Night (marish) revelries...

Gosh, I've been having all kinds of nightmares and weird dreams lately.

I am sure that it's because of some internal nervousness about my move. Like last week I dreamed up a whole new universe with lavender sky, and the earth being one huge futuristic building complex. The entire dream I kept walking in and out of all kinds of corridors and up and down stairs trying to figure out a way to get back to the "real universe". When I finally found the right doors someone on the intercom told me I needed a password to go through and that password could basically be looked up only at the location I started out from!! Obviously I would never be able to retrace my steps up and down and all around!

Last night I woke up around 4am because I dreamed that I moved to the Netherlands and some bakery called "Poppy Buns" (!??) wanted to SUE me for an incorrect mention on this blog!? Well I googled "poppy buns" and do not see any bakeries with such name (and no wonder!)... But in my dream I got pretty worried and kept throwing out their letters in the garbage and a messenger would deliver a new one everyday!!!! I started storing them underneath the sink in the bathroom and it started overflowing (the letters... not the sink).

I guess I'm just having the worst case ever of "am I forgetting anything"!

ps: oh and 3 weeks ago I had a dream that it was time to leave for the airport and NOTHING was packed yet... scary...

I must breathe and concentrate on sweet happy things... like for instance, a cupcake mountain!!

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I'm a GENIUS!

OMG! I'm so excited I just had a phone testing session with a language school in Amsterdam. They said, based on the written part I need to stop playing myself thinking I'm a beginner and just go straight into the intermediate level. (!!!)

Of course as I sent in my written test, I left them Vito's telephone number and when the lady called with the news, Vito told HER to stop playing because I can't even order a beer correctly. (If I say: I want more right now! It is not because I can't speak Dutch, it's just because I can't stop speaking NYC.)

Anyway, because they were so impressed with me they're going to send a limo to pick me up to take me to class!!!! At least that's what I think she said in Dutch.... what does "U gaat jong meisje zweten!" mean?

;)

Happy vrijdag!

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Miss Piggy!

On the way to my run I stopped by my friend's house. I like to think he lives on the street with the Italian mafia, because the street has huge brick homes. (Instead of cardboard that the rest of the houses are made of.) See, the main industry on Staten Island is construction and well... what is the best way to "wash" money? Elaborate homes! Now, I'm just talking out of my imagination (and news reports and overheard conversations at the local supermarket...) I personally do not know or even know of ANY real mafiosi... so the fact that I'm about to skip country has nothing to do with running from the mob! (Just so we're clear.)


But this post is not about the mafia, it's about wild animals. This is the thing about New York City, it is very diverse and it's hard to be surprised about anything since all kinds of people come here and bring all kinds of habits with them.

This also manifests itself in the pet choices. Once I've seen a girl walking around with a HUGE parrot on her shoulder. There were news reports of a pet tiger that lived in a manhattan apartment. Of course it went crazy and ate his owner, but that is probably because manhattan apartments are so tiny!! I wonder how humans don't go crazy and eat each other living in them! In Staten Island there is a bit more room. For example in a house like above, one could very well house a medium sized elephant. Or a little cute giraffe- the front door is tall enough!

My friend has an adorable raccoon! Miss Piggy. It's not exactly legal per se' but if the cops arrive on his street, lets just say the raccoon will be the LAST on their list of priorities.

On the pictures maybe the raccoon looks smallish, but its actually HUGE when it stands up and tries to "kiss" you... I put my hair away in case she decided to jump on top of my head or do some other wild animal gesture.

Hmm, I guess they really like animals over in the Netherlands since they have a whole political party devoted to them!! Wow! (See.... Ducky would be so happy there...!)

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To bring or not to bring...? (Volume 2)

Yes, more dilemmas as to what to bring or what not to bring. So to help me decide, today we are going to play a very very exciting game called:

BRING IT! or LEAVE IT! ("recorded" cheers from the live studio audience please)

Today's contestant is....... DUCKY!!!!

A bit about ducky:

He is fabulous, fuzzy, pink, and he QUACKS! Kinda like Donald Duck!

He loves to travel, good food and relaxation.

Even though he is a bird he doesn't actually fly, unless his seat belt is fastened and he did not forget his Italian Dance Compilation CD!

He loves to sleep on 800 thread count sheets in the very best hotels. Yes he is a bit snobby, but its because he knows he is one of a kind...

(Accompanying photos were taken while on a Bachelorette trip for my friend Bernadetta to the lovely Santa Barbara, California) Ducky was the only "boy" among 10 girls!

Seems logical to bring him, but at the same time, will there be room for Ducky in my new fabulous life in the Netherlands?? (Not to mention... will I have room in my luggage?)

I mean, I will be mature and grown up and will not have time for duck games..?

Help me DECIDE!!! do I BRING IT? or do I LEAVE IT?

Should Ducky come to Netherlands with me?
	Bring it! He is pink and fab!!
	Leave it! You got Vito now!
pollcode.com free polls

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Ahhh the family...!!

For my birthday, which very inconveniently fell on a Monday, we had a small, quiet family soire'. That in itself is an accomplishment because there is nothing quiet about my family, except for my dad who is just always calm and relaxed (we think he is an alien...). Well yesterday evening it was just my parents, my brother and my grandparents and somehow we still managed to make more noise then my dad liked to suffer... So at one point in the evening when the volume really rose and everyone was talking at the same time he just said:

You! stop whistling like an on-coming train! (pointing at my mom)

You! stop jangling like 50 bells! (at least I'm a bell and not a train!)

