November is Birthday Month

Posted on December 1, 2014 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged bagna cauldo, C.O.S.I, donkey, Mrs Sensible, Pecora Nera, piedmontese food • 54 Comments

In November, I was supposed to write a foodie post for the C.O.S.I group; unfortunately I have been much too busy celebrating my birthday. I am not sure how I manage to get away with it, but much to Mrs Sensibles dismay, I manage to squeeze 2 or 3 birthday parties into the month and a couple of celebrationary meals with friends.

So to keep everybody happy, I will start with a brief foodie post on traditional Piedmontese food.

Bagna Cauda

November is cold and wet in Piedmonte, so to stay warm and cosy your average Piedmontese sits down to a bowl of Bagna Cauda.

Bagna Caulda; a sauce made from garlic, anchovies, more garlic a bit of olive oil and more anchovies.

Bagna Caulda is a hot dip, made from anchovies, lots of garlic and olive oil. It is served with a selection of raw vegetables, peppers, potatoes, carrots etc. The object of the meal is to dip the raw vegetables into your sauce and cook them. The conversation around the table normally goes something like this.

P N: So I dip the potato in here?

Mrs Sensible: yes but be careful the sauce is hot.

PN: Is the potato supposed to stay crunchy?

Mrs S: Tsk! leave it a bit longer.

PN: Can you pass the red wine down this way.

PN: Oww!!!

Miss Sensible: I told you it was hot!!

PN: Quick more wine.

An added bonus of enjoying the delicious dish of bagna caulda, is you never have to explain to your friends or colleagues what you had for tea the night before…. they will smell the aroma of anchovies and garlic as you walk across the carpark.

OK back to my birthday.

One of my birthday dinners was an impromptu meal with some friends, as usual we started with the swapping of the presents and the opening of a couple of bottles of wine. We then moved onto a fine selection of cheeses and salami.

Our hosts trying to open the bottle of wine I brought. (amazing what fun you can have with a bit of superglue)

Mrs S asked me if I would like a little more salami; of course I nodded and said I prefer the darker salami. She promptly added 3 more slices of meat and added “mmm the asino is tasty”

Some of you will know what asino is, for the rest of you let me enlighten you.

Asino is another Piedmontese delicacy.

Sagra d’ donkey !!

We have sagra’s dedicated to the humble donkey, it is available as meatballs, agnolotti and of course salami. It has taken me 7 years to remove the image of the Blackpool Donkey from my mind when a slice of asino is added to my plate.

Blackpool donkeys, I don’t think I know these young ladies

For many years I refused to eat Asino, occasionally I would unknowingly eat it, only realising after I was asked “did you enjoy the meat”

To finish with

1) If you want to search for Bagna Caulda on the internet, please spell it correctly, my first attempt was bagno caldo and google provided lots of pictures of women in the bath

2) Where are all my presents and birthday cards?

3) If you are a donkey, Italy is probably not a good holiday destination.

Fancy a holiday in Italy?

Normal food posts by the C.O.S.I group

“Arm yourselves against Emilia’s arsenal of food.” – Married to Italy

“Nobody Leaves The Table Until They’ve Eaten So Much That They Hate Themselves”–Observations on Eating in Italy – The Florence Diaries
Operation: Italian Thanksgiving – “La Festa della Gallina” – Sex, Lies, and Nutella
How (not) to Spend Thanksgiving in Florence – Girl in Florence
Foraging, Toxoplasmosis, And Eating Until You Die In Cassino, Italy — Surviving in Italy

Telecom Italia uffa!

Posted on November 10, 2014 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged englishman in italy, internet access in Italy, Italian customer service, Pecora Nera, Telecom Italia • 51 Comments

Boh! I give up

A pole and a phone

Posted on October 22, 2014 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Uncategorized • Tagged an englishman in italy, fun expats, humour, Italian customer service, living in italy, Mrs Sensible, Pecora Nera, piemonte, Telecom Italia, telephone contracts in italy, wine • 64 Comments

Somewhere in Italy there is a boat minus it’s mast. I know this for a fact, because there is a boat’s mast stuck in my garden. I was going to get a shovel and dig the mast out, but knowing my luck the rest of the boat is probably still attached to the mast. Over the past three months I have thought of several uses for our yachts mast (did you notice it now belonged to a yacht) I thought it might be useful for drying towels or maybe Mr’s Sensible’s knickers. (I might edit that bit out later, it will depend, if I can hide her wet wooden spoon)

No these aren’t our scabby cats nor are they Mrs Sensible’s knickers

As you know, Telecom Italia are driving me nuts, we still don’t have any internet connection and to be honest, by the time Telecom Italia arrange for their technical man to test our line, I will probably be retired and sat in an old people’s home drinking grappa and causing lots and lots of trouble for the nurses.

If they are armed with wet wooden spoons and needles, I might behave

If they are armed with a wet wooden spoons and needles, I might behave

At the moment the only way I can connect to the internet, is to sit in a café, drink copious quantities of coffee (in the morning) or lots of wine (in the afternoon) and use the cafés internet. Being an Englishman, as soon as the waitress removes my empty cup, I feel obliged to order another coffee, especially as I am taking up a table and using their internet.

Last week, I tried to vary the boredom of drinking cups of cappuccino by started with a caffé macchiato, I then moved onto a café marocchino, washed that down with a caffé doppio and just for good measure, I finished of the morning with a rather nice caffè corretto ( I then Jitterbugged to the Turkish toilet with big wide starring eyes. I suppose it is no wonder they think their resident Englishman is a bit mad.

Pecora Nera colides with the waitress as he jitterbugs to the loo

If I am at home and I want to use the internet, I create a hotspot on my little crappy Huawei phone, I place the phone on a chair in the garden, run back upstairs to my office and hope and pray it picks up a good enough signal so that I can quickly download my e mails. This drives me almost as crazy as jitterbugging around the café.

Yesterday I had an eureka moment; I knew there was a reason I hadn’t chopped down my flagpole. I suddenly realised it would make a fabulous internet mast. One plastic bag and a bit of string later, my mobile phone was hoisted 5 metres into the air and miracles of miracles, I had 3G, well maybe 1.5G but it did work and I managed to upload this post.

I told Mrs Sensible not to turn my flag into a cushion.

So if you decided to contact me, please, please, please use my contact form and don’t phone me, it is a nightmare when the phone rings. I have to run downstairs, play the last call on the bugle and lower the flag and all this takes time.

PS If you work for Telecom Italia or you know somebody who works for them, please tell them Pecora Nera is one of their dissatisfied customers.

A brief lesson on how to tell the time in Italy

Posted on October 8, 2014 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Language • Tagged an englishman in italy, fun expats, humour, italy, languages, learning Italian, Pecora Nera, telling the time in Italy • 16 Comments

A little video to explain how Italian locals tell the time.

Telecom Italia, you have just got to…..

Posted on September 19, 2014 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, fun expats, humour, Mrs Sensible, Pecora Nera, piemonte, Telecom Italia • 38 Comments

Telecom Italia you have just got to ~~love them~~ hate them.

Boh!

Yesterday I once again pestered Mrs Sensible to phone Telecom Italia. I waited until she was sat down and drinking her cup of tea before I started.

She had a another really interesting conversation with Telecom Italia about our unusual postal address (They agree with my version of our address, so I am starting to like them). They did ask Mrs S which of the two address they now have for our telephone line, we live at… 🙂 🙂 🙂

The latest update is they will test our line to see if I can have broadband, this will take place between now and the end of the month. It takes so long because they have a ‘specialist line tester’ !!!!

Telecom Italia or 2 cans and a bit of string.

Posted on September 16, 2014 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Work • Tagged an englishman in italy, fun expats, humour, Italian customer service, living in italy, Mrs Sensible, Pecora Nera, Telecom Italia, working in italy • 48 Comments

Welcome to my new office. You might notice it is full of old men drinking espresso, this is so I can sit here unnoticed and get some work done, well until I open my mouth and order another cappuccino and all heads swivel my way.

Some people in my office are even older than me…. incredible

Why don’t I work from home? Two reasons, 1 It is full of scabby cats and 2, there is no internet connection. A week ago I asked Mrs Sensible to phone Telecom Italia and ask them to connect us to the internet, this should be very easy after all we already have 5 working phones scattered around the house.

We value all our customers, even the dead ones.

So Mrs S picked up the phone and called a ~~customer service representative~~ woman at Telecom Italia. She gave them our address and explained that the previous owner of the house had died and we wanted to have the line reconnected (The phone line was working, it just wasn’t in our name) and to also have fast internet. Telecom told her, the contract is still in the dead man’s name and they required a relative of the dead man to write to them and prove he was dead so they can cancel his contract. While this conversation was in progress I was hopping from foot to foot saying helpful things like “how soon, I need fast internet, tell them I also need a modem. The scowl from Mrs S shut me up.

Stay Connected with your loved ones

I sent an E mail to the son of Telecom’s dead customer and asked him to prove his dead dad was in fact dead. He told me he had proved to Telecom that he was dead 2 years ago and to his knowledge, things had not changed.

Mrs S phoned Telecom and reached a different woman, she explained their customer was in fact still dead and they had been told he was dead 2 years ago. The woman said “we know he is dead” Ah ha progress!! Mrs S again gave her details and requested an internet line and phone line. I knew I was allowed to hop from foot to foot but I had to keep silent. When Mrs S put the phone down, the phone that according to Telecom was already disconnected and as dead as their previous customer, she told me Telecom would call me in a couple of days to organise the fitting. I was sooooo excited.

The best I can hope for.

Seven days passed and no calls, so I harassed Mrs S to call them again.

The conversation went something like this,

Mrs S; You promised to phone Pecora Nera to organise his internet access, when are you going to do this because he is driving me mad.

Telecom: Please will you give me your address.

Mrs S: 2 Green Leaves Road in the middle of the countryside.

Telecom: That is why we didn’t call you, this phone is registered to 13 Old Mill Road in the middle of nowhere.

Mrs S; Can you please update your system as the address is wrong, the council say we live at number 2 Green Leaves, not number 13 Old Mill Road.

And so until Telecom arrive with my 2 tin cans and a long length of string I will have to share my office with 7 old men.

There is a post about our strange address here I will update you on Telecom Italia ASP (at some point)

Pecora Nera and Mrs Sensible now live at different addresses

Posted on September 15, 2014 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, Mrs Sensible, Pecora Nera, post services in Italy, Poste Italia • 38 Comments

We have now been living in our new house for just over 2 months, Mrs Sensible still can’t find many of the things that I packed! After a talking to by Mrs S, I have promised myself that I will be a good boy and be a little more organised, so I trotted of to the bank and gave them our new address, Mrs Sensible went to the gas and electric companies and did the same.

Poste Italian surprised us by finding the house and delivered 2 Electric Bills and a birthday present for Mrs Sensible all the way from England.

Poste Italia, as organised as anything can be in Italia

Poste Italia, as efficient as anything can be in Italia!

A week ago Mrs Sensible visited the local council offices to formally tell them, they now have a Black Sheep resident in their little village. When she returned home, she had a little surprise for me, the address we have given everybody is wrong, not wrong as in slightly wrong but wrong as in a completely different address. I suppose that is why Poste Italia managed to deliver our mail.

Our village now has a black sheep living there.

Our house has a number 13 nailed to the wall, and I believe the road name is Old Mill (translated) The council claim our house should have the number 2 nailed to the wall and the road is called Green Leaves (again translated). Mrs Sensible with her infinite wisdom is following the council’s advice and filling out all her official forms using the address 2 Green Leaves. I on the other hand prefer to use the address 13 Old Mill, not because I am a black sheep, but because Poste Italia thinks that is where I live.

The woman at our post office does not look like this

To date no letters have arrived for Mrs Sensible at 2 Green Leaves, so either nobody is writing to her or……. She might be wrong!!!!!

Mrs Sensible was last proved wrong….

It won’t be the first time she has been proved to be wrong, but I think Halley’s Comet was passing close by the last time I proved it.

The thighs have it.

Posted on August 31, 2014 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged Bidet, englishman in italy, Italian toilet, living in italy, Loo, Moving to Italy, Pecora Nera, Turkish toilets • 79 Comments

You are no doubt asking yourself what Tatiana Kashirina the Olympic weightlifting has to do with Italy, well let me tell you, it’s her thighs. Now before you all start jumping up and down and sending messages to Mrs Sensible about her errant husband, let me explain.

Tatiana Kashirina

Before I moved to here, I thought living in Italy would be very similar to living in Great Britain, just without the rain and a decent bacon sandwich, but I was in for a huge culture shock. To start with they don’t go to the bathroom the same way we do. I promise you it is true, so stop giggling. In England we sit on the loo, ponder life for a bit, clean up using a bit of Andrex toilet paper and then as our mothers taught us, we wash our hands. Nice and simple, in Italy nothing is simple, including going to the loo.

Andrex Puppy and loo roll

To start with we have an additional piece of pottery in our bathrooms, it is called a BIDET, it is like a toilet but it has taps on it and no it is not for washing your feet ….. its for washing your , well your bits in. You see the Italians have decided cleaning your bum after a number 2 with toilet paper, even using expensive soft stuff like Andrex is not good enough (number 1 is a wee and number 2 is, well a number 2), so all good Italians use a bidet to wash their bits after a number 2 or even a number 1.

A bidet is not for washing your feet in. www.emiliehope.wordpress.com

When Mrs Sensible lived in the UK she was astonished and horrified to learn that most homes didn’t have a bidet fitted and the people who did have a bidet fitted, used it for anything but washing their bums. I am not going to go into how to use a bidet, there is a useful link here for those of you who are interested, but I will add just one word of warning, make sure you get the temperature of the water just right or it will bring tears to your eyes.

Our UK house didn’t have a Bidet so Mrs Sensible had to improvise.

Before you ask, Tatiana Kashirina has absolutely nothing to do with Bidets. But she has everything to do with the Italians fascination with Turkish toilets. A Turkish toilet is as close in design to an English toilet as a pizza is, to a big juicy bacon sandwich with egg, mushrooms and if you are lucky a dollop of tomatoes thrown on. A Turkish toilet is a toilet without any super structure, it how a minalist would design a toilet if he was asked. Basically it is a hole that you squat over and this is where Tatiana Kashirina thighs come into play, because if you don’t have well developed thighs you are likely to collapse and fall down the hole.

A Turkish Toilet

While I was writing this I got to thinking why the Turkish toilet never caught on in the UK and you are free to disagree with me here, but I think there are two main reasons. 1) It would be impossible to read a book or the Sunday Paper whilst trying to balance over the hole and 2) The English like to go drinking in pubs in the evening and alcohol and good balance rarely go hand in hand.

I stole this from Gingerfightback so go and have a look at his site http://www.gingerfightback.com

Now before you go off in search of humorous pictures of bidets or Turkish toilets please spare a thought to how you would manage, if you needed to spend a penny* when you had your best evening frock on, or even a pair of dungarees.

If you slip whilst using a Turkish Toilet you will get wet. (Maria Grazia Cucinotta star of Il Postino)

To spend a penny is a polite English expression to say you need to go and pee.

Please go and have a look at what the other COSI group members think about the loo in Italy

‘Potty Humor‘ – Married to Italy
‘The Bidet and how to have a sparkling downtown area‘ – Surviving in Italy
‘Life Next to a Public Bathroom‘ – Girl in Florence
‘What you need to know before you go‘ — Rick’s Rome
The toilet situation in Italy — The Unwilling Expat

Does this stuff really happen!!!

