The introverted traveler: Cologne

Plus, fun and strange finds from the World Wide Web

Jun 12, 2025

A reliably good place for a meal

Art museum restaurants and cafes can be a great place to hangout for the introverted flâneur. They often have good food, good service, and are in the center of town. Being attached to a museum, they usually feel the need to be mindful of aesthetics, both atmospheric and food quality wise.

Better: there are often very few people in them, especially compared to popular and tourist places. The prices might be higher, but you get what you pay for.

The Ludwig Museum restaurant in Cologne is a good example.1 It has all of the above, but is also a three or five minute walk from the central station. It has a busy pedestrian walkway/plaza with no stores. There’s ample outside seating, well shaded. This means a chill spot for a cold beverage with endless people watching.

Also, the museum is good. Highly recommended.

Waste Book

“bottomless pit of plagiarism.” I mean, obviously. Someone should do something.
“best portland cat cafes.” Also “Brazilian Facesitting Fart Games.”
“hard mode is where status lives” Cult-talk.
“The executive swoop and poop.” PagerDuty-talk.
“The waffle makers are standing by.” On being “rigorously OK.”
And, that article keeps giving: “There’s something more dynamic about making your waffle and pouring the batter and the anticipation of it coming out hot and steamy.”
More: “They canvassed dozens of chicken farms in search of a liquefied egg product that could be scrambled in hotel microwaves”

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Here I am presenting at SREDay Cologne:

I’m thinking of renaming this newsletter “Coté’s Waste book.” First, no one (who doesn’t speak German, maybe Dutch?) can pronounce “Wunderkammer,” and they all ask what it means. And second, I don’t know, the waste book is my favorite part, and I think its definition more closely fits what happens here: more of a combination of a wunderkammer, notes, and (not really, but it’s fine) longer articles. That said, I just realized that “wastebook” is actually two words. If “daybook” can be one word, seems like waste book should be. That doesn’t seem right, but whatever. Maybe I’ll stick with the one word - English as she is spoke, and all that.

If you liked The Lounge Show reference recently, looking at the playlists, you’ll probably like another KOOP Austin show, Crate Digger’s Gold.

And, yes, of course in Cologne you should also sit at one of the giant, packed places on a plaza and order a giant joint of pork, freshly made schnitzel, etc., and an endless series of tiny glasses of Kölsch. The flâneur‘s proper response to any recommendation counter-proposal should be: yes, and…why not both?