Left vs Right and somewhere in between

I have just done a very interesting 2 half day seminar with the kids about the brain! Basically you can be Left Brained or Right Brained and you can fall anywhere in between - Far far left is an Aspergers Brain and far far right is an Autistic Brain and in the dead centre is your ultimate boring fence sitter! That is my sum up of the seminar for the purpose of this page - now I will tell you how this affected me in Venice!

Burano

We went to this beautiful little island called Burano which lies off Venice. It is a tiny place consisting of amazing coloured buildings and I immediately thought that it looked like the whole island fell into a Dulux paint factory! Fairytale like and romantic, it is quaint and awesome and produces stunning hand made lace.The biggest seller seems to be lace toilet roll holders which do not blow my hair back, but I thought that this would be a perfect place to buy a tablecloth for my new dining room table.

After the humming haring and being taken to a second shop by the sales lady I found THE table cloth. It was not cheep but then quality is not cheep! I loved it and wanted it and was prepared to take the plunge and sell a body part to buy it and then I made a fateful mistake! I turned to the Hubby and said "What do you think?" and so began the Great Lace War of 2011. He of No idea what things cost/No use for things not 100% practical/No likey spend money told me just what he thought - "For that price you can buy 300 beers back home! Or even 66 beers here in Italy at their over inflated prices" Well I did ask!

By the time the calculators had been whipped out and fabulous discounts had been offered he was already out the door and heading towards the first restaurant that sold the beer he had been reminded of, and he is not even a huge drinker in his maturer days!

I am right brained, I am more creative and imaginative and impulsive than my left brained hubby who is analytical, needs all the facts and needs time to think about everything before it is done! I am astounded when he says - I think I may have coffee today instead of tea so I am not exaggerating!

He needs to hear about the table cloth, decide the value of the table cloth, compare prices of other table cloths, see the table cloth on the table, and decide that we can afford the table cloth if we save for 6 months THEN decide if we should buy the table cloth!

I need to get the table cloth because it is pretty!

WHY?

I was going to bombard you with Italy and food and fabulous but life got the better of me this week! I will bore you to tears with more soon but today I need to put this out into the universe! It may only help me but here goes:-

People be nice to each other! Revel in each others glories! Hold hands when support is needed! Cry over sadnesses! Drink coffee or wine and be with them when they need someone to be with! Love their new hairdo's and outfits and cars and be glad for them that they got them! Be happy when they do something wonderful! Or go somewhere you want to go to! Or chose to share a bit of their lives with you! Speak well of them and praise them when they need it even if you feel they may not deserve it!

I have seen a lot of strange things this week and do you know what -life can be hurtful and mean and cruel! Be nice to each other - Why? - it may impact on you next!

Torino Torino Torino

The thing about going to Italy that excited me most (as with most places I have to confess) was the FOOD!  I am a Foodie, a Food Lover, A Gastronomic Finder! I am a Taurus and I think with my stomach! This is probably the reason that I battle to stay a size 10! 

The first part of my holiday was the Hubby's business trip to Turin where I was his Plus 1, and we stayed in a rather southern part of the city and this did not excite me until we drove past this place!

Eataly

It might not look like much from the outside but when you walk inside . . . Well I thought I had died and gone to heaven. It is a supermarket, deli, market, food store, restaurant (well about 7 restaurants) and and Italian "Woolies" all rolled into one! And I spent almost a whole day 'window shopping' as I knew that we could not buy anything with 2 weeks of travelling ahead of us.

Just hams

Pasta, Pasta, Pasta

ONLY Parmesan Cheese

A small sidebar here:- The people of Turin do NOT speak much English. They are friendly and try, but international tourism is not like the other cities in Italy and so I did a lot of pointing, grunting and nodding.

After all the food staring and salivating I decided to have lunch - this is where the sidebar comes in handy - the menus were all in Italian, and there were things I just did not know how to translate. There are about 7 restaurant stations within this gastronomic sanctuary and the only non Italian speaker was Spanish!

SO, I did what I thought I would only ever do at a Chinese take away, I ordered a number 3 - I had recognised prosciutto as ham! I was offered wine with more gestures and hand signals which I refused - the look of horror was something I thought I would only ever get from my kids when I tried to kiss them goodbye in public so I took the wine. What a fabulous call! The food and wine both danced on my tongue.

I wondered if I could tie myself to the chair and beg for Gastronomic Asylum!