"Quite unique chocolate with an overwhelming note of leather! Also noticeable are cheese, cherries and chili."
Why would we want to eat THIS?
Tuesday, August 29, 2006
Monday, August 28, 2006
From http://www.seventypercent.com/chocop/bar_detail.asp?ID=103
"Appearance isn’t as glossy as Domori’s other bars and approaches a duller sheen with intense ribboning and an undulating surface similar to sloping hills. It’s fairly dark, with a red leather likeness, approaching a lighter shade of burgundy. Aroma is fantastic and invigorating, light and vibrant on the nose with a subtle acidity accentuating the cranberry-raspberry-blueberry fragrance. For balance, it’s also quite chocolaty and dark underneath, providing contrast and backbone to the lighter air surrounding it.
Despite the aroma, the flavor is not as lively or perky but more subtle and controlled. It’s immediately chocolaty, though, gratifyingly bold and stern in its presence, providing a full body to the chocolate for the entire length. Domori’s typical fermented tone quickly and forcefully asserts itself along with heavy bleu cheese notes looming overhead. Then, there’s a red berry and blueberry hit that persists strongly with a well-controlled acidity that Domori has masterfully kept in check. Cream peaks in and settles into nuts, and then coffee finishes off the length. Texture is super creamy and not waxy or pasty like other bars, and melts wonderfully in the mouth.
Regardless of Rio Caribe’s dominance in this blend, the acidity is remarkably low and controlled extraordinarily well here. Bravo! Flavor evolution is very subtle and doesn’t provide stark peaks and valleys for easy discernment. Instead, it meanders through the length like a long and winding river, gentle in its snake-like curves, but powerful enough to cut through the rocky earth. This is a chocolate that requires you to extract its flavor and manually pick it apart because it will not jump out at you. In a sense, this is the quiet kid in class, the genius among bullies and future dropouts. Although shy in demeanor, his underlying character and vast intelligence exert a noticeably strong presence and must be approached to fully appreciate. In other words, this is the intellectual chocolate among a forceful and ostentatious lot; reserved in outward display but deep in inner character."
I want to be a chocolate reviewer. I knew there was a reason I took that last class with Dr. Shulze...(Kerry, you know what I'm talking about!!!!). I am ready...bring on the exalted language and the chocolate bars!!!!
Despite the aroma, the flavor is not as lively or perky but more subtle and controlled. It’s immediately chocolaty, though, gratifyingly bold and stern in its presence, providing a full body to the chocolate for the entire length. Domori’s typical fermented tone quickly and forcefully asserts itself along with heavy bleu cheese notes looming overhead. Then, there’s a red berry and blueberry hit that persists strongly with a well-controlled acidity that Domori has masterfully kept in check. Cream peaks in and settles into nuts, and then coffee finishes off the length. Texture is super creamy and not waxy or pasty like other bars, and melts wonderfully in the mouth.
Regardless of Rio Caribe’s dominance in this blend, the acidity is remarkably low and controlled extraordinarily well here. Bravo! Flavor evolution is very subtle and doesn’t provide stark peaks and valleys for easy discernment. Instead, it meanders through the length like a long and winding river, gentle in its snake-like curves, but powerful enough to cut through the rocky earth. This is a chocolate that requires you to extract its flavor and manually pick it apart because it will not jump out at you. In a sense, this is the quiet kid in class, the genius among bullies and future dropouts. Although shy in demeanor, his underlying character and vast intelligence exert a noticeably strong presence and must be approached to fully appreciate. In other words, this is the intellectual chocolate among a forceful and ostentatious lot; reserved in outward display but deep in inner character."
I want to be a chocolate reviewer. I knew there was a reason I took that last class with Dr. Shulze...(Kerry, you know what I'm talking about!!!!). I am ready...bring on the exalted language and the chocolate bars!!!!
Crunchy Crawlies go to School....
My very mature younger sister has informed me that I am not a true missionary because I have never contracted head lice.
This is her third time.
I maintain that finding small worms on the floor of my bathroom and having to dodge bullets (or at least, hear them whizz past on occasion) more than makes up for the fact that my scalp doesn't itch...
But still. It does raise the question...my mission work is significantly more "cushy" than the majority of the people in my organization. The comfort level is balanced out by the fact that I live in what basically amounts to a Israel-Palestinian war zone and that the community radio is engineered for slow mental breakdown...like a 1980's elevator musak Chinese water torture...
