’s like, I’m a little princess. It was so cute. I loved it.

Michelle: 00:10:52 Yeah, it was tons of fun. So I basically just like that took it out of me, that took it out of me for I don’t know.. The rest of the week.

Brandi Sea: 00:10:59 Whatever it is. It was out.

Michelle: 00:11:01 It was gone. And then, um,

Brandi Sea: 00:11:04 And the Cheshire cat.

Michelle: 00:11:06 And the Cheshire cat, so yeah. And then we did the whole Halloween thing went trick or treating and she got so much candy and I eat like five pieces of candy a night at this. It’s so gross.

Brandi Sea: 00:11:17 I know. If it’s there right? If it’s there it’s like, Oh Kenny, while you’re up can you grab me like four mini Twix and three KitKat’s.

Michelle: 00:11:28 Exactly.

Brandi Sea: 00:11:29 And otherwise I don’t even think about candy.

Michelle: 00:11:32 No. I don’t want candy

Brandi Sea: 00:11:32 I don’t even buy candy.

Michelle: 00:11:34 But like she got a lot of good stuff too. And I’m like there’s still so much, there’s so much Kit-Kats and there’s so many. Like I love almond joys and I love 100 grands. They’re like,

Brandi Sea: 00:11:45 I don’t think I know what’s in a 100 grand.

Michelle: 00:11:47 They’re like crunch bars.

Brandi Sea: 00:11:49 Oh, okay.

Michelle: 00:11:50 And, and she got so many

Brandi Sea: 00:11:51 I like the Heath bar.

Michelle: 00:11:53 Oh, the Heath bars so good. She didn’t get any of those.

Brandi Sea: 00:11:55 And jolly ranchers.

Michelle: 00:11:56 She didn’t get any jolly ranchers.

Brandi Sea: 00:11:58 Well.

Michelle: 00:11:58 I’m all about the chocolate.

Brandi Sea: 00:11:59 We only have a bunch because we didn’t get enough kids coming to our door. So we have, we had bought like a mix and so.

Michelle: 00:12:04 Yeah, you live in a culdesac. So.

Brandi Sea: 00:12:06 I know, I didn’t realize that was a bad thing till Kenny was like, yeah, we’re at the bottom of a Hill in a culdesac. So we’re like the last of the last and nobody comes down.

Michelle: 00:12:15 You know what you should do is you should come out to the end of your driveway with like a table and stuff. That’s what I.

Brandi Sea: 00:12:22 A sign, come to our house.

Michelle: 00:12:24 Please, please visit us. Know where we go. Trick or treating in Albuquerque is on fourth and solar. So it’s like right across from like a Dion’s, which is a pizza place, a Sadie’s, which is a Mexican restaurant. Um, New Mexican restaurant and fourth and solar is like the place to trick or treat all the people come out of their house. They have setups and they give you candy and they have like fire pits out and their just hanging out

Brandi Sea: 00:12:49 So you don’t have to go knock on doors. They’re just like hanging out on their lawn.

Michelle: 00:12:52 Yeah. And some of ha, some of them have like scary things. Like somebody like built a casket, like the one that Kenny built for work built a casket and it had like one of their friends in it, like dressed up, all scary and he would scary people.

Brandi Sea: 00:13:02 Oh my gosh.

Michelle: 00:13:02 As they came up. So it was like fun stuff and it’s super fun, family friendly. And we had a blast. We tricker treated for probably like an hour and a half until it was like way dark. So it was a blast. We had so much DJ only fell over her costume once.

Brandi Sea: 00:13:19 Hey that’s a win. She’s pretty clumsy.

Michelle: 00:13:21 She is. I was like, it wouldn’t be a night if DJ didn’t fall. So.

Brandi Sea: 00:13:24 So there it was, there was the one, Hey, maybe she’s growing out of her clumsiness? No?

Michelle: 00:13:31 Maybe? One fall is, let me tell you, that is.

Brandi Sea: 00:13:36 A miracle.

Michelle: 00:13:37 An actual miracle has happened. Other than that, I’ve just been really trying to embrace Fall. I’m really excited. I’m trying not to skip over fall and be excited for Christmas. But I think I’m mostly just excited for the season. Like.

Brandi Sea: 00:13:53 I’m, this is how I am every year.

Michelle: 00:13:55 Like, and I think you and I are finally like, we’re, we’re on the same page with like gifts and stuff. Like I literally am not excited for gifts at all this year. I just want to like hang out and be with people and eat good food and be warm, you know?

Brandi Sea: 00:14:10 Yeah. Well we told, we told the kids because this wasn’t like something we thought about ahead of time, but by the time we got back and like gave them all their souvenirs was like Christmas. And so I was like, Oh my gosh, you guys, it’s like Christmas in here. And Kenny was like, you know, maybe we don’t do as many Christmas gifts this year and um, you guys get less gifts and maybe we save a little bit of money and do like a weekend trip on the train or something to like Durango.

Michelle: 00:14:39 That’s fun.

Brandi Sea: 00:14:39 Do an experience instead.

Michelle: 00:14:41 Polar Express.

Brandi Sea: 00:14:42 Yeah like, I mean, I don’t need anything. Like there are a few things I want like, or could use, but.

Michelle: 00:14:50 Yeah, I asked for one thing for Christmas this year from Kelly. I just want AirPods and.

Brandi Sea: 00:14:56 Like the new fancy ones.

Michelle: 00:14:57 The new fancy ones, the Bluetooth, the, well, there are all Bluetooth I guess. But the, um, what is it? Sound,

Brandi Sea: 00:15:05 Sound canceling, noise canceling.

Michelle: 00:15:07 Canceling, noise canceling. Thank you. I’m like this sound ones.

Brandi Sea: 00:15:10 The sound canceling. Wait, no, that’s the opposite of what I want.

Michelle: 00:15:13 Yeah. There’s no noise canceling. Yeah. I want those. And he knows how I am with gifts. Like if I ask for something and I don’t get it, I’m going to be real hurt.

Brandi Sea: 00:15:22 Especially if you only asked for one thing.

Michelle: 00:15:23 One thing all I want. But yeah, no, totally. Like I don’t need anything else, you know, so I’m just excited to hang out with people.

Brandi Sea: 00:15:33 Yeah.

Michelle: 00:15:33 And, and live life. Um, but with that I decided to listen to Kelly’s music the other day, which is not normal for me.

Brandi Sea: 00:15:42 Something’s definitely wrong.

Michelle: 00:15:43 Yeah. I listened to his music and I think it like was because it was first thing in the morning and I was like, this will wake him up, like him listening to his own music instead of me listening to my, like pop music or whatever. Um, and so I turned it on and then this song came on and I really, really liked it. Like I was like, I know this song, but then I looked at like who it was and I just was like, this is like good chill music. And it’s a Weezer medley. I think it’s literally called Weezer Medley.

Brandi Sea: 00:16:16 It is.

Michelle: 00:16:17 Um, by Rivers Cuomo and Chilly Gonzales. Like what names are these?

Brandi Sea: 00:16:22 I’ve heard of Rivers I think it’s Cuomo.

Michelle: 00:16:25 It might be Cuomo. You’re probably right. It’s got the “u” before the “o”

Brandi Sea: 00:16:27 But I’ve never heard of Chilly Gonzales and I don’t know what these people have in common, but apparently it’s Weezer.

Michelle: 00:16:33 Yeah, apparently it’s Weezer and they just like mashing them together. And I’m just going to play this music under us, um, this entire time because like, there’s no set, there’s no lyrics. You know, it’s just fun. Chilly Gonzales, Rivers Cuomo Weezer Medley. You can go put it on a play list. Actually, you can listen to.

Brandi Sea: 00:16:55 Just listen to our playlist.

Michelle: 00:16:57 Design Speaks playlist. Exactly. Which is on Spotify. And how many songs do we have on our playlist?

Brandi Sea: 00:17:01 Oh man, let me look it. Does it say how many songs you have?

Michelle: 00:17:05 How many hours of music do we have?

Brandi Sea: 00:17:09 Eight hours and 36 minutes.

Michelle: 00:17:11 That gets you through a Workday.

Brandi Sea: 00:17:11

Michelle: 00:17:13 That’s, that’s a full day of things that we love guys. Yes. It’s so, it’s so much fun. So Weezer Medley. Go check it out. Thanks for listening.

Michelle: 00:17:36 How was your, uh, week of recovery?

Brandi Sea: 00:17:42 Oh my goodness. Um, so the week we came back Kaden was sick, so we got back on 20th, which was a Sunday, and the very next day is supposed to be like a full homeschool day. My homeschool days are all day, Mondays and Tuesdays. And then half day, Wednesdays and Monday, Kaden was sick and I was a little bit like jet lagged over, hung over. Not a lot. Like I didn’t feel, I didn’t feel terrible until about four or five, six in the evening. And then, and then my body was like, wait a minute, where do you think we’re seven hours ahead? Why aren’t you sleeping? And so I would just feel really tired. But, um, I don’t know. It might be all in my head. I don’t know if those things you gave me are like a placebo, but I definitely took those.

Michelle: 00:18:30 Did they work?

Brandi Sea: 00:18:31 I don’t, that’s what I’m saying. I don’t know. Like I didn’t feel bad at all on the way there. Like I felt great when we got to Paris and then on the way back I only felt tired, like I said in the afternoons.

