Category Archives: Experiences

I am alive!

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“Do you like it?”, he asked.

“It’s OK. It enables me to stay here”, I replied.

Thinking about it, it’s not really OK at all. But what can I do? He is determined ‘to be a writer’. But I remember, vaguely, some quote from an actor or writer that said, more or less, that they kept on saying that one day they would be a writer or actor until the time came to renew a passport and, since they didn’t have a ‘real’ job, they had to put writer or actor and then realised that there was no ‘big moment’ where they moved from being an aspiring whatever to the real thing.

So, he is, in fact, a writer. A writer of books. Well, one book with another, he hopes, soon. I hope so. I wish it could be the same for me but I am not that skilled in writing that I could ever be a real writer. I’m just a blogger which is not the same thing at all. Anyway, I couldn’t do what he has done/does and my goal is not that defined. I have no goal. ‘Just living’ is the goal. Oh, yes, and eating and drinking and spending time with friends and the dogs and stuff.

Hardly the stuff of dreams.

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F is funny. When he meets any one of my friends (or, even in this case, someone I really don’t know), he talks. It’s like he can’t have a silence.

Of course, once he had found something to talk about, he didn’t stop. In this case, once Karl (this is NOT anything to do with the ‘Karl spark’ – it’s his real name and I’ll link to his blogs in due course – since the ‘Karl’ in the ‘Karl spark was, in fact, a guy with a real name beginning with J) had explained his ‘great plan’ (which is not a great plan as such – just an idea that will change as the year progresses), which is to visit as many festivals as possible over the world, F started to come up with all the festivals that Karl absolutely MUST go to. They were all music festivals and included, of course, San Remo.

I’m not actually sure that, even if Karl intends to go to San Remo, it will be quite the same as the festival experience he’s looking for. After all, it’s a little commercial now. I recall the Upton Jazz Festival. The first year that it was staged, the jazz bands played in the many pub gardens that are a feature of Upton upon Severn. Everything was free. The feeling that one got was fantastic, wandering from pub to pub, having a beer, listening to some live band – really ‘chilled out’. The next year, the bands were behind screens and you had to pay and, immediately, it moved from being ‘a night out with friends (even if you didn’t know the people nor the musicians) to being a commercial event. Not the same at all. A little like the Hay Festival or (I imagine) the Edinburgh Festival. Far removed from the original thing.

I think San Remo would be more like going to a book festival. Of course, to F, it is a wonderful thing. We shall watch it again, certainly.

Still, Karl took notes, which was kind of him even if some of them were almost certainly going to be dropped from the list even as he wrote them down.

As I predicted, F didn’t come and stay with me. He is quite strange sometimes.

This morning, I got up just after the alarm. The sambuca, the night before, didn’t seem to have the usual effect, which was good. The lack of enough sleep makes me tired – but it’s not really different from normal.

He said he slept well. I forgot to ask if he had managed to connect to the internet OK after I went to bed. I forgot to tell him to take tram 23 to the middle of town. Mornings are not really my best time.

But, in case you were worried, I am, in fact, alive.

So he wasn’t a crazed axe murderer after all. Nice guy doing this round the world thing. I couldn’t do it – I like my comforts too much, I guess. Still it was interesting and I wished him good luck with it all.

Everyone should do something crazy once in a while, don’t you think?

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You don’t really ‘live’ without experiences. I mean to say, that’s what life is all about. For those of you who have read my blog for long enough, you will know that it was one of the reasons for coming here. To put myself in a strange situation and to ‘see how it went’.

As I’ve mentioned before, all those people who, when we told them we were giving everything up and going to Milan because we quite liked it said things like ‘You are brave’ whilst privately thinking ‘You are crazy’. Some time after we had been here, I came to that conclusion too, in that it really was quite a crazy thing to do but I don’t regret it and I wouldn’t change anything (well, almost).

So, yesterday, when I read that some guy that I don’t know was going to be in Milan for a night and was probably going to have to sleep rough, I suggested that he could sleep on the sofa. It was a simple comment made without any real thought. After all, I’d probably never hear from him.

Until, of course, I did. I read the email. Last night he slept outside. He said that he was still trying to get the chill out of his bones. I can only imagine.

I read the email again. Of course, I could pretend that I hadn’t read the email. I could say that, after all, it wasn’t ‘convenient’ (he had given that option in his email). He offered me a pizza and a beer.

