Rock n' Roll and Biscioto

Good Monday morning! I had a great weekend, and you? It went something like this: sleeping, beer, food, sleeping, food, snooker, ice cream, sleeping, beer, classic rock, more beer, snooker, more beer, more music, food, sleeping, food, successful skype downloading (finally), food, and finally more sleeping. The perceptive of you may have noticed a small imbalance in the quantity of each events listed above....

Now for a few more details.

By the end of last week I was pretty tired, and so were my roomates, so even though we had planned on going out friday night, we ended up just doing a lot of sleeping interspersed with a beer or two and some pizza frigideira.

Saturday started out another relaxing day involving a nice place to eat where I had feijoada (a classic brazilian dish of black beans and pork), more food, and really, really good fresh fruit juices. Next it was on to counting votes at USP. Vanessa had to count votes for student elections, so I tagged along and practiced my portuguese listening- I swear everyone here must think I'm a mute (which I'm sure is amusing to those of you who know me). Then I proved, in case there was any doubt, how god-awful I am playing pool in a fun game of snooker. This was followed by some really good ice cream- the place was amazing- an ice cream buffet where you get whatever kind of ice creams you want with all the imaginable toppings. Oh man was it good! Then it was time for a little nap... you see we had to rest up for a night of rock n' roll. We met up with my friend Marcela and some of her friends at a bar in downtown Ribeirão Preto called Vila Dionísio where they serve up cervejas & rock n' roll. I, being more scatterbrained than usual, forgot my passport for identification. Luckily I was able to cob together appropriate identification to prove my advancing age. It was a great bar and a great time, I recommend it if you are ever here. They had two live acts which mostly played classic american rock- think a lot of Beatles and other classics- they were great! I talked to some people, and had consumed enough alcohol that I was less embarrassed about trying out my Portuguese. We were out until nearly 4am- ending with a late night stop for Kibe and some other tasty middle eastern fare whose name escapes me at the moment (it might have something to do with the advanced hour or the few cervejas I consumed). Then sleep.... a lot of sleep.

Sunday was a very relaxed day of which the highlight was good lasagna and, finally, a successful download of Skype on my computer. For some reason, it has been very difficult for me to get it. I decided that maybe I should try to download it from the Brazilian version of the site instead of US, in case the downloading server was different. I don't know if that was the reason, but it worked. The amusing part is I now get emails from Skype in Portuguese, so I guess I'll get some reading practice in.

And now for the section I will christen Food from Norahland... today, Biscioto:

Friday afternoon concluded with a fun and entertaining discussion of biscioto. Now I though biscioto meant cookie in Portuguese, but after a lot of discussion and some helpful diagrams from my fellow labmates- and taste testing, of course- I learned about this delicious snack. These biscioto are rather like cheesy poofs minus the cheese, and these in particular are made of polvilho, a flour made from mandioca (which I believe is yucca). They taste amazing and totally addictive- finally I had to have Marcela take them away from me so I would stop eating them!