Michelle: 00:18:43 Okay.

Brandi Sea: 00:18:43 So I don’t know if they helped. It’s possible, but, um, Kenny seemed to feel a little bit worse than me and he didn’t take them.

Michelle: 00:18:52 Yes!

Brandi Sea: 00:18:52 So.

Michelle: 00:18:52 He was like, I’m not going to take him on the way there, but I’ll, maybe I’ll take them on the way back.

Brandi Sea: 00:18:56 I kept trying to get him to take them and he’s like,

Michelle: 00:18:59 He was like no.

Brandi Sea: 00:18:59 My body doesn’t need that kind of stuff. And I was like,

Michelle: 00:19:01 Oh, okay.

Brandi Sea: 00:19:02 Okay. Yeah. So I took them, I was happy to take them. I’m like, give me all the things, give me all my anti-nausea meds, give me pain things, give me whatever it takes to make this more bearable.

Michelle: 00:19:16 Yeah right.

Brandi Sea: 00:19:16 Um, yeah, so that was, and then Kenny got sick. So I think either either Kenny and Kaden had separate things and Kenny got something from the plane or we got home and Kaden gave it to Kenny and then Kenny gave it to me so I was sick. So the last episode probably sounds a little out of it and my voice didn’t sound great, but it was.

Michelle: 00:19:37 You did what you could.

Brandi Sea: 00:19:38 It was an episode. So, yeah. So, um, yeah, that was, that was basically how I’ve been feeling in the past week since I’ve been home. Just missing missing everywhere. I missed my kids.

Brandi Sea: 00:19:54 Yeah. And I missed my family and I missed you, but you know, I missed your, my family and Joelle, like I missed like my close friends and Stephanie and stuff, but it was like, do I have, I mean I miss home but I don’t miss home.

Michelle: 00:20:08 Did you miss, Oh, you didn’t miss your house?

Brandi Sea: 00:20:12 No, I don’t.

Michelle: 00:20:14 I would’ve missed my bed. I, I, I don’t know. Like we, the bed, we only slept in one bed. That was like a little bit springy, like where you could feel the springs, but actually when you slept, I didn’t feel them. Like when I was just laying there, like on my phone right before we went to sleep, like I felt them and I was like, this isn’t going to be very comfortable. And then I slept great all night. So I don’t know. But I can sleep, I can sleep a lot of places. I don’t really like miss my bed. People were like, I miss my bed. I guess if I was traveling more.

Michelle: 00:20:46 I for sure miss my bed.

Brandi Sea: 00:20:48 On the train, I probably would have missed my bed. But we stayed in like normal hotels most of the time, so I didn’t, I didn’t really,

Michelle: 00:20:58 That helps.

Brandi Sea: 00:20:59 Kenny’s always like I missed, I missed home. I missed familiarity. I’m like, I like everything new all the time.

Michelle: 00:21:06 All the time. always. Did you listen to any good music while you’re out there?

Brandi Sea: 00:21:11 You know, um, while we were out there, I listened to, um, Sleeping at Last probably the most. Um, just because, uh, I listen to it to keep me chill on the planes. And we did, we did, I counted them up nine flights total.

Michelle: 00:21:30 Dang.

Brandi Sea: 00:21:30 Um, between, uh, he, we had three flights just to get out of the country from our, from New Mexico cause there’s no direct flights from Albuquerque overseas. So we had to get to Boston from here. Um, so there was that, there was the, the in in Europe flights to get like to Glasgow from Rome and then London and stuff. So there was a lot of flying. So I listened to a lot of um, Sleeping at Last and also.

Michelle: 00:21:59 Which is kind of funny if you think about it cause he writes a lot of songs about space.

Brandi Sea: 00:22:04 He does and they’re so calming.

Michelle: 00:22:08 And space is a little terrifying.

Brandi Sea: 00:22:09 So they’re all downloaded so I don’t have to like stream anything.

Michelle: 00:22:13 Right right.

Brandi Sea: 00:22:13 Cause um, downside is Kenny like upgraded his phone to like the regular speed. So we could have normal like LTE speeds in Europe but didn’t want to. S we didn’t feel like it was necessary to spend the money to do that for both our phones. So I had cruddy service, like super low unless we were on wifi.

Michelle: 00:22:33 And you’re the one posting. So.

Brandi Sea: 00:22:35 I know it was making me insane, but he was the one that needed the maps like the whole time to like help us get places. So it was a trade off. I’m like,

Michelle: 00:22:43 That’s more important.

Brandi Sea: 00:22:43 Well, I guess I’ll have to wait, which is why I’m so behind on posting. Like while we were in Paris, why there was a lot more wifi. And so I was able to post right away.

Michelle: 00:22:52 It’s like you’re still there.

Brandi Sea: 00:22:52 I know, I’m like, as far as the world is concerned, that doesn’t know me. We’re just getting to Scotland, I think, or we haven’t even gotten there yet.

Michelle: 00:23:00 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:23:02 But um.

Michelle: 00:23:02 I’m just dreaming of that of Scotland. I love Scotland.

Brandi Sea: 00:23:06 So good. But the song that I am bringing today is, is not necessarily something that I listened to while I was there. Um, but it’s, it’s, uh, it’s part of like five or six songs that I’ve been listening to on repeat for probably three or four months, which is very unlike me. But it’s because it’s a few different songs. It’s not the same one. But, um, so Angels and Airwaves released some new stuff and the first single that they re released is called Rebel Girl and it’s really, really good. And it’s, uh, it’s the song that’s at the top of this list cause I really love it. And um, here it is.

Brandi Sea: 00:25:10 Had you heard it?

Michelle: 00:25:10 It’s classic Yeah. Well, no. Yes and no? You played it for me a few weeks ago when you were like, I want this to be my song for the episode and then you forgot to play it.

Brandi Sea: 00:25:22 I did.

Michelle: 00:25:22 But.

Brandi Sea: 00:25:22 So I’ve been listening to it since before Europe. So there’s that.

Michelle: 00:25:25 Yeah. You were like, you were like, do you recognize this? And I’m like, is this Tom? And you’re like, Tom. And I was like, Tom from Blink-182, and then you’re like Angels and Airwaves. And I’m like, Oh yeah, it’s Tom.

Brandi Sea: 00:25:40 I don’t, I.

Michelle: 00:25:40 I feel like you knew that. I feel like you new.

Brandi Sea: 00:25:41 I did but it’s just so weird. Like there, there are like celebrities and musicians that like when you say their names, you say their whole name.

Michelle: 00:25:49 Yeah. Tom DeLonge.

Brandi Sea: 00:25:50 Tom DeLong. It’s not like, is this Tom? And I’m like, who the heck is Tom?

Michelle: 00:25:55 I’m like, Tom, I have like Justin’s and Tom’s.

Brandi Sea: 00:25:57 You’re all, THE Tom. My mom’s Tom from

Michelle: 00:26:00 I have Justin’s in my life and I have Tom’s in my life so,

Brandi Sea: 00:26:05 Well I was just like, it just kind of threw me, I’m like, are we on like a first name basis with these people? Do you?

Michelle: 00:26:12 Oh yeah for sure.

Brandi Sea: 00:26:12 My brain was was was like, do you know this person? Is this like, do we know who this is? Is this someone else? Like I thought this was, what’s his name from Blink-182.

Michelle: 00:26:22 No, I just feel like he’s been a part of my life for so long.

Brandi Sea: 00:26:25 You deserve the first name basis.

Michelle: 00:26:27 I deserve the first name basis.

Brandi Sea: 00:26:29 You see him in concert and you’re like, Tom! It’s been awhile

Michelle: 00:26:35 I’ve actually never seen him in concert. I’ve seen Blink, but it was when they already had Matt.

Brandi Sea: 00:26:39 I haven’t either. I’ve never seen them live.

Michelle: 00:26:43 They’re like, they’re good. They’re, they’re Blink-182. Their audio is always super. Should I say this? Their audio is always super muddy. Um, but they’re fun. They’re lots of fun.

Brandi Sea: 00:26:53 It must be on purpose if it’s always super muddy.

Michelle: 00:26:55 If it’s always super muddy. Yeah. I’m like, they must be doing this.

Brandi Sea: 00:26:58 It’s what they do. It’s just what they do.

Michelle: 00:27:00 They do it on purpose.

Brandi Sea: 00:27:01 Yeah. So that’s my song. It’s, I mean the quality of it is Angels and Airwaves. I’ve, I’ve been in love with them for some years and um, it sounds like them but also sounds new, which I love. And the lyrics are really fun. Like the shoe fits my little Cinderella and talking about rebel girls and stuff. I’m all about that life. So, you know, girl power,

Michelle: 00:27:23 It’s good. Angels and Airwaves is always, is always fun to listen to.

Brandi Sea: 00:27:27 It’s always a good time.

Michelle: 00:27:27 They bring a bit of nostalgia. Ooh. Speaking of nostalgia have you listened to the new Blink album? Probably not. Right?

Brandi Sea: 00:27:33 No I haven’t. I haven’t had time to sit and listen to anything cause I’ve just.

Michelle: 00:27:37 Oh okay.

