Up on the roof

5th September 2021

The unsettled weather of last week heralded one of those seasonal changes and Monday saw a return to blue skies but with temperatures hovering around a more equable mid-20s. Although it was still August, just, it was a lovely autumn day which saw the return to work for Stephen – not that there was a lot for him to be doing as yet, meaning in the afternoon the painting of the bedroom was completed and all was put back as it was before.

There was an unforeseen benefit from him spending the morning at the factory for the conversation turned to a chat about this year’s council tax and when Marina asked him how much, if any, ours had increased Stephen said he didn’t know as we hadn’t received the bill. “But it has to be paid by tomorrow,” said Marina, whereupon she called the Comune on our behalf to say that we the mail had gone AWOL. “Well, we sent it,” said the woman in the office, a tad defensively, which no doubt they did but it had not found its way to our post box, and I think we all have a shrewd idea where the responsibility for that lies.

All was not lost, however, as the lady did email a copy of the two bills to Stephen who forwarded them to me. I printed them out and we turned up at the Post Office the next morning after doing the shopping, and we only had to wait about 20 minutes before we were able to settle our account. The tax is actually in two tranches, due in August and November, but we always pay in one hit, which I know you will think strange: why only queue up and share a bit of good-natured banter with the other waiting customers only once when we could have done it twice?

There were two things on Wednesday that showed we had left August behind and entered the first month of autumn. The first was when we woke to one of my least favourite sounds, if not the least, of life here in downtown MSP. A handful of locals had made an early start on the first official day of the hunting season and were letting off sporadic gunshots that the early morning quiet somehow intensifies – but living in the countryside it is another of those things you have to accept. The other, and maybe for me more important thing, was that though daytime temperatures are very pleasant, with a decidedly fresh edge to mornings and evenings the time had come to stop wearing flipflops around the house and switch to something to keep the chilly air from getting between my toes.

A change of footwear was all very well, but a light pair of espadrilles were not going to keep me snug through the winter, so the arrival of our wood supply on Thursday afternoon was very welcome. Our friend from Rapagnano was a great improvement on our recent vetoed divo; he arrived when he said he would, unloaded without any fuss, exchanged a few jolly words with us and went up the hill without making any fateful prognostications, only stopping once to regroup before making a stately exit.

This left us with the usual pile of logs that needed transferring the hop and skip into the garage, which we did in two sessions the next day, a morning and afternoon one, in a total record time of under two hours. This was due to two factors. The first was because we ordered 30 quintali and the mister man brought 30 quintali, unlike our erstwhile supplier who would add a few extra, maybe because he thought we needed them or maybe because it upped his turnover. The second was that Stephen implemented a new system, whereby one of us loaded the wheelbarrow and manoeuvred it into the garage where it was tipped onto the floor ready for the other to stack the logs. You can’t beat teamwork.

This left us free over the weekend, meaning we could set off in good time yesterday evening to rendezvous with Marco and Maddalena in Numana. They were already there, staying in Maddalena’s parents’ apartment for the weekend, which is why she said they would meet us on the main road and guide us to where they were staying. This sounds simple but when I messaged her after leaving the autostrada there was a slight delay in replying, and the response of “We’ll see you in the car park after the bridge on the left” wasn’t quite precise enough for us.

That’s why, when we actually reached the centre of the downtown area we thought we had probably gone too far, so seeing a handy supermarket Stephen pulled into the car park so he could phone Maddalena – which was when we saw Marco running and waving his arms, for in one of those moments that make you realise that there is someone watching over you we had ended up there at the same time as they were putting their rubbish into the recycling bins before heading down to meet us.

This serendipitous encounter boded well for the evening as a whole. We followed them, almost as planned, to the apartment and had a little aperitivo before a walk through the square up at the top of the town to take in the views along the coast and then down to the restaurant, La Torre. This is one of the places to eat in Numana, for the open roof-top terrace affords a panoramic vista as well as a bird’s-eye view of the harbour (allowing Marco to feign a call to the captain of his yacht), with food and service to match the setting. It was, I think I can say, one of the best meals I have had since coming to Italy.

As the restaurant operates on a two-sitting basis, and as we opted for the earlier one, partly because we had to factor in travelling home but more importantly so we could eat as dusk fell and the sky grew dark, which I think is always a lovely thing to do, we had time afterwards for a wander back to the main square. Here we took coffee and a digestivo, and watched the people promenading, many of whom were German or Dutch holidaymakers – and we could distinguish them from the Italians because, you won’t be surprised to learn, they weren’t wearing coats.