Now That's Something

Mmm, Italy shaped porchetta.
It happened again. That makes twice. Which is enough but I’m not sure what happens if we get to a third. I hung a load of laundry on the line Wednesday night so it would be dry when I came home from work Thursday afternoon so that I could hang the next load. We have a really nifty little washing machine, but dryers are actually pretty rare here and most people line dry everything, as do we. We have a couple racks designed for hanging clothes indoors when outdoor conditions aren’t ideal. Normally this is fine unless more than one person wants to dry clothes or you’re trying to get your sheets dry without draping them along the floor. These are the ideal times for outdoor drying. It’s hot. Clothes dry quickly, usually. About 5.30pm on Thursday I looked out my office window to some pretty serious thunderheads. How do I know they were thunderheads? It was thundering. Anyway, I thought about my summer fresh clothes hanging on our terrace and thought about running home. But I’m a gambler (not really) and I decided to hold’em (actually I was just lazy) instead of fold’em (well I’ll fold them eventually) so I took my chances and hoped there wouldn’t be a storm or I’d be home before it started. Twenty minutes later it sounds like someone is emptying a bucket against my window. Nuts goes the laundry.

I guess I can claim I’m being green by not using a dryer, but can you claim the credit when you’re doing it because it’s the only option? Because I have to; I didn’t choose to skip using a dryer. I’m not choosing not to drive; I don’t have a car and everything I need is within easy walking distance. But choice or not my carbon footprint has definitely shrunk (unlike my carbon waistline) and is now about the size of a small foot. Barely big enough to cast a shadow. Yeah for me? Not really. If I could use a dryer I would. That fresh summer smell is way overblown. And the towels are stiff and scratchy. Give me 45 minutes on High heat with a couple fabric softener sheets any day.

Now some might think that based on the above and that I haven’t written in a while that nothing has been going on. Well if some think that then some are just plain wrong. Lots has been going on. For example, the World Cup started last week. That’s something. And another thing is I want to Ca’Gallo (I’d give you a link to it but it’s too small to get its own good link) on Sunday. And even another thing is on Sunday I also went to Schieti (again, really small) for Raimondo’s trampoli race. That was really something!


And the next something is the party I went to on Monday for Italy’s first World Cup match against Uruguay. Although that turned out to be not much of anything. And the final something was the Good Shoes concert on Wednesday night. So you see, lately it has been a lot of doing which hasn’t left much time for writing. But I’m trying to fix that…right…now.

Last Saturday was the second night of the World Cup tournament. I’m actually cheering for four teams: the USA (home team), the UK (mom is from there), Italy (sort of feel obligated and if Italy can somehow pull off a repeat I want to be here for that party), and the Ivory Coast (childhood nostalgia for the country where I grew up. Yes I did Kelly.) and on Saturday night the USA was playing the UK and Massi, Lorenza and I had been invited to dinner at Francesca’s house to watch the match. We were outside eating the antipasti course of snails, tramezzini and vegetables with the game started and about five minutes later we heard a commotion and Massi joked that the UK must have scored. “Har, har” goes I without much of a second thought, but about ten minutes later I figured I should at least check and after that is when I decided to stop watching the game. But the primi course of asparagus soup was being served just before the half ended and we saw the miracle, lucky, skillful, unlucky goal that had us all obsessed for the second half. I had four Italian rooting on the USA with me through the pasta course of spaghetti with pomodorini and mussels, the secondo of baked mussels, fried scampi, and grilled sardines. The game was tied and well and done when the fresh fruit for dessert came out. For those of you who lost count, that’s 1-1 for the match and five courses for dinner.

