Efficiency, heat, ligurian dogs.....

Since I made that big life change, leaving the US and my full-time office job, I've been trying to work on my multi-tasking ability....getting rid of it, that is.  I've discovered that multi-tasking is an excellent way to do a lot of different things at one time in a totally half-assed way ("totally half-assed"....wouldn't that be "full-assed"?  anyway, you know what I mean).  Not to mention, multitasking just sucks.  So, as I was saying, I've been trying to cure myself from this illness.

This doesNOT however mean that I don't appreciate things that multi-task.  Quite the contrary....I LOVE things that do more than one thing.

Take for example our new kitchen stove.  That puppy, in addition to being nice to look at, heats the house AND cooks dinner at the same time.  Now there is some multi-tasking that I can enjoy. I suspect that David wishes he could say the same thing about me....but I digress....

And then there are my newly knit hats

Two-in-one, they are!!!!

And if your neck is colder than your head, you can just wrap that thing around you...instant scarf. I guess that makes it a three-in-one.

 Two hats and a scarf in one garment.  Come on....multitasking genius.

Lastly....and this doesn't have anything to do with multitasking but friend Christine and I now have a live website with our little jewel creations.  Christine paints tiny watercolors and I make them into wearable art.  Please check out www.liguriandog.com for wonderful gifts for the holidays....for someone else or for yourself.  You could multitask by buying one for yourself which would make you happy and bring joy to everyone who looks at you wearing it.....at the same time. 

So, Q, my dog...one of my dogs, turned 6 today.  In the past I have shared dog birthdays with you all.

I'm sorry.

Yes, I'm very sorry for having done that. 

Those of you with dogs, have shared my enthusiasm when I have done this.  And I thank you all for that. 

And now, having just lived through the Halloween season on facebook....I feel tremendously guilty for my previous posts about my dogs.

Those of you with dogs and no children ....might understand why I'm apologizing.
Those of you with children and no dogs....just accept my apologizes.
Those of you with children and dogs....understand what you want from this post.

And...Happy Birthday Q. 

Ever wonder....

...what Father Christmas does in the off season?

Apparently he connects septic tanks to houses in Italy.  Who knew? 

big turkeys, small elephants and rubber bananas

Thanksgiving in Maberga.

So, I went to the butcher about a month ago to order our turkey for thanksgiving.
"you want a turkey?"
"yeah.  you know, we're americans, it's thanksgiving time."
"oh right, you guys put the whole thing in the oven, right?"
"yeah."
"you don't want a turkey, you want a tachinella"
"yeah.  the little girl turkey.  that's what you ordered us last time"

So David went back to the butcher on Saturday to pick up our feminine poultry.
"sorry.  they didn't have any  tachinellas, we got you a tachino.  It's 15 kg, is that too big?"
Quick math...15 x 2.2 = 33lbs.  David didn't do the math, he just looked at the beast that weighs as much as our dog.
"yeah.  probably too much.  can you cut it in half?"

So, with half a monster boy turkey in the oven and pots and pans and plates and bowls on every surface, we welcomed our pals for Thanksgiving, Maberga style.  Of the 10 eaters last Sunday we had 4 Thanksgiving virgins.

 Um, yeah, only half of those four are t.g.d virgins.  The other two are Christine and Valerio and they're not, um, virgins.

Chef says....

Soup's on...

 Toast the chef, friends present and family not, thankful for food and all the rest....

Eat.
Eat.
Eat, some more.
Eat.

Let's dance...

And eat cookies...

There were actually three totally beautiful pies that I didn't get a photo of because I was, well, dancing.

Time to retire upstairs for our annual White Elephant gift extravaganza.....

For those of you in the White Elephant dark, it is a gift exchange game in which people bring small, maybe silly maybe not, gifts and they are chosen by the guests by a lottery of numbers, each person getting a new gift or able to take the any that have come before.  Ok, that was a shitty explanation, you can google it if you're really curious.

Gianni got a knife and Ute got a key ring.

Toby got some frilly hand knit wrist warmers and David got screwed...um, I mean David got an old t-shirt I had lying around the house.  Not my most inspired gift which is why it doesn't show up in the photo.  Toby and David were the other two thanksgiving day virgins, by the way.

 Daniela got a hand knit scarf and Piero got a hand knit hat and a banana shaped dildo.

 David got a pack of handmade Christmas cards.  And I got, um, well, an elephant.

 Valerio got a wooden butterfly and Christine got some hand knit washcloths PLUS the grand prize of the day -- the crate of tomatoes that didn't make their way into the bloody mary's.  Some people thought that maybe Piero actually got the grand prize....of course I'm referring to the hand knit hat.

Another great Thanksgiving in Italy.

I'm thankful for Christine who started this tradition.
I'm thankful for David who prepared ALL the food we ate, except the green beans (I did those!)
I'm thankful for all the friends that shared with us in our awesome day, including you guys who are reading about it.

I'm not much of a morning person.  'Course, I'm not much of a night owl either.  Or maybe I'm both.  Yeah, let's say that I'm a morning/night switch hitter.

Being yanked out of bed when I'm not quite ready is just fine by me if I get to see this out my window

Absolutely amazing.  That's the town of Castellaro there on the hill and in the v of the valley between the mountains the island of Corsica is popping up out of the sea.  Yes, Corsica.  Let me show you where that is (for the geographically impaired)

 

Yeah, ok, crappy map.  I mean, it's a cool map, just not readable.  Maberga is up there top left where Italy meets France and Corsica is that yellow island (I don't think it's really yellow) above Sardinia (the green one....which, I believe is actually green).

Have a nice day.

Just for your Friday enjoyment...

A public service announcement, of sorts, from my friend Jacopo...



And, what I should have been told when I married a Cornwell (from brother-in-law Kevin)