criplomats

We had a lovely afternoon today. We met up in San Telmo with John’s old friends from his Systematic days, Martin, his wife Rosario, Hernan, and his wife Sandra. We started out at the Museo Moderno, poked around the Sunday market at Dorrego Square, then sat down for a bit at the cozy restaurant at the Hilton Anselmo. It was fun to catch up on such a gorgeous day outside!

It was a busy week. John and I went to the Sofitel Hotel on Tuesday night to celebrate their 60th anniversary (we do a lot of business with them). It was fun to hob-nob a little bit. Yesterday I walked up to have lunch with Jenae at Cafe Mishiguene – she’ll be leaving Argentina next week. It was a nice bookend for me: we worked together on our first tour in Juarez.

John and I are enjoying Michael Douglas as “Franklin,” and we’re waiting anxiously each week for the next episode of “Presumed Innocent” to come out. And – don’t judge – but I enjoyed bingeing on a few episodes of “America’s Sweethearts: the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders”!

I finished “The Gate at the Stairs” (don’t recommend) and have started “Entitled,” by Kate Manne.

Here are our photos from the Sofitel event, walking down a hall of lights.

Due to a confluence of local and U.S. holidays, we only had one(!) work day this week! Even the work day was light, as most folks took the day off, leaving just a skeleton crew in the office. John and I spent our days mostly at home reading and watching a little TV – a good time to just recharge our batteries and also enjoy a rainy day or two.

I popped out yesterday morning for a fitting for a leather coat, then gassed up the cars (with everyone out of town, the wait for a pump was much shorter). Lea came over Friday morning for coffee. I had a good visit with Muffy on the phone one morning.

I finished (and enjoyed) “The Frozen River” by Ariel Lawho. I also read “The Mushroom at the End of the World.” Although a lot of it was over my head (OK, most of it), I did like Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing’s prose, and now I know a bit about the matsutake mushroom. I enjoyed the short novella, “Mrs. Caliban,” by Rachel Ingalls with its strange story and wry outlook. Yesterday, I started “A Gate at the Stairs” by Lorrie Moore.

John and I are almost finished with a very well done documentary about the Cold War, “Turning Point: The Bomb and the Cold War.” And we’ve started the remake of “Presumed Innocent.” We also watched the 1935 version of Dickens’ “A Tale of Two Cities,” after he read it this week.

Today is the ninth anniversary of Mom’s death – hard to believe.

Due to the safety doodads on the windows, I can’t open them to take a good sunset photo, so I’ve decided to start thinking about the beautiful view as a painting in the kitchen instead! The camera doesn’t do the colors justice and it’s always gorgeous to walk into the kitchen and see this view!

Today (Monday) is an Argentine holiday and I completely forgot to blog yesterday – oops! It was a pretty normal week. On Wednesday, the Embassy hosted a town hall for American citizens at the Ambassador’s residence, so I went to that. Saturday walked up to a new dermatologist for a facial and met Lea afterward for a glass of wine nearby. This morning, I drove up to Olivos and had book club brunch with Lea and Rachel at a cute place by the water.

John has us on a Queen Elizabeth I kick – we’ve watched a couple of different versions (Cate Blanchett, Margot Robbie), plus we’ve watched a couple about Mary Queen of Scots. I finished reading “Supercommunicators,” by Charles Dohigg and “We Need to Talk: How to Have Conversations that Matter” by Celeste Headlee. I’m currently engrossed in “The Frozen River.”

Sue let me know that Mom’s beloved cat Tiger died this week at the age of 14. I was very sad to hear it, as he was kind of the last tie to her. I’ll forever be able to hear her saying, “Oh honey! He’s so smart!” I’m grateful to cousins Ann and Sue for taking care of him since Mom died. It looks like he had a good life. This is the last photo Sue sent me of him.

We had a couple of weeks of pretty cold weather, but the high today is supposed to be 76, and 60s/70s next week! Boo – I was enjoying pulling out sweaters! I hope we get a return to cooler temps soon.

John, Lydia, Cesar and I reprised the Disco Cats trivia team Thursday after work – alas, we made a good showing but didn’t win! We had fun, though! Friday was an admin day without visa applicants to give us a much-needed day to catch up. At the end of the day, we walked over to the Ambassador’s residence for our semi-annual awards ceremony.

Saturday I picked up a leather jacket I had made at Silvia y Mario’s (cute!), then walked up to meet Lea for lunch at Mero. John and I finished rewatching “Wolf Hall” (so good!) and I finished reading “Supercommunicators.”

Flavia is doing great. By our calculations, she will turn 20 (!!!) next month, but she still seems to be getting along pretty well!

John has had us on a great Dickens kick – we finished watching Andrew Davies’ “Bleak House” and then “Little Dorrit” – both excellent. We also watched “In the Heart of the Sea” as a follow-up to John’s reading it and “Moby Dick” recently. I’m definitely benefiting from his current reading list!

The summer transition season has begun in earnest – last week one of my new deputies arrived to replace Jill, who left this week. I’m in denial that she is gone — to be followed soon by her co-deputy. They have been my right and left hands for the last two years. Lea, Marko, and I took Jill out for drinks this week at the same sweet little wine bar where we all met two years ago to start getting to know each other – a nice bookend.

Monday was Memorial Day and John and I attended the ceremony to commemorate it at the Embassy. Several older veterans were there, along with a few visiting members of Congress. I always enjoy the remembrance. Afterward, Lea took me for a delicious and enjoyable late birthday lunch at Roux and today we went for sushi at Osaka. Also on Friday, I went to the DEIA happy hour to kick off Pride Month.