Sunday afternoon I had my first fun misunderstanding due to the language barrier (which tells you how my Italian is progressing; I now know enough to be dangerous). I was going to ride with Lorenza to Ca’gallo for Raimondo’s big race. When I came downstairs to meet Lorenza she remarked that I hadn’t packed anything. I asked why I would need more than my wallet, camera, keys and phone since we were just going for the day. Actually, we’re staying the night because she is not coming back to Ancona until Tuesday and I’m taking the train back to Ancona Monday morning with Raimondo she says. Am I really is about all I could come up with. Apparently this had all been discussed and agreed to in the car home from dinner the previous evening by the two of us. Well paint me surprised. Not much to do now but pack a bag quickly and get on with it which I did.

Ca’gallo is Raimondo’s home town, about a 1000 residents, north towards Pesaro and then 30 kilometers west towards Urbino. Ca’gallo means House of the Rooster in dialect in case you were curious.


The Cecchini family HQ in Ca'gallo.
We arrived during the Sunday nap so we went to the bar to watch soccer and wait for the family to rouse themselves. Once they roused, we made introductions, admired the family garden, and headed for Schieti for the annual Palio dei Trampoli festival. Trampoli means stilts and every year participants dress in historical peasant garb, mount their stilts and race through the town of Schieti.


"Downtown" Schieti, perched on a hill.

Saturday has a series of seeding races and Sunday, there are the finals. Before the racing started there was a parade.


First came the exalted contestants...

and then came the festival royalty.
Based on his time, Raimondo had qualified in the third fastest group and when his race started he bolted to a quick lead. The race begins at the bottom of a steep hill which turns sharply right after about 20 meters where the hill gets slightly less steep for about 10 meters, goes flat for another 15 meters or so and then tilts up slightly around a left turn for the last few meters. Coming out of the first turn Raimondo lost his stilts and his lead but boarded his stilts and got going in time to place second in his race, a vast improvement over last year and one to which I have to claim most of the credit for as it was me that pushed him in training over the past couple of months.


Oooh, he's come off his stilts!
After the races were all done there was an awards ceremony where all participants received a hunk of cheese and a bottle of wine.


Thunderous applause and a hero's reception.
And then it was time to party. Schieti is tiny and perched on top of a hill with an old church crowning the top and old, stone, craggy buildings guarding the approach. Nestled in any open space between the buildings were several beer gardens, food courts, artiginal (artisanal? artisan?) food and craft vendors, and rowdy children. We ate our dinner in the church courtyard, listening to live music and watching the sun set on the surrounding hills, turning the church pink and then purple while kids danced and laughed themselves silly and the adults relaxed alternating between singing, eating, talking and nursing the latest bruised knee or elbow of their tiny performers.



On Monday night, Italy played their first World Cup match. I went to a friend's house with a crowd of other people to see it. It was a cool experience. They put a TV on their patio and his wife, who is from Naples, made pizza for everyone and we sat outside in the sun and watched the match and had beer and pizza. It wasn't much of a match and just like in the US, you get that many people together and it quickly becomes more about the conversation than watching the game.

The host's parents were there and they are also from Naples. I couldn't understand a word they said. The accent is tremendous in every sense of the word. Generous. Boisterous. Gregarious. They acted like the Italian American stereotypes from the old B&W movies. Most Italians from the North consider the South another country and you can kind of see why. They also have a blind dog and a cat with feline HIV. Plus turtles that do tricks. Over the top crazy. A good experience for watching my first Italy World Cup match. The next one is Sunday afternoon.

Fortunately, at the Good Shoes concert Wednesday night there was no need to fight the boredom. Ancona is a port town and many years ago, like lots and lots, during the Black Plague, the port officials built themselves a fort to keep the infected people away and them safe so they could keep the port operating. These days, the fort hosts art shows, plays, concerts and other cultural events during the summer.


Aerial view of the Mole Vanvitelliana taken from my helicopter. Concerts happen on the starboard side nearest the water.

Where the drunks go if they aren't paying attention during the show.
Wednesday night was the first concert of the season. It was a muggy, sticky, humid, evening but nice enough down by the water for it to be better to be outside than inside. The concert flyer said the show started at 21.30 which meant we arrived at 22.30, everyone else got there around 23.00 and the show started promptly at 23.15. Forty minutes later it was all over and soon after that I was back in my air conditioned room (my carbon footprint just put on flippers!).

