The IT Man Cometh

Rather than a rant (although cannot guarantee such things), this is just a list of a few things that I have found strange while living in Italy, but at the same time amusing (ish). I am sure that many people have had different experiences, but these are day to day things for me.

1. Elderly people like to walk everywhere and they do this very slowly and choose a zigzag pattern to make sure that they block you from getting past. You would think that this predictable pattern would be easy to negotiate, but it can be slightly erratic and with the high volume of posts, plant pots and bike racks along the pavement, it is quite tricky to get past. They even look at you and see that you are trying to get past, then continue to get in the way even more and on purpose!
2. The last thing on a driver’s mind in Italy is the road or anything happening on it. Not particularly amusing, but quite amazing in a horrible sense.
3. Italian coffee is the best (if your favourite coffee is espresso). Italian coffee culture is appreciated in the UK, but so are other coffee cultures and espresso is considered as a type of coffee rather than “The” type of coffee. I quite like an espresso, but I prefer a good cup of filter coffee where the type of beans and the roast is of great importance to the flavour. I have not met one Italian so far in Italy who even pretends to know anything about coffee beans, so I am surprised they have such a strong opinion on what makes good coffee (those who do know about such things, I am not talking about you!). I have to admit, that product elitism gets my back up a bit. It reminds me of the (rather more geeky) Apple versus the rest of the world argument – Apple stuff is the best and the other 100s of alternatives are not even worth considering. I cannot respect a strong argument from someone who does not have a balanced view I am afraid! For the record I enjoy both espresso and filter coffee, but find filter coffee a more enjoyable (and obviously longer) experience (flavour and all). I also have an Apple iMac and an Apple iPhone, yet Apple partisans knock me if I have any criticism of an Apple product! Apple products are good, as are non Apple products – they all have issues too. Just take a look at the competition before criticising something – that is all I ask!!!
4. It is going to be a while before the locals in the supermarket work out how to use the self-service checkouts efficiently. Some people stand there staring at the machine expecting it to read their minds. The diagrams on the screen are fairly self-explanatory, so there is no excuse!
5. As you start improving in Italian, you realise that a lot of Italians use a lot of swear words! Many foreign languages sound so eloquent when you do not know what the words mean, but I have discovered that many of my Italian friends and colleagues insert as many rude words as possible into the most mundane of sentences!

These points may change over the course of my life in Italy and surely there will be some more in the future. No offence intended to anyone – these are just observations based on a single view. Feel free to comment and discuss or even to put the record straight!

I cannot explain why, but for the past week or so, I have not been able to sleep at all. I am reverting back to being a teenager where I don’t really want to go to bed because I have too many ideas floating around in my head and sleep seems to be inconvenient. Of course, when the alarm goes off in the morning, bed seems a lot more attractive.

I should be wanting to sleep a lot more – I am going to the gym and not getting much sleep, so I should be tired right? I don’t feel tired at all, I just get stressed that I am not tired when I am lying in bed!

So that’s my insomnia, but how does the she-devil fit into all this? Well although I have been going to the gym, I have become addicted to “La Diavola” – which is my favourite pizza to have for lunch. Maybe this is negating my work at the gym and somehow responsible for my insomnia!

Rant mode on (if it wasn’t already): I mentioned in an earlier post that I was happy because the scoffolding was coming down. In fact, it was doing no such thing! The builders appear not to come anymore and the scaffolding has not started to come down. We were told to leave our shutters down until they had gone – been weeks now since they last did anything. Grrr!

Rant mode off: I can’t think of anything else to rant about right now. On the funny side of life, I did fail miserably in my communication in the gym. The trainer was filling in my details and I am so bad at Italian I got confused about questions on height and weight. I think he put 70kg instead of 80kg, so when I have my next medical and they weigh me – it will look like I’ve gained 10kg despite attending the gym. They will make me work even harder or think I need to cut out those diavole for good! Ah well, it’s all fun and games

Mr Tiddles didn't care much for warnings

Due to the timing of moving to Milan just before Christmas, it seems like I have made a load of New Year’s resolutions. I have just joined a gym and I have started to blog more regularly (here’s hoping). I am even planning on doing a second blog which will be more about technology, reviews and a bit of humour (if that is at all possible, given the subject matter).

I am making all sorts of plans, but they are not resolutions I tell you! I have cut down on beer consumption (but have increased my wine consumption – ho hum). My diet is more varied and I eat more salad, but also more pizza.

There is, of course, a huge list of things that I have been meaning to do and some of those things have been on the list for quite a few years. I do have a bit more time than I used to, so I really should get some of them done. This blog is one, so I am winning already…

All I need to do now is get rid of this cold that has hung around after having the flu – I’ve got to go to the gym tomorrow and I will appear unfit and lame with a bunged up nose!

A mini rant, if I may: why do they not sell squash or cordial in any supermarkets in Milan? Does this disposition affect the whole of Italy? I wonder if they have yet to discover this great way of flavouring water. Some people dig water, but let’s face it – it doesn’t taste of much.

There are all kinds of new things appearing on these blog pages – I have been playing around and I have added a random photo on the right which links to a blog album, a Twitter feed and a Twitter button (why not?). I also tried loads of other things, but didn’t want to clutter the whole thing up too much!

Ciao for now.

Not part of a New Year's diet