Hollywog's Pond

La Traviata

That is how I spent my Sunday afternoon. My first real opera and I have to say, it was hard to pay attention to everything. At the symphony you can just close your eyes and absorb the music. At musicals I feel like the music is more an to the actions which are usually so fast paced that I am just swept along. For me, with opera, you can't do just one or the other. I found it difficult to fully appreciate the music while following the actors on stage. It was amazing! The way they can project their voices, even when laying down or facing another direction totally blows my mind. There is so much feeling in their words even if it is just a note drawn out all the nuances in pitch and volume say a lot. Put that together with some hand gestures and other body language and you don't even need to speak Italian to understand. Crazy talented people. There was even a short flamenco section that made me yearn for Spain in a way I haven't felt for years. Sigh.

I've decided to embrace beets. Growing up my only exposure was mom and her love of pickled beets which still don't do anything for me. Enter my man, Jason. He likes beets and beet greens. So I decided to test some out on myself this evening (with opera date mom). Did you know they take almost an hour to cook in boiling water?!? That is a serious vegetable. Made a nice little mix of onion, garlic, golden beets, beet greens and apples. Delish. Especially with a splash of apple cider vinegar to finish it off. I was able to convince mom to make some pear snow and boy did that take me back to my younger days. Excellent dessert. And not even that bad for you, as desserts go.

Nothing too exciting happened last week as my evil, no EVIL, cold still had me in its grips and rendered me useless. I am happy to report that my evil cold is gone and I can now venture out into public without fear of contaminating everything (and everyone) around me. Yeah!

The Halloween costume is coming together nicely. Waiting for UPS to deliver the last few pieces and I'll essentially be done. Party party.

Miss Sugar has been feeling a bit vomacious lately and so I took her to the vet and they ran some blood. Nothing obvious except low on neutrophils, but not really that low. And based on that finding alone she either has some sort of bone cancer with no other side effects (at the moment) or it is hairballs with a low neutrophil count. Let's vote for number two please. Suggested testing the same again in two weeks to see if it was a fluke or if further examination needs to take place. She is nine and they are calling her a geriatric. Seems a bit harsh to me.

Oh, and speaking of geriatrics, I was talking to a young, pretty thing at a salon about hair products. I asked her for her opinion (she was a stylist/salesperson) on a shampoo/cond that might help give some oomph to my fine hair. She takes me to her suggested product and explains that it has "vital proteins and nutrients for aging hair". wtf? I'm not even thirty yet and I have aging hair? It is constantly replenishing itself. Next to skin cells sloughing off I think it is the youngest, newest thing on me! Grrr. I didn't buy it because I was pouting but now I'm kind of curious...

Totally missed Trophy's new cupcake flavor today - choc cake with nutella buttercream dipped in crushed hazelnuts. Sounds divine. But I did make super fabulous banana bread with walnuts and dark chocolate chips. Mmm. That should count for something. Maybe Trophy will decide to do them again tomorrow since they were such a hit today (twitter feed keeps me up to date).

Ciao for now, the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is calling to me.