Posted on August 13, 2014 by Pecora Nera • Posted in Health, home, Wine • Tagged an englishman in italy, expat, fun expats, Italia, Italian eye test, Mrs Sensible, Pecora Nera, wine • 36 Comments

I received an e mail asking me, what inspires me to write my posts and does this stuff really happen or do I just have an over active imagination. So let me take this opportunity to put the record straight. Much to Mrs Sensible’s dismay, my blog is as it happens here. Mrs Sensible wouldn’t allow me to tell lies or exaggerate. If I did she would hit me with a wet wooden spoon.

Mrs Sensible is deadly with a wet wooden spoon.

How do I decide what to write about? Well let me give you an example.

Two weeks ago my reading glasses were sitting on my face at a funny angle, so I took them off and tried to straighten them. I heard a little snap and ended up with two monocles, one for each eye. Mrs Sensible just looked at me as my glasses fell apart in my hands. “What have you done now?” she asked. Nothing I replied as I tried to hide my glasses in my pocket.

A monocle for each eye.

Breaking my glasses is not a huge problem as I also wear contact lenses. Unfortunately I lost several boxes of contact lenses when we moved house. I can find my corkscrew and my bottles of wine. We have eventually found the kettle, but my lenses are still in a box…. Probably marked Christmas decorations!!

Are they in the box marked Christmas decorations?

Like everyone else I have two eyes, my right eye does all the work and my left eye… well it is there only for decoration, it is called a lazy eye. It looks normal but it just refuses to work. When I went for my eye examination for my Italian driving licence, the doctor gave me a paddle to cover my left eye as he tested my right eye. Everything was OK, however when he asked me to cover my right eye and read the letters on the wall, I was tempted to ask him “what wall?” I managed to get around this slight difficulty by removing the paddle and having a quick look at the letters before the doctor turned around and asked me what he had just pointed at.

What do you mean, where has the wall gone?

So what inspired me to write this post? Well last week we had the COSI on-line discussion and I was sat in a bar with a glass of wine, squinting at my laptop. I couldn’t find any more contact lenses, my reading glasses are broken so my solution was to wear my normal glasses and over the top of those I put on a pair of Mrs Sensible’s reading glasses, with the double magnification and providing I partially closed my left eye I could read my laptop almost perfectly.

With my multiple sets of glasses I looked quite sexy

After a couple of glasses of wine I forgot that I was wearing two sets of glasses. When the waitress who delivered my third glass of wine, looked at me funnily I immediately checked to make sure my fly was zipped up.

The COSI webcam was a bit chaotic, but I enjoyed it. I sat there with a glass of wine in one hand, an ear phone plugged into my right ear and my finger stuck into my left ear to block out the noise of the bar, oh and two sets of glasses on. I think ‘M’ from Married to Italy sent me a message and said Pecora “ your webcam is on we can see you” I didn’t worry too much until I realised what I must look like, after all I was already getting strange looks from the people in the bar.

So do I make this stuff up? No this is life as I know it in Italy

Confess: We have ways of making you talk

Posted on December 21, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, awards, Italy Magazine, Italy magazine nominations, Mrs Sensible, Scooby Doo • 109 Comments

Who did it? Was it YOU?

I have been a Pecora Nera (Pecora Nera is a black sheep, for you non-Italian speakers Ha!) for as long as I can remember. I dreaded the days when my mum would angrily shout my brothers’ and sister’s name one after the other, until she finally got her act together and settle on my name. I have found myself in some sort of trouble for most of my 52 21 years.

A classic example was the Ritz Crackers episode.

These crackers got me into a lot of trouble.

There was an unspoken rule in our house. No one was allowed to open a pack of biscuits or Ritz crackers unless my mum had either: a) said we could open them or b) she had already opened them. If the pack was already open, then to a certain extent we could ~~grab a handful and hide in the bedroom eating them~~ eat one or two of them, providing we left more than crumbs in the box. No one ever dared to finish a box of crackers, the consequences were quite severe. My mum would say “Peter, go and make me a cup of tea and fetch the Ritz Crackers”. She knew they had been scoffed, I knew I had scoffed them, we both knew I was in trouble.

One evening, when I went foraging for food, I found to my dismay, that the box of crackers was unopened. But as I moved it to see what delights were hidden behind it (maybe an opened packet of chocolate digestives), I noticed that this particular box of Ritz Crackers didn’t feel very heavy. It should have weighed 225 grams but it felt as though it was missing two or three crackers.

I investigated further and to my horror, shock and amazement, the box had very cleverly been opened from the bottom. A quarter of the pack had been eaten and the box carefully resealed. I knew for sure my brothers and my sister were not ~~stupid~~ brave enough to pull a stunt like that, which left only my mum.

I vividly remember the evening, when my mum decided to eat the Ritz that she has secretly opened and there were only three and a half crackers left and three innocent children plus one suspicious looking black sheep.

Ok so this post is really about one of you out there in bloggo land who needs to confess to a deed most foul. One of you filled out a form on the Italy Magazine. com and nominated my blog of madness for Best Living in Italy Blog.

Cool

I know it was one of you lot, because I have interrogate Mrs Sensible and she denies it. Scooby Doo is not ‘yet’ allowed in the house, (Mrs Sensible keeps dropping hints, and the hints will get big when the snow comes) so he is not guilty which leaves one of you.

Out in the cold and the rain

It wasn’t me, I only found out because I am a stataholic and I followed a referrers link back to the awards. Who ever did it,

THANK YOU VERY MUCH

Merry Christmas

Christmas truce Scooby Doo and Gilda Style.

Posted on December 18, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, cat food, dog eats cat food, englishman, expats, fun, humour, italy, Mrs Sensible, Pecora Nera, piemonte, Scooby Doo • 84 Comments

Can a Machiavellian cat and an incredibly fat, but short-legged dog call a truce over Christmas?

Two months ago Scooby Doo adopted us and moved into my garage. At the moment he is in arrears with his rent, I sat down with Scooby Doo and discussed his lack of payment; the following day he left half a mouse. Obviously I was less than happy with the payment, so I gave him a stern talking too. The following day Scooby Doo left me a small brown slightly warm lump in the middle of my garage floor. I have left further payment discussions to Mrs Sensible.

I am patiently waiting for NHS Supplies to come and collect their cat

I am not really a cat person, I like dogs, big dogs that can chase and fetch sticks. I have repeatedly suggested to Mrs Sensible that we should rescue / buy a big daft dog. Mrs Sensible always points out that we have Gilda.

Gilda is the incredible fat but short-legged dog that belongs to Luigina and lives next door.

Gilda in trouble yet again

Link to Gilda

Gilda and Scooby Doo have a love hate relationship, Scooby Doo hates Gilda and Gilda loves to chase Scooby Doo. In November I posted the pictures of the great cat chase between Gilda, Lila and Scooby Doo. Sadly earlier this month Lila passed away to doggy heaven.

The great cat chase

Last week Mrs Sensible shouted me

Mrs S: PN!! Quickly come here.

PN: Nope I am busy. (I think I was catching up on blogs from fellow bloggers either that or I was chilling on the sofa)

Mrs S: You will never believe it, quick where is your camera?

PN: Uffa! It’s here, why?

Mrs S: Quick look out of the window.

And there it was, Scooby Doo and Gilda eating cat food from the same tray. I was not surprised that Gilda was eating cat food, Gilda eats anything, she is the only dog that eats grass because she is hungry and doesn’t barf afterwards.

Gilda and Scooby Doo enjoying a romantic meal together

I was so surprised, I had to check that it was Gilda, so I called her “Yo! fat dog you are supposed to chase the cat” Gilda looked suitably ashamed.

Yo! Fat dog, you are supposed to chase the cat

Now the real question is, have they called a truce because it is Christmas? Will the truce last till boxing day?

Clearly the fat dog likes cat food

Merry Christmas from Mrs Sensible, myself, Scooby Doo who is in temporary residence and Gilda the incredible fat but short-legged dog.

Mrs Sensible & Pecora Nera, featured on InterNations.org !!!

Posted on December 10, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • 30 Comments

Gosh, the kind lady at Internations.org has added my little blog of madness to their website.

Internations is a web site where expats can meet up with other expats, to discuss job opportunities or more importantly where and when the next ~~pub crawl, beer festival~~ social gathering takes place.

I was asked to submit a photo of sunny Italy so I gave them this one.

Sunny Italy

On hindsight I should have sent this one.

The spare bedroom on the day we moved in

Because this is what the spare bedroom looked like until Mrs Sensible told me to sort it out.

Please go and have a look how I have managed to infect a sensible web site with my strain of madness. LINK

A big red box will appear, either join (which is a good idea) or click the X in the top corner so that you can read my post… and then join.

8 things about a Black Sheep

Posted on December 9, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged afro, cox, drowning, englishman in italy, flying, rowing, Sheffield rowing club, swimming • 63 Comments

I have been tasked with telling you nice people, 8 things you need to know about Pecora Nera. I could keep my mishaps to myself, but then I would have to decline the award that the nice lady at Sandcastles in Portugal gave me.

Ok, here we go.

Number 1

When I was 13 I was asked to be a cox for the Sheffield Rowing Club. It was great fun, I used to sit at the back of the boat and tell a crew of men or women what to do. I loved it! We raced all over the country and the two crews I raced with were very successful, we even won a Gold Medal at the Vesta International Championships.

One weekend it was ~~peeing it down~~ raining rather heavily. On that fateful day we arrived late at Nottingham Regatta. By the time we had rowed to the starting position, my boat was a quarter full of water. We asked the umpire if we could empty the water out of our boat. The umpire told us that we were late and if we didn’t come to the start position immediately, he would disqualify us. I wonder if he is related to Mr Cretino?

So we started the race with enough water in the boat to take a bath in. As the oarsmen took their first stroke, all the water in the boat was forced down the boat and into my lap. As I frantically bailed the water out with my little hat, the crew slid forward to take the second stroke and all the water rushed down to the bow of the boat (the bow is the pointy bit at the front). I was just trying to work out why all the water had disappeared, when two of the crew at the pointy end stopped rowing. So I shouted at them, I told them to join back in as soon as they could. Ronnie, a huge tall Irishman, shouted back: ” We are f&%$ing sinking!!” There was no Kate Winslet to hold my hand as my boat slowly but surely disappeared below the waves.

Pecora Nera sinks at the Nottingham Regatta

Number 2 (can things get worse)

When I was nineteen, I decided to host a Christmas party in my little flat. I invited my friends from the local pub including Sarah and Julie (I think those were their names). Both of them declined my party invitation, because Joy (I am 100% sure I have her name correct) was due to perm their hair on the night of my party. While I was drinking my pint of beer, I suddenly had an incredible idea. I would invite Joy and she could perm and set the two girls hair while we all partying: easy peasie lemon sqeezy. Joy and the girls agreed.

My hair needed cutting, as it was getting just a bit too long. So Joy suggested she could perm it for me (remember these were the 70’s). Obviously I promptly declined the offer; you see… I can be sensible at times, just like my wife. However, after 2 or 6 drinks it actually did seem like a bit of a wheeze to have my hair permed. So, having being asked again, this time I agreed.

Joy, who was no longer the Sensible hairdresser that I knew from the pub, giggled while she poured the solution on my head. We all got another drink and ~~sat down and gossiped~~ danced the night away. All of a sudden, Joy let out a shriek we all turned to her, and she said ” oh my gosh, you still have the perm solution on your head!” I then looked at Sarah and Julie who were suddenly collapsing in a giggling heap. I personally didn’t understand what the problem was, even after Joy dragged me into the kitchen to wash the solution out of my hair.

Never get your hair cut at a party.

I don’t remember much more of the party, I vaguely remember dancing to We are family and Le’ Freak. I remember waking up the following morning with an enormous hangover; as I rubbed my poorly head, my fingers felt a mass and I mean a mass of tight frizzy curly hair, not unlike the picture above.

Number 3

When I was seven and unable to swim, my older brother took me boating in Stamford Park in Manchester. All of a sudden the heavens opened and it started to rain, which is not unexpected in rainy Manchester; knowing that I couldn’t swim, David took the decision to head for the island in the middle of the lake rather than the safety of the landing stage, where the boat owner was waving to us. As we reached the island, David said: “Quick, get out and I will steady the boat”. I really believed him… duh! With one foot in the boat and one foot on the island, the little boat slowly drifted away. It is amazing how quickly one learns how to swim.

My very first swimming lesson

Number 4 (Are you still with me?)

Whereas I was slightly inebriated when I had my perm ‘done’ I was stone cold sober, when it seemed like a good idea to have a tattoo printed on my body. My younger brother had a mermaid winding itself down his leg, whereas I (mainly because I was sober and I thank the Lord I was) decided to have a discrete tattoo done. I wanted Pecora Nera (Black Sheep) printing somewhere about my body; and to this day it is still there. Mrs Sensible has obviously seen it, and the Germans at the sauna saw it.

Painful

Number 5: I ate at the same restaurant 36 times in a three month period.

Three times a week for three months, I went to Maso Restaurant and indulged in their fine food, in a vain attempt to persuade Miss Sensible to go out for a meal / drink with me. She kept turning me down with excuses such as: she needed to wash her hair… she was too tired or had a much more sensible thing to do than going for a drink with a crazy Englishman. Not one to take a hint, I would simply rebook another meal.

Ah! I am sorry Miss Sensible isn’t working tonight, try again tomorrow

Number 6: I have been a pilot taa raaa.

My elder brother is stinking rich; I am poor as a …. well poor. My brother has his own plane, it even has a go faster stripe down the side. One weekend he offered to take me flying. As we flew over Lincolnshire he let me take the controls of the plane and asked: “Have you ever gone cloud hopping”, “cloud hopping?” I asked.

“Yes: you head for a cloud and pretend you are a battle of Britain pilot”. So David and I went cloud hopping, neeeeeooowwww; the plane went as we shot down through the clouds. As we burst out of the cloud into the sun we shouted Rat tat tat tat tat and pretended to blast the imaginary German Luftwaffe. We were having a great time until the local air controller asked in a very British clipped voice “could you please confirm your direction. Ooops! Once a Pecora Nera always a Pecora Nera.

Fortunately I didn’t decide to fly for an airline.

Number 7

I am a dog man. I like pussy cats, but I prefer dogs. I want a big daft dog that will chase sticks; however, at the moment I have a cat that sleeps in our garage and he isn’t really our cat. I had to dissuade Mrs Sensible from putting a collar on him yesterday. We feed him twice a day, he has been deflead and has thanked us by peeing on the stairs and leaving a little parcel for me in the garage. Mrs Sensible said he does it because he knows I won’t let him into the house.

Scooby Doo lives in a box in the garage. Although he is not completely happy with this arrangement. PS dear NHS supplies if you want your box back, you may come and fetch it.

8) I have been awarded The Woman’ Skirt Award, hence the 8 facts about me.

Woman’s Skirt Award

And 8 other people who deserve this award? Very difficult to pick only 8

http://livinginthelanghe.wordpress.com/ Mrs Sensible and I went and visited them a week ago, Mrs Living in the Langhe was wonderful, their little dog Otto was fab, I can’t remember much about Mr Living in the Langhe.

http://ilghepardo.wordpress.com/ This lady is not scared of trees.

http://ytaba36.wordpress.com/ Yvonne from Ytaba. Maybe I will invite Mrs Sensible and I to her part of the world.

http://lifeisbutalabyrinth.wordpress.com/ He makes me laugh even on a Monday. The man has more blogs than I have fingers..

http://bluefishway.com/ Ralf is as mad as me.

http://ididnthavemyglasseson.com/ A really nice blog.

http://1writeway.com/ A great blog for all you budding writers.

