Bits and Bobs

I feel like I only post here when I'm doing something ridiculous (which actually happens more often than my frequency of posting here would suggest -- I am terrible. I fully admit it!), but right now I'm both building muscle mass and rectifying the whole brown sugar situation:

I'm making my own! Zucchero grezzo di canna (raw cane sugar) plus the molasses I picked up from the import store. I'm grinding the coarse grains of sugar in my mortar and pestle to a finer grain (although there are still some big beautiful crystals hanging about) and pressing it through some molasses. This is what the stuff looked like with about 3/4 of the sugar already added. Gorgeous, rich, moist -- I wish I could do justice to the smell, but it's this thick and almost smokey richness that is just beautiful. I'm just about done with it now and it's looking like any nice rich dark brown sugar you'd pick up in the store. Coarser grains of course, but mmmm it's lovely, and full of the natural trace vitamins and minerals found in unrefined, unbleached sugars! Sugar that is (in at least some ways) good for you? Why thank you, I do believe I will. I'm going to put it in this mason jar we picked up from Ikea to show it off, and to keep it from drying out like a brick. (Also, I'm pretty much obsessed with Jamie Oliver right now and homeboy would definitely approve of the natural goodness of this sugar!)


So, I posted before about the obelisk down the piazza from us -- It'd been shrouded in scaffolding and advertisements since we'd gotten here. As we're driving up via Cristoforo Colombo in the shuttle back from the airport, all of a sudden this comes in to view from beneath the archs of the walls. As much as I'm sure the obelisk in all of its unrestrained glory is breathtaking in and of itself, this? The thing rising from these jagged poles and platforms is pretty staggering in a different way. Each evening we get this view of it with the sun as it's setting peering through the structure. I caught this picture last Saturday night -- I mean look at that sky. The picture barely does it justice. Those two little dots are two giant balloons that were released from a Carnivale party that was going on in the square in front of the church's side facade. If I can get my camera to behave (it's in full revolt right now) I'm going to get some pictures of the Carnivale happenings this weekend. This is the last week so Sunday should be a riot -- all of the little kids walking around in these outrageous costumes (princes, princesses, clowns)? It's pretty fun to see.


And just for fun, here is the "fresco" that's on the wall in our room. This was before we did any arranging (there's a big armoire in the middle of the wall now). The thing is actually an enlarged photo (complete with typical 70s color saturation) on four strips of wallpaper and it is hideously hilarious. Jackie, Freya and I have a new goal in life: find out where the picture was taken, go there, take a picture in typical tourist fashion (peace signs and fanny packs), and hang the framed picture right in the middle. Amazing!