Hello there!
Welcome to the new folks who have joined in the past month!
First, let’s have a Honey update: she’s getting braver!
For a long time, our rescue pup Honey wouldn’t let anyone within a five or so radius of her, she’d just scatter off and keep her distance. But with each passing day, she’s getting more and more comfortable.
As you can see in the first picture on the left, she jumped up on the couch and my wife woke up from her nap to find Honey sniffing her foot. She will also randomly run up to Katie from behind, whether she’s standing or sitting, and boop her foot with her nose. She’s also booped my daughter’s foot, but I have been left off the boop list.
In the second pic, my wife was napping and woke to find Honey sitting on the edge of the bed. She will scamper into our bedroom at night after we’ve gone to bed and look around, but hasn’t stayed.
I included the third pic because many times Honey is so focused on watching everyone, she doesn’t look like she’s relaxed. But here, for the moment, she is - not looking at anyone in particular, just chilling with on of our other dogs Dusty on the couch while we’re at the kitchen table.
Second, as I mentioned in the previous newsletter, we went to Italy. It was my first trip outside North America, and it did not disappoint. Sure, we had mishaps, mistakes, and general confusion abounded at various points, but overall we got to do and see all and more that we could absorb in ten days. I had three important takeaways:
This is a cornetto, which is basically a sweet croissant. It has a pistachio filing and layer of dough that make it the perfect morning compliment to a cappuccino. We also had Nutella, Italian creme, and honey filled cornettos. Depending on where you went, coffee shops usually sold these for a few euros. I cannot express how deeply I love these pistachio cornettos. I drank a cappuccino on an empty stomach one morning and my stomach was unhappy. Pairing it with a cornetto, or one of the other many tasty pastries Italians eat in the morning, provided the perfect sweet/savory balance and made my stomach very happy.
While I did not drive in Rome or Venice, we did rent a car on the island of Sicily so we could travel about two hours from Palermo to my wife’s family village in Gangi. I cannot stress enough how chaotic city driving looks in Italy from an outsiders point of view. Cars do not seem to adhere to things like speed limits, lanes, or right-of-way. If you want merge, you just do. And here’s the thing, the only reasons you’ll get yelled/honked at is if you are hesitant or making a huge mistake, like I did by driving the wrong way down a one-way. But after a steep learning curve, I figured out that embracing the chaos meant simply this - everyone has the right-of-way, and no one has the right-of-way. Traffic in Palermo was a constantly shifting organism with no center, it just expanded and contracted and you moved within it with complete focus. No looking at your phone, no searching for radio stations, just drive your little four-cylinder compact with the patience of a nun and the aggressiveness of a velociraptor.
RECENT READS
Ramones - Ramones by Nicholas Rombes (33 1/3 Book Series from Bloomsbury)
M
RECENT TV/MOVIES
65 - Unremarkable sci-fi survival tale that didn’t do much more than expected.
JOHN WICK 3: PARABELLUM - Another great installment, maybe the most consistently good movie franchise.
EXTRACTION 2 - Crazy intense action carries a minimalist story.
TED LASSO, Season 3 (Apple TV) - Solid send-off, glad it didn’t go on too long.
RECENT MUSIC
Holly McNarland - Stuff (1997)
Glide - Open Up & Croon (1995)
A few reminders before you go:
Help spread the word - leave a book review at Amazon or GoodReads!
All previous newsletters are archived. Lots of stuff to check out including a link to the original 2011 screenplay of THE BLACK SKY, hints and helps to get started on the real work easter egg hunt teased at the back of the book, and more
Spotify Playlists! I made them for when I was writing THE BLACK SKY, THE RED SKY, and there is also a special one for “The Dank” bar that is in THE BLACK SKY.
If you like instrumental electronic music, I have soundtracks for THE BLACK SKY and THE RED SKY available at most streaming services, along with several other releases.
Stay Safe!
Tim
Listen to my 90s music podcast: Dig Me Out
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