Brandi Sea: 00:27:37 Well here’s the thing. When you’re sick, you don’t binge music, you binge TV. So.

Michelle: 00:27:42 Yeah, and then you fall asleep.

Brandi Sea: 00:27:42 Yeah

Michelle: 00:27:44 Yes.

Brandi Sea: 00:27:44 And then you sleep and then you binge watch tv.

Michelle: 00:27:46 Oh, can I go back to one thing really fast?

Brandi Sea: 00:27:49 No.

Michelle: 00:27:49 Something. Dang. Okay, never mind.

Brandi Sea: 00:27:51 Of course

Michelle: 00:27:52 So this is something I wanted to mention. Um, I have been watching a show slowly because there’s a new podcast at about it. Office Ladies. Um, so Office Ladies is by Oh shoot. Um, Pam and Angela from The Office.

Brandi Sea: 00:28:10 Oh my gosh.

Michelle: 00:28:12 Yeah. Um, and so they are best friends in real life and they have decided to start going through The Office episode by episode and give you like behind the scenes information.

Brandi Sea: 00:28:23 Oh my gosh that’s so fun.

Michelle: 00:28:25 And fun little tidbits. Um, so they’re only, I think if they released an episode this week, they’re only on episode four.

Brandi Sea: 00:28:33 Wow. That’s really new.

Michelle: 00:28:35 It’s brand new. So I just decided to start watching The Office again and watch it kind of with them. I’ve already finished the first season cause a whatever and I’ll just listen to now. I’ll be up to date. I just saw the episodes. Um,

Brandi Sea: 00:28:49 I wonder if this is like a thing though because I just found a podcast for Buffy and they’re on like season four already and, but they do that. They’re not the actors though, but they have the actors on like for interviews. But they do that, they go through each episode like super slow and like talk about like all the stuff and it’s like I’ve been listening to that one. So we’re like on the same wavelength with different shows.

Michelle: 00:29:16 Um, yeah, so Gilmore Girls has a podcast like that called Gilmore Guys.

Brandi Sea: 00:29:21 So it’s guys?

Michelle: 00:29:21 And yeah, and they talk everything Gilmore Girls and they have um, random people from the show on like the last one I listened to, I think Milo Ventimiglia was on.

Brandi Sea: 00:29:34 Oh, nice. It’s Jenna Fisher and Angela Kinsey. I knew her name was Angela, but I didn’t want to say it. Yes. Jenna Fisher and Angela Kinsey are hosts seat and co-hosting this.

Brandi Sea: 00:29:43 And I probably for sure knew Jenna Fisher, but when it’s like you’re called on it and you can’t think of it.

Michelle: 00:29:48 The pressure to say, now I didn’t have it, but it’s a lot of fun to listen to and I’m listening and I’m watching the office over again because of it. Anyway, because you talked about being sick and binging TV.

Brandi Sea: 00:30:01 Yeah. That’s really great. I’m excited about that. I don’t know if I can commit to another podcast.

Michelle: 00:30:06 I know it’s a lot. I only have this one podcast right now so.

Brandi Sea: 00:30:10 I have so many, I just started listening to the killing of Marilyn Monroe.

Michelle: 00:30:14 Oh my gosh.

Brandi Sea: 00:30:14 And that one’s really good. Anyways, so it’s been some weeks and we haven’t caught up. So we’ll spare everybody all the details.

Michelle: 00:30:23 And just get to the episode. How about that?

Brandi Sea: 00:30:25 Let’s, let’s do, let’s do.

Michelle: 00:30:27 Okay. Okay. So your trip, where do we want to start?

Brandi Sea: 00:30:31 I don’t know. I was really having a hard time figuring out, like I’m, I feel like this is weird for me to still be processing, um, because I usually process things like pretty well pretty quickly. But I, I think when I’m inundated with something that I love this much.

Michelle: 00:30:47 And something you’ve been waiting for for so long.

Brandi Sea: 00:30:50 So long.

Michelle: 00:30:50 And it have happened.

Brandi Sea: 00:30:52 It was so much and I am like not.

Michelle: 00:30:54 It finally happened.

Brandi Sea: 00:30:54 I don’t know. I guess let’s just start with one little tidbit and that will give you some insight into how I felt about the trip. So one, I visited Europe when I was 15 or 16 and went to a lot of the same places that I went this time, but it was, um, it was a completely different experience. There was a lot of negativity wrapped around a lot of the places, especially Paris. And, um,

Michelle: 00:31:19 That you went last time.

Brandi Sea: 00:31:19 When I went the last time.

Michelle: 00:31:20 This is a positive experience.

Brandi Sea: 00:31:22 So this is a positive but so, and we’ve been planning it for seven years and, and, and I love Paris and all this stuff. So, um, we got off the plane in Paris and you have to take the train into the city cause all of course all the airports are always outside the city. Um, so the train was a, was an underground train. It wasn’t a subway but it was an underground train and so then you switched to the subway and you get into to the city. So we were trying to get to the stop nearest our, our hotel and we, at this point we still don’t really exactly know like, um, what area we’re going to end up at as far as where we’re getting off. I know Kenny did, but still like context, we didn’t know exactly where we’re coming up. So we came up from the subway and the first thing I see when I come up, we get off right next to the Seine and turn to my right, like a quarter of a degree and Notre Dame was right there.

Michelle: 00:32:24 Okay.

Brandi Sea: 00:32:24 And I cried.

Michelle: 00:32:27 That’s how I felt when I walked into the Wizarding World. It’s a little different. I turned the corner.

Brandi Sea: 00:32:37 Somehow yours is better. I don’t know why.

Michelle: 00:32:37 I turned into the Wizarding World at Universal Studios and I just started crying

Brandi Sea: 00:32:44 Oh my gosh, I don’t know what to say. I wish I was there for that. I’m like, Michelle, it’s make believe.

Michelle: 00:32:51 I’m like, no, you don’t know now.

Brandi Sea: 00:32:52 No that’s probably going to be me when I go to New Zealand and I say when cause it’s going to happen. And I go see of course. And I go see like the Shire.

Michelle: 00:32:59 Uh yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:32:59 Um, so I just cried and Kenny was like, Oh sweetie. I was like, I’m okay. I’m just really happy, which is not like, I’m not like that. I don’t like easily cry. I’m not like, I can get overwhelmed with emotion I guess. But usually it’s more just like, wow, this is amazing. So that was like, that was incredible. Um,

Michelle: 00:33:24 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:33:24 As far as like what all I want to talk about, you had to give me some sort of direction cause.

Michelle: 00:33:31 So cause we could talk for like seven hours about this and I.

Brandi Sea: 00:33:34 Easily.

Michelle: 00:33:34 And I don’t think we should do that.

Brandi Sea: 00:33:37 I mean people would definitely unsubscribe. They’re like, okay, I thought this was something different. I hate this. I’m tired of they’re voices.

Michelle: 00:33:43 I’m sorry we’re not selling, we’re not selling you a weird product.

Brandi Sea: 00:33:47 I know we’re selling you on Europe guy.

Michelle: 00:33:49 Yes. Go.

Brandi Sea: 00:33:51 Go to Europe, travel the world. Um, so you, what was it that you told me when I was like, I don’t know how to approach this episode.

Michelle: 00:34:02 I was just like, um, why don’t you just, I wanted you to like pick out points. Let me see. I said, Oh shoot.

Brandi Sea: 00:34:10 You said something about like design themes or I don’t.

Michelle: 00:34:15 Oh yeah. And you’re like, I don’t think that’s possible. Um, I said maybe one design element from each place you visited.

Brandi Sea: 00:34:23 That’s right. And I was like laying down, I don’t know how to do that. Which was weird.

Michelle: 00:34:30 And I’m like, figure it out.

Brandi Sea: 00:34:30 It was also weird for me to think about because.

Michelle: 00:34:32 I thought like I had like given you like gold in your, like literally not possible.

Brandi Sea: 00:34:38 So I did come up with like some points. Um, and I don’t want this to just be like a bullet, a bullet list of all my things.

Michelle: 00:34:46 Right.

Brandi Sea: 00:34:46 Please interject. Cause otherwise, you know how I get, I’ll just railroad you. Um.

Michelle: 00:34:53 Bulldoze.

Brandi Sea: 00:34:53 Like, yeah, that’s the one bulldoze. Railroad? I don’t know. A bulldozer rolls over things. I don’t know. A train.

Michelle: 00:34:59 You know, trains are dangerous, so.

Brandi Sea: 00:35:02 I don’t know. Apparently I’m, my brain isn’t all better. Um, so I kind of like put together just like a few sort of listy type things. Um, the main, I think the main design thing that I was, that I noticed the most as far as like actual design, not like the way I look at things and everything is beautiful and everything’s inspiring and I see things really weirdly different was the restaurant logos. I was like, really, it’s going to sound maybe mean. I was like shocked at like these little hole in the wall restaurants that had incredible design like mom and pop places. It was like in new, in New Mexico and in a lot of places like you expect the mom and pop stuff to be like great food, but design is like not their deal.

Michelle: 00:35:54 Nothing else is great. Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:35:56 And I had the exact opposite experience, whether it was in Paris at like some little like bakery to some Italian restaurant, let’s literally in a basement in Rome. Like.

Michelle: 00:36:11 Why do think that is?