Culturally, I'm a lot more at home here. The food doesn't make me crave anything other than Mom's lasagne, Planters' Cheese Curls, and assorted chocolate candies, most of which I can get sent to me in care packages from time to time. I don't miss driving all that much, though I do miss wide open spaces (but not the Dixie Chicks).
I don't have to use my hand as toilet paper.
Ah, the advantages of South America!
Sometimes, just sometimes, I feel guilty and sorry for my collegues working in India or Africa. But not for my sister. She's in Canada, for goodness' sake!!! Lice are a small price to pay to be able to speak English and get a visa in less than two years...and without having to do graduate level studies. In a foreign language.
So i think we're probably even.
I'd take her lice in a second if she's willing to write my thesis (15 pages in Portuguese) on "Cosmogonia e a Interdependência da Criação," chapter two of four in a monograph on "Ecology and Religious Education."
Ugh. What have I gotten myself into???
This is her third time.
I maintain that finding small worms on the floor of my bathroom and having to dodge bullets (or at least, hear them whizz past on occasion) more than makes up for the fact that my scalp doesn't itch...
But still. It does raise the question...my mission work is significantly more "cushy" than the majority of the people in my organization. The comfort level is balanced out by the fact that I live in what basically amounts to a Israel-Palestinian war zone and that the community radio is engineered for slow mental breakdown...like a 1980's elevator musak Chinese water torture...
Culturally, I'm a lot more at home here. The food doesn't make me crave anything other than Mom's lasagne, Planters' Cheese Curls, and assorted chocolate candies, most of which I can get sent to me in care packages from time to time. I don't miss driving all that much, though I do miss wide open spaces (but not the Dixie Chicks).
I don't have to use my hand as toilet paper.
Ah, the advantages of South America!
Sometimes, just sometimes, I feel guilty and sorry for my collegues working in India or Africa. But not for my sister. She's in Canada, for goodness' sake!!! Lice are a small price to pay to be able to speak English and get a visa in less than two years...and without having to do graduate level studies. In a foreign language.
So i think we're probably even.
I'd take her lice in a second if she's willing to write my thesis (15 pages in Portuguese) on "Cosmogonia e a Interdependência da Criação," chapter two of four in a monograph on "Ecology and Religious Education."
Ugh. What have I gotten myself into???
Friday, August 25, 2006
Mr. Smith and the 9 am serenade...
Sometimes, Hollywood doesn't get it too wrong.
Like today, when in the midst of a vicious gunfight (small handguns, lots of varying calibers of machine guns, and at least one tank), the community radio came on and gave us ironic background music. Soft 1980's pop and Brazilian love songs...."Sailing...takes me away again..." or "One Moment in Time," something cheesy about "ebony and ivory, living together in perfect harmony" and other such fluff.
I watched Mr. and Mrs. Smith tonight when I managed to leave the favela and couldn't help but laugh at the similarities.
It's the most healthy thing we seem to be able to do in the circumstances. My 70ish upstairs neighbor, "Grandma," joked with me about the need to get Kevlar vests and possibly put a fireman's pole in to connect our houses, thus eliminating the danger of going up and down the outside stairs in the event of a shootout. I couldn't believe we were talking about this, or that she was the one shuffling over to the window to take a peek...we were incredulous because there were people actually in the middle of the street who jumped a bit closer to the walls when the shots echoed past. HELLOOOO. It's practically an all out war, and you think you can just go sauntering down the streets??? Wait 15 minutes, people.
I can't decide if it's idiocy, apathy, or bravery.
But I wait until it's calm again. My guardian angel deserves some breaks now and then.
Like today, when in the midst of a vicious gunfight (small handguns, lots of varying calibers of machine guns, and at least one tank), the community radio came on and gave us ironic background music. Soft 1980's pop and Brazilian love songs...."Sailing...takes me away again..." or "One Moment in Time," something cheesy about "ebony and ivory, living together in perfect harmony" and other such fluff.
I watched Mr. and Mrs. Smith tonight when I managed to leave the favela and couldn't help but laugh at the similarities.
It's the most healthy thing we seem to be able to do in the circumstances. My 70ish upstairs neighbor, "Grandma," joked with me about the need to get Kevlar vests and possibly put a fireman's pole in to connect our houses, thus eliminating the danger of going up and down the outside stairs in the event of a shootout. I couldn't believe we were talking about this, or that she was the one shuffling over to the window to take a peek...we were incredulous because there were people actually in the middle of the street who jumped a bit closer to the walls when the shots echoed past. HELLOOOO. It's practically an all out war, and you think you can just go sauntering down the streets??? Wait 15 minutes, people.
