slidergirl

Melody - I like that little snap of the collar!! Sassy!! Friday in the summer, means noise ALL DAY LONG from the landscape team doing the mowing and trimming. Since I live with the biggest open space in the subdivision, I get to hear it all day. Now I remember why I put on my noise-cancelling headphones and listen to music and podcasts on Fridays. Between that and the very frequent yapping, squealing and barking of the new dog next door, it's driving me crazy. At least the dog didn't start up until 6am today - it was 5 yesterday. I can't get back to sleep when it does that. I don't want to be the "dog police" so I'm hoping it will calm down once it gets used to it's new home.

The Beach Boys were a big part of my childhood when growing up in Newport Beach, CA ,from 6th grade until graduation from High School. I did see them in person a good number of times. My "6 degrees" moment: one of my girlfriends in 6th grade lived a few doors down from me. Her father provided the Hammond organ the BBS used on "Good Vibrations." My History of Jazz prof at UCLA created the first synthesizer that they used on the song... I hope Brian finally has peace of mind. 💔 Watching Nat Geo Channel - "Lost Treasures of Rome". Not just Rome. Now it's Pompeii and Herculaneum. Interesting. A mix of archeology, volcanology, history.

What is the "foreign port" you stop at? Bermuda? Bahamas? Curious

Cynthia - I'll drive to Arricia to get a piece of that pig!!! When I worked at the St. Regis, our exec chef would roast a pig on a spit once in awhile for an event and staff could munch on leftovers. That crispy skin was just so yummy - I know why Stanley was hopping around! Ladies back on the cruise booking wagon, I see. I can't get too excited to do anything yet as I have to pay off my last vacation 😸 But, I love to vicariously live through you all! I will say that, now that I've done the TA, I can see it as a valid way to get to another European vacation. Right now, I have my BFFs talking about another getaway for September. No idea where yet. But, it sounds like I need to get into my "cat herding" mode after having a perfect solo adventure... OOTD: joggers and a Tshirt. Nothing worth going out for today.

We have no Chinese options up here - only one and it's pretty ugh. I miss Chinese food, but not so much that I'd go to this place. I've got today off from my Silly Market volunteer gig. So I went out for breakfast at the local bagel place. Poppy seed bagel with egg, bacon and cheddar cheese. The biggest coffee offered. I could have driven 2 more miles and had a good croissant and coffee, but the egg and bacon were calling me. The croissant, while really good, would just make me want to go back to Europe... OOTD: denim shorts, my Barcelona soccer shirt. It's a very comfy 1/4 zip front with long sleeves that easily push up to elbow length.

Lois - cataract surgery doesn't automatically give you 20/20 vision. It's really putting a clean lens on your eyeball. I think now they have different options of lens to use. When I had mine done, it was only 3 kinds and only 1 wasn't thousands extra. How it adapts together is what can determine how you see. I ended up with "monovision" - one eye is better with closeup and the other eye is better mid-to-distance. So, patience, Grasshopper... DDD has been in Park City for 3 times that I know of. It's been down in the Salt Lake Valley a ton of times. OOTD: just a Tshirt and lightweight joggers.

I've done Sammy's. It's good. It's off Main Street so locals will go there and the owners don't gouge on prices. When I was working at one of the hotels, sometimes we'd order from Sammy's for our dinner. I always liked the Pulled Pork Sandwich and the Chivito Club sandwich. The Asian Chicken Salad is good, too.

All I know is I want to know where he goes to find that beautiful pig in the teaser! I'm thinking it's in Ariccia, since that's known for porchetta. I'm a sucker for pig.

I looked it up. There are 3 of them listed. Are you in El Segundo, Costa Mesa or Laguna Nigel?? Curious because I spent time growing up in Newport Beach. Lois - I'm jealous of your 6.1. But 6.4 is way down from what it was when I started my diabetes journey 5 years ago. I'm positive I could get it much lower if I could give up some foods more often. I did add 5 lbs back on over Winter - I knew that when I was trying on my shorts and jeans for vacation. I'll have to work a little to get rid of it! Saw the ad for the next Stanley episode. Looks like he is going to travel outside the walls of Rome and into the Roman countryside. Artichokes and pig on a spit, aka porchetta, were teased.

