August 23 & 24 Leaving on a jet plane

No matter how hard you try, the last few days in Italy are always crammed with good-byes, shutting the house down, last minute events and trying to eat everything left in the house.

Ok just one more shot of the mountains from our terrace. 

One of the unexpected things was taking a trip to Brico to buy some more canvases. I sold a couple of my oil painting so had money to burn and I discovered that the canvases at the NEW Brico were more like the ones in America, which is pretty crappy, and so we returned to the OLD Brico and bought another 10. I am ready for next summer! 

The bad news about this trip is that the best gelato place did not have their gelato out and the good news was that there was a Saint band in Raiano.

Unfortunately our last day moved on to its end and, 

what should be no surprise by now, is to more surprises. 

I was happy to visit my friend, Fred, one last time. 

One of the unexpected things was that we went to a mattress sales presentation to support the daughter of some friends, boyfriend. Just saying we really had no idea what we were getting into. After about an hour and a half we left, because we were leaving in the morning and had saved getting a pizza at Antiqua Sapore for our last night.

We did get our pizza around 10pm and were joined by more and more defectors from the mattress sales pitch. Dinner with friends: mission accomplished.

Before leaving I try to put as many things away as possible and cover the furniture against the persistent dust.

Living room with its plethora of chairs.

Bedroom with no clothes on all the chairs.

Kitchen with shelves cleaned off. 

Before we leave I put all the breakable things under the metal bed in my studio. If there

is an earthquake I would rather everything broke in one place!

Jim takes a last look for this year. Everything has also been taken off the terrace and all the plants have gone to new homes. 

After nine hours we are waiting for Gina and Jessie to pick us up! Our trip went
really well. 

Now Jim is in Vermont and I am in Oklahoma for my mom's 90th birthday. Salute Italia and see you next summer!