The well-made bed

I'm having a getting and spending weekend (but mostly spending). Starting with the getting, I've shifted my focus to the publicity of the book, and for the first time, actually getting excited about it. I'm starting to have some ideas--like making my quest for a sexpert body (and self) a part of the book's story.
For instance, I rented a place in Trastevere where I could look out over the Roman street life and the shopkeepers sitting in front of their shops gossiping every morning, worked on the book, had gelato every day, traveled, learned Italian, and (rather rapidly, given the circumstances, healed a broken heart. IF ONLY ELIZABETH GILBERT HADN'T DONE ALL THIS FIRST. I SWEAR I DIDN'T GET THE IDEA FROM HER!

Ahem. Anyway, I healed my heart in Rome, started a blog called Rome is Where the Heart Is, and immersed myself in other women's stories about sex, while not getting any literal sex at all, but feeding my body and soul and brain in the most sensual way possible. There's a story there, no? Then, she returns to NYC, starts dating up a storm, hires a young, cute, gay personal trainer and drops 20 pounds...only 15 more to go! It's amazing how much easier running is getting--I even pass a (very) few runners around the reservoir lately, as opposed to solely walkers.

Now, about the bed. I shopped and spent and shopped and spent this weekend, though in my defense, everything was something I vaguely needed. I bought two beautiful spring summer dresses in Varazioni, both easy, packable, hand washable and not extremely expensive ($100 each). Then I bought a pair of Ralph Lauren pillowcases in the perfect shade of melon/apricot and a certain deep, jewel-toned pink that I associate with India and Italy. Then, I went lower end today and bought a set of 1000 thread-count sheets (yes, you read that right) in Egyptian cotton in a somewhat rundown neighborhood store that sells no name brands, but you can sometimes find nice, much cheaper stuff in there.

The major splurges that I DIDN'T need, that I NEVER need, because I work at SELF magazine and I get free or $1 products regularly, but I am a product JUNKIE, were the following: An Acqua di Parma body cream in the scent of Sicilian oranges, an Aveda candle in the scent of Shampure (it's one of their shampoos, and smells amazing--I can't even describe it but it's the ultimate in clean and fresh; a Nars concealer and makeup brush from this cool new product store called blue mercury Actually, that could be a fun topic for me to write about in my new anthology: She's gotta have it: 21st century little addictions, a book about guilty pleasures and even guilty non pleasures. I could be honest and funny and it wouldn't embarrass anyone related to me.

Okay, enough blogging. Time to start living. (Actually, time to work on publicity for my book. I also want to study Italiano.

Ciao--
Paola