Italian night.... with a twist

Facebook. I have a love-hate relationship with it. When it's not bombarding me with ads or winding me up with fake news, ignorant and discriminatory re-posts and commentaries,  I find myself grateful for connection to loved ones far away, new recipes or life hacks. <sigh>

This week I was inspired and motivated by a lady who turned her focaccia's into beautiful works of art. All edible!  I tried my hand at one and out of it was born Italian date night with Mark.

Fresh homemade bread and spaghetti al dente. (Raise your hand if you DON'T think you were Italian in a past life?!)

Im sure there was an Italian desert that I could have whipped up, but the truth is, there was a small bunch of browning bananas on the counter. If they didn't end their lives as banana bread tonight, they would have been fruit fly utopia by tomorrow! 

One of the positive outcomes of COVID quarantine is small changes in behavior, don't you think? Like not wasting food.

And then the Pandemic Tears came

Monday morning. I made the mistake of starting my day, my week off by rolling over in bed and reaching for my cellphone. A "what's new with the world?" type check-in, while sipping coffee.

I've been slowly working up to a resilience toward Facebook posts that are divisive, negative, political or even COVID-19 newsy. That in itself took 6+ weeks.

Today I turned attention to an eclectic array of articles. News, public interest, Youtube travel vlogs and viral tidbits.

Then I realized I had not worked up a resilience to the changes in our world since a pandemic was unleashed, but rather I had compartmentalized it along with all the associated emotions.

All of a sudden, watching sweet and inspiring clips, I cried. Large tears of grief, sadness, fear, loss. Deep and soulful. Longing for life as it used to be.

Prepare yourself. The following videos bring it home, fast.

Hugs. Social contact and physical contact in general. GONE. If they're not in your bubble, it is frowned upon to hug a friend, grandparent, neighbor, mentor, kid with a booboo... anyone.

Handshakes are gone too.  Smiles are hidden under masks. In essence, gone because what is a smile if you can't see it, share it, catch it?

Eye contact, while not forbidden, seems to be missing in a big way when people are afraid of people.

COVID-19 has stolen contact with others from me and nothing makes that more obvious than watching a movie/documentary made not that long ago, that is filled with contact. Humans have always shown care to another by holding a hand, giving a hug, placing a hand on a shoulder.

With every interaction, Michelle Obama reaches out to touch a person. It's a beautiful, comforting, connecting thing... that I'm sorry to say, makes me cringe right now. I have (sadly) been reprogrammed!

Have you met Kara and Nate?
Mark and I have been Kara and Nate vlog followers since early 2018. This young Tennessee couple set the audacious goal of visiting 100 countries in a year of travel and began that journey in 2016.

One year morphed into 4 years and until 2 months ago, they were uploading 5 minute videos to Youtube about their traveling and destination adventures on a regular basis. 100+ countries and 7 continents later... I was hooked. (Me and a million other people!)

Kara and Nate fled the Philippines just before it locked down  all airports. They spent 3 weeks living in a hotel in Singapore before making the hard decision to come home. The video above documents the journey. Travel in times of COVID is sobering.

COVID-19 has stolen our freedom to roam. The ability to eat street food and investigate new places. But for me the tears rolled as I watched footage of airports - empty. Lifeless. There is a special place in my heart for airports and for me, this was like watching an old friend get sick and suffer.


For Kara and Nate the nomad life is on hold, indefinitely. I'm sad for them, but I'm sad for the rest of us, living vicariously through them too. If you, yourself can't travel, then watching someone else muddle through a border-crossing, make language and currency faux pas and simultaneously have their time of their life, is the next best thing.

The grief and anxiety of not knowing when it will be a possibility again and whether other countries will welcome us or shun is complex.

I am wondering whether we will know when travel is less (COVID-19) dangerous to ourselves or another country?  Will not traveling at all be just as damaging to the wanderlust of our souls and the struggling economies of our international friends.

Perhaps I also grieve because there are no answers, there are no solutions right now.  

Vacation inside a Pandemic Staycation

Who's on vacation? I am, in a way. Stay-cation is more appropriate, I guess... but none-the-less, work is slow, I get up later than normal each morning and I do more "me" projects than things that result in income. This is the kinda life I have on vacation!

After 8 weeks of this stay-cation though... I'm starting to lose my mind. I miss socializing with friends and clients, I miss meals out, I love my house but wish my life had wider boundaries. My wings need to be stretched!!!

So..... Mark and I took a road trip of sorts this weekend. A vacation from our stay-cation. We ventured into another county. We drove the highway and passed through a town that wasn't Boulder. Oh my!

Welcome to Red Feather Lakes. A quirky little part of northern Colorado, where the high plains meet the foothills and rolling ground is the base for beautiful, colorful granite formations, looming pine trees and groves of aspen trees. Pine cones litter the ground...and there are swamps - black and oily looking. Every open meadow features at least one seasonal stream, flowing melted snow downhill to somewhere else.

Birds were singing. Chipmunks dashing. Squirrels barking up high.

At the Lady Moon trailhead the parking lot was full, the toilets were closed until further notice and no-one was wearing a mask. Hello vacation from what has become normal COVID life!

Once out on the trail, there was barely a soul to be seen and we actually enjoyed running across two ladies, out for a horse ride together.


We stopped for not one, but two picnics and enjoyed 5.8 miles of bliss the Colorado great outdoors.

The Isolation Bakery is still cranking

Ok, I admit to feeling a bit flat today.
I guess sometimes you just have to wait for it to pass and in the meantime, keeping truckin' along.

Im super grateful for Mark. His upbeat attitude and go-with-the-flow nature is often what I rely on during our days in isolation together. And sometimes outside of isolation too.

And kitty cat...

Of course, baked goods and desserts help too. I'm not one of those people who feels guilty about putting sugar and other empty carbs in my mouth.

To everything - turn, turn, turn

There is a season - turn, turn, turn

And a time to every purpose under heaven

Date night @ The Isolation Cafe

Keeping it fresh and exciting... trying to, at least.

We normally did date night about once a week, pre-COVID. Staying home and spending quality time together started off easy when self isolation was new - in mid March! But as the weeks progressed, with both of us home all day anyway, that urge to get creative, put in effort for an evening together, did somewhat diminish.

I felt it wouldn't be long before I'd still be in last night's PJ's, defrosting chicken soup and offering up one more episode of Ozark, for date night.  C'mon... tell me I'm the only one?!

Two weeks ago we mixed it up and went camping in the back yard.  Easter Friday... pizza delivery outside and a bit of a fight to keep the cat from taking over the tent.

But we giggled and watched Netflix on the iPad until falling asleep under a 4 season down comforter... until 4:30 am. Yep, the ground was cold.  And another winter storm was on its way too. We found ourselves watching the news on the sofa indoors by 5 am. Still cuddled up under the comforter, mugs of coffee in hand.

This weekend we went in another direction.  A nice dinner in. Me in my little black dress, Mark wearing nice pants and a button down shirt.  Hair, makeup, even heels on! We had a candlelight dinner and bottle of bubbly Martinelli's.

I made stroganoff and strawberry rhubarb pie and he braved the supermarket for ice cream.

Creating memories during COVID-19.  Making the most of all we have to be grateful for.  Laughing at our wee efforts to keep things interesting.

Last weekend we had a 'game night'. Quite the tournament! We dragged the cornhole game into the back yard and, supervised by the cat, proceeded to enjoy grass under foot and late afternoon sunshine.

Im a good loser!

It doesn't have to be just another Groundhog Day, after all.