I have often said that traveling abroad with students is very much like child birth – very painful in the moment, but then you come home with the baby and forget the pain. I have returned home with my baby babies, and already, less than 48 hours after arriving, the painful moments are slipping from my memory. The exciting moments were ... Read More »
Get your pen ready! Here come spectacular recommendations for small-vineyard Italian wines. You won’t hear about the big joints at all, but instead, the small players, the individuals who have passed down their love of grapes through generations. These are vintners interested in exploring and exploiting the possibilities in their vines, not glutting the market with “good enough”. I was ... Read More »
Who wouldn’t love this? Run away to New York City for the day: early train down, arriving just in time for a boutique Italian wine tasting, followed by the requisite walk through Times Square, a visit to the Oyster Bar in Grand Central Station, and the evening train home. Time as a couple? Check! Seriously amazing wines? Check! Top it ... Read More »
Huh? Yes, gimbaled funiculars. Yes, bivalve players. A sequential thought process here, maybe a pedantic love of funny sounding words, and of course a reference to Spain, where I will be in 2 ½ weeks. Disclaimer: my sister in law served a “signature drink” at our recent American Easter/Greek Easter/Passover gathering. It was perfect for an afternoon sitting outside after ... Read More »
I am really struggling with this… It just… looks so… BAD! For the third time in three years, I am heading out to Spain at the end of the semester. And every time I arrive in Madrid, I feel like I have come home. ARGH! Elitist, arrogant, snobby, Western-European-promoting, blinders-on-to-diversity JERK! Yes, that is me. This is how it started: ... Read More »
I survived the college search – as parent – once, and here comes the second round. “I’m wishing I was grown up, but I am really really really scared!” Or maybe it was … “Let me go! Let me go! Let me go!” Or in this latest round of college visits… “Do I really have to go? Can I just ... Read More »
Are you present? Or not? Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (click here for the trailer if you have no clue what I am talking about) may well be the classic analogy for modern life. Are you here? Or have you skipped out? I am a perhaps addicted complete fan of modern technology. I am one of the few parents who knows ... Read More »
As time passes and our life circumstances change (read “kids are growing up and will eventually move on”), Stephen and I sometimes now ask the question, “Do we want to stay here?” We live in the Town of New Scotland, in the Voorheesville School District, waaaaay out in the country. We often talk about the idea of having a condo ... Read More »
I feel Anna’s pain. Desserts are too demanding! Don’t sift your flour? Get ready for heaviness in your concoction. Don’t have a silicone pad for your baking sheet? Get ready to soak, scrub, soak, scrub, and probably give up and heave the messy pan. I used to love making desserts as a teenager. It was my “thing”. It was also ... Read More »
In what my children would probably call a fairly typical, schizophrenic mode for me, I find myself both demanding that the kids “grow up”, while at the same time, resolving this year that I need to be more childlike. Whaaaaat? Today I witnessed a scene that made me stop multitasking between laptop and smartphone, sit back, and enjoy life. I ... Read More »
Sauced In New York Sometimes the food is in the sauce, sometimes we are