Melissa - have an enjoyable trip to LA. What is your favorite Mexican restaurant there? Always looking around for more good Mexican/Latino food when I go to Southern CA. Had my endocrinology visit today. Really wasn't looking forward to it as my morning numbers haven't been as good as usual the past couple of months. But, I was surprised that my A1C dropped even further, down to 6.4. We spent most of the appointment talking about my vacation since everything was OK. That did brighten up my day. OOTD: my denim shorts and the olive "cows grazing" Tshirt that I bought in Saõ Miguel, Azores. Still wearing my Merrells because my brace fits in it. At least it didn't bother me to go without my walking stick today!

Lois - when I had my first cataract done, I had better vision out of that one right away. But, after that, I don't really remember anything better and better, maybe more slow and gradual. Melody - happy to see more food porn posted!!! I haven't Mexican in a long time. It made me try to remember to put our little hole-on-the-wall places here back in rotation. I was in San Antonio once, a good 15 years or so to visit friends who had moved from here to there. I enjoyed the Riverwalk area. Yesterday was my first volunteer shift at our Sunday Market here in town. Sunny, hot and no wind. My assignment was sooooo easy - sit in a chair at one of the entrances and click a counter for each human who came in. In my 4 hours, I clocked 801 people!!! My entrance was at the bottom of the street, at the music stage and food booths. So, I had good music and great smells of BBQ that whole time. The guys who ran the alcoholic beverage booth gave us an umbrella to sit under and kept us hydrated with water. Nice guys - they didn't have to do that. I'm going to be volunteering for most of the Sundays this Summer, minus the couple of Sundays we don't have the market due to other activities scheduled on Main St. Bringing doggie treats next Sunday - probably had a few hundred doggos pass by in those 4 hours!! Last night's Stanley was definitely low on the list. It doesn't sound like there really is much to Abruzzo if you aren't into nature. That one area where they stopped at the "saloon" and roasted lamb on sticks looked like an area I'd like to do a road trip around. I was ready to make an Abruzzo dinner last night: spaghetti alla chittara, but I was too tired out from sitting out there all afternoon to make it. Oh well, my heart was there. OOTD: Yesterday: jean shorts (first time of the season), my cream Tshirt with the big red heart on it and my vintage (a good 15+ years old) J. Peterman "Miss Blue" panama widebrim hat. Today, just a Natural Life Tshirt and jean shorts.

Melody - you made my mouth water!!! Yummy-looking food!

Good to hear the surgery went well, Lois. Like Sherri said, it's interesting how different MDs do their post-op protocols. I wore a little cap over my eye that had tiny holes in it - it reminded me of an ant eye op close. Only had to wear that at night for a week, mainly to keep it safe from unconscious rubbing/scratching when I slept. I was awake for both of mine - just had a ton of numbing things put in my eye. The thing they put on the eye to keep it open during surgery reminded me of "Clockwork Orange" - I really wanted a pic of me with that thing on!!! Yes, the drops are annoying. Now, on to the next one!! And become extremely diligent in wearing sunglasses EVERY TIME you go outside!!!!!

Melody - wonderful pictures! Congrats to the DGD for completing training. Where does she go from here? Off to my hair stylist today. We're 2 weeks past coloring time because of both of us having vacations. But, with the lightening job we did before my vacation, you can't see where the gray is except at my temples. I'm loving the light-color in my hair. I may have to keep it year-round. My Spring allergies finally caught up to me. All the cottonwood and aspen tree fuzz floating around kills me. Plus the local landscape guys have started mowing so there is grass crap to contend with. I was worried about the olive trees in Spain & Portugal setting me off (they are my #1 tested allergy), but nothing happened. I come home and it blows up. Ugh. OOTD: washed my Free People shorts and Cotopaxi SPF hoodie last night so they are ready to go today. Up to 75 today and sunnt, with high going up to 80 on Sunday. Then, a big shift down to the low/mid 60s for a few days. Welcome to Spring in the mountains!

Post-vacation adventures: My poor ankle still hurts. I decided to hobble over to the Urgent Care office to see if I could get reassured that I didn't do anything bad to it. X-rays didn't show anything obvious. It did show that arthritis has set in (no surprise). But, with all the hardware in there, the radiologist and NP suggested that I go see the local ankle orthopedic guy to go over it with a fine-tooth comb. In the meantime, she gave me a spiffy soft brace to wear. Can't wear my high tops with it so I'll have to just wear my trail runners for now. OOTD: shorts and a Tshirt. It's a 76 high today.

