Category: LiveJournal

Interlude…

I shall get back to my Italian Job in another day or so. But tonight, I’m being a badgurl with Amy, Rachel and mom. We’re at the Lake on our second stay-over together. Last night, we sat by the fire and talked and marveled at Rachel’s fire tending skills. Tonight, since it had rained, we just sat on or by the swing and chatted, instead. And now we’re inside, mom playing The Same Game on dad’s laptop, Amy & Rachel checking out a magazine, and me doing this.

Today, the girls went off to Archbold to the wedding of a friend of theirs. Mom and I, meanwhile, went clothes shopping. Yes, it’s my one time of the year to go clothes shopping. I got 2 weeks’ worth of undies, 3 slacks, and 7 shirts. And spent about $500. Yay me! Even mom found herself some nice clothes.

I dropped mom off to her home (then she and dad returned to the Lake) and headed off to Fairborn/Beavercreek to do some more shopping. First, I had Indian Fud at Jeet India, then shopped at the Mall. Finally, I went to my comic book store to pick up my Doctor Who magazines (and one of the new DW books – to give it a try).

The final stop was to Meijer where I got the ingredients to try my own Tuscan Meal. I’ll soon be writing about our cooking class where we learned to make pici and bruschetta and stuff. They gave us recipes for the items, too. So I decided to make the full Tuscan meal in honor of Amy & Rachel’s 1st anniversary. So, to Leo’s bemusement, I worked several hours in my kitchen making the meat sauce, making & rolling pici, and baking crostata. And then I bagged it all up and drove back to the lake (ala elsaf).

We had peach shortcake (with REAL whipped cream, not ala Elsa) that was very yummy. Then papa headed home (though we assured him that he could stay and be badgurls with us) and we went into badgurl mode.

Italy: Day 5 [Florence, Y’All!]

Jul. 24, 2005

Sunday morning, we awoke early. I put on my swimming suit and swam a bit, then showered and was ready for Fierenze (Florence).

We managed to get to Flornce in good time, but then finding a place to park was a real bear. [Marcia says it was an hour to Florence, and an hour and fifteen minutes to find a parking place!] We did find a small garage and to our delight, discovered that parking was free on Sundays. We headed to the Duomo to meet up with Lisa (formerly Katie) Saunders.

Lisa was there in her P. Hill shirt and judiang was amazed we managed to meet up with not only a P. Hilligan, but also John’s niece! Had to tell her that the meeting was preplanned. 🙂

Several of us moved on to the Uffizi art museum to see the works there. Due to restroom concerns, we actually went through the museum backwards. The piece I most wanted to see was The Birth of Venus by Botticelli. We also saw some da Vinci stuff and Caravaggio works. I bought a photo of Venus and a magnet of Caravaggio’s Medusa. (Interestingly, it’s painted on a shield-shaped object.)

We caught up with folks after Ufizzi and we headed to a cafe for lunch. I ate with Dave and Mary and had spinach pizza (very American pizza, I thought) and fruit juice. Not too bad, and IIRC, around €10.

After lunch, we milled around til we were near the Accademia dell’ Arte del Disegno where David is held captive. We said farewell to Lisa and some of us went to the Accademia. Both the Ufizzi and Accademia cost money (cash). €10 for Ufizzi and €11 for the Accademia (or less, if we wanted to wait in line forever). Most of the Accademia was just “eh” but man, getting to see Michelangelo’s David – wow! The Botticelli was bigger than I expected – and so was David! Truly impressive art.

When we left the Accademia, I saw someone selling the Rainbow Pace flags. I’d wanted one since I saw it in Rome. I decided if it was around €10, I’d get it. I asked and it was €25. I was shocked and walked away quickly. But he found me and asked what I wanted to pay. I said “no more than €10.” He changed to €15, but that was still too high. I suggested 12, he countered with 13. Just then, Jo walked by. “What do you think?” I asked her. “No more than €10” she said. “You offered €12,” he said. I looked in my wallet to see slim pickin’s (€20) but bought the flag. [Wow, my first ever time haggling. I made sure to never look for those flags again for fear of discovering I’d paid twice as much as I should have.]

