LAST GAME NIGHT FOR AWHILE

 the start of the potluck feast with Nancy (in the back holding multiple plates), Matt, Jim (with his goofy lovable grin) and Kelly (rabid Ravens fan).

 This is Sara one of the 2 hostesses with the mostest.

 and on the couch is the other hostess, Megan. and Judith is the lady with the frenchified and feisty purple scarf. The cat on the couch has 3 legs; lost one to a barbed wire fence.

 around the joyful gathering we have (starting with bottom left), Carol, Nancy, Matt, me, Kelly, Mary, Jim, Bill and Pat.

 me having my usual size portion of one of Jim's excellent desserts; this time it was a German chocolate cake.

Deadly serious Farkle dice game with feline help.

THE BOOK THIEF

This was a good movie about life  in Germany during Adolf Hitler's reign and it focused on the German citizens and their life with the forced conscription, the philosophical indoctrinations and the bombings which meant long hours in a bomb shelter.


It was also the story of Liesel, a young girl who was foster parented by Emily Watson and Geoffrey Rush. When she started living with them, she couldn't read but that changed under the gentle and encouraging guidance of her papa.

It was very well acted and had some great poignant moments but all in all it was an idealized and a tad too 'clean' and spruced up movie. Even the scenes of watching a jew being taken from his home and beaten seemed sanitized and the town though reeking of poverty still seemed like a cute garbage free touristy village. There was a fellow schoolmate of Liesel's who was very much into the hitler beliefs and he bullied both her and her friend but that also seemed not quite real; there wasn't a feeling of tense violence.

However, it was an interesting story and kept me entertained throughout. It was too long and the ending (which took you through the deaths of her foster parents and her life after the Americans rode into town) was too pat and melodramatic in its attempts to be kleenix worthy. We gave it a 7.

FALORA - TUCSON, AZ

The quality of the 'gourmet' and unusual and fusion ?? pizzas served here didn't come close to the one we had at the Heist restaurant. Well, at least the one Bill and I shared.

The restaurant is quite small with maybe 6 tables along the wall and 2 very long wooden benches. At the end of the room was all the wood they use in the ovens but it was  really close to the seating area and stuck out at wierd angles and 2 people that were coming back from the bathroom ran into this set-up. Not sure if they got splintered or not.

They play vinyl records so the music was absolutely wonderful. The service was superb.

You are served olives when you are seated but i think they could have given us more than 9 olives for 4 people.

So the pizza we got was the Arrosto (molly got it too and agreed with my take on it). It had feta cheese, mushrooms (we got these instead of eggplant), potatoes, dates and white truffle oil. It was  not balanced; too much feta cheese and maybe because of the potatoes,  it was very dry. Every so often i would bite down on a date which added some needed flavor diversity and moistness.
and the crust was thin but not crispy enough.

Bill and I also shared a butter pecan salad with butter lettuce, spinach (way too much spinach), apples, fennel (again tasteless; no licorice flavor at all), goat cheese (way too much), toasted pecans and apricot vinaigrette which was so-so.

We've got both pizza and salad left and even if both dishes improved overnight; i won't be going back here.