Leaving on a jet plane...

Today I fly back to London. I'm nervous just thinking about it. I hate leaving my beloved... even though I'll be back next Thursday. I love having a bed to myself but I hate sleeping without him. I hate not being able to see him and I hate forgetting little things, like the way he smells, the feel of his lips of mine and the way they taste.

I'm looking forward to being back in my city more than I can express, but this strange feeling in the pit of my stomach is tainting that excitement somewhat. I guess I'm worried that flights will be delayed and I'll have an awful trip again?

In that case, I wish for only one thing, that my trips will be hassle free and on schedule, so I can enjoy my time in London and make it there and back safely.

I'm also looking forward to seing my eldest sister and her family. The eldest two are staying in London until nest weekend and her, her hubby and her youngest are flying back to Ireland tomorrow. Another reason why I hope my flight is on time, if I don't get back until 4am, the time I have with them will be ruined somewhat by my dull eyes and tired body.

I'm planning on going to the cinema, having tourist style fun in town and maybe getting myself hooked up with technology again after my laptop died a couple of months ago.

All in all it should be a good trip. And who knows, maybe by the time I get back, the bf will have found us the perfect flat in Novara so we can move out of the night storage heater we're currently living in. One can only hope!

Italian Adventures

I've had a few Italian adventures over the past month, but I've been too busy/lazy to upload pictures, sorry! I'm going to start with my most recent adventure and work my way back.

This past weekend the bf's parents drove down to Italy from Lyon and I went with them. We didn't go straight to Turin because they had an appointment with a carpenter who was measuring for windows in their house in the mountains which is currently being renovated. So I had an hour to while away in Fenils. It's a tiny little village, just houses and a church kind of tiny. I've been there before, but never in such glorious weather, so I decided to snap some pics. I also got some in the car on the way to Fenils, the clouds were doing some crazy things and the drive through the Alps is just magical :)

Enjoy...

I love the little houses nestled into the mountainside.
(Probably going at about 170km an hour here)


Waiting by the side of the road. (Excuse the reflections in the car window)


Amazing sky.


Amazing views.


The snow melts, the river grows.


No shops, but there is a church.


Some awesome catches for the window shutters.

I hope you've enjoyed the tour of Fenils, I look forward to seeing you again on another tour in Italy.

So. Freaking. Tired.

I've been running around shopping, fetching things from storage, packing, making swaps which I should have done last week but left until the last minute, unpacking and repacking and ugh, I'm so tired.

I watched 'The Lion in Winter' yesterday and it's such a fantastic film, splendid dialogue with such well cast and great actors. I hadn't ever heard of it and got sent it through the post because I forgot to switch back to my list on Love Film and I'm really glad I got to watch it, because it was just really, really great. I would be more enthusiastic but I'm exhausted.

I bought something for the flat we're going to be staying in for a while in Cameri and although it's really not that heavy, it's big. Really big (I would tell you what it is, but my bf might be reading this). I had trouble getting it into my luggage, but I managed it. Then I spent ages fiddling around with liquids and electronic things that I can't take on as hand luggage and finally zipped up the bag only to weigh it and find it was 5 kilos too heavy. So I had to repack the bag a couple of times to get it right.

And don't even get me started on hand luggage.

The thing is... I got this thing for the flat that will likely be useless elsewhere and it seems the bf is keen to move asap. If I had known this was the case 2 days ago, I wouldn't have bothered and could have filled my luggage with books! As it stands, we'll just have to see what happens. And I suppose it will at least be useful for the 3 weeks I'm going to be in Italy.

So, Ciao for now. Volcanic Ash Cloud (Yes, I've capitalised it) permitting I'll be flying to Lombardia and getting a bus back into Piemonte and finally seeing my beloved again. He said it's raining loads there at the moment, but it's ok because apparently the town is filled with CATS. Big fat lazy cats... and if you didn't already know, I'm a crazy cat lady in the making ...well, apart from actually having a cat of my own that is, one step at a time eh?

♥

Feeling sorry for myself.

I have a few things to be sad about today.

1. The sun is not really out. There is too much cloud, a forecast of rain and I am worried about the future of our summer.
2. I am ill. I had a really nice weekend, but by the time I got back ot London yesterday evening my throat was really painful and I'd had a stuffy nose on and off all day. This morning confirmed it. I'm ill. Some hideous viral infection, I hope it goes away quickly.
   
