THURSDAY! - ST. PETERSBURG!  After waiting for hours last night in Moscow at the "Leningradsky" station we finally got on the 11:50pm train to St. Petersburg.  We think that Gladys Knight would be proud of us even though it's not a "Midnight Train to Georgia" (although the Pips might be a little pissed off, but that's why they're Pips!).  We were worried because we could only get 2nd class tickets sharing our compartment all night with two unknown Russians - BUT!, as it turns out they were both 20 year old, gorgeous and VERY promiscuous students!  Okay, they weren't promiscuous at all, but that didn't stop Kevin from trying to play "duck, duck, goose" with them all night long.  Anyway, at around 9am we arrived in St. Petersburg right on the Arctic Ocean ("some or all of ours guests will receive  a year's supply of Eskimo Pies - now back to you, Bob!).

So, even though they call this city "St. Petersburg," it used to be called "Leningrad," and before that "St. Petersburg!"  They just change the name back and forth every few years to sell more maps.  We spent most of our day here touring the Hermitage, which Kevin thought was where Davy Crockett lived, but it's really the former Winter palace of Peter the Great (what peter isn't great?), Katherine the Great (back-stabbing bitch - more on her later) and Ivan the Terrible (couldn't hold his liquor).  It houses one of the greatest art collections in the world after the Louvre in Paris, the Norton Simon in Pasadena, the Museum of Art in New York, the...okay, so it's sort of an "also ran," but it still is pretty cool!  Besides, since it was the first Thursday of the month we didn't have to pay admission because we're foreigners ("English speaking dogs!") and so we saved allot of Monet (a little art humor there for ya'll).

Folks, let chat a little bit about Catherine the Great.  First off, she was really Catherine II so what's really so "great" about being second?  Also, she had her husband Peter (the not so great one) murdered so that she could take over and run Russia while she collected his social security benefits.  Can you spell B-I-T-C-H?  Okay, so she did collect a palace full of world class art (at taxpayer expense) but seriously, what has she done lately?  Listen people, it's no wonder that Communism sorta caught on here, besides after Lenin joined the Beatles they had eleven straight gold records!  Okay, it's getting late so we're gonna quit "Stalin" and find some serious Russian Beer, or better yet, several cold Budweisers...

FOLKS!  WE HAVE GREAT PICS & VIDEOS, BUT THE COMMUNIST INTERNET IS KILLING US!  PLEASE!!!!!!