Weekend Plans

Thank heavens that we have something to do this weekend. Last weekend was dreadful with nothing to do. Well, that doesn't include Friday night. Lisa and Luke invited us over for dinner and that was a real treat. The dogs got to run around with Molly and the humans got to catch up on what felt like months of not seeing each other. I teased Lisa because we normally talk (via email) several times a day, every day. Then all of a sudden, after we officially moved out of Andover, nearly a week went by and I didn't hear from her. I thought for sure that she disowned me because we 'moved away.'

So this Saturday will be our big demolition day in Haddam. My father and brother got all the necessary paperwork to allow us to 'remove' the existing cottage on Dad's land. The boys (Dad, Angelo, John and Karlo) have big plans to drive the backhoe straight through the house. This should be an interesting day for sure. I'll be sure to bring my camera so I can share some pictures of this event.

Then on Saturday night we are heading to Tammy's for dinner :-) Tammy and I were discussing this dinner yesterday. She's asking me lots of questions about my food and drink preferences. You guys don't understand that we are so thrilled to be invited to dinner that we would literally eat ANYTHING and be soooooo grateful for both the dinner and the company. Tammy joked that she will probably screw up making her favorite dish. That's when I shared my story with her and now I'll share it with you too . . .

I told Tammy that the last time I invited friends over for dinner I made Turkey Chili. You ready for this? I forgot to add the chili powder!! Can you imagine chili with no chili powder? Well, Luke & Lisa can. I'm such an idiot. They still claim that it "tasted fine" but I'm still an idiot.

Public Apology

I came to my computer to send my sister-in-law, Penni, an email to say I was sorry for forgetting her birthday yesterday. Her birthday was ON Easter and I totally spaced out. I had to ask Dad today what the date was and when he said the 9th . . . I thought "Good Lord, yesterday was Penni's birthday!" And since my stupid computer is not letting me send emails at the moment, I thought it would be better to publicly say I'm sorry and let the rest of the reading audience know that yesterday was Penni's birthday. No idea how old she is now . . . I think 29 :-) Same as me!!!

The Highlight of My Easter

The eggs are just the props to showcase that heavenly Italian cupcake! Penni just told me the name and I'm still not sure what it is. Something like "Casada." These cupcakes have been a Romano Easter tradition for many generations. My grandmother used to pump out (probably) hundreds of these things every year. I know it took my brother a few years just to scientifically reduce Grandma's recipe down from feeding a small army to a reasonable amount. I think the original recipe started off something like . . . 3 pounds of sugar, 5 pounds of ricotta . . . you get the picture.

So my wonderful brother has carried on the tradition. He learned how to make them from our grandmother. (Not sure where I was during all this baking, but thank God he learned.) To my sheer delight, my brother's family came over yesterday morning with the beloved cupcakes in their hands. What a treat. They only come once a year, but are so worth the wait. I'm wondering if any of my fellow Italian buddies know what they are. I'm thinking they are a Sicilian item because our grandparents were from Sicily and the only other people that Penni found that make the same things are also from Sicily. Little pieces of heaven.

And the not so pretty eggs were done by me! Certainly not my best Easter effort, but they still taste good.

Happy belated Easter to all.

While I've Been Working Hard & Stressing

Tammy and her family have been living large in Florida, visiting Disney. Unfortunately, Pluto ate her son Brendan!

Just kidding, here he is having a ball. I'm soooooo ready for a vacation. And actually, now that I think about it . . . I bet Tammy is too! Disney with a kid doesn't exactly sound like a relaxing trip :-)

Who Let the Dogs Out?

Did you sing that title? My father can not be trusted!!! We are very lucky that we still have two dogs . . . Seems our hounds have been getting braver and braver in Hartford. At first they just ran to the back of the yard, did their thing and came right back. But we noticed that with each day and each trip outside, they started to venture off further and further. Bentley decided it was much nicer to poop in the neighbor’s yard and would take off on a mission, not listening to Karlo yelling at him. Very unlike our perfectly behaved pooch. See what living in the city can do to ya?

So based on this bad behavior, I left Dad a note yesterday asking him to NOT let the dogs out!!! We already bought a fence the night before and yesterday we planned to come right home and set up the fence. After which time, Dad could let the dogs out to his heart’s content. But did Dad listen to my request?? Of course not. He not only let them out once, but he let them out twice. And he managed to lose one dog each time.

First Peanut took off on him (which is exactly what I would expect to happen). So Dad had to get in his car and go find her. Next, it was Bentley that decided to go sightseeing. Poor Dad was walking up and down the street looking for him, when some guy gave him a tip that there was a tall skinny dog wandering around a block away. So Dad jumped in his car again and took off after Bentley. He looked all over and couldn’t find him . . . so he went home and there was Bentley in the backyard.

