A bunch of this and that

Where to start?  This week, the last month, even this past year has gone so quickly that I need to stop and count to ten.  But that won’t happen for another couple of months.  On Sunday Camillo and I will leave for 3 weeks in Italy. I know, I know HOW TERRIBLE!  No it will be great, it is just that this year has already been packed so full, even for us it is FULL and so it all seems a little much.

Starting in Verona we are driving south, right down the ‘backbone, and into Rome.  We are calling the trip ‘Italia Profunda’.  I don’t know if this is Portuguese or Italian but the meaning for us is to ‘get to the core’ of Italy.  We will not go into any large cities, nor stay in big commercial hotels but in small B&Bs, and we will eat only in little out of the way places.  We will taste the local foods and drink the local wines.  We go to Rome because Camillo’s sister lives there, and we can’t go to Italy without visiting his sister, but that is the only BIG destination.  (Photo from a similar trip in 2004 – Assisi is in the background)

I have bought a journal to log the places, the foods and the wines.  Now all I have to do is show unusual discipline and actually write in it.   We have only reservation in Verona and in Arezzo.  In Verona we needed a meeting place for the friends that are joining us, and in Arezzo there is a festival which will fill the local hotels, the rest of the trip we will find a place to sleep as we go.  If I can get it done before we leave I will post a map that we tend to ‘sort of’ follow.  I will try to post from the road – but who knows when or where we will find internet connections.

(Gubbio) 

Okay that is the first part.  The week we return to Rio, we have meetings in Rio about the database project I have been working on since my return from Oslo.  Associated with that is a long list of things that need to be finished.  A week after that I will go to Houston to work with the engineers in the Houston office.  That part of the project will last two months.  Right in the middle of that time I need to visit with my mother in Michigan, then Thanksgiving dinner to cook (Whoopee!) and then finally back to Rio the first week of December.  (not to forget the birth of our first Great-Granddaughter in December, Christmas, New Years, Marissa’s birthday, and last but not least the twin’s birthday – but we are used to that being our December so no problem!)

SEE what I mean.  I hope you can keep up cause I feel worn out already - I have to write it all down to remember.   Come back to visit Flowers to try and keep track of me.  Write me comments so I know you miss me.  I will post as often as I can from the road, sharing our experiences and a ‘few’ photos as we go.  Tchau!