And last but not least ANDY, who comments on my blog. Andy, now you have an award, go and start a blog.

You 8 now have to write a post, include 8 things about yourself and nominate 8 other blogs. To read the proper rules go and visit HERE

On the Twelfth day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me ♫♫♪

Posted on November 27, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Uncategorized • Tagged 12 days of christmas, Christmas, Mrs Sensible • 85 Comments

Christmas is a coming, the geese are getting fat. Please put a penny in Pecora Nera’s hat.

On the twelfth day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Twelve blogging buddies ♫♫♪

12 bloggers a blogging ♫♫♪ I couldn't narrow it down to 12

49 bloggers a blogging ♫♫♪ I couldn’t narrow it down to just 12

On the eleventh day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Eleven hospital visits ♫♫♪

11 Mrs Sensible and the fantastic bra shuffle

On the tenth day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Ten driving licences ♫♫♪

I should have asked Mrs Sensible in the first place, it would have saved a lot of time with Mr Cretino

I should have asked Mrs Sensible, not Mr Cretino to organise my Italian driving licence

On the ninth day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Nine wines for drinking ♫♫♪

Wine by Marco Bellero, who is a bit of a hero of mine link

On the eighth day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Eight killer snakes ♫♫♪

Scary snakes, Gilda, Luigina and our guestaway

On the seventh day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Seven summer skiers a skiing ♫♫♪

7 Summer skiers a skiing

On the sixth day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Six golden geese ♫♫♪

OK 5 golden geese and a big brown one.

On the fifth day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Five pink elephants ♫♫♪

5 Pink Elephants

On the fourth day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Four Gatwick police ♫♫♪

Hello hello hello, what’s all this then, Mrs Sensible’s mum with a big pen knife?

On the third day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Three scary trees ♫♫♪

I hasten to add, Italians aren’t scared of trees. Only us poor Englishmen

On the second day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ Two fat dogs ♫♫♪

Gosh am I seeing double?

On the first day of Christmas Mrs Sensible gave to me.

♫♫♪ A Scooby Doo in a fig tree ♫♫♪

This is the best picture I could take, Scooby Doo was not interested in being a model.

Merry Christmas to my blogging buddies.

Pecora Nera, Mrs Sensible and a nude selfie.

Posted on November 20, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, Italians, Mrs Sensible, Mrs Sensible and Pecora Nera in the nude, Mrs Sensible in the nude, Mrs Sensible naked, naked englishman, naked Italian woman, naked selfie, selfie • 94 Comments

Selfie – “a photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one that is taken with a smart phone by stretching ones arm to the limit and then trying to press the camera button, the photo (that you will forever regret taking) is then uploaded to a social media website” – has been named word of the year by Oxford Dictionaries editors, after the frequency of its usage increased by 17,000% over the past 12 months.

One of the few completely dressed ‘selfies’ on google

Purely in the aid of research, I did a quick search on Google images for ‘selfie’ and I was astonished, amazed and even gobsmacked at the number of women who took selfies of themselves in their bra and knickers.

Not to be outdone I have decided that Mrs Sensible and I should post our very own selfie. After searching through the selfies that Mrs Sensible and I have taken over the years, I have decided to push the boat out and post a nude selfie.

If this post is a success, we may consider a 2014 Pecora Nera and Mrs Sensible calendar after all it worked for Rylstone Women’s Institute.

Pecora Nera & Mrs Sensible in the nude

Why does Mrs Sensible buy cat food, when we don’t have a cat?

Posted on November 2, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged Cat and dog chase, italian cat food, Mrs Sensible, Scooby Doo • 83 Comments

Cat food in the cupboard.

During the summer, I managed to lock a skinny, mangy looking cat into one of our garages. It wasn’t my fault, honest; it was raining and the cat had hid in the garage. Three days later I opened the garage to find a cat meowing and winding itself in and out of my legs. I was impressed that the cat had not peed or messed in the garage and I instantly named the cat Blacky.

Mrs Sensible didn’t think the name was appropriate, so she asked Luigina, if she knew who the scrawny cat belonged to. Luigina keeps her finger on the pulse of village life and was able to tell Mrs Sensible that the cat lives across the road with the woman who has the wolf that Gilda torments.

We carried the cat across the road and as we handed it back to its owner, one of her dogs jumped up and tried to eat one of the cat’s legs. While the cat meowed and tried to escape the dog, the lady told us that the cat was called Scooby Doo!!! Now I think naming a cat after a dog is even less appropriate than naming a white cat Blacky.

Blacky AKA Scooby Doo tucking into my salami piccanti

Blacky AKA Scooby Doo tucking into my salame piccante

Since the summer, Scooby Doo has decided to use our house as the local takeaway and we have fattened him up. He arrives at our house at 6.30 in the morning and then after 7.00 pm in the evening. He sits and meows outside our window until one of us gets up and finds him some left over scraps of meat. Last week the cat arrived and started meowing, but the cupboards were bare. We couldn’t find any left-overs that the cat could eat. We couldn’t get the cat to shut up, so we threw it some of my precious salame piccante.

The decision was made: we don’t own a cat but as he prefers to come here and eat our left-overs than share a house with a dog that wants to eat him, we decided to buy some cat food. The problem now is, Scooby Doo likes the cat food so much he wants to eat three square meals a day.

The time of day that Scooby Doo arrives is important and proves this cat is not stupid. From 7.00 pm until 7.00 am both Gilda and Lilla are under house arrest; they are both securely locked up and although it drives them mad to see and hear a cat meowing outside our window, there is nothing they can do.

This lunchtime, Scooby Doo came asking to be fed, but the take away was closed, so Scobby Doo decided to sit on my car and wait for opening time. And then trouble arrived in the shape of Gilda and Lilla. They often wander over from Luigina’s house to say hello. The cat froze. I ran in search of my camera.

Gilda and Lilla arrive to say hello

From my bedroom window, I was taking photos and laughing at the two dogs. Scooby Doo was watching the two dogs and Mrs Sensible and Donna (who became famous following the Vicious snake attacks defenceless woman in Italy post) were trying to distract the two dogs from the lounge window.

Lilla smelled a rat, or more likely a cat and wandered off in search of it.

Lilla scouts the area while Gilda begs for food

The cat never moved.

Dun dun dun…Gilda spots Scooby Doo

The cat looked at the short legged but extremely fat dog with utter contempt. And then Lilla arrived…

Lila arrives and Gilda tries to reach the cat.

Lilla arrives while Gilda inspects whether there is sufficient tread on my tyres .

It was at this point that Scooby Doo decided it was time to take a leisurely walk home.

Scooby Doo tests the water.

And then Scooby Doo launched himself into the air and Lilla did a back flip and attempted to catch the flying cat.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it superman? No Its Scoooobbbbyyyyy DOOOO

And then the chase was on. “GOOOOO Scooooby”… shouted Mrs Sensible and Donna.

Run, rabbit, run erh cat

Despite the fact that Gilda has short stumpy legs and is carrying several excess pounds and was also late at setting off, she soon overtook the trim Lilla. The only sound was the crowd shouting encouragement to Scooby as he ran for home.

Gilda the short legged and incredibly fat dog overtakes the Lilla

Gilda, the short legged and incredibly fat dog, overtakes Lilla (These photos are not photo-shopped: Scooby Doo is so confident he is only using one leg)

As I precariously hung out the bedroom window, capturing the race for posterity and Mrs Sensible and Donna cheered the cat on. I did wonder if the high protein diet we are feeding Scooby Doo helped him in his escape from the terrible twosome.

Scooby Doo widens the gap and heads for the garden fence. But just look at the fat dog fly…

The excitement was almost too much to bear; even the Grand National or Formula One is never as exciting as this.

Gilda who realises the race is all but over, decides to show off by imitating a kangaroo

Scooby Doo raced around the corner of the house, while Gilda who couldn’t corner as fast (due to her short legs and excess weight) ran directly in front of Lilla. The race was starting to resemble an episode from the Keystone Cops.

As Scooby Doo disappears around the house, Gilda deliberatey tries to hamper Lilas efforts

As Scooby Doo disappears around the house, Gilda, with flapping ears is unable to corner and runs in front of Lilla.

And with that, the race is over. The cat clears the fence and Gilda and Lilla screech to a stop.

Scooby Doo escapes. The dogs sulk.

This evening at twelve minutes past seven, Scooby Doo came around for his evening meal.

Way to go Scooby

The largest Cannabis party in the Med.

Posted on September 20, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged 30 tons cannabis set alight on a cargo ship, cannabis, cannabis party, italy, malta, splif • 31 Comments

A cargo ship containing 30 tons of hash was set alight in the Mediterranean creating a massive drifting cloud of marijuana fumes. A group of smugglers set fire to their cargo ship to stop the Italian Finance police and Maltese police from gate crashing the party confiscating their hash.

MV Gold Star Smoking…..

The slightly charred and smoking MV Gold Star, was sailing under the Tanzanian flag, and had been monitored by police for 3 days before boats and aircraft were sent out to gate crash the party apprehend the ship. The ship’s nine-man crew then began to set fire to the cannabis concentrate before diving overboard into the sea.

As the Italian police escorted the smugglers to the cells, Giuseppe, with a big grin on his face, said: “Hey man, was that cool or what? Did you see all the big black kinda wavy smoke coming out of the ship, like pink elephants in da sky?” His partner replied: “ yeah man, this was the highest point of my career, like, way high man, way high.”

Pink Elephants in the sky, Crazy Man!

Despite several calls to the helicopter to tell them they were no longer needed, the helicopter continued to fly round in circles and an awful lot of giggling could be heard over the airways.

Hey dude copy you, going around for another sniff erh, look. Tee hee hee

A police spokesman could not be drawn on why the smugglers dived into the sea several miles from the nearest land; his only comment was: “It was very strange behaviour and we are trying to figure out what exactly made them do it”

The smoking ship was towed to the Sicilian port of Siracusa where people partied the night away the soggy smugglers are being held for questioning.

The people of Siracusa partied all night…..

One police officer lamented: “It took 3 showers and a lot of soap before Fleabag, the sniffer dog, would leave me alone”

Fleabag the sniffer dog

The whirling dervish from Vileda

Posted on August 31, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, fun, hoover, humour, Mrs Sensible, Vileda • 43 Comments

My mum bought me a train when I was five, it had flashing lights and made a whoo whoooo sound. I was quite impressed with my present, mainly because it wasn’t another pair of mittens connected together with string. My mum was less than impressed with my train. She said: “The man at the market said it was supposed to move.” Picking the train up from the carpet, my mum carried it through to the kitchen and set it down. It immediately went Whooo whooo, screeched across the linoleum, swivelled around 3 times on its axis and came haring back towards me. Being a bright boy I had spotted the imminent danger and decided to go running back into the lounge screaming and shouting and looking for my dad.

Whoo whooo

I hid the monstrous train at the bottom of my wardrobe with my collection of mittens.

Despite the string I usually managed to loose at least one of the mittens

Fast forward to present day and imagine my horror when Mrs Sensible arrives home with a battery powered hoover. Although it doesn’t have flashing lights or go whoo whoo, it does drive me mad. It is a fiendish gadget developed by Vileda, who, in my humble opinion, should stick to making mops.

Vileda Whirling Dervish

Before my wife leaves for work (she leaves at stupid o’ clock in the morning) she switches the hoover on and lets it wander up and down the hall, thus saving either of us the task of cleaning the hall. This would have been a really wonderful idea, except I hate how just as I am halfway through a nice dream, the hoover bangs into the bedroom door and wakes me up; I just manage to drop off to sleep and engage in my dream just in time for the robot to travel down the hall and return to frantic crashes against the door. It doesn’t go whooo whoo, like my train, it goes mmeennnnhhuuummm, mmeennnnhhuuummm, BANG, mmeennnnhhuuummm, mmeennnnhhuuummm, bang, bang, bang, mmeennnnhhuuummm.

Fortunately a couple of months ago it developed a fault: the stupid hoover forgot how to steer in a straight line; all it could manage was to swivel on its axis and clean a perfect circle. In my infinite wisdom I decided it was beyond repair and hid it at the back of the garage. Mrs Sensible did wonder if it was an act of sabotage.

Yesterday Mrs Sensible came home with the latest housewife cleaning aid: another battery powered hoover (notice I didn’t use the term house-husband). At least this one can only work when it is safely attached to Mrs Sensible’s hand.

Mrs Sensible’s hand assisted mop

Just another Tuesday

Posted on August 27, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged concorso, dog meat pasta, englishman in italy, fun expats, humour, Italia, italy, Mrs Sensible, piemonte, porca meseria, wasps in Italy • 42 Comments

Well… I am not sure what to write about today. I flicked a Euro in the air to help me decide and it rolled under the chair, never to be seen again. So, today I will only give you a little flavour of a day in the life of an Englishman living in Italy.

Bring back Sterling

Mrs Sensible left the house in a happy mood this morning. She had just learnt that she had been awarded the Sisterhood of the World Bloggers Award by 1write way.wordpress. Personally, I am gob-smacked. I am not sure why she won the award, because this is my blog. Mrs Sensible is the cook and the woman that keeps me out of trouble, she doesn’t put ink to paper. A couple of months ago during a glass of fine wine, I did suggest to Mrs Sensible that she should start her own blog. She thought it was a good idea and started to discuss the possibilities of “Living with an Englishman” and “Living with the man who burns Pasta”. Fortunately, I managed to steer the conversation onto more pressing matters and away from a blog discussing her life with me.

Mrs Sensible’s blog award.

(There will be a post about the award later…..) Massimo, the builder who had come to look at our roof and gutters, following the tornado that wandered through my garden, nearly fell off his ladder this morning. We, me and him, propped a rather large ladder against the side of the house and while I did the technical bit of putting my left foot against the bottom rung of the ladder, Massimo climbed to the top.

A rather long ladder

My conversation with Elsa (the landlady and daughter of Luigina) was abruptly interrupted by Massimo shouting a lot of rude words and waving both of his hands in the air. Damn fool I thought, he is supposed to be using one of his hands to hold on to the ladder. “Vespa!! Aiuto!! Porca miseria” he shouted as he waved his hands about. I calmly suggested that maybe he should descend the ladder before he fell off and squashed my pot plants. He took my advice and came to ground zero, sporting a few rather nice wasp stings to the side of his face.

I forgot to give him the can of Zig Zag until it was too late. The ammoniaca was for the stings

Oh!! I nearly forgot, earlier this year Mrs Sensible entered a national competition organised by the Italian government, (I wrote about this in March). The competition was to organise who would get full-time contracts within the Italian School system and who would continue on temporary contracts. The Government has decided that their competition is far too complicated and they can’t add up who has won, so they will now announce the winners in September 2014. Fortunately Mrs Sensible has found a place for this year at the same school she taught at last year, so we will make it through another year. PS. I made lunch today,

Dog meat pasta

I used onions from my vegetable patch, some cans of meat that resembled dog meat, but I am assured it is the Italian equivalent to corn beef (as I said dog meat) a clove of garlic, a bottle of wine (I always cook better with a glass in my hand) and some tomatoes. Through gritted teeth, Mrs Sensible said she enjoyed it. If you are lucky I might upload the menu.

Click oops!!

