Author Archives: mishafesto

Giorno de Vacanza 12

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Ciao 👋

Where were we? Oh yeah, Saturday morning Paul had to work. But only from 8am to 1pm 😒 Then I tried to bake a pie. But let me start at the beginning…

One of his coworkers, an Italian that’s from here, was having a small birthday gathering on Saturday night. And we were invited. That’s cool. Paul asked if he could bring anything…booze, food, girls? The reply was ‘something Kansas-y’ 🤔 Um, that would have been good to know four days ago, before I left freakin’ America! So Paul was like, can you make the Key Lime Cheesecake? To which I was like, 😂😂 No. 😐 This AirBnB is nice and all, but it doesn’t even have a measuring cup, let alone a mixer or springform pan. But I offered to try and bake an apple pie. It’s simple and definitely says ‘America’. Ha.

So Paul gets home Saturday afternoon, and we rush to the store to look for apples, cinnamon, something sorta like white flour, and granulated sugar. Those aren’t a thing here. I basically ended up with sugar cubes I had to smash, probable-pizza flour, a new rolling pin, and a pack of plastic Dixie cups. Not a single effing measuring cup to be found. This was at one of the bigger markets, mind you. 😒 So I set Paul to working out equivalencies for everything, and then trying to figure out what that meant in 200cc plastic cups.

Fail from the get go 😐 It was way too humid and warm to make a crust work, and the strange flour wasnt helping. The only pan I could find was a foil dish that was about 12 inches across and looked more like a deep dish pizza pan. So it took nearly 16 (small) apples to make the filling. I only realized that because Paul did 10 and was all ready to go, when they wouldn’t cover the bottom, let alone heap. So Paul peeled and sliced six more. The crust absolutely would not cooperate, so I ended up just smushing it into the pan like soft Play-doh. And there was no top crust, because of the size of the pan and the failure to roll. So into the oven it went. And out it came. Ugly pie.

Evening here starts late. Restaurants don’t open til 8, everything else closes at 7. It’s a wierd place. So this party was at an apartment half an hour away. The pie is still hot, it’s too big and sloshy to set in the car, so it ends up in a roasting pan on my lap. Have I ever mentioned how ziggy and zaggy the roads are here? Or the roundabouts at EVERY intersection? 🤔 Because yeah. Trying to hold this hot pie still, for half an hour of constant motion, not proud of it at all, it’s ugly and stupid looking. We arrive and I make Paul carry it in 😂 The hosts were polite but I don’t think they’d ever even seen a pie before. They kept calling it a cake. It would have been an even uglier cake. But anyway, we snacked and stood in the backyard chatting for a few hours, being eaten by mosquitos. Bonus, I can now find itch spray even when it’s written in Italian! Then we all go inside, about a dozen of us, and have real cake. A delicious, creamy, tiramisu type thing. It was pretty. #CakeEnvy Then, as an afterthought, the birthday guy asks if anyone would like my cake. It’s pie. Apple pie. About five of us try it. It actually set up well, scooped out way better than I expected for such a large, deep, dish, and tasted good. The crust was pretty crumbly, stupid Italian flour, and the apples were pretty bland, stupid Italian fruit lack-of-variety. But those that tried it praises it. Those that didn’t, didn’t even try to hide their revulsive faces. Seriously. We left it there, only bringing back the apartment’s roasting dish.

Chow. 🍏🍰

Giorno de Vacanza 11

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Buongiorno! That’s good morning/ good day! I’m behind on my blog (surprise) but I’m taking notes 😂 Today would have been Friday, I had a headache and laid around most of the day. Surprise again.

