Sunday, February 5, 2012

Scenery, Scrabble, and...Snow?!

So according to Italian Meteoweb, temperatures in Malta might go down to -4 and -5°C and it might even snow somewhere between tomorrow afternoon and Tuesday morning. According to my research (ie googling it) it has snowed briefly in Malta (the latest being 1962) without the snow even touching the ground before melting. I just hope that if it does actually snow (or hail, which is common-ish here, happening about two or three times a winter), I'll be at home, not at work!


In other news, my boyfriend and I (J, as he shall be known) went out for some photography time. It ended up being too cold to take any, plus my shoes were SO not good for the rocky terrain we ended up choosing for our walk. So we went for a drive instead. Here comes (cell phone) pic-heaviness:

J took an HDR of this scene, I was too comfy in the car so I snapped a quick pic with my phone instead ;)

Then, we decided that we needed something warm to drink, so we drove to Mdina and walked around there and Rabat for a while before heading to Point de Vue for this:

Chocolate cake, green tea, THE best banoffee pie I have ever tasted, and Jamaican coffee.

Sooooo good! And inexpensive, which is always a plus. 
See, happy people :D

 Back to the car and off to J's house for some more green tea and a brilliant idea:

DIY footwarmer

Then to round up a pretty awesome day, I taught J how to play Scrabble. He was winning for a while, then skipped a few turns and I got the upper hand ;) Then I decided to play around with the tiles instead:

*insert heart symbol here, guys*

And now I'm in bed, wondering if it'll snow. Who knows, maybe Tuesday might end up being a snow day!

 

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Of pencils and sunsets...

Well, today I started off writing a blog post the old-fashioned way: pencil on regular, lined paper. Just when I was about to launch into the loveliness of the cathartic feeling of writing and erasing whatever you want to change, I realized something. There I was, alone on the upper deck of the Gozo ferry, just as the sun was about to set. I grabbed my camera and thought I'd catch some awesome picture of the pretty colours everyone says sunset makes.

Leaving Gozo, just before sunset

Yepp, as everyone says. Because until this evening I had never experienced the sun setting. This may seem weird since I live on an island which isn't as urban as smaller cities in bigger countries, but I just never was in the right place at the right time. I'd barely even know which way to look since my directional skills are near-crap and the only reason I'm sure that the sun rises in the east is because the east is the 'Land of the Rising Sun'. Yeah, I'm that bad.

But anyway, this time I was finally in the right place at the right time. Luckily for me, the upper deck area I was in was deserted, probably because it was too cold out for any sane person. So there I was, happily snapping away until I realized all this. There I was, watching the sunset alone, with the wind whipping around me, the waves crashing beneath me, and a light humming sound coming from the ferry itself. Just sitting there surrounded by nature was so peaceful, and I didn't experience that whole romantic-watching-the-sunset feeling at all. I just felt that that moment was mine, and no one else was experiencing it quite like I was. And I was happy. I've often felt that my life is too rushed, flitting from one thing to the next without much of a chance to gather my thoughts, so much so that at night I sometimes have to wonder whether I'd done anything for myself that day.

Today, allowing myself that moment of peace and letting my thoughts wander was my gift to myself. As cliche' as it sounds, I lived in the moment, and I've got to start doing that more often.

This was about the time I realized it was too windy to take any good pictures!