3. My lovely boyfriend is going to Italy tomorrow. Indefintiely. For-ever. I will be visiting him soon, and eventually moving out to Italy too, but it saddens me. There are so many things I wanted to do with him here in England before he left, but sadly we have run out of time.
   

So, I'm feeling sorry for myself. I emphasized this by eating chocolate for brunch. I'm holding out for mum's roast dinner, so I doubt I'll eat anything in between (which merely adds to the pathetic state of mind right now).

Apart from being a little pathetic, I actually had a really fun weekend. We spent a lot of it with our friend Don Michele. He picked us up on Friday and drove us to his home town, and drove us home again yesterday too (Thanks again!!). We went to Cricklade, first town on the Thames. We saw the Thames in it's tiny stunted form and Michael took great delight in saying "HA! We have the same river as you!" before I told him that where I live, we actually have a different river as I don't live anywhere near the Thames.

We took a really nice walk from whitehorse hill to weyland's smithy and spent a peaceful half hour or more talking about life. We also visited 80% of Britain's Snake's Head Fritillaries. They are a really beautiful flower, but my camera doesn't do them justice.

We met new people and we played Lord of the Rings boardgame which was really fun. I don't like things that are competitive, but this is a co-op game and I want to play it again, but with the expansion packs :D And maybe a 5th player so someone can be Fatty. (yes, there is a hobbit character called Fatty).

Sunday evening was a little rushed as I threw on my heels and bombed it to Leicester sq with the bf to have dinner with my sister and her bf. We went to Abeno Too, which is a fabulous restaurant serving okonomi-yaki and various other Japanese delights. I only care about the okonomi-yaki, so I kinda glaze over the rest of the menu, although the teppanyaki chicken my sister had looked great.

We were planning on going to Brighton for the day today but I woke up feeling like shit and the bf didn't feel much better, so we decided to stay here and chill out instead. I hope we're not missing too much sun on the coast!

Time flies...

It feels like an age since we went to Munich and I feel bad for not having posted the pictures earlier, but I've been busy with family and spending lots of money that I don't really have. But enough chat, here are some selected pictures.

Amazing food Stefan's Grandma made us.


The New Town Hall and Glockenspiel Clock


One of many pictures taken of Munich from the top of the Tower
of St Peter's Church. It was hellish to climb those stairs but worth it.


Enjoying a litre glass of beer while waiting for food at the Hofbräuhaus.


Kaiserschmarrn, which I didn't eat because I don't like dried fruit.
But it looked pretty tasty apart from said offensive raisins.


It snowed. A lot. For three days straight. It was around -5 most days. Flippin cold.


Um, I was drunk and enjoying German snacks. Darn alcoholic Monopoly!


That being said, I won!!!


This installation was nuts and lots of fun. It's called Pink Flamingo
and I can't remember the artist for the life of me. Pinakothek der Moderne.


Me enjoying the effects of the Pink Flamingo.

That's a very brief summary of our trip. We also went to a couple of art exhibitions Haus der Kunst, a fantastic building, whose history was briefly inscribed on the doors in German, English and French. The most memorable phrase of the entire holiday was etched upon that plaque, it explained that the Haus der Kunst enveloped "a cauldron of racist propaganda". Despite its Nazi origins, the building is spectacular inside, so grand. The exhibitions were good too, Ed Ruscha in particular.

We spent Sunday in the Modern Art Museum which is where we saw the installation 'Pink Flamingo'. I think it's possibly my favourite installation to date. Being in that room saturates your eyes with such brilliant colour that of course, even looking out into another room causes everything to appear shocking pink. Walking out of the room made my head throb, I thought I would fall over, it was a real down the rabbit hole experience that I enjoyed so much I went back a few minutes later.

I quite miss that rose tinted world. I may just install a neon green flourescent in my bedroom :)

Bye bye Bayern!

After 45 minutes spent on the plane waiting for enough staff to man the air traffic control tower for take off, we made it home in one piece and indulged in our last junk food meal for a very long time at Stansted last night. Right now my body hates me, I'm seriously dehydrated, still recovering from excessive beer consumption and my uterus is cramping like crazy... but I had a great time in Munich and ate some wonderful (mainly pork based) meals.

I woke up a little too early due to the bf's alarm and still being on European time, but it meant I got to enjoy the peace and quiet of the house for an hour by myself and I spent my first cigarette of the day pawing over beautiful clothes, which I'll be sure to post about soon.

