Dee's Exciting News and Other Things

Doesn't this trip just keep getting better and better? This latest news for Dee is amazing to me and I certainly hope it comes off. I would offer that maybe a good question to ask would be "do you think there is a chance you will come to the USA to perform? Preferably the west coast?" That might show that her interest really is in seeing him perform, not just meeting him. Fun Stuff!!

Another adventure we have come across (they just seem to keep mounting) is that we discovered another site we both really want to see, although we probably can't work it into this trip. We were told about this place called Hadrian's Wall which in northern England. It runs very close to Newcastle, which it so happens we will be arriving in after leaving Edinburgh. From Newcastle, we will catch the ferry to Amsterdam (yet another adventure we are really looking forward to). Hadrian's Wall was built beginning in AD 122 and runs about 80 miles across England. It was constructed to keep out those rascally Scots from the north. You can walk it or there is a tour where they take your luggage from B&B to B&B for you (or pub to pub :), or you can take a bus along it. Quite beautiful really. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadrian's_Wall

We've decided that this particular adventure will have to be on our next trip, but it's not the first thing we've decided we want to see on our 'next trip'. We DO love planning!

P.S. 6 months from today, we will be in London!!!

Becky

A Decision....Of Sorts.

After thinking a lot about it, I have decided the way I am going to approach the situation mentioned (well, sort of) in the previous post is:

1)  I am NOT going to ask to have a picture taken with him/them (and I don't intend to do it even if it is brought up.)
2)  I am NOT going to ask for an autograph
3)  I am probably going to be traveling on a train for several hours (dragging my sister behind me) to go meet someone who I respect, and I am going to approach him with respect, by not taking advantage of the situation.  I am simply going to say hello, perhaps shake his hand, and tell him I appreciate his talent, his work ethic, his voice, and his commitment to the people who pay money to come see him. 

I don't think because someone is a public figure, he/she should be treated like an animal in the zoo.  I think too often, when we really like a performer, we begin to think they belong to us.  After all, we pay him/her/them to entertain us, and therefore, we feel we should have access to them.  I don't think that is how it should be.  I believe we do pay them for just that, to entertain us.  Not to have their pictures take with us; not to answer endless questions (which nearly always are questions that has been asked and answered time after time); and not to be set upon by anyone who sees them on the street. 

If truly given this opportunity, I am going to look at it as a special adventure in my life, a chance to do something that I have never done before, but not a ticket to impose myself on someone, just because of who they are.  To be given the opportunity to just sit and watch, whatever the situation is, and to soak in the ambiance of a different culture, will be one of the highlights of my life.

I hope it happens.

So What If....

So just suppose you had a favorite artist.  Someone whose music or art spoke to you, and for whom you had a special regard.  Suppose it was someone whose music or art lifted you up at a time when you were really down, and sparked an interest in something when you hadn't been interested in anything for a long time.  Now suppose you were serendipitously placed in a position where you were going to meet that person. 

Are you sweating, yet?

I am, and I don't even know what the situation is, yet.  It came about on Facebook.  Now, our sister Julie is doing the "mom" thing.  You know, the one about all the evils that abound on Facebook, and how people have vanished off the face of the earth (or worse), because of liaisons started between the innocent victim (moi?), and the pervert on the other end of the Internet (Mario, obviously).  Becky and I didn't think of any of that.  To us it was just an exciting, unexpected, marvelous adventure that presented itself to us as a gift, a wonderful, happy, (and for me) spine tingling explosion of emotions.  

So back to that meeting of fan and artist.  What would you say?  What would you do?  I think Becky's take on it is perfect:  Try to not look like an idiot.  Well, that is all well and good, but how does one do that?  For one thing, I am not completely sure that he speaks English.  I know Mario doesn't because,  1) the chat was entirely in Italian, and 2) he told me he didn't.  My artist may or may not.  He does sing in English occasionally, and his favorite artist (maybe the one that would have him tongue-tied) is Peter Gabriel, so there is a small chance that I could listen to him speak English with a delightful Italian accent rather than him listening to me stutter my way through in a mess of badly conjugated verbs and confused articles.

In any case, I am not even sure I am reading Mario's email right, and won't know until I hear back from my Italian teacher who I have asked to be my definitive translator (sorry, google translate).  In any case, it raised an interesting question for me.  How would I behave in that situation?  What would I say?  What would I do?  And how would I be perceived?  What do I want to know?  Do I just let him know what his music has meant to me?  Or maybe I will simply say, "Grazie per aver condiviso il tuo cuore, e per salvare la mia anima."

(Perhaps to be continued...)