I can't decide if it's idiocy, apathy, or bravery.
But I wait until it's calm again. My guardian angel deserves some breaks now and then.
I am soooo procrastinating...
Why do I find it so funny that Pluto is no longer a planet?
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060825/ap_on_sc/planet_mutiny)
Maybe it has to do with all the memorization of the “real” planets and the fact that Pluto is one of the few names that really sticks. And the fact that odd numbers are always better. 8 planets? Boring.
Demoting Pluto??? It’s just wrong.
It is the only planet that had a Disney character as a namesake. The underdog. The twentieth-century discovery...it’s even got MOONS, for goodness’ sake!
Has no one in the Astronomical Union read Saint Exupéry? Size is no distinguisher of planethood...the prince's planet was tiny enough for 43 sunsets in one day...and probably didn’t clear out its orbit, though it was habitable enough for a rose....
Yet another reason why high school science class was a waste of time. Other than learning how to fill soap bubbles with gas and ignite them with lighters before they hit the ceiling tiles...
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060825/ap_on_sc/planet_mutiny)
Maybe it has to do with all the memorization of the “real” planets and the fact that Pluto is one of the few names that really sticks. And the fact that odd numbers are always better. 8 planets? Boring.
Demoting Pluto??? It’s just wrong.
It is the only planet that had a Disney character as a namesake. The underdog. The twentieth-century discovery...it’s even got MOONS, for goodness’ sake!
Has no one in the Astronomical Union read Saint Exupéry? Size is no distinguisher of planethood...the prince's planet was tiny enough for 43 sunsets in one day...and probably didn’t clear out its orbit, though it was habitable enough for a rose....
Yet another reason why high school science class was a waste of time. Other than learning how to fill soap bubbles with gas and ignite them with lighters before they hit the ceiling tiles...
Tuesday, August 15, 2006
Pedra Lisa
As I stagger down the stone steps and grades of Pedra Lisa, I wonder, half in a state of moony hallucination, what the headlines will look like: American falls to certain death from high Rio cliff; rescued by mountains of trash breaking her fall...
Pedra Lisa is built on just that. A smooth stone. With high steps and slick rock stairs, it's not the best place to be decending after nightfall when you're dizzy and catching a fever. Which I was, last night.
It always seems to happen, just after the full moon, this 12-24 hour exhaustion thing that leaves as quickly as it came...
I was at Pedra Lisa, because today was my day to tell the story and it was my first time too, so I was a bit peeved my energy was so low. There are three groups that we do the Bible club with: kids near the bottom of the mountain and kids up top, at an old church building Timonis bought. All in all, we could have 100 kids on a good night. So there I am, getting all worked up and jumping around, wringing my hands, pretending to be Jesus and Jairus and the dead daughter and the sick woman all at the same time...and then after each storytelling, finding some place where I could sit down and lean up against a wall and just breathe...
But even with being sick, it was a good time. And the kids sat really still and appeared to like my storytelling. But maybe they were just confused. I'm not so certain that all my tenses were right...
Pedra Lisa is built on just that. A smooth stone. With high steps and slick rock stairs, it's not the best place to be decending after nightfall when you're dizzy and catching a fever. Which I was, last night.
It always seems to happen, just after the full moon, this 12-24 hour exhaustion thing that leaves as quickly as it came...
I was at Pedra Lisa, because today was my day to tell the story and it was my first time too, so I was a bit peeved my energy was so low. There are three groups that we do the Bible club with: kids near the bottom of the mountain and kids up top, at an old church building Timonis bought. All in all, we could have 100 kids on a good night. So there I am, getting all worked up and jumping around, wringing my hands, pretending to be Jesus and Jairus and the dead daughter and the sick woman all at the same time...and then after each storytelling, finding some place where I could sit down and lean up against a wall and just breathe...
But even with being sick, it was a good time. And the kids sat really still and appeared to like my storytelling. But maybe they were just confused. I'm not so certain that all my tenses were right...
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
I find I get irritated...
much more often these days by ignorance. And general stupidity. And really off-base folk wisdom.
What irks me, is, I know, a cultural barrier. It is also, unfortunately, a poverty barrier, and I don't know how to break it.
