And Bob's your uncle

18th June 2023

Despite my misgivings about the weather, I was able to get a bit of time on the terrazzo on Monday and Tuesday while waiting for Stephen to come home from a busy working day. This meant that he missed a moment of excitement, at least for Bella and Harry, which indeed I almost did too.

I was enjoying my merenda before my Tuesday evening lesson with Sami, when Bella and Harry started barking madly, as is there wont, and having caught a glimpse of something furry ambling down the drive I thought, naturally, that it was one of Mario and Luigi’s farm cats, coming to scout out the barn. Things went quiet for a time, while Bella and Harry kept vigil at the far end of the terrazzo, but then all hell broke loose and they ran up and down barking at the top of their voices. And not surprisingly, really, for when I looked up it was to see a hare nonchalantly making its way back up the drive. It was obviously not in a hurry, nor at all impressed by B&H, as it paused in its tracks to stare over at the house before taking a short cut over the corner of the field and scampering up the road. So much for my cat theory.

It was another busy day for Stephen on Wednesday when he was almost an hour late for lunch. The good news is that they managed to get all the samples done betimes (which was a miracle, he said) so he wasn’t late in the evening. The bad news is that he wasn’t able to renew the insurance on the Jeep, which expired at midnight. He had gone to see the fiercely competent lady at the insurance office first thing, only to find it closed with no indication why or for how long. We assumed that they had bought into the national day of mourning for Silvio Berlusconi.

Fortunately I didn’t need to use the car the next day, but in any case, the office was again open the following morning when Stephen went back and handed over wads of our hard-earned cash. He’ll be back again next month, this time for the Panda and the extra medical cover, so in the meantime I (by which I mean he) better start taking in washing.

Friday was a bit of an adventure as we took Harry to the vet’s in Corridonia, our first recourse to animal medical assistance since Chiara moved north and the vet retired. Harry had a recurrence of a problem he has had a couple of times. We think he had a bite or sting on the back of his neck, which he scratched so much it opened up a small lesion, which continued to irritate him, causing him to continue scratching. Stephen had been putting some cream on it but to little visible improvement and when I was brushing him on Friday morning he was gipping a little when I touched him near his neck and shoulders. Hence the adventure.

Actually, it would have been a fairly unremarkable visit if not for the practice being situated in the country on the outskirts of Corridonia, at the end of a road that in turn was a right turn off another road that went apparently nowhere. And this wouldn’t have been so much of an adventure if Google Maps, which Stephen had opted for rather than the sat nav in the car, hadn’t directed us to turn sharp (by which I mean hairpin requiring two manoeuvres to conquer it) left when there was, we discovered on our return journey, another quite sensible left turn just a little further on.

Harry was most excited when we eventually arrived, there being a wealth of cats hanging around the outbuilding that housed the practice, but calmed down once we were inside and, to his credit, behaved impeccably when being examined. The nice lady vet checked him, rubbed some cream on the lesion, gave him an injection, told him how fabulous he was (twice) and gave us three more syringes to administer every two days. He is now well on the road to recovery, the wound is healing, and he has stopped scratching at it, and we are happy to have found another simpatico vet’s.

As if using the new, vacuum-sealed storage bags to house my jumpers over the winter was not enough excitement for Stephen yesterday morning, things got even better when we went for dinner at Mandi last night. The weather, after another rainy day on Wednesday, started to change on Thursday afternoon, heralding proper June temperatures and whole days of sunshine, so it was dining al fresco in the bijou side street outside the restaurant. They were incredibly busy, and they have obviously built up a clientele amongst the great and the good and the consciously stylish of Civitanova. I bet, though, that none of them performed the sartorial trick that I executed, which was to sit down to dinner in a different shirt to the one I left home wearing.

As ever, we arrived in town a little ahead of schedule so we could take a stroll along the main drag, which is when Stephen’s eye was caught by something in the window of Dolcissimi (I think), the shop manned by three slightly crazy ladies that sells random sizes of labels, the sort of place where if you see something you like you have to cross your fingers that the one or two hanging on the rails will happen to fit you. “We don’t have time to go in,” he said; quickly followed by, “Yes, we do.” And we were in luck.

While he tried on a bright yellow 40WEFT t-shirt, I spotted a short-sleeved shirt by Bob. “Try it on,” he said when I showed it to him as he emerged from the changing cubicle, pleased with the t-shirt. “But it won’t fit, it’s only a large.” “Try,” he said. (It’s almost like you were there, no?) So I did, and it did. “Do you want to keep it on?” said one of the ladies. “Are you kidding,” I could have said, but didn’t, “when it makes me look so fabulous.” And that is why, when they make the Hollywood version of this anecdote, and all the people at Mandi look at me in awe as I sit at my table, it’s because of the shirt and not because I’m being played by Bradley Cooper.