SimplyMaggies

So i am back… On my blog, that is… I have been neglecting all my blogs for the past three months and the reason for it… Well, my grand move from Italy back to the USA…

And it wasn’t peachy, I can tell you that much. It started on the day we we re supposed to leave Sicily but the flight was delayed a whole day… That trickled down like a domino effect and we missed some other connecting flights… So, of course, we ended up paying for another set of tickets because the American airline industry is so ‘helpful’…Not to mention the horrible customer service that we were subjugated to…

As if that wasn’t enough, we spent over a month in a crappy hotel (and over $1200.00! not to mention money spent on food and such) since we were waiting to close on the house we found… I tell you one thing though: if you want to buy a house, you need to be prepared for a lot of paper work and arm yourself with a lot of patience.

But all is well that ends well and we are finally in the new house. I am connected to the world again and thus can start writing more….

So stay tuned…. I will see you here real soon…

“Lies and illusions”, directed by Tibor Takacs and starring Christian Slater and Cuba Gooding, Jr., tells a story of a self-help book writer whose long-time girlfriend gets kidnapped and killed. Upon her death, Slater’s character finds out that not only did his fiancée had a house he knew nothing about but also an account and a safety deposit box, which one of the mob bosses is after.

Yet again, we have the story of a poor schmack, who is dooped into thinking he knows the woman he plans to spend the rest of his life with only to find out that the person he fell in love with did not exist. This time, however, the story is told in such boring fashion that you feel like poking your eyes out 20 minutes into the movie!

While the beginning is somewhat promising with its similarities to the ‘50s Bond movies and the French detective films, one quickly realizes it is not to be so… The story drags, the actors fail to portray the dilemma and the tragedy a person would experience in such situations and there is nothing there to keep you from turning it off.

And if you think that both Slater and Gooding will make a good movie, you are sorely mistaken. I’d say: don’t waste your time and two thumbs down!!!!

Yesterday I had one of the most surprisingly good days. It started awful…

I woke up congested and with a terrible headache and simply did not feel like getting out of bed at all. It took me about half an hour to convince myself I should (since I already paid for the trip I was supposed to attend). I finally dragged myself out of my warm and comfy bed and somehow got ready for this trip (which, at this point, I started to dread). And off I went…

As it turned out, my friend (who, by the way, convinced me to go in the first place) was also not feeling too chipper herself (we both shared symptoms of either common cold or flu, who knows…). And thus, we found ourselves sitting at the back of a van, sneezing every so often and drinking water to stay hydrated…

Perhaps it helped because by the time we got to the orange farm, we forgot about the cold or flu (or whatever it is) and actually started having a good time. However, the good time was just beginning…

The nice farmer and his wife welcomed us to their home as if we were part of their family. Then we went orange picking–the whole reason for the trip. It was an experience in itself, especially for someone like me, who likes nature but more form the distance than first hand. And here I had a chance to experience it first hand, not only covered nearly up to my knees in mud but also walking in weeds almost hip high just to get a chance to pick my own Sicilian blood oranges. Crazy, isn’t it? How I didn’t end up covered in ticks is simply beyond me… But I did end up having a time of my life,even though I had to carry my bag of oranges (that most likely weight about 10 lbs) up the muddy hill!

As if that wasn’t fun enough, we had this wonderful Sicilian lunch, which included lots of home-made wine and freshly-squeezed orange juice waiting for us at the farm. This was the perfect ending to a very adventurous morning. And the day that began dreadfully, turned out to be one of the best experiences of my life.

The funny thing is, I think you can only experience something like that only here in the Mediterranean. People are simply so friendly and they welcome you as if you were not this stranger but part of their family, which gives it a different meaning. And makes it far more special…