I hesitated. This won’t be ‘convenient’ – I mean, An maybe celebrating as she hopes to sign up for a flat, round the corner from me (she is returning to Milan to work – leaving her husband in London); A has already suggested that we might meet for a beer; and then there is F who, if there is someone else in the flat, probably won’t want to sleep there (because he can be quite strange, sometimes) – and then there would be how to explain this person. It’s not easy. It’s easy for me, of course, but for others, there is the fact that they probably wouldn’t do it and so I would be ‘crazy’.

I mean I don’t actually know him. I’ve read his stuff. He’s quite famous (been on TV and stuff) but only with a bag on his head. I’ve read about his latest ‘escapade’ and, to be honest, like me coming to Milan, he’s quite brave (or crazy). I think he’s dropped using the bag now :-)

But I’ve never met him, haven’t spoken to him and, but for his blog, wouldn’t even know anything about him – and, anyway, his first blog was, in reality, one great big lie to be precise – so who’s to say this latest one isn’t?

But I only hesitate for a few moments. After all, if you don’t actually do things then you can only regret not doing them in the future and you would never know if doing it would have been good or not. Whereas, if you do things then, at least, you have a 50/50 chance it will be good ……. or interesting ……….or exciting …… or amazing, perhaps?

And so I said ‘yes’. Why not? Perhaps he will kill me in my sleep? Perhaps he will be as boring as they come? Or stink? Or, perhaps, he will just be an interesting, nice guy with whom I hit it off?

Who knows but it seems it is set. I await his call.

Now, how do I explain this to F ………….?

In celebration of life

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Now that I have checked (as I needed to know the answer for this post), I have been here for five and a half years, not six as I often tell people.

You’d have thought that, after all these years, there wouldn’t be that anything that would be so unusual or different. But you’d be wrong. There are still things I stumble across that I find interestingly, frustratingly or horrifyingly different.

I’ve always had some sort of fascination with death. It’s the same sort of fascination that I have with overly-large breasts. I don’t want to physically experience it and, yet, there it is, in full view, so to speak.

I thought I would be dead by the time I was 42. This was something I thought of as a kid or teenager. 42 happened to coincide with the year 2000. It was a totally irrational thought, of course, but, nevertheless, I was convinced. It didn’t worry me. It was too far away and, by then, I figured, I would have had quite enough of living.

As you get older, with death no longer creeping but approaching at something closer to the speed of light, one wishes for ‘just a bit more’. I suppose it’s like money really – the more you have the more you want it. However, I am aware that my time on this earth is more limited now than it was 30 years ago when, even if my imminent death (42, remember) was coming, it still seemed ‘a lifetime’ away.

I see Rufus and wonder at how he has lived so long. I see his frail body and picture me in that state. Well, sort of. I am pragmatic in that I have smoked for so long and so heavily that I doubt, very much, if I would get to that state. We shall see. Stranger things happen. Everyone seems to have a story of someone who smoked all their life and still lived to be 95 or something. If we are honest though, these are exceptions. If I am also honest, I always think I shall be one of those exceptions as I’m sure most people do.

So, when F told me that his cousin (or uncle – it’s quite difficult to work out the correct relationship) had dropped dead with a heart attack at the age of 58, I couldn’t help but blurt out that he was just a little older than me. Don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t make me worried. In some way it amazes me that I am still here.

I’m sure I would be exactly the same as Anthony Hopkins in Meet Joe Black. I would be asking Father Time or God or whoever if I couldn’t just have another few years …….. or a year …… or, if I really DO have to go soon, couldn’t it just wait another 6 months? OK then – another month will be fine.

But this wasn’t really what I wanted to talk about. The guy had died. He was close family and, so, F went to the funeral, of course. And, although I was aware of how different things are here, I still find it all quite amazing.

The British have this propensity to party, it seems. Wetting the babies head; the christening; birthday parties; engagement parties; weddings; special anniversaries and, finally, wakes. In each case it gives the opportunity for families to reunite, have some alcohol and, quite possible, do some of that ‘only at weddings’-style dancing – to some of the worst music in the world.

But, mainly, it is a sanctioned ‘getting drunk’ time.

The parties are almost more important than the event itself. Certainly, in the case of a funeral, the party afterwards, to me, is the ‘best bit’. I don’t mean to be disrespectful. Let me explain.

One assumes you go to a funeral because you knew the person. Probably (almost certainly now that they are ‘gone’) you quite liked the person. And the funeral makes you take stock of the way that the person had touched your life: the funny bits, the sad bits and the many other ‘bits in between’. The funeral is your chance to say ‘goodbye’ even if the idea of that is quite preposterous, since ‘they’ can’t hear you. The funeral is really for your sake, not theirs. We all know that and accept that this is true. The funeral is sad and everyone whispers to each other as if, by speaking at a normal level you would wake someone – even the dead.

