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Sunday, August 29, 2021
Alanis Morissette Show, upcoming travel and more
Look at me updating on a Sunday. Had a little bit of extra time so I figured why not try and get that out of the way :)
Another busy week last week but then when isn't it lately? Nothing really too out of the ordinary besides work. Had an orthodontist appointment Thursday late afternoon but that was about it.
Yesterday, Saturday, we had lunch at Rizzuto's in Westport and then at night we went to the Xfinity Theater in Hartford to see Alanis Morissette. It was the 25 Year Anniversary of Jagged Little Pill tour. Well 26 years now because the show was really supposed to be last year but being 2020 it was of course cancelled. Garbage opened for them and it was a really fun show all around. We also got super lucky 'cause as we were driving to the venue and were getting ready to get into the lane towards the general parking when someone in the car next to us yelled over to us that they had an extra VIP Parking Pass (usually $40) and handed it to us. So we got to park in the VIP section which is super close to the entrance and also made leaving the venue a whole lot easier. Although when we were leaving it started to drizzle and then turned into full blown rain which did not make the ride home much fun but the show itself was great. We got there early and were able to get some drinks and food beforehand. Also ran into a colleague from work which was fun.
Today we are just chilling mostly. Slept in since we didn't get home till after midnight. I looked at some of my work stuff to try and organize things for when I am away. Can't believe I will be on a plane in less than a week now (I leave Friday night) Going to head to lunch in a bit and might run a couple of errands and eventually binge a few more shows. We have been watching "The Expanse" on Amazon Prime and "Turn" on Netflix.
Other than that just been trying to get ready for my travels. I ended up pretty much cancelling the UK portion of my trip. I do still fly through London but it is really just a transit. It's too bad but is what it is, you know. I will have 1 night in a hotel at Heathrow on the way there, on the way back I just have a pretty long layover at Heathrow so all should work out ok hopefully. Need to still organize my Covid tests and all the other paperwork that is required by the UK and Austria for entry. Traveling sure isn't simple these days.
Mail Update: Received a letter from/owe a response to: Carmen/Malta, Celia/MA, Nina/WA, Tiffany/OK and Kimber/Canada.
Posted by Hanna at 11:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tuesday, August 24, 2021
Still busy ... Henri and more
Happy Tuesday. Yeah running behind with everything as usual. Let's see if I can get this update in real quick before having to go into the office. As usual I meant to get up early but yeah didn't really pan out that way. One of these days I will catch up with my sleep. Right? Right? :) Well anyway, nothing all that much new really. This past weekend, Sunday/Monday, we had storm Henri pass through. The forecast kept changing all over the place on where it would actually make landfall and where the most impact would be. For a while they were saying that it would actually come over Danbury as a category 1 hurricane. It did not end up working out that way - thankfully - but we did still get a ton of rain. It rained from late Saturday night through pretty much Monday night I think. Not too bad on the wind part though so besides flooding there luckily weren't too many issues. Not complaining. Today it looks to be sunny out this morning. Kind of nice to see the sun and right now it's still relatively cool but I know it will get hot and muggy. Supposed to be in the high 80ies up to low-mid 90ies for the next few days again, with high humidity. UGH.
Anyway, that's all for my complaints about the weather. Saturday night was actually pretty nice. We had lunch at Rizzuto's in Westport and later went to our friends Maryellen and Rich's house. They invited us over for a BBQ. It was one of those things that had been planned for ages but just never worked out for one reason or another. Got to swim in their lovely pool. And Maryellen of course had tons and tons of food. She is one of those Italian mothers who needs to always feed you. :)
Sunday, we didn't really do much. Just had brunch locally at Marketplace, hung out, watched some TV, etc. I am still working on my travel plans. For the most part the UK is out of my plans at this point. I still need to fly to London since I booked the Jet Blue flight to Heathrow but will then continue on from there after a quick stop over. I rebooked my British Airways flights to Austrian Airlines after BA kept changing and cancelling my flights and nothing worked out right anymore with the schedule. All in all not so bad. There's one flight where I only ended up getting a voucher and not a refund but it's good till 2023 so hopefully I will be able to use it at one point.
