The Duck Bar at Christmas

It's looking more and more like Christmas at the Bar Papaveri Papere (The Family Duck Bar to us) in Nicolosi, where my friends and I gather every Sunday morning. Not only do they have a big tree outside and beautiful pastries inside, but it even snowed today! Check out the chocolate Nativity cake and Yule log cakes above!

Etna Blowing Her Stack Tonight!

These photos were taken just moments ago, between 7:00-8:00 PM, September 4. My friend Kendra called me from her house to the east, on the coast, to ask if ashes were falling in my yard. She said it was raining ashes on her house from Etna. Luckily (for me), there is a strong, strong wind out of the west, so it's moving away from us in Nicolosi.

I went to Rob and Jacque's across the street and got these photos from their back patio. I don't have a great camera. Jacque's photos will be better. It's shooting several hundred meters high. Kendra reports the lava flow on her side of the volcano is growing and moving down the mountain. (She's not in danger, nor are we.) It's just so awesome . . . we were all ooohing and aaaaahing like the Fourth of July.

Arrivederci & buon fortunato, Mike!

About a year ago, Susan and I were at the Papaveri Papere bar here in Nicolosi one weekend morning and we noticed a blonde man who was obviously an American waiting politely for his turn. (That's how we knew he was American, along with his clothes, shoes, blonde hair, military haircut, stance, and no sunglasses.) When he finally turned around, Susan beckoned to him and we got him to come over and talk to us. This is how we met Mike Rice.

Soon Mike met our entire "breakfast club" and became a regular. Much to my surprise, he was here on active duty with the US Navy. The surprise was that he lived way up here on the volcano, at least 20-25 miles from his workplace. Most military members live much closer, most right on base. So, we knew he must be really okay if he chose to live up here with "the mountain people," as we civilians sometimes call ourselves.

We learned that Mike had joined the Navy late in life (we are not really sure why) and that he had been in for eleven years. He lived alone and had been working for twenty years or so restoring a 1967 pickup truck for a hobby. Yes, the government shipped it over here! I never actually saw this famous truck, but I heard a lot about it. A few months after meeting Mike, he announced that his girlfriend Ann, from the Phillipines, was coming for an extended visit. And so we had the pleasure of having Ann become part of our group during two extended stays here in Sicily. She even took care of Pete and Repeat for me this summer!

Throughout the year, Mike (and Ann when she was here) joined us on outings, eatings, and Sunday morning coffee club. Our favorite saying of Mike's followed another memorable meal at Lisa's: "Just another occasion to totally stuff myself!" And our favorite photo of Mike is Jacque with her hand on his suddenly gigantic belly after an eating extravaganza at Trattoria Incognito. (Usually he is not only very slim, but also very modest in his eating and drinking!)

Now, Mike is going to sail off into the sunset, literally. He has had more than enough of the Navy. He and Ann are going to the Pacific to find a nice island, far, far away from "civilization" and just live there, for as long they want. We hope it for happily every after. (Get settled and we will all join you to play Gilligan's Island!)

"A Big Scoop of Sicily"

"It's horns, Vespas, sunglasses even though the sun's not out, cigarettes, litter, family, and lots of strutting. It's a little kid wearing two shades of orange clothes and his dad with the same two shades on his cone. It's a guy who rides by with a cardboard license plate taped to his scooter and a micro fender-bender in the street and the Italian-style arm flapping that goes with it.


"It's a big scoop of Sicily."

These lines are the ending of an article entitled "Getting in Their Licks" by Joe Ray that appeared in the Boston Globe last week. "Sicilians have succeeded if you are one with the strawberry," he writes.

It is great to have the opinions of my friends and me validated in this article. It's now granita season again, and we are loving Sunday mornings at the bar/cafe with pistachio, almond, chocolate, lemon, coffee, and strawberry granita being offered right now. Later on in the summer, there will be mulberry (my personal favorite) and maybe peach. Only fresh ingredients are used, of course.

In the article, he talks about the entire "ice cream culture" of Sicily and its superiority to Naples and the rest of Italy. There are references to the pistachios of Bronte, just around Etna from us. He even names some of the best places for ice cream and granita in Sicily, but he doesn't know about the best place of all--Papaveri Papere--our bar of choice in Nicolosi, which has, by far, the best granita, pastries, hot chocolate, and barmen, all of whom have fun trying out their English on us. There is Leonardo (the artist), Michael (trying to get Kendra to let him drive her Audi), and two or three others who sometimes already have the cappucino on the bar before we order it!

This is the bar where we meet for what sometimes stretches in hours of fun and laughs, swapping outrageous stories of work and travel and Sicily and planning outings for fabulous food and sights. Ranging in age from early 30s to nearly 60, we are an unlikely group that has somehow become fast friends and support group. We pretty much all love granita and eating it for breakfast, like the Sicilians, is the greatest. How can you not like a country that does that?