Carpe diem with kids

Today would have been the wedding party of our dear friends, somewhere near Lecce in South Italy, and were all so excited about it. My heart goes out to them, I know it' not easy for now,  but we'll party even harder next year. Since we can't make it this year, I decided to make up for each missed holiday by remembering past holidays, looking at pictures and videos, sort of reliving beautiful memories. What a beautiful country Italy is, so many gorgeous places, so much culture, the food, the wines, the joyful people, it can never disapoint. Our first visit to Italy was sort of by accident. In 2006 was attending my first international scientific conference in Rijeka, Croatia, with a colleague I was working with and our partners. We stayed in a villa in Opatija, and while we loved exploring the surroundings and the Istra Peninsula is absolutely gorgeous (so many Venetian influences), I couldn't help throwing the idea of taking a little detour on our way back home and ...

It's one of those days when I just feel nothing's working. Last night had to look into an urgent situation for work and turned my mood upside down. I needed to go out, vent, cycle, run, anything, but then had to put the girls to bed, they're not sleeping if I'm not there. Even Ariana, she needs to know I'm in the next room. Oh, that ombylical cord, guess it was never cut!!! I wonder how miserable I'll be once they finally decide cut it! This morning I woke up thinking I need to clean up the rest of the mess at work on what was supposedly a day off, and felt just annoyed. Then the postman rang the bell and left on our doorstep a box of Fitzbillies Chelsea buns, sent by my employer. And a note, to say thank you for the work done over the last weeks. Timing could never have been better. Again, it's the little things in life, the ups and the downs, the pink and the grey, the clouds and the sunshine, that make us feel alive.  https://www.mommaaddict.com/...

Nearly 7 weeks into this isolation and (at times) I am getting fed up with it, as I am sure most of us are. But don't think the end is near, so we just have to deal with it. While some of us are happily working from home and loving it, their productivity rising to the sky (crazy people, eh?), others are really missing face to face comunication and struggling with all this exclusively remote work.Video calls are generally ok (apart from that very important meeting with a new client when I was supposed to lead the meeting and make a good impression, but my bloody Zoom crashed) but still feel strange and just won't do for me. It is hard, I feel tired, annoyed to not be able to control things, missing people, spending too much time on social media to distract my brain. Today I was witnessing from my kitchen a situation where an older lady fell on the road near the pavement, must have been the heat, and people were trying to help her but keeping the freaking (note how I am tryin...