Monthly Archives: January 2026

Holiday cards

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OK this is just plain weird. Yesterday, January 9, we got a holiday card from friends in the U.S. It was mailed December 13 from Virginia. Happy to hear from them! We chuckled about the Poste Italiene. Then, I heard on Facebook from a friend who got three cards today. I was agog. But wait…then another two commenters in the friends post said they TOO had gotten two holiday cards today, So what’s going on? Did the Poste Italiene save all the holiday cards from the U.S. until today to send out to us stranieri? If so, WHY? I mean, did they say, it you see a card from the U.S., put it in this basket? We will deliver in January. 🙄

Of course we don’t really know who is at fault. One commenter said in tracking their card it went to Chicago and from there Indianapolis where it sat for several weeks. Why? Chi sa! The part that is still odd is why did so many of us here get our cards on the same day?

Epifania

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Today is Epifania, a holiday, the day the 3 magi came to visit the Christ child. It marks the official end of the Christmas season. Now we hunker down and try to struggle through the longest, coldest and darkest month.

We are in the very beginning of a frigid week. There is a polar vortex that’s covering most of Europe. France is the coldest since 2012 and I would wager it will be here as well. Predicted to have -5C (23F) tonight and -8C (17F) tomorrow. Coldest in the 11+ years we have been here. So cold that the cover covering he lemon and kumquats will not be adequate protection, so they now are inside upstairs.

I also looked up olive trees and how hardy they are. Seems mature trees can tolerate to -9C but young trees only to -4C. I’m wondering if this will damage these around here. I hope not. They say the cold is good to kill the fly larvae, but this is pushing it.

For a treat, it began snowing here about 1pm. Is is very pretty. Slowed down now (4:30) but with that cold coming it could make for treacherous roads, Video I took, I hope it is visible.

I have been making cold weather food the last couple of days. I made a big pot of potato leek soup for lunches, and a big pot of chili last night. Sticks to the ribs and warms you up.

Stay warm if it’s cold where you are. If it’s warm, enjoy it! Ciao!

Buon anno a tutti!

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I decided to make Hoppin John soup instead of traditional Hoppin John. I made this last year and really liked it. It is also a one pot meal and I was not up for making multiple things. I had left over rice so that made it doubly easy.

I was tired last night because we decided to move from the top floor to the bottom floor in our apartment. It was quite a lot of work. Just emptying the refrigerator and freezer was a lot! I am trying this out this year but I am not sure I will do it again. Part of the reason is the stufa is on the main floor. We have a pallet of pellets in the garage. We wanted to use them and augment the heat. I also wanted to just test it out. It seemed a waste to never use anything but a bedroom and the bathrooms on this floor. The upstairs will now not be heated to save money. We will move back up in the spring. Anyway, we concluded a hard days work would kill us 😁 We moved Luther’s desk and chair down, that was a pain, and then there were all the spices and some food. Multiple trips. But it’s done now and the experiment begins.

We are going out for lunch in a bit with good friends from Montone. That will be a nice treat!

Happy New Year to all.