Paul’s factory is about 30 minutes away, so he drives there and back each day. Working 10a-10p, he eats lunch and dinner there. They have a cafeteria. However, there is also a small restaurant across the street where they go sometimes, for a change. And they actually serve steak. Like, real honest to goodness steak. All you find here normally is a very thin, very tough cut. So he gets pizza everywhere 😂 but the other guys all had filets at lunch Friday. He saw that, too late, and decided we needed to go back for dinner and have steak! After driving half an hour home. We drove half an hour back. It was only 6:30pm. They were sold out of steak 😒

Long story long, we had pizza. 😕 Then drove half an hour back home. Which sounds ridiculous, but over here everything is a string of tiny towns. You never really leave ‘town’, you just zig and zag like madmen until you find a parking spot, basically. So that was our Friday. Until tomorrow, three days ago…

Arrivederci (that means bye) 👋

Giorno de Vacanza 10

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That’s Italian for Vacation Day 10 😂

Now that we are settled in, and Paul has gone back to work, it’s really not that exciting here. Although we are on a hill overlooking the town, it’s a good five mile walk down to the city center, where all of the interesting things are. And it’s a very steep five miles back up 😂 This YouTube video shows some of the town!

But I keep myself busy. There is wifi, so there is work to do, writing this ridiculously mundane blog, and such.

Word of the Day: Per Favore

The formal use of ‘please’. Like much Italian, it is similar to Spanish (por favor).

Pronounced: per fuh-vor-ay

Vacation Day 8 & 9

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1am came way too early today. We were up and on the road to LAX by 2am. This was the plan because traffic is so terrible the rest of the day. We made it to the airport by 3am, which was a little early, but oh well. So Paul and I sat there until the gates opened at 4:30 and we could check our bags. Then it was a quick trip through security (another reason to arrive stupid-early), and more sitting. But we got to sit in the Delta lounge, because Paul flies enough that he gets the important treatment 😂

It was really nice, with a decent breakfast buffet, a quiet and calm area, and unlimited orange juice 🍊😋 We finally boarded around 5:45am and then it was a 5 hour flight to New York. Once in JFK Airport in NY, we found an Irish pub for lunch and then sat for hours in the Delta Lounge. They had cookies, drinks, and phone charging ports, so it could have been worse. And by worse, I mean boring-er 😂 But finally it was time to board, which we get to do first as Paul is a SkyMiles points-hoarder, but we were also in the next to last row (44) so we sat on the plane for another 45 minutes. 😞

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Another 8 1/2 hrs of flight, and we landed in Venice. It was now noon local time, 5 am Kansas time. On Wednesday. But I will be time-lost for a week or so 😂 After forever in the customs line, and the rental car line, and the traffic, we made it to our AirBnB near Bassano del Grappa. You can check out our exact AirBnB here.

It’s amazing here, cheaper than a hotel, and definitely much more relaxing. We’ll be here three weeks, then move to a different apartment in a nearby town, for the last two weeks. Paul is working the 10a-10p shift at work, 5-6 days a week, so I’m on my own for lunch and dinner. But that is the great thing about an apartment…groceries and a kitchen! More on the daily life of Italians, coming soon. 👋

Word of the Day: Ciao

Like aloha, it is an informal greeting meaning hello and goodbye.

Pronounced ‘chow’

Vacation Days 5, 6, & 7

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Saturday we were awakened to a power outage at our hotel. At 7:30am. We thought we would just walk down to the McDonalds a block over…but the power was out all around us. Fortunately there was still hot water, so we showered then drove a ways away to find breakfast. My friends Jason and Scott were getting married today, the entire reason we were here! We returned to the hotel to find power restored, put on our nice, suffocating dress clothes, and went to the ceremony. I didn’t cry, but it was a very touching and heartwarming service, between two amazing people that are beyond meant for each other 😍 Of course I still had a stupid migraine (too much bright sun and sinus-drying a/c) so we left the reception early. A nap at the hotel helped me though, and we were able to rejoin the celebrations that evening at a local bar for drinks and dinner.

Sunday, we packed up and headed west…er, to my mom’s house east of Los Angeles. She is car-sitting while we are in Italy. The drive from Phoenix to Hemet is only about 4 hours, but it is the I-70 of the desert. Boring beyond belief. The I-10 is nothing but trucks going 60mph and cars going 90. But we made it, her little dog actually liked Paul (Khaos is a man-hating monster), and spent a relaxing evening catching up.

