Glorious, perfect day of doing pretty much nothing.
I did my yoga outside–a little tricky with balancing poses on a mat over bumpy grass, but worth it. I’m going to try pilates out there today.
After yoga, breakfast on the patio, So, so nice. BW wanted poached eggs, so Kat and I watch her make them–very much as my mother used to. Hard boiling water–but she adds some vinegar and salt, stirring, stirring when the water gets to that fast boil. Then crack the eggs right in the water, boil them fast for a couple minutes. She scoops them out and onto a thick kitchen towel. Serves them on toast for BW. They were beautiful.
Our shower here has the biggest rain head I’ve ever seen, and was indeed like showering in the rain.
I took my book and walked back to the pool, sat and read–moved into the shade, read some more. Spent a lot of time just looking up, then around at the sun-washed hills and fields.
Walked back for lunch. Amazing gnocci with pesto and a leafy green salad with grilled chicken. The lettuce was so green and fresh I expected it to shatter like glass. Antoinetta gave me the recipe for the pesto. I must try this at home as I grow so much basil.
More reading in the shade, with doves cooing somewhere in the trees.
The four of us finally stirred ourselves enough to walk up to the bocci area above the pool and play. Much fun, even though we’re fairly pitiful. Still, some pretty good throws/rolls here and there–both accidentally and on purpose. I’d already walked across the little dirt road for a closer look at the vineyard, but we all crossed over on our return. Big clusters of grapes–still need ripening, but both Kat and I sampled one. Deliciously tart.
We had Concord grapes growing over our little flat-roofed garage when I was a kid. I remember so well sitting up there eating them in the summer. And the grape jelly my mother would make from them if we left her enough.
And a closer look at the two front gardens. Red, red tomatoes, purple eggplant, green and red peppers. Something that may be kale but is bigger than I’ve seen before. I spy some purple verbena that looks as if it’s growing right out of the stone wall.
Back for dinner. I ask Lucia what the little tree is right outside the kitchen with the fruit that doesn’t quite look like pears, not quite like figs.
Pomegranate! I’ve never seen them on a tree before. They’re very young, fussy and fasctinating.
Asia tells us that tonight we’ll be able to see the ISS near the Big Dipper at about 10:25. We gather out on the chairs on the lawn–with a laptop that shows its progress. It’s over the US, over the Atlantic, over Greenland and so on. The sky’s so big, the world here so quiet, with the only lights the few scattered over the vast shadowed landscape from houses or villages.
And we spot it right away, track the little, fast-moving light up and through the Dipper, overhead. Then it dims and vanishes like a candle snuffed out.
That is our dinner and a show for the evening!
Today the others are going out to explore a nearby village. I’m staying back to bask and to write. Maybe read some more, maybe take a walk. Plenty of left-overs if I want to make lunch. And Antoinetta will be back to make dinner.
Nora