It’s stressful, particularly if you loved the person; if it was a close relative – an uncle, cousin, parent or, worst of all, your child, however old they may be. There might be some things said at the funeral – some speech by the vicar (who, in all probability never knew the deceased but has taken instruction from the surviving relatives) and or by a relative which may make everything excruciatingly painful – one can’t help but remember the truly dreadful speech given by Lord Althorp at Diana’s funeral – it is, after all, not really the best time for name calling.

Then it’s all over and the coffin has been put in the ground or been silently slid away behind some curtain to be burnt to cinders later. Either way, it’s all over. I always think: ‘Is that it?’.

And then there’s the party. The party, I think is the most important part. There is a release now that it’s all over and done with. It’s final. It’s done. Now you can get back to the business of living – and, in the case of the party, remembering the person – remembering the good times, the funny times, learning about things you didn’t even know about.

They were loved. They were good. You will miss them but they are still there, brought to life again by the stories and the laughter and the general ‘thinking about them’. And, maybe, that’s one of the reasons that my maternal grandfather has never really left me – I didn’t have that experience, that opportunity. To be honest, for the funeral wakes that I’ve been to, you didn’t really want them to end – you didn’t want to forget the person, to let go.

Not so here, it seems. The funeral is, I guess, more or less the same but afterwards, from what I understand, everyone just leaves! For me that would be an awful thing. It’s almost as if you would miss out on understanding them better, on reliving their past through others.

No, it doesn’t matter how much I try and understand, I just don’t get it. The party is the celebration of a life. Without which it is almost disrespectful – as if that person meant nothing.

Of course, having been brought up in the UK and our way being ‘the norm’ perhaps I am being unkind. I don’t mean to be but I hate the idea that if I were to die, there wouldn’t be some sort of knees-up afterwards. I would want people who bothered to come, the chance to enjoy themselves and celebrate my life. For that’s what it is really all about. The celebration of the life of someone who did touch you.

Perhaps your experience is different? But I find that our ways of saying goodbye are fascinating in their differences. Tell me I’m wrong, tell me how it is with you, tell me what you want – even try to help me to understand. I am, really, fascinated by the differences.

Good? No, bad, bad, bad!

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I put my hand up. I probably shouted ‘Me! Me! Me!’ It was my first (and only?) time at the ‘top table’. We had our lunch first, before others were served. The headmistress was an old dragon but I got my chance. I would get a second serving of the baked potato.

There was a problem, of course. I was 5 or 6. My stomach could not take 2 baked potatoes. And I struggled to eat it. In front of everyone I was told that as I had asked for it, I must eat it. I was in tears trying to stuff potato into a mouth that certainly did not want it.

It was a lesson, for certain. To me it seemed cruel. I don’t think I ever sat on the top table again. I’m pretty sure I never asked for seconds again.

But, nearly 50 years later I had forgotten that lesson and that incident …………. until yesterday.

In the canteen, at work, there were chicken slices in a tarragon cream sauce. In addition, left over from yesterday (because less people had come into the canteen than was planned for), were some meatballs in a tomato sauce. The meatballs had been rather nice. I asked Gina for a meatball too.

“Can you eat two?”, she asked.

“Yes, sure”, I replied and then, as I was taking my tray to the table, I remembered the first incident like this. And, as I ate the first and then second meatball, I remembered the whole horror of it. But now I am older and I had to finish it as Gina was also clearing the plates so would know it was me. It was delicious but I simply must be more careful in future :-)

Actually, thinking about that school, where I was for a couple of years only, I can remember nothing good. Only two bad things. The lunch I’ve just mentioned. Then there was the time when the whole school (it was only small) was playing rounders one afternoon. We were in two teams and our team was batting. I got a little caught up in the whole match. One of our girls (much older than me) hit a ball and started to make a run for it. Meanwhile, the fielders were trying to get the ball back to get her out. It got very exciting, everyone was shouting and cheering and encouraging their side and then, as our girl was almost at the last post, the fielders managed to stump the post and she was out.

I had obviously completely forgotten that I was on the batting side and was cheering along with our opposition. I don’t remember anything that was said but I do remember the stern look from the headmistress and I know that I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me. It seemed that everyone had stopped cheering and I was left as the last person still cheering.