Yay Lois! Now, let that anxiety go. It's going to go smoothly. On your waiting for the phone call: I'm doing that now and I'm steamed. I arranged with my drug insurance person for a call at 11:15 today. She had texted while I was on vacation and said I was to contact her about one of my meds (fortunately, only my cholesterol one). Well, I've been waiting 45 minutes now. I'm thinking of doing what we did in college with our professors - if they don't show up with 5 minutes of the bell, just leave... OOTD: Another 30 degree temp change day. high will be 75. So, shorts and a Tshirt.

I like his easy way of talking about anything, from food to discrimination to politics. He doesn't sugarcoat things. Kind of a high-end Rick Steves - if you see Rick's FB posts or his Monday night videocasts, he wears his politics on his sleeve. Those gnocchi did look potentially yummy. They seemed easy to make, if one wasn't concerned with a precise presentation. I was in Bolzano way back in 2003, so my food memories are kind of missing. My now-ex was not a food explorer, so we probably had something basic, like that sausage sandwich Stanley had from the market. I do remember the market going on, even though it was February. Only there 2 nights - we came from Venice and were then going over the Great Road of the Dolomites to Cortina and onto Innsbruck (more bobsled). It was a very "diverse" town in that it is now Italian but really still showed it's Austro-Hungarian self.

@Korimako - little things like the sandwich made by staff for you is one of those things that I like and I tried to do for my guests. It's how staff react to situations that can make or break a stay. As for hotels in Paris, I stayed at the Hotel des Marroniers in a single room. It is a typical very small European room. But it was just fine and I had all the room I needed. The staff was also very good. That's the only hotel I know about other than the big one I stayed at on my ex's corporate trip. Maybe Lois or Cynthia has more insight. Did anyone else have dinner with Stanley last night? I got into it again. Last night's homage to Trentino-Alto Adige food was to make speck-wrapped polenta disks with a little riff on peperonata as the vegetable. Next week Stanley visits Abruzzo. I know nothing about the area and it's food, so it should be fun to find something new to play with. On this Memorial Day, as I always do, I take time to remember friends I knew who were killed in war (in this case, Viet Nam). One was listed as MIA for decades, but thankfully his remains were eventually found so his family could finally have peace. I am thankful for those who gave their all in all our wars and conflicts. OOTD: My big, oversized Tshirt. Not going anywhere, not doing anything today (except my vacation laundry)

Excellent!!! It looks like a baby Boston. That's the same colorway that I have for my Boston, Tempest and Metro. Those little expansion zippers on the side came in handy in reverse - zipping them up made the bag seem smaller and the agents didn't seem to want to measure it 😸 The black bottom part on my Boston actually is another compartment that zips off if I don't need that whole bag.

An edit on the last post: It is Magnolia Pearl Clothing. oops

I did the Equinox TA a month ago and the coffee cups in the buffet were all Lavazza-branded. I would hope that Celebrity would use Lavazza coffee in those cups! I like my coffee, but I'm not sufficiently educated on coffee tastes except that Starbucks is horrible and always tastes burnt. At home, I'm a Trader Joe's single origin whole bean coffee person. My machine grinds the beans right into the brew basket. And where I worked until this Winter, my lodge had a wonder machine that used whole beans of 3 different types/strengths and could make just about any kind of coffee beverage you could want. I really missed my double-strength lattes from that machine!!!

Melody - the Luzon 24L that STP has on the website sale was what got me started on Cotopaxi. Now, if they had the Allpa 35L and 42L on sale, I'd grab them if I didn't already have them! I love how colorful the Cotopaxi bags are. I've only shopped and bought from QVC once - last late Fall when I bought my pair of Sofft boots for my winter season. They happened to pop up on my Google search when I was looking to see if anyone had the color I wanted at a better price than Sofft itself. @Korimako - I wanted to give you a "thank you" for recommending the Leonardo Boutique Museumhotel Hotel in Amsterdam!! It was a nice little hotel in a perfect location. Is anyone up for doing "Dinner with Stanley" this season? I had a fun time doing it with is last season of "Searching for Italy." It had me doing a little research into typical food of the region he was visiting and making a dinner based on that and dining while watching. Tonight, he visits Trentino-Alto Adige. First things that popped into my mind was speck (the "prosciutto" of the region) and Pinot Grigio. One of the men I worked with back when I was a Bobsled official was from that region. He had a small vineyard and winery that made Pinot Grigio. It was my introduction to Pinot Grigio. Anyway, back to food. I have to hit the grocery store today and pick up some speck, polenta or spaetzle (if I can find it), peas and some salad greens. A new clothing company has popped up on my FB feed - Magnolia Clothing. The stuff is so boho and fun! If only I was 45 years younger and had unlimited funds to play with!!! This really pair of overalls popped up and I was instantly in love: perfect for my volunteer work at our local Sunday Silly Market. Unfortunately, they were $600 ☹️. OOTD: It's the days of 30 degree temperature swings and waking up at 6am instead of 9am because of jetlag. So, it's my shorts again and a Tshirt with a zip up hoodie to ward off the 40 degree temp at the start of the day.

