Summer fun

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óbidos, medieval festival, dinners out, sangria on the beach, vila viçosa, alandroal, evoramonte, screen test, vasco da gama with cristina, the conspirator, lunches out, walking on the paredâo, borba, redondo, badajoz, caceres, america's cup, laughing, old lisbon, horse show, relaxing, boulan, bookclub luncheon, tomar, castelo de vide, super 8, cascais, good  bye dinners, shopping, friends, reading, blogging . . .

a good summer, a very good summer indeed!


Hot Fun in the Summertime, Sly and the Family Stone

Autumn

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Our lives are driven by schedules, deadlines, calendars, clocks, bells, alarms . . .  These are all contrivances designed to organize and control our time/lives.

This year on September 23 at 9:04 am it will be officially fall. According to Wikipedia, "An equinox occurs twice a year, when the tilt of the Earth's axis is inclined neither away from nor towards the Sun, the center of the Sun being in the same plane as the Earth's equator." It continues, "An equinox happens each year at two specific moments in time (rather than two whole days), when there is a location (the subsolar point) on the Earth's equator, where the center of the Sun can be observed to be vertically overhead, occurring around March 20/21 and September 22/23 each year." Wikipedia also makes a distinction between an equinox and an equiluxe. An equiluxe is the term used to denote those days when sunrise and sunset are the closest to being 12 hours apart.

Growing up in Pittsburgh it was easy to tell when it was fall.  We have long hot, humid summers.  Often times in the summer there's not a big difference between the high and low temperatures.  Sometimes it just too damn hot to sleep.  When I was growing up, on nights like this the houses were dark and parents would be sitting on porch swings and gliders speaking in hushed tones, if at all, and all you would see would be the red light from the tip of their cigarettes.  The kids would be sleeping in tents and sleeping bags in the back yards.  The doors were open all night long and no one was afraid that their kids would be abducted nor were they afraid that anyone would enter their homes.  That was out of the question. It just wouldn't happen. You knew it was autumn when the humidity dropped.  That was it.  That was the sign.  And it didn't happen according to a date on a calendar.  It was fall when it was fall.  The humidity drops and there's a certain chill in the air. . .  The light changes too. . .  The color of the sky is a bit different . . .

Some things are beyond our control.  My calendar says it's still summer, but it's not.  It's really fall. All the signs are here . . .

25 years later - Stand By Me stands the test of time

I just got finished watching one of my favorite movies of all time.  Stand By Me was a 1986 box office hit directed by Rob Reiner. Upon learning of the the death of a childhood friend, the narrator recounts a story of a sad adventure shared by himself and 3 other boys. The story takes place in late August, 1959 just before the summer holiday ends and boys enter junior high.

There are lots of memorable quotes from this film but none is more meaningful than the last line which was typed in, not spoken, by the narrator: "I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve. Jesus, does anyone?"  Yeah, that says it all.

Dorothy Parker

Born: August 22, 1893
Died: June 7, 1967 (aged 73)
Occupation: Author, poet, critic, screenwriter, all round caustic wit and wise-cracker

Quote: The cure for boredom is curiosity.  There is no cure for curiosity.

Not only was she something, she was also something else . . .

no comment . . .

3 in a row . . .

 See what I mean?

Monkey see, monkey do

I notice a trend  . . .

Smart or not?

I live in a great apartment on a really cute little street in a nice neighborhood. Although residential, most of the buildings are multi-family buildings.  The smallest housing 3 families.  The rest are apartment buildings and condos and even a hotel. My building and the building next door, like many of the buildings on my street,  have underground parking.  The space has a combination of individual garages and parking places. However, noone uses it.  There is a steep decline, a sharp right turn and most of the people in these two buildings own big cars. Everyone parks on the street.  This, coupled with the fact that we live within walking distance to a restaurant, a popular coffee shop and a tea salon, results in a parking problem.

As you can see in the photo above, the Smart car was parked in the worst possible spot.  It is parked right smack in the middle of a space that usually holds 2 medium sized or 1 large and 1 small car.  (The small car is usually mine - a Fiat Seicento).

Smart car?  Maybe.   Smart owner?  No way.  Smart ass?  Yes, definitely!

Castelo de Vide

Another medieval hilltop town loaded with charm, Castelo de Vide has Roman origins and been inhabited continuously since then by the Vandals and later the Moors.  There are even megalithic ruins littered throughout the area.  The town was chartered in 1180. The castel in this Alentejano town dates from the 14th century and at one time had a thriving Jewish quarter complete with a medieval synagogue.

What I love about this city is that life still thrives within the castle walls.  What an amazing legacy that is . . .

Born in the USA Tour

August 11, 1985 - Bruce Springsteen - Born in the USA Tour

It was a warm summer night and Bruce rocked Three River's Stadium. I wore slim-cut Calvin's and a white t-shirt with the sleeves rolled up à la Bruce.

Oh, what a night . . .

"I'm sorry" doesn't always mean that someone is sorry . . .

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I've been walking along the bay every morning since my summer holiday began and I'm patting myself on the back all over the place about this. It's roughly a 50 minute walk and I cover approximately 5 kilometers (3 miles).

This morning on the way to walk a relatively normal looking guy in his early 30's went through a red light. He was accompanied by his young wife and little one in a car seat in the back seat of the car. As he was going through the red light he said that he was sorry. When we chastised the driver, he said, "I said I was sorry."

He looked like a nice guy. Yeah, we've all gone through red lights - or at least I have. No one was hurt by his mistake. BUT he was in the wrong.  There's more to being wrong than saying "I'm sorry".  You have to actually BE sorry.  If you are sorry, you are remorseful.  If you are remorseful, you don't cop an attitude with the people you almost hit.  End of story.

"I'm sorry" doesn't always mean that someone is sorry.  Sometimes it's just a lot of blah, blah, blah. . .

August 6 and August 7

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August 6 - August 14, 2011

I was lucky enough to watch a couple of these events. . .