Ahhhhh....summer.

One of my favorite rituals of the summer season is the annual hanging of the beads. That was a sarcastic comment.  There's very little at all nice about the Italian version of a screen door.

a.  they come in one size fits all.  This means that David and I spent an hour today snipping off the end of each individual string of beads, sliding the extra beads off, and re-knotting it so that we didn't just spend 30euro for a set of plain strings.
b. they don't really keep the bugs out which is in fact their intended purpose.
c. they give the house a definite 70's feel....not in a good way....if there is a good 70s feel.

On the upside, because I am despite my overflowing font of sarcasm, a very optimistic person:
a.  all those extra beads will make some lovely jewelry.  I really love accessorizing to match my house.

 

b. they keep more bugs out than NOT having them and they are slightly healthier than the chemical spray bomb we've been setting off every morning for the past week.  Ohhh, the carnage.

c. yeah....hard to turn the 70s thing into something more than what it is.

Summer in my corner of the world also means swimming in the sea. Ahhhhhh.....so lovely, cool dips in the brilliant blue Mediterranean Sea.  Or, it would be lovely if it were brilliant blue and I were dipping in it, which it isn't and I'm not. It been really stormy and rainy - happy orto, angry sea.

  However, in another corner of the world that I'm fairly familiar with summer means cool (really cool) dips in the Lake....which I have done already this summer.  See

yeah, so that's obviously not me but rather my sister and brother-in-law...it's hard to take a photo of yourself when you are in the water.  The camera gets wet.  Trust me, I was there and in the water.  

 Yes, I was just back in Wisconsin a couple months ago (or weeks, if you count like my dad).  Why the extra trip?  Weeeeelllll, let me tell you.  

Summer also means that this chic has a birthday.  

 

This year was a big one.  You can see that because she's holding up the number on her fingers.  It's hard to buy gifts for a girl who has everything so, in addition to that nice Coors light that her husband gave her for her birthday, my parents decided to give her her sister. They flew me home just to surprise her.   How cool was that?  My sister and I thought it was pretty cool.  My mom and I also gave Laurie some limericks we wrote ourselves.  Most of them can't be published on my G-rated blog.  That's a fuckin' shame because several were very funny.  Anyway......

that's about enough for right now because summer also means renting bikes with 4 wheels and riding them along the sea before stopping for dinner on the beach....which is what I'm off to do right now. 

PS.  my parents asked me to post this really flattering photo of them so you all can see what special people they are