And that’s the something that has been keeping me occupatto these past few days.

And finally, a coupe really BIG somethings:

Happy Birthday Mom. I know Dad will make the day special for you and I’m sure Dave has something nice planned to celebrate when you go visit him later this summer. (Don’t you Dave?) I hope you have a great year and what I would say to you if I was there is that I love you and then I would sing “Happy Birthday” really loudly and badly like you always do for me and then I would insist on a really big piece of your cake..

Happy Father’s Day Dad. I know Mom will make the day special for you and I’m sure Dave has something nice planned to celebrate when you go visit him later this summer. (Don’t you Dave?) And what I would say if I was there is that I love you and I’m really proud of you and that you’re a pretty special Father and I’m incredibly grateful that you’re mine.

A Fiery Firenze (Part 2)

Last time, I had just finished sweating all over Florence and was headed to a dinner to consort with Communists. And now my thoughts on all that. Florence is one of the primary stops on the "Two Week Tuscan Holiday" trade route, so busloads and trainloads of tourists pour into the city for the day, clog it up, sweat all over it, and then disappear, to be rushed to the next stop on the itinerary. I've been thinking the traveling equivalent of Tread Lightly (the outdoor ethics program that among other things encourages you to pack-out your own poo when you camp) is to not travel in a Pullman coach with 43 fellow travelers, but if you decide to, don't all go to the same gelateria at the same time, but if you do, don't all stand around in front of the counter blocking it from the nice Italian woman; she probably goes there the same time every day and now thinks we're all obnoxious.


I can see now why there is such a love-hate feeling among Italians for us foreign visitors. We're a key part of their economy, but we really do get in the way. Most of the traveling I’ve done so far in Italy has been during the low-season so maybe it was jarring to find myself in a city during the high-season for the first time. And not just any city, but a city that was named, in one study in 2007, as the world's most desirable tourist destination. It’s considered the “Cradle of the Renaissance” and is perhaps the last preserved Renaissance city in the world, stuffed with important attractions, a World Heritage Site since 1982, the home to the Medici family, the birthplace or chosen home to Dante, da Vinci, Botticelli, Donatello, Gucci, Ferragamo, Cavalli, burial place of Michelangelo, Galileo, Machiavelli, and home to the Ponte Vecchio. Even so, I don't know if I really liked Florence. Which makes the fact that I've spent all this time writing about it just a tad ironic and more than a little galling. I felt like I was supposed to be amazed and huzzah'ed and I tried hard to be but I came away feeling like the best I could muster was a resounding “m’eh”. I know, I know, I’m acting like a jaded, annoying, superior tourist, but to me Florence has the same sort of reputation as Paris or Venice - spoken about in breathless wonder, but those two cities knocked me out of my casual yet sturdy walking shoes from the first moment I saw them. But Florence? I can’t get excited by her. And as such, I’m eager to go back in the late fall and see it with the smaller crowds in cooler weather to give myself a second chance to get a first impression.


Just like this sign, Florence is tempting me to give her another try.
Back to my long-lost original theme: sometimes it feels like I’m on an extended vacation. And that’s because of nights like Saturday night, a regular Saturday night on the 2010 calendar, but choking on the feeling that I was in the middle of an extended getaway, not another weekend night. We got back to Bologna from Florence, breathed a sigh of relief in the cool night air and headed off to meet two of Valentina's friends from high school - Katerina and Elisabetta - for dinner.

