Tag Archives: Outside Italy

Republicans love the Royality, it seems. As long as it’s not theirs!

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Further to my post below, I have to say that S, my colleague, seems more British than I.

When she finally realised (even if I had told her several times before) that I would be on holiday tomorrow, she was quite upset. She had been relying on me to find live coverage of that wedding thing on the Internet. In particular she wanted to see the arrival.

That’s right, I live in a republic where the ex-Royal Family parade themselves on televised song contests.

Oh, no, wait! Maybe that’s better than being a team on It’s A Knockout!

Grumpy old sod?

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I suppose I should mention it. After all, tomorrow is a special day.

Oh, yes, and some posh bloke is marrying some ordinary woman and they’re making a rather big deal about it although the Guardian is being funnier about it all whilst the Daily (Hate) Mail is getting it’s knickers in a twist one minute and all overly-excited, the next.

I will be at lunch whilst it’s all happening. At a vegetarian restaurant, of all places!

But, still, I have this annoying thing in my brain that will mean I shall probably try and find some coverage on the Internet when I get home. It annoys me because I shouldn’t (and don’t, really) care – but I am intrigued. And, I too, want to see ‘the dress’, even if it will be, after all, just another dress.

It makes me feel stupid. I am just thankful that I am not in the UK. I guess I would have stopped watching the news a few weeks ago.

Or am I just a grumpy old sod?

After the after-party party

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“Oh!”, she exclaimed, “we won’t be able to fit Rufus in. I have to pick up this other thing too and it will take all the room in the back’.

I turn from looking at the thing we had come to get – something like a washboard but not – and reply, “It’s OK, he can sit in the footwell with me”.

“No, no”, she adds, “I’m sure we can work it out”.

She is giving me a lift home. We are in a furniture restorers or carpenters place or something like that. F is not here. He is somewhere else. I’m not sure where. I don’t like him not being here. He should be here. I am uncomfortable with him not being here. It is the following day. The following day after the party or exhibition and after the after-party party or after-exhibition party at her house.

We had walked to her house from the party or exhibition. F had been there but not for the after-something party. It is disconcerting. I am not questioning why I cannot walk back home.

My worry about Rufus and whether he will fit into the car changes it all. I wouldn’t call it a nightmare – just a bad dream.

I wake up.

The TV is on. But it is silent – the sound turned right down. F is not there. I shout ‘Babe’ and he replies. “Are you OK?”, I ask. Yes, apparently he is. Except he’s not really as it’s almost 3 a.m. and he’s not asleep.

I can’t shake this dream even if the remembering of it is difficult. It has left me with a certain disquiet but for what, I can’t be sure. I get up and go to join him in the kitchen. I am really tired but know I have to get it all out of my head. Look at it logically – not that it was really logical – I know that much.

I grab a glass of milk and a cigarette. I ask him why he is up. He says he doesn’t know but he just can’t sleep. It’s not me or the dogs. He is playing ‘the game’ as we call it. He says that maybe it will help. I doubt it but say nothing.

I go back to bed. In the morning, when the alarm goes off, I put it to snooze and snuggle up to him. He got to sleep then, eventually.

I’m not even sure how the bad dream started. Something about a party or an exhibition. Rufus only appeared the following morning. It wasn’t Milan – nor anywhere I know. But it was similar to Hay-on-Wye. A group of us decided to go to the after party. I knew the people although, with the exception of F (who was never there but always just outside the picture) and one other, I can identify none of them. We walked up the hill. Maybe through fields. It was very late. F knew I was going and would join us later. We arrived with the girl whose house it was and who was giving me the lift back home on the following day. We started the party. Nothing really happened. More people came. It was nice. I worried about F not having arrived. I don’t know if I texted or tried to call but I think I did. I was worried anyway and really wanted him to be here.

Then V arrived. It wasn’t altogether unexpected. I mean, for some reason, I knew he was coming or, rather, might come. Somehow, he managed to avoid turning towards me. He was, as FfC and I say, ‘being fabulous’ as V does. But, still he wouldn’t look at me. I saw him across the room (with his back to me), taking off his jacket and talking to the woman. And laughing as he does. I was disappointed that he wouldn’t at least acknowledge I was there but other than that I didn’t really care.

He must have stayed for a bit and then he left, never once showing me his face. And then it was the next morning. And F wasn’t there. And, for some equally strange reason, I had Rufus (although not as thin as he is now) and we had to get home. And we were stopping on the way to pick up these things that the woman had to get. And then I woke up.

Tea made richer

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Nothing beats a good mug of tea made with the Tetley Round Bags.  I can’t get them here but have to have willing ‘drug mules’ bring them from the UK or go and get them myself.

