Hall steps

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Here is a picture of the steps I mentioned in my post about the renovations. It is taken from the living room. You can see one step up from the living room. Then a flat area which is one step up from the hallway to the stairway down out of the apartment. From that flat area you go up one more step to an area just in front of a bathroom. Then one more step up to the hallway back to the bedrooms and kitchen.

Emanuele wanted to raise the step in front of the bathroom and also raise the area before the stairway out to all one level even with the hall to the bedrooms. This would mean you’d have 2 steps down into the living room and 2 steps down to the stairway. I see his point but it is an expense that we will probably have to forgo at this time.

Ordering the kitchen

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Last night I phoned USAA, our bank in the US to have them wire €10,000 to the kitchen people. This is a 50% deposit. We signed the contract and emailed it back. Turns out the contract had been sent to Emanuele a whole week ago and we never got a copy! Too bad but I hope the delay is not going to affect things too much.

Kitchens in Italy, and all of Europe for that matter, are kind of like kits. You buy the whole thing, they assemble it and get all the appliances and then the whole thing comes and is installed in one day. Really! Of course the prep work has to be done beforehand. This explains why Europeans generally take their kitchens with them when they move. When you look at an Italian apartment most of the time there are just pipes sticking out of the tiled walls and outlets along where the cabinets were/will be.

Emanuele will be doing the electrical and plumbing work to include moving the gas, water and drainage. The old kitchen will be removed. Then he will prep and tile the floors in the kitchen and the pantry. They will then do the tiling on the patio and the built-in seating and the new gutters and repainting the railings. This should all get done before the kitchen comes.

On a more fun note, it is Saturday today and we planned a trip to Pietralunga which is a hill town up in the mountains past Montone which is the close hill town to us. They are having an exhibition of paintings from the artists in residence at Civitella Ranieri near us. After that we will have lunch either in town or out at an agriturismo I found. We invited Susan and Gary to join us.

I will report back after our adventure.

Meeting with the Geometra

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So on Wednesday evening we met with our Geometra, Emanuele with Susan in tow to translate if necessary.

Emanuele had a line item list of costs for the things we want done. To be short, it was a lot more than we want to spend. So we took it home to decide what we want to do and what we do not “need” to do.

We went over to the house and looked at each item. All the kitchen, pantry and patio stuff are important to us so we will do those. Also having the floors cleaned and refinished and all the walls painted. Lighting is also important but we had already whittled that down from the “everything you could EVER possibly want” to what we “actually” wanted. The initial estimate was €10,000. We got it down to under €4,000.

The things we cut out of the budget were mostly in the attic areas – there are two of these. The areas are very large, great for storage. The estimate included painting the spaces and tiling the floor which we pretty much nixed. We are OK with them cleaning out all the old stuff left up there. I am thinking we can just take a couple of cheap carpets up there to cover the crumbled concrete floors and still use it for a lot of storage. We will still have them put vent windows in to release the heat up there and replace the small windows that are in each attic. We also discovered we could see down into the kitchen from up there so that needs to be fixed!!

Other stuff that we nixed were sealing and waxing the vaulted ceilings and the living/dining room beams. I am OK with them as they are. Also changing the steps in the hall. Emanuele said it would be good to make them more level. Hard to describe. I need to take some pictures. Anyway, in the end you would walk from the hallway onto level area with 2 steps down to the living room and 2 steps down to the foyer. Rather than one down now from the hall to the platform and then one down to the LR and foyer. Just not worth the expense.

Long story short, we eliminated about a quarter of the costs so that will work in the long run.

Sofa and Spello

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We woke to a rainy Tuesday. Reminded me of our January trip but warmer. We decided to go visit Divani & Divani which is the Natuzzi store down between Assisi and Perugia. I was not expecting to buy anything, but when we arrived we realized it was their July sale, one of two sanctioned by the Italian state. No one is allowed to have a sale other than in January or July in Italy. Many of their sofas were on sale for 50% off. I really loved some of the sofas and even though we really can’t use it until our house is done it was such a savings we decided to go ahead and buy one. I toyed with the idea of leather as we had in Alexandria but remembered the damage the cats claws caused to it. In the end we went for a nice big beige fiber (cotton and linen) one. The covers all can be removed so I assume they can be cleaned. Here is a picture:

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It will be delivered next week.