The dinner was actually a Festa de l’Unità sponsored by the Partito Democratico which is a political party on the left in opposition to Berlusconi's government. Emilia-Romagna is the region at the heart of the Communist party and the Communists originally organized these parties, but since the Communists aren't in Parliament these days, their members usually support the PD, but since they are still Communists at heart, there are still lots of these traditional parties all through the summer. The festa is organized in different cities with cheap dinners, live music, midway games, dancing and such stuff to recruit new members, sway voters, build loyalty, etc. Since Valentina was back in town for the weekend and wanted to catch-up with her friends and Katerina is quite active politically, we ended up at this Communist Party party. I was practicing saying "Si, Comrade!" on the drive over and wondering what was in store for this capitalist pig.


The "Lawrence Welk Show" being filmed live in Italy.
The heat of the day had evaporated with the setting sun and in its place was a beautiful late-spring evening with soft light accented by the glowing neon from the various booths. There were flags and banners and posters for the PD everywhere and the sounds of several bands, kids playing and the buzz of voices mixed in the air. It was distracting and entertaining and pulled us in towards the smell of the dining tent, a huge covered area separated into three large sections. You sat in a section depending on what kind of food you wanted - pizza/panini in one, pasta and grilled meat in another and fish in the third, all of it regionally appropriate. We chose the meat section. The "restaurant" was staffed by volunteers and the waiters were all old men. We were a group of four with three women and myself and the women attracted a lot of attention from the waiters which was fine by me because it meant the service was fast and there was a little extra of each dish. We had handmade tortellini, one bowl served in ragu and one in a cream sauce, two platters of grilled meats - the pig is king in Romagna - with ribs, sausage, chops and chicken, and another platter of grilled steak with shaved Parmesan cheese and rucola with lemon. A cold bottle of lambrusco (sparkling red wine) washed it all down. After walking around for a bit and playing a few of the fair games (where Betta won a slinky) we found a tent with live music hosted by a local microbrewery where we drank our way through each of the different varieties and relaxed and talked our way into the early morning.

On Sunday, with no race to attend, I slept late and then Valentina and I took a couple bikes and road to nearby Cento to have breakfast and work-up a healthy appetite for the Sunday lunch to come. This was my longest ride in nine months, done without the aid of bike shorts (oh the horror, oh the pain) and in flip-flops. We probably did over 20k in total, passing and being passed along the way, folks on rugged utility bikes, roadies in full team kit, kids on BMX bikes, and even a fixie or two. This region is the heart of bicycling in Italy, is pancake flat, and on Sunday, the bike rules. Crowds of old men gather in all the piazzas, arriving by bike, to have a coffee and gossip about the latest regional news. Church-goers arrive on bike. Along our ride we road tarmac, cobblestones, gravel and dirt roads, along the shoulder of the road being buzzed by cars and scooters, in painted bike lanes and on separated cycle tracks. Single-file on busy streets and two-up on the quieter ones. We signaled turns and blew stop signs. I popped a wheelie off a curb. I saw three helmets out of a few hundred people on bikes. We imagined ourselves climbing the Gavia Pass over the one hill, a slight rise over a bridge, on the route. It was glorious. Although the after-effects, experienced a few hours later while sitting on the train, were much less than glorious.

Insert imaginary photos from the ride here. I forgot my camera in my backback so no real pictures were taken from this part of the weekend.
Sunday lunch featured the last strawberries of the season, the first pesto of the season, zucchini flowers stuffed with prosciutto and buffala, melon and prosciutto, roasted eggplant, roasted potatoes, roasted chicken, more of those pork ribs, gelato, 30-year old grappa, and homemade wine (slightly fizzy with the subtle scent of burnt wood and the unmistakable flavor of gasoline). With loaded bellies we boarded the train to Ancona where I spent the next three hours watching thousands of Italians turning themselves horrific shades of red on the beach as we trundled by resort town after resort town along the Adriatic coast.

The World Cup starts on Friday!

A Fiery Firenze (Part 1)

Even though I’ve been in Italy for almost nine months now and I ostensibly came for work, if I’m honest it feels like I’m on an extended vacation sometimes. This past weekend was no exception. Ah, I can see ears pricking-up. (Or would it be eyes?) You’ve flocked here to find out what I chose to do over the weekend – Florence or Mugello – haven’t you? That is the question that bedeviled your every waking moment lo these past few days. Well, out with it! I went to Florence on Saturday. I love typing sentences like that so let me do it again. I went to Florence on Saturday. Whew. Feels good to get that off my chest.

