The Land of Giants

My husband and I took my younger son, G, to the local amusement park this week. We would have taken my older son, too, but at age 14 he is way too cool to be caught dead outside of the house with his parents. So just the three of us headed out to Miragica, which claims to be "the land of giants." Didn't see any giants or anything even very large there (besides the rides), but I guess these places need a theme.

I love all the crazy rides and willingly stood in long, hot lines for 30 seconds of wild hysteria.

Long, hot and SWEATY lines . . .

Around and around, up and down

No ride is too crazy for me, I'm up for it all.

Even the ones G was terrified to try - like the Tower

 - 47 meters straight up and 47 meters free fall, whoo hoo! We went this one alone.

We also caught 3 shows over 2 days. You see, if you pay for one day, the second day is free. What that means, is that whether you are up to it or not, you feel obliged to go again the next day. Because you already paid for it, right?

The shows were worth it, though. Russian dancers, acrobats and contortionists . . . pretty heady stuff for this small provincial city!

She was good!

By the end of the second day, all I could handle was a gentle ride on the merry-go-round. 

While, in the meantime, G had overcome his fear of the scary rides and decided to ride the roller-coaster as many times in a row as physically possible. I think he did it six times! I did go with him the first two times, but lost my appetite for it after the second go when my hair got stuck in the safety bar and I couldn't get off the ride at the end. The ride operators extracted my locks and said it happens all the time.

What will I do when G is too cool to go with his parents to the amusement park? I'll have to borrow some little kids from someone for an excuse to go!

Do you LOL?

My son says LOL. He says it like it's a word. A real word. Not a sequence of letters, but a word that sounds like "loll" as in to laze around. But, he means "laugh out loud" from computer lingo. He says it when something is funny. So, sure, even I know what it means, but I had never heard anyone say it . . . out loud, you know?

Is this normal?

Do other kids say LOL? New words are being created every day, fair enough. They even have a special name: neologism. You know you're really an old fuddy duddy when the new words start bothering you. Eh?!! What's that you say?! Chimping? Don't monkeys do that?! Lapware? Isn't that a costume for doing that dirty dancing stuff?!

So, my question is this: is he the only one? Or is there a whole tidal wave of LOL happening out there in the real world that I just haven't noticed since I've been tucked away in this lost corner of southern Italy? Instead of actually laughing, do people just state "LOL"? Wikipedia tells me they do:

LOL, ROFL, and other initialisms have crossed from computer-mediated communication to face-to-face communication. David Crystal—likening the introduction of LOL, ROFL, and others into spoken language in magnitude to the revolution of Johannes Gutenberg's invention of movable type in the 15th century—states that this is "a brand new variety of language evolving", invented by young people within five years, that "extend[s] the range of the language, the expressiveness [and] the richness of the language".

The cool kids probably say BRB, too.

The really weird thing is that my son uses this expression in the middle of a conversation in Italian. He didn't even know what LOL meant a couple of months ago. It certainly doesn't make any sense in Italian. To say "laugh out loud" in the Italian language you'd have to say "ridere a voce alta," which as an acronym would be RVA! I guess it's not as catchy as LOL.

Logically LOL must be a verb . . . to laugh out loud is what it's got to be, but like all truly useful words, it has taken on a life of its own. Besides saying LOL in funny moments, my son tells me I'm so "LOL-y" or "extremely LOL."

Friends around the world - do you say LOL? 

Children's Theater Festival

Every summer a local theater group, Teatrermitage, sponsors a week-long children's theater festival called Ti Fiabo e Ti Racconto (difficult to translate, but something like "I'll Tell You a Fairy Tale"). We have been faithful attenders for the past eight years. The first three days of the program, called Le Strade Che Ridono (The Laughing Streets) features free shows held in the streets and piazzas around town. Then there are seven days of nightly performances held in an amphitheater. 

In the Laughing Streets part of the event, my younger son participated in a "dinner theater" where cooks prepared various dishes related to stories read aloud by an actor, and the children got to sample everything!

Of the main events we have seen Jack and the Beanstalk, La Freccia Azzurra (The Blue Arrow) and Sleeping Beauty. At the end of the week awards will be given to the best show and best actor or actress. 

Last night we saw a gorgeous production of Sleeping Beauty. The stage set was unique and versatile and the costumes were breathtaking. We all had a hard time following the dialogue (extremely fast bordering on incomprehensible), but decided that it was meant to be primarily a visual show. Here are a few rather out-of-focus photos taken on my smart phone . . .

This was our favorite so far, but with two more shows to go - who knows what surprises are in store for us?

Class of 2011

I have quite a few American friends nearby, which is a great thing. Because for all that it's neat and wonderful to live in a foreign country . . . it's also really nice to have people you can talk to in your own language and who share your cultural background.