Brandi Sea: 00:36:12 Beautiful, beautiful logos like unbelievable. I don’t know.

Michelle: 00:36:17 Why do you think that is? I don’t know either. Like I don’t have any answer.

Brandi Sea: 00:36:19 Like I was trying to figure it out. I think the only thing that I can think of is time. Like they have been around long enough to know that it matters. Maybe because they are so immersed in this history of beautiful art in all of these places that it’s like, well yeah, of course we want our stuff to look nice. You know what I mean? It’s like their food looks pretty and they’re, their buildings are old and beautiful and like everything is, is just like oozing this ancient beauty that maybe it’s just like more built in? I don’t know.

Michelle: 00:37:05 Yeah, I know it’s second nature. It’s become something that they just do.

Brandi Sea: 00:37:09 They’re and they’re like classic and they’re, they the logos, in order to have a good logo, they need to be describable. They need to be memorable, they need to be scalable, like all of these things. They just are.

Michelle: 00:37:22 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:37:23 And so those, that was probably like classically designed type thing. What I would say is the one thing I noticed the most, um.

Michelle: 00:37:32 Which is so nice.

Brandi Sea: 00:37:33 Yeah, it was, it was surprising and really cool. Um, uh, let’s see. Um, we sort of ended up, I don’t think it was like our goal to do this, but we ended up like figuring out really amazing places for like the best views in every city.

Michelle: 00:37:52 Which is nothing I would have ever thought of, but that’s so fun.

Brandi Sea: 00:37:54 Yeah. And it was, it was like accidental half the time. Like we, I had bought the museum pass for Paris so that you can basically, um, for, I think it was like, I think I bought the seven day cause you needed to, there was like a three and a seven and we were there five, so it was anyways, you get to go into most of the museums as much as you want, um, and you get early access and you get discounts on the tickets if you get this pass. So we had.

Michelle: 00:38:24 That’s like the dream.

Brandi Sea: 00:38:25 Right? So we, we did, we did like the Louvre and we did a whole bunch of really cool things. And then we went down to the Champs Elysees to go see the Arc de Triomphe. And um, we were walking around and just taking pictures and stuff. And I was like, you know what, I think I read somewhere that we can walk that like we can go up to the top and you can’t even really see people up there. So I’m like, I don’t know, maybe, maybe not. Like, let’s check our ticket and see if we can. And so we just like walked over to the like museum passholder entrance. And we’re like here and like not knowing if it was gonna work or not. And they’re like, here you go. And then, then the stairs, let me tell you, in Paris, all there are is stairs. There’s stairs upon stairs upon stairs.

Michelle: 00:39:12 They don’t have elevators?

Brandi Sea: 00:39:14 Not a lot of places have elevators.

Michelle: 00:39:15 Not that but jeez.

Brandi Sea: 00:39:17 So I don’t remember, it was probably, it was definitely close to 300 or 400 steps, something like that to get to the top, but it had the best views.

Michelle: 00:39:27 Oh I’m glad you accidentally found that.

Brandi Sea: 00:39:29 Oh my gosh, it was the best. And then, um, Venice was a L it wasn’t like you couldn’t really find a place for views because there’s not like, um, the.

Michelle: 00:39:39 There’s not high buildings there are there?

Brandi Sea: 00:39:41 There’s not a lot of high ones. So we did, there is a place that you can go, um in St. Mark’s square, but you have to like pay extra and wait in line forever. And apparently it’s a really tiny stairwell. And I was like, not about that life cause I’m claustrophobic. So Kenny was like, do you want to do that? It’s probably has the best view is another. Like, Nope, what’s the next best thing? So, um, so St. Mark’s church, the one right behind it, you can go, you can pay like, uh, some euros, not very much and go up to the top and like look out from the top onto St. Mark’s square. And that was probably the best view in Venice in my book.

Michelle: 00:40:20 Did you get a good hang of euros? I’ve never worked with euros. I’ve only ever worked with like pesos and Costa Rican money and stuff.

Brandi Sea: 00:40:29 Um, it’s close enough. Um, it’s close enough that you basically just, I just thought about it as dollars plus like an extra 50 cents to a dollar.

Michelle: 00:40:39 Yeah the currency.

Brandi Sea: 00:40:39 Like it says it’s $6. It’s probably like 7.50 or.

Michelle: 00:40:44 Okay.

Brandi Sea: 00:40:44 Something like that. Um, or seven. So it was close enough that it was like, meh.

Michelle: 00:40:49 Okay.

Brandi Sea: 00:40:50 It wasn’t.

Michelle: 00:40:51 Sure.

Brandi Sea: 00:40:52 This is like, here’s this. The one thing that was a little confusing at first was that they have coin dollars.

Michelle: 00:41:00 Oh.

Brandi Sea: 00:41:00 So they don’t.

Michelle: 00:41:01 I mean we have those, but they’re not in like high circulation.

Brandi Sea: 00:41:04 Right, that’s their only dollar is,

Michelle: 00:41:06 Oh.

Brandi Sea: 00:41:06 Like their, they have $2 coins and $1 coins and 50 cent and 20 cent coins.

Michelle: 00:41:12 Okay.

Brandi Sea: 00:41:12 So that was the thing that took like the most getting, used to.

Michelle: 00:41:15 It’s so complicated.

Brandi Sea: 00:41:16 Cause I’m like, um leaving where I’m like, it feels really weird. So most places don’t. They, they, they’re um, wait, people get paid higher and they don’t expect tips.

Michelle: 00:41:27 Yes, exactly. Which is I wish, man, I don’t, I don’t work with him in any way anymore. But this guy used to work with and they Will hates tip culture. He’s like, they don’t do that anywhere else.

Brandi Sea: 00:41:39 It’s true.

Michelle: 00:41:39 Just here in America. So.

Brandi Sea: 00:41:39 It’s true. And I think that it’s great the way they do it, but also they, they basically said, because I have this etiquette book for places in Europe that it was like, if you, um, if you really think that they were exceptional, you can give a tip. So we would give like a couple bucks, um, on top of whatever was included. But it was like, I’m just leaving two coins, but it’s actually $2 or you leave one coin and it’s a $2 coin. It’s like, here’s my little tip. It just felt really weird. Um, but other than that, no. I think that that was just like, it took some getting used to, um, with the coin thing.

Speaker 4: 00:42:20 Um, in Rome.

Michelle: 00:42:22 Sorry I derailed it.

Brandi Sea: 00:42:22 No, no, no, you’re fine. I’m glad you’re interjecting. I have lots to say about everything. Um, in Rome, another thing that was sort of last minute sort of a find we were at, um, I was checked, I was looking at blogs a lot before we left and I, I had remembered that there was apparently a castle in Rome somewhere, but I kind of forgot about it. And then we got there and we went to, um, Oh goodness, all these places I should have probably written them down. Um, in Rome where the big tall obelisk thing is and it’s like in this huge square. Um, and there’s a church there that has a Michelangelo’s Pieta of one of the Pieta that he did. Um, people were in line to go see that and it was huge line. And I was like, okay, I don’t think I want to do that. Like it’s, we’ve been seeing a lot of really great stuff. I don’t think I want to wait for four hours to see one thing.

Michelle: 00:43:19 No no.

Brandi Sea: 00:43:19 So, um, then it started raining. And so we were just standing around and I was like, Oh, you know what? I think there’s, I think there’s that castle around here somewhere. Maybe we should go do that since it’s raining. And so we walked over and it, it’s called Castile castle San Angelo, and it’s at punt Pontius San Angelo, which is this beautiful bridge. And the castle is like from medieval times or close after medieval times. And it’s been like a fortress. It’s been a hideout for the Pope’s. It’s been like all sorts of crazy things and it’s really incredible. And you can go all the way to the top and have these 360 views all around and see all the Hills in Rome and see palaces and see like parts of the Vatican and it’s just, it was incredible. So that is, that was the little secret in Rome was, which was again, not something we were seeking out, but it was just like, Oh my gosh

Michelle: 00:44:20 You happened upon.

Brandi Sea: 00:44:20 These views.

Michelle: 00:44:22 What the heck? That’s so cool.

Brandi Sea: 00:44:25 Yeah. Kenny was poor Kenny. Every five seconds, I’m like, hold on, please hold, wait, hold on.

Michelle: 00:44:31 He showed me pictures that he had and all his pictures are of you taking pictures.

Brandi Sea: 00:44:37 I know. I was like, you should take pictures of me when I know you’re taking pictures of me.

Michelle: 00:44:44 So funny.

Brandi Sea: 00:44:44 Snd all of my pictures are of his backside cause I’m following behind him everywhere.

Michelle: 00:44:50 Yeah, yeah, yup. He’s like walking away from you.

Brandi Sea: 00:44:53 Yeah. Yeah. I’m like, come back. No, Scotland, we didn’t, we didn’t stay in Scotland a whole, a whole lot. Um, we were only there for like, um, I think two nights and like one and a half days, but.

Michelle: 00:45:06 Okay.

Brandi Sea: 00:45:06 Um, so I can’t say like categorically like this is the best views in Scotland, but for the.

Michelle: 00:45:11 Right.

Brandi Sea: 00:45:11 For what we did, um, we went to go see Sterling castle, um, in Glasgow, Glasgow, Glasgow.

