A couple of days of catching up to do here. Yesterday Susan and I took a nice long walk along the Tiber river. The weather had turned and it was fresh and cool. It was a fun walk and the time flew by.

Yesterday was also market day so we bought some fresh vegetables, wonderful aged pecorino cheese, some mortadella and salami, beautiful melons, and some more wine and one artisanal beer.

Gary called and said that he and Susan were going to the “Mall”. Susan had written about this mall in her blog and I was eager to know where it was. It is very much an American style mall anchored by a huge Coop food store and a really big Media One store with everything electronic and all appliances. In between were lots of smaller stores including a McDonalds Cafe. We were in the market for a printer which I was really missing. We got an HP. Susan got a new case for her IPhone. Hopefully bounce proof 🙂

It was lunch time just about and Susan and Gary never miss a chance for a good lunch. We went to an amazing old palazzo out in the country called Villa Taticchi in Ponte Pattoli between Umbertide and the mall. We had a glass of Prosecco in the garden and then had lunch inside. We had, to start, a fat spaghetti with an eggplant and tomato sauce and I think pistachios. Then a nice cold roast beef with arugula and shaved parmesan. Both were excellent.

We ate in last night and then went out into the piazza to enjoy some wine and Luther’s cigar. The last semi-final game in the World Cup was being played. It was between Argentina and Holland. There were two tables of Hollanders one even decked out with a headband with flags attached. Too bad, Holland lost. But it was a great game.

It rained overnight and got very cool. We decided to just hang out today but my main goal was to get my haircut. I was pretty terrified. I have seen some pretty bad hair cuts and I didn’t want to end up with one. I looked up all the possible words I would need and walked across the bridge to a shop just on the other side where Susan goes.

Well they were very, very nice and tolerant of my inability to speak Italian much. I took a picture of myself with a haircut that I liked and she did a very good job. Her name was Anna and she was the shop owner. I am SO relieved. Here is a selfie I took.

The only other news is that I have been emailing with an American woman, Elisabeth, who lives in Spoleto and she and her husband are returning to the States in the fall. I think it’s fate because I went on the Internations site which I very seldom go to and randomly was looking around and in the Marketplace section was an ad from them about selling their furniture. I got in touch and she sent a list and prices. We plan to go down on Sunday to take a look. Also, I am looking forward to seeing Spoleto again as I have only been once a number of years ago. Susan and Gary will join us.

Today we had another meeting with Emanuele. He has used our homework list and has really worked out all kinds of options. We discussed electrical issues. He recommends dividing the house into 3 zones with 2 kilowatts of power to each zone. Not being an electrician Luther later told me that in the US a townhouse like ours had 60 Kilowatts coming in!!! In Italy it is 10 times less! I guess because power is so expensive.

We talked about air conditioning the living room. We discussed the dining room window and wall. He thinks after the winter we may decide to add some insulation to that wall. Also the window is problematic. It is pretty and a big picture window but doesn’t swing open so it will be hard to clean. He recommended sliding glass door style window. I’ll think about that.

We talked about adding track lighting in all the rooms because that will allow us to not tear up the walls too much. He talked about tiling the kitchen floor and for continuity tiling the pantry and the patio with the same tiles.

Anyway we met for about an hour and a half and our next thing will be to go with him to the lighting store, the kitchen store, and the tile store. He gave us the bad news about the timing of the construction. Because in August all of Italy pretty much closes down even if we start in July it will be well through September and into October before we’ll be able to move into the house. Not happy but nothing I can do about it.

After our meetings Luther and I decided to go out to lunch and drove up to Citta di Castello which is 18 kilometers north of Umbertide. We got there around 11:30AM and the place was really jumping. It is about double the size of our town and the centro storico is mostly walled. It has lots of little streets and some very interesting architecture.

We had brought a list of places recommended for lunch. The first one was on it’s weekly day off. The next looked pretty closed up, maybe for good. The last one was open. It was called…Trattoria Lea.

It was OK but not notable. While we were eating lunch I asked Luther when do you think it would stop seeming like we are on vacation and begin to believe we were living here. It is very hard since we’ve traveled in Italy so many times and now – Well, we live here! But it has not sunk in yet.

Here are some places we passed by on our stroll around the city.

Nice statue in a niche.

Tall tower.

Pretty street.

Today we paid our electric bill and then went to Perugia to try to get our Codice Fiscale cards. We have the number that they gave us at the Embassy in DC but they also are supposed to give you little plastic cards which we did not get. Paying our bill was a new experience but turned out to be pretty easy. We just took it to our bank, wrote our account # on it and signed it and the bank paid it.