Actually, I can remember almost nothing good about any of my schooldays. I hated school – not for the lessons but for all the other bad shit that happened. Whoever said that your schooldays were the best days of your life was either completely off their head or didn’t go to any of my schools!

Well, they’re fashion people of some sort, I suppose (but how would I know?)

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Well, I guess that I should be telling you about meeting some of the good and the great of the fashion industry.

Except that, apart from them all appearing to be very rich, I haven’t the faintest clue who they were. There were some fat men. There were some, ahem, ladies past their prime. There was a hat designer who came late, sporting a hat that (for those of you from the UK) would be best suited on some working class, washerwoman – a lot in the style of the wife of Andy Capp or, even, not unlike the way that Hilda Ogden used to be dressed on Coronation Street (but without the rollers in her hair).

Some woman, of a certain age (which was, actually, very uncertain – but O L D nonetheless), with a bright orange bouffant but very thinning hair-do and a very pale complexion caused either by her being very ill or by her applying a whitening mask to hide the liver spots, which, by the way, was unsuccessful, thought that the hat was wonderful. She is like Anna Wintour, apparently. Everyone had to agree with her even if they, secretly hated it (and, certainly, the few people around me DID hate it).

Some woman next to me kept jabbering at me in Italian. I understood some of it. We had a conversation …… of sorts. F says sorry to me for having to be somewhere where everyone is speaking Italian. I tell him not to worry and that, if it becomes a problem, I will tell him.

I was there, after all, not for my pleasure, exactly but to be introduced (or should it be ‘shown off’) to some friends of his.

“It will be very fashion”, he tells be beforehand. Everyone will be from the fashion world. Although, as it turned out, there was also C, Fi’s husband and he’s NOT fashion but a chef. These were the people with whom we were supposed to spend Christmas and New Year. Apparently, they had organised a special party for New Year, in F’s honour. He is their ‘jewel’, so I was told.

I am to like P, even if I don’t like her. She is part owner of a rather large business in Italy. She has a house in Venice. And a ‘Guest House’ nearby. This Guest House is lavish and huge, apparently. F wants to take me there. P says that she doesn’t like Venice apart from going there a couple of days every so often. I don’t say it but for me it is the most romantic city in the world. It beats Paris, hands down.

We are at a ‘chic’ restaurant. Ristorante da Gaspare. I won’t link to it as it would be unfair. I am led to believe it is expensive. We had some antipasto of shrimps and clams. Some pizze and foccia. And then the biggest branzino I’ve ever seen was wheeled to our table – then taken away to be served up in smaller dishes so that we could help ourselves.

I don’t know how much was paid but I think it was a lot. The branzino was wonderful – but I didn’t get much. Nor did most other people (except the fat bloke almost opposite me – which explains his fatness, I would think). A couple of people had sweets. I tried one. It wasn’t up to much. The rest of it I could take or leave, really.

The atmosphere was great – for the people we were with. The place itself lacked atmosphere being bright and more like a canteen. I’m sure the fish was very fresh but it wasn’t really anything special.

Fi and C were lovely. They bought presents – for us for Christmas – some stone dogs which, apparently, in Austria (or in one town/village in Austria anyway) people put outside their houses to warn people that they have a dog. It was sweet of them. There was one for me and one for F. F pointed out that, if we put them outside our front door they would be nicked. Fi hadn’t thought of that. There was also a special cake for F’s birthday. Bless them. They think the world of him, I can tell. I think I passed the test :-) I think they liked me.

They were all nice people, really. Even the small fat guy who, if I hadn’t been told he was married – with a grown-up son – I would have placed as being the most gay of all gay people at that table (there was only F and I). He wore, round his neck, a black scarf – no, more like a shawl – with beads round the edge. It was more feminine than all of the ladies at the table! His wife was lovely.

F told me that the lady wearing the Missoni dress was a journalist. Married to the old guy with the pin stripe at the other end of the table. I’m guessing he was ‘something’ in fashion. I was more amazed that it was a Missoni dress. It looked much like something you could pick up in a junk shop – something from the 70s. I didn’t say anything. F surprises me sometimes and he obviously has a great deal of knowledge about his industry – but doesn’t say anything to me, much.

Before the event, though, he did say that, as it was very ‘fashion’ I should dress accordingly. I dressed in my normal ‘smart’ way – as I would for any night out with friends, or, even him! I don’t know whether that was right or not. He doesn’t ever tell me and I don’t want to ask.

We are, apparently, to meet up for an evening out with P. She seems nice although with her head somewhere else half the time. Still, I don’t dislike her and she is a good friend of F’s – or maybe Fi’s – I’m not really sure.

