My Hermit Long Weekend

Brad went to his friend's house in Pemberton this weekend. So everyone was asking me what I was going to do. When I would reply "I'm not leaving the house" I got nervous laughter.

But I'm serious!

I love spending time with friends, family and of course my husband. But often I just need to be alone. I don't mean for half an hour. I mean for days. So when Brad announces these trips to the mainland, I mentally mark my own calendar too.

Friday night I stocked up on all the groceries I needed, made sure I had enough food and littler for Ziggy etc.... I shut the door and knew I wouldn't leave again until Monday afternoon when I pick Brad up at the ferry.

I've done lots of great stuff! Slept in, read tons, listened to copious amounts of music and tonight I'm planning on curling up in bed with a Jane Austen movie.

I also bought these earrings and this necklace. I wanted something really simple and found this fantastic shop.

I remember seeing this great quiz a while ago so I just took it and I'm Elizabeth Bennett! Woo! Hoo!

I think it would be interesting for someone to take it who isn't familiar with the characters. Here is the link if you're interested.

I hope everyone is having a great long weekend!

Hello Strangers!

Music is a HUGE part of my life. I grew up playing instruments, singing in choirs and endless, endless music always playing in the house. My Grandma could play by ear - a gift I always wished I had.

For years now, since I bought my first iPod I haven't bought cds, so my cd player became obsolete. The only way I could play music was to plug my iPod into my amplifier. It worked fine, but it was a huge pain and I rarely listened to music anymore.

Today I bought something I've wanted forever! Right now I'm lounging on the couch, blogging and surfing the net with Brad and.....get this.....listening to music on my stereo speakers with the laptop!!

Holy crap have I ever missed these speakers.

Airport Express is a beautiful thing.

Book Review #8

It's been a while since a book review and I've read lots - and lots of GOOD book this time - woo hoo!! My pile looks small, because I've been using my Kobo a lot lately. I'm addicted to how easy it is to hold and carry around with me.

Summer's Lease - John Mortimer
I only got 75 pages into this before I put it down. Even though it was about Italy, I couldn't get through it - B-O-R-I-N-G! The characters weren't interesting enough to keep me engaged.

The DaVinci Code - Dan Brown
I was in the mood for a page turner and Brad bought this book a couple years ago. It was good but I wouldn't say it's tops on my book list or anything. Probably as good as the movie, which is rare. I give credit to Tom Hanks for that last statement.

The Birth of Venus - Sarah Dunant
This book was fantastic!! Thanks Christielli! The main character and her family were so interesting, then the book took a turn I was totally not expecting which turned it into a really complex story. I highly recommend.

The Everafter - Amy Huntley
A young adult book I got from the library and it was pretty good! A girl who had died, she was stuck in this weird space between life and death. She would find an object she had lost in her life (a bracelet or a key or something) and it would take her back to re-live that moment.

The Midwife of Venus - Roberta Rich
Holy crap - another amazing book!! I read this start to finish while we were in Italy. I didn't sleep well in Florence at all for some reason. It was way more of a page-turner than DaVinci Code. A midwife who lives in the Jewish Ghetto in Venice and her husband's story. I'm surprised they haven't made a movie yet. Read this book.

The Red Herring without Mustard - Allan Bradley
Another refreshing mystery from the perspective of a 12 year old girl who is obsessed with chemistry! I love her sisters even though they are totally mean to her. I'd recommend this to anyone who likes the occasional mystery.

I've also had the best luck with the library lately - I was 20 pages from the end of one book and the next one became available to download. Also, I get ebooks on hold way faster than regular books. I had a hold on Midwife of Venice and was 249th out of 249 holds. It only took about a month for it to become available.

What have you guys read lately that's good?

Italy Part 7 - La Boheme

Alterations to Wedding Dress - $120

Tickets to La Boheme in Rome - $250

Hauling opera clothes around Italy - free

Not being able to see a thing - priceless

* * * * * * *

Okay. Let me explain.

When we bought our tickets, we reserved the box - not the seats. There were four seats in each box so we got there early so we could get the 'best seats' in the box. But there were already two people there - who had the better seats. The problem was - we didn't realize how bad the other two seats would be....