We took the Graffiti Train to Perugia.

We walked from the station to the official building. It was all downhill. We took a number and waited.

After about half an hour we got called. We went in to window 10. The lady there was very, very nice. We didn’t really have all we needed like copies of our passport etc. or the form filled out. She could have chucked us out but I think because Luther spoke to her in his best Italian she was charmed. Old guys speaking bad Italian are always charming! So she helped us out and we should get our cards in the mail.

Now it was time for lunch. We decided to walk back up to the top and get on the scala mobile (escalators that run underground through town). It was a hike. We found a restaurant that we had eaten at back in January. I had pasta with lemon and mint. Luther had a pizza.

So that was all the good part. Now for the not so good. I got us lost and we missed our train! I guess that wouldn’t have been so bad but for the fact that the next one was an hour and a half later. So we sat in the waiting room. The only good thing was there were some books in English. Sort of a trading library type thing. So I picked one up.

Waiting…waiting…

When we got back we found there was a flea market going on in town. It lasted long into the night with very loud music. They played the background music and the people in the group sang to it. Sort of like Karaoki.

Yesterday we visited Francesca who will be helping us to get our gas and water contracts situated and our permesso started. She also helps with whatever we need so I have sent her numerous questions about things like bed sizes. They are not the same as in the US. Our mattress in our apartment seems too small for the platform. I am fine with making that our guest mattress but don’t know the sizes here. She can help.

Today we had coffee in the piazza with John and Libby, Americans who live in the hilltown near here called Montone. I have conversed with John for a long time and it was great to meet them! It was a beautiful morning and the Saturday market, which is more local producers was in full swing.

Next we decided to find another pet shop in Perugia. We plugged in the address into the GPS and it sent us right. Through. The. Middle. Of. Perugia (!) OK well we managed it and found a good tree for the cats to pick. On the way back the GPS took us through the middle of nowhere (I think she is schizophrenic). Lots of hiking trails, mountains, parks and we even found the Strada del Vino for Lago Trasameno. We stopped in a lovely winery/agriturismo and bought a couple of bottles. When we brought the cat tree to the flat they immediately, enthusiastically started to pick it. Happy days! They are very good about not picking furniture as long as we provide an alternative.

We ate lunch in and dinner out. The dinner was great, we sat outside and the weather was perfect, but way too much food! We ended up out in the Piazza for wine and grappa and Luther’s cigar. The Piazza is amazing. So much is happening from the old men playing briscola (Italian card game), to the little kids on bikes and chasing pigeons, to the table full of Brits to the 15 or so people watching the world cup. All this at around 10PM. Luther and I just looked at each other and agreed this is what we wanted. Our town is not that picturesque but it is a “real” Italian town with authentic activities. Yay, we love it.

Back to the flat to bed. Speaking of the flat. It has air conditioning but it has not been so hot that we have to use it. At night I open the windows on both ends of the living area and put the fans in and they pull in the cool overnight air. I shut the door to the zona di notte and we and the cats stay in there. I am afraid to let the cats get into the windows even though there are screens. We do sun management with the shutters, closing them when the sun is coming in and opening them when it passes on overhead. Then closing the back one in the afternoon. Works pretty well. I see we are headed for a streak of very hot weather so we shall see if we decide to use the AC. The cats with their long hair do suffer in the heat.

Tomorrow we are celebrating our friend Susan’s birthday at an agriturismo for lunch. There is an Arts on the Piazza in the afternoon and then there will be a group of us getting together for dinner. It should be fun!

Buonanotte!

We still had to lug three 40+ pound bags up 4 flights. We decided to take them to our own apartment and unload only what we needed to Susan and Gary’s apartment. We got a chance to look around our apartment. It was as charming as I remembered. I know we will be happy there once we get everything done. Here are some more pictures of the empty apartment:

Living Room – where the sofa will be. Those bookshelves need to be removed.

Other end of the room where the dining table is.

Office room

Guest bedroom

Existing kitchen.

Patio view to the Tiber river.

We showered and changed clothes and went out to Bar Mary and enjoyed a relaxing beer on the Piazza. There was a thunderstorm brewing so we hurried over to Susan and Gary’s house where we enjoyed a chat and a bottle of red wine. By the time we were finished the rain had stopped.

So the end of the arduous journey and onward to the new adventure!