Back in black
Or more accurately, back in a black mood. Is that something we say in English? Sometimes I worry that the local, obviously made up language, is eroding my English. Which as an EFL teacher, aren't necessarily great news.
Anyways. So yes, I'm back in Italy, the land of the sun and of all things great (as long as political transparency doesn't fall under your definition of 'great'). I spent three weeks in Scotland, resting my weary mind and limbs, while giving a fair beating to many of my internal organs, which was nice. It was great to see friends and family, and my Dad had his 60th birthday party, which was really nice. There were lots of photos of him when he was less old, and in many he looked a wee bit like me (while holding a much smaller podgier me), which is all very strange, although I guess, to be expected. Maybe the most surprising aspect of them was that they seemed quite spontaneous, which I didn't think you could do with daguerrotypes. You learn something everyday, if you want to or not.
One of my pals, who surely doesn't read this (Hawrite Mikey!) was also kind enough to have his birthday when I was back, so we went to the horse racing to celebrate. Using my in-depth knowledge and cunning, I left the race course more or less even, having won on the first and last races on horses that had the best names, which was eminently satisfying. I may give up the EFL lifestyle of caviar, showgirls and champagne for the life of a professional gambler, which in the long term will also more than likely end in penury. But I wouldn't bet on it.
So, back to the title. When I flew from Edinburgh, it was very early, earlier than is normal or sane, about 7.35 am. I had a connection in Laaandan, and then a flight here about 10. I'm sure BA have changed their schedule to stress me out. When we landed in Gatwick there was a bus from the plane which took us on a mini-tour of Laaandan, then returned to drop us off outside the building. I hot-footed it back through Security and then ran the fifteen minutes to my departure gate. Upon boarding, I asked the steward if he could check (inhalation of breath, wheeze) if my bag had been loaded, because (stagger, stinging pain in chest) my flight had landed about (taste of copper, darkness closing in) 40 minutes ago. I heroically made it to my seat then waited for the guy to come back bearing good news. He came back with bad news, with, he thought, an amusing twist. He didn't know if my bag had been loaded, but I was now sitting on the same fecking plane that had taken me from Edinburgh. So, basically, I'd flown up in seat 17-something, got off, ran about for 15 minutes being quite stressed, then got back on the same bloody plane and sat in seat 20-odd, but with the added bonus of a two-hour wait to see if my bag had also made a similar wacky journey. Oh! How he chuckled at the tangled web fate twists! Oh! How I resisted the urge to slap his baldy heid!
By the time we'd landed in Genoa, I was a little more sanguine, which is good, because my bag hadn't made it. Not a great inconvenience in the grand scheme of things, although 3 weeks earlier in a strike of prescience, I had taken all my pants with me to Scotland. As readers of the last post will know, when it's hot here I normally sit about in my pants. This left me in a quandary, and my neighbours in ringside seats for a day. In the end I fashioned a loin cloth, which suited my Tarzan-esque physique, so everyone's a winner. My bag arrived two days after, thus bringing the curtain down on the whole sorry charade.
In other news, I see that my last post has been looked at in locales as exotic as Israel, USA! USA! USA! and France, which is odd, as I don't know anyone in the former or latter. Friend of the blog and Chief Rainer-on-Parades, Joanna, says this is probably just spam, but I'd like to think that the industrial-grade level of pish that I write would override a computer's patience. If this isn't the case, hello future overlords, think kindly of me while you are exterminating my species (I always rooted for the Terminator, John Connor was a tool!). If on the other hand you're in one of those countries, or any country that isn't Italy or Scotland:
hello, welcome to the party, and thanks for wasting your time.
I wanted to write this at the weekend, but literature, darlings, got in the way. I made my first official football research trip (all previous football outings have been for theglory disappointment and beer) to Turin, which was cool, and absolutely chucking it down. The ferocity of rain still surprises me here, as despite having lived in Scotland for 25 years, it doesn't rain in the Auld Country like it does here. It's like standing in a really powerful power shower (try to say that in an northern Irish accent, it's fun). I also realised a key difficulty that I have - approaching strangers to have a chat, which is so far out my comfort zone that I might as well be in an Iron Mary listening to an audio loop of women talking about their menstrual cycles. Did it though, woop woop!
This has been much longer than anticipated, apologies, so........
And finally.......
Che cavolo succede!?
I was reading the newspaper the other day when I saw an article about two guys who hypnotized a women in a tobacconist's and made off with about 2000 euros. Brilliant! Hypnotism has been used too long to encourage people to think they're animals and such like, so I really enjoyed the chutzpah of these enterprising criminals. If I were a policeman, I'd just let them go because it was quite entertaining and nobody got hurt. Although, if I did want to catch them it'd be pretty easy to find them I reckon, as surely almost every hypnotist is standing on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh doing free shows just now, no? Simply find who isn't doing that and Robert is my father's brother-in-law.
Elsewhere in the newspaper, in the private ads section there were a number of ads offering the services of 'accompagnatrice's', which seem basically to be escorts. They all describe themselves as beautiful and fun, as I believe that any prostitute that advertises herself as being a bit of a misery and pug ugly finds difficulty in attracting business. I may have grasped the wrong end of the piece of wood that fell off a branch, but really, adverts like this in the local newspaper? How odd. You don't get that in the Evening News (you get this:
http://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/glasgow-man-says-edinburgh-ketchup-charge-racist-1-3062264 )
Well, that's all from me folks, I'm off to Ikea. I hope you have more fun than I will!
