Bowling along

16th June 2024

With no news on the house front, Irene having, as we expected, other things on her mind for the next couple of weeks, the most exciting thing to happen early on was the arrival of a new water bowl for the terrazzo for Bella and Harry. You’d have thought finding one would have been easy; not so. Sourcing one that was in neither metal nor ceramic and which was of substantial enough plastic not to blow away with the slightest breeze took a little time. The one we eventually tracked down (on Amazon though we did try local pet shops first), a black, designer creation in recycled plastic, pleased us enormously. As for Bella and Harry, they were more interested in substance over form and were just happy that it held water. Where did we go wrong?

As for the weather, that decided to keep us on our toes for a few days mid-week, doing that thing where it is clear and sunny in the morning, then cloudy at lunchtime before becoming increasing grey and unleashing a torrent of rain for a time then clearing up again. We, however, got off lightly compared with Fermo and, especially, Porto Sant’Elpidio where an onslaught of hail caused a river of ice to run through the town.

Fortunately, it was Wednesday morning that I met up, for the first time in person, with Luca, one of my conversation partners, in Porto San Giorgio, when it was still hot and sunny and we could enjoy sitting in the shade of a chalet, looking out over the beach with a refreshing granita (the better way to encounter ice). He was over this way from his home on Ischia as his middle daughter, who like his eldest one is home schooled, was taking some end of year exams in a school near San Benedetto del Tronto down the coast, and he had a morning free to meet up. And it was almost like skipping school for me; mornings are when I usually do my household bits and pieces so leaving them behind made it into something of a guilty pleasure – especially as Stephen was on lunch duties so I didn’t even have to boil the pasta water.

I did have to shift for myself, though, over the next few days as Stephen left the house before eight on Thursday morning, his first stop Civitanova station. He then headed north to meet up with an old shoe acquaintance who wanted him to go round the trade fair in Garda and pick his brains, then discuss other footwear related matters when they took the temperature of retail trends in the local area. Meanwhile at parochial LCDDB, the only things of note were the return of fine – in increasingly hot – weather on Friday and the first courgette harvested from the orto yesterday while I was watering.

As for today, Stephen’s homeward journey didn’t quiet go to plan, but at least, in the end, in a good way. He was due to arrive at Civitanova around 9pm, his usual time, but a message he received on Thursday advising him that there was to be a train strike starting at 15.00 Sunday, today, made that a moot point. There was no point worrying about it in the interim, though an initial check showed that his connecting train from Bologna was running as scheduled.

After a tour of the shops this morning, Stephen was dropped off at Rovereto station (a city suspended between art, culture and nature, according to one website) to get an earlier train while they were all still running to try to ensure that he made it for his late-afternoon connection. It was as he was sitting taking stock of his surroundings that he noticed the train he was on stopped on its way down the coast at Civitanova, not having realised this when he booked the ticket the previous evening. He asked the very nice and helpful conductor about the possibility of him staying on rather than getting off in Bologna for the later train – remember that train tickets in Italy come with a reserved seat and are strictly limited, not like the UK where you can be jammed sardine like, especially when they decide to just cancel certain services, as I have found out to my discomfort.

That was certainly possible, she replied, saying that the least complicated way was for him just to buy another ticket from her for the leg between Bologna and Civitanova, as it would be much simpler than trying to change his existing one, and maybe even cheaper – the only caveat being that when the train arrived at Bologna, he would have to get up, take his luggage and walk down through the carriages to his new seat. Well, it’s always good to stretch your legs on a long journey, even if it does elicit some puzzled looks from your fellow travellers.

We were all very excited back at LCDDB that he would be home, he said, around 6.30, three hours earlier than previously expected. It was, therefore, a surprise when Harry started to bark an hour ahead of that on hearing the Panda coming down the hill. “You’re even earlier than you said,” I commented after we had all welcomed him home. “Yes,” said Stephen, “I made a mistake reading the time.” That was no surprise to us. As we all know from previous experience, numbers aren’t his thing and having to tussle with the 24-hour clock and an unpremeditated arrival time had been too much for him to compute. But who’s complaining? The extra four hours meant not only did we have time for merenda on the terrazzo but also a pre-dinner g&t followed by an episode of The Gilmore Girls and pizza. Not a bad Sunday night in the end, proving that plans can turn out for the best even when they go off the rails.