In the Caribbean the temperature never changes, the sun just goes down. – Kris Marshall It’s that time of year again! With stockings and Christmas ornaments stowed for another year, January is the month we trade visions of sugar plums and dreams for a white Christmas into images of white sand beaches and warm turquoise … More South Caicos: A secret no longer
What is better than to sit at the end of the day and drink wine with friends, or substitutes for friends. – James Joyce Dublin is a literary town. Bookstores, libraries, literary museums and tour, pubs where famous authors hung out, Dublin has them in spades. The city has contributed four Nobel laureates in literature … More An unlikely story (or what to read, see, eat and drink in Dublin)
Above us, only sky. – Motto of Liverpool John Lennon Airport My Ryanair nightmare wasn’t over. Every day for two weeks leading up to our anniversary trip to Dublin, I opened harassing emails from Ryanair asking, “Don’t you want to get through security faster?” or reminding me how I could save ten percent on an … More I never said it was a brilliant idea
Here are no lying nor vain epitaphs. – Henry David Thoreau I blame a lot of things on my mother. My high arches, baby fine hair, brown eyes and chocoholic tendencies are all traits I inherited from her. Along with her interest in cemeteries. A dedicated amateur genealogist, Mom’s idea of small talk around the … More Look what I found!
Everyone, deep down within, carries a small cemetery of those he has loved. – Romain Rolland Humans have always built monuments to commemorate the dead. Ancient Egyptians mummified the bodies of people and pets before entombing them in pyramids. Prehistoric Britons moved megalithic stones hundreds of miles and encircled them with grave mounds. A Chinese … More Top 10: Cemeteries
I’ve got a surprise especially for you, something that both of us have always wanted to do. – Two Tickets to Paradise With our anniversary looming on the horizon, Robie started hinting around about how 29 years of wedded bliss should count for something. By this, he meant he should be in line for a … More The one going down the low-cost carrier rabbit hole
You cannot trust people who have such bad cuisine. – French President Jacques Chirac The best part about British cuisine are the names. While Italians love their women with pasta alla Norma, pizza Margherita and the indelicately named pasta puttanesca, France offers less appetizing fare that sounds like rat patootie (ratatouille), Coke in a van … More The Great British Marketing Scheme
Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. –Winston Churchill I apparently hadn’t thought things through. Because when I asked my sister to walk the Camino de Santiago with me, the reactions I got were, well… bizarre. First, Cheryl didn’t respond to my invitation. Instead, she left the question hanging out … More It’ll be grand! *
This book is dedicated to all Yankees in the hope that it will teach them how to talk right. – How to Speak Southern Before I moved to Texas, I read Steve Mitchell’s helpful little handbook How to Speak Southern to explain why my new neighbors pronounced “eye” like “ah,” said “Ahmoan” when they meant … More Lern Yerself Scouse
Tradition, tradition! – Fiddler on the Roof Robie and I don’t have many traditions. We don’t have annual Christmas rituals (though we do have a handful of must-watch Christmas movies that include Die Hard, A Charlie Brown Christmas and Trading Places). We don’t cook a roast lamb recipe passed down through generations at Easter. We … More For us Friday night means only one thing