Monday, we did some laundry and sorted through what we were taking to Italy and what we were leaving. When we return on June 28th, we’ll be staying in California for a few weeks. It was another uneventful day, we went out for pizza, did some work on our phones, and lounged around. We hit the sack early, as we had to be back up by 1am to head for LAX. Had to beat the traffic and check in early for our 6am international flight.

Vacation Day 4

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Friday dawned a *little* less hot, only mid 90’s. 😂 Paul and I had an entire day free to explore Phoenix. We did a little shopping, had an amazing lunch at Chompie’s, an authentic New York Deli chain in PHX, and then we went to the aquarium! But not to see fish…they were hosting a special travelling exhibition of Bodies Revealed! Learn all about the exhibit here.

I have wanted to see this show since I lived in Phoenix twelve years ago. I always missed it though, in Kansas and around the country. But it was amazingly worth it! The process they use to preserve the tiniest of veins and nerves is unbelievable. Paul was a trooper, medical things are not his cup of tea, but he knew how much I wanted to see this. 😘

After the bodies exhibit, we made our way back across town to a dinner of Panda Express and an early night at the hotel.

Did you know? The city of Phoenix has a little over 1 million people…but the greater metro area has 4.7 million! 😮

Vacation Day 3

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There’s a Bear in my room! ✈😍🐻

After already hitting 100º by noon, Phoenix reminded me of how un-acclimated I had become. Even with my sunglasses, it was so bright all day that I got a headache. The squinting is not only bad for wrinkles, but for tension in the forehead muscles.

Check out was at noon, so I had to venture out into my favorite big city and kill time until Paul’s plane landed tonight. Not much more to say…I wandered two Targets, a TJ Maxx, a DSW, a Kohl’s, and had an amazing omelette at my favorite NY-style deli!😋

We’re all checked into our home for the next three days, a Candlewood Inn, with an amazingly equipped kitchen, even for an extended stay place. 🤔 Aspirin has been taken and the lights are going off. 🛏

Useless fact of the day: Our hotel is on Baseline Avenue, so named because when Phoenix was being settled and mapped out, this road was the center (or baseline). 📐📏

Useful fact of the day: All of the numbered, north-south running roads in Phoenix start low in the middle and get higher as they go out. Streets go towards the east, Avenues towards the west. (< ave. 4 3 2 1 / 1 2 3 4 st. >) 🛣

Vacation Day 2

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After spending a restless night in Tucumcari, NM (why must hotel A/Cs be so loud 🤔), I was up bright and early and on the road by 8:30. Took a quick spin around the town, as it is on Historic Route 66…but it is definitely past its prime. Not even a cafe! Nothing but dilapidated and abandoned roadside hotels and disintegrating billboards 🙁 So after a McGriddle and OJ, I hit the highway. The real highway.

Running parallel to Interstate 40, but to the south, is Highway 60. It’s actually a very nice route! Two lane, but with a lot of long passing lanes, nice blacktop and zero traffic! I mean, (proper use of) literally no other vehicles for 30 or 40 minutes at a time! It’s 65mph, too, although every little town drops down to 35 😑. But all the neat things are down there! The V.L.A (Very Large Array) of Radio dishes. You can read about it here.

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And Pie Town! A town that literally consists of two pie restaurants and a campground! 😍 It was a small kitchen and three family dining tables. The owners, a couple, were extremely friendly and conversed with all of us as we ate. One couple was hiking a well-known trail, having started at the Mexican border 8 days before. Another couple made a Dorothy joke, but I let it slide because he said he was actually from Ozawkie, a town near Topeka! But he had become a snowbird, fleeing to Arizona, forty years earlier 😂 They serve food as well, and I had a homemade chicken pot pie, before my amazing Pear-Ginger dessert! 🍐🍰 Read all about Pie Town here.

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After a few more fuel stops, I made it to far east Phoenix about 6:30pm (they’re on Pacific time right now). The sun was setting and I couldn’t see where I was going, so I just exited and found the first decent hotel I could. 😂 Paul will fly in tomorrow night, and we’ll have Friday to explore Phoenix, then a friend’s wedding on Saturday!