Posted on August 24, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged Black sheep, englishman in italy, weekly photo challenge • 69 Comments

One of our neurotic hens woke me at 6 this morning, it was laying a remarkably large egg and decided to shout about it; this started Gilda, the remarkable fat, but short-legged dog barking. Between the two of them it became impossible to sleep. So I gave up all hopes of a Saturday morning snooze and spent 10 mins trawling my wordpress reader.

If it wakes me up again at the weekend we will have a talk over Sunday dinner

And I found a great photo titled The eye’s (or rather eye) have it By THE NUMPTY WITH A CAMERA AND A LAPTOP for the latest wordpress Photo Challenge.

I have a nice camera, in fact two years ago I bought myself a Canon 1000D. I carefully wrapped the prezzie in Christmas paper and added a tag with the words : Love from Mrs Sensible, thereby giving both of us a surprise on Christmas morning.

Unfortunately none of my photos are ever likely to match one of Steve Currry’s who is the master of photography.

However, today I have entered the wordpress photo challenge with the following photo, and after careful deliberation I have titled the photo Click oops!

Click, oops

Because, I was leaving the house with the camera in my hand, when the damn thing when off, nearly blinding me with the flash.

http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/08/23/weekly-photo-challenge-focus/

As easy as ABC

Posted on August 13, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Wine • Tagged an englishman in italy, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, italian food, Mrs Sensible, Spaghetti aglio olio e peperoncino • 43 Comments

Are you the type of person that burns a boiled egg? Then have no fear, you are in good company.

As easy as ABC

Mrs Sensible decided that today was my cookday and I was to cook spaghetti aglio olio e peperoncino. My cookday? “It is easy” she said, “there are only 4 ingredients. Olive oil, garlic, chilli peppers and spaghetti”. This is fine, but I cook bacon, eggs, mushrooms and fried bread, that is when I have supplies of Bacon from the UK in the freezer. I don’t do Italian, even my Sicilian aunty turned her nose up at my tuna and pasta spaghetti concoction, and she loves me to bits, plus I laced it with wine.

“Okay” I said to Mrs Sensible, “how do I cook it?” “Pan fry a little garlic in the small frying pan and a little chilli pepper. While you are doing this, cook some spaghetti when it is done add the spaghetti to the frying pan add a bit of water from the spaghetti, fry until it is done and serve.” she said as she watched her latest Inspector Morse DVD.

Easy peesy lemon squeezie!! What could go wrong?

Lots

I know that before putting any ingredient into a pan, it is important to open a bottle of wine. I chose a fine bottle of Sovrana from the cantina of Marco Bellero.

Sovrana by Marco Bellero

“How much spaghetti?”

“200 grams”

How much oil should I use?

Enough to cover the pan bottom, don’t burn the garlic !!

Uh huh!

Where is the spaghetti?

Bottom cupboard.

No it is not.

yes it is, I will come and get it for you.

Thanks!

The Spaghetti is here and you have burnt the garlic!!

Do I bin it?

Deep sigh, “Yes start again”.

So I started again, I fried a little garlic in a bit of olive oil and started to boil the spaghetti. When I thought the spaghetti was cooked, I wandered into the lounge with a bit of spaghetti hanging from a fork. Just as I waved it under Mrs Sensible’s nose and said “Is this cooked? Inspector Morse shouted “You have killed her, you were his doctor”

“No” she said.

So I wandered back into the kitchen. The garlic looked a little too brown so I took it off the flame.

Mrs Sensible shouted from the lounge “Have you grated the cheese for the spaghetti”

Erh! No

So she came in to rescue me and the spaghetti.

As she chased the garlic around the pan she said “I have never seen garlic so well-burnt”

“Uh huh” I replied

She threw the spaghetti into the frying pan, added some water, fried it and served it into two plates.

What can I say… the wine was very good, however Mrs Sensible declared that she had eaten better pasta.

So here is the recipe if you want to try your hand.

Spaghetti aglio olio e peperoncino

Spaghetti with garlic, olive oil and chilli pepper (and a glass of wine)

Difficulty

Allegedly very easy

Preparation time

2 minutes

Cooking time

15 minutes

Serves

Ingredients:
200 grams of spaghetti
1 small red chilli pepper – seeded & chopped
2 medium cloves of fresh garlic (squashed but unpeeled)
2 -3 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil
Salt, to season the pasta and to throw over your left shoulder for good luck.

1 bottle of good wine to drink while you cook.

Specialist Equipment

A large frying pan

A deep pan

Sharp knife

A good cook

A glass for the wine

How to cook:

1) Discard the seeds from the chilli pepper and chop the pepper into small pieces.

2) Cook the pasta according to the pack instructions and season with salt. If there are no instructions, E mail Mrs Sensible.

3) In a shallow pan, place 4 tbsp of olive oil and heat until hot, then add the garlic and chilli pepper. Cook over a low to medium heat until the garlic starts to turn golden (do not allow to burn)

4) When the pasta is ready, drain & transfer pasta into the shallow pan with the oil, garlic and chilli. Toss together and allow to heat through for approx 2-4 minutes. Serve immediately.

If you try this and it works, let me know. If you try this and you fail, please do not feel bad it is a very difficult dish.

You have visitors coming? Ok, then I will huff and puff and blow your garden to bits.

Posted on August 13, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, driving in italy, expat, fun expats, humour, mosquitoes in italy, Mrs Sensible, piemonte, storm, storm protection, wind • 54 Comments

Today started as any Monday morning… with a groan. I rolled out of bed, wandered into the kitchen and started to boil the kettle for a nice cup of tea. Just as I plugged the kettle in, a bolt of lightning and a crack of thunder shot across the sky. Mmm that was close, I told Mrs Sensible.

As I wandered into the bathroom, two more bolts of lightning lit up the bathroom and then the winds came. There is a Latin name for the winds that suddenly appear in Piedmont something like bigggusti flatulantisti windusti. A strange howling sound came from the chimney, it sounded like a Scotsman struggling with a very bad set of bagpipes, Mrs Sensible and I looked at each other with horror, as we watched the lounge ceiling start to vibrate. As we stood watching, the ceiling cracked where it was supposed to be glued to the wall and lifted about 10 centimetres. That’s about 4 inches in real money.

As designed by Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown and redesigned by a bit of wind. For you dedicated gardeners, can you spot my lemon tree?

We both, in a very calm British stiff upper lip way, decided that we should vacate the lounge and close the windows. The conversation and actions went something like this.

“What is the noise?”

“Don’t know”

“The roof is moving”

“What?”

“Look, it is moving.”

“Move, run, now”

“The windows”

“Close them, oh Dio!”

We calmly walked ran around the house like headless chickens, shutting the windows as the wind blew and the mad Scotsman in the chimney played his bagpipes.

A strange sound came from the chimney. Was it Father Christmas, a mouse or a strange Scotsman with his bagpipes.

The crazy man who converted, what should have been a lovely 1800’s barn conversion into a modern American style office building house, installed swinging windows that are 1.5 metres square (Five feet in English). When the wind grabs them then can spin 180 degrees and smash into little pieces.

This photo does NOT do these stupid windows justice.

In Italy, we have a small problem that blights the country; now some of you will be thinking of the mafia and some of you might be thinking of the glorious Italian bureaucracy, however the real problem is the blasted mosquitoes. A ‘proper’ Italian house, designed and built by anyone with an IQ above 25 makes sure that it is easy to install anti mosquito nets. Unfortunately because a moron designed this house, it took me 12 months to devise a way of attaching nets to our huge, swinging windows. The end result took over 80 metres of gaffa tape (for you non-English blog readers, gaffa tape is like sellotape, but wide and very sticky, it has the remarkable property of sticking eyebrows to lips and fingers to windows) 10 packs of netting and a lot of swearing. The end result is mosquito nets, which hang from the windows, the same way my old grannies knickers used to hang from the washing line.

Big and baggy, just like grannies knickers

They nets do stop 97.5 % of all known mosquitoes, the remaining 2.5% still manage to get in and bite me at around two o’ clock in the morning; but because of the masses of gaffa tape needed to secure the mesh, the windows no longer close properly. Now this is not normally a problem, except the wind was blowing a hooley and the rain was raining horizontally!! We stood and watched as the rooms slowly flooded. I ran around in circles while my wife ran for the mop and some mats to soak up the water.

When the wind and the rain stopped, we surveyed the devastation. Apart from the three new ponds in the bedrooms, the destroyed shed, various roofs that had detached themselves from the chicken shed etc.; what most upset Mrs Sensible was she and to a lesser extent I, had spent the previous couple of days cleaning and tidying the house ready for our visitors.

I will huff and puff and blow your shed away.

We checked to make sure Luagina, our neighbour had survived the storm and then we started the clean up operation, so that we would be ready for our visitors arriving from the UK. Hopefully bearing gifts like piccalilli and HP brown sauce.

This post will self destruct in 48 hours

Posted on July 22, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, birthday, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Mrs Sensible • 54 Comments

If you read my posts, you may find that they change after a couple of days. They remain basically the same, but the grammar and spelling ~~miraculusly~~, ~~miraculastly~~, amazingly improves. This is because Mrs Sensible logs onto my blog, switches into skool marm mode and mutters and tuts her way through my spilling mistakes.

Because Mrs Sensible reads my posts, this post will self destruct in 48 hours if not sooner.

Pecora Nera in trouble

On Sunday I was in trouble. I don’t know why, I pondered everything I had done, not done, touched or not touched over the previous three days. I know I had been a bit lax with the old, unloading the dishwasher but it doesn’t normally cause frosty stares and monosyllable answers.

I asked if I was in trouble. I hasten to add this is not a good thing to do…..

In the end I sat down and had a proper Poo Bear think.

A really hard think

And then it came to me, like a bolt out of the blue, a sledge-hammer thought, straight to my left temple.

A day to remember

I HAD FORGOT MRS SENSIBLE’S BIRTHDAY

Panic struck… I tried to remember the exact date that I had forgotten. I checked my phones diary, my laptop for proof of her birthday and even her facebook page. I knew her birthday was around now, but had I just missed it, or was I really in trouble, by at least a week or more? Was my life salvageable?

I checked her Italian ID Card.

With shaking hands the truth stared me in the face…. I had missed her birthday by several days. I was mortified, scared even. It was too late to rush out and buy a big chocolate cake with Mi Dispiace printed across it. I was doomed, my fate was sealed.

I quietly sat back down in the lounge and pondered my alternatives. They looked very bleak. How could I forget my loves birthday???? Should I broach the subject empty-handed? or wait it out until Monday and buy her lots of flowers, chocolate, new shoes etc, and endure another day of being in trouble…

And then I had another thought

Another really hard think

I couldn’t believe I had missed her birthday, so saying silent prayers I quietly tiptoed back to her handbag, dug out her purse and re checked her ID card. The date I had seen in my terror, was the date her card expired….. Her Birthday is in August, on the 12th to be exact.

So I am really really glad, I didn’t play honest Joe and tell her that I understand why she was mad at me and that I was sorry for forgetting her birthday, because I would have dug myself an even bigger hole than I was already in.

The problem is…. I still don’t know why I was in trouble…. and I don’t want Mrs Sensible to read this and realise that I forgot her birthday, so this post will self destruct in 48 hours.

Yoo hoo I am back

Posted on July 20, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, East Midlands Airport, englishman, expat, humour, ryanair, wine, Yorkshire Tea • 56 Comments

I have been away from bloggoland for almost a month and I have to say I miss you guys. I enjoy writing about the crazy stuff that happens to me in Italy, but more importantly I love the comments and interaction between other bloggers. So, normal service has now resumed or as normal as it is ever likely to get.

Over the past month, we have had an assortment of Mrs Sensible’s family arrive and depart, I have eaten too much fine Italian food and gained nearly all the weight that I had earlier lost. I have also played countless games of Scoponi, see here for instructions. My Zia gave me a new nickname ‘Furbo’, I think it means ‘he who wins every game of Scoponi.’

Some of us are naturally lucky, and some of us have 2 gold sevens in our hand

Last week I flew to the UK to watch my daughter’s passing out parade, we celebrated with copious quantities of beer as only an Englishman can. The following day I was Godparent to one of my nieces and once again we celebrated with gallons of beer at the local rugby club.

Proud, so very proud of her. She is holding a medal she was awarded for attaining the best fitness in the troop.

Proud, so very proud of her.
She is holding a medal she was awarded for attaining the best fitness in her troop.

Feeling slightly hung-over and very tired I arrived at East Midlands airport at 5.30 am Sunday morning. Still wearing the clothes I had partied in four hours earlier. I consider myself a seasoned traveller; I know not to wear boots with large metal eyelets. I understand that if you don’t remove your watch and belt before passing through security, the guards become upset and will give you a quick pat down to make sure you aren’t trying to smuggle a pen knife through security. Some people do you know, even innocent mother in laws.. see here.

I passed through the metal detector without a problem, as I started to rethread my belt and scoop up my loose change I noticed that there seemed to be a bit of excitement over someone’s hand luggage. Three security men were pointing at the monitor. It was at this point that my hand baggage emerged from the x ray machine. As I waited for it to trundle down to me, (I was still struggling to loop my belt through my pants,) a female security guard picked it up, turned it on its side and pushed it back into the machine.

Stranger and stranger I thought, as my case disappeared into the machine, the guards again started pointing at the monitor. This time I took a long stare at the monitor, they were pointing at a dark grey square that looked like a big block of plasticine. Ah ha I thought, my two kilos of hermetically sealed bacon does kind of resemble a slab of semtex, or maybe even, the better quality C4 much used by the professionals.

Plasticine, not to be mistaken for Semtex

As my case exited the machine for the second time, the female security guard asked in a very loud and authoritarian voice. “Whose case is this?” I sheepishly held up my hand and frantically started to worry, if it was illegal to transport parts of dead pigs across European borders. “Did you pack it yourself… sir?” she asked.

Breathing a fair quantity of the previous evening’s alcohol in her general direction, I said I had packed it. “Can I look inside” she asked. Now, I have always, always wanted to say “No bog off”, but ever so politely I said of course. As she started to rummage through my clothes, I tried to breathe the alcohol fumes out the side of my mouth, “it’s full of dirty clothes” I said, as a pair of boxers rose to the top of the case. Ah ha, mmm hum, she muttered. She moved my camera case, that contained my Semtex Plastacine C4 hermetically sealed middle back bacon and grabbed a box of Yorkshire T bags. “Erm” I said raising a finger in the air. “Two minutes” she said as she waltzed of down the conveyor with my precious cargo of T bags.

My two favourite drinks. Yorkshire tea and Barone di San Pietro

When she returned, she gave me back my T Bags and said “they looked strange on the monitor, but you can pack your bag and go” I nearly, ever so nearly said you made a mistake, what you saw on the monitor that looked like a block of Semtex was my bacon. It was only because I was trying to breathe out of the left hand side of my mouth, thereby not intoxicating her with alcohol fumes that I literally… kept my mouth shut.

So the moral of this story is, if you want to smuggle Semtex bacon in your hand luggage, hide it in your camera case and drink enough alcohol the night before, so you remember not to open your mouth and incriminate yourself.

A dedicated follower of fashion

Posted on June 20, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged englishman in italy, Milan fashion • 70 Comments

I have lived in Italy for the past six years, or maybe it is seven years, I forget dates much like I forget birthdays and anniversaries. But one thing that is hard to forget, is I am living in the fashion capital of the world.

Canali Spring Summer 2013

Even old biddies on bicycles, get in on the act. They make sure they have their best fur coat on and sometimes they feel it is necessary to carry two hand bags; one to match the clothes and one to match the bike.

