A little less concrete, please

Hey y'all

It's been a few weeks, so I figured it was time to update you on my never-ending thrill-ride of a life. Charlie Sheen hasn't got anything on me.

Having said that, not a lot has happened, but don't let that stop you from reading on. You never know, something interesting/amusing/diverting from the monotony of existence might be in here somewhere. No promises, mind.

So, yeah, life is crashing on. I still like beer, football is still King, still got a job that I really like, still can't speak to girls. Some things will never change.

Talking of work, lately I've been working a lot at the World Trade Centre in Genoa, which isn't quite as exciting as the name suggests, but is still pretty tall. It's based in Sampierdarena, which as fans of football team etymology may note, has the shame of supplying part of the name of Sampdoria. I'll not bore you with the details of the how and why of this, so will instead bore you with other things. Sampierdarena is a heady mix of Ecuadorian people, roundabouts and busy roads. There are a couple of streets that I imagine 5o years ago or so were quite grand, however in the more recent past it has taken a turn for the ugly, thanks in no small part to the wisdom of architects/town planners who felt that what it really needed was a uniform colour of grey. It's been rather enthusiastically concreted, overshadowing the few small decent parts of it, and yet, strangely, despite the fact that lots of people work there, there is a paucity of benches near the WTC where I could eat my lunch. How inconsiderate - did no one tell them I was coming? However, this may have something to do with the fact that the WTC is also windier than a fat person who loves beans.

More on the work tip: many moons ago when I was a mere mortal starting on the path to teaching immortality, I imagined that teaching English would be a bit of a skive: working a few hours a day (almost always in the evening), and then having a relaxing libation before tottering off to bed and repeating the same idyllic existence ad nauseum. This, it became clear quite soon, was not to be the case. Although today I don't start work til after lunch it's only because a student cancelled this morning, and yesterday I started at 9 in the morning and finished at 8.30 in the evening. Although Route One (the fantasy) sounds just lovely, it's not really practical if I want to have any money, so Route Two (the grim reality) it is. I'll be 28 next week, and the realisation of what exactly adult life entails is starting to hit home now. Still, it was a good run while it lasted. Ho, and very much, hum.

A couple of weeks ago it was the 150th anniversary of the unification of all of the disparate states that now make Italy. Although I really like living here, I wouldn't say that Italy is particularly unified. As one wit/twat (I forget which he is) from a political party said: "Garibaldi didn't unify Italy, he divided Africa." Oh, now I remember, he's a twat. His political party is the Lega Nord, who's original aim was to partition Italy so that the more industrial north could break away from the more agricultural south and be it's own state. Bizarrely, this party born in the north, is actually quite popular in the south, so now they've decided that what the real problem in this almost suffocatingly Catholic country is Islam. Another religion that is archaic, dogmatic, and restricts the freedoms of the population? No thanks, we're Catholics.

Woaf, that almost sounds like a rant. Sorry. But yeah, there was the birthday of Italia. The centre of town was bedecked with about 5 flags, and they changed the colour of the water in the fountain in the main piazza to make the tri-colour, which was all very jolly. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't too great, and it was also St Patrick's Day, so I missed it all in the search of a good pint of Guinness. Mission: failed. :( There was a bagpipe player in one bar though, which as far as I know isn't an Oirish thing. It pretty much filled my bagpipe quota for this year too.

The Genovese (people from Genoa) are generally not what you could call a cheery bunch. In many ways they remind me of Scottish people, which is perhaps why I feel so comfortable here. There is a word in the dialect of Genoa, (which I'm sure my Genovese friends will forgive me for the inevitably poor spelling) which is mughegnare, which means to grumble. I like this word a lot, and it has quite a satisfying sound. So much so, that when I say it I no longer feel like grumbling. I do though, just to keep up appearances.

I've been toiling away, working my fingers to the bone writing in my blog what could politely be called 'stuff of varying quality', for nigh on three years (!?), with my only reward your imagined faces contorting in apathy. So, I decided that I'd try to look into getting some ca$hmoney for writing my blog. I signed up with a popular search engine, which for anonymity's sake I'll call 'Goggle', as they said they could put wee adverts on the sides of the blog, thus generating the millions of pounds that I so richly deserve. I've just been looking at the T&C's, which was a novel experience as I don't think I've ever actually done that before. But they say that I can't encourage you to click on whatever worthless tat they're pushing, and that any profits they make would only maybe be paid to me, using a formula so complicated that they can't possibly tell me. Well, that's not what I'm after, so I clicked on the 'bugger that' button. Even though I'd like to get paid for this, I don't seriously think I'd actually get much from it, so enjoy your advert-free blog readings people.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaand finally, in football news 'Doria could be facing the startlingly amusing prospect of plying their trade in Serie B next year. Relegation is looming like the realisation that you can never get back the few minutes you just spent reading this. Fnar fnar fnar fnar.

