Four Nights in Nice

Well, Nice has already proven to be a huge improvement over last summer, which most of you suffered through with us! Gloria met me at the airport; she was horrified that she was late, but she does not usually drive to the airport. I was fine, of course! A hot Saturday August afternoon in Nice means horrid traffic jams...it took maybe an hour to go 5.6 km or 3.5 miles!!! She was concerned, because her car was VERY close to being out of gas, but we made it in time!
Gloria has had a month's vacation, like most Europeans. Part of the time she was on vacation with her husband; for the last two weeks she had taken a French course to improve her French. So, we are having multi-language practice! [And, by the way, "hat" in Italian (should I leave it somewhere again!) is cappello!]
We arrived at her 2 bed/2 bath 6th floor apartment, and she made us lunch, after she took her daughter's dog for a walk. She has been dog-sitting for two weeks; she says she will not do it again! That is Gloria and Pippo, a bichon frise, pictured in Place Garibaldi.
Lunch was Insalada Russa with tossed salad. Salade Russa is delicious! She peels, boils, and mashes a few potatoes. She adds half of a small jar of Gardiniera (a mixture of vegetables-red pepper, onions, cucumber, carrots, cauliflower, in white vinegar, or you could add your own vegetable choices). All of this is pureed,food proceed, and then she added some green peas, and two tablespoons +/- of mayonnaise. For dessert she served some cut up delicious blueberries and peaches (from her garden at home in Alessandro) with a touch of simple syrup and some white wine! (She has eighteen fruit trees in her garden at home.) Then it was 3PM, hot, and time for a nap. Two hours late I awoke-and this is a busy, noisy street with the music of cars, busses, and trams, passing by-so I was tired. Unfortunately I found Gloria dealing with a mess! She had washed some small pillows in the washing machine, as she prepares her place for the students next week. One of them had been filled with small pieces of latex stuffing, and it had opened in the wash, so there were small pieces of the stuffing ALL OVER EVERYTHING IN THE WASH. What is worse is that some of the stuffing has clogged the pipes so the washing machine doesn't work; she has no Sears 24 hour service call line, so she has to wait until Monday to find someone to repair the machine!
I thought I needed to stop here, as my computer access from the McDonalds across the street kicked me off, but I'm back on, so I'll be quick! We went for a delightful walk around her neighborhood, along the Promenade des Anglais, and into the famous and popular Old Town.: Back for dinner...fusilli with home-made tomato sauce and fresh oregano and fresh basillico she has growing in pots out here on her balcony. Dessert was grapefruit with homemade elderberry jam she made with sambucus nigra on top. Afterwards we were going to walk down to see the fireworks or fuochi d'artificio or feu d'artifices which were rescheduled from Ferrogusto (August 15th). Instead we sat on Gloria's balcony on-line and also enjoying the terrific fireworks. While I'm finishing up today's update, she is researching elderberry; she asks if any of you know much first-hand about this plant? I didn't!
PS. Some of you have asked how to post comments, and I don't know how you do it, so if anyone wants to add how you did that in the comments,THANKS!!