You see, I'm an intellectual snob. Not one of the worst, but definitely in the top twenty percent. Before I was 13, I was scrounging the library book sales for Homer and Aristophanes and Machiavelli and other classics. Not because I necessarily liked them, or thought I would. Simply because I knew they were classics. And other 11 and 12 year olds weren't reading them. I tried to learn various languages throughout my lifetime, mostly in the hopes that this would allow me to read great books in their original languages. I didn't get around to reading good children's literature until I was almost a junior in high school. And I still can't resist a book sale...So we've established that I was and am and forever will be a nerd.
With this nerdy-ness, I love to debate. Blame my father. We always had to have a defense for everything growing up, even our opinions (and yes, I know that this sentence is erroneous by the exclusivity of ALWAYS and EVERYTHING). But I also like debating, discussing, interacting with both ideas and people...finding new connections, having my horizons broaded a little bit, discovering new nuggets of truth I'd never seen before.
The closest my favela friends come to discussion is gossip about the famous people they know or wish they knew or the poor people who are floating through the rumor mills this week. That, and speculating on the plot of the next novella. They're so uncomfortable with disagreement, with various perspectives on truth, that they change the subject almost immediately. About the only time I see people visibly embarassed to be with me is when I question, when I want an answer that's more than, "That's the way it's done here..." Happened the other night, asking the pastor about baptism. I want to know why the Baptists (and other denominations too) have a baptismal tradition that is so different from the Scriptural examples we're given as to be almost non-Biblical. An example? Philip and the eunuch. Evangelism happened, the man accepted and believed and was baptized on the spot. No waiting until the bi-yearly baptism party. No forced baptismal classes to see if he was "ready" or not. And it doesn't sound like the NT church went around re-baptizing converts when they didn't like the quality of the water or the quantity used or the age of the participants...
Anyhow, I just wanted to know WHY. And my girl friends with me got really embarassed and tried to make me shut up, because I was talking to a pastor, and I've never been to seminary. Therefore, I'm not qualified to question a pastor, nor to be able to bring up a few examples of my own from Scripture...but the pastor himself seemed less than interested in engaging my question. It's odd.
So, we chalk up yet another Protestant ritual I don't understand, as my friend goes to be baptized for the third, or is it the fourth, time? Apparently, none of the previous ones counted...
Anyone out there got an answer for me? 1) Why does poverty seem to strip people of the curiosity to know, to question, to seek answers? 2) Why do many churches make people wait so long to be baptized?
What irks me, is, I know, a cultural barrier. It is also, unfortunately, a poverty barrier, and I don't know how to break it.
You see, I'm an intellectual snob. Not one of the worst, but definitely in the top twenty percent. Before I was 13, I was scrounging the library book sales for Homer and Aristophanes and Machiavelli and other classics. Not because I necessarily liked them, or thought I would. Simply because I knew they were classics. And other 11 and 12 year olds weren't reading them. I tried to learn various languages throughout my lifetime, mostly in the hopes that this would allow me to read great books in their original languages. I didn't get around to reading good children's literature until I was almost a junior in high school. And I still can't resist a book sale...So we've established that I was and am and forever will be a nerd.
With this nerdy-ness, I love to debate. Blame my father. We always had to have a defense for everything growing up, even our opinions (and yes, I know that this sentence is erroneous by the exclusivity of ALWAYS and EVERYTHING). But I also like debating, discussing, interacting with both ideas and people...finding new connections, having my horizons broaded a little bit, discovering new nuggets of truth I'd never seen before.
The closest my favela friends come to discussion is gossip about the famous people they know or wish they knew or the poor people who are floating through the rumor mills this week. That, and speculating on the plot of the next novella. They're so uncomfortable with disagreement, with various perspectives on truth, that they change the subject almost immediately. About the only time I see people visibly embarassed to be with me is when I question, when I want an answer that's more than, "That's the way it's done here..." Happened the other night, asking the pastor about baptism. I want to know why the Baptists (and other denominations too) have a baptismal tradition that is so different from the Scriptural examples we're given as to be almost non-Biblical. An example? Philip and the eunuch. Evangelism happened, the man accepted and believed and was baptized on the spot. No waiting until the bi-yearly baptism party. No forced baptismal classes to see if he was "ready" or not. And it doesn't sound like the NT church went around re-baptizing converts when they didn't like the quality of the water or the quantity used or the age of the participants...