Vacation Day 1

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Woke up with a headache. At 5:30am. Because of course. So after laying around all morning, I got on with my final, procrastinated chores and actually drove away at 3:30pm. 😞

The drive west was uneventful, and by that I mean boring. It was cloudy, which was nice for driving into the sunset, and the traffic was non-existent! The two lanes nowadays are so much better, both surface and passing-wise, anyway. After a quick stop in Liberal, continued south on 54, through Guymon, OK and Dalhart, TX. Managed to shoot the gap between two thunderstorms around the OK/TX border, but did get a nice lightning show! 🌩

Made it to the near-halfway point of Tucumcari, NM about 10:30 Mountain Time. So a solid 8 hrs on the road. Tomorrow, gonna check out the downtown here…it is on Historic Route 66! Then taking highway 60 across NM and into Arizona. It runs parallel to Interstate 40, just to the south. It also goes through a place called Pie Town, which I saw on a PBS travel show 🍰

Random Fact of the Day: Interstate numbers go up as they go north and east. Also, even numbers run east/west, and odd numbers go north/south. I knew this already, but this link explains it in more depth.

You can read about the Interstate system here.

Food Fight

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There are two kinds of people. The one-meal-a-day types and the six-meal-a-day types. I’m the latter. I snack. Every few hours, I need to eat something, even if it is literally just a cherry tomato. I mention this because the New Year always brings about resolutions of healthier diets and lifestyles. For many of us, I’m hardly an exception. But even at 38 years old, I feel uneasy eating in front of people. Not only is it difficult to eat well when you don’t like sit-down square meals to begin with, but when you know you’ll be hungry in an hour but don’t want to eat again ‘so soon,’ it can be very anxiety-inducing. But why, you ask? You’re a grown up, you’re married and everything! Well, let me just tell you…

I was always a chubby kid, a big ol’ nine pound baby! I did my share of running and playing in the dirt when I was little, and was hardly that obese baby you see on the talk shows. But my parents felt the need to (what we now call) fat-shame me as I grew up. Yeah, I’m sure it stemmed from their divorce and constant need to get back at each other and use me in the process, but still. Telling a 10 year old that they are “fat and worthless” is hardly nice. My father was so bitchy about my weight that he would just not buy groceries. I suspect more as a punishment than as a genuine concern about my health. He would make me feel so bad, and reduce me to tears, about my weight that I would only eat after he went to bed. I would sneak food up to the privacy of my room, and eat in secret silence. That left dirty dishes though, and I couldn’t very well leave intake evidence in the sink, so 12 year old me, would leave the plate in my room until he would leave the house, then I could sneak it back down and wash it. But then he and his girlfriend would search my room, find dirty dishes, and explode about what a fat and dirty slob I was. Did he want to hear my explanation? That I was going to take them back to the kitchen, I just didn’t want him to know? Nope. I was the most terrible, evil, worthless, fat, waste of flesh ever. Never mind my protestations about why his girlfriend was searching through my fucking room and reading my diary.

And on this went for several years, this cycle of sneaking food, getting caught, not having groceries available for awhile. To this day, I feel guilty eating after my husband has gone to bed (I’m the night owl, so being up another several hours will make me hungry). I mean, how fucked up is that? I’m nearly 40 years old, and I STILL feel shame and guilt about eating when I’m hungry. I’m always telling him, “You’re a grown up, you don’t have to clean your plate, if you’re full then stop.” And yet I can’t take my own reasonable dietary advice. I feel terrible guilt when we go shopping and I put something in the cart and he innocently jokes about having just bought it last time. And I feel absolute anxiety when he gets up in the middle of the night and I’m sitting on the couch, reading and eating fruit. Fucking fruit! So, thanks. Thanks for giving me a fucking complex that requires twice-daily Xanax, Zoloft, constant guilt, sneak-eating in my own goddamned house, and a lifelong battle with zero self-esteem. The only thing worse than feeling that you’re worthless is thinking everyone thinks that, too. Because your parents told you so.