more pasta please....

just back from having dinner at my friend, silvia's place....she just got back from a visit home in italy, and with her, came grandma's homemade pasta, and sauces. i was transported back to all the amazing meals i had in sicily..... the fact that my brain didn't have to work overtime to work out what everyone was saying made the meal that much more enjoyable. but i appreciated the thick italian accents.

...pasta is just not worth having if it's not homemade by a grandmother.

que sera sera...

am in the midst of a housing dilemma. may have to move again in a month, which freaks me out a bit, since it might be like last time, packing and moving all within 2 weeks. i'm hoping i won't have to move, so we'll see how it goes.

if i don't move, i'll need to find another housemate. so if anyone is looking to move down town (or knows of anyone) and wants to live in a super cute house, with good private space for yourself, let me know!

au revoir, le tour!

as my month of captivity by the television ends, i'm rounding off July (aka month of cycling) with this awesome story about cyclist Chris Horner, and what he did at the Cascade Cycling Classics in Oregon this month (too bad team Astana was not at the TdF). apparently, a fellow cyclist had crashed badly, and no cars were in sight to give him and his bike some aid, and he was going to walk the last 2k with his bike to the finish....

so, as the cyclists recover, i, too, will have time to recover before being inevitably sucked into the Beijing Olympic games next month.
(my television: "ahhhh, yes, resistance is futile. ")

put another nickel in...

music, music, music....just got back from my 3rd concert at the Mann in less than a week. tonight was Carmina Burana, monday was Rachmaninoff and Beethoven, and last friday was a fun one with violinist, Leila Josefowicz.

one can never have too much music, especially live music. however, this is what happens when you have time on your hand...am loving it--at least there's an upside to this whole vocal healing time.

soft fingers...

the callouses on my fingers are slowly fading after 4 weeks of not playing the guitar. i guess i should pick it up soon, or else it'll be painful when i do start using it again on a regular basis. i wonder what other skills have deteriorated in the last month...probably some brain cells.

i'm no saint...

...and can safely say that i won't be one in this life time, but i like what CS Lewis says:

"Here is another way of putting the two sides of the truth. On the one hand we must never imagine that our own unaided efforts can be relied on to carry us even through the next twenty-four hours as 'decent' people. If He does not support us, not one of us is safe from some gross sin. On the other hand, no possible degree of holiness or heroism which has ever been recorded of the greatest saints is beyond what He is determined to produce in every one of us in the end. The job will not be completed in this life; but He means to get us as far as possible before death.
That is why we must not be surprised if we are in for a rough time. When a man turns to Christ and seems to be getting on pretty well (in the sense that some of his bad habits are now corrected) he often feels that it would now be natural if things went fairly smoothly. When troubles come along--illnesses, money troubles, new kinds of temptation--he is disappointed. These things, he feels, might have been necessary to rouse him and make him repent in his bad old days; but why now? Because God is forcing him on, or up, to a higher level; putting him into situations where he will have to be very much braver, or more patient, or more loving, than he ever dreamed of being before. It seems to us all unnecessary: but that is because we have not yet had the slightest notion of the tremendous thing He means to make of us." --from Mere Christianity

star of Isle of Man...

so i've been watching the Tour de France, and now i officially have a new crush: Mark Cavendish. He's a young sprinter, at 23, he's a baby, but oh-so-crazy-fast (i guess it also doesn't hurt that he's eye candy). he just won his 4th stage today (a first for a British rider at the tour)....at the end there, i found myself yelling for his win--probably undid weeks of vocal recovery. Mark, if you are reading this, you owe me a few weeks of speech therapy.

he might not finish the tour so he could ride for the UK in the upcoming Olympics, but fortunately, that means we'll see him race for gold in august.

apparently the Dalai Lama is lying...

...according to these buddhist demonstrators outside the Kimmel Center, where he was speaking.
they were demonstrating against a ban by the Dalai Lama on praying to a deity called Dorje Shugden. the busy city noon crowd was greeted with a mass shrouded in gold and red, and a *soothing* chant of : "Dalai Lama, Stop Lying!"...though, i'll bet not all monks have adopted the chant as part of their spiritual practice.

(flash back: the noisy daily debates of monks at the Sera monastery in Lhasa)

fish face...

teaching the nephew important things...

Tour de France...

another event that makes it summer for me is the Tour de France. ever since summer '03 when i happened to check out the on-demand feature on my cable tv and saw the tour on, i've been watching (it helped me pass late night packing sessions during my move). didn't know much about cycling, but it happened to be a great one with lots of drama, and i was hooked. 5 years later, i'm still watching, even though people are disgusted with all the scandal surrounding it. i think it's just amazing and inspiring what the human body is capable of.

my brother-in-law says that if he was a guy dating me, he would have to end the relationship if he found out that i was a fan of the Tour. hum. that's why i'm not the one married to him.

2nd Annual BBQ...

i had friends over for a cook-out for the holiday. here's what went down:










so...what's wrong with this picture?? hum. thanks guys.

Ben Franklin & Betsy Ross got married...

i just got back from an outdoors Philly Pops concert at Independence Mall, where i saw Ben Franklin and Betsy Ross get hitched....apparently we, as good tax-paying citizens of Philadelphia, paid for this union. according my friend, Christine, they will spend their wedding night at the Four Seasons hotel, and the honeymoon, where else, in Philadelphia.

The Real Wedding of Benjamin Franklin and Betsy Ross
In real life, the city’s well-known Benjamin Franklin (Ralph Archbold) and Betsy Ross (Linda Wilde) re-enactors fell in love and decided to get married. In a public ceremony with Independence Hall as a backdrop, Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter will officiate over the nuptials with the Grammy-winner Peter Nero and the Philly POPS providing the wedding march. The couple, attendants and several of their family and friends will don Colonial attire.