Adventures Abound: The Amber Valletta Project

Places I Want to Visit Whilst in Europe

It would be great if you could elaborate on some of my travel ideas. Tell me places YOU love most...

* Greece. Greece, Greece, and more Greece (October this year? We're hoping so!)

* Positano, Portofino...the Italian Riviera

* Train trip through Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Sweden

* Bicycle riding tour through Bordeaux (May?)

*Driving trip through France, Switzerland, Lichtenstein, Austria, and Germany (DONE! April 2012...awesome!)

* Rent-a-Car Tour of Ireland (June. Spectacular. DONE.)

* Turkey (Voila DONE.)

* the South of France (Christmas! DONE.)

* Tuscany (Christmas! DONE.)

* Spain (Two weeks of amazingness! Easter 2010. DONE!)

* Ireland (Valentine's Day weekend in Dublin...DONE!)

* Austria (October!!! DONE.)

* Paris (Perfection. DONE.)

* Bruges (DONE! So romantic ;) )

What I've SEEN So Far this Year (and last)

CORNWALL
ICELAND
PORTUGAL
DEVON
Birling Gap, Seven Sisters
Bath
an assortment of little towns around CUMBRIA
Southern TURKEY (again)
LONDON from the top of St Paul's Cathedral
WINDSOR
LIME REGIS
The ruins of King Arthur's Castle
TINTAGEL
PLYMOUTH
Stonehenge
the London Marathon
BATTLE, Hastings
WOODSTOCK, Oxfordshire
the Red Light District, Amsterdam
the second floor of the Eiffel Tower, Christmas Eve
Montmatre
Sacre Coeur
the Champs D'Elysee on Christmas
BRUSSELS
EDINBURGH
AMSTERDAM
the home of William Wordsworth
WINDERMERE
The Lake District
GLASGOW
KILKENNY
CORK
Blarney Castle
KILLARNEY
GALWAY
Cliffs of Moher
DERRY
Giant's Causeway
BELFAST
DUBLIN (again)
DUSSELDORF
HEIDELBERG (swoon. Hard.)
STUTTGART
Neuschwanstein Castle
INNSBRUCK
VADUZ, Lichtenstein
Reinefall (where the Reine meets Lake Kostanz)
GSTAAD
Lake Kostanz
GENEVA
The (Swiss) Alps
BERGERAC
EYMET
a Manchester United football game
ZADAR
BOSNIA (!)
Plitvice Lakes, Split
SPLIT
DUBROVNIC
ZAGREB
ISLE of WIGHT
BRUGES
Tate Britain
OLYMPOS
CAPPODOCIA
Goerme National Park
ISTANBUL
The Natural History Museum
Abbey Road
CAMBRIDGE
Canada Day in Trafalgar Square
BRISTOL
PARIS
Champs d'Elysees at night and during the day
Versailles
The Eiffel Tower
Arc de Triumph
Spitalfields Market
Columbia Road Flower Market
Brick Lane
The Royal Wedding
BARCELONA
SEVILLA
Sierra Nevada mountains
GRANADA
MARBELLA
MALAGA
LA SPEZIA
RIOMAGGIORE
Islington
British Library
Notting Hill
Portobello Market
Dover Castle
Science Museum, London
V & A Museum
National Portrait Gallery
Harrod's
Kensington Palace
Kensington Gardens, Holland Park
Sussex
The Guinness Factory
DUBLIN
Hyde Park, London (not to be confused with the gem in Toronto)
Oxford Circus
Trafalgar, SoHo, and Beford Squares
the National Gallery
Piccadilly Circus
Chinatown
SoHo
British Museum
St. James' Park
Buckingham Palace
FLORENCE
Trayes (aka where Jean Claude van Dam lives)
VENTIMELIGLIA
GENOVA
MONTE CARLO
MONACO
Pablo Picasso's studio and Freud's office
ANTIBES
NICE
The Walk of Fame at the site of the Cannes Film Festival
CANNES
MARSEILLE
BREMEN, Germany
the Alps
GRAZ
VIENNA
SALZBURG
a Russian-themed play by Canadians in London
Camden Market
The best butcher shoppe in Kent
Covent Garden
London Bridge
The inside of my OWN classroom
BRUSSELS

Books I've Read (and what I've thought of them)