Fi didn’t really stop talking. She is almost as bad as F’s sister! We are to go there in May or something, when the weather is better. And, probably, after Rufus has left us.

This morning I took F to the airport. He is away for 11 days. I can’t wait for him to be back ……. already!!!

p.s. below is a clip where Jennifer Saunders is wearing almost the same hat as I mentioned above – except hers is a dark colour and this one, the other night was bright pink! Enjoy the clip anyway, it is very funny.

French and Saunders version of The Exorcist!

Euronics – yes! Darty – never, never, never again!

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I never did like Darty. Or Marcucci or whatever they were called before.

We bought our television from them when we first came here. It was the first ‘electrical’ shop we saw. They were, to be honest, quite unhelpful. As were their fitters. When part of the ‘system’ broke down I went back to the shop to try and find a fix. The staff were unhelpful, to say the least.

Then Darty took them over. I went back there, hoping that a change of ownership would improve the staff. It didn’t. I suppose it would have been like Fortnum and Masons taking over Woolworths – nothing could have been done about the uselessness of the staff. And so, nearly always, I go to Euronics and, over the last few years they have had quite a bit of business from me.

Not only are the staff at Darty unhelpful but they are also very rude …….. to me. I am mindful that it might just be me, though. Several people have mentioned going to Darty. I always try to avoid it. F suggested we look for irons at a Darty store at San Babila (as we went that way anyway). It wasn’t difficult. I wanted a fairly cheap iron and I wanted a Phillips since the last one had lasted so long.

I’m not really what you would call a ‘shopper’. I go in, see something I want and buy it. Unless I need a specific thing and am unsure, I don’t ask. I didn’t even know that this Darty store existed in San Babila! It’s not a real surprise for they have taken one of the entrances to the Metro and you enter into the shop that way.

Ah well, this is San Babila. Perhaps this will be different?

We go in. We find the area for irons. We see the Phillips brands on display. There isn’t much of a sale going on but there is one which has about 10 Euro off. I want that one. We check the boxes below and find the right model. OK, good. I find some new arial cable as well. We go to pay.

I pay but I think to myself that it is slightly more than I thought it would be. I check the receipt. The price is the original price and not the sale price. I call to the lady. She continues to walk away and ignore me. A man near her looks up. He looks like the store manager. He deigns to come over to help me. I explain that the price of the iron is wrong as it is shown at a reduced price on the shelf.

We go over together (including F, of course). As we start down the aisle, he asks a girl who works there about it. She also continues walking away from him, shouting over her shoulder that it was only the green one that was reduced. It was reduced because there is no box. I shrug and say OK, I’ll take the green one.

The girl switches direction and goes to get the green one from the display. As we walk to the cash desk, F gets involved.

I don’t understand all he has to say. There’s something about the ‘customer is right’ and that something is ‘not good education’ (our equivalent would be ‘not good manners’). This comes from both F and the ‘manager’ – to each other. There is some talk about giving us our money back. The argument is fairly short (a couple of minutes) and quite heated. The manager goes to a till and gives me money.

F is incensed. He explains all to me. Apparently he was not happy about me having the iron without the box and the instructions. He didn’t feel that it was right that is came without a box. The staff (including the manager) couldn’t have cared less what he thought. So he got me my money back.

He says he is pleased that he’s found out that they are not good. He will never shop there again. I explained that I knew this and never used them. He asked me why I hadn’t said anything and I explained that I thought it could just be me, being a foreigner and all. I was actually quite pleased that, with not a hint from me, he had ‘found out’ that they are crap.

And so we go to Euronics. This is out of our way. We ask someone about the cable as we cannot see it on the racks. The guy says that they have run out of the cable we want but there is a shop down the road that will, probably, have some. We find the iron section. I pay a few Euro more than the full price at Darty for the same iron. But I am happy with that as I feel Euronics, where the staff are always so helpful and the service is very good, deserve to have the money that Darty have lost.

I am now doubly sure that I won’t use Darty again, in future. F certainly won’t. All for the casual, unhelpful rude and indifferent attitude of the staff. So, don’t go to Darty, people. Go to Euronics instead :-)

Stop looking for your soulmate

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For those of you who have been reading this blog over the last 2 years or so, you will know that, having thought I had found my soulmate, I found that I hadn’t, apparently. At the end of it I thought that, given my age and, having already done it all twice before, I wouldn’t even be able to find someone else to live with but then I changed my mind. I decided that I DID need to be with someone and that there had to be someone out there, somewhere, who was looking for me. I did the internet dating thing to save myself having to go to bars and clubs, seeing it, as I do, as an alternative to those social places.

