Favorite Posts

If you’ve just arrived, here are some of my favorite posts to get you started:

About Calabria:

• Maloccchio: Conquering the Italian Evil Eye One Plastic Red Horn at a Time
• Destination Calabria: Photo Tour of a Medieval Village in Southern Italy Parts I and II
• Into the Heart of Calabria: Benvenuti a Badolato: my village in a nutshell
• La Settimana Santa (Holy Week) in Calabria: celebrating one of the holiest times of year here
• The Lay of the Land in Calabria: explaining the physical set-up of my life in a medieval village
• The Meaning of (Calabrian) Life: what makes Calabrians tick
• My Great-Grandmother’s Village: Isca sull’Ionio: a tour of another ancestral town
• Sunday Scribblings: Superstitions: superstitions in Calabria
• Tuesday Morning Market in Calabria: Part I and Part II
• Also check out Scenes from Village Life and Life in Calabria categories

About me, expat life, the blog, and blogging:

• When Olive Trees Smile: How Living in My Ancestral Village Changed My Life
• 5 Ways to Increase Blog Traffic & Make Money With Your Blog
• A Blog By Any Other Name: how I came up with “Bleeding Espresso”
• Breaking Up Isn’t Hard to Do: My Decision to Leave the Law
• Dreaming about the Meaning of Life: sharing a rather philosophical dream
• The House of Violets: my path to Calabria was paved with violets . . . and destiny
• If You Know Me Well, You Know…: some fun facts about me
• In the Life of an Expat…: challenges and rewards of living abroad
• My Top 10 Realizations After Being “Home” for the First Time in Nearly Six Years
• Sunday Scribblings: Crush: fondly remembering a childhood crush
• Sunday Scribblings: Masks: the struggle of showing my real personality while learning Italian
• Why I Would Want to Live *There*: verbalizing the reason behind my living in Italy
• Love Thursday: William’s Orgasmic View Lives On: tribute to a friend
• You Say Goodbye, I Say Hello: my decision to move here was actually quite easy
• Also check out the Me Me Me category

About P:

• Amore Mio: finally a photo of my beloved P
• Conversations with P: my beloved being romantic and stuff
• How a Jean Jacket and Some Wind Can Change Your Life: how P and I met
• Love Thursday: Tokens of Love
• Love Thursday: Tomato Love
• Also check out the P category

About the pooches:

• Getting to Know Luna: a meme from Luna Balloona
• Most Popular Dog in Town: my efforts to keep Luna pure
• Puppy Eyes & Puppy Sighs: when the puppies first saw the world
• Love Thursday: A Mamma’s Love: all the babies in one post
• Stellaaaaaaaa!: a meme from Stella Bella
• Also check out the Puppy Love category

About my family:

• Bigs Gifts from Little Ones: presents from my niece and nephew in the States
• Ghost of Christmas Past (revisited): my childhood Christmases and my grandfather wearing bows
• A Grandmother’s Influence: a post about my Italian-American grandmother who helped raise me
• Signed, Sealed, Delivered: Happy Father’s Day!: a story about my daddy
• Sunday Scribblings: Wings: a tribute to my mom
• Also check out the Family category

Freelance Writing:

• Freelance Writing Week I (five posts!)
• Freelance Writing Week II (five posts!)

About Sicily:

• Touring Sicily: Messina
• Touring Sicily: Savoca (The Godfather village)
• Touring Sicily: Tindari’s Sanctuary of the Black Madonna
• Touring Sicily: The Ruins of Tindari
• Antica Focacceria San Francesco in Palermo
• Teatro Massimo in Palermo
• Palermo’s La Fontana della Vergogna/Fountain of Shame
• Quattro Canti in Palermo
• Palermo: La Porta Nuova
• Duomo in Palermo
• Palermo’s La Vucciria Market
• Gardens of Palermo: Villa Garibaldi & Villa Bonanno
• I Beati Paoli: Secret Society in Palermo, Sicily
• Capuchin Catacombs, Palermo, Sicily

About Italy and the Italian language:

• Claiming Italian Citizenship “Jure Sanguinis”: How I Became Legal in Italy
• Happy Befana!: celebrating the Epiphany in a uniquely Italian way
• Murder and Xenophobia: Troubled Times in Italy: the Meredith Kercher murder
• Sisterhood of the Impossible-to-Find Pants: the joys of shopping in Italy
• Top 5 Italian Words You Really Don’t Want to Mispronounce
• You Know You’re In Italy When…
• Also check out Uniquely Italian and Why Do They Do That categories

About food:

• Apples & Thyme: Celebrating Time in the Kitchen with Mothers & Grandmothers
• Eating Out in Calabria
• Ms Adventures in Italy’s Tour del Gelato Comes to Calabria
• Ode to the Peperoncino
• Top 10 Reasons Nutella is Better Than a Boyfriend
• A Word on Grappa
• Also check out the Food category and Recipes section.