So, basically our box wasn't where I thought it would be - it was along the side of the theatre, not the back. So it looked towards the other side of the theatre, not the stage. You can see what I mean in this photo. The stage was off to the left...

The worst part was that there were solid walls on either side of the boxes. So in order to see anything, I had to lean out (in my dress, with the boning, the boning) to see anything. And the more I leaned out the less Brad could see.....it was so uncomfortable and ridiculous.

Well, anyway - here was the stage we could barely see.

Bottom line - this theatre was built when you didn't go to the theatre to see a show - you went to see and be seen. They shouldn't be selling four seats in a box. I'm glad we went - but it was disappointing.

Italy Part 6 - Gelato

Behold.

Ooooh, wow. We ate so much gelato. It was all so yummy, but unfortunately we only took photos of half of the gelato we ordered....but get ready anyway:

In Florence, I had peach and Brad combined chocolate and orange gelato.

In Bologna I had strawberry and Brad had ricotta.....I know....

In Florence we got caught in a tourist trap place by accident. We paid 11 euros for these - oops. They were good though - mint chocolate and pistachio.

In Venice after our lunch from my previous post, we had gelato that came highly recommended. I had caramel and Brad had chocolate orange.

Again in Venice - I had lemon and Brad can't remember what he had! This time I shouldn't have gotten gelato, I was already full of wine and pasta from dinner.....oh well, it was worth it - the lemon flavour was incredible.

In Rome - these were two of the best ones we had - dark chocolate. It was like eating a cold, creamy not-too-sweet chocolate dream.

In Rome - this was another of my favourites - grapefruit!! One of the best cones EVER. Brad had watermelon. We ate these as we watched a French music festival in the Piazza Farnese - right up the block from our apartment.

In Rome again - I had cappuccino - so good, not too sweet. Brad had zabaglione - which is like custard. Very eggy - weird. He liked ordering the strange flavours.

If you found the right place, you got super yummy gelato for cheap. Maybe three euro for a small cone. And no worries about getting the smallest size - they always seemed to pile it on.

When we got back here a friend told me to go to this "gelato" place downtown. I think we were pretty desperate because we weren't thinking. This place was right in the tourist zone and it cost a fortune ($15) for two cones. It wasn't gelato either - it was bad, chalky ice cream. Super disappointing.

Ah, Rome. I miss you already.

My New Buddy

This was a good week.

First, we paid off our Italy trip. Paid. Off.

And we had some money left over, so we........wait for it.....

....bought a new MacBook Pro!!!

This has been on our radar for at least a year. We got the 15", 8GB RAM, 500GB hard drive version and TimeCapsule for backups. Next up is Airport Express so I can play music throughout our apartment.

This is my first blog post, I'm getting used to manoeuvring around this thing (my first Mac ever!) but I'm completely in love already.

Italy Part 5 - Best Sandwich Ever

A quick post about....sandwiches!

One night we got sandwiches from this super tiny hole in the wall place in Rome. Seriously - it was the best sandwich I've ever had.

Super simple ingredients. The bread was really fresh and grilled a little bit. The cheese is cut thick.....the Italians just KNOW how to make good food.

Italy Part 4 - Church Skeletons

I'm taking a break from the posts about the cities to show you some other crazy stuff we saw on our trip.

Obviously we went into a lot of churches and saw a ton of art. When I heard people say that you get overloaded on art and it becomes a blur after a while, I didn't believe it. How could you pass by gorgeous sculptures and paintings and not appreciate it??

But it's true.

Also, when you don't know the religious stories behind the art, this can be a really crazy experience. One thing that totally stuck out for me were the skeletons.

Here, once again is our street with the beautiful church at the end.

Once you get closer though, you see it has skulls all over it!

....more skeletons on the ceiling of the Duomo in Florence.....

And my favourite creepy skeletons....inside The Friar in Venice. We were seriously spooked when we saw these.

This is only an example - they were everywhere.

Italy Part 3 - Venice

How come nobody told me jet lag could linger for almost a week after you get back from a trip? Brad is having major trouble sleeping and we both woke up at 4:30am all this week!

Anyway, Venice....we had a great dinner the night we got there.