Dee

E Più Cioccolato (and more chocolate)

Becky and I are both "heavily" into chocolate (heavily being both the adverb and the resulting condition). So, as mentioned in an earliery post, we chose our date for the trip based on the dates of the European International Chocolate Festival in the city of Perugia.

Since we are coming up to an American Chocolate Festival (Easter), I thought I would insert some short videos of the festival in Perugia.

On this one, notice the people waiting for their samples.





I put this one in because I wanted Becky to see how people are dressed for October 19, 2010....Dang, it is going to be hard to keep it to a single backpack.







ALERT: ANYONE WITH DIABETES SHOULD WATCH THIS ONLY UNDER MEDICAL SUPERVISION!






And they have chocolate bananas!!!! Ok, you can watch this if you took your insulin today. Otherwise, you might want to skip it. It is just a video of a lot of boring chocolate.




Becky, do you think if we watched this about 10 times before we leave for the festival, we would be so desensitized we wouldn't even want to eat any? Ok, probably not. BUT, I have been exercising my "control muscles" in preparation by not buying Cadbury Mini-eggs. So far, at least.


Buon Appetito, e dolci sogni del cioccolato. (and sweet dreams of chocolate)

Dee

Auguri Tutte delle Donne nel Mondo.

Today is the International Day of the Woman. Apparently, it is celebrated in most of Europe, and other places in the world, but misses the US. A Facebook "friend" says that in Italy, men come up to you and give you mimosa...the flower, not the drink; sorry, Becky.

So, for all of the women in my life: Auguri Oggi delle Donne!

And also to all of the women in the world who live in slavery, poverty, despair, and hopelessness...this is a day for you... and I hope in some way you receive a bit of unexpected beauty in your day.

Practice Run - Chapter 2, Monday and Tuesday

We were so pleased when we found out that it was a relatively short walk from our hotel to Madison Square Garden. Our plan for Monday morning was to get up really early and be at the Garden (we frequent travelers to the Big Apple call it "the Garden") by 7:00 so we could get 3 of the very limited chairs that are set up along ringside. You can sit up in the grandstands, but we wanted to really be able to see the dogs. The Malinois were at 8:00, and the Aussies were in the same ring at 1:00. We figured we'd stick like glue to those chairs for that period of time. There were some serious problems with the planning and execution of the show by someone and when we got to the Garden, we were not allowed in until 7:30 - then we had to stand in a stupid line for 15 minutes. THEN they moved the line through some doors and to some other doors - so hundreds of people running to get to the other doors. What a mess. We barely made it to the ring on time.

If you have ever watched Westminster on TV you know there is a green carpet they show the dogs on. That green carpet is a holy place to dog show people. To actually be ON the carpet at the Garden is very exciting to us. What you see on the TV at night is nothing like it is during the day. There are about 6 rings during the day, and thousands of people. Literally a sea of people watching the various rings. You hear cheers and shouts all day long as someone's special dog wins or looses. Quite fun.

So we watched the Malinois. I slid down a few rings then to watch the Corgi's. We watched some other breeds and then had to go across to another ring to watch the German Shepherd of a friend of Sue's so we lost our prime chairs. After the Shepherd and grabbing a hotdog, we mosied back over to the first ring to watch the Aussies. Had the distinct pleasure of getting to see Beyonce who has won just about everything in the Aussie world, both AKC and ASCA and is the daughter of Riley who my good friends Rhonda and Carol bred. Quite a feather in their cap. Beyonce won the breed and I quickly texted Rhonda to let her know Beyonce would be in the Group ring that night.

We'd decided to go to the Italian Restaurant from Saturday for dinner on Monday night. We'd called and made a reservation for 5. At about 3:30 we were done watching the dogs we wanted to see most and decided to hop a taxi and if we couldn't get into dinner until 5.... we'd just drink! As it turned out, they gave us a table right away. (But we drank anyway). Another great dinner and only $157 this time (only???). We had tickets to go back to the Garden for the groups that night at 8 but is was only around 6 when we finished dinner and we decided we were tired, had full tummies and really just wanted to go back to the room, put our jammies on and watch groups on TV. So we did.

Tuesday was a more relaxed day as our breeds were not showing, so we stopped at our new favorite little bodega on the corner of 32nd and Broadway, for some breakfast stuff to take with us. We watched a few breeds, did some half serious shopping at the vendors and then decided to go to 'our' bodega for lunch. After lunch, Barb and Sue wanted to go back to the room and nap and I decided to go back to the show and watch a couple of breeds. After that I walked around the city a little, then back to the room. We'd had such a good dinner at the Brewery that we decided to taxi back there for dinner monday night. It was yummy again and then it was back to the room to pack and watch groups again and Best in Show. Right after the show it was lights out because we (Barb and Sue) had a 4:30 wake up call to get ready to leave by 5:30. I had showered so I told them to wake me at 5, but I was up by 4:45 anyway. Nice ride to the JFK and essentially uneventful flights home except that when we got to Sacramento, our luggage was not on board. Oh well, better that direction than going! It was all delivered the next day.