You! stop being a trumpet! (pointing at my brother)

My grandma is also naturally a soft spoken person, but since the only way to participate in a conversation is to scream at the top of your lungs so she learned too.

Grandpa is however the only person "officially" allowed to talk loudly, and that's because he's been through the war and all those granades blowing up all the time at close proximity could really damage those eardrums. What's the rest of ours' excuse I don't know...

Vito dear, get your "loud voice" ready for when you're in New York ;)

(Grandma and Grandpa helping Daniele with his homework)

And on another happy note, my lovely mamochka cooked up an absolute storm! My expressed desire to also cook something was dismissed with "Yeah, whatever" I even got a cake with CANDLES!!! :) Seriously, I think me turning the big 29 left a bigger impression on my mom then me...

You know you're special when mom makes a 4 layer secret recipe cake from a super secret old cookbook that is HAND written... we had to literally rip Daniele's face out of the cake, he loved it so much...

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March 26!

So RiRi's birthday was Saturday, her husband's birthday was actually on Sunday... and guess who is the birthday girl TODAY!???

Meeeeeeeee!

To be perfectly honest, this year I came really close to forgetting my own birthday... There is just way too much excitement and commotion that is going on due to moving that if it weren't for my blackberry beeping at me with birthday alarms for the other March babies, I'd totally forget my own.

I'm not big on making a huge deal out of my birthday but there have definitely been some memorable moments!

Well my 21st B-day was unforgettable and at the same time "hard to remember"! RiRi and I had a joint celebration since we went to the same university. Great fun, a big party with all our friends there... what I don't remember is how her and I ended up in the shower (fully dressed) at the end of the night!

My 22nd B-day was not as rambunctious but nevertheless glamorous. I was studying abroad in Florence and a whole bunch of us went out to my favorite place, Maracana. It was a pizzeria turn samba dancing place. Had a pizza Napoletana... ;)

My 23rd B-day also involved a pizza in Italy ;) This time, quatro staggioni IN Naples.

Anyway fast forward to another B-day full of sharp sensations... last year on my 28th B-day I opened my mailbox and saw a little pack... it was from Netherlands!!! A few month's before I started exchanging some emails with a co-worker from my company's Dutch office (whom I've never met in real life). Some shared stories of travels, pictures of our coastlines and empty liquor bottles, and boom we became friends! The pack had two CD's of a famous Dutch group (in Dutch) and as I listened to it in the car on the way to work I couldn't help but to be very curious about this new friend... (hehe).

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To bring or not to bring...?

The entire downstairs of my parents house is filled with various piles of various clothes from various eras. Ok, I'm not THAT old (yet, come Monday I'll be even OLDER) but there are just certain pieces that I'm really attached to.

Check out the internal voices: "But this is the little t-shirt I was wearing when that cute boy kissed me at my friend's sweet sixteen!" Or- "This is the sweatshirt I got in Gap when the girls and I were driving on an impromptu trip from San Luis Obispo to LA and it got cold..." Even though all this stuff may have shrunk beyond remedy, or has paint stains on them, I never wanted to throw it away.


For example:

A perfectly nice NYC Lifeguard t-shirt given to me by my very first boyfriend. Its historical! How can I throw it out? Besides, its ORANGE and I can wear it to cheer the Dutch National Football team. See!! Makes perfect sense to keep it right!?



Or this sweater! I don't even know HOW I got it... probably from camp. Around week 5 we'd reach the point, when everyone has run out of clean laundry and wearing each others' dirty clothes was somehow better. (Just to calculate, this was about 17 yrs ago and this sweater wasn't new when I came across it either! This sweatshirt is over 20 years old probably!!)


There are of course "The Untouchables", stuff that I've worn maybe once or twice, that have somehow failed to make friends with any other pieces of clothes and remained on the top shelves untouched for years. Like this little thing all the way from Italy:

That pile I'm donating to my favorite charity and oh look they have a blog too :) They're awesome! They take groups of volunteers down to Dominican Republic and build stuff, school rooms, little houses. And once basic construction is in place other larger organizations are able to place teachers and nurses there.

Well, someone sure is going to be stylin' in a Miss Sixty shirt over in DR. That's the only way I feel OK to part with such a piece! Hopefully no local bull will mistake them for a young cow... ehem..

This packing thing is harder then I thought!

Oh and remember how we were having a grand ol time the other day discussing the tragic lack of Target stores over in Europe?? Well, after reading it super Vito emailed me a link to what apparently IS the answer to Target in the Netherlands: http://www.zeeman.com/ "Where smart shopper buys". Not a very snazzy website but basically the same idea of good quality for low prices with stores in multiple locations. Yes I even found a 100% cotton tee at a comparable 4.99Euros.

See this is the difference between men and women, we just kinda like to discuss stuff and it doesn't mean that we are necessarily unhappy or see something as a problem. Men don't do that, if there is an "issue" they SOLVE it, otherwise there is NO issue and it's not worth discussing.

I guess that's how the Roman Empire got so HUGE and out of control. Cleopatra woke up one day on the wrong side of her bed, got pissy, told her man-toy Julius (Ceasar) that she wants to rule the entire world... and I guess that's what he tried to do (and got killed trying)... there you have it: the Roman Empire. I guess that's why they say "women should be seen and not heard" what we say apparently has very powerful effect on men. Well of course there is also the case of Hellen of Troy... she kept her mouth shut and her beauty alone STILL caused a WAR! Oopsie? My goodness girls we really must be careful!

Oh and speaking of gorgeous women, it's my friend's RiRi's Birthday today!!! Yey! (I italianized her name a bit, I mean Italians have GiGi? so why not RiRi?)

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