Ciaooooooooooooooooo
Anyways. So yes, I'm back in Italy, the land of the sun and of all things great (as long as political transparency doesn't fall under your definition of 'great'). I spent three weeks in Scotland, resting my weary mind and limbs, while giving a fair beating to many of my internal organs, which was nice. It was great to see friends and family, and my Dad had his 60th birthday party, which was really nice. There were lots of photos of him when he was less old, and in many he looked a wee bit like me (while holding a much smaller podgier me), which is all very strange, although I guess, to be expected. Maybe the most surprising aspect of them was that they seemed quite spontaneous, which I didn't think you could do with daguerrotypes. You learn something everyday, if you want to or not.
One of my pals, who surely doesn't read this (Hawrite Mikey!) was also kind enough to have his birthday when I was back, so we went to the horse racing to celebrate. Using my in-depth knowledge and cunning, I left the race course more or less even, having won on the first and last races on horses that had the best names, which was eminently satisfying. I may give up the EFL lifestyle of caviar, showgirls and champagne for the life of a professional gambler, which in the long term will also more than likely end in penury. But I wouldn't bet on it.
So, back to the title. When I flew from Edinburgh, it was very early, earlier than is normal or sane, about 7.35 am. I had a connection in Laaandan, and then a flight here about 10. I'm sure BA have changed their schedule to stress me out. When we landed in Gatwick there was a bus from the plane which took us on a mini-tour of Laaandan, then returned to drop us off outside the building. I hot-footed it back through Security and then ran the fifteen minutes to my departure gate. Upon boarding, I asked the steward if he could check (inhalation of breath, wheeze) if my bag had been loaded, because (stagger, stinging pain in chest) my flight had landed about (taste of copper, darkness closing in) 40 minutes ago. I heroically made it to my seat then waited for the guy to come back bearing good news. He came back with bad news, with, he thought, an amusing twist. He didn't know if my bag had been loaded, but I was now sitting on the same fecking plane that had taken me from Edinburgh. So, basically, I'd flown up in seat 17-something, got off, ran about for 15 minutes being quite stressed, then got back on the same bloody plane and sat in seat 20-odd, but with the added bonus of a two-hour wait to see if my bag had also made a similar wacky journey. Oh! How he chuckled at the tangled web fate twists! Oh! How I resisted the urge to slap his baldy heid!
By the time we'd landed in Genoa, I was a little more sanguine, which is good, because my bag hadn't made it. Not a great inconvenience in the grand scheme of things, although 3 weeks earlier in a strike of prescience, I had taken all my pants with me to Scotland. As readers of the last post will know, when it's hot here I normally sit about in my pants. This left me in a quandary, and my neighbours in ringside seats for a day. In the end I fashioned a loin cloth, which suited my Tarzan-esque physique, so everyone's a winner. My bag arrived two days after, thus bringing the curtain down on the whole sorry charade.
In other news, I see that my last post has been looked at in locales as exotic as Israel, USA! USA! USA! and France, which is odd, as I don't know anyone in the former or latter. Friend of the blog and Chief Rainer-on-Parades, Joanna, says this is probably just spam, but I'd like to think that the industrial-grade level of pish that I write would override a computer's patience. If this isn't the case, hello future overlords, think kindly of me while you are exterminating my species (I always rooted for the Terminator, John Connor was a tool!). If on the other hand you're in one of those countries, or any country that isn't Italy or Scotland:
hello, welcome to the party, and thanks for wasting your time.
I wanted to write this at the weekend, but literature, darlings, got in the way. I made my first official football research trip (all previous football outings have been for the
This has been much longer than anticipated, apologies, so........
And finally.......
Che cavolo succede!?
I was reading the newspaper the other day when I saw an article about two guys who hypnotized a women in a tobacconist's and made off with about 2000 euros. Brilliant! Hypnotism has been used too long to encourage people to think they're animals and such like, so I really enjoyed the chutzpah of these enterprising criminals. If I were a policeman, I'd just let them go because it was quite entertaining and nobody got hurt. Although, if I did want to catch them it'd be pretty easy to find them I reckon, as surely almost every hypnotist is standing on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh doing free shows just now, no? Simply find who isn't doing that and Robert is my father's brother-in-law.
Elsewhere in the newspaper, in the private ads section there were a number of ads offering the services of 'accompagnatrice's', which seem basically to be escorts. They all describe themselves as beautiful and fun, as I believe that any prostitute that advertises herself as being a bit of a misery and pug ugly finds difficulty in attracting business. I may have grasped the wrong end of the piece of wood that fell off a branch, but really, adverts like this in the local newspaper? How odd. You don't get that in the Evening News (you get this:
http://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/glasgow-man-says-edinburgh-ketchup-charge-racist-1-3062264 )
Well, that's all from me folks, I'm off to Ikea. I hope you have more fun than I will!
Ciaooooooooooooooooo
posted by michael | 01:53
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