Michelle: 00:45:18 Glasgow. I don’t know how they say it.

Brandi Sea: 00:45:21 They say Glasgow. Glasgow. Um, and so Sterling castle is obviously like up at the top of this, um, this beautiful Hill. And the views from there were unbelievable. There were, there were like so many places I just kept saying like, is this real life or am I like.

Michelle: 00:45:43 This is Scotland

Brandi Sea: 00:45:44 Did I hop into like a Mary Poppins chalk drawing cause.

Michelle: 00:45:48 Seriously.

Brandi Sea: 00:45:49 Or Instagram cause this.

Michelle: 00:45:50 That’s what Scotland is.

Brandi Sea: 00:45:52 Not just.

Michelle: 00:45:53 It’s for real.

Brandi Sea: 00:45:53 Yeah. And it was like I kept, I like would look at my phone like framing up a photo and look up and look at my phone and look up and be like, it’s the same.

Michelle: 00:46:03 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:46:03 And it, it looks like I did something to this picture.

Michelle: 00:46:07 But you didn’t.

Brandi Sea: 00:46:07 It’s my eyes. My eyes are filtering. So it was really crazy and really amazing. Um, finding views was probably, it probably made me feel the most, I dunno how to say this. Like full.

Michelle: 00:46:21 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:46:21 Because you get to take in so much more as opposed to like, I’m just seeing inside this one place. It’s like I can see this city.

Michelle: 00:46:31 What like what’s crazy to me is that like you got to go there and look at these views and that like people live there.

Brandi Sea: 00:46:40 Yeah.

Michelle: 00:46:41 People really live there.

Brandi Sea: 00:46:44 It’s.

Michelle: 00:46:44 How crazy

Brandi Sea: 00:46:44 Crazy. Yeah. That kept blowing me away too. I didn’t write that down, but that’s a really good point. It kept blowing me away that like they’re just sitting down, hanging out, having meals next to like this 2000 year old building on a street that like Paul walked on.

Michelle: 00:47:05 Like, and every, yeah, every so often I think like, wow, we have the mountains right there and.

Brandi Sea: 00:47:12 Yeah, sometimes I do that too.

Michelle: 00:47:12 Some people don’t have mountains.

Brandi Sea: 00:47:14 Yeah.

Michelle: 00:47:14 Some people just have like nothing, you know,

Brandi Sea: 00:47:17 Fields.

Michelle: 00:47:17 Like fields, uh, nothingness. Um, but like we have mountains, but I look at like the green, the historical, the beautiful Scotland pictures. I’m like, people are there right now living their lives.

Brandi Sea: 00:47:34 Yeah. With a castle in their backyard.

Michelle: 00:47:36 Yeah, whatever.

Brandi Sea: 00:47:38 Yeah. It’s nuts. Or, I mean, I don’t think that I have felt that way necessarily about most places. Like when we’ve gone to New York, San Francisco or Chicago, I’m like, man, I hope these people know how cool it is here. Like I hope they know how cool it is. Like, I think that’s as much as I’ve, I’ve gotten or like I hope that they appreciate how much stuff they have access to or things like that. Like things that we don’t have here.

Michelle: 00:48:01 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:48:01 But there was just like, I mean, a lot of places in the city, there’s just like these historical landmarks everywhere in Paris. It’s like, Oh, there’s the Louvre. There’s Notre Dome. It was, it was exactly my experience just coming out of the subway. It’s like just coming out on the subway in there Notre Dome.

Michelle: 00:48:20 Yeah. Yup.

Brandi Sea: 00:48:21 What?!

Michelle: 00:48:22 Can you imagine stepping out of the Notre Dome and seeing it on fire?

Brandi Sea: 00:48:26 Oh, un huh, no. Oh, it was devastating. We got so many pictures of like the backside and it’s just like all scaffolding and all sorts of stuff.

Michelle: 00:48:35 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:48:35 Speaking of scaffolding, my biggest disappointment was in London.

Michelle: 00:48:39 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:48:39 Did Kenny tell you?

Michelle: 00:48:41 Uh, he told me that you guys weren’t like huge fans.

Brandi Sea: 00:48:44 No Big Ben was covered with scaffolding.

Michelle: 00:48:47 Oh yes. He told me that that would have been a huge bummer to me too.

Brandi Sea: 00:48:50 Specifically my biggest, biggest disappointment.

Michelle: 00:48:53 Like, like they should publicize that.

Brandi Sea: 00:48:57 I know we like, we like made our way over there. That was going to be like the start of our like walk cause we only had like four and a half, five hours to like walk London and it was completely covered. Like you couldn’t even like make out like where it was.

Michelle: 00:49:11 That’s so sad. Where is Peter Pan going to go?

Brandi Sea: 00:49:15 So sad. Um, so, uh, the views were really cool. Um, I don’t think I was able to really find good views in, in um, in London we weren’t there for very long

Michelle: 00:49:27 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:49:27 Trafalgar square was pretty cool. Um, for.

Michelle: 00:49:30 Maybe a trip to London is in order just to explore like that side.

Brandi Sea: 00:49:33 Yeah. Oh yeah. I definitely want to, I definitely want to go back and check it out some more. I don’t think that I can accurately judge it on four hours. Um, let’s see, what else? Something else that was really, really big that we kind of saw trending or whatever trending in.

Michelle: 00:49:53 Trending. What’s trending?

Brandi Sea: 00:49:53 Was sculpture trending for our trip was, was sculptures like this, the sheer quantity of sculpture we saw was insane.

Michelle: 00:50:05 You have one right behind you, sort of.

Brandi Sea: 00:50:09 The David. Michelle, I saw the David.

Michelle: 00:50:13 I know. Did you shed a tear? Did your eyes get all glossy?

Brandi Sea: 00:50:16 I did, I was just so excited because like, I don’t know if you know this about me, I’m terrible with scale, so I know he was 14 feet tall.

Michelle: 00:50:26 But what is that?

Brandi Sea: 00:50:28 I’ve studied it? I drew it like I know that in fact form, but being there and looking up at a 14 foot tall un freaking believable statue sculpture on top of a like three foot base was just, I have no words. I can barely get them out now. It was just like, you could see like every single texture you could see like where he had like sculpted in the veins in his hands and like the muscles in his back. And like that was probably the coolest part because you never get to see the back.

Michelle: 00:51:12 Yeah, exactly. I’m, that’s what it would see. I’m not terrible with scale. Like I, I might, I am on the, maybe I am not the best with it. I might walk up to him and be like, Oh, it’s not as big as I thought. Like it’s not as tall as I thought he was going to be, you know? Um, because.

Brandi Sea: 00:51:31 I don’t think you would think that about this.

Michelle: 00:51:32 But what would get me, what would for sure get me, is like the 3D-ness of him.

Brandi Sea: 00:51:39 You’re like, Oh, you have all sides.

Michelle: 00:51:41 Yes. Wow.

Brandi Sea: 00:51:43 Yeah. I’ve never seen, I’ve never seen really good and it’s probably cause I’ve never really sought it out, but I never really thought to seek it out, but like to see the back, it’s so awkward to see the backside of it.

Michelle: 00:51:56 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:51:56 You know, like.

Michelle: 00:51:58 Yeah, he’s naked, whatever.

Brandi Sea: 00:51:59 I know, but that’s kind of what I mean. Like you literally see the backside, but also like you can see the strap of his slang swung over the, his back.

Michelle: 00:52:07 Like of course that’s there, you know, and you don’t think about that.

Brandi Sea: 00:52:09 And it’s like, Oh, hi. So like I was, Kenny kept kinda like having to drag me away cause we were looking at other things around it too. And then I’d have to like go back and like take a few more pictures and then like go. I’m like, Oh wait. But I didn’t get a picture of his big toe on his right foot. Like it was just incredible. Um, but what I, what I was really inspired by with, with the sculptures for me was like, I kept getting really close up to like random parts of their faces or hands or, um, like their shoulders up and I was thinking like how I can paint on them. Oh. Like, like, you know, do what I do with my pictures and like paint over and like do some cool things. I took a really close up picture of this one statute. I don’t even know who he was. It was just like in Paris somewhere. Just some random guy on a horse. I didn’t look at the plaque, but he had been bird pooped all over his head, but it looked like war paint going over his eye and it was really cool. So I took a picture. I’m like, I’m going to do something with that. Who does that?

Michelle: 00:53:13 That’s so funny. It’s this bird poop. So sad.

Brandi Sea: 00:53:16 I know. So that there was a lot of, there was a lot of like that stuff with sculptures. I was like,

Michelle: 00:53:20 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:53:20 Oh, these things look really cool. I wonder what I can do with that. That was the majority of my pictures. Yeah. The other weird observation that Kenny was like, it’s like, I don’t, I don’t understand you, but I love you anyway. Was um, in Paris there’s all the bistros, right? There’s like all these little all over the place or all these little bistros and they have bistro chairs. Every single place has different chairs like,

Michelle: 00:53:51 Which is like how, you know, where do you get all these chairs?

Brandi Sea: 00:53:55 I was thinking that I was like, is there like a bistro chair manufacturer that’s like, Hey, I want to start a bistro.

Michelle: 00:54:02 No two are alike.