We roamed back to our meeting place and spied a gelateria nearby. One that Judi was at. She said she got an Internet Point card and pointed me into the cafe. I bought a mint gelato and went to write on my LJ.

We met up again at the steps of the Duomo and headed back to our cars. We decided to hit Arezzo for supper and with a bit of effort, found a place to park. Marcia’s book had some suggested restaurants to eat at, and we made our way there.

There was no one eating on the nonsmoking side, so that worried us a little. However, once we ordered the food and had our meals, we agreed it was a fine dinner. I had wild boar and polenta for supper and it was very good. And it was around €13 or so. I let Judi buy it for me and I paid the tip. We toasted to Ruth and Mike who were celebrating their 40th anniversary. We applauded the owner after supper.

That night, we sat at the kitchen table and crowed about the fab meal. Well, those of us who got there, that is. Ooops! Forgot to mention dessert, which was Fedora Rustica al Ciocolatto. Rustic hat with chocolate, I guess. Twas very yummy! 🙂

So, what did I mean about “those of us who got there”? The Fishers were following Mike and the other two cars were ahead. Mike realized they’d not taken the left turn when they should have, so he got us safely back to the villa. So we waited half an hour for the Saunders to arrive and probably another half an hour for the Weavers.

Humourous aside: I entitled this LJ entry “Florence Y’all” for a reason. Florence, KY had a water tower that used to advertise the Florence Mall, but they got in trouble with the other businesses in town (or somesuch) and had to change it. So they turned the M into a Y’. Heh. It always made me chuckle when I’d see it. (And I seem to recall the Florence Mall had a nice record store.)

So, onto photos. Most are of the Duomo, which is a really impressive dome on a really impressive cathedral. Pink and green – more churches should be pink and green. There’s also a shot of the very narrow streets in Florence. Just picture 4 cars driven by American tourists trying to find parking, when you look at the narrow street shot. 🙂

Lisa at the Dumo.
Here’s Lisa in her P. Hill shirt! Small world, eh?

Fake David.
Couldn’t take a photo of the real David, so I made do with the Fake David.

Tower at the Duomo.
The tower at the Cathedral known for its Duomo.

The Duomo.
The Duomo itself, currently under rennovation.

The narrow streets.
Florence sure has narrow streets! So medieval! So claustrophobic!

In other news, Amy & Rachel come to town tonight! Woot! They’re off to a wedding in Archbald on Saturday, so they’re staying at the Lake while they’re in Ohio. Shame I have to work tomorrow, but I’ll get to spend Friday evening and, I think, Sunday day with them.

Italy Day 4: Villa Francesco

Jul 23, 2005

2:13pm We are currently in a Hertz rental car on the way to the villa. Gary’s driving and Marcia’s his second pair of eyes. judiang‘s propped her swollen feet up on my lap and is reading one of my Tuscany books.

The scenery is beautiful. We’re in the 5th car in the convoy. Weave’s ahead of us, then Mike, then Dave, and John S (with Sheila excellently navigating) in the lead.

Despite a wrong turning at one point, Sheila got us on the A1 and we’ve been going now for about an hour. We stopped at a rest stop and I bought a cheapo watch (€12.90), some chocolate cookies, and a chocolate candy with toy – hoping for an Asterix toy. Got a cute little knight on a horse instead. Total was €18.

It’s neat to see the mountains around us. And vineyards. And just now, a huge field of sunflowers.

We’re about to get off the A1 and onto our next road. We’re making progress!

9:40pm “Travel with Tammy! Nothing but the best!” Lordy, lordy, guess what we had for dinner? Well, I’ll tell you about it later. La Grande Mela will remain one of the most memorable experiences of this trip.

[The next day, I wrote more about our day traveling to the Villa. I shall nab some of that for the next bit.]