Giordano was on a two-stop tour with the Gomma Gommas so Valentina decided to visit her parents in Bologna for the weekend and generously offered to let me tag along and proposed we spend Saturday in Florence. The night before she made that offer, Raimondo’s friend called him and offered up a free ticket to the MotoGP race in Mugello (Valentino Rossi! Ben Spies! Nicky Hayden!) on Sunday. Faced with trying to decide between the two options, Valentina suggested I could do both. Take the train to Bologna with her Friday night, see Florence on Saturday, and then take the train to Faenza on Sunday morning to meet Raimondo and ride with him to Mugello in Tuscany to see the race. Perfect. It would mean missing Sunday lunch at the Cristoferi house but the chance to see the Texas Tornado and Kentucky Kid soothed that disappointment. All I had to do was buy the ticket to the race.

We checked online Friday night and there were plenty left in the same section as Raimondo’s ticket but I couldn’t make the online purchase because the only delivery option was by mail. No problem. I’ll buy it in person on Saturday. Saturday morning in Bologna, before leaving for Florence, we go to the ticket office. No tickets left. In that section? At all. Are you sure? Completely sold out. Oh. Interesting. Amarezza!

I guess I am really assimilating into Italian society. We wait until the last minute to do something, arrive somewhere, etc., and then we’re surprised by the resulting traffic jam, crowded restaurant, or sold out tickets. Bravo! I sent an SMS to Raimondo in the afternoon with the news that I wouldn’t be joining him. No problem. Turns out Rossi (9 time World Champion, born in the same hospital as Raimondo and Raimondo’s hero) crashed during qualifying and was out of Sunday’s race so Raimondo wasn’t interested in going. Glad I hadn’t bought that ticket! Sunday lunch, back on!

Friday night after work we caught the regional train to Bologna and then an even more regionally train to Valentina’s village where her dad was waiting to pick us up. The second train was a hoot. While it looked like a regular train, it sounded and operated more like a train body that had been stuck on an truck platform that had been found lying around. It literally accelerated like a truck with the engineer up-shifting and downshifting through the gears of a manual transmission as we arrived and departed each station and while there was a train whistle at all the crossings I fully expected to hear an air horn each time.


Saturday morning I awoke early to a bright sun and blue skies. I’m no fan of the heat and everyone has been warning me about what to expect from the Italian summer, and this looked to be a day for my first true experience with it. I had a sexy sheen on my forehead by the time we reached Bologna and I knew I was in for a long, moist (you’re welcome for that Jenn) day. Rather than take a train directly to the main Florence station from Bologna, Valentina had saved us about 50% on the cost of the tickets by routing us into a minor station on the city outskirts with a transfer and short ride into downtown on the commuter line. We boarded the train into Florence and it was standing room only, a first for me, with the aisles clogged by fellow day trippers and the soulful sound of English pinging off the walls. Floppy hats, Titleist caps, lobster skin, and casual but sturdy and comfortable walking shoes were in abundance. More than one copy of “Experience Florence in Less Than a Day” were seen.

Florence was hot (it’s literally in a cauldron, situated in a river valley, surrounded on all sides by the Tuscan hills and lacking any prevailing winds), crowded with tourists, and suffocating. It's beautiful but it is so hard to really appreciate anything because you can't get any perspective on it as the streets are narrow and close together with everything packed in tightly.

As we stepped from the dark of the train station into the searing heat and light of the city we passed a flock of bewildered Americans milling about like a group of robot vacuum cleaners whose guidance systems have been disabled, plaintively crying, “Now what?”. No such problems for me as Valentina had already mapped and highlighted our route on a map, cross-referencing the best places to see with the suggestions from three different Italian guidebooks. Our first stop was the Piazza Santa Maria Novella, site of the Basilica Santa Maria Novella.