(I am not normally very good at acknowledging where my pics come from, but please take a trip to Italian Confetti the snapper of this pic)

I have squeezed the following fashion picture in for all you women bloggers. Ladies, note the six packs, following my diet and my ride to Germany on the back of Franco’s bike I hope to obtain one of these. P.S I have lost 4 kilos somewhere, so a small round of applause please.

Hunky men with six packs, for the female bloggers

So where was I? Oh yes, we have a delegation from Mrs Sensible’s family staying for a couple of weeks. So last Tuesday, or maybe it was Wednesday, I drove to Milan airport to meet them and snapped the following picture.

High fashion at Milan airport

By now, you regulars will already know where I am heading with this post. I am a dedicated follower of fashion. I always make sure my flip flops match my cut off jeans and t shirt, that is providing, Mrs Sensible doesn’t tell me to go back to the bedroom and change into trousers and a nice linen shirt. However, I do occasionally need to wear a business suit and following the example of the lady at the airport I think I have found one.

My next business suit

Weekly Photo Challenge: Fleeting

Posted on June 7, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, crop dusting, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, mosquito • 49 Comments

Mario the pazzodico crop duster

A point and press picture.

I have seven photos of this lunatic flying low over our house. Six of the photos I took, feature either the front of the plane or just the tail of the plane, as he disappeared over the roof tops. Twice I nearly toppled over the veranda as I stood on tip toes trying to capture him.

Mario was spraying the rice fields, to kill the mosquitoes that breed in the paddy fields. He didn’t do a very good job because they still ate me alive.

I nearly killed my self installing the mosquito netting on the windows, I will up load the post when my hands stop shaking.

P.S I think this is the first post that doesn’t mention Mrs Sensible

This post is for the Weekly photo challenge: fleeting

Blackberry: A lesson in customer service. (Italians please pay attention)

Posted on May 28, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, Blackberry customer service, Blackberry Playbook, customer service, englishman, expat, Fedex fiasco, Fiasco, fun expats, humour, Italians, italy, language, Mrs Sensible, piemonte, Playbook camera stopped working, RIM, RIM customer service, sauna • 59 Comments

A while ago I wrote a post about the Fedex fiasco , I was trying to point out, that even a well oiled machine like Fedex grinds to a halt as soon as it crosses over the border into Bella Italia. Last week, the camera on my Blackberry Playbook ceased to work, I thought another fiasco was about to begin….

For my birthday, my children bought me a Blackberry Playbook. It is a wonderful device. I use it to read English books, watch films, and to monitor the fat I am losing I have lost two and a half kilos in the past 2 weeks. When I travel I use the playbook to keep track of my business expenses, price lists, quotations, e mails, gosh the list goes on. To be honest, Mrs Sensible tends to get a tad annoyed with me and the Playbook, because it is normally glued to my hand, as I read yet another book.

Disaster stuck on the 14^th May 2013, the Playbook camera stopped working. I was devastated, I could still read books and all the other functions worked, but without the camera I couldn’t annoy Mrs Sensible, by filming her while she paints her toe nails or capture her admitting to one of the few mistakes that she makes.

Mrs Sensible is a bit camera shy.

My children bought the Blackberry Playbook in Meadowhall UK, the receipt is nowhere to be seen. I spent two days deciding whether to contact Blackberry, to see if they could fix it under warranty. The main stumbling points were A) I had lost my receipt, B) would my Playbook get lost in the Italian postal system and finally, C) Would my playbook be sent to Giuseppe Garybaldy in some repair clinic in Naples, never to be seen again.

I decided to phone Blackberry; I ignored the Italian helpline and instead phoned the UK helpline. Paula, one of Blackberry’s technical support staff, answered the phone. She asked me what the problem was. I began by explaining the camera fault; I then started to tell her how I had tried to fix the fault myself. I went into great detail, telling her I had researched the playbook forums and I had tried all the fixes, including holding down various buttons and forcing the playbook to reboot. I don’t think she was too impressed. I promised, I would never again try to fix my playbook myself.

Paula told me she needed my Playbook to send her a report. She explained how to do this and promised to call me back in twenty minutes. What a nice woman!

Twenty minutes later, Paula phoned me and said it was a hardware problem, she said I needed to send my Playbook to their service centre. I could just visualise good ole Giuseppe Garybaldy with his screw driver and hammer, plus the next six months of asking “have you found my Playbook.” I told Paula, that I had reservation about sending my playbook to any site within Bella Italia. I think I told her about my driving licence fiasco, and various other problems I have had with Italy. I even offered to pay the carriage, if she would let me send the Playbook to a UK repair centre.

Paula laughed, she said the Playbook needed to go to Germany. Ah the Germans!! I remember them from the sauna Now that is a different story, the Germans are more efficient than the English. In fact, they make the English look like Italians when it comes to efficiency. Paula said, she would send me a box with instructions, I was to put my Playbook in the box, complete the form and ask DHL to collect the box. There was nothing to pay; what a nice lady!

Honest I did a google search for German efficiency and this came up.

The following day, Paula E mailed me and asked “have you got the box?” I had a quick scout around my office and reception, I couldn’t see it.

I asked the accounts lady “I search box, this big, you see?”

COSA? (WHAT?)

I asked the company secretary “box, like this, DHL, errhh you see?”

She gave me a ten minute explanation, which I didn’t understand, but I nodded my head as though everything was as clear as ~~mud~~ day.

I e-mailed Paula to say, sorry but the box has not arrived. As I pressed the E mail send button, I wandered of to the coffee machine, and there on a shelf was my box. Of course it was there, I work in an Italian office and of course, I should expect my box to be hidden. This is why Italy grinds to a stop; no one knows who moved what or why.

I watch movies while I cook, Please note, the playbook stand in use is not a Blackberry authorised stand.

I placed my playbook in the box and sent it back to Blackberry. I was wondering, how I was going to cope without my playbook; would the DT’s set in? Would I have to watch Italian television? 24 hours later, DHL delivered a brand new Blackberry Playbook.

Paula phoned me and asked if it had received my brand spanking new Playbook, she asked if she could phone me on Monday to make sure the Playbook was working and to make sure I was happy. What an incredibly nice woman!!

I am not sure where Paula is based, but I sent her, a link to the Fedex Fiasco. After lunch I checked my stats, lots of hits on the Fedex Fiasco and 72 visitors from Portugal. Now if I was a betting man, I would say the lovely lady from Blackberry is based in Portugal.

Read, help and criticise…

Posted on May 9, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Language • Tagged an englishman in italy, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, language, languages, learning Italian, Mrs Sensible • 50 Comments

Ok girls and boys, I have been invited to submit a post (under 1000 words) to a newspaper and after a long think, bearing in mind I can’t use lots of pictures, this is the one I will send. Unless you have a better idea.

I would love any feedback, you can be critical and I won’t be offended. I might just un-follow you 🙂

Grazie PN

Today is back to school day for most of the children in Italy. My Italian wife, Mrs Sensible is a primary school teacher. This year the Italian education authority thought it would be a good idea for her to teach English, mathematics and music in a school five villages away and English and Italian in a school six villages away. My wife seems to spend half her life driving from one school to another.

While I sit here typing this blog Mrs Sensible is colouring in posters for her new classrooms. The little quip I made about, I hope you have finished all your work before you started colouring in your pictures was almost met with physical violence.

I too have to go to school; Mrs Sensible has forced me to go to the local evening class to learn Italian. I suppose forced is maybe a bit hard, my mum forced me to school by threatening me with the slipper, Mrs Sensible used the “If you want to stay in Italy you need to learn the language or maybe we should just go back to the UK” threat.

I have never found my lack of Italian to be a huge problem, I can order wine and grappa. I can also request the cost of items at the local shops. In fact my lack of Italian has been quite useful, Scusi, io inglese, mi dispiace non capsico, (Sorry, I am English I don’t understand) has saved me from buying expensive items or helped me escape from street traders trying to sell me bags and belts.

So, as my good wife had become exasperated with being my interpreter, she enrolled me in a basic Italian night class run by the local municipal for stranieri (immigrants). The teacher Maestra Piera is in her late 50s. Her eyes glitter with excitement as she explained to my wife that if I want to learn Italian, all I have to do is listen to everything she says. Oh and importantly attend her class regularly. This seems far removed from the way I was taught in school. I seem to remember it took the threat of the cane and detention for me to apply myself to the lessons.

On my first lesson, I was determined not to draw attention to myself. I quietly entered the classroom and walked to a desk at the back of the room. As I started to sit down, Maestra Piera pointed at me and announced to the class “Lui e’ Inglese, si chiama Peter.” (He is English, his name is Peter) She then pointed to a desk at the front of the class and shouted “Vieni Peter, vieni qui.” (Come Peter, come here) The horrors of my former school life quickly returned as I slowly dragged myself to the front of the class and sat down in the desk that is normally reserved for the naughty boy. I was beginning to wonder if I would have to produce a sick note signed by my wife when I decided to skip a lesson.

The classroom is the same as any schoolroom that I have sat or stood in the corner of. The only difference is the desks are scored with graffiti in Italian, Giuseppe Ti Amo Loradana. (Giuseppe loves Loradana) As I sat waiting for the lesson to begin I started to thumb through my new Italian – English dictionary, wondering if my homework would include backing it in brown paper. As I sat there wishing I was somewhere else I become aware of all the different languages that were being spoken in the room Russian, Ukrainian and a lot of French but no English.

We started the first lesson with a simple subject. How to change a singular noun into a plural noun, while remembering to change the article at the same time. We also needed to remember that the rules are different for male and female gender nouns. Not only is it mind-boggling, but all the explanations the teacher gave were in Italian. Logarithms without a table or calculator would have been easier. It wasn’t until I showed Mrs Sensible my notes later that night, that I became aware of what I had been listening to for the previous two and a half hours.

At one point during the lesson Maestra Pierra looked at me and said with a huge smile and a nod. “Peter hai Capito?” (Peter you understand?) I slowly shook my head no. Huge mistake! She walked to my desk smiled at me, leaned in close and raising her voice to a shout proceeded to give me the exact same explanation, once again in Italian. “Oh ok ok io capisco” (Oh ok ok I understand) I said. I never made that mistake again.

In the early lessons I think Maestra Piera thought I was her perfect student. I never asked her to repeat anything twice and I wrote down almost everything she said. It was only later that she understood how badly I was progressing in her lessons. One of the problems with the lessons, was I didn’t understand Italian therefore I didn’t understand the teacher. The second problem was the class had a massive mix of abilities. There were the French, Spanish and Romanians who with their Latin based language could argue with the teacher over the correct structure of a sentence and then there was me who needed pictures of cats and dogs with gatto and cane (cat and dog) printed beneath them.

I struggled through two years of classes with Maestro Piera and I know it was as much a struggle for her as it was for me. The symbolic certificate she gave me saying I had attained level 2 in Italian was presented more for my dogged attendance and also to make sure I didn’t re apply for a third year.

**Thanks for the suggestions, I have updated the post. So if the comments below don’t make any sense, it is my fault.

It is Monday morning and I really need a bacon butty.

Posted on April 22, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Language, Work • Tagged an englishman in italy, bacon, bacon butty, bacon sandwich, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, language, languages, pizza, pizza diavola, translation, translator, working in italy • 60 Comments

Red Cross Parcel

It is Monday morning in Italy, it is raining, I am sat in my office sulking and I need a bacon butty (bacon sandwich).

Don’t tell Mrs Sensible, but from time to time I do miss bits of England, bits like crisps, real beer or a bacon butty.

During the summer two of my children came to visit me, “Dad, do you need anything bringing” they asked. The above photo shows the goodies they managed to fit in their suitcase. I think the only clothes Lucy managed to fit in her suitcase, were a pair of jeans and a bikini. We spent the rest of the holiday buying her summer dresses. On hindsight it might have been cheaper, to have air freighted my emergency provisions over and let Lucy fill her case with her own clothes.

Back to rainy Monday and life in my office, I have 25 industrial water pumps in Taiwan that should be sat in my stores, money sat in my customers banks that should be sat in my bank and I really, really need a bacon butty.

I really need a bacon butty

If I was still sat in my old office in England, it would still be Monday morning, it would still be raining and I would be dreaming of life in Italy. But, and it is only a small but. The sarni shop (sandwich shop) down the hill made fantastic bacon buttys.

I could order a pizza from the local pizzeria, if someone was here to phone them for me, last time I tried it was a total disaster. I never realised how difficult it was to mime down a phone line.

Io bisogno una pizza (I need a pizza)

Cosa? (What)

Mi scusi, Io bisogno una pizza Diavola, mio indirizzo è strada industriale… (Sorry, I need a Diavola pizza, my address is industrial road…)

Cosa, non capisco?

ARGGGHH! IO SONO INGLESE, IO FAME; IO BISOGNO UNA PIZZA, PLEASE. ( I am English, I am hungry, I need a pizza Please)

CLICK Brrrrrrrr

As I stared at the phone that was still brrrrr ing in my ear, Manzo the nice delivery man from Bartolini, arrived with a parcel. He understood that I was hungry and he phoned the pizzaria on my behalf.

This is a Pizza Diavola. Purchased during the summer from a local pizzeria.

The pizza, complete with a bottle of beer arrived. It was very nice, but I really wanted a bacon butty.

UPDATE….

I have just bust my glasses.

Just bust my glasses

As if the day was not bad enough, I have just bust my glasses.

Summer Skiing in Italy

Posted on April 18, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in Health, home • Tagged an englishman in italy, englishman, expat, fun, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, nordic walking, skiing, skiing accident, summer skiing • 52 Comments

Driving home at lunch time, I spotted two old dears running down the road, whilst madly waving a pair of ski poles around. Now I have lived in Italy for the past 6 years and so nothing surprises me. But I must say, these two old dears in their stretch running pants piqued my interest. (Photo will be uploaded later)

So in the interest of science, I have done a little research.

Summer skiing. Very safe unless you trip over each other.

It seems that Summer Skiing is considered to be a safe sport. It is highly unlikely that you will fly home from your Skiing trip complete with a plaster cast. Whereas in winter skiing, a plaster cast is considered by many drinking companions, to be adequate proof that you actually did go winter skiing in the Alps.

Skiing in wellies is perfectly acceptable.

The cost of the clothing is also quite reasonable. You do not have to spend the kids inheritance on fashionable ski attire. It is quiet acceptable to go summer skiing in wellies, jeans and a silly hat.

Learners on a nursery slope.

But with all sports, it is very important to find the best summer ski instructor. Here you can see three beginners getting to grips with this demanding sport.

These are not English Summer Skiers, because there is not a knotted hanky or beer belly in sight.

Although I do not condone summer skiing on a beach, in my opinion beaches are for relaxing, and sunbathing, not running around waving dangerous ski poles. It is advisable to check with your local authorities for restrictions.

Summer Skiing in your garden

Your own garden is a very good place to practise Summer Skiing. After all, if you are worried about falling down and getting tangled up with your ski poles, it is better to do so in your own garden, rather than out on the road where someone might have a handy camera.

Summer Skiing is also an indoor sport.

For those rainy days, and here I am thinking of the people who still live in England, Summer Skiing can take place in the comfort of your own home. A word of warning, cornering around the coffee table should only be undertaken by experienced Summer Skiers. And please mind the dog.

No special footwear is necessary.

So to recap. Apart from the cost of two ~~sticks~~ ski poles, the cost of this sport is very low. No ski lift passes, no expensive medical bills and you don’t have to freeze to death.

