Today is August 24, 2010 and Joan and I are just four days from returning to Arizona. We have been here in Mezzegra for more than nine weeks and can’t believe it has gone by so fast. However after nine weeks we feel it will be good to get back home. I’m sure we have a massive pile of mail waiting for us, lots of junk, magazines, and, of course, bills. We are able to pay our bills on line so we should be up to date. I tease Joan about there being no Scottsdale Fashion Mall and no Nordstrom here so there should be no surprises when we get home.
As the weeks go by we have been doing less sightseeing and a little more lying around reading. We both enjoy this and don’t have too much guilt doing nothing. However we have had a few adventures to report. We recently took a walk from the rental down to the shore in Lenno (right beneath us) and continued to walk along the promenade to the hillside road leading to the beautiful Villa del Balbianello. This Villa is built on a beautiful point on the lake that can not be seen except from the lake itself even though it’s only about two kilometers from the our house. We had been out there a couple of years ago but had only walked in the gardens as the house tour was full. The villa grounds are immaculately cared for and the lawns look like they have been manicured with scissors. Great pride is taken by the permanent crew to have EVERYTHING perfect and it shows. As we approached the ticket kiosk the gentleman asked us if we were there for a tour. We said yes and he responded that an English tour was starting in two minutes. We paid our money and off we went. I don’t have the skill to describe the entire tour so I urge you to check out the website: www.faibalbianello@
Denis Ducey left after his stay with us and headed for Lucca, Pisa and the Italian Riviera and we were greeted by a massive amount of rain! Up until then the weather had changed from oppressively hot to very nice , in the low 80’s. While not unusual it was a little tiresome. One event we look forward to is the Lenno fireworks weekend where they are shot off right below us. The entire event was rained out and re-scheduled for Sepember 4th when we are safely back in Phoenix. I guess we can’t have everything so our way.
Last Saturday we welcomed Dr. Sven Becker and his two children to our home for the weekend. Sven is an oncologist gynecologist from Tubengen , Germany. And how did we meet him? He was our exchange student in Arizona back in 1984-1985! We have stayed in touch with him and his family all these years and have really enjoyed this relationship. He has delivered over 1500 babies in his career, but now specializes in surgery for women with cancer. One of his biggest accomplishments is authoring the definitive medical book in Germany on all types of female cancers. I asked him to bring a copy so I could see it. Unbelievable tome!!!! About seven hundred pages, complex text (all in German) and more than 400 sketches of the female anatomy. This book is considered the bible!!! He was going to give me the copy but I told him I just wanted to see it with his name on the cover and besides it had to weigh 20 lbs., is in German and would have been impossible to carry home. I think I’ll wait for the English version. By the way, the cost of the book? Over four hundred Euros, about $550 dollars. Needless to say we are very, very proud of Sven!! His wife, Graziella, stayed home so that she could study for finals as she pursues a degree on her own. The kids were fun and loved swimming in the pool. We went on walks, Joan fixed a great meal, and we had a great pizza meal down in Menaggio topped off by delicious gelato. It was fun reminicing about old times.
So as I said, we are wrapping up here, Dennis and Anna will stop by Friday night to pick up our unused food and we’ll be on a plane on Saturday morning heading for home. Dennis continues to fight cancer with chemo and will be getting some results in this fight this week. He looks great and is positive about the ultimate outcome. We leave from Milano, go to JFK, connect through Nashville and arrive in Phoenix 20 hours later. Thank God Joan was able to get us an upgrade into business class so it won’t be as painful as it could have been. I only hope I can find some pants that still fit me and not cut off circulation at the waist line. That’s it for now but I intend to have one more posting after we get home.