Well, now, I say that nothing beats it and I would be wrong.  It can be beaten by adding the appropriate biscuit.  It has to be a biscuit that can be dunked.  Therefore we’ll have none of your flaky type of biscuit nor, for me, anything added.  I don’t want bits dropping off or chocolate that is melted by the tea.  I need a biscuit that will go quite soft, quite quickly but remain in one place long enough for it to travel from the mug to my mouth.

For me there is only one type of biscuit that really does the job.

It’s Rich Tea. A boring biscuit to most people, I know but one that perfectly fits the bill.

What I never knew, until now, was that you can even make a cake with them although I’m not sure it would be my wedding cake, even if I were to have more than one!

Signs and remembering

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There are things. Things that remind me of the past or a person. Very occasionally a smell or some music. In this case there is no smell nor music but just a sight.

Sometimes it is unexpected. I catch my breath. Like this morning.

The sight was something like this:

OK so not quite as nice as this one pictured – but you get the idea.

My maternal grandmother loved Magnolia. I think it was her favourite and they had one in front of their bungalow, right outside the lounge windows. And it is still there, outside the bungalow. We passed by the bungalow when I was boring F to death with the ‘….and this was where…..’ stuff last year when we went to the UK for the wedding. I didn’t really understand, all that time ago, because it had no smell (and I liked flowers with smell). However, my last house in the UK had one because I put one in. You don’t see them so often and they only seem to flower for a few weeks but they are glorious. And they are, of course, a reminder that spring is here. The only problem in the UK was that you were as likely as not to have a frost which would kill the blooms immediately. Here it is much less likely.

And, so, I was reminded of both her and, by association, my maternal grandfather whom regular readers will know, I loved very much.

And it was a nice thought on this fine, slightly-not-cold, spring morning and I thought I would tell you.

Bloody people.

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It has to stop. No, really it does!

I don’t really get angry. I just feel disappointed. I should feel angry but, you know, there’s just too much effort in being angry. And, anyway, it doesn’t solve anything. However, I could be, shall we say, firmer. You could say ‘more of a bastard about it’. And that would be true ….. to some extent.

But, overall, I’m just disappointed – both with the people concerned and with the resulting situation for me.

I don’t know why I do it really. The ‘planning’ bit. Even as I’m doing it I think, ‘don’t do this ‘cos it won’t all work out like this at all’. Still, I do it.

In this case, I’m talking about my students – but, to be honest, it applies to most things. One of them, who has to complete this test before the end of this year or else he loses his degree that he worked so hard for. But he doesn’t work hard enough (in his own time). There are excuses, of course. They are reasonable excuses – he works full time, also runs a business (a nursery) with his wife, has a baby daughter and fights with his wife most evenings. Oh yes, and he’s just bought a new flat which needs work to be done. Not really a recipe for success when the English thing is difficult for him.

So, as he hasn’t worked hard enough, he wants to stop the lessons. This is fine by me. His Monday, hour-and-a-half lessons at 9 p.m. were a real killer for me. It meant not getting to sleep much before midnight, making me have a lack of sleep that is showing in my face as I rapidly approach old age. He says he wants to self-study. He won’t pass his exam ….. even if he does actually take it. But he has no intention of using his degree; it’s too difficult for him to get work in his field without working for a while as an intern (meaning no money – which with all his other commitments is impossible) and he’s unlikely to get an internship at his age (being a few years older than is normal). Anyway, his long-term plans means that he doesn’t really need a degree. He wants to open a tobacconist (he works for the one below my house). You don’t need to be an architect to do that.

And so, he cancelled a lesson a few weeks ago and said he didn’t want to do any more. But he had pre-paid. I said he had two lessons left. And so, he booked for last night and next Monday.

I sit in my kitchen. Everything is ready. Well, I say ‘ready’. I have no real lesson plan. I’m not sure what he wants from the last two lessons. I will play it by ear.

F is packing for Spain and trying to do the music (see post below). He knows the lesson is until 10.30 so he isn’t rushing. He ‘does beauty farm’, as he says. After he comes (which is always after the lesson), we will eat the remains of the Cottage Pie. It is too late, really, but the other option is to throw it away.

I had, previously, rushed round to his place to show him a ‘solution’ that didn’t really work and rushed back to be sitting in my kitchen, with a cup of tea, by nine.

It reaches two minutes past nine. I have a ‘sense’. It’s not a good sense. I decide to text my student. I attach his message which gave the dates and ask ‘Are you coming or have you forgotten?’. I already know he has forgotten or, if not forgotten, chosen not to come.

