Blaire from San Francisco for a day...

Q and I were walking to the train station this morning when a handsome Italian man started calling out "Blaire!". We turned when we heard him call out, but no Blaire appeared. We were at a crosswalk and the man ran up to me and gave me a bear hug and said "Blaire from San Francisco!"

I tried to tell him I wasn't Blaire. He eventually understood and tried to apologize in English. Q asked me why I looked "that way". I said that I was just wishing I could be Blaire from San Francisco for a day!

she realized...

She realized she loved this man because every beat of her heart reminded her of him.

90 percent...

I think a good rule of thumb is to listen 90 percent of the time and talk only 10 percent. You can learn a great deal about a person by simply listening.

if you are a hammer...

I was thinking recently about a saying my brother told me awhile back. He said that if you are a hammer, all you see is a nail. The longer I live, the more I think this is true.

A relaxing day in the best sense...

Had a relaxing day. Slept in (for me that's 7a.m.), ate way too much good food, did laundry, took a nap and read "Walden" again. My favorite quote: "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discovered that I had not lived." --Henry David Thoreau.

Tomorrow will be power sight seeing--Vatican City followed by the Colosseum. I am looking forward to seeing these sights, but today was a slow day, in the best sense. Life is good.

Angels watch over children and fools...

The theme for the day: "Angels watch over children and fools" (emphasis on fools). We took the train and exited what we thought would be the stop by our hotel. We began walking, following the directions we had. After 1 hour we were still searching for the hotel. The area was old and beautiful with winding streets but no street signs. Our phones had died so all we had was our paper map.

It was starting to get dark and we began to panic as we tried to find a main street to ask someone for directions. We came across a lawn mower repair shop and asked the owner if he could direct us to our hotel. He spoke very little English so we pointed to the map. He looked quizzically at us and asked, "How you get here?" We explained that we had taken the train several hours before.

He told us we were at least 10 miles from the hotel. We asked if he could help us get a cab. He replied, "I take you." He loaded up our luggage in his car and drove us 30 minutes away. Turned out we had gotten out at the wrong train station! When we arrived we asked him if we could pay him or take him out to eat. He declined and said, "No, no. Welcome to Berlin" and hugged us.

Angels watch over children and fools...