Bran

Bran.
No, not the stuff you're supposed to eat more of so you don't get colon cancer.  I'm talking about the place where Dracula's Castle is.
Except Vlad Ţepeş was never there which means an argument could be made that it is therefore not Dracula's castle. But somehow everyone calls it that.  Why?  I don't know.  You'd think I would know cause I've been there enough times to have figured that out or at least to have read all of the little plaques that surround the place and explain the story.
Retention of trivia used to be my strong suit.  I used to be able to read useless facts and then later regurgitate them when it was least necessary and when people were the least interested, like when talking to strangers in doctor's offices.  "Hey, the name for that space between your brows is glabella" and "Sisinnius was the 86th Pope".
But now my brain is filled with memorizing adverbs, trying to understand how to correctly pluralize nouns and how to keep my kids from failing the 8th and 5th grades.  I've got no space left for long-dead rulers of Wallachia who liked to shove sticks up the bums of their enemies.
Usually no one else really cares about this either but now its October which means Halloween.  October would be my favorite month but Halloween ruined it.  It was okay when I was a kid and no one thought about Halloween until say, October 28th but now we've got orange plastic pumpkins dangling from store windows as early as the end of August and I'm disgusted.
By the way, I've decided that anyone who publicly announces that the sending of Halloween cards is a lame idea is pretty okay in my book.
But back to Bran and Dracula.
So there is no evidence that Vlad Ţepeş was ever at this particular fortress but somehow it has become Dracula's Castle (if you can't rest until you know how, ask Marius for the details) and if it's October and you're doing the Cliff Notes version of a trip to Romania, a visit to Bran and a tour through the castle is a must.
That's pretty much how we ended up there with Sharon, Kelly and Todd.
They did a Cliff Notes trip to Romania in October.
This was day one and two.  Days three through five will be coming soon...

Bran: its not just what's for breakfast.

Toamna

Autumn

Delicious autumn!  My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns.  ~George Eliot

                                                   Oh good gigantic smile 'o the brown old earth,

                                                   This autumn morning! - Robert Browning

The day becomes more solemn and serene

When noon is past-there is harmony

In autumn, and a lustre in its sky,

Which through summer is not heard or seen,

As if it could not be, as if it had not been!

-Shelly

Autumn nodding o'er the yellow plain

Comes jovial on - James  Thompson

I saw old Autumn in the misty morn - Thomas Hood

Deep inside, we're still the boys of autumn, that magic time of the year that once swept us onto America's fields.- Archie Manning

Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean,

Tears from the depth of some divine despair

Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes,

In looking on the happy Autumn fields,

and thinking of the days that are no more.

- Tennyson

How well I know what I mean to do

When the long dark autumn evenings come

- Robert Browning