First Day at Sea (5/3)

The first day at sea - very relaxing. While family members were good and went to the gym, I lounged by the pool and read. I was pretty excited to just be lounging and go through the books. I finished six on vacation and could have spent more time doing that. Granted, I didn't even kid myself by packing work out clothes, mainly because I didn't want to use any of my precious poundage on tennis shoes.

I don't know what land we were going between but there were some very pretty shots available - so, of course, I had to take advantage of that. Mom, Dad, Beth and Donald doing their own little pow wow. It was a little chilly - and you can see some action in the waves. It was very convenient to have the towels to use as blankets - maybe we were just wimps to need them.

So, this was the night Jen and I (Jen was nice enough to spoil me and I fully appreciated it) went and got a pedicure before our dinner. It felt so nice to just sit there and be pampered. However, I didn't need our lady telling me I look too old. The lines in my forehead shouldn't be there. She was very quick to point out where Jen needed to work on as well. So, over our makeup, she kept putting stuff on our face and telling us how to fix our issues. The whole time, Jen and I were keeping our thoughts to ourselves. I kept thinking that I have an extremely stressful job and live in a desert - I am going to have issues with the level of moisture in my skin and am doing good to only have some lines on my forehead. And I don't think they are that bad. Fortunately, we were both able to laugh at it and realize that she is just trying to sell product, but I do think she needs to work on her technique a bit. Isn't the saying that you can catch more flies with honey than vinegar (not that I want flies)? When we told Mom and Beth about that part of our treatments, they both wondered what would be pointed out for them if they were to go. But they didn't find out.

This was our first dress up night, the Welcome Gala Dinner. The menu was full of fungi (I don't like mushrooms):

Filetto di gallinella

(Moorhen fish filet served with ricotta cheese and lemon dressing)

Vitello al sale

(Veal meat with fresh salad, pecorina cheese and olive oil)

Insulatina di cous cous

(Cous Cous salad with braised vegetables)

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Crema di funghi

(Cream of mushroom soup with garlic croutons)

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Crespelle gratinate al funghi

(Oven au gratin crepes with mushroom stuffing)

Trofie al pesto

(Pasta with Pesto sauce)

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Francio di pesce spada

(Swordfish served with boiled potato, zucchini salad, dried tomatoes, olives, capers and basil oil)

Cosciotto di vitello al forno

(Oven baked leg of veal, served with natural gravy, fondant potato and vegetables)

L'anatra arrosto con salsa all'arancia

(Oven roasted duck served with orange sauce, caramelized red cabbage, carrots and potato croquettes)

Sfogliatina al ragu di asparagi e funghi

(Puff pastry triangle with asparagus and mushroom filling served on mushroom sauce)

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Insalata mista

(Assorted garden salads flavored with balsamic vinegar)

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Formaggi

(A selection of Italian and International cheeses

Gogonzola, Bel Paese, Fonal

served with walnut bread, grapes, dry fruit)

Obviously not my favorite night for food, but you can't win them all.