Sunday thought....

Never let a problem to be solved,
become more important than a person to be loved.

Thomas S. Monson

stressed/desserts....

things are tough at the moment with a new director coming to the company soon.

he has been in watching every day this week with his little note book of who we are.

screwing up his face, occasionally frowning, with cogs in his head clearly turning as to who he is going to keep and who is going to get the chop.

Needless to say stress levels are high.

In fact i didnt realise how affected i was until i went barmy the other day when someone with took my after-dinner choclate bar from me.

Literally Barmy!

The next day at lunch with the same person i burst out crying because there was too much food on my plate. Amid the tears i suddenly started bawling about how scared i was that my job is on the brink....yes it took too much cheese on my plate for me to realise this!

At least it came to light that there was an under-lying reason for my recent crazy outburst and i'm not just nuts, nuts nuts...

On the upside, my cake baking has gone to the extreme in the last few weeks.

Carrot and lime cake, banana cake, lemon cake, cocount cake...a

nd in a moment a good old fashioned chocolate cake...

then i saw this and now i know why....

Good Ole Ale...

there are only two ways to live your life.
One as though nothing is a miracle.

The other as though everything is a miracle

Albert Einstein

fair verona...

Verona was far prettier than Milan

It came with pretty coloured houses

Love notes at Juliets (so-called) house
(we didnt go visit her 'tomb', seeing as she is a fictional character)

a pretty castle
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a collosieum

and a designated hand bag carrier

Eat your greens please....

On my journey to Italy i came to understand just how serious Italians take their food.

At one restaurant one of my friends asked for a slight change to the normal menu,
just an average request of the normal 'can i have it without mushrooms please'
The chef however was not impressed,
and we proceeded to be lectured on how,
'the Ingridients are the Ingridients' not just a general whim...



At another restaurant whilst eating the house delicacy, Horse Steak,
(which by the by tasted exactly like beef),
in the centre of the table was a platter of roasted vegetables.
When the waiter returned to collect the plates he exclaimed something very passionatley in Italian to which all the Italians proceeded to look very guilty
and ate very quickly the remainder of vegetables from the platter.

Apparently he had chastised them for not eating all the food he had made and we were not getting desert until all our greens were gone...

On the up side it was all exceedingly delicious....

Feeling poor in Milan...

Milan was nice, but not as great as i thought it would be.

It had a nice Duomo which you could walk aroud on the roof of which was pretty groovy...

but for tourist sights that was about it.

I wanted to go shopping but that only made me feel like a peasant.
How could poor little starving artist like me afford to walk around those shops full of Chanel, Gucci and Prada....

I had fun at a lovely little antiques market, but again no moneys to buy the pretty objects.

I did on the other hand buy a mini-catapult from a street vendor and that filled me with plenty of amusment!

Walk like an Egyptian...

I went to Milan this weekend.

This is one of my favourite pictures from there.

Whilst Captain Tim was very seriously

trying to take some pictures of the Duomo

and main square i kept sneaking in his pictures

doing my 'Walk Like an Egyptian' Dance move

that i have been practising to in the kitchen all week

whilst dancing along to my Bangles Greatest hits.

What makes me smile is that no one was batting an eyelid

as i was dancing around rather strangely in the main square.....

(a couple of other photos is sneaked into)

Its a bugs life....

Sometimes people get the opinion that being a ballerina is a glamorous job to have.
I can tell you that having had to get up at 6am to run around the stage dressed as giant cockroach who is trying to avoid being squished by a shoe i did not feel glamorous at all.

On the upside someone sent me a bouquet of red roses to the theatre today.

Unfortunately
when i rang up the person who i thought had sent them
to say how romantic i thought he was and how much i loved them
he had no idea what i was talking about...

looks like i may have a secret admirer...

Running away with the circus...

A couple of my favourite snapshots from my visit to the circus the other week....

Whilst watching the trapeze artist i whispered to my fellow circus watchee that with a little bit of training i figured i could become a trapeze artist and run away with the circus.

He reminded me that the other week i couldnt make my dinner as i wasnt strong enough to open the jar....never mind hang from a trapeze.

Okay, Okay....
So a LOT of practise then...

Belated Sunday Thought...

One woman who had been through years of trial and sorrow said through her tears,

"i have come to realise that i am like an old twenty dollar bill, crumpled, torn, dirty, abused and scarred.

But i am still a twenty dollar bill.

I am worth something.

Even though i may not look like much

and even though i have been battered and used.

I am still worth the full twenty dollars."

Extract from talk by Deitrich F. Uchdorf.

Go Away Nasty Grey Clouds....

I have of late been unconcisously making up a list of exciting summery things to do now that it is Summer time.....

i am all aglow with anticipation.

But the grey clouds seem to have come back and are spoiling my plans....

I guess I'll have to put them on hold until Mister Sun chases them away.

Here a few things on my summer list...

Climb Nanos and fly a Spiderman kite at the top of it

(cause i saw a Spiderman kite in a toy shop the other and secretly coveted it)

Swim in the outdoor pool that i have cycled past
many-a-day for 2 years and never been in but alwas wanted to

Have a barbeque

Go white water rafting....
again something i've talked about and never done...

Go to Vintgar Gore....it looks so pretty

These are just the tip of the iceberg....
Summer this year is going to be so FUN!

Finding adventure...

"What a large volume of adventures may be grasped within this little span of life
by him who interests his heart in everything."

Lawrence Stone

I am not a dog person.....

I'm not really a dog person, or a cat person either to be honest.
I think the reason is that they move too fast and can make loud noises....
indeed i do like fat lazy cats that do nothing but simply flick their tails on occasion...

this could be the reason that i have a pet tortoise...she sleeps more than i do (very few things can) and never makes quick movements that make me flinch.

(In fact i realised recently that its a real deal breaker that if people talk to me too much about their pet dogs on a date it really turns me off)

But after seeing some of these pictures
i could definitley change my mind about dog owning....

Okay, okay,
so most (all) of these dogs have been dyed by their crazy chinese owners to make them look like pandas and i'm sure tht there are probably a few pet protesters out there protesting away at such things...

but...

they are so cute!
Pandas are my favourite animal
and as a child i always wanted a pet panda.
This would be the next best thing to a wish fulfilment....

(p.s check out my baby ballerina picture over at Dancing Branflakes)