Should I buy a Lotto ticket?

I am having an exceptionally girly week.

Yesterday I met with the Social committee of my sorority chapter to plan the “socials” for the incoming sorority year. Yeah, I know, I never mentioned it here but I do belong to a sorority, with all those Greek letters, but not related to any colleges. I was “adopted” by this group over 3 years ago, and I call them “my girls” being that the ages are mostly between 70 and 80’s. Actually I was told this is the biggest sorority in the world and we do a bunch of good charity stuff but we also have some fun while doing it.

Today I have a dinner date with G, we always have a great time together. Lately we only manage coffee at the nearest Starbucks cum Target place but we both agree we need more time, you know, the whole catching up and talking relationships stuff works better with a glass of wine or 3!

Last but not least tomorrow is Special K get together for haircut and color day! Yuuupie! We go to this private salon and Jane always work wonders and make us feel pretty, oh well, maybe if we don’t look anywhere down from our necks!

It is very unusual for me to have this much ME time in the same week.  I just feel REALLY lucky!

Wilderness Wondering

We live in a small town, not tiny but small, specially compared to other places I lived before.

At first I was enchanted by the squirrels on our backyard, at least until Matisse went thru a window to try to catch one, I am still amazed he did not hurt himself, considering the window broke in a thousand pieces.

We are just one house removed from a very busy street but we often see skunks and raccoons, a few times we saw coyotes by the end of our street and once we were having dinner and I just saw a fox across the street out of the kitchen window, but mostly we keep a healthy distance and try to be careful while walking the dogs.

Since the big maple went down we have been walking the dogs a lot more, they miss having the open yard to spend some energy running around, Matisse rolls his rocks around (he is a true Mick Jagger) and Jack just keep bringing his ball to play catch, so we try to compensate and take them out for walks a bit more often then we like.

Last night while we took them out one of the neighbors drove by and warned us about a black bear she just saw on her backyard. We cut the walk short and did another  very short one before bedtime.

This morning I was careful while taking them out but at the same time wondering if maybe she was just kidding. By late afternoon I was surprised when He-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed came home after a meeting and told me that the bear was seen by two other neighbors, one of them we know well and have no reasons to doubt.

I have very mixed feelings, at one hand I am afraid, especially because of my dogs, having no idea how they would react if we encounter the bear, but at the same time I really want to see it. I mean I have seen bears at the zoo, and close enough, I mean safe but not from a mile away, but to have a chance to see a real wild one, although one that fancies a visit to town seems to be a very special thrill. 

I HEART GREEKS

Da Capo is officially open for business. The last few days have been very stressful for my clients with all the final inspections and they did have some glitches last night with the computers but the mood was festive. They will start advertising today, on the radio and newspaper, so yesterday was supposed to be a soft opening but they did have a nice crowd wanting to try the new place.

The food was divine; we already tried the desserts last Sunday when we stopped by to check if things were under control. I am very picky about desserts, even in good restaurants around this area they don’t prepare them in-house but they do at Da Capo. They keep it simple, just 3 options of Italian classics and a New York style Cheesecake and every one of them are very well done.  Monday we stop there on the way back from another job and end up staying for 4 hours helping with last minute stuff. Our reward was the best pizza I had in US territory. Mmmm’ kay in New York I can get thin crust and the right kind of mozzarella but in our neck of the woods it is simply impossible, well it was until yesterday.  Last night I barely had to look at the menu to choose, well I did spend so many hours designing the menu I can almost list the dishes in the right order by head. He-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed seems to be quite pleased with his choices too.

Sunday when we were there they held their staff meeting so we end up getting to know all the waitresses and waiters, yesterday it felt nice that most of them remember us. Our clients are very happy with what Boe Studio did for them so they treat us like royalty and hey it feels REALLY good. We get the kind of pampering I was used in Brasil.

Yesterday we met yet another cousin, Sofia, a very bubbly girl from Corfu, which by chance I visited some 10 years ago. She told me about her favorite Brazilian dish, I was surprise her choice was bacalhoada, which actually is more a Portuguese dish but we do make it around Easter in Brasil.

The past two days I have been having trouble with my left hand; the pain starts at my wrist and spreads to my hand, I am giving it a day to get better if not I guess a visit to the walking clinic will be in order.

 Ooops I just heard the radio blurb for Da Capo, she practically went verbatim with what I wrote for the menu, somehow it makes me feel GREAT. It makes me feel like a I belong to something that is part My Big Fat Wedding and part Big Night, a nice italian restaurant owned by Greeks from New York.

After a long hot day

Feeling hot and bothered

It is time for sandals baby!

Look at those lil piggies!

Thanks to Special K (the BFF not the cereal) now I have freshly done toes and nails.

We always enjoy our girl time together and she wanted to have a mani and pedi, I could not afford it right now so she treat me to it! Special K is not just good for my looks; she also does wonders to my mental state.

We had some good laughs and manage to improve each other’s day apart from the sheer pleasure to have presentable, oh strike that, to have extremely good looking nails and toes now.

Bring the sandals out!

We all need names

We live in a quiet street, well maybe not so quiet since we are just around the corner from the busiest street in town, but still most of our neighbors are old people that live quiet lives.

My favorite are a couple, well into their 90’s, they drive this old big car (yeah, not good with names here) and they always wave to me and sometimes even stop for a quick chat. They do go out much more than I would expect someone of their age, by and large it is the miracle of America for me, since in Brasil old people mostly just stay home.

They once told me they have been married over 75 years and they do look like most of it has been happy years. Once they mentioned that they go to the hospital twice a week because she is under some treatment, but apart from that he just drives her around, she is fond of driving around.

I went to take Matisse for a walk, I usually take one dog at a time specially when I know there are plenty of temptations in the form of squirrels and birds and chipmunks. I was just out of the door when I saw the ambulance drive by, and the old couple car behind it, he stopped almost in front my door, because the ambulance was waiting to get to the main street, he looks at me and puts his hands together in an universal gesture that means “pray” while he looks ahead to the ambulance, I respond in kind and nod and he makes the sign of the cross and drove away.

I don’t really know them; I don’t even know their names. They are the old couple in the big car. I just got a bit disappointed with myself, because I wanted to pray for her, and I did but I could only refer to her as the old lady from the old couple with the big car.

a-poppin'

They have not been very lucky, with the amount of rain we have been getting and specially because the storms have been fierce and they are so delicate. I truly love the way they look like butterflies on a stem, almost like they are made of paper. I love flowers but I even love them better if I planted them as I did with these poppies. Again it came to me for free, just a package of seeds from some magazine and they seem to love the spot I choose.

We still don’t have a backyard in working order. Actually every time I look at the dismantled fence and the sad dead tree I feel a little helpless. The whole thing looks so desolated it is rather overwhelming.

 He-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed said we might be able to fix some of the fence this coming weekend, being it will be a holiday, not that he ever makes much difference as he probably will work right thru it again.

It will depend on the weather since we have to pour new footings for the posts and wait until they dry to be able to get the fence up. We need to get the small one first, around my raised bed, since otherwise the dogs will get to what is left of my tomatoes and herbs.

I am keeping my fingers crossed since life is way better when we have a yard for the boys. Looking at the state of things they will probably think we built them a jungle gym.