I'll be honest though - it's seriously overrun in areas with tourists. I almost panicked when we arrived - think Disney stores, McDonald's and streets where you can barely walk. It just wasn't what I was expecting from Venice.

It got better though....see?

Anyway, a map of our one full day in Venice....it is by no means accurate. I think that is the whole point of Venice - to get completely lost and enjoy yourself anyway.

We started out from our hotel.....the cute little Hotel Bernardi.....!

.....and made our way to the Vaporetto ('public boat') and went directly to San Marco which is the main attraction in Venice. On the way......


At this point, I had had ENOUGH of the animals (err....tourists) so I wasn't willing to wait for two hours in a lineup to see the inside of the buildings. I just wanted to get out of there and explore the quiet side of Venice. I'm so glad we did because we got to see a lot. (See my map above.)

So we got out of there and wandered around for a bit and took the boat across the water again and walked along the 'shore' of Venice.

We decided to find this particular square and see if there were any good restaurants for a late lunch. We found a fantastic little place and had an awesome lunch here.

I think this place was super memorable for me because we had such a great time here. We kicked back in the shade, had good iced coffees and killed ourselves laughing the entire time. It was fantastic. The food was great too - click on the photo to see the size of the capers Brad had.

Do it.
After this, we kept wandering and stumbled on this basilica. It's called Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari. We paid the four euros to go inside and it was worth it.....seriously the strangest church ever. More on that later......I promise.

We ended up over in the Jewish Ghetto, which is a great area - less tourists, more locals. We popped into a wine bar and had some fantastic wine and bruschetta. I love this photo with our shadows....

After this we walked home, had some tiramsu on the way and fell into bed ready to leave for Florence the next day.

Italy Part 2 - Rome

Okay, so this post is really hard! I've been wondering how I would describe how amazing Rome is and how much I loved it in one blog post?? Then I realized that I could post all of our photos of this place and it still wouldn't describe how awesome it is. So I will just shut up and begin.

One of my favourite things about Rome is that you never know what is going to be around the next corner, but it's always something ridiculous. Like the Pantheon.

.....or a building like this....

....and of course there is usually a place to sit and have a glass of wine near these places too.*

Which we did....a lot.

Then there are lots of obvious things about Rome that blew my mind. Like the Pantheon.

The other thing that surprised me about Rome was that the things that I thought would totally make me cry (ie: Sistine Chapel) didn't, and then something completely unexpected would have me weeping. Like....

We sought out San Luigi dei Francesi because there are three Caravaggio paintings in there that we wanted to see. The church is fine on the outside...nothing TOO remarkable (in the context of Rome) which is probably why I was so affected when we went inside.

Seriously?

I was brought to tears. (Brad has photos.) It was beautiful and so unexpected! Then after we explored the church, we saw the paintings and they were fantastic.

This is the coffee bar where we had lots of our morning coffees.

We took this photo on our last morning there and the couple at the table next to us was entertaining. The girl was totally into this guy (in the white t-shirt) and all he did was talk about himself and his travels through Italy. He was seriously annoying. I wanted to lean over and tell her she was too good for him. There was also a model shoot - it was....interesting.

The only downfall of Rome are the tourists. After a couple days I felt like I had to get away from people.....we even started referring to tourists as 'Animals'. I'm glad the Vatican was one of the first places we visited. That's where this shot was taken:

People are asking us 'What was the highlight?' and that is impossible to answer because there are so many experiences - culture, art, food, wine, architecture...so I would say the highlight was just being there.

Since I'm not allowed to post any photos of Brad, I'll leave you with this photo**. At least you get the idea!



*We went into Sant'Ignazio and it had me weeping too. It didn't help that mass had just finished and there was organ music still playing. The ceiling though - seriously - google it. It's worth it.
** This was the first time we had iced coffees and they were the best ones we had.

Italy Part 1 - Shoes

Behold.
This is a window in our apartment in Florence. Oh - and those are the three pairs of shoes I bought in Bologna!

I seriously cannot take the green and brown ones. They are so gorgeous I blush every time I look at them. The blues ones.....they're great, but don't take my breath away. What do you think??

Don't worry, I'm going to post better pictures of our trip, but we're still gathering all the photos together. For now....the shoes......oh, the shoes!