Our original plan was to take the bus to the Hertz rental place, but they don’t like big luggage on the bus. So then it was taxi hailing time. While we stood across the street waiting for taxis, a groups of children came over and started crowing over Judi and touching her face. She felt one of the girls as she was unzipping her (mine, actually) fanny pack. She pulled back, said “No!” in a loud voice, and reluctantly, the children moved on to find a new mark. Sure enough, the fanny pack was open, but they hadn’t taken anything yet.

A cab was going by the other way and we hailed it, so it U-turned and took me, Judi, and Weave to a street just a couple blocks from the car rental. (To be fair, he was following another cab with some of our folks.) €13 for the ride and tip [which we later discovered to be a ripoff compared to what the others paid for the same journey], and we headed offf with our bags to Hertz.

Next to the car rental was an underwear store with some boxes of Calvin Klein undies. The photos of some of the young men in shorts were quite, um, bold. One guy looked like he had a apir of socks stuffed in his shorts. The store owner kept getting pissy at us if we covered his window, so we stood to the side while folks got the paperwork going.

The garage for Hertz was another block, so we had to roll our luggage around again. It took awhile to get all the paperwork sorted and slowly, one by one, we got our cars. Judi and I ride with Gary and Marcia.

We had walkie talkies set to channel 9 and Sheila kept us appraised of our progress. We missed a major turning, but with a single pullover, they figured out how to get back on track. We were soon on the highway and heading for the Autostrada.

We made it to Foiana della Chiana in good time, but missed the villa. We stopped at a restaurant and John & Gary talked with a local who insisted we turned wrong and had to go back.

The old gentleman was right. Once we got back onto the road, we drove past the place. By the time we did (we were no longer last), others behind us drove onto the lane. A quick turn aound and we, too, had gone up the lane.

Now, we’ve already had a great vacation so far. So what does the place look like? Is it a dump? Or is it as pretty as the photos online? Well, it was neither – it was prettier! Bootiful!

Judi and I have a room on the 3rd floor and we share a bathroom with Jo & Jacki. There are many antiques in the building, including a suit of armor I have named Guido.

They had some pastries out for us and three bottles of wine and showed us where everything was. The pool is lovely. The guest house is awfully nice too. A lovely place to stay.

We sat around eating and drinking (and killing ants) after unloading the cars. Then Mike, Ruth, Beth & I headed to the nearby Penny Market for supplies for the weekend cuz they’re closed on Sundays.

Shopping in a grocery in a country where you don’t know the language is certainly interesting. We found most of what we needed and my little translation book did a nice job helping. The place reminded us of Aldi’s and we even boxed our stuff up, even though they had bags. Whoops!

The total bill for 18 people’s worth of breakfasts, wines and so on? €44! The wine was €1,50-4,00! Other items were similarly priced. And the food and wine has been decent, too. (There was even wine for less, but we were afraid to try it. We might get some now!)

My goal, when we were done, was to go swimming! Mother Nature, OTOH, had other ideas. For the first time on our trip, it rained lots! Folks were out of the pool and under the tent. And poor Trina sat with them, all dressed up and no place to swim!

Thankfully, the rain finally cleared and I got to swim in the lovely pool. And realized that it had been so long since I last swam that my confidence was lower and swimming in the deep end was a little panic inducing. So I stuck to the shallow end and swam back and forth a few times.

After the swim, I got ready for supper and we drove into town. We stopped at the first eatery – La Grande Mela (The Big Apple).

The waitress spoke English very well – turned out she was from Finland. She actually didn’t know much Italian and had some trouble getting our orders.

Now, before we entered, the place was deserted. Getting 18 seats outside was easy. When she passed out our forks and napkins, they were plastic blue forks and paper blue napkins in plastic bags. These were simple clues noticed only in retrospect.

A couple of folks ordered pizza, but most of us ordered pasta. I ordered spaghetti alla carbonara. We chatted and laughed while we waited for food. Judi and I were sitting by Amy, Kathie, Dave, and Mary.

When the waitress brought out the first meals, I did a double-take. Surely not! Must be a joke!

