Las Vegas, and FarmVille

We headed out to Las Vegas last weekend and met up with all kinds of friends!

Ron Malnar & Jamie were flying in from Chicago, and Tom & Maggie Dupart flew from Detroit.  Both guys are high school friends of Rick's.  We all met at the Golden Nuggett in downtown Las Vegas.  While we have gone there on some previous trips, we never stayed there.  It was a fun and different way to enjoy the city. 

Number 1, it costs less there.  We stayed in the new Rush Tower at the Golden Nuggett.  

2nd, the casinos are very close together so we could walk around to several of them.  

We drank more than a few $2.00 Corona's.   Ate more than we should, and, the lucky ones came home "almost even".  

On Friday night we did go down to The Strip to see Cirque du Soleil's "Beatles Love".  The music and sound system was incredible.  What great music those Beatles created!  The Cirque's acrobats sure are amazing.

On Saturday Rick's nephew's Jeff and Joe came to meet us.  And then so did Jeff Johnson, whom we have not seen in many years.  (Although we saw his parents last October in Chicago.)  Jeff is attending UNLV.   All 9 of us went out for dinner that evening. One of the funniest parts of dinner was when several of us started discussing our FarmVille Farms!  (more on that later.)  Julian would be proud!

Sunday morning meant the others had to fly back home.  Rick and I hung around till Monday when we went to visit his former Ford co-worker Ray and his wife Sharon who have retired in Las Vegas.  They took us for a short drive to the Red Rock mountains.  Whew.... the wind was really blowing and the temp was only 40!  We didn't stay out of the car long.  I don't think Sharon got out at all!

Crazy Ray!  Still fun.  Cooked us a great dinner too!  It turns out we have all been cris-crossing vacations around California and so we've made plans to get them out to San Diego, and maybe even meet up in San Francisco in April.

Oh, and Ray, well he has 2 or 3 farms on FarmVille.  And his grand-daughter has 10!  I guess Julian should have a job for awhile!

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North County San Diego Italian Language Meet-up Group

Last Summer, in an effort to find people to learn Italian with, I found a Meet-up Group online for "Italian Speakers".  In fact, I found a couple.  But they were down in San Diego, a 45 mile drive and we just didn't get down there.  We love going to San Diego's "Little Italy" but again we don't go into the city often.  Then I found a Meet-up group in North San Diego County!  And we haven't looked back.

We have met many fun and interesting people. I think about 1/3 are Italians now living here, 1/3 are Americans who have lived in Italy a year or more, and the other 1/3 like Rick and I: love Italy and want to learn the language.

We meet for dinner at an Italian restaurant every-other-Monday in Encinitas (still a half-hour drive).  The group just started last Spring with about 4 people, then maybe 15 when we started going in the Summer and now: over 100!

We often have parties at homes, and darn, with busy days we had in December including Rome and Christmas, I forgot to post that Rick and I hosted a "Festa di Natale" for our group.

Oh, there was so much food!  I'll have to go find some photos to post.

Last month Stephanie held an "Italian Movie Night" while her Italian boyfriend Cippi was here visiting.  Yesterday Nino & Susan had many of us over for a "Cherimoya Tasting Festival/Individual Guacamole Contest".  As typical, a "few" bottles of wine were involved.
Susan with Cherimoya Ice Cream:

Jodi is also a group member and she teaches Italian.  Rick and I took her class last Fall, and I'm starting another this week.  We are improving but slowly slowly.  It's still fun.  We have been listening to a variety of Italian language cd's since last May when Carolyn bought me "Fodors Italian for Travelers" cd's for my birthday.  We listen while home, walking, driving, when ever we can.  In fact, a Pimsleur lesson is running on this laptop as I type.

Rick and I are getting very excited for our Spring return to Italy.  Several Simionis have invited us to their towns to show us around.  Brother and sister, Mattia and Elisa, live right in Rick's father, Desiderio's, boyhood home Castelfranco.  We have not found any direct relatives yet, but I don't doubt we are all cousins!

We have also been invited to a Simioni wedding in Italy on May 1st!  So, we are moving our trip up to late April so we can be there for that.  Our plan is to fly to Venice and spend a week or 10 days in Veneto which is where most Simionis live.  Then head over towards Milan and the lakes area for a few more Simionis.  

Somewhere is this Simioni family is the groom-to-be, Diego:

Then we'll move down to Florence and Bologna for more typical touristy travel.  Cippi lives in Bologna so we hope to meet up with him. Another person in our Meet-up Group is going to Florence in a few weeks and is staying for 3 months.  This will be the 3rd year she and her husband are doing that.  We should over-lap a few days and now are planning to meet up with them there!

OK...  I'd better listen closer to these Italian lessons so I can chat with all the "Simioni del Mondo"!

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