I wait for no answer and am rewarded.

Ten minutes later, I text again, this time putting a delivery receipt on the text. This one just asks ‘Are you there?’. He’s not. Or he’s ignoring me. Or his phone has been stolen. Or he’s arguing with his wife (again). Or he’s in hospital or dead or something. But his phone’s still working and there is a receipt to say the message was delivered.

I am a little pissed. At least have the decency to let me know you’re not coming? I had turned down a drink with A (who is away the rest of this week) because of my errant student.

I decide that I will charge him this anyway. Stuff him. Unless he has a really good excuse like he’s in hospital. Or his daughter is, or something. Then I couldn’t do it. There’ll be some excuse, for certain. Also I had told someone else they couldn’t have a lesson at that time. Goddamn them. Bloody people.

But this keeps happening. People cancel. At the last minute. Now I have to be upfront about this. I have to set rules. It will make me seem like I am a money-grabbing bastard. But so be it.

As I found when running a business before, rules only need to be brought in when people start taking the piss. And so it goes.

It’s bloody people that are the problem!

Raining. Really?

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Well, since I live here, I suppose I’d better wish Italy a very happy 150th birthday.

In the mean time it is ………. erm …….. raining. Again.

It seems like it’s been raining for a month, even though that isn’t true.

The clarinet is playing above me. I mean, the clarinet is being played by someone above me. I think it’s the girl that I see every morning, more or less. I should ask, really. She speaks some English. Or maybe it’s an oboe. Today, I can hear she is playing a record or a tape and playing her instrument to it. It’s kind of jazz or blues – I can’t hear it so well. Still, I like the sound of her playing. It’s kind of mellow.

F has gone home to make some CDs for someone. It’s a customer from Barcelona who keeps offering him a job and, as he says, you never know. I said I could always teach English, which is true, although the real meaning behind that, I think he missed. Or maybe not. He’s difficult to fathom out at times. He said ‘yes’ anyway.

And he’s working tomorrow, he said. Although one can never be entirely sure. I used to like to know what I was doing. To have some plan. But I gave that up, mostly, when we moved here. Now I don’t plan so much. It’s not really important anyway. And things keep getting in the way of plans. It’s better to ‘go with the flow’. It’s more relaxing. It makes me more relaxed.

Yesterday, in spite of the teeming rain, I went for lunch with FfC. We talked about many things but nothing really important. I had wine. She didn’t. But I’m on holiday and she’s not. Still, it was lovely to do that. She’s working today and tomorrow since she has to work when the stock exchanges are open – which is most of the time.

I had been doing lessons last night and F came round early or, rather, earlier than usual. He wanted to see some of the stuff I had done. Particularly the correction of errors. He is funny. For most of the errors, he corrected them or said them in a different way. His English is quite good really. Being as competitive as he is he wanted to be better than any of my students. Which he was, more or less. But he was far better at the listening exercises that he did. He makes me laugh. He wants to be the best all the time. Sometimes I think that we have absolutely nothing in common. But, when I look at him, playing games on my computer, as this morning, I truly adore him.

And now I really must do some things – put away the ironing that my cleaner guy did yesterday, do some computer work, maybe, even, make a start on the bedroom.

And so, I leave you for now. For those of you who are Italian, I hope you have a lovely celebration day. And for the others a nice day anyway. I hope the weather is better where you are than it is here!

Auguri!

It could be much simpler.

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I had measured, of course. Using my trusty measuring tape.

It said ’18’. I’m looking in the shop and see the rail I want. It says 120. Good, that will do all four windows.

The rods said they were extendable to between 30 and 40 so there was a lot of extra that I wouldn’t need.

I am using the rods for the kitchen. I got up at 6.30 this morning and, despite having had two large mugs of Italian coffee (so, about 4 or 5 for an Italian), I’m not quite ‘with it’. I find that the ‘extension’ comes out completely quite quickly and have to modify, slightly, where I make the holes for the holding brackets. It’s OK. I think one of the curtain-things is a bit higher than the other. For me it’s OK. F might mention it though. After all, we did ‘hang the pictures on the floor’ before committing them to the wall in his place – to ensure the spacing and everything was right. Oh well, I can always lower one of them. For me they’re fine and do the job.

I didn’t really think about the extension parts coming out of the rods.

I measure the rail. I measure 18.

Hmmmm. Hang on, this isn’t right! I won’t be able to do three windows, let alone all four. I feel a bit peeved. They have lied ……… of course …….. on the packaging.

I measure again. And put the rail up to the window. No. Whatever it is it isn’t 120 as it says on the package. I get the tape measure and measure the rail.