But no, she had 3 microwave lasagnas on her tray and was passing them out. The entire table erupted with laughter. And the laughter continued as more meals were brought out. Judi sent hers back to be reheated (and it wasn’t what she ordered, but they didn’t have a TV dinner for spaghetti bolognese).

The TV dinner wasn’t too bad, and the laughter was precious. For desert, we had gelato – that was actually homemade and very good. (I had chocolate.)

[Tammy ordered an Americano when we were ordering drinks – before the TV dinners ever arrived – and it was apparently the foulest mixed drink she’d ever tried. We decided (Judi and I) that it was the post-George W Bush Americano. Heh. Oh, and Judi and I ordered Bacardi Breezers – peach flavored. Pretty good for alcohol.]

OK, enough from the journal, now onto photos!

Judi points the way!
If only Judi had been pointing to this sign in the first place, we wouldn’t have missed the villa!

The lane leading to the villa
This is the lane leading to the villa. It’s at the top of a steep hill, so not only is it beautiful to look at, but you’re just so pleased to be on nearly level land when you get to this point.

Overhead view of the villa and pool.
They had a huge photograph of the aerial view of the house, so I took a photo of the photo.

De pool! De pool!
Ah, the most wonderful pool in all of Italy! The one I got to swim in!

Grigio gatto.
Grigio Gatto – gray cat. S/he was very friendly and loved to hang out with us at the villa.

PS: Happy Birthday rustyverse!

Italy: Days Two & Three

Jul. 21, 2005

Thanks to having Internet Access at our Hotel in Rome, I wrote a detailed (well, sort of) post about the trip to the Vatican here. I already posted a photo of judiang and me at the Vatican in this post. However, I forgot to mention that we saw a “gypsy marching band” perform that evening in the streets near the Pantheon. Knowing nought about gypsy bands, however, I reserve judgment. They were lively and fun, however, and that’s all that matters with a marching band. (Oh, and don’t go picturing trombones & stuff – strictly percussion.)

Jul. 22, 2005

I only had 9 minutes, however, to write about our day exploring the Roman ruins and Colosseum. And there is very little in my hand-written journal about the day, so I’ll see if I can expand upon the day some.

Our main goal of the day was to see the Forum and the Colosseum. We stopped at a cafe for lunch where I had a small sandwich and some of Judi’s Gatorade. People at our table felt so guilty that the sandwich was small they kept giving me more food. I certainly won’t complain about that! Gosh, I’m trying to remember what the gelato of the day was. I know I had some after supper, but was there afternoon stuff? I seem to recall a gelato shake made of chocolate ice cream – I’ll bet that was it.

Rather than going off to St. John Lateran and another basilica, Judi and I headed back to the hotel with a few others. I did some shopping while Judi napped (or did I do that the day before?) Anyhoo, at some point either Thursday or Friday, I bought a cute little wooden clock that was shaped & painted like a kitty cat. I also got a wine cork for mom & dad with the same kitty design. Only €17 for it all. Oh, with regards to the cat, the tail is the pendulum of the clock. (Like my plastic Kit Kat clock, but without the moving eyes.) I think it’ll be good in my Reading Room once I have the floor to ceiling bookshelves in place.

I actually wrote about the supper that night in my paper journal. So I’ll reprint that here:

…We finally found a non-tourist trap restaurant. Las Maddalen (which I think was a Zio Ciro restaurant) was just off the square where the Pantheon was located. I ordered too much – brushetta and a pizza, when the pizza would suffice. They let us sit inside together while they got tables together outside. They brought out two €25 bottles of sparkling white wine for all of us to drink while we waited, gratis. Very friendly, very accomodating. BTW, I rather liked that sparkling wine – go figure!

Everyone agreed it was the best restaurant we stayed at. Only €1 cover charge person, less than 10% service charge, and we were happy to tip well.

For gelato that evening, I got half crema and half ferrero rochere (chocolate hazelnut). The crema had a slight lemon flavor, as did the one I had at another gelateria the night before. So I’m guessing crema must have slight lemon flavor… Will not be tempted to order that again, I think.

