Guns and Frocks

Loving Delta and the Bannermen since 1987

Raining in Sorrento

Sunday 19 February 2023

A view of the marina from the top of a cliff in Sorrento. There's a long jetty jutting into the water with a ferry standing nearby. In the distance is a forested headland, closer are some large hotels perched on the top of the cliff.

I arrived in Sorrento the day before yesterday. This is my third time here. I first came here in 2008 and then again in 2017 (when I stayed for about ten days).

I like Sorrento. It’s a bit touristy, particularly on the weekends, but it’s very pretty and there’s lots of places to eat, to walk, and to sit quietly and read. And it’s close to other things, like Capri, Pompeii and Herculaneum.

This time I’m not going to any of those places. I’m here for two more nights, and I plan to take it very easy. This morning I had breakfast at the hotel, sat at a bar drinking coffee and reading, and then took a walk down the cliff to the marina, followed by more sitting and reading. But then it started raining, so now I’m back in the hotel writing this. If it doesn’t ease up soon, I might start doing some podcast or website things until I head off for drinks and dinner.


A few of the water from the top of a cliff in Sorrento. In the foreground are the red roofs of some buildings, further off in the background are some massive hotels perched on the top of a cliff.

Some random thoughts about the trip so far, in no particular order.

Picks of the day

I’m currently enjoying the podcast If Books Could Kill, in which Michael Hobbes critically revisits the dark side of some of the most famous airport non-fiction of the last few decades, including Francis Fukuyama’s The End of History, Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers and Steven D Levitt and Stephen J Dubner’s Freakonomics. Hobbes is really thoughtful and funny, and he gets extra points for pushing back on Twitter against centrist dunderhead Jonathan Chait’s credulous bullshit take on healthcare for trans children, which was published in The New York Times in the last week or so.

And while we’re on the subject of The New York Times’s appalling coverage of trans issues, here’s The Onion’s take on it — the most blistering satirical article I’ve seen from them in decades.

Hm. It’s stopped raining. Off for a walk. Chat soon.