Brandi Sea: 00:54:02 Okay call this person. Yeah. The colors, the patterns like the wood, the way that like the whatever the stuff is wraps around the wood is completely different. I took so many pictures of just.

Michelle: 00:54:17 Chairs.

Brandi Sea: 00:54:17 Just chairs. I’m like, this is funny. Such a crazy interesting.

Michelle: 00:54:22 That is interesting.

Brandi Sea: 00:54:23 Accepting of this city is like, there’s so many bistros but maybe that’s how they set themselves apart. I don’t know.

Michelle: 00:54:29 I guess I like it. Like I love the bistro with the green and tan and black chairs.

Michelle: 00:54:36 Yeah. It’s like, Oh, there you go. It’s like and take a right at.

Brandi Sea: 00:54:40 Yeah. At the one with the red and white and black.

Michelle: 00:54:44 I guess.

Brandi Sea: 00:54:44 It was just, it was crazy.

Michelle: 00:54:46 I love that. Not like us. We’re like, Oh these chairs. Oh yeah, I’ve got these chairs cause I saw them at, you know, the Grove or whatever, just like whatever.

Brandi Sea: 00:54:54 And we all have matching cause there’s only so many.

Michelle: 00:54:57 Yeah. It’s like you got Target and Amazon. So.

Brandi Sea: 00:55:00 I think it just kind of also speaks to like the, I’m not crafty and I have that word in my head cause you kept saying we were crafty. The like I’m not creative. More like old, old school, like classic guys making things like ah,

Michelle: 00:55:22 Masonry? Or.

Brandi Sea: 00:55:24 No, not like a specific thing.

Michelle: 00:55:26 Carpentry.

Brandi Sea: 00:55:26 Oh my gosh.

Michelle: 00:55:29 Oh no.

Brandi Sea: 00:55:30 My thesaurus is broken.

Michelle: 00:55:32 Oh no.

Brandi Sea: 00:55:34 Um, anyways, the level of quality, craftsmanship.

Michelle: 00:55:37 Craftsmanship. Yes.

Brandi Sea: 00:55:37 That’s the one.

Michelle: 00:55:40 There it is.

Brandi Sea: 00:55:41 The level of cross craftsmanship in Europe I think is different. It’s not crafty. It’s craftsmanship. There is a difference.

Michelle: 00:55:48 Oh it’s so funny.

Brandi Sea: 00:55:50 I think that’s what it is. It’s like they just, I feel like they just like care more about some things.

Michelle: 00:55:55 Yeah, yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:55:57 Differently than we do. Not that we don’t care. We just care about different things.

Michelle: 00:56:01 We do. Ourselves.

Brandi Sea: 00:56:07 America, the best coffee by far was in Italy. You will be shocked, shocked, shocked, shocked, and amazed to believe that I had more than one cup of coffee. Um, cappuccinos without anything in it.

Michelle: 00:56:22 No way.

Brandi Sea: 00:56:23 And I like.

Michelle: 00:56:24 You had a cappuccino, which is a dollop of foam and a shot of espresso.

Brandi Sea: 00:56:27 Yeah. That’s all I drank. There was cappuccinos and.

Michelle: 00:56:30 Oh I’m so proud.

Brandi Sea: 00:56:31 And then I would add.

Michelle: 00:56:32 I bet it tasted amazing.

Brandi Sea: 00:56:33 Like two sugars if I, if, if I wanted to have sugar, it would be one or two sugars. And there was, there was a couple of times I was like, well, now I know what people have said about if it’s good coffee, it doesn’t need anything.

Michelle: 00:56:47 Don’t need it.

Brandi Sea: 00:56:48 Except I have yet to have anything like that here because I have.

Michelle: 00:56:52 A coffee shop opened while you were gone and we have to go visit it.

Brandi Sea: 00:56:55 Is it castle?

Michelle: 00:56:56 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 00:56:56 I’ve tried their’s. I had that. They were at a thing here in Los Lunas and I got a cup of their coffee before they open.

Michelle: 00:57:04 He is literally so sweet. The owner’s name is Josh and he is a friend of Kelly’s.

Brandi Sea: 00:57:11 Oh that’s awesome. I met, well I met him cause I was like, who did your design because you have a really good logo. And he was like, Oh are you a designer? And I was like, I was like yeah, nobody asks questions like that. And he was like, Oh okay cause I was going to tell you if you’re looking for a designer you probably can’t afford them cause I paid them a lot of money for this logo. And most people that ask me can’t afford what I paid. And I’m like, Oh no, that’s good. I’m glad you paid a lot.

Michelle: 00:57:36 Me too. Me too.

Brandi Sea: 00:57:38 But I didn’t know. I didn’t know he was, he knew anybody that I knew.

Michelle: 00:57:41 Yeah so Kelly’s known him for a while, but um, he actually also played Kelly played that show at that hair salon towns.

Brandi Sea: 00:57:50 Yeah.

Michelle: 00:57:51 In Albuquerque and Josh was there handing, giving, selling Castle coffee. Like before.

Brandi Sea: 00:57:57 Oh was that who was, I didn’t even know, I don’t think I even went over to the coffee. It was too late in the day for me to have coffee.

Michelle: 00:58:02 Same. Well, I say that but like right out like my treat for getting the podcast edited and sent to you as a cup of coffee today. So.

Brandi Sea: 00:58:09 Oh okay.

Brandi Sea: 00:58:11 Well that’s not true. I do do decaf, but yeah, I was sitting there drinking like cappuccinos with no sugar thinking Michelle would not believe what is happening right now.

Michelle: 00:58:21 I know I would freak out.

Brandi Sea: 00:58:24 Yeah. The other thing about it is it’s, it looks effortless. They do, they use the same machines, they use the same foamy. It’s just like they’re talking, it’s like they’re, it’s like they’re pouring a pint of beer and not looking, they’re just, you know, talking with the people and hanging out. And I was like, Oh man, please pay attention. I don’t want it to be gross. You know, like it is here if they’re not paying attention, like it’s not good. And so I’m like watching them with anxiety. First time I got when we first got to Venice, I was our first stop in Italy and I’m like please. And I ordered like something sweet cause I wasn’t sure it was like a cappuccino thing with foam and nuts and something else. It was like an Affogato type of a thing. Um, and so I’m like, Oh my gosh, it might be weird cause they’re not paying attention. And then she hands it to me and it’s like the best thing I’ve ever had in my life and it just got better from there. So if you want the best cup of coffee you will ever have in your life, we’re going to Italy. Okay, um.

Michelle: 00:59:21 Sounds good. Let’s go.

Brandi Sea: 00:59:23 Okay, let’s go now. Um, the other really cool theme, um, that, uh, that Kenny and I talked about was that it was really cool to see, um, things in context.

Michelle: 00:59:36 Mm.

Brandi Sea: 00:59:36 Like, so as you guys know, and as you know, Michelle, by now we go to a lot of museums and um, I’m like art freak. And so I appreciate like all the famous things that I get to see like at the MoMA or whatever. But a lot of times it’s like, okay, like that’s really cool and I love this thing, but it’s not in any kind of context. Like you don’t get to see where it came from or why it’s famous or why it’s there. And so going to Europe and being able to see certain things in their natural element, so to speak in a lot of cases was like mind blown.

Michelle: 01:00:16 I think that’s like a key thing that people could take away from this episode. That context is everything even in your design.

Brandi Sea: 01:00:27 Oh yeah.

Michelle: 01:00:27 And so though we, you, you do. And I mean we all do if we’re going about the process correctly, tons of research and everything beforehand. Um, just cause that’s necessary. Like knowing where those things like originated and came from is just so important. So it’s like really cool that you got to see those sculptures in context with the history behind it.

Brandi Sea: 01:00:52 Yeah. So in Florence, so Kenny was very surprised by Florence cause I don’t think that he realized the historical impact of the Renaissance started in Florence and a lot of other really crazy stuff happened. But in Florence, what they do is super, super cool. So they have, they have this major history of art, right? Because of the Renaissance art and science in Florence. Um, but they’ve also been around, it’s an ancient city. So they have like all these churches and all these sculptures and all these parks in all sorts of squares with, with things that should be out for people to see right? But then the elements and stuff. And so there, they basically decided as a city to take all of the art that they wanted to be out where it originated. Like when Michael Angelo sculpted the David, it was out in a square in, at the entrance to one of the Medici’s um, places of residence.

Michelle: 01:01:57 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 01:01:57 And it ended up needing to be put away because there was like revolution and someone mocked his arm off with a chair and there was some crazy stuff, but it was like, it was like at that point they were thinking, okay, let’s make replicas of all of these things and leave them in the places where they’re supposed to go, where they were meant to be, and then bring all the originals into museums. And so that’s what they’ve done. So, not only did we get to see the originals of a lot of these really famous sculptures, but then you get to see, you get to go out and walk the city like any normal person would at the time when they were created and actually see them in the place where they belong.

Michelle: 01:02:36 Which is so cool.

Brandi Sea: 01:02:38 Which is unbelievable. So in New York when we went, I think it was at the MET, um, we saw the, um, the hunt of the unicorn tapestry. And you’ve probably seen this. It’s a very famous tapestry. It’s like a unicorn in like a little pen and it’s a tapestry.

Michelle: 01:02:56 Where is it at?