I already miss the German hospitality of our friend's Gramdma who kept and fed us for 5 days, but I'm glad to be home, with space to relax, if just for a day and to be able to go outside without minus temperatures and the heavy blizzards of Munich.

2010 Skiing and my love for Torino

I think I actually spent less time skiing this year than I did last year... can that be true? Maybe not. My skiing as definitely improved, but I think I'm still in need of lessons. Me and MrM decided we should start a skiing fund for our trip next year. I would love to buy some skis and boots, but lets face it, skis are expensive, so maybe I'll just get some really well fitting boots. The main aim of the fund is to be able to afford two weeks worth of ski lift passes, a few hours worth of lessons to turn us into wonders on the slopes and money for the weekends when we'll abandon the busy mountains for the glory of the chocolate city of Europe... Turin!

This means I'll be saving for a possible move to Turin, the big Japan trip in 2012, a car and skiing. I better get a well paid job sorted out eh?

I really do love Torino, I think a lot of it has to do with my love of the in-law's apartment there. It's indescribable, it's not huge, nor well fitted, but there is something about it that tugs on my heart strings. I just want to hug it and love it and look after it. Strange, I know, but the thought of actually moving there for a year makes my heart skip a beat! I'd be able to spend time and love making it ever so pretty... eep! Apart from the apartment love, Torino is full of beautiful buildings, amazing ice cream parlours (Ahem, GROM!), restaurants, coffee shops (Mulassano is my favourite), chocolate shops (Agiordano), Pasticcerias (Pfatisch), there are also an abundance of squares to be found hidden around unexpected corners and the largest outdoor market in Europe where great food is so cheap it makes me cry!

Unfortunately, I rarely take pictures of things like this, opting for more obscure things in order to try and make my pictures look more arty and *cough*pretentious*cough* pretty. So, without further ado, here are a few I took in Bardonecchia/Torino/Lyon :)

Some post piste snacks (there is sure to be a food theme here)


Giant chocolate squares!


Is Christmas lingering or is the owner of this lonely wreath too lazy to
retire it for the year?


Me and the bf and some random large cutlery outside Brek.


Mmmm, Pasticcini from Pfatisch.


Trust me, they didn't last long!


I couldn't resist this view from the apartment window.
It was so autumnal, the mist hung to the ground that night.


But the following day was glorious!


The bf and I commenced morning lounging in the sun.


This is the only picture I took in Lyon. The neighbours of my in-laws keep bees
and the garden was full of them everyday. Some of them were definitely drunk...
Tsk tsk Mister Bee!

Baked Goods

I am sadly very much influenced by the masses. If someone trendy that I admire says something is good and I think they may be right I'll want to try it. I'm also a sucker for ads. Example being food ads... if I see an advert on TV for beer, I'll want a beer, if there's an ad for McD's I'll crave it for the rest of the day, sad but very true.

With that knowledge you can understand that I'd been hit by the macaroon bug. I spent the majority of my life being a little unwilling to try new things because as a kid I was a bit of a fussy eater and there are certain things I really don't like, no matter how many times I try them (cheese, dried fruit, candied fruit, yoghurt with fruit in, custard, ginger, aniseed/liquorice/fennel, most spirits/liquors), so I'd never ever eaten a macaroon in my life. I was a little dubious as I didn't know what to expect but they look so pretty and I love baked goods (who doesn't?) so in february me and the bf took a trip into Town to go to Ladurée. We went there mostly because they have pretty boxes and quite a few bloggers have raved about them.

I didn't get any pictures because we ate our purchase while sitting in a churchyard and drinking coffee, nut they were nice, really nice. I wasn't sold on them though, I didn't think they were amazing. Sure, the packaging is divine and the colours are a dream, but I wasn't sold enough to pay for the journey into town on a regular basis, although I'd be sure to pop in if I ever got the guts to go to the Chanel boutique.

That has all changed.

While in Lyon last week the bf and I had said we should hunt down a patisserie selling macaroons. We never did do the research but on our first afternoon in town we stumbled upon Pignol, a Lyon based chain of bakery/patisseries which had amazing cakes and macaroons in the window. I immediately wanted to buy one of everything in the shop, but we went for a small sample of the said snack. The actual macaroons are smaller and more round than those of Ladurée, but you could see they had more filling and they were flipping amazing. Seriously. The Vanilla was by far my favourite, it tasted like a marshmallow dream and the very centre of the filling was a taste explosion... I'm salivating while writing this.

