I've got to say that I'm finding this thread really interesting! It feels like I'm getting to "know" people a little better.
My vacation began at 6pm; I had a small ceremony to celebrate shutting off my pager. I'm not on call again until January 22.
After work I went to Brookline Booksmith and stocked up on reading material to bring to Italy. It started to snow as I was walking home: big pretty flakes.
Maureen
Posts: 4724 | Location: Boston or Florence | Registered: 07 July 2001
We are all such readers! I read that Pompeii book in Italy in September and thought the same thing. I think I gave my copy to Cristina. Elizabeth mentioned Margaret Drabble's The Seven Sisters. I am in the middle of it right now, but will put it aside to start reading books about Rome. And Robert mentioned Penelope Fitzgerald's The Blue Flower - I am pretty sure I read this and some of her other books a few years ago.
Just got back from some shopping - picked up my new cell phone at the mail boxes (switched to T-Mobile because they have a $20/month plan - we don't use the cell phone much - and they get reception on Kauai, so on our next trip I can be online all day and not worry about Steve not getting his business calls), got a new kettle (to fill our hot water bottles - perhaps this one won't leak), got a binder and baskets for stacking papers, got soap for Stephanie.
It is wonderfully cold and Christmassy out.
Ran into a web client at the store - she said she is getting lots of business from her web site!! (She is an architect.)
We're under blizzard warnings now. I'm going to get into my flannels now - Chris promises to make pancakes in the morning. Now if only we could get someone else to shovel for us, it would be perfect.
I've been reading Middlesex off and on all day, and it is enthralling. Beautifully written and totally unique. Had my first session of physical therapy for my lame knee and am encouraged by the therapists' comment that I should be "good to go" by March. Weather in Austin today was much as I imagine autumn is in New England -- golden sunshine, windy, 50's. Elizabeth
Amy! That's no way to spend a snowy weekend (and its just beginning, too.) I've been anticipating the snow since the weathermen started hyping it as an excuse to stay at home, forget the shopping frenzy for a while and do some baking. The cookie thread is just the thing to get me started.
Hope the kids recover quickly and you get a little time to curl up and enjoy the snow. I'm all for it as long as we don't have a snow day on Monday. I'm not quite ready for that yet.
Posts: 265 | Location: Massachusetts | Registered: 09 June 2002
The weather in New Orleans has been incredible - crisp and clear, with beautiful blue skies. So I got on the phone earlier this week to make an appointment with a landscape architect - we've just expanded our yard and will expand more in a few years. Having no creativity whatsoever in that department (I don't mind working like a Trojan - and in this weather I love it.) I seek guidance. Once my husband left for work, I thumbed through garden books, looking for pictures I like to show this landscape guy. He was right on time, and had lots of interesting ideas to ponder. Can't wait to see what he suggests.
Then I made an appointment for a pedicure and manicure - my holiday treat to myself. After a little fooling around with laundry, etc. it was time for lunch with a friend.
We ate at Gabrielles, a neighborhood restaurant with a super fixed price Friday lunch. Started with a glass of champagne. Appetizer was a crabmeat stuffed shrimp in a tomato basil sauce - most delicious. Entree was an eggplant pirogue filled with duck and sweet peppers. Dessert was homemade pistachio ice cream.
Headed to our local SPCA after lunch to help organize an adoption event for tomorrow. I work with the foster care program and needed to help some foster kitties get their last check ups and get settled in before the big day tomorrow.
Husband had an upset tummy so I ate cashews and dried cranberries for supper with a really nice cabernet from Washington state. The cashews and cranberries make a great party snack - one of my favorite recipies.
Finished up a poster for the adoption event tomorrow and hope to get to bed early.
Posts: 655 | Location: Maine | Registered: 23 November 2002
quote:Originally posted by Pauline: (like Barb does in her blog, but shorter
Uhoh...am I too long-winded? Pauline, this is your fault for getting me started with the blog...for someone who didn't even want to d blog at all, I sure seem to have come up with a few things to say!
I just got home after seeing the movie "The Last Samurai". Remember I bought yesterday my ticket for "Mystic River" at 8:15pm? Well, I left my apartment at 7:00pm to allow myself to take a nice walk to the theatre without having to rush. Luckily, it was a good idea because when I arrived at 7:25pm and after reading the big poster in the lobby, I realized that I've seen the pre-screening of that movie. "The Last Samurai" was at 7:30pm so I asked the manager to exchange my ticket. I stopped by D&R to get some Sudafed and Calcio tablets and then my Chinese dinner (chicken sauteed with mixed vegetables, spicy - my favorite). I just finished eating (don't panic, this is New York and nobody eats early). I am having a cup of green tea and just opened my fortune cookie! It says: "You will make a sudden rise in life". Not bad. Hope I won't go down like a souffle And on top of everything, a strange coincidence. On the back of the little paper are the words: Learn Chinese -'August' (my birth month) = Ba-yue I know now how to say August in Chinese. I have to remember how to say 14 (my father taught me how to count in Chinese) but I haven't practiced for many years I better refresh my memory for my next trip to Venice
"Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza..."