Brandi Sea: 01:02:57 So it’s in New York. Okay.

Michelle: 01:02:58 It’s at the MET you said.

Brandi Sea: 01:02:59 At the MET. Um, so that particular thing has always been like really intriguing to me and I love it and it’s beautiful. Okay. But I never really looked into it further. When we went to Sterling castle, we found out that apparently this thing was created at Sterling castle.

Michelle: 01:03:17 Wow.

Brandi Sea: 01:03:18 And they told us this whole history of the unicorn. And they had, they had people reproduce it in the exact same way as it was produced originally so that they could have these tapestries hanging up in Sterling castle so people could see them in Sterling castle where they were created. And again, my mind was like, I’ve seen this. I didn’t fully appreciate it until I saw where it belonged.

Michelle: 01:03:39 But you couldn’t, I don’t think that you could fully appreciate it, you know?

Brandi Sea: 01:03:45 Well, I mean, yeah, you can appreciate the art artistry of it, but when something is where it was made or where it came from, it like has this whole new life. Um, we got to see liberally Liberty leading the people, the painting.

Michelle: 01:03:59 Okay.

Brandi Sea: 01:03:59 You know which one that is, you know,

Michelle: 01:04:01 You know just googling things as you say.

Brandi Sea: 01:04:02 Yeah. So you’ll know it and you can tell me what album cover it’s on. I was about to tell you, but you don’t have to, you’ll know.

Michelle: 01:04:09 It’s Coldplay.

Brandi Sea: 01:04:11 Yeah.

Michelle: 01:04:11 Vivi La Vida. I didn’t, you know what? I didn’t even have to like literally just saw the red and the cut type of art it is. I’m like, Oh, livin la vida. Who am I? Loca?

Brandi Sea: 01:04:20 Livin la vida loca. Yeah. So the crazy thing, so I’ve always been a huge fan of this piece even before it was on that cover. Um, but when you see it in France like, so it’s Liberty leading the people. So it’s by French people for France in France. It was just like, and it’s huge. It’s a lot bigger than I ever thought it was actually. It’s like, it’s like a size of a wall. Um, and you get to like be up close and see it and like see the emotion in people’s faces. And it was just like so impactful to me. And it was like this, I can see how this is like people, French people are so all about like their revolutions and like protest is actually like their national sport. It’s what they say. There was a protest the day we left.

Michelle: 01:05:15 Le Mis.

Brandi Sea: 01:05:15 Did Kenny tell you?

Michelle: 01:05:16 Um, no, he didn’t tell me. He told me about um, London.

Brandi Sea: 01:05:23 Brexit.

Michelle: 01:05:23 London. Yeah. Brexit.

Brandi Sea: 01:05:25 So on the day we were leaving Paris, we were like, we were walking over to one of the museums on the mall in the morning. And it was pretty early. And we’re like, why are all these cops closing off roads? And we didn’t see like any accidents and.

Michelle: 01:05:36 Just the daily protest.

Brandi Sea: 01:05:38 We didn’t know what was happening. And then when we came, cause we went like a roundabout way to get back to where we were and we look over, they were just calmly preparing for that week’s protest, I guess. Like they’re just,

Michelle: 01:05:49 It’s got to happen. So whatever, I guess.

Brandi Sea: 01:05:52 It was just, it was just really interesting. And um, just seeing things in context and learning even more in depth about things or being reminded about things that I learned was awesome. So that was, that was probably like the biggest thing for both of us was like, we just saw the, we just stepped foot into the same castle, but like William Wallace was in.

Michelle: 01:06:16 That’s amazing.

Brandi Sea: 01:06:17 That’s bonkers.

Michelle: 01:06:17 That’s cool.

Brandi Sea: 01:06:18 Like it’s just insane. Like the kinds of things, and it’s like if you sit here for a second and think about how many people have walked this cobblestone street that is killing my poor feet, like, Oh, you would just lose your mind.

Michelle: 01:06:32 You posted that picture like cute. But they hurt my feet. I was like, Oh yeah, cobblestone would suck to walk on. Huh?

Brandi Sea: 01:06:38 Oh my gosh.

Michelle: 01:06:39 None of it’s even none of it.

Brandi Sea: 01:06:41 It’s awful. It’s awful. It’s so cute. And it’s so pretty in pictures. But walking on it, it’s like I just wanted to die.

Michelle: 01:06:50 A death sentence.

Brandi Sea: 01:06:52 Um, okay, I’m going to try and go quicker. I only have like two more things. Um, so the style, I researched very intently to make sure that I didn’t look like a tourist when I went to Europe. And I think I did a pretty decent job outside of just my camera out every five freaking seconds.

Michelle: 01:07:07 That’s how they knew.

Brandi Sea: 01:07:08 That’s probably how they knew. But besides that, my outfits I think were pretty on point. But the cool thing that I, that I saw was like a lot of the things that I had read about and I wasn’t trying to dress like, like a Parisian woman necessarily outside of the leather jacket that I got, that a lot of the things that I read were accurate. 100%, like.

Michelle: 01:07:29 Good.

Brandi Sea: 01:07:30 Um, so the, the,

Michelle: 01:07:32 No athleisure.

Brandi Sea: 01:07:33 No athleisure. So two things. Um, athleisure in Paris is not a thing, but in the UK it is all up in there.

Michelle: 01:07:43 Okay.

Brandi Sea: 01:07:44 That’s probably another reason you love the UK.

Michelle: 01:07:48 I’m literally wearing pants that I’m going to go, well here’s the thing, I’m actually working out now so I’m okay with it.

Brandi Sea: 01:07:54 Yeah.

Michelle: 01:07:54 I’ve been working out consistently two times a week for a month and a half.

Brandi Sea: 01:07:59 I am so proud of you. and I’ve been sick so I haven’t been doing anything.

Michelle: 01:08:02 Maybe you can come with me sometime.

Brandi Sea: 01:08:05 We’ll see.

Michelle: 01:08:06 Okay, hold on. I have this, you know the body pump thing, there is an 85 year old woman who goes, she just wears normal clothes and works. And she’s killing it.

Brandi Sea: 01:08:19 Are you saying I’m like an 85 year old woman?

Michelle: 01:08:21 No, I’m just saying you have no excuse.

Brandi Sea: 01:08:23 Okay fine. We’ll see. I’ll give it a try. I’ll give it a try.

Michelle: 01:08:28 Just come with me.

Brandi Sea: 01:08:29 Okay.

Michelle: 01:08:29 Anyway, continue.

Brandi Sea: 01:08:31 So I was, I was like actively on alert for like things that I had read about like well, French women, this and French people that and I’m like, okay, I need, I’m going to like vet your, your thoughts on all this. So,

Michelle: 01:08:44 Okay.

Brandi Sea: 01:08:44 It’s completely accuret.

Michelle: 01:08:45 Do French Women shave.

Brandi Sea: 01:08:46 Well I wasn’t that close and everyone was in jackets. So,

Michelle: 01:08:49 Okay. Got it.

Brandi Sea: 01:08:50 I’ve never seen more black leather jackets in my life in more different styles. I didn’t see the same style of leather jacket on a woman the entire five days in Paris.

Michelle: 01:09:01 Wow.

Brandi Sea: 01:09:01 Which is really kind of cool cause it’s like okay the black leather jacket is a thing, but they all have like their own version of it.

Michelle: 01:09:09 I love it.

Brandi Sea: 01:09:09 And then we went to Venice and saw stores with the Italian leather and I’m like, Oh I see where all the French women are getting all their really unique jackets cause they’re all in Venice. White tennis shoes of all shapes and styles is like their deal. It’s like, Oh my skinny jeans, white tennis shoes.

Michelle: 01:09:29 And a black leather jacket

Brandi Sea: 01:09:30 And a black leather jacket.

Michelle: 01:09:31 Okay. I love it. I’ll wear that every day.

Brandi Sea: 01:09:34 I could easily, and I was like so proud of myself. I was like, well I had read that the white tennis shoes were a thing. But I also knew it was going to be raining and I would be a mess right now cause I don’t live here. I can’t just like go home and change my shoes.

Michelle: 01:09:47 Yeah, exactly.

Brandi Sea: 01:09:48 Um, and the, the hair is so easy and the makeup is like, I was made to be a French woman.

Michelle: 01:09:57 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 01:09:57 I just was, it’s like they don’t, they look clean and they look put together but they don’t look like they are trying too hard.

Michelle: 01:10:06 Yeah. I love that.

Brandi Sea: 01:10:07 It was just like, that was kind of Paris. It’s like the motto of Paris for me was we don’t have to try hard. We’re just beautiful.

Michelle: 01:10:16 We are how we are.

Brandi Sea: 01:10:17 We just are. Paris just is. Um, so that was fun. It was kind of fun to, to look at the fashion side of all of that kind of stuff. Um, Kenny bought me a cute pair of pants in Paris at a little boutique, um, fun for not expensive.

Michelle: 01:10:34 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 01:10:35 That’s not a sentence.

Michelle: 01:10:35 Still fun. For not expensive.

Brandi Sea: 01:10:38 Um, so then my last, my last thing. Um, okay. Had, I had one last, second to last thing I decided most surprising was the difference in food regions in Italy. So from Northern Italy to Southern Italy, the difference in food was marked and very noticeable. Um, from like Rome has the most flavor and the most probably closest to what you guys, we all here in America knows Italian food and Florence is like, you’re, you’re, it’s like my mom cooks like you can taste the food but you don’t taste a lot of seasonings.