A mother in law, a pen knife and the airport police.

Posted on April 3, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Language • Tagged airport security, an englishman in italy, dogs, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, italy, language, languages, learning Italian, mother in law, Mrs Sensible, police, translation • 47 Comments

I was going to do a post about the Easter bunny and how he gave Mrs Sensible a dishwasher rather than a chocolate egg, but the stupid rabbit bunny forgot to give me anything. So instead here is a post about Mrs Sensible’s mum, Gatwick Airport and a police caution.

In 2007 Mrs Sensible and I were still living in rainy England. From time to time visitors from Italy would arrive and the language in our house, quickly changed from English to beautiful Italian, except mine of course. Despite the amazing collection of Italian grammar books and dictionaries I had acquired, I soon found mime was easier to learn and much more universal.

Marcel Marceau the master of languages

One of my favourite visitors to our house was my mother in law. One evening while Marta was staying, we were invited to dinner by our friends Gary and Joan. Joan created a delicious meal and during the meal Gary gave my mother in law a beautiful bone handle penknife for her husband. Gary said, he had carved the handle himself, he also strongly suggested that we place the knife in our main luggage when Marta flew home. This was duly translated by Mrs Sensible.

The penknife was a little bit like this.

When I booked Marta’s return flight to Sicily, I was amazed at how low the cost was, and so I also booked a seat for me. I told Mrs Sensible that her mum shouldn’t carry her suitcase by herself, so I would go with her have a 10 day holiday and would be back in the UK quicker than she could say “questa è una cosa molto egoista da fare. Ho bisogno di una vacanza così”

The security at Gatwick Airport was on high alert following various terrorist incidents, so we had to remove our shoes and pass them with our bags and coats through the X ray machine. I didn’t mind the increased precautions, because 1) I didn’t really want to get on a plane that might have a bomb on it and 2) I had left all my dangerous items, such as my battery razor and tooth paste at home. As I walked pass the security guard and reached down to pick up my holdall. A female security guard pointed to Marta’s hand bag and said “Is that yours sir?”

My Hand bag?

Mine!! A handbag! Was she mad? “It belongs to Marta” I said pointing at my mother in law. “Can we look in it please?” she asked.

I shrugged and turning to Marta I mimed, have you got any face cream, bottles or perfume in your bag. Marta smiled at me and shook her head. The security guard was definitely onto something, she was excitedly rummaging through Marta’s bag; the way a sniffer dog might, if it had just sniffed 4 kilos of cocaine in burst bags.

Meet Fleabag the sniffer dog

With a flourish the guard produced Gary’s penknife. As she opened the knife and waved it under our noses there was an audible AAHHH from the other travellers in the queue. I looked at Marta in amazement, this didn’t look like the innocent pen knife Gary had given her, it looked like a Samurai sword, and if the guard didn’t stop waving it about, someone was going to lose an arm.

Policeman with the penknife

I started to apologise, I explained that Marta was Italian, not used to travelling, not a spring chicken, not a terrorist, blah blah blah. I asked if she would kindly dispose of the knife and we would be on our way.

Fifteen minutes later, we were still stood in the naughty corner waiting for the police to come and tell us off. When PC Plod and his sergeant eventually arrived, I again apologised and explained that our flight was due to leave in 15 minutes. I calmly explained the dinner and the gift, it was at the point where I mentioned Marta’s lack of English, that the Policeman asked if we needed an interpreter. It might take an hour or two for the interpreter to arrive, but we need to fill out some forms and your mother in law will need to accept a caution . We don’t need an interpreter; I am bi lingual I said.

Of course I speak fluent Italian

I translated all the questions the policeman asked. Some questions were easy, for example; what is her name or what is her address. But when the policeman asked me to translate, please ask her if she will accept a formal caution or would she prefer to make a statement at the local police station. I resorted to total gobbledygook. I strung as many Italian words that I knew together and kept adding stai zitta (shut up) every time Marta opened her mouth. I am not really sure what Marta thought as I started to say in very very bad Italian “stai zitta, where bathroom? I like kitchen no like knife, no stai zitta, please si si si I said, as I nodded my head.

Marta whose eyes were as wide as saucers, nodded her head. The policeman then gave my mother in law an official police caution. She was warned that if she ever gets into trouble again, this police caution may be taken into account.

Any more trouble from you and…

My mother in law and I ran through the airport to the departure gate, while I tried to explain on the mobile to Mrs Sensible why we hadn’t called her and no I wouldn’t go back and ask the policeman if we could keep the penknife and yes I realised it was a gift for her dad.

A video paints a few thousand words.

Posted on March 27, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, driving in italy, easyjet, expat, fun, fun expats, humour, Italia, italy, low cost airlines, ryanair, yorkshire • 25 Comments

I have decided it is time for another sensible post. We have had enough mirth and merriment. So today we will look at the low-cost airlines, that we like to whinge about.

Frederick R. Barnard in 1921 coined the phrase “A picture paints a thousand words” (see I do my research)

So here is…. A video paints a few thousand words, attributed to Pecora Nera 2013

Yorkshire Airlines

Fascinating Aida

Part 2: How to swap a UK driving licence to an Italian one in 340 difficult steps

Posted on March 26, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in Driving, home • Tagged an englishman in italy, carabinieri, driving, driving in italy, english driving licence, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, italian driving licence, italian police, Italians, italy, language, Mrs Sensible • 101 Comments

Yesterday was my third visit to the motorizzazione, in my ongoing saga to convert my UK driving licence to an Italian Driving licence. At 5.30 I arrived at the office with Mrs Sensible in tow, she wouldn’t let me bring my sharpened fork.

Signore Cretino once again asked if he could take a photo copy of my driving licence, Italian identity card and my codice fiscale. Just for fun I also handed him my British Passport. This is the third set of copies he has taken. He must be building up an impressive file.

Pecora Nera Driving Licence

The first problem we hit was the name on my UK driving licence didn’t match the name on my British Passport or my Italian Identity card. Mrs Sensible explained, that in England it is possible to combine the surnames of the husband and wife when they marry. He wasn’t very impressed; I have to take my hat off to Mrs Sensible because she calmly explained that she was right and he would just have to accept the situation.

The next step was my medical. I had to visit the doctor who had an office next door, but way up on the fourth floor. By the time we had climbed the steps, I nearly needed a doctor to resuscitate me. We passed an old lady on the way up who was slowly climbing the stairs for her medical. She looked about 80 years old. When she finally entered the waiting room she looked 85 years old.

It is impossible for 20 Italians to sit in a waiting room and either sit quietly or to whisper to their partners. It took them about 3 nanoseconds to realise I was English.

Old Lady: “Your husband is English, Does he understand Italian?”

Mrs Sensible: “Yes he is English and no he doesn’t understand much”

Pecora Nera “I speaks Italian small small”

Old Lady “Ah! His Italian is very Good”

Mrs Sensible looked to heaven and I gave a huge grin.

Mrs Sensible then showed everyone in the doctors waiting room, my new driving licence photo. She used the following words as she handed my photo around e’ Brutto, e’ schifo.

The old lady laughed and showed her photo. A second lady who was sat across from us produced her driving licence. I would estimate her age somewhere between 65 and 70. Her photo showed a woman of 26 with a 1960s hairstyle.

Her photo was something like this

Pecora Nera “ That doesn’t look like her, how can the police identify her? I mean she looks like her daughter or even her daughter’s daughter; but with a 1960s hairstyle”

Mrs Sensible “In Italy we don’t need to update our photo”

Pecora Nera “Madness, so you can be 85 and use a photo taken when you were 18?”

Doctor “Next”

Pecora Nera “ I English I speaks Italian small small”

Doctor “Ok we speaks English, I speaks English little”

Pecora Nera “ Oh your English is so good, thank heavens you understand English”

I passed the medical and we went back to see Signore Cretino at the motorizzazione.

As we entered the office, the following conversation was taking place between a young man and Mr Cretino. Mrs Sensible quietly translated it for me, while I laughed into my hanky.

Young man: My driving licence was suspended by the Carabinieri. When the suspension was over I went back to the office to collect my licence. The Carabinieri in the office had lost it!! So I asked them what they intended to do about it.

The outstanding Carabinieri

Signore Certino: And?

Young man: The Carabinieri said “We won’t do anything, it is your problem. You need to sort it.”

So I asked how do I sort it, what do I need to do? The Carabinieri told me to come here and apply for a brand new driving licence. He said “take your documents and two photos.” I asked him if the photos will need authenticating, he said no, so here I am with the documents and the two photos.

Signore Cretino: You need to authenticate one of those photos; you need to go either to the Carabinieri or to the council.

Young man: But I have just come from the Carabinieri and they said it wasn’t necessary.

Mr Cretino: Well, they could have authenticated them, but they didn’t, so now you will have to go back to them and come back here tomorrow.

As regards to my driving licence, I am now in possession of a piece of paper with a sticker on it. This wonderful bit of paper is valid for 30 days and only valid in Italy.

3 steps forward and 5 steps backwards.

P.s Multifarious Meanderings is trying to get a French licence in France, go and read.

Part 1

Part 3

Part 4

Who am I? Expat, Immigrant or Zingero

Posted on March 25, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, driving in italy, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, immigrant, Italia, italian, italy, Mrs Sensible, piemonte, Solipsism, stranieri, zingaro, zingero • 50 Comments

Following on from my post Solipsism, I have decided to discover who I really am. A few people who left comments on the post suggested that I really don’t exist. So who am I?

I would love to be an Expat, I even belong to the British Expat Forum. Although the moderators in their infinite wisdom, banned me, back in 2008 and I had to secretly reapply using a different name and e-mail address. But as a committed black-sheep (Pecora Nera) I was not surprised. Apart from being ceremoniously booted off the Expats website, there are also two other reasons why I don’t think, I fall into the category of Expat. The first one is, I was born in Malta and I am not sure if ‘us’ Maltese can be Expats, the second and fundamental reason is, I can’t afford to pay a Punka Walla, also Mrs Sensible draws the line at me sitting all day in the sunshine drinking gin and tonic.

Gin and Tonic plus a Punka Walla

Photo credit to Neither use nor ornament

This leaves me with either option two an immigrant or option three Zingero. I love the sound of Zingero, it is one of the few Italian words that I can pronounce. It also kind of fits in with the black-sheep image. Zingero is a derogatory term used to describe immigrants from Eastern Europe. However I think Mrs Sensible would throw a No 8 wobbly if I started filling forms in with Pecora Nera, a Zingero.

So I am left with being an immigrant. I have just read in the news that David Cameron our ~~beloved leader~~ is clamping down on immigrants entering the UK. Does this mean he won’t let me back into the UK when I need to stock up on Bacon and T bags? Life is so complicated. On Friday night, I discussed, who am I? with Marco over a couple of glasses of beer. We batted the question and answer back and forth as we shared a plate of chips. After much deliberation Marco gave his considered opinion. You are a stupid Englishman.

So now I know!!! When I fill out my application for my Italian Driving Licence I need to write Stupido Inglese.

Solipsism, or am I a figment of my own imagination.

Posted on March 23, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged amazon, an englishman in italy, chocolate, driving in italy, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, Mrs Sensible, ordering with amazon, Poste Italia, SDA, vegetable • 44 Comments

This weekend was designated as a chocolate eating and a movie watching weekend. I ordered fresh supplies of chocolate and, armed with my trusty credit card, I purchased a selection of DVDs from Amazon.co.uk

Mrs Sensible likes British Costume Dramas

Another good film

This one was for me

And just in case we ran out of movies I bought this one.

I thought I had prepared the weekend to the last detail. All the films were in stock and would be delivered on Friday afternoon. I now had an ample stock of dark chocolate for Mrs Sensible and an adequate stock of milk chocolate for me.

On Friday afternoon I left the office early and drove home. I waited and waited, occasionally I glanced out of the window in search of the delivery van. At 6.43 I received an e-mail from Amazon, explaining that SDA could not deliver my DVD’s because my address was incorrect. Now this is strange because SDA have delivered to my house before and the gas and electric bills always find me.

Everything became clearer when I tried to input the tracking number on the SDA website, because SDA is part of Poste Italia. Poste Italia is the government-owned postal system that specialises in losing parcels and making grown men cry. I dropped a quick message to a blogging friend at Expat eye on Latvia and received the following.

useful advice

I was quiet worried; just to make sure I wasn’t a figment of my own imagination, I immediately pinched myself to see if I was real. I then ran outside to check that the house was still here and got a second opinion from Google maps.

My house exists!!

They also found me.

So here I am, Saturday morning on a non Chocolate and film weekend. It has turned into a let’s clean the house weekend. Curse you SDA!!! Debbs at Digging wiv Debb will be pleased because choosing between cleaning the house under the direct supervision of Mrs Sensible and planting some seeds in the vegetable plot I chose the latter. The race is now on, will the peas, lettuce and cucumber arrive before SDA find my house?

Please place your bets below.

How to swap a UK driving licence to an Italian one in 340 difficult steps

Posted on March 20, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in Driving, home • Tagged an englishman in italy, driving, driving in italy, driving licence, englishman, expat, fun expats, How to swap a UK driving licence to an Italian Driving Licence, humour, Italia, italian, italian driving licence, Italians, italy, Mrs Sensible • 70 Comments

Pecora Nera Driving Licence

I have created a new page for this post because I know this is going to be a long and painful saga. I will update this as I jump, dodge and get blown up by the Italian minefield of bureaucracy.

20/03/2013

Last summer I noticed that my driving licence would expire in May 2013. I searched on the internet whether, I could renew my licence with DVLC. Unfortunately this is not ‘legally possible’ because I do not live in the UK. I do have a house in the UK but someone is living in it. Further research seemed to imply that exchanging my UK licence for an Italian licence was easy. I would only need two photos, some money and a completed form. I should have known better, after all this is Italy, a country where I have been stopped for driving with a European UK driving licence.

The carabinieri who stopped me was not the brightest man alive, he tried to explain to Mrs Sensible that I, an Englishman was not allowed to drive in Italy with a Ukrainian driving licence. Mrs Sensible went straight into teacher mode and asked the poor carabinieri, (who was now asking himself why he had stupidly stopped me) when did the Ukraine joined the EU? Still pointing at the European flag on my licence, Mrs Sensible then explained to him, again in teacher style language, that the UK on my licence actually stood for United Kingdom, and no it did not need to have GB for Grand Britannia on it.

So here, we are fifty-eight days from my driving licence melting down; and I decide enough is enough. I asked Mrs Sensible to phone the local office that deals with driving licences and find out what documents I will need to take to the office and how much it take to change my licence.

OFFICE: Why does your husband want an Italian Driving Licence?

MRS SENSIBLE: Because his UK licence expires in May.

OFFICE: UK licences do not expire. Italy is going to change to licences like the UK one.

MRS SENSIBLE: My husbands licence expires on the 17th May 2013. it is clearly stated on the licence.

OFFICE: Really! Tell your husband to pop into the office this afternoon and we will sort it all out.

MRS SENSIBLE: Pecora, if you go to the office now they will sort it out for you… go now… go.

PECORA NERA: He hasn’t got a clue what he is talking about has he…. ALL RIGHT I am going.

Standing in the office the ~~idota~~ ~~stupido~~ helpful man explained that, for a small sum of money he could stick a sticker on my UK driving licence that would make it valid for another 5 years.