"I sing to life, to its beauty, to each of its wounds and each of its caresses..."
Posts: 1831 | Location: New York, New York | Registered: 21 December 2002
Want to thank Gloria for the pignoli cookie receipe and tell Shannon that I finally got her Chow, Venice. And See's candies are soooooo good. I remember sitting in a Korean post office (actually staging a 'sit-in' of sorts, while we haggled over the duty they wanted to charge me when Mom sent a can of See's Bordeaux chocolates (my fave!). I wouldn't leave without them but I wouldn't pay what they were trying to extort either. I won. And, Pauline, do you think Bill's reading this and will ever tell us what he thinks of Pompeii (the novel)?
Callie and viabrodolini, go to your profiles and put your location in. It's so much fun to see all the different towns and countries that we're posting from! And, Pauline, the message board is loading soooooooooooo slooooowww tonight! Give 'em hell at Infopop.
It's 1:00a.m. here, just noticed this thread, and before I go to bed thought I'd add my own mundane ramblings. I had nothing much on the agenda prior to going to work today, so took it easy...got up late, sipped coffee while surfing the net, showered, ate lunch (or what passed for it..must remember to get groceries!) Then thought I should catch up on my Astrology correspondence course that I've been procrastinating about for months, did one exercise and gave up. Put up some more Xmas decorations, watched T.V. (soap I'd taped yesterday) while opening mail. Went to work for 3:00p.m. Work in Psychiatric hospital; transferred one patient and received a new one...lots of moving around and paperwork, spent the usual night with one unusual twist where we went through a list of suspects that we felt may have set the fire of the night before! Chatted with my daughter-in-law about my two grand-children...my grand-daughter Sarah who at 5 months is going to see a Pediatric cardiologist on Monday re. the heart defect we just found out she has, which may mean surgery, and my grand-son Ryan who is having anger management problems in kindergarten because he hates being told what to do! Got home at 11:30ish, and after reading three pages of your interesting lives, and letting you in on a bit of mine, am now off to bed. Love this thread! May it last forever! Night Night..Avis
P.S. Weather in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada is -6c at present, tomorrow is supposed to be -1 and partly sunny. Have had small amount of snow, but it's pretty much gone now. Oshawa is less than an hour east of Toronto.
Joanna - arrghh. Bordeaux See's are my all time favorite. Burnt brown sugar. Yum.
Anyhow, I've been thinking for a few minutes (there I go working without tools again.) And reading all the posts on this thread,I keep hearing Julia Roberts in "Pretty Woman" saying to Richard Gere after a heart to heart "well no wonder you had to come looking for me" (or something like that.) Us and our lives being Richard Gere; Italy (or wherever) being Ms. Julia.
Our lives are on display here - working, sitting in traffic, cooking, cleaning up kids puke, but the thing we dream about is travel, that far off la la land, a place you know as heaven or I know as, well I won't say that here, something we are all familiar with enough to know that we can't get it out of our minds.
We are all stranded between two worlds. A good place to be I think.
Okay, I completely missed this thread --- that's what I get for flying through the digests and not taking the time to read. That's 'cause I have a freak for a boss ... yeah, yeah, so I'll blame it on something!
Today I'm working, as normal, and looking forward to my "weekend" (my whole one day!). As always, my buddy Kim will come by around 5:30 to pick me up and she'll sit in the office chair until 6:00 when I actually get to leave the office, even though we close at 5:00 ... Throughout the day I'll watch my little security camera television and try to guess whose car is coming at various times throughout the day ... god help me this is boring!! I'll wait for a couple people that are supposed to check out today ... a couple of my present-favorite-troublemakers will come in at some point and give me hell ... they should be out exploring Sicily! I keep telling them that. They're finally starting to listen No cookies, but today's lunch will be pasta with a "sauce" of fennel ... lightly browned (so to speak, probably more like roasted) in a pan with a little local extra-virgin olive oil, sprinkled with some parmeggiano.
Tonight Kim and I will stop by a small family owned ristorante we found on the coast in Acireale. We’ve been a couple times already – the first time we just happened upon it after walking out of another restaurant that hadn’t even served us water after 30 minutes and the second time was when we took a small group of Army guys that were here for a day and going home after surviving their time in you-know-where. The Reserve command has put me in charge of the weekly Reservist dinners since I know the “non-Americanized” places, and I’d made reservations for a huge dinner there last Thursday … that got changed to Saturday because people were covering the world games in Catania … that got changed to Sunday because then people wanted to go to Palermo and see dead people in catacombs instead of enjoy a fantastic fun-filled meal … that now got changed to NEXT Thursday! But the owner told me I MUST stop by tonight for a coffee and a “sweet” … so we will. Tomorrow morning we’ll be up bright and early (yeah right and go to Catres, a great store I found. Right now they’re in the process of closing for Christmas and will open in another area. The store has mostly crystal objects – all hand-made here in Italy/Sicily. Oil and vinegar sets, dishes (obviously not crystal, before someone gets me on that one!), incredibly gorgeous glasses (they call that stemware, right?), clocks, figurines, artwork, rugs, etc., etc. Best thing is that because they’re closing, everything is 50-65% off!! Eight beautiful crystal wine glasses for like E14….I’ve been sending lots of people there. Later, if the Catania market is still open, we’ll stop there as well. Then we’ll go back to her house in Zafferana Etnea, a smidge up Etna on the east side with a gorgeous view of Taormina and the sea and also the coast of Italy, and maybe wander around the town … or drive up Etna and go climb around the volcano.