Michelle: 01:11:19 Yeah, I know what you’re saying. Okay. Yeah, there was one time I’m not used to that type of cooking.

Brandi Sea: 01:11:25 Which kind?

Michelle: 01:11:25 Um, but I am the bland cooking.

Brandi Sea: 01:11:28 Okay.

Michelle: 01:11:29 We made pork chop. There’s a pork chop, you know, but that’s my, um, I remember going to my sister’s house and her mother-in-law was cooking and her mother-in-law will never listen to this, so I will say it, I wanted to die. Like there is nothing on that pork chop. It was literally a pork chop. And I was like, but my mom like breads it and salt and peppers it and then gives me a sauce to dip it in if I want. So what is this?

Brandi Sea: 01:11:58 Where’s the flavor? It’s like where’s the beef? But where’s the, yeah. Yeah. And so Kenny wasn’t super thrilled on the Florentine steak. Like I saw the guy, the old man in the back, like chucking away with this hatchet at the meat to get off our steak and then throw it on the thing and cook it. And it was beautiful. And I posted a picture of it. It was like beautiful. And it had, they like layered on this like weird lard, bacon, fat stuff on top of it, which like added a saltiness to it. But that was it.

Michelle: 01:12:24 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 01:12:25 And so it was just like, I think just really surprising. And then I was like, well is that, that’s surprising cause Northern New Mexican food and like Southern New Mexican food are completely different.

Michelle: 01:12:36 Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 01:12:37 So it shouldn’t, it shouldn’t surprise us. And the other thing was all of our hotels were surprising and all the best ways. We liked the super cheap places and we’re going to be like, we’re not going to be in there long. Like it’s not a big deal. They look safe. So, but every time we got there it was like, how is this a two star hotel? What does a freaking five-star look like? Like on top of the Eiffel Tower? I don’t know what more we could ask for.

Michelle: 01:13:02 Nope.

Brandi Sea: 01:13:03 Like balconies and um, just great views.

Michelle: 01:13:07 Well just the architecture is just so much different there.

Brandi Sea: 01:13:10 It is. That’s probably why.

Michelle: 01:13:12 We’re used to a little square.

Brandi Sea: 01:13:12 I know. Yeah. We also didn’t try.

Michelle: 01:13:14 It has walls and a roof. What do you want?

Brandi Sea: 01:13:15 We didn’t go for like best Western or anything. We like, we’re doing boutique hotels, but it was still like this, the two star hotel and we’re like five seconds away from the Sorbonne. Like this is nuts.

Michelle: 01:13:26 Exactly.

Brandi Sea: 01:13:28 Um, so, so the last thing I thought I would save sort of like the best for last. I sh this should be like our clickbait is the most Instagrammable. What, what things do the most Instagrammable cities have in common that I visited.

Michelle: 01:13:41 And that is?

Brandi Sea: 01:13:42 Um, so first of all, the, the most Instagrammable places were in this order. Paris, Venice and Scotland.

Michelle: 01:13:50 Ooo, okay.

Brandi Sea: 01:13:50 So, um, Rome is beautiful, but it feels very, it’s almost like an ancient concrete jungle. Mm. It’s just a lot of big gray buildings and they’re all really beautiful. Not really old, but there’s not a lot of color. There’s not a lot of like charm. I didn’t, I didn’t really feel the charm in Rome. Um, so I would say the things they have in common and so I kind of stole this sort of idea from, in fashion they say to make a good outfit, it should be, um, color, pattern, texture and shine. Like if you can combine those things, you will have a really nice outfit. Um, but I decided to go with color, nature, architecture and water. They don’t have the same light bounce to it, but those are like things that I figured out. They all have in common. So in Paris, the Seine is there and if you, if you’re not next to it, a lot of the time, like you can see it from somewhere almost. Um, but there’s like just water in the air. And so it’s so moist everywhere. Um, and when it was raining, which it rained a lot, it just makes everything like glisten and shine.

Michelle: 01:15:00 Yeah, I know what you’re saying.

Brandi Sea: 01:15:01 Yeah. And so, um, and the same was true for Venice. Obviously Venice is like a city on the water, but it wasn’t dirty. And the water was like this unreal, sort of like teal color. And I don’t know how like in, so in Chicago it’s natural that that happens. There’s some sort of plankton in the water that makes it like turquoise. So I don’t know if it’s like that there, but everywhere you turn in Venice, it’s like, Oh look, another pretty picture. Oh look, another little pretty picture. And it was like that in Paris. Like I killed my battery completely dead, which, and I have the brand new phone completely dead twice a day in those cities because I just like couldn’t, I couldn’t stop taking pictures. It was like, I can’t not photograph this. Um, so that’s, that’s like the nature. Um, and then in, um, obviously in Scotland it’s just like green Hills and just,

Michelle: 01:15:57 Glorious.

Brandi Sea: 01:15:57 Yeah, green, green, glorious everywhere. Um, so the color also was a thing. So buildings, um, in, especially Venice and Paris, there was like all these beautiful pastels and um, like awnings and flowers. So colors were a thing. And then in Scotland, again, just I would say the warmth felt like a color because it was like the green. And then there was all this like warm light coming from either like streetlights or buildings or restaurants. It was just like the color of warmth was amazing. Um, architecture obviously that’s kind of self-explanatory. When there’s great architecture, it’s just begging to be photographed. Um, alleys though specifically. So in Paris, the streets are all windy and sort of crazy and they connect really bonkers. And so you can like wander down this really random alley and it’s like, what is this beautiful little town I’ve stumbled upon in the middle of the city, in its.

Michelle: 01:17:03 But it’s an alley

Brandi Sea: 01:17:04 But it’s just an alley. But there’s like a little restaurant with like two chairs. And so that it was just like all the and so, but in, in Venice, there was all these teeny tiny alleys that are like, some of them barely big enough for you to go down, but then you like end up in this beautiful courtyard all of a sudden on the other side of this teeny tiny little alley.

Michelle: 01:17:23 Little secrets

Brandi Sea: 01:17:24 Yeah it just felt like, am I just discovering all this? Like for the first time.

Michelle: 01:17:29 Like everything feels so special.

Brandi Sea: 01:17:30 In the history of man?

Michelle: 01:17:31 I know. No one knows this is here.

Brandi Sea: 01:17:34 I’m the only one. And.

Michelle: 01:17:36 It’s like nobody, no wonder, nobody knew where Rapunzel was. You know, like there’s too many secrets everywhere.

Brandi Sea: 01:17:42 For real. That’s how it felt. Um, so, so water everywhere, greenery, flowers, buildings, um, adorable things everywhere you turn. Um, those are like if I were to tell people, if you want to like get Instagram photos for the rest of your life, just go to Venice, Scotland and Paris, not in that order.

Michelle: 01:18:02 Amazing.

Brandi Sea: 01:18:02 But, um, yeah, so those are, those are like the best themes I could come up with for today and still keep it at, I don’t know what we’re at an hour.

Michelle: 01:18:12 An hour and a half, but it’s good. Yeah.

Brandi Sea: 01:18:15 So.

Michelle: 01:18:15 That’s so good. That’s really good overview of your trip.

Brandi Sea: 01:18:19 Yeah.

Michelle: 01:18:20 Now I think I am ready off off the microphone off air to go deeper into your trip.

Brandi Sea: 01:18:28 Oh man. You’re just going to get, I’m going to start sounding like that person. That’s like, uh, when I was in Europe,

Michelle: 01:18:35 I live with that person, don’t worry.

Brandi Sea: 01:18:36 So when I was in Europe.

Michelle: 01:18:37 Oh yeah.

Brandi Sea: 01:18:38 And that time when I was in Paris. Except I’m not trying to show off. I just really love it.

Michelle: 01:18:46 It’s good. It’s good.

Brandi Sea: 01:18:47 So, so we have, we have a lot of work to do for the next couple of weeks and we have some big announcements and things coming. But uh, I think that’s it for today. So Michelle, where can people find us?

Michelle: 01:18:58 Well, they can find us on all forms of social media. I think the most important one is Instagram @designspeakspodcasts, go check it out. We also have our music playlist. It’s Music from Design Speaks on Spotify, so go listen to that also.

Brandi Sea: 01:19:15 Full work day.

Michelle: 01:19:15 Yes. Full work day. You can also send us questions, comments and concerns.

Brandi Sea: 01:19:19 Snide remarks.

Michelle: 01:19:20 Snide remarks, brandi@brandisea.com Or you can hit us up on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter. So you choose your poison battle.

Brandi Sea: 01:19:30 Yeah, I was like, what’s the word? Choose your poison. Choose your weapon.

Michelle: 01:19:33 Choose your weapon. Choose your weapon. Yes, exactly. I liked that one best. Also, thank you to.

Brandi Sea: 01:19:40 Colin.

Michelle: 01:19:40 Vesperteen Gosh, thank you to Vesperteen for letting us use this song Shatter in the Night as the intro and outro to our podcast. I hope to hear new music from him soon.

Brandi Sea: 01:19:50 See you guys next week