Daily update - parte uno

Since quite a few prior blogs left several loose ends blowing in the breeze, it might be time to give a few updates.

First, the container did finally arrive, and not too late either. Couldn’t get the truck down the driveway, so we had to engage the help of neighbour Giuseppe and his tractor. Took 2 trips to get everything down, and stacked in the barn. Only one casualty as well, it seems – the glass from our framed Miro poster, shattered when some customs or moving idiot threw – yes, threw – our large chair back into the container during/after inspection. Luckily, the picture itself is not damaged.

Much time is spent going through boxes looking for various things. Needless to say, I didn’t make a full inventory of the boxes (see “A real man moves out” if you want to know why), nor are all the boxes comprehensively labelled. For example, there must be 6 boxes with “Kitchen” scrawled across the top (none in my handwriting, of course), and just a few with specific things like “Glass jars”, or “Orange Creuset pots” (in my handwriting, of course). The longest and so far least fulfilling search involves a box-scouring effort to unearth truffle and coconut oil (I kid you not), and a thermos flask.

Money-wise on the moving saga, the Italian agent agreed to pay half of the delay/demurrage fees, while the American company (Rainier) said they’d chip in $400, not apparently because they feel they were at fault, but due rather to my ranting and raving. The cheque, of course, is in the mail …

Car-wise, the BMW transfer got finalized, without any hitches, and the money duly found its way into my bank account. Phew!

On the home front, several changes. First, the field kitchen got scrapped after an all-day cobweb-cleaning, floor-scrubbing, and partition-demolishing effort to make a workable indoor cucina. It worked. All meal preparations and cleanings up are undertaken indoors, and have been for a few weeks. It has made all the difference. We’ve entertained two sets of guests so far, very successfully, too, although I can’t claim any credit for the high-class meal that Maria produced.

We’re also the proud owners of a new cooker, donated by our friends Michael and Lili, who had one collecting dust in their basement. This one even has an oven, for making toast! Now all we have to do is get some bread.

Maria and I have also moved indoors, putting our Natura bed on top of the resident bed frame. As a result, we’re now thankfully getting up without the back creaks that were a feature of our caravan days. Julius, however, continues to soldier on in the caravan, he and his nighttime prisoner Mr Young.

Mr Young is a veritable hunter of the plains, stalking everything from lizards to mice to what might as well be phantom saber-toothed tigers, for all I can see. The haring streaks around the garden and up the trees have increased in frequency, as much if not more than when he was in Chapel Hill. In many ways, there seems to be more going on for him in our little rectangle of space here than the nearly two acres we had back there. Whether this is a reflection of reality or the imagination – his – matters not one iota.

All the random branches and tree trunks that were lying around the garden when I arrived – some were even in the house – have now been reduced to firewood, courtesy of several lengthy (hand) saw sessions by yours truly. At the tail-end of the last sawing session – the one in which I lacerated the index finger on my left hand – Julius stood not two feet from me munching away on something as the sweat dripped from all parts of my body. He said it was fun watching me work.

The builder has now been here twice, and although he has yet to actually do any work, we are encouraged that yesterday’s estimate on when he’d be starting was down to 10-12 days after the initial 15-20 days he gave two weeks ago. It seems that the current phase of the other job he’s working on – we went to look at it and it’s good – is nearing completion. We’re praying for the rain to stay away, since apparently Italians melt in any kind of precipitation (and therefore don’t work outdoors).

Other than that, our days alternate between house work and scuttling around in the Smart, bopping from Internet point to department store to grocer to whatever-the-flavour-of-the-day’s-need happens to be.

I’m now getting desperate for an Internet connection at home, so I can be productive in my various searches for other people’s money. The telephone company – at whose whim we find ourselves – said that a technician would give us a call within 8 days to set up an appointment to come and check us out. That was 2 weeks ago. I’m fully confident that I’ll be online in my barn by the end of next week…