So yeah, that's all for now. This upcoming weekend we have a very busy weekend. Hopefully the weather cooperates. On Saturday we are seeing Alanis Morissette at the Xfinity Theater in Hartford and on Sunday we have a pizza walking tour in New Haven. So all that should be fun. Busy but fun.
Mail Update: Received a letter from/owe a response to: Carmen/Malta, Celia/MA, Nina/WA, Tiffany/OK and Kimber/Canada.
Posted by Hanna at 06:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tuesday, August 17, 2021
Hopkins Inn Lunch ... and general business & craziness
Running behind again with my updating. Last night when I meant to update I was just kind of burned out. It was a long Monday and work is just really kicking my butt at the moment. I meant to get up early today to get a headstart on things and even had the alarm set for 5.30 but yeah it didn't really work out that way. I lingered in bed for way too long and just dragged when I really needed to get a move on. Ugh, I really do need a reset. I do have a vacation coming up in less than three weeks but even that is kind of stressing me out at the moment. Yes, go figure. lol. Back in May I booked a roundtrip flight to London when Jet Blue announced their new route and had a great sale on tickets. My thought process was that I could spend a few days with my friend Nicola in the UK before heading to Austria to see my mom. Well, all that sounds like a great plan in theory on paper but what I didn't calculate into the deal was that instead of getting better everything has gone a bit crazy again with the new variant of the virus. Travel restrictions and rules, testing, it's all super complicated and also expensive. The UK does let you in if you are fully vaccinated coming from the US now, without having to quarantine. BUT you still have to take a day 2 test ($$$) and then I also need a test to leave the country again and to get to Austria which has to be a PCR test no older than 72 hours. Those seem to be difficult to come by unless you are in a metro area because everything else is mail-in tests where you do the test at home and then mail the sample to a lab and get results. Anyway they do have relatively quick rapid tests at Heathrow but for a good amount of money ($150-$200). So I am trying to figure out what I am actually going to do. I really do want to see my friend and we had made such fun plans already. Go hang out at a winery, have afternoon tea, go to Brighton for the day, more tea & cake and whatnot. So yeah, just trying to decide. The only other way out of it would be to rebook my London-Vienna flight and go on to Vienna the same day I arrive in the UK (pretty much what I am doing on the way back) Because rebooking to a flight straight to Vienna would mean that I would have to cancel both my Jet Blue and British Airways flights - they are cancelable but you only receive a travel voucher/credit back and not an actual refund. So I would have to pay for an entire new set of tickets and booking with relatively short notice, not sure if that's the best of ideas either. Also the other fun thing is coming from the UK you are currently required to quarantine when entering Austria. There are some exceptions such as extenuating personal circumstances in the immediate family/births/deaths/health of a family members etc. So my aunt is going to work on getting me a letter in regards to my mom's health and the reason for my visit which should hopefully do it.
So anyway, besides the work stuff .. which I won't bore you with (basically it's really busy, we are short staffed and no matter what we do, hiring new people, it just never seems to help us because every time we solve a problem something else seems to happen) .. I just feel generally burned out and tired at the moment. I know it will get better and all this will be a distant memory at one point but right now it's just hard. But yeah, one day at a time, that's what I have to keep telling myself. If I didn't have all my personal stuff in the back of my mind (my mom, the upcoming trip, all the travel nonsense) it would be easier to manage I guess but well it is what it is.
The weekend was nice though. Most of last week was a crazy heat wave and by the weekend I was really over it. Saturday was still pretty hot but by Saturday evening it was much better and felt nice to have a nice cooler breeze and Sunday was absolutely beautiful. We went to see "Free Guy" in the theater (fun!) and then went for a lovely lunch at the Hopkins Inn - the most beautiful spot, lunch on a big terrace overlooking Lake Waramaug. Delicious food and the most wonderful weather and scenery. It was a nice break from all the craziness even if it only lasted for a few hours.
Mail Update: Received a letter from/owe a response to: Carmen/Malta, Celia/MA, Nina/WA, Tiffany/OK and Kimber/Canada.