The best news of the day, however, was the arrival of Judi’s luggage that night! Yes, the night before we were to leave the hotel, the luggage finally arrived! Yay!

The Gypsy Marching Band!
The gypsy marching band. Or something. Whatever it was, it was lively and fun! And had a great cadence.

Bunch of broken shit.
Bunch of old, broken shit.

Not quite as broken shit.
Just as old, but not as broken shit.

And you should see the state of the stadium!
And geez, you should see the state of the stadium! 😉

Italy: Day One (Arrival)

Jul. 20, 2005

8:40am (I think) My watch says 2:40am and I think Italy is 6 hours ahead. [Wow, sometimes I’m actually right about things!] We’re flying over the mountains. Alps? Could be. [Probably not – I haven’t a clue WRT geography.]

I didn’t sleep a whole lot during the night. I watched Hitch and Robots and then a History Channel special on Ice Cream. Tried to sleep, but couldn’t, so I listened to Unregenerate!, the latest 7th Doctor audio. Not McIntee’s best work, but not his worst, either. The movies, BTW, were fun.

For supper they served us a choice of BBQ beef w/ mashed potatoes and green beans or tortelini. I went with tortelini. Pretty mediocre, but the cookie was good. Plus they had raw carrots for munching on. Breakfast has been a measly buttermilk donut and milk. Wasn’t bad, just measly.

Well, I wonder if judiang made it to (or is on her way to) Amsterdam. Here’s hoping “yes!” to that and a further “yes!” to getting to Rome. I hope they look after her bag! [The irony, of course, being that Judi’s luggage most likely went to Amsterdam. Judi, meanwhile, was enroute to Rome.]

So far the flight has been smooth and uneventful. Hope the others are having a similar flight. Wonder if their entertainment was as good as mine. [It wasn’t, bwa ha ha ha!]

11:20am Sitting in International Baggage Claim waiting for everyone to arrive. The Northwest Flight number is different from the one on Judi’s itenerary – unless there are two flights to Rome from Detroit. And it doesn’t arrive until after 2pm! Unfortunately, I don’t know which airline is Tammy’s (I suspect Delta). [I suspected correctly.] So I’m sitting and waiting and hoping someone comes along that I recognize.

Boy am I sleepy!

1:50pm Still no sign of Tammy. I’m running out of options (flights). Man, if the 2:02 NWA flight isn’t the one that everyone else is on, I dunno what I’ll do. I guess I’ll take the €8 train to Roma and a cab to the hotel. I was rather hoping to meet up with Tammy since she might know more about the other flight time.

No sign of any flights in from Amsterdam on the list of upcoming arrivals. So prospects of Judi are getting more vague. And hell, if the Detroit flight ended up being so much later, surely they could have gotten her to the airport on time for its departure.

My own time in was fine. Thanks to the 15 minute delay in getting started, we ended up being one hour late landing. But customs went smoothly and I picked up my suitcase without a hitch. Nice to know at least one of the 18 made it to Rome!

[More wittering on continues. I was too tired to read, but apparently, not too tired to worry and witter…]

3:30pm Yay! Everyone’s here! Even Judi! Tammy’s flight was delayed 2 hours due to storms in Atlanta, and the Detroit flight was doing a US Air WRT bad lights going off, lots of Tarmac waiting, and stuff like that. [Did I ever write about my US Air flight from hell in this journal? Don’t think so – it’s a real chuckler – now…] Unfortunately, Judi’s bag did NOT make it. So I’m standing in the lost luggage line while Judi waits in the Alitalia line.

Here’s hoping we get out of here and quickly! I’m hungry!

8:12pm Sitting at Quattro Fiumi Cafe at the Piazza Navona. We just had an expensive ass meal, but it was very good and we were very hungry. We’ve been using Judi’s cell phone to call friends and family. Judi and I had supper with Amy & Kathie. Now we’re just waiting on the bill (which will come eventually).