Ah, yes. The 120 is centimetres and the 18 is inches. Damn! Now that means I have to and brave the rain this morning to get another rail.

Why can’t everything be done in inches? So much simpler, after all!

The Facebook Network

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I think I’m not that much different to most people (although that is a rather sweeping statement, I know).

But, in general, I think that most people have a love-hate relationship with Facebook. It has certain points that are useful, some things that are nice to have and some things that are concerning (or, at least, concerning to some).

It is useful that I am able to keep in contact with some friends, scattered around the world. This is particularly good as I don’t live in my country now. This is good because it ‘reminds’ me of them. They post something and I know that they are there, maybe I even make a comment.

It’s nice that it reminds me of birthdays – some people I would never have known their birthday! It’s nice to be able to see photos of them and see that they’re doing well.

I am careful about the information that I put up. My email is hidden. My mobile phone number is not there. I have not said which school or university I went to nor where I work. I don’t want people to be able to randomly see this information. My details are restricted to Friends and not to the Friends of Friends or, even the whole world. If I am a friend of yours (with a few exceptions) you can see everything I post. It’s OK. If you’re not a friend of mine, there must be a reason.

Unfortunately, Facebook changes things from time to time. Recently, it showed you a list of Friends’ phone numbers. Soon it will be passing your details on to other internet addresses. These things I really don’t like. And, yet, by default, it does this without telling you it has done it. That is more than a little annoying.

So, I both love Facebook for what it does for me and hate it for being like a very annoying best friend, who tells your mates things that you would prefer them not to know.

I didn’t want to watch the film. I couldn’t think of anything more boring. However, The Social Network was anything but boring. It was made interesting with the basis being two lawsuits against Mark Zuckerburg with flashbacks as to what had actually happened. I think it painted Zuckerburg as some sort of visionary that, perhaps, was not the reality but, what it really did, from the start, was paint Zuckerburg as an obnoxious twat as far as personality went.

From the beginning, he was hateful. As the film went on, he was hateful. By the end of it, he was hateful. He didn’t have a redeeming feature – except he could program well. He reminded me of some of the worst people (and I stress this is personality-wise) that I have met in the computer industry. People you could not go for a beer with and have a decent conversation. People that, actually, I could deal with at work but once outside work the only thing you wanted to do was kill them. Mind-numbingly, boring people. With a big minus on the social skills.

Oh yes, of course, I would love to be as clever as he is. I would love to have thought up some thing like this and be a billionaire now. But not for the price of having a personality lower than that of a slug. He probably doesn’t feel lonely but that is because he is the head of Facebook but I wonder how many of those friends that he has are real friends; how many would come to aid him in his hour of need? Not that he should care, one way or another.

But, the film was, surprisingly good. Or, rather, it was interesting. It was not slow and laborious and boring as I thought it might be (although it had its moments, as in all films).

Would I watch it again? Probably. Although I’m not sure it will be quite so exciting as the first time of watching. Still, if you haven’t seen it, you should, if only to understand the way that Facebook became as it is now and the dysfunctional characters behind it. For me, it is not entirely a Social Network, hence the title. It is a social network, in some ways. But whatever it is, it is certainly the Facebook Network.

The smell of dead things.

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Of course, certain smells and sights remind you of times, of places, of people, etc.

And I was in conversation with a couple of people the other day. I was explaining how our Purchasing department (occupied by three women) have plants and flowers dotted around but that most of their plants and flowers are in various stages of death.

And how there was one flower that, even when alive, I detested as, when alive, it smelt like a dead thing. And when dead it stopped smelling but looked like a dead thing. It has no redeeming features.

The other people were Italian and I was told that the smell was wonderful because it reminded them of spring. Of course, since we don’t have it in the UK, it doesn’t have this recollection for me – to me it is quite horrible.

The flower (or is it shrub) is mimosa and today, being La Festa delle Donne (Women’s Day) it the flower of choice to give to a woman. I suppose, in the same way, the flower for St David’s Day is a daffodil (since it’s almost the only flower out in the UK on St David’s Day).

I don’t give it. I couldn’t bear to have it in the same space as me. Dreadful, dreadful stuff.

Also, as it happens, this is Pancake Day – but only in the UK, I fear. This is a shame as I really like pancakes. I could make my own but, somehow, this not being Pancake Day here takes all of the impetus out of it.

I suppose, as it’s Pancake Day, it must also mean it is Shrove Tuesday.

Wow! There’s a LOT of stuff going on today.

Are you doing pancakes or celebrating Women’s Day or doing some other wonderful thing for this very full Tuesday?