Needless to say we made another trip into town and bought twice as many macaroons this time round. We managed to save them until we got home and devoured them in bed while watching south park. Not exactly romantic, but my tastebuds were in love!

If you ever travel to Lyon, or France in general actually, get some macaroons, I'm sure they taste better there :)

Back in London Town...

...but not for long. We're flying to Munich on Thursday and it will be my first real trip to Germany, WHEEE!!! I'm quite excited and I know it will be a great trip filled with much eating and drinking of beer :D

However my return to London has brought with it mixed feelings of joy and grief. I returned to a handful of parcels of supplies for my shop, I was/am feeling really positive about my venture although I still have lots of research to do. I also found my lovely copy of Lula waiting for me, and here is where my anger starts brewing again. In case you don't know Lula is a hefty magazine, over 230 pages worth of gorgeousness and the stupid f***ing postman decided to BEND the poor thing in half and JAM IT THROUGH THE LETTERBOX thereby creasing ALL the pages and also scratching up the back page of the magazine. If it were a 60p weekly magazine I wouldn't mind so much but grrr, I'm so angry. I feel a little silly for getting worked up by it, but really, how hard is to knock on the door and give it to my mother in person?? Anyway, see the damage for yourself.

The awful bending :(


And the terrible scratches that actually went through to the next/last page.

Otherwise, I'm happy to be back because the sun is shining, I have access to my iPod again, I can upload my photos and I have access to both bathroom and kitchen scales again! Oh, and I can't forget the love I have for Benji my lovely pussy cat (he's really my mum's but I like to pretend he's mine seeing as he loves me most, heheh).

I don't really have much to update on. Although I am full of motivation and inspiration, it is mostly to do with making things, learning Italian and the possibility of moving to Turin in september, so I'll leave you with the final picures of our Glastonbury trip (which feels like a lifetime ago) while I get back to book keeping, which is what I was supposed to be doingin the first place ;)

The amazing glittery Virgin Mary, although she needs a hoover.


Someone in the guestbook of the B+B described this bed as
'like sleeping in a marshmallow'. Possibly the most accurate
way to describe this heavenly experience!


We stumbled upon this amazing cul-de-sac in Wells, all the
houses were like this with amazing chimneys and to top it off,
at the end of the street was a church with pretty stained glass.


Crazy giant red bunny at Wookey Hole Caves.


Me and the bf in the hall of mirrors and Wookey Hole Caves.


At the top of Glastonbury Tor. It was horribly windy, but
definitely worth it.


A view of Glastonbury Tor from Chalice Wells gardens.
We were actually sitting in a sheltered wooden garden swing,
but I forgot to get a picture of it :(

A Magical Weekend

The bf and I have just returned from the magical Isle of Avalon, also known as Glastonbury. We had a great time and Kay and Lawrence from Spirals were lovely and made our stay even more special, they even gave us a card on our Anniversary!

We spent a lot of time drinking coffee and eating cake, drinking ale and huge meals. We also walked alot, including a gloriously muddy trek up the Tor where it snowed as we reached the top, a long trek from Wells to Wookey Hole where we also explored the caves and met a gorgeous black cat who loved me. We actually did a lot over the past few days and as a consequence I have taken precautions so as not to forget everything and have written a list of all the things we did for each day.

We're flying to Turin tomorrow afternoon to ski and drink more coffee. I'm a little worried about skiing, I'm not exactly the best, but I had a blast last year, so I just need to find my inner confidence. I've got packing to do and I'm exhausted from all the travel, but I brought back some cider which semi-burst in my bag and it's waiting for me in the fridge so I'll take a moment to chill before the running around like a headless chicken sets in... again.

The Red Spring waters of Chalice Wells



'Say it with Beer' Glastonbury Ale



Love tea, it was scrumptious



The flowers in our room bloomed through our stay



From our room... "The Heart Room"



No Journey is complete without bear shaped
chocolate chip cookies and...



Plenty of music to choose from!

I have other photos from my own camera which I will have to post at some point. They include the favourite item in our room... the pink glittery Virgin Mary coin bank. It has to be seen to be believed... I might see if I can get hold of one myself!

I guess I won't be posting here for a while due to being on the continent, but it doesn't mean I've forgotten my duties as a blogger. I'll have plenty to report upon my return.