I am pretty excited about it. It is my first nesting thing and I feel very good that I have done at least one thing towards the furnishing of the house!

After that we had planned to go visit Spello which is a pretty hill town we have never been to and to a winery Luther wanted to try called Sportoletti between Assisi and Spello. We had a nice tasting and purchased a mixed case of 3 of their wines.

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Next we drove the short distance to Spello. The densely inhabited town, built of stone, is medieval, and is enclosed by medieval walls on Roman foundations, including three Roman gates (Porta Consolare, Porta di Venere and the “Arch of Augustus”) and traces of three more, remains of an amphitheater, as well several medieval gates. Spello boasts about two dozen small churches, most of them medieval. The town is famous for the Infiorate which includes a whole night of work to create over sixty flower carpets that adorn the streets for the Corpus Domini feast. Here is a website with some pictures from the Infiorate in 2014. It is important to note that these are all made from wild flower petals that are gathered in the hills. It is incredible. I plan to go next year!

Here are some pictures I took today:

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We went to Enoteca Properzio in the center of town. It is a wine store and restaurant. It was a hoot. It was a lot of show but fun. We didn’t know what to expect so just went with the flow. The father, Roberto, son, Luca, and daughter Irene were all present. They had the show down pat. They poured wine by the glass and we had bruschetta to start with a Grechetto white Umbrian varietal. Excellent. The bruschette were, two with olive oil from two local producers to compare and contrast, and one with lovely fresh tomatoes from their garden. Next we had a Sangeovese also an Umbrian varietal red. We had it with the two pasta courses, one with the black summer truffles shaved liberally over and the other with tomato sauce. Last we had a very expensive, jammy red, also Sangeovese but 2011 vintage. Excellent wine and paired with two cheeses and balsamic vinegar. Everything was good but I could have made any of it. It was notable for it’s fresh local ingredients that blended very well with the wines and were appropriate for the summertime. Pictures!

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A really weird “small world” thing happened in the restaurant. The person we met a number of weeks ago at the wine bar across the river from us in Umbertide, Geoff was at the table next to us! How strange is that? Like we know a lot of people here (not) and one of the few should be in the same restaurant that is about 30 miles from where we both live.

Saturday outing

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It was a slow day so we decided to go to Todi about 45 minutes south of us to visit a winery. Sadly it was not open even though we were there during designated open hours. That’s Italy for you!

So we decided to go to Todi for lunch at Ristorante Umbria. Todi is a beautiful example of an Umbrian hill town. You can see it for miles around. There is traffic in it but we always park in a lot outside the walls and walk UP. And it is always up. Here are a couple of pictures.

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Arches near the Piazza Popolo up at the tippy top of the town.

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Cherry picker working on medieval tower – interesting contrast don’t you think?

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House with pretty terrace below restaurant – note the Etruscan satellite dishes.

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Pretty table outside of our restaurant.

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Picture from our table on the restaurant patio.

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Us using my remote shutter for a pic at lunch.

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My yummy raviolini with arugula and fresh tomatoes.

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Luther’s faro, broad bean and chick pea soup. YUM!

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Proscuitto e melone appetizer.

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The wine.

A fun trip back to a place we had been to with our friends Vicky and Tommy a number of years ago. Still very good and soooo pretty!

Visit to the Questura

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Today was our appointment to go visit the Questura or State (of Italy) Police in Citta di Castello. We had gone for a ride out yesterday with Gary and Susan who knew where it was – kind of out in the industrial area outside of town. (then we had lunch :-))

So today we had a 9AM appointment and made it fine. We were the first called and we each went with a different person. We were fingerprinted and we had all the necessary forms. The two guys we dealt with were very nice. Luther had fun practicing his Italian and got lots of compliments on how well he spoke. They told is in 2 or 3 months we should have our Permesso. OK. At least that’s another hoop jumped through.