Anyhow, I just wanted to know WHY. And my girl friends with me got really embarassed and tried to make me shut up, because I was talking to a pastor, and I've never been to seminary. Therefore, I'm not qualified to question a pastor, nor to be able to bring up a few examples of my own from Scripture...but the pastor himself seemed less than interested in engaging my question. It's odd.
So, we chalk up yet another Protestant ritual I don't understand, as my friend goes to be baptized for the third, or is it the fourth, time? Apparently, none of the previous ones counted...
Anyone out there got an answer for me? 1) Why does poverty seem to strip people of the curiosity to know, to question, to seek answers? 2) Why do many churches make people wait so long to be baptized?
Rich and Rebecca returned...
and Puxa looked at them with eyes of horror. Tonight, she crawled up on my lap while I was reading a book. Maybe, I'll miss her. A little bit. I was reading Roald Dahl's "Matilda" in Portuguese, to get a feel for the translation. We're reading books together at Projeto Vidinha, and at the rate we're tearing through C.S. Lewis, I need to get some new titles in my library! It's fun and educational for all. I get to practice Portuguese and learn new words that I would never use in daily vocabulary, the kids get to exercise their imaginations, and the older kids practice reading as well...
I've been having a lot of late nights recently. An energy surge at midnight keeps me creative until two or three am, which works wonders for everything but my sleep schedule. So today I was a little lethargic. Cleaned the house, did some office stuff, and looked at the clock. 2:30 pm!?! Where did my day go??? I got on a bus to Tijuca, because Tuesdays are my days to go to Projeto Vidinha, stopped by the bookstore, and showed up at about 4:30...as we're getting reading for our reading huddle, which is more of a chaotic mess punctuated by my cries for breathing room, Tiago calls. He's coming to Tijuca to see me and take me home...and shows up, mercifully, AFTER I have removed the wig and oversized glasses I was wearing while playing games with the energetic ones...what WAS the name of that character I created with Aunt Nancy's wig and those cat-eyed spectacles? Anyone remember? In any case, tonight reminded me of those hilarious dress-up days. And I was just saying the other day that I needed to find a wig...
Of course, such antics leave even the youngest children letting me know that they think I'm crazy.
I say they watch too much television.
I'm happy. I got to see my boyfriend before he heads off for the weekend, I'm reading a children's book, eating bread with crunchy peanut butter and nutella, daydreaming and procrastinating going to bed. What can be better?
I've been having a lot of late nights recently. An energy surge at midnight keeps me creative until two or three am, which works wonders for everything but my sleep schedule. So today I was a little lethargic. Cleaned the house, did some office stuff, and looked at the clock. 2:30 pm!?! Where did my day go??? I got on a bus to Tijuca, because Tuesdays are my days to go to Projeto Vidinha, stopped by the bookstore, and showed up at about 4:30...as we're getting reading for our reading huddle, which is more of a chaotic mess punctuated by my cries for breathing room, Tiago calls. He's coming to Tijuca to see me and take me home...and shows up, mercifully, AFTER I have removed the wig and oversized glasses I was wearing while playing games with the energetic ones...what WAS the name of that character I created with Aunt Nancy's wig and those cat-eyed spectacles? Anyone remember? In any case, tonight reminded me of those hilarious dress-up days. And I was just saying the other day that I needed to find a wig...
Of course, such antics leave even the youngest children letting me know that they think I'm crazy.
I say they watch too much television.
I'm happy. I got to see my boyfriend before he heads off for the weekend, I'm reading a children's book, eating bread with crunchy peanut butter and nutella, daydreaming and procrastinating going to bed. What can be better?
Sunday, August 06, 2006
The cat is being especially nice today.
She must know that her time in cool aunt Jenna's house is about to come to a close. Rich and Rebecca and baby screamer Anna are back!
I overslept today and so missed the second month in a row of Baptist communion. I guess they never read that part in their Bibles where the disciples took communion together each time they met...maybe that's really code speak for the first Sunday of every month? I'm realizing that the majority of people just don't like a good discussion. I sang with Jessica at a church a couple bairros away, and we got into two little commentaries. The first was on whether musicians should be paid (or charge) for their services to a church. I maintain yes, if their ministry is also their job. The worker deserves his wages...and if a pastor can get paid, and a missionary, how dare we tell our artists that they get less? Musicians work hard (long practice hours, mood swings, waiting for inspiration to write the music, expensive equipment). If I am willing to pay a Christian pastor to preach to me, and a Christian carpenter to build my house, why should I have problems paying a Christian singer to share his or her art with me? Ah, flashbacks to being a militant music major...anyhow, we determined that the key was not to abuse the ministry God gave us.