I was determined. I don’t know that I ever thought I would find my soulmate or, even, if that was important. What was important was to find the ‘person for me’. I had some preconceived ideas about who that would be. The criteria narrowed after a short while. They couldn’t be too young nor too old. In the end I found someone and, to be honest, that someone was a surprise and (partially) unexpected. But I remain intrigued about how people find their soulmates and, even, if that really exists or if it is your soulmate but only for a period of time (that period being undetermined and indeterminable).

I remember my sister. She, as I told her more than once, always tried too hard. Her criteria, it seemed, was always non-existent. If they moved and were male it was enough. Now I look back on that as probably her trying to hard to be straight and conform, since she has a girlfriend now.

I was at a friend’s house on Sunday. She is setting up this internet dating lark. She is very clear. She doesn’t expect to find the perfect man on the internet – only to determine exactly what she DOES want. To be able to refine her criteria. But, I wonder, is she just saying that?

Anyway, I was interested to read this:

Relationship gurus expend enormous amounts of energy debating whether “opposites attract” or, conversely, whether “birds of a feather flock together” – largely, it seems, without stopping to reflect on whether relying on cheesy proverbs might be, more generally, a bad way to think about the complexities of human attraction. Should you look for a partner whose characteristics match yours, or complement yours? The conclusion of the Pair Project, a long-term study of married couples by the University of Texas, is, well, neither, really. “Compatibility”, whether you think of it as similarity or complementarity, just doesn’t seem to have much to do with a relationship’s failure or success, according to the project’s founder, Ted Huston: the happiness of a marriage just isn’t much correlated with how many likes, dislikes or related characteristics a couple does or doesn’t share. Compatibility does play one specific role in love, he argues: when couples start worrying about whether they’re compatible, it’s often the sign of a relationship in trouble. “We’re just not compatible” really means, “We’re not getting along.” “Compatibility” just means things are working out. It simply renames the mystery of love, rather than explaining it.

According to the US psychologist Robert Epstein, that’s because a successful relationship is almost entirely built from within. (He cites evidence from freely entered arranged marriages, arguing that they work out more frequently than the unarranged kind.) All that’s really required is two people committed to giving things a shot. Spending years looking for someone with compatible qualities may be – to evoke another cheesy proverb – a classic case of putting the cart before the horse.

For F, of course, his most ‘successful’ previous relationship was with a blue-eyed, English, Taurean. He cites this often as if to explain why he is with me. He is saying that it is ‘inevitable’ that we would be together. Conversely, of course, it could also be inevitable that we will split up!

I look for things that we like ‘together’ and find few. I worry that we don’t have enough in common, the most obvious being my love of all food whereas he is so picky. As I said to my friend (mentioned above), if F and I had met in some bar or club, I’m not sure that either of us would have given the other a second look. We met only because we had chatted for some time first.

Yes, the pictures I saw of him – he was sexy. But, mainly, he was funny – he had the ability to make me laugh and feel better. He still does and may it long continue.

As his friend R said, he was ‘ready’ when we met. So was I. We both wanted the same thing and so, together, we can get the same thing from each other.

And, I suppose, that’s why V and I split up. We no longer wanted the same things. F is not V in any way. V wasn’t M in any way. F and M are not similar either. Being compatible or not seems, as it says, to be unimportant as to whether it works or not. You (both) just have to WANT it more than anything and be prepared to step off the deep end and see how it goes.

And that, together with making those small sacrifices to make your partner happy seem to be the only requisites to have a happy and loving relationship – for however long that lasts.

For the above ‘piece of advice’ plus other tips (that can replace your New Year’s resolutions) go here and enjoy :-)

F’s Birthday and stuff

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Well, further to my post below, Rufus seems much better. Ain’t it always the way? But I know better than to assume that he will remain this way for long.

Last night we went to Giacomo – it was F’s birthday. I had raw scampi to start (and some of F’s raw tuna) and branzino (sea bass) with artichokes as a main. F had the mixed raw fish to start and then a cooked tuna steak (he loves tuna and has it whenever he can). A nice bottle of wine, some mirto and then home.

This being a restaurant that is, as F would say, very fashion, there are the great and the good of Milan and many of the rich tourists or others who are here for business. In this case, there was a model who, apparently, used to work for Helmut Lang. However, I didn’t even recognise the name. Apparently, Giacomo has opened a new restaurant near Piazza Duomo, with views over the city. We are to go there for my birthday, I am advised :-).