Yesterday we met with Emanuele and had Susan along as an interpreter as it was kind of technical stuff about the estimates, lights, kitchen, schedule etc. We got the number for the kitchen from Pedini which was about on track with our guess as to cost. The big surprise was that the rest of the work and lighting, tiles etc was much higher than we had anticipated. We are not sure why. Perhaps it is the logistics of the whole job. Emanuele told us they would have to take everything up and down the stairs. He had hoped for a hoist up to a window but that would be too disruptive to the stores below. Anyway. We took the lighting estimate home. It alone was 10,000 Euros but it was also everything and then some. We whittled it down and I think it will be more like 4,000 Euros now.

We took the lighting choices and the kitchen choice to Emanuele today and he called the Pedini people who will come to measure everything hopefully next week. He is also going to give us a line item estimate and we will eliminate anything we can to get the price down some. Right now I am thinking the attic area will not be tiled as we had discussed. We can use the space without it being tiled. We will still want the vent windows up there and probably have them clean it out. It will all depend on how much it will cost.

We also went to Formica, a big electronics chain who have a store here in Umbertide. Oddly the word formica means ant in Italian! We took Luther’s finally unlocked IPhone and got it activated with a plan for calling, text, and internet access. Pretty easy and pretty reasonable. He now has an Italian phone number. We will keep the little non-smart phone that I have which has a US number in case we need someone to call us from the US. I will use that for my phone.

I forgot to tell you that Susan told us about a free app for the IPad or IPhone called DuoLingua. It is a language app that I am finding extremely useful. I have learned a LOT of stuff from it in the last 4 days that I have been using it. I recommend it to anyone learning a language. It is really a lot like a game and that’s fun!

Car shopping

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Sunday we had a delightful lunch at La Collina in Citta di Castello with Susan and Gary. Here’s a picture.

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We sat outside. The weather has been delightfully cool after a short hot spell. We had two plates of assorted Bruschetta. One with meats, the other veggys. Susan said they were known for their brace or grilled meats. Luther and I had the mixed grill. It was only OK in my opinion. The chicken was nice and moist. The lamb not so much. It was fun.

Yesterday we decided to go down to Perugia to “car alley”. Just about every single type of car has a dealer in the same general area. We are shopping for our “practical” car. It has to have seats for four and decent luggage space so we can pick up people who visit. Since it is “my” car I want to like it as well. Not that we can actually buy a car yet. We still have to get our Permesso and residency before we can buy a car. Stupid rule. We have no idea why it is so, but it is.

So we started with Alfa Romeos. I love the little Mito. It may be a tad too small though but I still love it. I want to keep the price around 25,000 Euro or less. When the actual time comes to buy there seem to be a decent amount of used cars at the dealers too so that would be an option. Luther likes the larger Alfa Guilietta. It is a really nice car too. I have pictures of the Mito.

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Cute huh?

Next we saw the BMWs right next door. The One series is what I was looking at. I can’t afford a new one but there was a nice little used one there for about the right price. Here are pictures.

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Next we saw the Mini Coopers because they were housed in the same building as the BMWs. It is too expensive and I don’t really like the Countryman which is the big Mini. Here’s a pic anyway.

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Next we visited the Opel dealer where the Opel Corsa is about the right size and the price is about right. It doesn’t call out to me though.

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Next we went to the Skoda dealer. This car is way cheaper than the others with nice features. It also gets very good reviews. BUT, and it’s an interesting BUT, there is some stigma attached to a former eastern Europe brand. Now it is owned and built by VW. Here are pics.

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We stopped into the Porsche dealer but they had nothing. Only Cayennes and Panamaras. Next door was the VW dealer so we stopped in to look at the VW Golf. We rented one of these and liked it a lot. It is a nice little car with plenty of room.

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After we looked at cars we went to a recommended place for lunch (natch!) and it was nice. I had the pasta with seafood. Luther the “little ears” pasta with fresh tomatoes. Nice bottle of wine from just south of where we ate.

When we got back home Luther went on the internet where you can “build” your car. It is very funny that the base price is for the car with the smallest Gasoline engine. We want a diesel because they are way more economical and are just as fun to drive. When you get the diesel add about 4,000 Euro to the price right off the bat! Also there is no dealing on the cars. All dealers will charge the same price. This makes shopping kind of nice as there is no pressure. Everyone was fine with us just checking out the showroom cars.