The Weight of Blood (3.5)
The Secret History (4? 3?)
Luckiest Girl Alive (5...bad ending, but good book)
Yes Please (3)
Fates and Furies (5)
The Enchanted (5)
Our Souls at Night (2...awful!)
The Clasp (3)
The Girl on the Train (4.5)
Betrayers (3.5)
A God in Ruins (4)
Payback (1...it was £0.99...don't)
Dept. of Speculation (4)
The Crooked Maid (4)
Bossypants (3)
We are All Completely Beside Ourselves (2)
The Wasp Factory (1...just don't)
Belonging (4)
Caught (4)
The Girl with No Past (1.5)
The Paying Guests (4)
The Nightengale (5)
Mouthing the Words (3)
Astonish Me (3)
My Brilliant Friend (4)
We are Not Ourselves (5. Wicked sad.)
The Little Friend (5...amazing...same author as The Goldfinch. It wasn't a one-off)
The Versions of Us (4)
What Alice Forgot (4: light but deep, somehow)
A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of a Course in Miracles (5...review to follow)
Still Alice (5)
Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (5...Mindy you're the best! I read this in a day and a half...work days)
Three Day Road (4)
Stoner: A Novel (4.5...slow and sad)
Hausfrau (3.5)
The Free World (4)
The Children Act (5)
The Silent Wife (3)
Green Girl: A Novel (2)
The Invention of Wings (4)
The Good Girl (3)
The Girl Who was Saturday Night (2)
Everything I Never Told You (4)
The Narrow Road to the Deep North (4)
Not That Kind of Girl (4 Lena Dunham's inner thoughts...it was something)
Wild (5...good movie too)
The Husband's Secret (5)
Ours are the Streets (4)
The Bean Trees (5)
N-W (3.5)
Seating Arrangements (3)
The Brightest Star in the Sky (3...summer reading guilty pleasure)
West Coast (4…again, I don't feel all that intelligent after it. Still, it had some nice Scottish imagery though)
Instructions for a Heatwave (3…I don't like when books assume their reader is not intelligent)
Fifty Shades of Grey (quite possibly the worst written book of all time. Sordid sex scenes aside, what was all the fuss about? Oh, sordid sex scenes. Sigh)
The Beggar Maid: Tales of Flo and Rose (4)
The Secret Lives of Pippa Lee (3.5)
Great House (2 until the last third of the book…then a 6!)
All My Puny Sorrows (3…far too sad for my liking)
My Salinger Year (5. Top rated on Heather's picks for a gooood reason. You should read this)
Boy, Snow, Bird (4)
The Fields (4…this was hilarious until it got WAY too serious. Still, a touching, Irish tale
Secret World of a Shopaholic (didn't this used to be called Confessions of a Shopaholic?…3)
The Orchardist (4)
The Book Thief (10…just stunning)
The Joy of Living (5)
The Corrections (4)
Looking for Alaska (3.5)
Crow Lake (4.5 Very quiet, Canadian read)
The Goldfinch (6/5. Tremendous)
The Universe versus Alex Woods (5. So good)
Southern Cross the Dog (4.5)
The Misremembered Man (4)
The Light Between Oceans (4)
The Twelve Tribes of Hattie (4)
The French Lieutenant's Woman (well, I read half of it. 3. I can't stand this type of literature...sorry, Kat)
This Side of Brightness (4)
Three Day Road (4...tedious explanations of WWI battlefields, but rich in Native Canadian history)
When God Was a Rabbit (5)
The Great Gatsby (4)
This is How You Lose Her (4)
Gone Girl (4.5)
Inside (4)
Behind the Beautiful Forever: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Slum (4.5)
The Dinner (4...it got worse with time)
The Waterproof Bible (4...Sta-range)
The Good Father (5)
The Thing Around Your Neck (4)
Remains of the Day (5...great bedtime reading)
Hunger Games (4)
Inside (3.5...not the best Giller runner-up)
Through Black Spruce (4.5...Giller Prize runner-up 2012)
Headmaster's Wager (5...Giller Prize winner. Amazing Canadian author)
Wetlands (5...so super gross and yet entirely captivating)
On the Road (4.5...sort of wacky, sort of brilliant)
Half-Blood Blues (Giller Prize Nominee...5...awesome)
The Shadow of the Wind (4...I think i've read this before?)
American Dervish (3.5)
When a Crocodile Eats the Sun (5. More Africa.)
Everything is Illuminated (4...once I got into it. Which took three months)
Half of a Yellow Sun (5. Love my African books. Thank you, Laura)
To Kill a Mockingbird (5. Obvi)
The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake (3.5)
SLAM (3.5 Was this a book written for Young Adults, Nick Hornby? Because it certainly read like one)
A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian (4.5)
Anthropology of an American Girl (5)
We'll Always have Paris (1)
Last Chance Saloon (3)
The Girls (5)
Alone in the Classroom (4.5 I love a good teacher book)
Room (5. It was sad and devastatingly haunting. It kept me up at night, but still, it was well worth the read)
Solar (4...slow. And depressing. But witty...I'll give it that much)
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night (5...I loved this book. It got me thinking about autism in a completely more empathetic light)
Rachel's Holiday (4)
The Rough Guide to Turkey (as much as I needed to read...4!)
The Brain that Changes Itself (5...super cool)
Baby Proof (3)
The Pleasure Seekers (5...gorgeous)
Water for Elephants (4)
Love the One You're With (3)
Three Cups of Tea (5: Tough to get into, but so worth the effort. GREAT motivational story)
Middlesex (5. Heavy read, but well worth it)
The Perfect Age (4)
Breaking Dawn...4.5 (Glad that series is finally over. I can return to being an adult again and not a 12-year old girl.)
Wuthering Heights (sigh...so dull...3)
Let the Great World Spin (4)
The Help (5...stunning)
The Angel's Game (4)
December (2)
The Five People You Meet in Heaven (4)
Eclipse (4...I'm tiring of the series. Maybe it's because I'm not a tween. Sigh.)
New Moon (5. Again, swoon)
Twilight (6. Swoon. Voila done.)
Naturally Thin 5 (I'm obsessed with Bethenny Frankel..."you'll want to have my baby after you eat this.")
Incredibly Close and Extremely Loud (6...best book I've read in a dog's age)
Dead Cat Bounce (3: no comment)
White Tiger (4...it was a pretty funny book. And the ending was pure kharmic retribution. I liked it)
What is the What (4...this man thought he was being ignored and forgotten FAR too much. He's clearly never been to an Ontario emergency room...ever)
God is Dead (5...quite an interesting account of what would happen if God took human form and then died. My Dad says, "hey, that's already happened!" What a ham)
The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century (3...I don't like geopolitical books. At ALL. Interesting economy stuff though, hence the rating)
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (5)
Night (5)
Alienist (5...even though it gave me nightmares)
Angela's Ashes (5...SUPER read)
The Shipping News (4.5)
My Sister's Keeper (4)
Burning Bright (3.5...childlike at times, but some really great thoughts about innocence vs. experience. Plus, I love a book about a poet)
Love in the Time of Cholera (5...never before have I read a truer account of my version of love)
Sweetness in the Belly (5...just beautifully written, smooth, introspective and educational. A really wonderful read)
The Joy of X (4...dull at some points [to be expected from a textbook], but full of ingenius, nouveau teaching strategies)
One Hundred Years of Solitude (4...I loved the sheer mockery of the reader [me] despite the oft-excruciatingly boring text)
The Stone Diaries (4)...too sad, only two quotes ;)
The Poisonwood Bible (4.5...another multi-perspective narrative: nice)
Nineteen Minutes (5: I love a story told from different perspectives)
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (4...sigh...my first and last HP)
The Good Earth (5...perfect book: a real page-turner)
The Triumph of the Sun (3.5: history is tough for me, but it was well written)
Heiress for Hire (2)
The Memory Keeper's Daughter (3: Jodi Picoult, who wrote "My Sister's Keeper" said she was "captivated". She's diluded.)
The Laughing Place (4.5...the ending was far too slow...didn't leave me wanting more, but overall, great)
Three Weeks in Paris (3: Summer read)
Native Son (5: really well-written, highly recommended)
The Party Season (4: light summer read)
Late Nights on Air (Giller Prize Winner: need I say more? 5)
Half of a Yellow Sun (5. Love my African books. Thank you, Laura)

