Crap! I'm old.

I remember when I was in my last year of high school doing the mental math to see how old I'd be in 2000 and thinking, "damn, I'll be really old." I also remember how ancient I thought my dad was on his 40th birthday. Sorry dad, I was 15, what can I say? If it's any consolation, it seems that the older I get, the less ancient you seem to be to me.
So I turned 40 yesterday. I'm having a little trouble with this. I mean, I still get IDed on a fairly regular basis and the ladies at Safeway still call me "miss", so WTF? Oh well, I guess I'll get used to it in time to turn 50. I refuse to even discuss that inevitability. Lalalalalalalalala I can't hear you!
But, dispite the number, it was a really good birthday. I was taken out for delicious meals, given yarn, sent flowers and just generally spoilt rotten. I loved it. Today is a bit sucky. What with the having to make my own food and all.
These are flowers my dad sent:


Aren't they pretty? And those are pussywillows! How cool is that? Thanks dad!
And my SP sent me a birthday parcel too. It's all made locally in her area. There's a very pretty tealight holder (that will be very handy when our power goes out again), some yummy apricot jam, chocolate dipped orange rind, some jasmine soap, and chocolate crackling elves. The elves are chocolate filled with pop rocks. They amuse me no end. Must find more, everyone I know needs to have some of these. If you can eat them without grinning, there's something wrong with you.
Thanks for the super pressie SP! You have excellent timing.


The travelogue continues with our short stop in Pisa before we boarded the cruise ship. We only had 45minutes in Pisa and sadly, it wasn't long enough for us to go up the leaning tower. But we walked around it and the Duomo and Baptistry as well. When you round the stone wall that surrounds Pisa this is what you see:


It's incredibly beautiful. I was really surprised at the size of the tower. I had always thought it was huge, but as you can see, it's not that tall. Still impressive and will last now that they've reinforced and shored it up. Hopefully we'll make it back there to climb the tower someday.
That was our last day in Italy and I have a fun fact: apparently, you cannot buy Dante in italian in Italy. I went in almost every bookstore we found and no go. We found Dante in spanish, german and english, but no italian. Figure that one out.