So now we just have to wait until we can actually BUY a car!

Dinner with Italians and Americans – al fresco

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I got a call from Susan yesterday about an obscure invitation to come to we were not sure what. We just knew the nice lady with the scarf shop (Luciana) who is friends with the lady we bought our apartment from (Elisabette) as well as Joseph and Paul who live in the same Piazza as us were all invited.

Evidently this is kind of normal. There is no set time to come, we weren’t sure if dinner was involved etc. It was at Elisabette’s husband’s house. It was out in the country south of us.

We walked over to Susan and Gary’s house where we waited for a call from Joseph and Paul and then Susan, Gary drove us all to the train station to caravan down with them. The house was way up high in the mountains. Wonderful views. A beautiful house with pool and the most amazing outside kitchen with a big wood fireplace where all the meat was cooked. There were countertops and about 6 tables under a pretty flower arbor. Just incredible.

We had some nice antipasti beside the pool with a rose wine. There were a cast of characters. Most spoke only Italian. Some spoke a little English. I still had fun. I understood a lot and it was just fun watching everyone.

After a while we all wandered down to the outside kitchen and there were several dishes. French fries! And a big salad. Green beans and some other beans that I couldn’t identify. There was Prosecco and red wine etc. Then all the grilled meats came out. They had been basted with rosemary branches. So good. There was chicken and not just any chicken but gallo or rooster. Then sausages and ribs. All good.

Next we had cookies that Paul and Joseph brought, Biscotti with vin santo, an apricot tart. All really good.

It was just like I’ve read about in books. Everyone eating and talking, sitting around the tables. The cool night air wafting around us. The smoke from the fireplace and the smells of roasting meats. It was the quintessential Italian experience. I would love to have been able to talk to the Italians but there were enough English speakers that I didn’t feel left out. I am so happy to have been invited.

I am sorry I didn’t bring my camera!

Wine wanderings

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Yesterday we drove to the Montefalco wine area. So sorry I forgot my camera! But I borrowed a few from the internet. It is about 25 or 30 miles south of us. It is a really pretty area all planted in grapes and olive trees.

We stopped in Torgiano, home of Lungarotti the huge wine conglomerate and they have a hotel, spa and restaurant. It is really lovely.

We drove through Bettona, an ancient hill town. Very cool looking. Borrowed picture below.

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We stopped at a couple of wineries. They do tastings and they are totally free (unlike in the US!). And they pour quite a bit in your glass. You can’t do too many of them or you’d be drunk.

We visited a little town called Bevagna. It is completely surrounded by it’s old walls. And it is FLAT! Down on the plain beside a small river. Very cute place. Here is a borrowed picture.

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Then we had lunch in a place called Trattoria di Oscar. We sat outside. I borrowed this picture from the facebook page for the restaurant. Nice outside terrace. They even brought out a copy of Saveur magazine who chose the restaurant for it’s “Best of” article.

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I had ravioli stuffed with ricotta and in a really good tomato sauce with drizzled olive oil. The oil was incredibly flavorful. It really sang out in the dish. Luther had the tagliatelle with ragu. Yum!

Observations about sex

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OK, I know the title is titillating! Ha! But it is odd here. Earlier this week, when I was walking with Susan, we touched on an interesting difference between the United States and here in Umbertide. Men and women do not do things together. The men have their pals and pretty much associate with them exclusively. The women stay home and have their women friends. Marriage is more of a business relationship. Sort of “Sex, children, division of labor, man earns money, women do the house”. Kind of like it used to be in the 50s in the US. I am sure it is different in a more sophisticated city like Rome, Milan or Florence but here in the more old fashioned part of Italy it is still done the old way.

Susan said Emanuele asked her when he found out they were moving over to Italy “but what about Gary’s pals?!” That would be the attitude of an Italian man in Umbertide. When asked whether a man is a friend with his wife the answer is no. When you think of it, it is just the old way. In the middle east and in Eastern Europe it is still done the old way. And so it is here too!

Tonight we sat in the Piazza and Luther smoked his cigar. The tables were all full…. with MEN. There were 2 other women other than me out there. Just another example of the Sex thing.