Can you guess my favorite color?

I came home from Italy with this bag...


... and after I'd filled it, with my wallet (red), iphone (red case), and kindle (red cover), I realized that I like red more than I realized!


(snap from 7-2-11)

Living in another century

You might say that Kelvin and I live in another century as we might be the only two people left on earth who still own VCRs (so, by obvious addition, our household has two). I think my stereo system (which may be on its last legs) is about a quarter-century old and still has space to play audiocassettes. I think I may still have walkman and discman...somewhere. In any case, in honor of the movie re-release and 100-year anniversary of the sinking of Titanic on April 15, 1912, we (unwilling to pay to see the 3D version in theaters) just re-watched the film ... on VHS. It is, in my opinion, most certainly one of the best films ever made and very deserving of all its (11?) Oscars. It was just as good this time around. I cried again in all the same places.

I really like historical fiction novels, as well as period dramas/shows based on history, particularly the 16th century (and English Court), WW2 (Holocaust), and the 1960s / Civil Rights Movement). My newest favorite show, and which we plowed through in a weekend on instant Netflix, is the British series Downton Abbey, which takes place in the same decade as Titanic (in fact, starts out with the news of Titanic sinking) and chronicles the drama and lives of the Crawley family and scheming servants.



If you, too are a fan of Downton Abbey, you have to watch this spoof, called Downton Arby's, which can be found here. I am still holding my sides due to laughter.

And now I'm onto the Tudors. Any other recs (for historical books and movies)?
If you could pick a time period/decade in which to live, which would it be?

in sunshine and in rain

We had great weather on Saturday and took a trip up to hike in Trinidad, a beautiful town on the coast. We had hiked about half of the Trinidad Head loop in January during the Lees' and Kimie's visit, but made it the whole way around this time. The trail is surely one of the prettiest in the region, with ocean views around the peninsular perimeter, and from which you can sometimes see migrating whales (we did not spot any this time, though :().








Pepper, in pursuit of a bunny (can you spot it?)


Cross, replacing a wooden one erected in 1775 by the Spanish


After our hike, we enjoyed a lovely brunch at Seascape, a restaurant on the pier which specializes in freshly caught crab and local seafood. My crab and shrimp omelette, and K's crab sandwich, were delicious!



On Sunday, we had not-so-great weather. We are quite adept and regular now at checking hourly forecasts, to plan our walks and hikes; however, if it is only raining a "little bit," we will still usually brave the outdoors. We headed to Headwaters Forest Reserve south of Eureka, where Pepper enjoyed leading the way on the first part of the trail (although, at some point, we plan to do the full 11-mile round trip, the upper part is currently closed due to wet conditions).




"No rain is gonna stop me!"

(in my cute, red boots!)

49 countries and counting

Because it has come up recently (and prompted my enumeration), here is a map of the world showing the countries I've visited - from TravelBlog. Airports do not count. I am thankful to have had a family with the desire-- and the means-- to see the world, as well as a husband who would like to explore, too!





Here is a country list, organized by continent.

NORTH AMERICA
U.S.
Canada
Mexico

CENTRAL AMERICA/CARIBBEAN
Belize
Guatemala
Jamaica
Costa Rica

SOUTH AMERICA
Peru
Bolivia

EUROPE
Norway
Sweden
Denmark
Latvia
Lithuania
Germany
Netherlands
Belgium
UK
Ireland
France
Spain
Portugal
Switzerland
Liechtenstein
Austria
Czech Republic
Italy
The Vatican
Greece
Turkey (Eur/Asia)

AFRICA
Egypt
Nigeria
Swaziland
Lesotho
South Africa
Mozambique

ASIA
Bangladesh
Indonesia
Pakistan
Nepal
India
Malaysia
Singapore
Philippines
Vietnam
Cambodia
Thailand

I'm at (#) 49 and didn't hit any new countries on this recent trip to Europe.
Vanessa is at 51 (sniff, sniff). Kelvin is at 18, I think.
I have some work to do... some of my/our future conquests, I hope, will include Israel, Jordan, Japan, Brazil, Tanzania, and Kenya, but it probably won't be until 2013. :(

Graphs and Laughs

From my mom, here are some graphs (GraphJam) which had me laughing out loud today. Which is your favorite?





























