Love Bug-Pisa Red

Please drop this item in rural or Premium Member Only caches.  Do not place it in an urban cache or leave it behind at a caching event.  Transport the bug in the original plastic bag for as long as the bag lasts; this prevents the chain and tag tangling with other items.  Otherwise, take this travel bug anywhere you wish.  No permission needed to leave the U.S.

This is one of a series of heart-shaped items obtained from different places and converted into travel bugs. They are named either for the places of their origin or for Texas Panhandle-South Plains towns with interesting names or histories.

This piece was purchased in April 2014 from a gift stall in Pisa, Italy near the grounds of the Leaning Tower, the Baptristry and the Cathedral.  The Tower does lean at an improbable angle (see photo).  The base of the tower has been reinforced to preserve it.  The crowd of tourists cluttered up attempts to capture quality images, but we were also tourists so I really can't complain too much.

A son of Pisa, Galileo, conducted some of his gravity experiments from the tower.  However, his support of the works of Copernicus and heliocentrism (sun center of universe) put him at odds with the Catholic Church and the City of Pisa.  The latter asked him to leave the city; the former held him under house arrest for the rest of his life. He continued to experiment and write in other areas of science until his death, but there was little notice in Italy. Like some other famous Italians (e.g. Michelangelo, Dante, Machiavelli, Rossini, Marconi, Fermi) he was honored with a monument (and burial) in Santa Croce, in Florence. If there are any monuments to him is Pisa, we never heard about them--talk about holding a grudge!  After 500 years, the Catholic Church only recently acknowledged its poor treatment of him.