Some of these good friends are spouses of Boeing employees who are working on a collaborative project with an Italian company in this area. Four of their children have finished high school this year. Two attended an international school and have actually graduated. The other two attended local Italian high schools and will not have confirmation of having earned their diplomas until they have passed a battery of examinations over the next few weeks.

In Italy graduations are conducted completely differently from in the US. There's no formal ceremony, no caps or gowns. So, these families wanted to give their kids a celebration similar to what they would have had, had they been graduating at home in the States. 

The graduates!

Sometimes I really hate being gluten-intolerant!

Sister love!

A friend sandwich . . . the best kind!

One of the fathers made this toast which I thought was quite nice and, although he said he was drawing on his engineering background, it sounded quite spiritual to me . . . 

We are all energy and we never end . . . so let's take over the world!

Social Photography, 2

I'm in about week 4 of my Social Photography course. (If you want some background on the course, click HERE for my previous post on it.) We are learning all about our cameras and how they work and, theoretically, how to take different kinds of photos. There's been a lot of talk with very little practice so far, which drives a practical sort of gal like me nuts. 

Great! I think during the lessons, it's all very clear! But when I try to take a photo, all the info we have heard about in class gets all mushed together in my brain and I have no clue as to how best to capture the moment. In fact, the moment passes while I'm fidgeting around pushing buttons, trying to calculate exposure, white balance, aperture . . .

We have had one photo assignment so far: to record a process. Our instructor assured us that the emphasis was to be on capturing a process and not on the beauty or technical perfection of the shots.

Here is my sequence of photos which capture a trip with my younger son to the mall to pick up the new Pokemon Black and White game for his Nintendo. This was rather a big deal because he had sold a bunch of old games to pay for this new one, and there was apparently a countdown on various media to the worldwide release of this game. All very exciting for the hardcore Pokemon fan, you can imagine.

Leaving the house

Setting the house alarm

Walking over to the car

Mommy driving - G took this shot, I haven't yet perfected the technique of photographing myself from behind!

Oops, detour! My car ran out of gas on the on-ramp to the highway and we had to walk off the highway and back into town because, of course, I had forgotten my cell phone at home. All this in high heels!

Our hero came to rescue us!

What a patient boy.

Arrival at the mall. Don't ask me WHY this photo is psychadelic, things happen . . .

Pokemon White, finally! Do not ask me WHY this photo is pink . . .

Safe at home enjoying his hard-earned game.

To tell you the truth, these photos are absolutely nothing special. The process was definitely captured, but I shot them all on automatic. Cheating? I don't know. I think I will need a lot of time to practice just shooting and shooting pictures while playing with my camera's multitude of settings to see what happens.

In the meantime, if I want to take quick pictures I'll stick to automatic or even my old compact camera.

Practical Applications of Math Concepts in the Real World

As my kids get older they are less and less attached to me. Not emotionally-speaking, I hope that will never change, but I'm talking actually physically attached. When they were little they were like two barnacles clinging to the Saretta ship as she navigated her way through the day. I used to have to pry them off of me by force, lock the bathroom door for a moment's privacy. 

Now that my first-born is 13 (and three-quarters!) I'm lucky if I get the occasional peck on the cheek, after begging for it. That kid who used to crawl into bed with us every blessed morning at around 5:30, max 6:00 a.m., and glom on for dear life has been mysteriously transformed into this alien creature who grunts a barely audible "ugh" as he passes by.

That's why I don't mind that my 11-year-old still wants me to lie down with him to cuddle and chat before he falls asleep. It's great that he still wants me around...I'll take it as long as it lasts. The problem now, though, is that he is almost the same size as me and we don't really have enough room in his single bed to both lie down comfortably.

The Thinker at Rest

Last night, after insisting that I stay IN the bed, not NEAR the bed, but IN the bed, and lots of wiggling around trying to get comfortable he suddenly said with a loud and exasperated tone,

"What I don't get is how someone like you, who is NOT FAT, no, I'd even say NORMAL, can take up 15/16ths of the bed!"

Can you tell they're studying fractions at school?

Children's Theater Festival

This is the 15th year that a local theater company, Teatrermitage, has put on a week-long children's film festival in our town. There are 7 nights of shows held in an outdoor amphitheater. A jury of children is selected each year with the important task of evaluating each production and choosing a festival winner. My younger son participated as a juror last year and it was quite an experience for him. He felt very important!

The festival is called Ti Fiabo e Ti Racconto. I have included a link to their website, but the information is all in Italian.

Last night we saw a lively and acrobatic version of Peter Pan.
Here Wendy is dancing with Peter's invisible shadow...

Pinocchio

During Pinocchio, the actors came down off the stage and ran through the crowd handing out paper donkey ears to all of the spectators.

The Laughing Streets

For three days before the shows competing for Best of Festival begin, various theatrical events are held in the streets and piazzas of the city. This part of the festival is called "Le Strade che Ridono" which means "The Laughing Streets."

One of these performances was a Greek couple with marvelous marionettes.