Sold!

Those of you who have been living vicariously though these pages may be a little disappointed with this past week which, after all the recent hustle and bustle, has been much more pedestrian. There again, you might be glad of a bit a respite.

So what of the past seven days?

It started early on Monday with my second day at the school, with a mere two hours and ten minutes (not counting pre-school time as they arrived in the classroom) with the same nine children. With a bit of slight of hand and a modicum of YouTube I seemed to get away with it again, but what I hadn’t factored into my journey time was that the 14th was the day the public (which in Italy, as opposed the arcane system in the UK, does actually mean public) schools started after the summer break. It was just as well that I set off from home allowing plenty of time, as once off the autostrada the roads into Civitanova and around the school were nose-to-tail with traffic. How very different from the home life of our own dear MSP.

Whilst I was adding to the volume of cars in the big city, there was one fewer back home. Despite having the Freeclimber on charge all day Sunday, when Stephen turned the ignition key on Monday morning it was to the sound of an engine feebly apologising for failing to start. The Carellis now see it as a personal affront (not to mention an inconvenience when Stephen can’t get to the factory) and Mirco in particular has taken up the gauntlet of getting the Freeclimber sold and locating a reliable, affordable replacement.

His first step was finding a buyer for the spare set of wheels, the ones that are for off-roading I think, but don’t quote me on that, and which you may or may not be surprised to learn we haven’t used ourselves. That’s why I drove Stephen to the top of the road early on Tuesday morning to rendezvous with Mirco and then the pair of them headed to Civitanova to meet up with the buyer, a man who owns an agriturismo near Ancona. He wanted the tyres as his mother (?) has the same car and he likes taking it for a rough ride now and again and wanted the off-road set of wheels.

This successful transaction seems to have spurred Mirco on and he then decided (I’m not sure with anyone’s authority) to see if he could find a buyer for the car itself. How he can find time to do this, just days before Micam when there is so much to get ready is an interesting question, but it puts me in mind of when I was at university and had an essay to write. It was much more interesting to light a candle stuck in an empty wine bottle and encourage the melted wax to make interesting patterns as it ran down the sides, so maybe trying to sell the car is Mirco’s equivalent. Whatever the reason, at least his avoidance tactic is more profitable than mine was as he has already found two very interested people, whereas I just got something that looked like I had pinched it from a cheesy Italian restaurant. As for actually selling the car, that will have to wait till Stephen returns from Micam, so the doctor from Fermo and the businessman in Rome will have to be patient – and maybe up their bids.

And that was as exciting as it got. On Wednesday afternoon Stephen cleared out the tomato plants, I had another three-hour marathon shut in the same small classroom with the same nine pupils on Thursday morning, and then Stephen spent Friday preparing for his Milan trip and we returned pizza night to its rightful place. It was up and out early yesterday morning for the station run, before I returned to LCDDB for a weekend of jobs and lesson preparation.

It was a little more action-packed for Stephen, however, though maybe not in the way he would have liked. It was after he arrived and was unpacking that he realised he’d left the charger for the MacBook at home, and after trying a couple of cheaper alternatives with no success, he had to join the many people queuing outside the Apple store. He was placed by a very helpful young assistant, keen to practice his English, in the third queue, as he was not one of those who had already made an appointment (queue 1) or those spending oodles of euros (queue 2). The shop, apparently, was fabulous and efficient, which goes some way to easing the €89 price tag on the cable; some way, but not very far.

Today was the first day of the fair, which was better attended than might have been feared, although Stephen was almost not one of the attendees. In his second act of forgetfulness of the weekend, he arrived at the exhibition centre to find he had left his pass on the table back at his rented apartment. Hastening back for it meant that he was a good ninety minutes later than he intended (though still earlier than the factory) but he was also making like a wet rag – and not necessarily from the rain.

Whilst it was raining in Milan, the morning here was glorious. It was just as well Bella and Harry made the most of it as by mid-afternoon clouds were gathering and the sky became a distinct shade of battleship grey. We did manage our afternoon walk between showers and were all tucked up on the settee after dinner when the thunderstorm started, though fortunately for the road, the rain was heavy but not tumultuously so. However, no matter how much Harry ran around barking at the thunderclaps that accompanied the searing flashes of lightening the weather took very little notice of him – but there again, neither did I.