Posts Tagged ‘cooking school’

Made it to Italy AND the Internet is FINALLY Working

Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009

Cooking School In Italy

Cooking School In ItalyMichelle LaBrosse, PMP

We made it to Parma. YEAH. Odd how whenever I travel the business booms. I wasn’t gone more than 2 hours and sales doubled over the previous day. I am not sure why that is – but the team wants to take up a collection to get me a motor home.

Being that I love project management, everything went off like clock work – EXCEPT when the Iphone croaked and we lost the map to the hotel. Which was probably for the best. We passed the Parmagiano Reggiano Cheese factory twice and were most definitely not in a city area. Once we lost the Iphone, I picked up random signs for the hotel every other kilometer, but I’d lose them entering a round about. We got to drive all over Parma for two hours. Lovely little city. Finding the hotel was just an act of random kindness by the universe.

The Sur La Tab folks have already been in touch with us. Caught us snoozing. But got us up in time for dinner. We are still trying to figure out what time it is over here as it’s supposed to be six hours different from the US East Coast but for some reason it’s only 5 hours ahead. Maybe everything will work itself out tomorrow with daylight savings time. My body has no idea what time it really is so it doesn’t matter what time the clock says anyhow.

Carey and I are coming up with lots of ideas for columns already. One is just the project of managing a trip like this – it certainly has taken a lot of coordination by us and the folks at Sur La Tab. We had our schedule and our risk management plan (like arriving in JFK in NYC at rush hour on a Friday with three hours to go before our flight). Being highly risk tolerant travelers – we don’t worry that much about where we’re going once we get there. We both plan in broad brush strokes – not the minute details. It leaves a lot more room to find those unknown treasures that makes foreign travel so much fun. Day one of the trip and after the joy ride through Parma, Carey is still talking with me.

Got to go get ready for dinner – we’re going somewhere “fun” – but the earliest reservation is at 7:30 PM over here. I can’t for the life of me remember the name of the place and we have a vague idea of the directions. Will be interesting to see where we end up eating dinner. Oh Carey has just informed me, she wrote down the name of the place – or at least her rendition of the name of the place. Like I said – will be interesting where we eventually eat dinner.

Carey just discovered our trip itinerary – I’m sure they had an element of this for us before. Why know what you need to know before you need to know it? We made it to Parma – that was all I needed to know.

Lessons Learned – Much easier to travel with someone who likes a little planning and a LOT of adventure. Carey is a good travel companion for cities as she lived in NYC for 15 years and spent 6 months in Rome so she somewhat knows the language. Plus she has more convenient reading glasses than I do. She is my risk management plan

Off to Cooking School

Friday, October 30th, 2009

When I got the last of the little birds to fly the nest off to college, I decided to go back to school as well.   Cooking school.   Nothing too extreme – I do after all have a business to run and employees to care for still.   It is part of my overall Mom Emancipation Program.   The “Mom Emancipation Program” involves doing those things that I could not do over the past 20 years and could not do the previous 27 years before that due to being in “real” school.   It will be interesting to see where the “Mom Emancipation Program” leads me as the goals are fairly vague – do those things I could not do the previous 47 years of my life.

Packing Light for Cooking School

Packing Light for Cooking School

I’m off to “Cooking School Lite” with Sur La Table in Italy.  So far the experience has been OUTSTANDING.   They have an event concierge who sends you cooking supplies before you ever get there.  Calls you every other week or so to check in on how you’re doing with your travel plans (her name is Andrea and what an asset she is to Sur La Table).   Yes I was a little anxious to do this – I’m not inclined to fly off to Europe for a ten day cooking school experience.  Plus all my cooking skills have been self taught.   I talked my foodie pal and writing guru Carey, into coming with me.

I like to see how light I can pack.  I managed to get everything I need for the next ten days stuffed into these two little bags.   The question is – will I be able to stuff it all back into those two little bags for the trip home?