Yesterday, I went to see FfC and go out for lunch. She is getting ready to return to work next week after months off whilst she had a baby. The baby is about 7 months old now. He is big. She suggested he looks like his father and asked me what I thought. As I’ve said before, babies, to me, just look like babies and not like either of the parents or anyone else for that matter. So that’s what I said.

Then, later, after we had been out for lunch, she was sitting on one of the sofas opposite me and the baby waved at me. Apparently they’ve been trying to get him to wave for a while so she was delighted that he had, finally, done it. She was going to phone R, the father, as soon as I had gone, to tell him.

She told me, during lunch, that she had, really, given up on the idea that she would become a mother and that was when she found herself pregnant. Maybe there’s a thing about trying too hard. We also spoke about FfI. FfI went back to her home country for Christmas and New Year. She planned to spend Christmas with her family and then New Year with her daughter who is in another part of the country. Her common line is ‘I hate Milan’, quickly followed by ‘I want to go back to my country’. I always thought – well, go then!

I email her to wish her a happy New Year. She emails me back to tell me that she cried every day (and that everyone except her one brother, she had fights with), she spent New Year’s Eve in a motel room all alone and that she was cold and miserable and couldn’t wait to get back to Milan. She also promised that she would never say that she hated Milan again. We shall see. To be honest, I feel sorry for her. What a dreadful way to spend Christmas and New Year! But FfC and I were talking (and we have much the same views on most things) and agreed that it’s really important to be ‘happy’ with what you have and where you are.

Milan may not be the most beautiful city in the world, nor with the best climate but it has charm and a character of it’s own. Without coming to Milan there are so many experiences that I simply would not have experienced, both good and bad, things that I would not have enjoyed and have made my life richer and more fulfilled as a result. Of course, the main thing is that I would not have met F and, for that, I would never want to change the past because it is the past that has led me here and to this point.

We also spoke (FfC and I) about V. She was quite disappointed when he didn’t turn up one evening because he was shopping for a new outfit for Christmas, after she had prepared food and everything – and he didn’t even text or phone but relied on FfI to tell her. It made me so grateful that I am no longer responsible, in any way, for him. I explained to her that my thinking on the reasons why he had, effectively, cut me off from his life was that (and I learned this from FfI) he had been telling the new boyfriend that ‘the breakup had left him with so much debt’. She was as incredulous as I had been. But it is his way and if I were too close, there would be questions from other people which would lead me to tell the truth and the truth would not be what he wanted others to hear. Ah well. At least, now, I can understand the reason even if it’s a poor one. I remember telling him, when there was the previous boyfriend – ‘don’t lie about stuff’. For lying always, at some point, bites you in the ass further down the line. But, with him, he always seems to get away with it. He is, as FfC says – always being ‘fabulous’. Fabulousness is all about show and does not necessarily have any substance. And it’s so true of him. I just hope that the fabulousness doesn’t wear off any time.

New Year with people you don’t even know!

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2

Well, none of it was quite as expected. We didn’t exactly plan anything but we both had a rough idea as to what would happen, how things would go down. But none of that really happened.

And, yet, it was really most enjoyable. I mean both Christmas and the New Year. But let’s get on to New Year’s Eve.

So, P, my neighbour and her friend came round about 9. We suggested P bring her dogs so that they wouldn’t get frightened by the fireworks. I said we could give it a try. Her rescue dog is a mongrel but quite vicious. Always barking when she sees Rufus or Dino and actually attacking them. However, together, in the house they were fine and so busy concentrating on each other that they didn’t even notice the fireworks – which was a very good thing.

Dinner was good – plenty of wine and food and conversation (although mostly in Italian). F, at one point, mistakenly called me by the name of his ex, S. I found this really funny and it wasn’t a bad thing (although I know that most people won’t agree). I look at it this way – now he is relaxed with me and we are so much a ‘couple’ that we can, almost, be compared to his other long-term relationship, so that he is comfortable with it. And this is only after just over a year! Anyway, that’s how I see it.

Then we played burraco until about 1.30 in the morning. It was the first time they had played it so, apart from the last hand, we played open hands. However, it was nice and P’s friend especially enjoyed it. F decided that he wanted to clean up afterwards. I’m afraid this is not my thing really. Before they came round he spent about 2 hours cleaning my flat. He has even bought some cleaning stuff that he likes and uses. Bless him. Anyway, I took the dogs out and he started cleaning. When I cam back he told me that the sink was blocked. This is from the fat that we poured down the sink from the zampone. Damn! I had forgotten what it was like. It was the same last year except that, last year, we had only just got together and so I did all this on my own (the next day, obviously).