After standing in line for Judi’s suitcase issue, we were told that we had to go back to the Alitalia queue, so we waited some more. Gary, Marcia, and Tammy waited for us and we took an airport shuttle to the hotel for €18 each. (I put €15 and will buy Judi gelato later to reimburse the difference.)

The hotel is really nice and we have a window over the street. Tammy and John have the room above us and they have a balcony – the luckies!

We saw the Pantheon today before coming to Piazza Navona. Neat domed building.

Judi says “zzzzzzzz” and “Ciao, baby!” 🙂

So, a bit of Rome, at last! After this point, the dates and times on the entries have little to do with the actual events as recorded. Finding time to write things up wasn’t easy, because I managed to fill my days quite nicely with sightseeing and swimming and stuff like that. And I’ve just noticed in reading ahead, I really did Rome a disservice in my journal. I have very little actually written about my Rome times. My LJ entries that I posted had more than my paper journal! Well, maybe tomorrow I’ll try to remember everything that we did at Vatican City.

I have another photo from the trip, too. Trevi Fountain, which we saw our first night in Rome, after we left Piazza Navona. This photo, however, was taken a couple of nights later. But it still looked the same.

Trevi Fountain.
Many of us (if not all) tossed coins into Trevi Fountain to assure a safe trip home and another trip back to Rome. And it helped me get rid of a couple of US quarters that were threatening to mix with my euros.

Italy Trip: Getting There

Jul 19, 2005

11:00am I’m sitting at the S’barro seating area at the Dayton International Airport. I’ve got a peach smoothiethat I’m sipping on ($3.80 from Boston Stoker). It’s very tasty. The object of today’s flying? Get to Rome!

[Present day Trina cutting in here. This is the first entry in my paper journal that I kept during the trip. I’m making corrections as I go, but so far, am terribly faithful to it. You can tell by the sheer tedium I’m writing about. I’ll start cutting out the tedious comments as I go as well, or you’ll all be sleeping on your keyboards.]

Unfortunately my last journal was left in a Big Boy in Michigan back in April, so I’ve no idea what I last wrote about in my print journal. My electronic journal is a bit more up to date. [That’s what she thinks!] I decided against bringing my laptop on this trip because of the carrying issue, electrical issue, and lack of ‘net issue. I’ve got lots of electronics with me, however. So boredom won’t ever be an issue. [It wasn’t]

So, what’s up with this trip? Well, back in October ’03 our BW3’s group first talked about renting a villa in Tuscany. We’ve done a lot of plotting and planning since then and 18 of us are going to Roma for 3 days and the villa for 7 days.

I’m the only one taking US Air to Rome – most of the rest are taking Northwest. Even judiang (who is my roomie) is taking the Detroit->Rome leg of it. I’ll be on the same flight as everyone for the way back, however.

[The next several paragraphs are a summary of what we intended to do on the trip. Since I’ll be reporting on what we actually did, it seems a bit silly to include that here too, so I skipped ’em.]

2:20pm Now sitting near my gate (I think) at Philly’s airport. The place is practically deserted at the moment since most international flights leave at night. Mine’s at 6:10pm, so I’ve got a bit of a layover.

5:10pm Still at gate and so is our plane (has been for some time). Judi, meanwhile, got her times confused and left for the airport late. I’m hoping the lack of contact since her call means she’s in the air now to Detroit. Please let it be so!

5:53pm Good news! Judi’s luggage made the flight! Bad news – Judi’s body did not! Crap! So, she’s going to try and get on standby to Amsterdam and then from there on to Italy. If things work out, she can be in Rome by 3pm. Wow! Poor Judi! I’m hoping she can get there OK.

In the Good News camp again, we’re on the Airbus A330 rather than the Boeing 767. That means we get the ability to pick our own inflight entertainment! Sweet. There’s even a remote control! And the adapter for my headphones fits the jacks. Still dunno how well they work. [Got Magnavox noise cancellation headphones for the plane – only $35 at Walmart.]