All this drama and all this stress and I knew nothing about – which is probably a good thing. I would have had a nervous breakdown at work yesterday. And on top of everything else, Peanut threw up on the carpet after her adventures eating grass outside. My goodness . . . my father’s day would have been much easier if he didn’t let the dogs out!

Can’t Wait to Go to Sleep

My head is spinning and I’m so tired. I don’t know if it’s the jet lag, the complete exhaustion, or the really comfy IKEA sofa that we are now sleeping on, but I just can not get up in the morning. Seems like we have been going a million miles an hour for the past month. I have to admit, coming to work this morning (to the 300 unread emails and dozen projects piled up) strangely seemed relaxing compared to the rest of my life. Karlo even commented that he’s looking forward to going to work, getting a coffee, and SITTING DOWN. It’s been a month since the poor guy sat down for more than an hour (not including the plane ride). He stood in the machine shop for 12 hour days for a few weeks. Then he stood all day when he was teaching his class. Then he stood all day at the trade show. And at home, well sitting was out of the question there. So . . . it’s good to be back at work!

Yesterday was a blur. We had to go out to Eastford to meet our professional pool table installers in the morning. Took them hours to set up our table, but it was a nice visit with the owner of the house. He walked us around and told us just about everything you could imagine about every little detail of the house. My head is so full. I even got a lesson on working the fancy stove. Maybe it will inspire me to cook. Those high end appliances are such a waste on me!

When the installers were done we had to return our Comcast rentals and then we tried to get new cell phones. That is a long disaster of a story that I will spare you, but I’m left in limbo with Razor that’s been inactivated and an expensive PDA phone that doesn’t work. Great. More things to deal with.

Then it was off to the closing. I got to meet the people taking over MY house. It was hard, but the good news is that I really liked them. They are a young couple from Boston, just starting out, and I’m sure they will be very happy there. I finally met and love my attorney. I didn’t think that was possible. Karlo has a very strong aversion to lawyers (sorry Reg, nothing personal) and I have tried to convince him that not ALL lawyers are evil. I picked this guy because his last name is Romano. How could I go wrong? Love him!

So now we are temporarily rich!!! I have this large check sitting on my desk and I have to figure out what to do with it until the next closing (at which time we will be poor).

The dogs are doing better than expected. Grandpa is making me nervous by helping out. He let them both out yesterday with no leashes. I can’t even believe we still have two dogs. Karlo is setting up a temporary fence tonight so hopefully we won’t lose any hounds.

The Move Is Done

We made it back from LA and it couldn't happen soon enough. I have upgraded my feelings toward LA from hate to despise. Sort of like the security levels issued by Homeland Security. My previous feelings toward LA were an Orange Level, but they are now officially a Red Level. Red because that must be the color of Hell.

But anyway, enough about that place. On to bigger and better things. We got home Friday afternoon and jumped right back into packing up the house. We managed to take another small load and my motorcycle (thanks to Lisa saving the day with the battery charger) to Eastford. Karlo drove it over there for me because it was too cold for me to drive myself. It takes a big man to drive a lavender colored motorcycle!

This was the first time that we were at the house without the owners being home. It was Friday that we finally felt like that place was really going to be OURS. We stood outside and looked around at the property. We took in the quietness and just soaked in the fact that we do love it there. It was the polar opposite of LA and nothing could be better than that! I'm started to get excited . . .

Then Saturday came and the chaos started. The movers arrived at 9 AM and I was completed stressed until the truck was completed loaded. I was stressed because I was convinced that everything wouldn't fit. But luckily just about everything did, and with another trip with our own truck it will finally be a done deal.

Here's me on move day.

I was just pretending to cry that day. The real tears came today. I was doing fine all day. We were so busy getting the final things out of the house and CLEANING. My God, that took forever. And the whole while I'm thinking "How stupid to buy a bigger house - more cleaning to do." Anyway, we were going a million miles a minute and I didn't have time to think. It wasn't until we were all set to go . . . we had the dogs in the back of the truck and Karlo says to Bentley "This is it Bents. We're never coming back here again." That was it. I lost it. I ran into the house all alone, stood there and cried my eyes out. I really didn't think that I would, but I did. It was very emotional and hard to say goodbye.

Now we are getting settled in at Dads. Obviously I got my computer all set up and online. Lord knows where most of my clothes are, but who cares. As long as I have my computer and internet, I'm all good. The dogs are so scared and confused I'm not sure what to do with them. They won't eat and they are mostly just pacing around. Poor dogs. I feel so bad for them. But on a brighter note, I was able to find Fox on Dad's TV with no cable. Now I'm really all good. I got internet AND American Idol. Maybe this won't be so bad after all.