(so true!)



...and my favorites:




(I've been guilty of the red!)

Pepper's progress

After our week's tour to Italy, we spent two and a half days with my parents and sister in McLean and also got to catch up with some friends (my godparents, Erin, Phi, Jordan, Anna, and Eric... sorry, no pics) in the D.C. area. It was a nice way to "transition" back to life in the states, as well as to rest up, although somehow I got sick with a cold. We had to leave our house in McLean today around 4 a.m. to get to the airport and after two 3-hour flights, a BART trip, and a 5 hour drive back to Arcata, we are home. We had missed and were so excited to see our puppy, who Elise took excellent care of while we were gone.

While we were gone, we had gotten a couple of updates on Pepper from Elise, who had been graciously watching her at our house in between juggling work and her classes. While we knew Pepper was is in good hands, we were a bit unsure how she'd handle our absence as, although she has gotten a lot better, she is still quite clingy and unsure of "strangers" (i.e. anyone other than us). Here are some snippets:

On Monday:
"Pepper and I are getting along well. Friday night, it took me about 20 minutes to get her to go out for a walk before bed but then she was fully cooperative. She slept by the front door that night in hopes for you and Tara’s return. Saturday she was very cooperative with allowing me to approach her. She only ate one treat paw and a treat stick all day and didn’t want to eat her food just laid in her bed downstairs most of Saturday. Sunday morning she scarfed down her food. She does the growl and run at night or in the middle of the day when I have been gone for more than 3 hours but it only takes me a few moments to get her and then we are on our way. She has been sleeping down stairs either on the couch or her bed. Today (Monday) and yesterday she went into your room during the day to nap, but besides that she stays down stairs. She stands next to me when I am filling her food bowl and then eats as soon as I sit the bowl down."

Pep, chillin' on the shoe rack (doesn't that look comfy?!)

On Friday: "Pepper is the cutest thing. On Wednesday morning she was standing in the hallway pacing between my room and yours doing a low growl with a slight bark that woke me up. I laid there trying to figure out what she was doing and listening for sounds that could have startled her. When I didn’t hear anything I got up and she was instantly jumping up and down and doing circles around me. I walked down stairs, she ran straight to her leash and we went out. Every morning this is her ritual with me now. She has become Velcro Vu with me. Excited to see me every time I come back from somewhere and Wednesday night she started sleeping in the room with me :).

I think she might be bored because today (Friday) and yesterday I come back at lunch and after work and she has someone’s flip flop or a dust pan, or some other weird thing she found somewhere to play with. She loves to do laps around the living room into the kitchen and also from bedroom to bedroom. "

We got a very excited welcome from Pepper when we returned today-- despite the long trip back, feeling pretty awful from my current URI, and not wanting to go back to work tomorrow, it was nice to come home to such a fun, warm bundle of fur. We are so thankful that Elise was able/willing to stay at our house and take care of our "baby." We are hopeful that, after this experience, she is more willing to trust other people (and maybe we'll even take her back to daycare!).

For the chocoholics out there...

If I were a millionaire, I would have brought home several of these 5 kg (11-lb) jars of Nutella, which we found in the Zurich airport (I don't think the picture does justice to the colossal size of these jars, which usually come in 13-oz sizes!).

If you have never had it, Nutella, a chocolate/hazelnut spread manufactured by an Italian company, is about the most heavenly thing you could ever put on toast. It pretty much goes with everything, and I fear that, if I had a jar like this at home, it wouldn't last long.

I did give up chocolate for Lent, so it's possible it could last a week in my possession but alas, as we did not have Swiss Francs in our wallets, we passed it up... this time.