She's backkkkkkkk

09 MAY CREVALCORE—Benvenuti gentili lettori al mio blog di oggi. Oh sorry. Are we on? Uhmmm. Let me adjust the volume on my Itunes®. There we go. Got a little Glen Gould playing Bach’s Goldberg Variations going on in the background, just for snob appeal. Almost went for the Ketih Jarrett at the Blue Note but the groove didn’t fit the mood. RAI3 is on mute. I’m keeping an eye on the third stage of the Giro d’Italia. Nothing much is going on. It’s another flat, early stage on the southwest corner of the
Peninsula. I believe that the Tour will pass close to where I live, at Ferrara, a couple of weeks from now. In the meantime, I’ve almost got my ride ready to go. But I digress. Let’s back up, dear patients, and pick up where we left off at our last session.

Last week had our hero searching for his beloved pain-in-the-ass cat, Mimi, off again on one of her feline benders. I put up posters at the Koop grocery store, an elementary school (kids love animals) and generally tried to avoid the suspicious “vecchiette” (old ladies) that seem to be watching from behind every shutter. But if I had had to live through what they did I would be suspicious, too. (Note from the editor: I am preparing a blog for future publication on Bologna during the war. Interesting stories of how the Bolognesi suffered through 21 straight months of Allied bombardments with thousands of deaths and then were throwing flowers at Gen. Mark Clark and the other Allied soldiers who liberated Bologna on April 21, 1945. Ah, the irony is killing me.)

In between thrice-daily patrols of a 15-block area of Crevalcore trying to locate the black feline beast, I kept busy as usual doing other tasks. I’ve got my bleach-to-water ratio down pat now so that when I mop I don’t have to don my HAZMAT suit afterwards. I’m becoming really domesticated. Give me a few diapers to change and I’ll be ready for the big leagues.On Wednesday I got a call from our friend Paola who invited us both over to their spacious digs on Via Andrea Costa in Bologna that night. The deal was that she and the girls would go out and have fun and Gabriele and I would stay home and watch the kids.

We didn’t get their until dark but the kids were still in fifth gear. Pietro, the oldest, was riding his younger brother’s trike up and down the hallway while their mom got dressed with the other two shrieking and following in his wake. Ettore, the middle son, hid in a closet and then, of course, so did Iacopo. He’s only two and thus don’t talk too good so it’s hard how to figure out how to make him stop a hollerin’.The other ladies arrived and then they all departed in Paola’s new red Mini Cooper. (They have a bigger budget than we do.)

Gabri and I fixed ourselves a snack while the youngins put in “The Barber of Seville” and commenced singing and dancing in the family room. Figaroooooo! Figaaroooo! If you don’t like opera, watch the much shorter Bugs Bunny version. (Oh man, there was just a nasty accident in the Giro. A 33-year old Spanish rider touched the back wheel of the rider in front of him and crashed head first into the guard rail. He is surrounded by fluorescent-yellow clad medical personnel who are attending to him. Hopefully, he will be alright.) After eating, we adjurn to the family room. It is soon off to bed for the boys. We then busy ourselves watching the last part of the Champion’s League semifinal soccer match between AC Milan and PSV Eindhoven of the Netherlands. Milan won on goal differential but actually lost the night’s game. You can’t watch regular Serie A league games unless you have pay-per-view. It’s called premium sports channels on Sky. Seems that the rights to the games are so expensive that the non-cable networks won’t pay to televise matches. It’s not like in America where the major networks bid some ridiculous number every few years to have the exclusive television rights to games and try to make it back with advertising. In Italy, I’ve learned, you pay as you go for everything.