Posted by Hanna at 07:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tuesday, August 10, 2021
First concert since the before times, weekend stuff and more
Meant to update last night, my usual Monday update. But the day just ended up getting away from me so here we are Tuesday morning. Oh well.
Had a busy week last week but then what week is not busy these days? We had the concert on Wednesday night in the city at Citifield which was a lot of fun. It felt pretty crazy to be at a stadium concert with that many people. But it was definitely a lot of fun. So much energy, crazy. Fall Out Boy ended up having to cancel their appearance due to a positive Covid test within their organization, guess that's how things go these days. The Interrupters, Wheezer and Green Day all extended their sets so it was still an amazing time. Green Day kills me every time, they are just born performers. And it's crazy to think how long they have been around now. Makes me feel old. lol. Anyway we had a great time and even though we didn't get home till 1am it was well worth it. I did have the foresight to take off Thursday morning so I didn't have to log on till 11am which worked out well.
The weekend was relatively ok weather wise but definitely on the humid side. Saturday we just went to Rizzuto's for lunch. Sunday we went for a short walk around Wooster Cemetery and by the end you could definitely feel the humidity even though we hardly did anything super strenuous. Afterwards we headed to the Marketplace in Litchfield for brunch and then stopped at Miranda Vineyard for a bit. When we got to Miranda the clouds had actually given way to some sun so it was pretty hot sitting outside but we still had a nice time nonetheless. Watched a couple movies when we got home (Troop Zero and Gunpowder Milkshake) before calling it a night. Was dragging all day Monday and hoped I could reset myself by going to bed relatively early Monday night but yeah still pretty much dead tired this morning. Hopefully I will snap out of it at one point.
I think it's just the non stop business at work that is starting to catch up with me but there isn't really much to be done but to power through it. I do have a vacation coming up in less than a month (heading to the UK for a few days to see my friend Nicola and then on to Austria to see my mom for a week and a half - barring any Covid related travel problems - everybody cross your fingers for me please)
Mail Update: Received a letter from/owe a response to: Carmen/Malta, Celia/MA, Nina/WA, Tiffany/OK and Kimber/Canada.
Posted by Hanna at 06:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Monday, August 02, 2021
Wave Hill
And yes here we are again, Monday night. And it's August. I feel like I have been wishing the summer away between being so busy at work and half the time the weather being either super hot, humid, raining or all of the above. We haven't had a lot of great weather this summer so far.
Can't complain too much about the weekend. Saturday was a really nice day weather wise. We went to Wave Hill in the Bronx. Been meaning to go there for ages when we used to see posters for it on Metro North on the train. Anyway it was a pretty place and we walked all around and checked out the different areas, plants, flowers and views. When we were done there we went to Rizzuto's in Westport. Traffic was horrible but we did eventually make it.
Sunday we went to the movies and saw "Jungle Cruise" which was a fun and entertaining movie. After the movies we had lunch at Newsylum Brewery in Newtown which we had been meaning to check out for ages as well. Delicious pizza and they had Citizen cider on draft as well so that worked out. Afterwards we stopped at Rosy's for a bit where we met up with John. And eventually caught up on some TV and movie stuff at home.
Watched a few movies over these past days. "Tomorrow's War" (meh), "SAS Red Notice" (not super impressed), "Jungle Cruise" (fun & easy watch) and "My Spy" (cute funny movie) and also finished my re-read of "Echo in the Bone". Now I just have "Written in my Own Heart's Blood" to read before the new one in the Outlander series comes out in November.
Had another new person start at work today. In the office tomorrow too, then Wednesday and Thursday I am working 1/2 days. We have tickets to a concert at Citi Field in NYC Wednesday night. Green Day, Fall Out Boy, Wheezer and the Interrupters. Should be a great show. It's been ages since we have been to a concert. I am a bit freaked out with the whole Delta variant thing going around but at least it is an outdoor show and I am fully vaccinated so I guess I will take the risk. I am looking at it as a calculated risk.
Mail Update: Received a letter from/owe a response to: Carmen/Malta, Celia/MA, Nina/WA, Tiffany/OK and Kimber/Canada.
Posted by Hanna at 08:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)