Some random cruise fashion and beauty things: Bags - Sherpani - my favorite bag supplier - is having a 25% off everything sale - code "HOLIDAYMOOD". I happily used my Tempest tote on my vacation as my primary "purse". I loved having the Boston weekender as my "carry on the plane/train/bus" bag. On all my flights except the one home, the airlines were going around and making people gate check bags that they thought were too big (all the fights were full) and I never was questioned. Both bags have Sherpani anti-theft features which don't scream out "anti theft" and look fashionable. I've used Tempest at home as my everyday bag when I was working and had more than a wallet and reading glasses to take. I used it as a shoulder bag and a backpack on the trip, depending on what I was doing. On another note, I was surprised to see as many Cotopaxi Allpa 35L and 42L backpacks around Spain and Portugal airports as I did. Being a local (Salt Lake) company, it was nice to see it gaining popularity. Dresses - this vacation was an experiment in having dresses in the mix. I did like having them in the bag to wear. I think I'm still on the fence about them as a major part of the wardrobe. I wore them quite a bit on board the cruise, but only three times on the land trip. I was still relying heavily on my jeans and my camo pants. Maybe it's just my "culture" or that I'm old and set in my ways. Shoes - there are always women on the forum asking about "cute" shoes to wear, Well, after doing 2 weeks on a ship followed by 3 weeks on land, I have some observations to offer. On board, all kinds of shoes came out, from sneakers to flats to sparkly sandals and heels. On land, I'll say it was probably 80% various types of sneakers and the rest split between sandals and flats. It didn't matter what clothes were worn, sneakers won out for footwear. Just something to think about when planning what to pack. Accessories - I got lots of positive comments on my brooches that I wore on my jean jacket. I was pleasantly surprised at that. Scarves were still big day and night. I don't know if it was the season that I was traveling, but hats were extremely scarce. Yeah, guys were still wearing baseball hats, but women weren't wearing hats. A couple of straw fedoras here and there, but not to the extent I've seen before. OOTD: my Free People cargo shorts and one of my Cotopaxi sunguard hoodie shirts.

Finally got the pics imported. Amsterdam Cow - on the right end, with blue horns *the one I wanted* Cow Bone China - on the left end, with gold horns Netherlands Cow - in the middle My 2 sardines are from Lisbon. I was walking around and saw a display of all these different sardines in a window. Had to buy. There were soooo many to choose from. The Barcelos Rooster I bought in Porto. I knew I was going to buy a rooster, so many in Lisbon, Lagos, Porto. This blue azulejos one called to me.

Well, I don't go out for dinner often anymore, but I'll be happy to post photos of my food! Plus, since Stanley is back on TV, I may have to start up the tradition I had of making dinner to match the region he is visiting. Lois - I would talk to the MD about the injections, but I wouldn't be worried about them. Sometimes it just takes time and extra care to be sure to eradicate the issue. For me, it took longer than I thought to get rid of my uveitis. two rounds of the stuff over a year instead of just the one because it came back... I actually made it awake until about 10pm last night. Pretty proud of myself for that. But, I woke up at 7am feeling like my brain was taken over by a massive wad of cotton. Ugh, the ugly jet lag raises it's head. I did get all my stuff unpacked and dirty stuff put in the laundry, clean stuff put away, hard goods put back in their places. Oh, one thing: I did miss the Cow Museum and I was kind of bummed about it. At AMS, while walking through duty free shops, there is one dedicated to things from all the museums in Amsterdam. Lo and behold, it had COWS!!! And, it had the one that I had wanted when I saw them online!!! So, last minute purchase of that cow and 2 friends!! It made up for missing the museum. As soon as the pics of my ceramic purchases I'll post 'em. For some reason, my MacBook and my iPhone aren't talking well right now.