The second commentary was on baptism. Because as far as any of us know, there's not one Protestant denomination in Brazil that just baptizes people. You have to go through a class, and then once or twice a year they have this big ceremony. It's just that, well, that's not Biblical!!! What about Philip and the Ethiopian? Or all the households who received Christ and were baptized? I offered to baptize the person in question in the Manguinhos river and was rejected....ouch. Every time I read that OT story about Naaman the Leper and his servant girl who told him to bathe in the Jordan River...well, I think of Manguinhos. And realize that it would sorely try my faith to be told that I needed to dip myself in that fetid water once, twice, seven times to be cured of ANYTHING. I have new pity for the man...if the Jordan was even an 1/116th that bad, it would be too much!
My honeymood period of seeing my boyfriend every couple of days is officially over. This Saturday I start classes and he heads off to São Paulo for who knows how long (wedding, vacation time). And school. He'll be studying from 6-11pm...and working during the day. We'll see each other Sundays and every other Saturday. Oh, what fun! Yesterday he took me to this bairro called Santa Teresa. I fell in love. First, because we rode a trolley car up there. Second, because of the goregous views. This really deserves a list...
1. Trolley car
2. Awesome views of the city and sea
3. Cobblestone streets
4. Antique stores
5. People that look like they could be my friends...more hippie-like, artistic, intellectual types
6. A little museum stocked full of quirky art, some Picassos, a library (lots of Anatole France-not that I've ever read him...)
7. A ruined mansion where Anatole France and Isadora Duncan once came for society parties
8. Dancing on said mansion's outdoor veranda, imagining that I was said Isadora Duncan
9. The smell of trees and dirt and growing things
10. Antique fair. Old jewelry. Old clothes. Old furniture. Now I know where I'll be the first Saturday of every month....
He took lots of pictures, but they're on his cell phone, so once we figure out how to download them to my computer, you can all check them out!
I overslept today and so missed the second month in a row of Baptist communion. I guess they never read that part in their Bibles where the disciples took communion together each time they met...maybe that's really code speak for the first Sunday of every month? I'm realizing that the majority of people just don't like a good discussion. I sang with Jessica at a church a couple bairros away, and we got into two little commentaries. The first was on whether musicians should be paid (or charge) for their services to a church. I maintain yes, if their ministry is also their job. The worker deserves his wages...and if a pastor can get paid, and a missionary, how dare we tell our artists that they get less? Musicians work hard (long practice hours, mood swings, waiting for inspiration to write the music, expensive equipment). If I am willing to pay a Christian pastor to preach to me, and a Christian carpenter to build my house, why should I have problems paying a Christian singer to share his or her art with me? Ah, flashbacks to being a militant music major...anyhow, we determined that the key was not to abuse the ministry God gave us.
The second commentary was on baptism. Because as far as any of us know, there's not one Protestant denomination in Brazil that just baptizes people. You have to go through a class, and then once or twice a year they have this big ceremony. It's just that, well, that's not Biblical!!! What about Philip and the Ethiopian? Or all the households who received Christ and were baptized? I offered to baptize the person in question in the Manguinhos river and was rejected....ouch. Every time I read that OT story about Naaman the Leper and his servant girl who told him to bathe in the Jordan River...well, I think of Manguinhos. And realize that it would sorely try my faith to be told that I needed to dip myself in that fetid water once, twice, seven times to be cured of ANYTHING. I have new pity for the man...if the Jordan was even an 1/116th that bad, it would be too much!
My honeymood period of seeing my boyfriend every couple of days is officially over. This Saturday I start classes and he heads off to São Paulo for who knows how long (wedding, vacation time). And school. He'll be studying from 6-11pm...and working during the day. We'll see each other Sundays and every other Saturday. Oh, what fun! Yesterday he took me to this bairro called Santa Teresa. I fell in love. First, because we rode a trolley car up there. Second, because of the goregous views. This really deserves a list...
1. Trolley car
2. Awesome views of the city and sea
3. Cobblestone streets
4. Antique stores
5. People that look like they could be my friends...more hippie-like, artistic, intellectual types
6. A little museum stocked full of quirky art, some Picassos, a library (lots of Anatole France-not that I've ever read him...)