Until next time, cheery bye bye!

A post without a suitable catch-all title

Hey guys and dolls

Much like the Backsteet Boys lip-synched, I'm back (I'll let you mutter "alright!"). Looking back at my last post, it'd seem that I've not written anything for more than a month, which may have been a relief to you. This was largely due to my ongoing battle with Can'tbearseditis, which is a degenerating malaise which afflicts me sometimes. But today the sun is shining and I'm not starting work for another couple of hours, so I thought I'd try to be productive. A delicious smelling cake has just come out of the oven, successfully ticking the productive box, so here I am to witter on to you about stuff, ticking my wittering box for the day.

Today I'm going to recap all manner of things straddling the gamut of triviality. Hold on to your hats while I regale you with tales of football, bad karaoke and it's accompanying falling off chairs, killing giant ants and gigs!

So to start, lets delve back into the mists of time to last Saturday. Genoa was bathed in lovely sunshine and in the lovely sunshine it was pretty warm, so I passed the afternoon drinking coffee and making faces at Clare and Patrick's baby, Aoife. Friend of the blog, Joanna, was also there, and while we were waiting for Clare and Patrick to arrive we were treated to a girl practising karaoke in a bar. I say practising, but this is maybe being kind to the term practising. One of her 'songs' was Total Eclipse of the Heart, which through her thankfully inimitable style was less a Total Eclipse and rather more a Gentle Haze. I'm not saying she was bad, but lots of people spontaneously combusted, screaming and writhing in pain, while also grateful for the blessed relief that death brought. This seemed a tad of an over reaction, as we were in Piazza Matteoti, which is pretty big and they could have just gone somewhere else. What can I say, bloody drama queens these Italians. Look out for her winning X Factor next year. So bad she was, that in what was a tribute to poor balance and co-ordination, Joanna fell off her chair laughing. In doing so, she almost spilled my coffee. How rude!

In siginificantly better music news, I went to see my friend Simone's band, Five Wheel Drive. I met Simone on my very first day in Italy, almost three years ago, yet he had hidden the fact that he was in a band until about a month or two ago. I didn't really know what to expect and despite the fact that he had a sore throat, he and they were very good. The lead guitarist was rocking away, and clearly enjoyed a guitar solo. It all made me quite keen to pick my guitar up again, but once again my Can'tbearseditis struck again, so it continues to collect dust in the corner.

Both Simone's band and the karaoke incident happened in the same weekend, so to top it all off I went to see a gig with Fra and Diana. It was pretty intimate, and as we didn't know the people there we didn't stay for long. It was in a place called Punto G, which was understandably pretty hard to find. Fnar fnar.

I regret to tell you that I've not been feeling my usual F-18 self lately and have actually felt pretty rubbish, in large part due to having a seemingly endless cold. To try to get past this I've not been going out so much as alcohol and late nights probably aren't quite the cure-all that I'd like to think they are. So, instead of socialising I've spent a bit of time killing giant fire-breathing ants in the comfort of my room. Unfortunately this isn't the result of taking lots of mind bending medicine or having a fever, but is actually in a computer game based in a post-apocalyptic wasteland full of wandering mutants. I'll let you insert your own jokes about how much of it's based on Glasgow.

And now, to football! Since last I wrote, there was the Derby della Lanterna: the derby of Genoa. This is a bit misleading, as we all know that there's only really one team in Genoa, and the football reinforced this belief, nay, fact. Doria played the mighty super Griffon's of Genoa, the forces of righteousness and good triumphing 1-0 thanks to a beauty of a goal by Rafinha, our samba-loving little Brazilian. During the game I couldn't enjoy it at all, even more so after we scored in fact, as I was just too nervous that somehow the cyclists might fluke a goal. I could only really enjoy it all at the final whistle, and enjoy it I most certainly did. Just. Brilliant.
Following the exitement of all that, we played Roma up here and were looking down the barrel of a loss after 52 minutes, the score beaing as it was, 0-3. But then, in 38 minutes of atmosphere, football and implosion, we won 4-3, a situation that I'll probably never be lucky enough to be a part of again in all my days of watching football. I needed a long sit down and a glass of water after it. Again, Just. Brilliant.

I think that's all for now folks, my cake won't eat itself.

Until next time, take care tutti!

M