months gone by...

again we've fallen into this bad routine of NOT writing! apologies, apologies...

here's a brief recap since the beginning of february (has it been that long?)

aubrey's folks were out in rome for the first time, probably the first of many more to come in the future. they had a wonderful time, barring a few bumps in the road. i think they clocked about 16 miles of walking one day, and i don't have the figures on the others, but let's just say that they walked A LOT!!! as always, it was great to see them, to see their reactions to rome, and for them to see luca here. and for luca to see them. so we had them alone for 3 days, then my folks were here overlapped with the krewers for 6 days, then the krewers left, and we were alone with my parents for the rest of the week. it was a lot of fun seeing the 'rents, but it turned out to be a tiring few weeks. we needed a vacation at the end of thier vacation! we did get a private visit to the sistine chapel. that was amazing. of course we took pictures, but none that show the place empty... not thinking...

it rained a lot in march. that's about all i can remember. and i got bill murray's autograph. no, i didn't meet him again, or stalk him and force him to sign the thing. just a friend of a friend who heard my idiotic story and told mr. murray, who thought it was funny and said he remembered me, and signed an autograph for me on a call sheet from "the life aquatic".

april started to clear up a bit weather wise, but now we seem to back in a rain, sun, rain, hail, sun pattern. we had a string of beautiful days, then the weekends full of rain and gloominess. easter was eventful, workwise. we did a large number of live shots on easter sunday, got to talk to a few of my old friends back at sat ops HQ in NJ, and i cut a piece for sunday night. everyone was happy with everyone, which made it all more than worth it in the end. the unfortunate thing was that aubrey and luca had to spend easter without me, but they had good friends to share the day with in pomezia (micha, nikoma and niccolò.

i have a few more job prospects in my future, which we can go into at a later time. but things are looking well for our future in rome! also, maybe, hopefully, with the fingers crossed, a larger, more normal apartment. and maybe a few carpets.

we wanted to do a birthday picnic for aubrey on sunday 25 april, in the villa borghese. the days leading up to the party were wonderful, but all weather forecasts pointed to rain on sunday. friday i went and bought a ton of veggies, cheese, bread, crackers, dip, olives, artichoke hearts, fruits, beans for hummus, and various other snacky items. saturday we cut, sliced, baked datenut and zucchine bread, made dip for the fruit, smashed the beans into hummus, all with the sun and wind coming thru our windows. we were feeling good. then it started to rain. we got bummed. sunday morning was grey/white but very chilly. in the end we decided to do it at giovanni's. there were a number of people there, a few passerbys, and our friends. it was a great time of course, just would have been real fun to have a picnic in the park. we'll just have to come up with another excuse to do it some other time...

by the way the italians say that throwing a birthday party before the actual birthday is bad luck, so i guess aubrey got what was coming to her.

not sure what we will do for her actual birthday, i left it up to her, but she hasn't made up her mind yet... maybe a nice dinner. we'll see.

we've got some friends coming to visit towards the beginning of may, and then 4 june is the release of harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban. i know i'm a freak, as aubrey always says, but what can you do. too bad they don't pre-sell tixx in italy.

then july the armijos are on their to europe with a stop in roma! so that will be real fun. luca can hang with his cousins, aubrey can hang with her sister, and we get to show newbies around the eternal city. hopefully this summer will be MUCH cooler than last year. that's all i'm asking for.