7. A ruined mansion where Anatole France and Isadora Duncan once came for society parties
8. Dancing on said mansion's outdoor veranda, imagining that I was said Isadora Duncan
9. The smell of trees and dirt and growing things
10. Antique fair. Old jewelry. Old clothes. Old furniture. Now I know where I'll be the first Saturday of every month....
He took lots of pictures, but they're on his cell phone, so once we figure out how to download them to my computer, you can all check them out!
Being that I have no other picture yet...
this will require some compilation work on your part, dear reader. First, remember that these are very old pictures but chosen so that our heads aren't viciously out of balance. Second, these pics might disappear after Tiago finds out I put them on the internet...
The trick is to look at them both simultaneously to get an idea of the cuteness quotient of our couplehood.
:)
No really, it's just to let the curious out there know that my boyfriend is in fact, real. And I have a picture, no matter how old and scavenged off the internet, to prove it.
Real ones forthcoming when a scanner if found...
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
"About 500 women banging...
spoons against pots and pans seized a state-run television station and broadcast a homemade video Wednesday that showed police kicking protesters out of Oaxaca's main square last month." That's from Yahoo!News, where apparently the Mexican women are holding people captive and threatening them with violence. With wooden spoons??? These moms must be pretty angry about something to overrun a TV station with kitchen utensils...
That's the second odd notice-ment of the day.
The first was a man in tennis shoes and speedo doing jumping jacks in a gas station parking lot at 7:00 am...in the RAIN. And another one running his dog. In a speedo. In the rain. What makes these men feel that shorts are undesirable? I can tell you right now, if I ever have a boyfriend who thinks it's acceptable to wear a speedo for anything other than the beach (that includes running, biking, tae bo, and drinking six cases of beer while balancing on one foot outside a cheap bar...common pastime here...) well, we're going to have to re-evaluate our situation.
Speedo. Rain. Running. All bad combinations.
And what happens when you fall????
That's the second odd notice-ment of the day.
The first was a man in tennis shoes and speedo doing jumping jacks in a gas station parking lot at 7:00 am...in the RAIN. And another one running his dog. In a speedo. In the rain. What makes these men feel that shorts are undesirable? I can tell you right now, if I ever have a boyfriend who thinks it's acceptable to wear a speedo for anything other than the beach (that includes running, biking, tae bo, and drinking six cases of beer while balancing on one foot outside a cheap bar...common pastime here...) well, we're going to have to re-evaluate our situation.
Speedo. Rain. Running. All bad combinations.
And what happens when you fall????
Mmm. Feels like fall...and I'm writing short sentences today. Don't ask me why...
Cold, rainy, 14 degrees. Celsius, but that's still cold! I wore three shirts today and was still shivering when I got off the bus.
Worked with Tiago and the Americans today...but was more of a floater, filling in for translators going to the bathroom and so forth...and ended up in the dentistry room. The extraction room. I'm getting better at the whole crunching, grinding tooth sounds thing...one of the dentists kind of forced me (but it was really cool!) into giving a novocaine shot to a patient. Who knows, maybe next time I'll pull out a tooth for someone?
I lost R$20 today. It was in my hand at the grocery store, I gave Tiago the basket to put away, and when I put my hand out to pay, the money wasn't there anymore! I looked all over the checkout counter but no money in sight. I figure it must have been God. Someone else out there needed it a whole lot more than I did!!!
My finger is purple and still a little swollen, but I took the splint off today and had one of the doctors look at it...it's just a bad sprain and lots of broken blood vessels. And I don't have to immobilize it again, which is nice.
The cat stinks. How can such a small creature create so much poop??????
Worked with Tiago and the Americans today...but was more of a floater, filling in for translators going to the bathroom and so forth...and ended up in the dentistry room. The extraction room. I'm getting better at the whole crunching, grinding tooth sounds thing...one of the dentists kind of forced me (but it was really cool!) into giving a novocaine shot to a patient. Who knows, maybe next time I'll pull out a tooth for someone?
I lost R$20 today. It was in my hand at the grocery store, I gave Tiago the basket to put away, and when I put my hand out to pay, the money wasn't there anymore! I looked all over the checkout counter but no money in sight. I figure it must have been God. Someone else out there needed it a whole lot more than I did!!!
My finger is purple and still a little swollen, but I took the splint off today and had one of the doctors look at it...it's just a bad sprain and lots of broken blood vessels. And I don't have to immobilize it again, which is nice.
The cat stinks. How can such a small creature create so much poop??????
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