Words failed me, both English and Italian words. I phoned Mrs Sensible and said ” I don’t need a sticker I need a new licence. Hertz car rental is not going to accept an Italian Sticker stuck on my driving licence as proof that it is now valid for another 5 years. Please explain this to this ~~helpful~~ ~~intelligent~~ cretino. After Mrs Sensible had had a short telephone conversation with the man, the phone was passed back to me and I was told “He will have it all sorted tomorrow. You will need to call back tomorrow around four in the afternoon.

Tomorrow I will update part 2 after I have driven back to the office and had another discussion with Signor Cretino. Right now I am going to have a glass of wine.

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Oh how the mighty have fallen.

Posted on March 19, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, automatic gate, dog, dog attacks jogger in Italy, dogs, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, italy, jogging, Mrs Sensible, piemonte • 23 Comments

Oh how the mighty have fallen.

Gilda in the dog house

I am sure you remember Gilder the short-legged but incredibly fat sausage dog who saved her owner from the snake attack last November. Well she is in disgrace at the moment. There is a wolf that lives across the road from us. It is a pleasant dog that although it is big, it only howls at night when it remembers that its mate has died. It very rarely barks. The only time it barks, and then it goes absolutely mental, is when Gilda decides to stroll down to the wolf, bark at him and generally wind him up. When the wolf is in a frenzy, and running up and down the garden fence searching for a way to get at the little fat dog; Gilda deciding her work is done for another day saunters back across the road up our driveway and across to Luiginas house. Her tail at full mast just to wind the wolf up a little more.

If you look carefully you can see the wolf across the road

Now winding the wolf up is one thing, her punishment will surely come when the wolf realises it can jump the garden fence and outrun a dog that relies on legs that are only 3 inches long and needs to breathe in to make sure it’s belly doesn’t scrape along the ground. No, Gilda was incarcerated for joining up with Lila, Luigina’s other dog, which is known for being timid, and Diana a lovely soft Border Collie that lives up the road. The three of them caused a jogger to stop in mid stride.

The terrible threesome, and Gilda was the ringleader decided to surround a jogger who was going about his business of jogging up our road, and bark at him every time he raised a foot, shouted for help or tried to wipe the sweat from his forehead. He was paralysed with fear. Mrs Sensible asked me who Gilda was barking at; I replied she was probably winding up the wolf. Go and have a look please she told asked me. I had a quick glance out of the bathroom window and spotted the jogger who was doing an excellent impersonation of a statue.

Credits to Michelangelo. I think he was Italian

Armed with a sweeping brush, I gallantly went to the rescue. I didn’t really need the brush because the only danger from the three musketeers, would be a good licking. But as I had had to leave the comfort of my warm house, in my flip-flops, PJ bottoms and a coat, I was determined someone was going to suffer. Even if that someone turned out to be the jogger.

Having rescued said jogger, Mrs Sensible decided it was my fault, because I had left our automatic gate open. Please note the word automatic. We have the only automatic gate that is having hormonal problems and requires a good shove to get it to open or close. Friday it was raining and I simply refused to get out of my car and push our automatic gate closed.

Automatic, don’t make me laugh. they can’t even spell it correctly.

And that is why Gilda is in the dog house. A new motor for the gate will cost me around 400 euros (all donations to my paypal account please). The cost of keeping Gilda in Jail is significantly less. It’s a hard life when you are a jogger, wolf or a dog in jail.

Mrs Sensible is her name and teaching is her game.

Posted on March 7, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, concorso insegnante 2012, Concorso scuola, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, Italians, language, Mrs Sensible, piemonte, scuola, sicily, teachers exam, teaching in italy, Torino, Turin, university of Turin • 27 Comments

Mrs Sensible is her name and teaching is her game.

Mrs Sensible passed all her exams and qualified to be a teacher many years ago. Unfortunately so did many other people. Each year Mrs Sensible is given a ten month contract, working in one of the state schools. She is then laid off during the summer and we have to watch our pennies as she doesn’t qualify for holiday pay. We then pray that Mrs Sensible will be given another contract for the following year.

The Italian government has decided to change this nonsense and employ full time teachers for the 11,892 positions that are normally handed out on short term contracts. The problem is there are 172,248 eligible teachers who all want and need a job. Snr Profumo, some geezer in the government decided that what Italy needed was a competition, and so the Concorso Insegnanti 2012/13 is running.

Teachers in Turin waiting to enter the school for the 2012 School Contest

In December the first stage of the concorso (competition) took place. 50 multiple answer questions, were laid before the 172 thousand teachers. Only 33.6% passed, Mrs Sensible passed and was quiet annoyed with herself for only scoring 46.5 out of 50. She needed 35 to pass.

I have no idea how she managed to pass the first stage, since some of the questions were supposed to be based on logic but even Spock would have considered them illogical, and the maths questions… well let me give you an example.

Illogical Captain

5 trains leave different stations. Train A arrives before Train B, Train C was driving faster than train D. Train B arrived before train D. What did the driver of train C have for breakfast? Mrs Sensible knew the answer.

I like to think my lack of Italian played a small part in helping Mrs Sensible pass the exam. She is forced to use English if she wants any sensible answers from me, and so the English Questions that made up 25% of the marks was a piece of cake for the talented Bi Lingual Mrs Sensible.

Anyway at the beginning of this month she went to Torino to sit the written exam. I booked us in a nice hotel and went along for the ride. As I took a couple of photos a little lady whose name translates to Mrs Drinkwater asked me if I was a journalist. No no, my wife is a teacher I said, pointing at the mass of people who were trying to enter the building.

Mrs Sensible is in this crowd

“Come and have breakfast with me” she said. I often wonder if I have a note stapled to my back with the following printed on it STRANGE PEOPLE PLEASE APPLY HERE. On the way to breakfast Mrs Drinkwater acquired another friend who just happened to be standing near us. After breakfast and as we left the café I gave my excuses and said I needed to put some money in the car parking meter. Oh that’s ok we will come with you. Ahhuh… As the three of us approached my car Mrs Drinkwater, who by now had taken on the position of tour director, said There is a lovely church just past your car, would you like to see it?

Well I had 3 hours to kill, so stupidly I said yes. It was a lovely church and I wasn’t too put out as Mrs Drinkwater and our friend dropped to their knees to pray for their children who were at the moment trying to pass the concorso. I wandered off down the church to look at various paintings and sculptures. As I wandered back to the silently praying twosome, a priest entered the church and everybody stood up. Come on let’s go to the front, said Mrs Drinkwater. Aaahhhhh!!!

I know I shouldn’t have taken this picture. But would you have believed me?

We went to the front of the church, and I sat behind an old lady in a fur coat. The two priests took mass and communion, they said their Hail Marys and left the church. With Mrs Drinkwater in the lead we set off back to the school where Mrs Sensible was working hard.

Mrs Drinkwater stopped once or thrice to answer her mobile, she would have a loud conversation with someone called Giuseppe, and then set off walking again. We didn’t stop at the school, Mrs Drinkwater marched straight pass it, across the road to the University for physical education. Just before she entered the University she once more phoned Giuseppe. I naturally assumed that Giuseppe was waiting for us inside, we would be given cake and tea and take the load off our feet for a couple of mins. It couldn’t be further from the truth. We took a tour of the University trying various locked classroom doors, it was when she rattled the third door that I became a little suspicious that maybe Giuseppe wasn’t in the University and was more than likely sitting in Messina, Sicily, phoning his mum to make sure she wasn’t getting into any trouble.

We wandered down a long dark corridor, and I kept expecting to see a security guard who would shout at us and physically throw us out, or maybe something worse. At the end of the corridor was a gymnasium. Girls in leotards were engaged in some pretty physical jumping up and down and waving their arms around. Mrs Drinkwater put her shopping bags on the floor and decided to join in. Now finding myself caught up in a catholic mass on a Friday morning is one thing, and I am no stranger to surprises and strange circumstances but this was becoming a little too surreal even for me.

Mrs Drinkwater

The woman in charge of the aerobics class, pleasantly, if not a little sarcastically, asked if we would prefer to join her class rather than practising in the entrance. I made We need to go NOW signs with my hands and thought that if I started to leave the building Mrs Drinkwater and our friend would follow.

Safely waiting back outside the school for Mrs Sensible, the teachers started to emerge from the building. Some looked decidedly unhappy, one of them heard my dreadful Italian and she realised that I was English. She asked me to look at the answers she had given to the English questions. Now, I am not a teacher but the answers she had given were definitely incorrect. I shrugged. Mi dispiace, è sbagliato, I said as I shook my head. She looked stunned and wandered off. One or two others also asked me to mark their papers and I politely decline. I pointed at my wife and suggested they ask her. One girl bursting into tears was just too much for me.

There are two more exams to be sat before the 172 thousand teachers are weeded down to 11 thousand, I just hope and pray Mrs Sensible is not one of those that are weeded out.

A little Summer House

Posted on February 26, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Language • Tagged an englishman in italy, englishman, expat, finding work in Sicily, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, language, languages, learning Italian, Mrs Sensible, piemonte, sicily • 35 Comments

In 2009 I left Piemonte and went to Sicily in search of work. This cunning plan, was to find employment in a hotel, or maybe even at the USAF base at Signorella, I could then persuade Mrs Sensible, to move south to be closer to her family, the sun, sea and beaches.

Mrs Sensible thought this was utter madness, most of the Italians were trying to move north in search of work and her crazy English husband was moving south!! However she did see a positive benefit to the exercise. One, she would sleep better without me snoring in her ear and two, I would be forced to learn to speak Italian. Especially if I stayed with Zia E.

Zia E is a wonderful lady, she is the oldest sister of Mrs Sensible’s Dad, and we love her to bits. The only downside was she spoke very little English, maybe as much as hello, goodbye, one, two and three. Which in fairness matched my Italian.

One evening Mrs Sensible phoned to ask me how the job hunting was going. Not bad I told her, Berlitz want me to teach English to Italian Businessmen. Your joking she said, you can’t spell for toffee and your grammar is appalling. It’s not a problem I said, I will teach them to spell ~~fonetically~~ ~~phoneticallie~~ phonetically. There was a long pause and then Mrs Sensible asked me, how was my Italian coming along? Cosi cosi I replied, I am working on it. But you should hear Zia, her English is improving in leaps and bounds. She can now count to 30 and can tell me it is too cold for flip-flops in English. Mrs Sensible let out another audible sigh.

I didn’t secure a job in Sicily, however I did hear this wonderful story.

When Zia’s husband was alive, they owned a summer-house near a little village out in the countryside. Every year Zia and her husband would take a holiday, and visit the summer-house on the same 3 weeks every year. Life was fine, until one year they decided to change the dates of their holiday.

They arrived at the little summer-house 2 weeks early to find the front door was unlocked. As Zia and Zio entered the house, the aroma of fine Italian cooking wafted through the air to their noses. When they entered the dinning room, Zia was stunned to see a family of 6 sat at her table eating a meal. Zia asked the woman, who was sat at the table tucking into meat balls or maybe even spaghetti bolognaise what she thought she was doing .

Do you want to join us for dinner?? (Credit: Walt Disney Alice in Wonderland Brill film)

The woman stood up and said “we live here and are eating our meal. What does it look like; and who the hell are you?” (Obviously it was said in Italian, with a lot of hand waving)

When Zia told them she owned the house, the woman said you don’t live here, you only come for 3 weeks, and when you do we move back to the village. Why are you here now??

I think it was at this point that Zia blew a fuse and threw them out. She also decided to sell her little summer-house.

I did wonder how the family managed to live in Zia E’ house without her knowing. Zia explained that on her visits, she sometimes noticed the odd cup missing and maybe a rug not quite in the right position, but she just put it down to her memory and age.

Pancake day

Posted on February 13, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, BE-RO, findus, fun expats, horse meat, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, lasagne, Mrs Sensible, Pancakes • 37 Comments

Mrs Sensible is a wonderful cook, she makes a mean Indian Curry and of course thousands of Italian dishes. Unfortunately the odd dish includes bunnies or octopus. But last night she cooked PANCAKES. And pretty impressive they were.

I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that the pancakes were divine, after all Mrs Sensible has mastered the perfect Yorkshire pudding. The above half eaten pancake was savoury, inside it was filled with mushrooms, Gorgonzola cheese and the bacon that I smuggled on-board my last Ryanair flight from the UK.

At last a picture of Mrs Sensible

I have been asked to post a picture of Mrs Sensible. Here you go.

And where did Mrs Sensible get her recipe for the wonderful, marvellous, fantastic pancakes?

1956 BE-RO Home recipes

From our 1956 BE-RO Home Recipe book

The following is taken from page 3 of the book.

The woman who can cook well and bake well has every reason and every right to be proud of her cooking. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred she has a happy home, because good cooking means good food, and good food means good health.

I love politically correct statements.

So you lot out there, are you a BE-RO cook or do you throw a Findus ~~horse~~ beef lasagne pie in the oven. 🙂

Poo Poohed

Posted on February 12, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in Driving, home • Tagged an englishman in italy, englishman, expat, fun expats, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, mini one, Mrs Sensible, piemonte, snow, snowing • 28 Comments

We are up to our necks in snow, well almost up to our necks, maybe a little over our ankles if the truth be told. The snow that fell on Sunday is the cold wet type that freezes quickly, makes your fingers cold and the roads in Italy even more dangerous than they normally are.

On Midday Sunday the weather man warned that it would snow, the competition that Italy is running to find out if teachers like Mrs Sensible can have a proper contract was cancelled due to the forecast of heavy snow. Luigina and I looked at the beautiful blue sky and poo poohed them. Mrs Sensible washed the rugs and I hung them outside, they are still hanging there.

Frozen rugs.

On Monday morning on the way to work, I managed to pirouet my little Mini on the roundabout, as the car slide and slewed towards the barriers, I could hear Mrs Sensible, she was somewhere deep in my head saying “I told you, you need to put snow tyres on your Mini” As I simultaneously asked God to stop the car from crashing and cursed the idiota who was trying to overtake my spinning car. I promised myself that I would change the tyres, immediately if not sooner.

Mrs Sensible’s Car

God answered my little prayer, both my little Mini and I survived our little spin on the roundabout. At lunch time I changed the tyres on both my impractical, but fun Mini and Mrs Sensible’s small but practical and economic Peugeot.

It was still snowing on Monday night when I was driving home,

Snow and a little pic of my thumb

My house is on the right, if the council used our taxes to install street lights, you would be able to see it. Luiginas house is also on the right. On the left is the house where the bereaved German Shepard howls at night. The dog started howling after its mate died. The only time the dog doesn’t howl, is when Gilda, Luigina’s short but incredible fat sausage dog wanders down the road to bark at it.

One of these days the German Shepard will jump over the little garden fence and we will see how fast Gilda can actually run.

The snow effects everybody, even my hens are not very impressed, I opened the gate to let them out and they just glared at me.

Two legged egg laying machines.

Even after I walked back to check on Mrs Sensible’s rugs the hens hadn’t moved.

Hens, not the brightest animal.

My little Mini was frozen solid. The doors wouldn’t open and the wipers were frozen to the windscreen.

Pecora Nera One

Last picture,

This is what Italy should look like,

OK, admittedly this was taken on the beach, but you get the general idea. Roll on Summer.

weekly photo challenge: unique

Posted on February 6, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, cerebral palsy, charity, disability, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, piemonte, special girl, unique, weekly photo challenge • 19 Comments

This post was inspired by a fellow blogger called “I used to be indecisive” who posted this post.

I normally blog about Italy and humour, but a change is as good as a rest, so here are a few unique photos of Italy.

Mr Tree

Nearly everyday I drive past this tree. I wonder how many children have nightmares because of Mr Tree, or are told behave or Mr Tree will get you.

