Shira, Etc.

Nobody seems to understand what I do at work.  (And, honestly, a lot of what we do at work I don’t understand yet either).  But I thought I’d try to give you all a basic idea so that you’re not totally in the dark.

I work for a small computer programming company–small in the sense that there were three of us but one lady is having a baby next month, so she’s out on maternity leave.  Now it’s just me and the boss.  Our biggest project is the hotel/restaurant management software that Giuseppe (the boss) created a few years ago.  There are about 20 hotels/restaurants that use this online software (called Primohotel) to keep track of their reservations and monetary transactions.  (Click on Demo On Line to really get a handle on what the program does).

Primohotel is a fairly complicated program, and several hotels pay us to continually modify the program to meet their personal needs.  We use ASP and Visual Basic to create the dynamic webpages that make up the program.  At the Castello di Santa Vittoria, they use our program to manage everything–it keeps records of all of the accounting and tax information of every client, purveyor and transaction that comes into contact with the restaurant, agriturismo & hotel.

Another of our big projects (though I have barely begun to contribute) is the software that Torino’s Eataly uses to manage all of their transactions.  Eataly is new to Torino and reputedly one of the world’s largest food & wine markets.  They sell only high quality products (it’s not a place to go for your weekly shopping needs, but rather for a hard-to-find cheese or cured meat for a special dinner).  Inside the market there are several food corners where you can taste and enjoy products from 18 small artisan food producers as well as an elegant restaurant.  The store also organizes educational events & musical entertainment.  This week we’re creating the computer software needed to make gift certificates work.

We also create websites and the software needed to manage the sites’ extensive web of information.  I’ve had the most input on www.langheroero.it which we just finished completely redesigning.  (I made the Alba from Outer Space video…I know, it’s not very pretty, Google Earth has its limits).  Langheroero’s cicloturismo site, I created almost entirely by myself, with some help and advice from the boss.  (The site isn’t completely finished yet…still waiting for the final text, but you get the idea).  I also did www.castellodigrinzane.com almost completely by myself.

I’m also getting to be pretty good at making custom google maps:  this is my latest masterpiece.

We also created the software that all of the Osterie FuoriPorta use to handle their orders (the waiters have palm pilots).  This is our favorite place to go for pizza (my favorite is a personal creation: Burrata with Sausage and Rucola).

Some of the other sites we’ve done are:

www.turismodoc.it

www.holidaysol.it

www.hotellatour.it

www.acaweb.it/

www.liveraniautomotive.com

….and there are lots of others, but for the most part the work we do is for the hotel/restaurant industry.

I was going through my old journals today and found this random piece of text…

 “Take  my hand and be young with me; don’t rush; be a beginner; weave pearls in your hair; grow potatoes; light candles; keep the fire; dare to love someone; tell yourself the truth; stay inside the rapture.”

Today, millions of Jewish people around the world are celebrating Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.  I was wondering about the tradtions of this holiday and so did a little research…

Apparently there’s a trumpet made from a ram’s horn called shofar which is blown in traditional communities every morning of the month before Rosh Hashanah.  According to wikipedia, “the sound of the shofar is intended to awaken the listener from his or her ‘slumber’ and alert them to the coming judgment”. I wonder if Frances has one of these…

Like most religious holidays, there are special services and prayers that are recited, but during Rosh Hashana,there are also special poems (called piyyuttim), which I found interesting.

There are traditional greetings for this special day: “Shana Tova” (Hebrew for ‘A Good Year’) or “Shana Tova Umetukah” (‘A Good and Sweet Year’).

During the afternoon of the first day occurs the practice of tashlikh, in which prayers are recited near natural flowing water, and one’s sins are symbolically cast into the water. Many also have the custom to throw bread or pebbles into the water, to symbolize the “casting off” of sins.

And my favorite part–food!  Rosh Hashanah cuisine often includes apples and honey to symbolize a “sweet new year”. Various other foods with a symbolic meaning are served as well, depending on local custom.  Some of the more popular are:tongue or other meat from the head of an animal, or fish head (to symbolise the “head” of the year), dates, black-eyed beans, leeks, spinach, gourds, and pomegranates.  Often, round challah bread is served to symbolize the cycle of the year. (I love challah.  I remember when I was in culinary school I saved all the parchment paper that we baked challah on and used it for wrapping paper at Christmas-hotness!)  Epicurious has a mouth watering array of Rosh Hashana menus if any of you are interested in getting in on the festivities.

www.ritzybliss.com

Luca and I have been eating peaches like there’s no tomorrow.  Seriously, between the two of us, we probably consume on average 3 peaches every day.  They’re SO good right now.

The nine pumpkins I planted a few weeks ago are doing great!  This week I took down the protective tent (aka bedsheet) that I set up to give them a little cover from the hot Italian sun.  They’re growing like weeds!  Okay, so there aren’t actually any pumpkins yet, but the leaves are really big.

In other news, my Lancia is on the way out the door.  Luca has been doing loads of research on used cars (because personally I don’t have that much interest in doing used car research) and has almost decided which one we should get.  (I say “we” because, as sometimes occurs, he will probably be financing the initial purchase and I’ll pay him back in a few months).  The muffler on the lancia fell completely off last week.  And curiously enough, the insurance also expired.  So, we’re looking into a car that costs less in insurance, uses less gas and has a muffler. The most promising choice so far is a 1998 Ford Fiesta, metallic grey with 42,000km and both summer and winter wheels!  Ding.

I’ve been preparing lots of interesting things for dinner recently.  The other night I made Sarah Moulton’s Asian Steak Lettuce Wraps from her Weeknight Meals book.  They were so good.  I went foraging for mint for the wrap sauce after work, but couldn’t find any anywhere in Verduno!  (This baffles me because in Sinio I was practically the queen of finding wild mint).  So, I used basil instead and it was still great.

We’re going to the Aosta Valley for a week in August.  We’re staying at the Agriturismo Le Bonheur. Luca’s cousins go there every year and rave about it, so we thought we’d give it a go! 

I’m a little concerned about how my pumpkins will fare in my absence.  I’ll have to see if I can find someone to water them for me.  Maybe the Zio (those are his tomatoes above) would do it…The tomato crop this year is great.  No bug infestation like last year.  However, it’s a bad year for squash. (Figures!  Last year I planted tomatoes, this year I planted members of the squash family).

As you’ll notice in the picture, I installed tall stakes next to my plants.  A lot of people train their veggies to grow upward instead of outward to save space.  Since I only cleared about 3 feet of land, I figured I better do the same!

My green thumb must have really developed this winter, because I’m also  keeping FIVE grassy plants alive by our front door!  And four of them were Luca’s grandma’s plants that were left outside to die for three years and I miraculously managed to bring back to life.  One of the girls I worked with at AlbaBarolo gave me a beautious pink-flowered plant as a going away present.  It’s so cheerful!

One of the girls I worked with at AlbaBarolo gave me a pink-flowered plant as a going away present.  It’s so cheerful!

“Michael, I love you like a brother, but what’s with the $98 heart-shaped ice cream scoop?”

-From the article “Gadget junkie puts devices to the test” by Stacy Finz.  Appeared in the Wednesday, July 18, 2007 edition of the San Francisco Chronicle.