A bouquet for Cat

My thesis advisor, Cat Wallack, received her M.Arch. from Harvard's Graduate School of Design. Before I left for Boston, she strongly recommended that Sarah and I visit Harvard's Museum of Natural History to see their exhibit of glass flowers. By the way, the bright white spots on the images are reflections from the lights above.

The collection houses more than 3000 glass models of plants and plant parts for 830 plant species. They were constructed as models for students to study plant structures. The first models were constructed in 1886. You can see some of the plant parts--mostly the reproduction parts--in the picture below.



It is hard to believe that all of the structures and model components are made from glass.

Look at the fabulously fine root structure below.

Cat also recommended that we visit the Graduate School of Design. I saw the building from the outside but my tour of the building itself will have to wait until Sarah's graduation.

If you visit Harvard's campus, be sure to see the glass flower exhibit; you won't be disappointed.

Eating our way through Boston

With a little tweaking to our schedule, I was able to visit Sarah at Harvard where we pretty much ate our way through Boston. She met me at the train station and took me to her favorite pizza restaurant, Bertucci's, for dinner. Scallops on a pizza...yum.... That we still have our girlish figures after such fine food can only be attributed to the fact that we also walked our way through much of Boston!

Sarah had never been to Mr. Bartley's Gourmet Burgers on Massachusetts Avenue. I think that they have the best onion rings in the world. Sarah ordered hers with a veggie burger. The burgers are named after important people, and since I last ate there, the names of the burgers have changed, too. Oh, fame is so fleeting!

This was a good cappaccino, and pretty, too.

On Wednesday, Sarah had no classes and was able to find a replacement for work, so we went all over the city...and worked up quite an appetite. We stopped at a swank Italian restaurant in Little Italy. My salad was delicious.

I think this dessert was from the night before, somewhere along Newbury Street. We also ate outdoors that evening, as well. In fact, it was so ridiculously warm in Boston for mid-March (mid to high 70s), that we ate outdoors every chance we got.

Mike's Pastry Shop is located in Little Italy. If you like cannolis, then this is the place for you.

They have every imaginable flavor in the world!

I ordered a cake called a Paragina.

Sarah had a chocolate chip cannoli.

Apparently, they are really known for their lobstertails...after all, that's what you'd expect to find up there, right? By the way, you can't really tell from the picture, but the lobstertails were HUGE!

Satin and sepia

We had planned to visit Bill's dad over spring break, but he joined his bride a week before we came. This blog is about old pictures and new.

Here are Bill's parents at the Copacabana.



We think the next picture is of Bill's mom in a high school play. After she raised her family, Bill's mom was actually a card-carrying actress. In fact, she and Doris Roberts were up for the same role once. Remember The Exorcist? Bill's mom was filmed as one of the hospital inmates, but her blue eyes were so brilliant and she looked so healthy, her scene was cut.



Here are Bill's parents on their wedding day.



And just in case you wondered where Billy gets his good looks...






Here's are some pictures of Bill's mom in her wedding gown.



It's been folded up for over 60 years but it's still gorgeous...



and I can fit in it!

Speaking of a cute couple of kids, here are mine on Catherine's first communion day. I do like pretty dresses!

Farewell to Billy's first car

Several years ago, Bill's dad decided that Grandma shouldn't drive anymore, so he gave Billy Grandma's 1991 Dodge Spirit.

It was a quirky car, panting up Township Road, but it was Billy's first car, and he loved it.

When Billy went off to the University of Tulsa, Bill decided that Billy should have my car, a zippy red Toyota Corolla. I call my car Ruby Begonia, but Billy christened it Roxanne. He may have loved the Spirit, but it worries me that he's given my car a name!



I never drove the Spirit, but on occasion I did sit in the back seat where the velour ceiling would brush against the top of my head.



Since the Spirit gave up the spirit while Billy was in Tulsa, Billy asked that I take pictures of his car to memorialize it. And that's the reason for this blog.



Unlike my car that doesn't wear it name on its sleeve (or it's boot), the Spirit did and the name stuck.



And here's the boot!



When Bill and Billy first drove it from New Jersey, all of the hubcaps looked like this.



However, somewhere on I-70 they lost either two or three hubcaps, and there really never seemed to be any need to replace them.



It was a Yankee car and over its 20-year lifetime, it developed some rust.



On a serious note, as the Spirit was in the shop, Billy's grandfather was hospitalized for congestive heart failure and pneumonia. Dad was alert but generally didn't discuss specifics about our life in Arkansas, so it was odd that in his last week Grandpa asked how Billy's car was doing. Sadly, Bill told him that it had quit running.

Roma: let's finish this series of blogs!

One day while Bill was at work, I decided to pay a visit to a few of my favorite places in Roma. The Piazza S. Ignazio is a fabulous find of baroque pallazzi. There's not a right angle anywhere!

Across from the piazza is the church of S. Ignazio (hence the name of the piazza). The ceiling looks 3D because the perspective is so well painted.

Here's another view.

My all-time favorite building (I think) in Roma is the Pantheon. I wish I could just lie back and watch the sunlight glide across the concave ceiling.

Here is one of the Corinthian capitals outside.

Below is the base of one of the pilasters.

And the top of the pilaster.

It was a wonderful day!

Missing dear friends

One night Bill and I were taking a walk in Roma when we decided to walk down the street where Samia and Michele live. I won't tell you what street that is because much of the time they are gone. Samia is now a member of Parliament in Ghana, her father having been Kwame Nkrumah, who liberated Ghana from British colonialism when Samia was a little girl.

The other name on the mailbox belongs to Michele's sister, Barbara, who works in the Italian film industry. She is, herself, worthy of her own blog. You see, last semester in Italian class we were assisgned to watch Quando si nato non puoi piu' nasconderti. We had to write a report on this film, including listing certain credits. While taking note of such things, I noticed Barbara had been the casting director! By the way, it is a very moving and beautiful film.

While on the subjects of Italian film and the Melega family, I must add that we saw Michele in the miniseries Rome. He played the role of the high priest.

When you think of it, what are the odds of someone from Arkansas having not one but two connections to the Italian film scene?

On a random note...what good is a blog if it can't be random?...Barbara once let us stay in her apartment. She truly has a Roman tub lined with green tiles and from it you can see the Papal apartments!

In closing, we thought of the Melega family that evening (and on other evenings, too) and missed seeing our dear friends.

Let's get finished with Rome! - Befana

I have moved on--to Boston and NYC. That said, I'd better get the rest of my Roma pics posted. These lovely ladies are the witches known to the Italians, or at least the Romans, as Befana. They are sold by the gazillions during the Christmas season at the Piazza Navona. The legend has it that if you have been a good little girl or boy during the year, Befana will bring you candy in your stocking on the Feast of the Epiphany. If not, you will get coal.

My own personal read on this is that this is a veiled threat created by parents to ensure control over their children throughout the Christmas season.

She is so frightening that I don't think I would have ever wanted her to visit me!

And here there are, hanging by the dozens in Piazza Navona.