Great trip. Great fun... but awfully expensive. Not something you can do often.

P.S. The travel purse and satin dreamy (sleep sack) that I'd bought for Europe and used in NYC to practice, both worked wonderfully.

Becky

+.8

The Practice Run - Chapter 1 - Fri, Sat and Sun

Well...where do I begin? As Dee mentioned, I have been gone for 5 days. I was lucky enough to recieve an invitation from a good friend, Barb, to go with her and another friend, Sue, to New York City to attend the Westminster Dog show. I have been twice before, but it's one of those things that are just too fun to pass up. Barb and Sue both raise Belgian Malinois, a herding breed. Barb also has a Mini Bull Terrier. We flew out of Sacramento on Friday the 11th and arrived in NYC at JFK late that evening. A taxi in NYC is an experience all in itself. There was an accident on 6th Avenue, fire trucks, an ambulance and as we sat there blocked from moving, a guy got out of his car and started yelling at another guy. We thought it would come to fisticuffs. All we knew about the hotel we stayed at was that it was in mid-town Manhatten, used to be a Red Roof Inn and had been completely remodeled 6 months ago. At least it would be clean and hopefully handy to our needs.

Our plan was to spend Sat and Sun sightseeing and then spend all day Mon and Tues at the dog show. Saturday we headed out by taxi to pick up our show tickets to see "Wicked" on Broadway at the 2:00 matinee that day. The tickets were at an Italian restaurant near Times Square. Don't ask me why they were there - couldn't tell you. What we decided, however, was it was a place we wanted to eat. Smelled great and was REALLY nice inside.

We mosied on over to the theater as it was already about 1:00. Probably about a 3-4 block walk (lots of walking in NYC). I expected the show to be good, but it was more like completely fantastic. We all enjoyed it very much. We walked back through Time Square to see if we could get a table at the Italian Restaurant, but there were no reservations available until around 9:30 that night and that was MUCH too late for us. Back outside on the street we started to look around for a place to eat. There are HUNDREDS in that city. A few doors down was a place called the Heartland Brewery. Two couples had just stepped outside, so I just walked up and asked how it was. They liked it so we decided to go inside. Ended up having a truly wonderful meal - for about $180. Yep, that's what it costs to eat in NYC. Thank goodness it was great food.

Barb wanted to see Ground Zero and Sue wanted to see Greenwich Village, so we decided those were out goals for Sunday. It turns out that by walking out the hotel's front door and turning left, then walking for about 10 minutes, we ran straight into Penn Station (and Madison Square Garden). Penn Station is down below the Garden. At the Station we looked totally tourist as we studied a subway map and discussed how to get to the WTC (World Trade Center). We decided the "E" train would get us there. Turns out the "E" train was not running - it was under repair - naturally. So we were re-analyzing our choices when a nice lady with a Jamican accent stepped forward to help us sort it out. Turns out we needed the "A" train which is an express train, but then would have to get off at Fulton street and walk a few blocks to the WTC. As the train approached lower Manhatten, there was an announcement that that train would not stop at Fulton, but would continue on to Brooklyn. We had no desire to go to Brooklyn. We were just pulling into Chambers St and I decided we'd best hop off and regroup. We did and since we were too far to walk (Sue has bad knees) that far, we grabbed a taxi and took that down to Ground Zero. It was an interesting but somber visit to the site and Memorial/Museum. Next we took a taxi to Greenwich Village. A little walking around then a stop for cappuchinos (pepsi for me). A little more walking then a taxi back to the hotel as we had plans to meet friends of Barbs (other Malinois people) to go for Sushi for dinner. Not my choice, but I was trying to be adventurous - after all I did promise to practice that.

Dinner was in a little hole in the wall in..... Greenwich Village. About 1 block from where we were earlier in the day. Who knew? One lady in the group (4 of them) had been an exchange student to Japan while in college and knew Japanese and loved sushi. She did all the ordering and was nice enough to order me Vegetable sushi and vegetable tempura. Yes! I did try some tuna sushi and it was (sorry) disgusting. I did also try hot Saki and it was actually not bad, but nothing I'd go out of my way for. Dinner for the 7 of us was right around $750 dollars. Yes, I said $750.00. OMG!! Amazingly, Sue chose to pick up our part of the tab. Maybe she saw the stricken look on Barb's and my faces?? More later.

Becky
+0/-0 (can you believe it after 5 days of eating EVERYTHING!)