Movie choices include Hitch and Robots, so I think I’ll pick them. Who knows what Northwest will offer for the ride back.

Oh, interesting sign of the times: The old No Smoking lighted signs have been replaced with “Please turn off electronic devices” signs.

Captain’s just welcomed us. We should be pushing off shortly.

6:25pm Departing a little late – a connecting flight arrived late, but we’re all here now! And we’re off to Rome!

7:00pm Ha! Spoke too soon. Yup, we’re still on the ground, trying to get to the front of the queue.

Now, although this journal entry hasn’t actually talked about the arrival to Rome, I’m going to include a couple of photos from Rome. There will be more in the next post when I write about the arrival.

Judi and Trina in Vatican City.
Judi and Trina in Vatican City. If you look closely, elsaf, you’ll see the Pope in the background, left. He’s spying on us, but we just ignored him.

The Heffalump Monument.
I liked this particular monument. I like heffalumps. And woozles. No woozles on this one, however. And what’s with all the Egyptian needles? The Romans were obsessed, I think.

In other news, work was a bitch today (and yesterday), but my new video card (for my new computer) arrived today and installed nicely. I can now play City of Heroes on my new PC. Also, Semagic is able to detect music from QCD – woot! Oh, and while listening to Information Society, I discovered they did a cover of Abba’s “Lay All Your Love on Me.” Heh, never noticed before.

PDA post

Just a short note to post with my PDA.

It’s not easy doing this, however. Don’t think I’ll be using this method very often.

More Italy stuff later. With pictures.

Braindead & Jetlagged

Gah, I’d post more on the trip, but I’m lucky I’m actually vertical right now. Leo was wonderfully sweet and let me sleep in today, though I did have to get up to go to work. I was fine in the morning, but before noon arrived, my brain had shut down. Still, I had enough functioning motor skills to play with my new handheld & barcode reader, clone a computer, then blow it up, and probably some other things that I don’t remember right now. Dad and I decided that Chinese Buffet would be lunch – neither of us has any food in our houses. At least, that was our excuse.

judiang has posted some on the trip, so go read that. I’ll post more when I get my brain back in gear. Plus I have photos I want to post. I at least downloaded them off the camera. Yesterday, as I said I was going to do, I read Harry Potter and hung out with the kitty. He often came & sat on my lap while I read. It was a lovely and relaxing day. I even went to bed at a reasonable hour. After work, I continued reading. And I’ll probably do more when I get done with supper (a TV dinner, not lasagna). Early to bed again tonight – I have to kick this jetlag so that I can be more productive at work! New teachers arrive on the 17th!

Down & Safe (Again)!

Last night I got back to Ohio around 8:30pm & the folks picked me up. We went to Waffle House for a late supper and then I returned home to a very pleased-to-see-me Leo. Short amount of time online and then off to bed. Church this morning (dad preaching on “Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up?”) and now I’m home and ready to read Harry Potter and chill with my cat. I’ll report more on the trip when I’m more awake. It was a great time and I know at least 17 out of us 18 got back safely. And I’m figuring Tammy (the 18th) got back OK as well.

PS: Happy Birthday antiwesley!

Venice – it doesn’t smell so bad after all!

Sitting at an Internet Point in Venice while John & Mary wait outside. Only 8 of us dared to venture the autostrade to come here and 5 of us are off looking at the Doge’s palace.

Not much time to write, so I’ll just say so far, the trip has been brill. The trip to the seaside was a bit of a wash, but yesterday was spent in Foiana della Chiana (where the villa is) and then off to a “cooking class” near Montepulciano. The cooking class was the perhaps the biggest highlight of the trip. I made bruschetta and pici dough and rolled pici for the first time in my life. And I did a half decent job of it, too. The food was brilliant and the house was lovely. And I’d write more, but John just popped in to see how much longer I’d be.

Home soon – my kitty’s been good so far, say the parental units. I miss him and will be happy to see him again, even if it means I’ll miss out on the villa and the swimming pool. 🙂