One of the finest examples of Renaissance construction.

This is what they do to turtles who refuse to convert.
From there we would go to the Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore, and then to I Giardini di Boboli, followed by the Piazzale Michelangelo, and finally, the Basilica di Santa Croce (where all the most famous former residents of Florence are buried). I told you, with Valentina there is never any, “Now what?” coming from me. Using these attractions as anchor points, we planned to wander the streets of the city and take in as much of the overwhelming amount of things to see as our feet, picnic lunch, patience and curiosity would allow.


The Ponte Vecchio.



The decorative exteriors seen above are created using carvings and colored marble, not paint.
Appropriately wowed by the statues, suitably awed by the churches and stomachs rumbling we arrived at the Boboli Gardens (named after the smash hit pizza crusts) ready to find a shady spot to eat our picnic lunch. At EUR 10.00 per person to get in we amended our itinerary and went in search of another option. Which is how we came to find a secluded square in the Natural History Museum where I drank the coldest bottle of water I’ve had yet in Italy, we shared a picnic with a couple other tourists who hailed from Spain and a class of Italian high school girls studying in the skeleton room, and we saw this delightful sign.


After lunch we were determined not to let the disappointment of the Boboli Gardens get us down, and just as determined to do less walking and more riding as the sun was in full melting phase by that point. People scurried from sidewalk to sidewalk seeking refuge in the shady sides of the streets and those that hesitated would flare briefly before dissolving into greasy, gelato tinged mist. We boarded the magical number 13 bus from just past the Ponte Vecchio and were whisked into the hills outside the city, amongst the villas of the new Medicis, where we deboarded at the Piazzale Michelangelo. This is the spot to see the views of Florence that end up on postcards and the cover of books and tour guides are.




Just above this little bit of perfection was the San Miniato al Monte, an even more little bit of perfection. Situated at the very top of a hill, I was a hot, sweaty mess (you’re welcome for that Olivia) by the time I had clambered up to the top of the hill, but inside the church we found a cool and beautiful place which I proceeded to sweat all over. The floor is made up of individual marble panels that look like tombstones with details of various deceased people although there is only one actual tomb in the church.


The beautiful, cool interior of San Miniato al Monte.

A shot of the hand-painted ceiling rafters.

The church's gift shop where honey and other products made by the priests are sold.
The less magical number 12 bus brought us back down into the city and conveniently dropped us in front of the last, formal stop on our itinerary, the Basilica di Santa Croce. The tombs of some of Florence’s most famous past residents lie within but an EUR 8.00 entrance fee lay without so we did without. At this point, it was time for us to navigate, shove (yes, you have to shove your way through the crowds along some of the sidewalks – why oh why do the tour groups insist on assembling in the most ridiculous place), and trudge our way back to the train station for our escape, er return, to Bologna.

Thoughts on my visit to Florence and a Communist Party party in Part 2.

The Dolphins of Ancona

Ancona at night from my bedroom window.
This reporter was in attendance at Torette stadium on the night of Saturday, 29 June, 2010 to witness the American Football game featuring the Dolphins of Ancona versus the Giants of Balzano. I will leave the specifics of the match to the experts. I will leave the musings of the match to me. I went with Giordano and Valentina, both who had never before seen the American Football, and it was a lot like watching a football game with my mother. Complete (and in my mother’s case, willful) ignorance of the game. Trying to explain the intricacies, the on-field ballet of the game was futile. They couldn’t follow the movement of the ball, nor understand why everyone stood around after every play, or decipher why players kept shuttling on and off the field. Forget about explaining offsides or the scoring system. And right as the concept of four downs to move the ball 10 yards (meters?) there was an on-side kick. An on-side kick!?! I give up! The fevered screams for “Acqua! Acqua!” at each break did serve-up never ending amusement and giggles.