Gabriele is really giving me a hand trying to help me find some sort of gainful employment. He’s an engineering project manager but has made a few calls trying to hook me up with at least some informational interviews. He gave me one phone number of someone who runs a big ad agency in Bologna. Stefania and I are working on a script that I can use when I make the call. Everything takes so much more effort here. For complicated matters such as discussing career options I really have to prepare and look up al the anticipated necessary vocabulary. Moreover, I need coaching on how one conducts business here. What I will be attempting is already fairly rare in Italy. That is to say, I will be attempting the ever difficult cold call. I got this persons number from a friend who got it from an aquaintance of the person I need to talk to. However, this person doesn’t know that I will be calling. So I have to learn how to fire fast from the hip before the possible brush off. It’s good for the ole blood pressure. Hopefully, this person will at least be able to give me a better idea of how the print media world works here. From what I’ve seen, they could really use the help. Only problem is, my body of work is very specialized and doesn’t really exist here. Therefore, I have the additional challenge of explaining what I’ve done but also what I could do, albeit with no evidence to speak of. Should be good times.

Thursday morning brought an urgent call from Stefania. She said a man just called her to say that people on his street, Via Minzoni, had called the “vigili del fuoco” (fire department) to have them get a black cat off a neighbor’s roof. The cat had been stuck up there for three days and was driving people crazy with its incessant howling. The man had seen one of my posters and put 2 and 2 together and made the call. Spurred on by this hot tip, I dressed faster than Superman and ran down the stairs, around the corner and off towards Via Minzoni. This small residential street is located several blocks from my pad near the elementary school. I walked the long way around, behind the school and through a little park. I first proceeded down the street next to Via Minzoni, then came back towards my original direction of travel on the street where the cat was allegedly last seen. I passed the first house and a big German Shepherd leaped at me from behind a fence. Nope. Don’t think Mimi would be hiding out here. I continued down the street. After two more houses equiped with canine meat grinders I fell upon a peaceful looking yard. I peered through an iron gate and thougth, ‘what the heck.’ I gave the official ‘Mimi-get-your-skinny-ass-over-here’ whistle. A big bush in the back of the yard seemed to move. Then a streaking black cat came shooting out in a cloud of dust. It was the Meemer. She covered the 100 meteres between us in about 5 seconds flat. She almost went right through the iron gate. I reached over and pulled her back to my side. Yep. It was her. She had lost her collar (just like the 37 others she has lost) but seemed no worse for the wear and tear.

I started walking for home with her cradled in my arms. She didn’t take kindly to this. Probably thought she was going to the vet. So I wrestled Miss Hulk Hogan all the way home. Once inside, the howling beast from hell headed straight for the food bowl, of course. After refueling, you guessed it, she wanted to go out again. Uh uh. She got the message and went off to sleep off her Pee Wee’s Big Adventure (no not the one in a movie theatre...the other one. The one about the circus or something) in the penalty box. Slept for about a day. Serves her right. I should of fed her to that hungry German Shepherd down the street. It looked like he flosses with skinny black cats. Sasha, her over-fed big sister was happy to see her—she growled, gave her two left jabs, an uppercut and jumped on her back. Had to give her five for fighting, too. She was so glad to see sis’ that I thought she was going to go for a Gordie Howe Hat Trick—a goal, an assist and a fight.

As I write this I am bathing in the warm glow of Sasha’s contempt from her comfortable perch on the IKEA love seat in her rent- free apartment. If I had a job myself I’d tell her to go get one. The dogs are barking again at the end of the street as old folks on bikes pass beneath my window, bells ringing as they come to intersections. The older fellow who owns the house and courtyard beneath my back window must be taking a nap. He is constantly bellowing at his wife in a bone-shakingly resonant baritone. I can never understand what he seems so pissed about since he only talks in dialect. I’ve just unloaded some clothes from the new Whirlpool washer that Stefania bought. I don’t know how to work it yet, I just unload it. It’s all digital, about a third the size of an American washer and holds five kilos. (Clothes not drugs.) The console is all digital and looks like the cockpit of a 737. The manual weighs almost as much as the washer itself. I have some trepidation in attempting to do a load while at home by myself, only to have the bathroom fill up with water like a sinking submarine. Now that would be a good post!