And so, about 2 a.m. I am dismantling the pipes under the sink. Of course, I was not at my best at that moment and completely forgot how much water the two sinks hold. Although I had a bucket to catch the water, one was not enough and so there was water all over the kitchen! And then we had to clean that first before F could continue with the washing-up! He was really angry about it all whereas I was just laid back about it – like I am. I mean to say, there was nothing we could do about it except clean it up, so why get angry about it – it doesn’t make things better. Such is life. And so, in the end, we got to bed about 3.30 a.m. But F was right, it was much nicer to get up to in the morning.

And this morning, I asked him if he could remember the name of P’s friend. He said ‘no’ and that he was sure they were never introduced or introduced themselves to each other. I know I was and I know it was a strange name (or, at least, I think I know it was a strange name).

And, so, we spent New Year’s Eve with a woman I barely know from next door (although F knows her from years ago) and her friend that I don’t even know the name of! It’s a strange life I lead here. For certain, that would never have happened in the UK. I like my life here. It continues to be strange and challenging and improvised and with many surprises (most of which are good). Long may it continue this way.

In spite of everything, I hope he cheers up a bit.

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4

The alarm goes off at 4, as I had set it. I reset it for 10 past. But, as I have actually made the appointment, I get up within 5 minutes and get ready and go.

I arrive. He doesn’t recognise me from yesterday. I am, after all, wearing exactly the same coat, scarf and hat as yesterday. He is, to say the least, quite a miserable barsteward.

I give him my surname. He finds the appointment. I give him my phone number. He mistake a nine for an eight. I know my Italian pronunciation is not good but for goodness sake, otto and nove could not really be confused. I decide he is quite stupid really.

He tells me that if he doesn’t phone me that I am to come back before 7 (when they close).

I walk away, happy that I am, at least, doing the something that I should have done a month or more ago.

About 6 he phones me. I walk back to the place.

He is there. Some car is jacked up, without wheels. He gets inside. A man standing with him (who I realise is the car owner) wants something from inside the car. Between them they retrieve it. They speak some more and the man goes away. He starts swearing in Italian. The man has, obviously, pissed him off. I smile at him as if I understand what was going on. ‘Stupid customers’, I thought. He doesn’t smile back. I guess it’s not a good day for him.

I pay for my tyres and he gives me my keys. I have already seen my car and noted that, where they had parked it, there is a car blocking my way out. I ask him if he knows the car that is blocking it. Begrudgingly, he comes out and looks. Well, now, that’s a surprise, it is one of the cars in for a tyre change. He realises and retrieves the key to move it. We walk to the other side of the street and he goes to move the car but before he gets in, I notice some ‘packages’ on my back seat. I question him about why the tyres are not being stored in their storehouse – as we had talked about yesterday. He is not happy. He mumbles something and moves the car that is blocking my way out and then returns to the ‘shop’.

I follow. I don’t know what the hell is going on but I ain’t moving nowhere. He comes out and crosses the road. He gets out the tyres and puts them in the warehouse. This is not done with any joy. In fact, he is using the same swear words that he used with the last customer. At times like this I do wish my Italian were better – just so I could say something really sarcastic to him. This new law must have given them so much business and yet he is not happy about it! I imagine nothing makes him happy, really.

I go into the office with him. He takes down all my details. I ask if I need a receipt or something to prove that I have my tyres in their storehouse. Apparently not. He has all my details and that’s enough. I say I will come back in March. He suggests April is OK too. I set the date in my calendar on my phone. I set it for March because, if I am like I usually am, it will take me a few weeks to build up my courage to go back and go through all this shit again.

On the bright side, I have tyres and don’t need to worry about snow. Yay!

I hope that he cheers up a bit too.

I go to pick up F to go and get the lasagne. We were so impressed with the one for Christmas we have bought the same for New Year. It’s for 6 people so will last three days and it was truly wonderful. So creamy.

We talk about the fact that I have met P (a neighbour on my floor that knew F at the time when he was working in the shop). She has two dogs. She is staying home on New Year’s Eve for much the same reason as we are. The dogs don’t like fireworks and people go a bit crazy, here, with them. We agree that we shall invite her round for dinner. We have champagne, good wine, the lasagne, antipasto stuff and then the zampone and lentils. I will also do mashed potato (because F likes that). What more could you ask for?