The field, doing double duty for the night, was an astro turf soccer pitch and the yard lines were painted to fit the available space meaning they were suspiciously close in some areas and strangely distant in others. The goal posts were sticks tied to the sides of the soccer goals. Time was kept by the head referee with regular updates shouted to the sidelines and there was no scoreboard. We didn’t even know Ancona was staging a late-game comeback until we overheard a Dolphin on the sidelines mention it to a teammate. My middle-school team regularly outdrew the crowd that had gathered for the game, but what they lacked in numbers they made up for in cool dis-interest tempered by bouts of fierce encouragement in the form of well intentioned chants of “Offense Go!” or “Defense Go!” and there were suitable displays of outrage over the perceived incompetence of the obviously biased referees. It was all authentically American and totally Italian. A suitable metaphor for my life here these past nine months.

With seven seconds left in regulation, Ancona had tied the score and were debating going for a field goal from about 32 yards to win or playing it safe for over-time. The American quarterback was in the face of his Italian kicker and yelled a few times, “Can you MAKE it, SI or NO?!” A visibly intimidated and shaken kicker hesitantly and with no sign of confidence replied, “Yes, I think so, yes.” The kick was true if a few yards short and a Bolzano player (their American running back) caught the ball and returned it to the opposite 2 yard line before a sideline tackle by Ancona’s quarterback (and maybe the only other player on the field besides the ball carrier who knew the ball was still live) forced the OT.


American Football in Ancona.

The stands and fans. Bolzano on the right; Ancona on the left.

Group calisthenics led-off the second-half for both teams.

The picture is in focus. The players are actually blurry in real life.

As for the results:

Vittoria in OT per i Giants, onore ad Ancona
Dolphins Ancona - Giants Bolzano: 63-64 OT
Spettacolo in scena ad Ancona dove si assiste alla prima gara in over time dall'inizio della stagione con i Giants che vincono in extremis trasformando da 2 punti con una corsa di Greene. Doveva essere una vittoria scontata quella di Bolzano e, invece, i Dolphins sono scesi in campo con onore e orgoglio facendo la più bella gara della stagione. Putroppo non è bastato e, come è accaduto la scorsa settimana contro i Rhinos, il team di Argeo Tisma è riuscito a superare gli avversari col sangue freddo e il coraggio di una trasformazione da 2 punti. Nel corso del tempo regolamentare la gara era finita 56-56.

Wednesday was a holiday - Festa della Repubblica - the day Italians celebrate becoming a Repubic (except for the Lega Nord who never wanted to be a Republic - like Virginia) and kicking the king into exile except the king is back now and his son is a singer and television personality who recently competed on Italy's Ballando con le stele. I’d never complain about a day-off from work. It’s bad luck. But I can’t stand holidays in the middle of the week. They’re disruptive and the next day at work is always terrible. It’s impossible to really go anywhere or do anything. And if the weather is bad, it’s even worse. A not that much better person than I would ignore all of that and more and cook-up something fabulous. And they’d blog about it and everyone would be suitably impressed. All I can say is I slept late, I had lunch, I went for a run and then I went out for dinner. And the only reason I share that is so you will be just as disappointed in me as I was in myself. I let the horrible day-off in the middle of the week get me down.

But the good news is that on the running front, my back fat has stopped itching while I’m running. It feels great. Or rather, it doesn’t feel itchy which feels great. My theory is either the fat has compressed into a non-itching equilibrium or has leaked into my butt. I still sweat like Patrick Ewing but now I do it at more than a walking pace.

On a slightly less anatomical note, only 67 words after apologizing for squandering the opportunity that was my Wednesday day-off, I rebound with news that for this weekend I was faced with the decision of going to the MotoGP race in Tuscany at the Mugello track or taking the train to Florence. What is a boy to do? We all agree there are no wrong answers here right? Unless it’s wrong choosing between this or this. I’ll let you know next week what I decided.

Have a nice weekend everyone.