Did we start working harder then invent machines to make that easier to do, or did we invent machines then decide to spend the extra time working? I put the robovac upstairs and pressed the button, closed the door on the dishwasher and pressed the button, closed the door on the washing machine and pressed the button. When I came…
Euphoric is the only way to describe how I feel when I am travelling in Italy. Have you ever seen a dog hanging it’s head out of a car window into the wind? That dog looks as though it is the happiest it has ever been in its whole doggy life. That is how I feel when I’m travelling in…
I took off my jeans today without undoing the button, or unzipping the zip. I did it really without thinking. Those jeans were, if not too tight, then certainly tight enough to be a little uncomfortable three and a half weeks ago. Bits of me that should not be exposed to the naked eye were squeezed over the top of…
Getting skinny – it’s a billion trillion quadrillion dollar industry the world over. Our lifestyles are not making us fit or healthy they are making us fat. Routines and boredom, lack of time and stress, low self-esteem and unhappiness, the sheer abundance of junk food and hormones (oh those hormones) all conspire to make us fat. Our lives make us…
THIS IS WHY YOU SHOULD TRAVEL So that when you get to the end of the path, you can say you made your own path. So that you have memories that only you can have of an exact moment in time that will never, ever exist for anyone ever again in exactly the way it existed for you. In some…
The Italian world starts slow and continues that way. Most things open at 9am and close between 12.30pm and 4.30pm, opening again until 7pm. Dinner is generally 8pm or later. It’s all very civilized. It all seems to flow very smoothly despite a big break in the middle of the day when nothing can be done because not much is…
Distracting ourselves from our lives began with the most beautiful Italian apartment. We overlook an awe inspiring view of the village, valley and the Apennine mountains. As we stand here on the edge of a new beginning, we can feel our minds throwing off the stress and fatigue of our lives. We can feel our general pessimism being replaced with…
A couple of distracted travel trips ago, I decided that for the sake of being more in charge of my workday I would open the store at MIDDAY!. I run a small business, (a very small business), just me and the occasional assistant. It has been larger but I have been working on making it smaller with a higher turnover…
We ate and we lost weight. It was fantastic. Our breakfasts generally consist of yoghurt topped with fresh fruit and nuts picked from the trees by our front door. This is not a deliberate attempt to be healthy, but a celebration of the local produce which has so much flavour you just want to indulge. The natural yoghurt is exactly that,…
I eat more when I am sitting on my butt at work than I do if I am out hiking. Is it any wonder that I’m putting on more fat than my middle aged body can comfortably handle? I’m endangering all my internal organs which are now surrounded by a layer of slow death. My arteries are clogging, my heart…