Words by which to live

you're allowed to get excited and feel good. Just sayin.
--Laura Zizzo

So be kind to all of your neighbors
Be kind to all of your neighbors
'Cause they're just like you
They're just like you.

And you're nothing special
unless they are, too. --Typhoon

everylittlelovematters --www.wordboner.com

Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones; and when you have laboriously accomplished your daily task, go to sleep in peace. God is awake. --Victor Hugo

Fortify yourself with contentment, for this is an impregnable fortress.--Epictetus

Try not to become a man of success but rather, become a man of value. --Korean T-Shirt (actually, as it turns out, Albert Einstein)

Practice isn't the thing you do once you're good. It's the thing you do that makes you good. --Malcolm Gladwell, The Outliers

Don't invite trouble. It comes all on its own. --Heidi Cowie

There's the gift, there's the spirit, and there's the work: all three have to come together. -- Jay-Z

NOW is the time for guts and God. -- Elizabeth Taylor

Everyday, no matter how you feel, get up, dress up, and show up. --Unknown

You'll only regret the things in life you didn't do. --Frank Passaro and Jim Yeomans

Wherever you go, go with all your heart. --ATB 2009, 8 km

These things are sent to try us. --Mary Burgess

This too, shall pass. --Zacharias Women

Life is mostly froth and bubbles. Two things stand like stone:
Kindness in another's troubles,
Courage in your own. --Adam Lindsay Gordon

Perspective

The truly magical part about all of this is that our little piece of the world is really a small niche, if you put it all into perspective. We are small creatures in a really large place. So when it seems as though you are truly the most important being that ever was, that will ever be, I think it is important to ground yourself. Look up at the moon. Remember it was the same moon that Shakespeare saw, the same one that Ghandi saw, the same one that your grandkids will see. We are all intricately tied to one another, past, present, and future. Everytime you go away, you leave a little piece of yourself behind.

Adventures Abound

Thursday, February 2, 2012

The Amber Valletta Project

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