Why I haven’t been online or reading message boards….I’ve been entirely preoccupied lately with making decisions about my life here, what I’m doing and where I’m going. I work for a crazy man and this is not what I gave up everything to come here for. I’ve been having meetings with captains and others-in-charge and I’ve decided I’m leaving the TLA and will start my own business. Now I’m just in the process of figuring it all out … as in, whether I’ll actually be able to support myself in doing it, what with a reduction in sending people for training, etc. More on that some other time, but not in this ridiculously long “what-I’m-doing-today” post!! I still go back and forth in my mind about staying in Sicily/Italy because the timing on “the guy’s” orders are so up in the air – being 6,000 miles apart is hell on a love affair. I never thought I’d miss someone this much.
The weather’s nice here today … a few clouds, a little snow on Etna, the sun is out and it’s sweater weather…oh yeah, and we’re all having a “strength-in-numbers” quit-smoking day beginning this coming Tuesday…..we’ll make a quick stop at the Exchange to get me the patch! It’s the way I did it before, so it should work again.
Maybe another espresso will wake me up……
Maria When you know even for a moment that it's your time, then you can walk with the power of a thousand generations
[This message was edited by MariaV on 06 December 2003 at 03:00 AM.]
Posts: 1176 | Location: London area now! | Registered: 10 November 2001
Buon giorno! I've been in a bit of a posting slump lately and have decided to use this thread to get out of it.
Just got back on Wednesday from the US. Had plumbing problems on Thursday (I am not eluding to my heath) and computer problems on Friday. Today I slept until 10am! Aaahh. It is almost 11:30 and I am still in my jammies.
No snow here - just gorgeous blue skies and warm temps.
Just few questions brought up by this thread (also to prove that I read the whole thing )
Paris Hilton is not a hotel??? Please explain.
Dips are not something to go with chips??? Please explain.
On star? Please explain.
I must get dressed soon and get to the market. Monday is a holiday and everything will be closed.
I went on a posting frenzy! Now it is almost 1pm. My coffee went cold and grew skin! Don't worry Pauline - it's not really coffee, it's Yannoh. And what is this about you blabbing my soap needs on the board!
I really must get to the market or Cesare will kill me when he gets home and there is nothing to eat until Tuesday.
Steph, you're cracking me up. On Star is a satelite service - like a global positioning system for your car. You can have the map directly in your car or you can call them if you're in trouble. They advertise all over the place here.
So this morning, Chris will do round one of shoveling before the blizzard actually hits (probably in a couple of hours), but for now, he's downstairs making cofee and pancakes, so I need to run soon.
Other than that, we'll be baking and putting up Christmas directions. We were supposed to get our tree tomorrow but not sure if they (or anything else) will be open. Oh and I also need to scrounge through the cupboards to figure out what we have that I can make for dinner tonight.
A perfect snowy day. Amy - how are the kids doing?
Well, if anyone has some bright ideas on removing vomit stains/odor from a light teal carpet, I'm all ears. Soda water. Fabreeze. Baking soda. No dice. My kid has super-strength puke. I'm so proud.
The good news is that his fever broke during the night. Still coughing up a storm, though. Little brother still at the drippy stage. Go blow your nose, kid.
We have around six inches of snow, and it's coming down at quite a clip. Very pretty. Since my main shoveler is away and my second is under the weather, I may chase the snowplow guy down the street with a $20 and some cookies to see if he'll plow out the bottom of the driveway.
We have all the Marx brothers movies on the TIVO; some homemade chicken soup defrosting in the fridge; butter softening up for a cookie event; tissues, tylenol, and OJ for the kids; and I may lock the bathroom door and take a long bubble bath this afternoon. Or a nap.
Ah, it's just like Little House on the Prarie while Pa is out hunting. Heh.
Amy in MA "Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us, or we find it not." --Ralph Waldo Emerson
Posts: 8683 | Location: Newton (outside Boston), MA | Registered: 17 June 2001
Topic Closed
And on top of everything, a strange coincidence. On the back of the little paper are the words: Learn Chinese -'August' (my birth month) = Ba-yue 
I better refresh my memory for my next trip to Venice 
Throughout the day I'll watch my little security camera television and try to guess whose car is coming at various times throughout the day ... god help me this is boring!! I'll wait for a couple people that are supposed to check out today ... a couple of my present-favorite-troublemakers will come in at some point and give me hell ... they should be out exploring Sicily! I keep telling them that. They're finally starting to listen 
No cookies, but today's lunch will be pasta with a "sauce" of fennel ... lightly browned (so to speak, probably more like roasted) in a pan with a little local extra-virgin olive oil, sprinkled with some parmeggiano. 
and the second time was when we took a small group of Army guys that were here for a day and going home after surviving their time in you-know-where. 