Balloon Car

I spotted this car in Catania, Sicily. I love it.

Lucy

This is Lucy, one of my daughters. She is completely unique and very special.

Veronica a unique little girl

And finally, Veronica a very special and unique little girl. Here she is in Milan walking with the help of her papa. Despite her disabilities (she has cerebral palsy) she is always smiling. Veronica was born one month before Mrs Sensible and I married. It was in her papas restaurant (sadly now closed), that I met Mrs Sensible.

If there is anyone out there in cyberland who has a huge heart, and wants to make a difference to a unique and special girl, or for those of you in Italy, who can give 5% per thousand of their tax to a worthy charity. Please spare 5 minutes to have a look at Veronicas web site. Then open your wallet and spread a little happiness.

Normal humour will return next week.

Lost your password? Silly boy

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home, Work • Tagged an englishman in italy, e mail, englishman, expat, fun, fun expats, hacked, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, Mrs Sensible, passwords, spam • 22 Comments

This morning I received an e mail inviting me to make a 30% return on my investment. All I needed to do was click on a link and then enter both my e mail address and e mail password. Duh!!

The scary thing is; the e mail came from a friend (you know who you are 🙂 ) and therefore a trusted e mail address.

I bounced a message to my friend to let her know that her account might have been hacked; I then sat pondering how safe my accounts are.

Every so often I become paranoid regarding internet security and my passwords. I log onto my e mail accounts, bank accounts, amazon, facebook, wordpress oh the list goes on and on and change my passwords with some new and devious password made up of upper-case letters sprinkled with a few numbers and the odd Ὧ©ⅎ. The passwords become utterly unbreakable, even by me.

I then spend the next 3 weeks filling out the “have you lost your password again, stupid boy,” just so that I can log into my internet life.

Twit form

I have used passwords centred around the names of my children, wife and next doors extremely fat but short legged sausage dog. I have even tried dates of birth, marriage & birthdays, but boy did it get me into trouble when I asked Mrs Sensible the date we married.

In the end I have decided to simplify this password nonsense. I have decided to use the same password and phrase on all my accounts , one I won’t forget in a hurry. New password: Yourintroubleagain21

Rabbit, pizza or starve..

Posted on January 25, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, englishman, expat, fun, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, Mrs Sensible, pizza, rabbit • 16 Comments

Last night Mrs Sensible and I agreed to meet after work in the town centre. Neither of us wanted to cook, so we decided to blow the housekeeping on a well deserved meal out.

Our first stop was the Chinese restaurant near the hospital. I had promised not to order everything that appears on the menu. I tend to get a bit carried away in Chinese restaurants and order loads and loads. I then send Mrs Sensible completely batty, by complaining that I am too full and need to consider dieting.

Unfortunately it was only ten past six, and I am sure you are aware, Italians eat at strange times. The guy who was setting the tables said “Velly solly closed, open later…”

We tried Santa Lucia the Italian Pizzeria / Restaurant, which was also closed even though it stated on the door that it opened at 6.30 ….. I checked my watch and it was 6.50.

I said “ok lets go home and I will cook bangers and mash.”

Oh good Mrs Sensible said we have some nice sausages in the fridge.

“Really… I didn’t know”

Yes they are pork and ( I was waiting for the word apple) rabbit. RABBIT!!! Cuddly, fluffy rabbit.

Fluffy bunny

Frustrated peeved and miffed, I steered Mrs Sensible down the main street. Mrs Sensible walked into a shop that sold SLABS of pizza. She bought 2 pieces. I declined, I refuse to eat food that doesn’t look appealing and I was sulking.

They didn’t look as nice as this

As we walked back to the car, Mrs Sensible started to lecture me on why I did want any SLABS of pizza. She said I was behaving like a naughty spoilt child. I tried to defend myself by explaining that I won’t eat Mc Donalds or Burger King even if I am starving.

On the way back to the car park we passed Santa Lucia the restaurant. Lo and behold it was open. Food I said as I dragged her in the restaurant . Ok ok she said I will take the pizza SLABS to work for my dinner.

As Mrs Sensible disappeared to visit the little girl’s room I ordered a glass of red wine and for Mrs Sensible some fizzy water.

The food was great, and by the time we had finished the meal Mrs Sensible had forgiven me for sulking.

And the SLABS of pizza…. Mrs Sensible had put the plastic bag that held them on the floor next to her chair, and when we left the restaurant she forgot to pick them up….

It’s flipping cold

Posted on January 10, 2013 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, electrickery, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italian Electrics, Italians, Mrs Sensible, piemonte, shower, streaking • 22 Comments

It’s flipping cold, actually it is warm by Piemonte standards. Last night it was just under minus 1°C. Last winter it reached a staggering minus 22°C. Which amazed me, as I thought you had to visit the Arctic Circle to experience such low temperatures; not sunny Italy.

Anyway after completing my third day back at work following my Christmas Holiday, I decided I wanted a hot shower and a proper mug of English tea. I didn’t need a shower, but the heating had been switched of all day and I had the choice of a) going back out to the warm car and waiting for the house to heat up, b) disappearing under the duvet in the bed or c) having a hot and very long shower. Option C won the day.

I flicked the halogen heater on in the lounge, which is where I had decided to towel myself dry and drink my tea, and of course the heater in the bathroom, which is contra to good sense and most health and safety laws. I then quickly got undressed and just as I was about to step into the shower I remembered the kettle.

One of two heaters to help warm the house

We have amazingly big windows in our house, they are designed to let the heat escape during the winter and allow the sun to cook the house in the summer. As I streaked from the bathroom through the lounge to the kitchen I was praying that Luigina didn’t decide to walk past the house, the sight of so many wrinkles in full flight might have shocked her.

I filled the kettle, whilst hopping from one cold foot to another on the freezing kitchen floor and then flicked the kettle switch. After a quick streak back to the bathroom, I dived into the shower and stood in absolute bliss as the steam rose around me. Mrs Sensible was still at work so I didn’t even have to open the bathroom window. As I soaped my hair, I was contemplating how wonderful a hot shower really is, when the bathroom light went out. Strange I thought, then the shower started to blast freezing cold water onto me and the luxury steam vanished.

Exiting a shower is a very simple process, you simply slide the door to the right or maybe it is to the left and then just step out. However add the fun of dancing around the shower cubical in the dark, whilst trying to avoid the jet of freezing cold water, plus a little soap in the eyes oh! And add scattering and kicking various potions, shower gels, shaving cans and hair shampoo bottles that are normally stood in the corner of the shower tray and you find exiting the shower in the dark is no longer quiet so easy. From the lights going out, to the first blast of cold water, and finally exiting the shower must in reality have taken a little over five second. I certainly didn’t have time to swear more than three times.

Grabbing a towel and putting on my trusty flip-flops and still dripping wet; I went to the fuse box near the front door. The little red LED that flashes on the fuse box was not flashing, and the trip switch was still in the up position. So I grabbed the nearest coat, one of Mrs Sensible’s and set off outside to reset the main trip switch on the fuse box which just happens to be not only outside, but through the gate and stuck in a box on the front of the house.

The switch had tripped, and as I was resetting it Luigina said “Ciao Peter, come stai” As Gilda Luigina’s dog decided to lick my wet toes I answered “Fantastic, sempre bene, molti bene, e’ lei?” She looked at me as I stood there with shampoo in my hair, Mrs Sensible’s coat, flip-flops and bare legs; while her stupid dog was weighing up if my toes were edible or not. She smiled, handed me 6 fresh eggs from the hens, wished me goodnight, took one last look at me called the dog and walked back to her house.

Had Mrs Sensible been home when I decided to have a shower and make a cup of tea at the same time, things would have gone differently. First she would have made sure that the bathroom window was open so that the steam wouldn’t build up, second I wouldn’t have had to streak to the kitchen as she would have prepared the cup of tea for me and thirdly and most importantly, the electric would not have tripped out. Mrs Sensible knows to turn off the two heaters before attempting to boil a kettle.

If you have seen Electrickery you will know I am not a supporter of Italian Electrics, and in our all singing and dancing Italian house there are 15 switches in the lounge that enables me to operate not only the SINGLE light in the lounge, but also the lights in the kitchen, bathroom, hall, front door light, outside security lights, and in all probability several lights in Luiginas house, but if I try to boil a kettle and run two heaters whilst having a hot relaxing shower the fuse box throws the trip.

Simple arithmetic

First Halogen Heater 1.2 KW

Second Halogen Heater 800 w (one bar is non functioning)

Kettle 2 KW

Light bulb sweet fanny adams

Total 4 kw (ish)

Maximum allowable kw into the house before the trip has a tizzy fit and trips, 3KW

I don’t know why it didn’t trip when I first switched the kettle on, maybe it is Machiavellian and thought it would be better and more fun to wait until I was in the shower and had soap in my hair. Who knows in Italy?

Self Medicating

Posted on November 27, 2012 by Pecora Nera • Posted in Health, home • Tagged an englishman in italy, dentist, dentista, doctor, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, illness, injection, Italia, italian, italian health, Italians, italy, Mrs Sensible, pain • 13 Comments

A couple of days ago Mrs Sensible went to the doctors. I am not sure why she went, I prefer not to discuss dentists or doctors, as there is always some pain involved, and the pain is normally my pain. However Mrs Sensible returned with a hypodermic syringe that was sporting a rather long and dangerous looking needle.

Big pointy needle

What is that for, and where did you get it I asked, while silently praying it wasn’t for me. My wife takes great care of my health by monitoring my crisps and alcohol consumption.

From the doctor Mrs Sensible calmly told me. It is my anti flu jab, do you think you can give me the injection? Me! Give my wife an injection and be responsible for the pain it will involve. I refuse to even hurt spiders, ants or even daddy longlegs. The only beast I will kill or hurt is the blood sucking mosquito.

No sorry, can’t do it. No way I blustered. Why didn’t the doctor give it to you? He is the doctor after all.

Mrs Sensible explained that the doctor gave her the prescription and by the time she had cashed in the prescription for the lethal pointy looking syringe the doctor had gone home. And besides in Italy it is not uncommon for members of the family or maybe a friend to be a dab hand with the syringe. Mrs Sensible’s mum would do it if she was here.

I am your typical Englishman I frown on pain and syringes. Apart from our scary dentist, the last time I received a needle, was some thirty-one years ago when I had my last and hopefully only tetanus jab. We English take aspirin and a glass of lucozade when we have the flu I tried to explain.

All an Englishman needs when he is ill.

It is now three days later, the needle is nowhere to be seen and Mrs Sensible has not gone down with flu, so maybe she asked our neighbour Luigina to give it. After all Luigina is Italian, she is a dab hand with a pick axe in the garden and has written many books on Italy. I would think a simple injection would be a piece of cake for her.

On a footnote I have looked at our medicine tin that used to contain nothing scarier than a pair of nail scissors and a pack of plasters. Under the control of Mrs Sensible, it has grown to a medicine draw and looking at it we could probably survive a nuclear war.

A Sensible Post

Posted on November 23, 2012 by Pecora Nera • Posted in Driving, home • Tagged an englishman in italy, benzina, cost of fuel, driving, driving in italy, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, languages, learning Italian, maria grazie cucinotta, Mrs Sensible, petrol • 23 Comments

Mrs Sensible read my blog at the weekend and told suggested to me that I write something useful. Something that would help anyone who decides to travel to Italy. So here is my price comparison post.

Mrs Sensible is responsible for making sure I eat properly and she therefore buys the groceries. I don’t really take much notice of the cost of mundane things, such as bread, milk, cheese and butter my interest, is in the cost of wine and grappa. However in the interest of blogging I have made an effort.

Benzina or petrol as the English call it, is rising at an incredible rate. I was amazed to find out why the Italian government justify some of the taxes on a litre of Benzina.

Here are some of the taxes that make up the cost of petrol.

0.00103 euro for the War of Ethiopia 1935 – 1936 (yep, Mussolini started the trend)
0.00723 euro for the Suez crisis of 1956
0.00516 euro for the Vajont dam burst of 1963
0.00516 euro for the Florence floods of 1966
0.00516 euro for the Belice earthquake of 1968
0.0511 euro for the Friuli earthquake of 1976
0.0387 euro for the Irpinia earthquake of 1980
0.106 euro for the Lebanon war of 1983
0.0114 euro for the intervention in Bosnia/Herzegovina 1996
0.020 euro for renewal of transport workers (autoferrotranvieri) contract 2004
0.0073 euro for conservation and maintenance of ‘beni culturali’
0.040 euro to finance influx of immigrants due to Libya crisis 2011
0.0089 euro Liguria/Tuscany floods autumn 2011
0.082 euro Save Italy decree 2012 (Not sure it has worked)

Near my house there are two petrol stations. Tamoil charges €1.82 a litre for petrol and TE who are less than 100 metres away charges €1.69 a litre for petrol. Now you will be wondering why there is such a big difference in the price. Let me enlighten you.

Mrs Sensible uses TE,

Mrs Sensible’s Garage TE. €1.69 a litre

This is an unmanned garage.

Mrs Sensible can’t buy important things like chocolates, sweets or drinks because no one works here.

Mrs Sensible has to pay for her fuel using the little machine.

The garage attendant

She then has to don protective clothing and fill her own car up.

Protective Clothes. PS This is not Mrs Sensible.

When this is done she walks back to the machine and collects her receipt. It may even be raining, it does sometimes.

Mrs Sensible’s receipt

I on the other hand prefer to use Tamoil

My Garage, as you can see sometimes it is not sunny in Italy

At this garage I don’t even have to leave the comfort of my warm car. Maria will fill up my car, clean my windshield take my money and return with my receipt. I once discussed the benefits of both garages with Mrs Sensible but she has this strange fixation with the difference of 13 cents a litre.

My receipt a little less fuel for my €20.00

I once asked Maria why her petrol was so much more expensive than the garage down the road and she shrugged her shoulders shook out her hair and said “non lo so”

Maria my garage attendant

Vicious snake attacks defenseless women in Italy

Posted on November 11, 2012 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, dachshund, dogs, englishman, expat, fun expats, grass snake, heroism, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, l'orto, language, languages, learning Italian, military honours, piemonte, snake, snake attack, vicious snake, viper, workaway • 34 Comments

I know I have just done a post about dogs but Gilda the extremely fat but short legged sausage dog yesterday saved the life of our neighbour Luigina. I know I hinted that Gilda was a good for nothing fat little eating machine but yesterday at about twelve minutes past two in the afternoon she saved her owner’s life.

Luigina who is a spritely 87 years old was brutally stalked and then attacked by a very long snake as she walked across the garden on the way to feed the chickens.The beast of a snake was slithering through the grass with the intentions of impaling its fangs into Luigina’s heel. Fortunately Luigina saw the snake and realising she was in mortal danger she let out a piercing scream and clutched her hands to her breast, OK my imagination is running away a bit but she did shout bestia and wave her hands about a little. (A picture of Luigina can be seen here L’orto and the Fairies)

The snake was badly mauled by Gilda so this is the best I can do

Gilda who heard her mistress’s distress came running to her rescue. Her tail was in the full mast attack position and her belly was clear of the ground by at least 2.5 centimetres. Gilda pounced on the snake and pinning it down with her front paws, she sunk her teeth into the middle of the snake and gave it a really good shake.

Donna our guestaway who is not scared of snakes dead or alive estimated the snake to be about this big.

Upon further inspection by our resident expert (again Donna) the snake was deemed to be a Natrix Natrix or to the uneducated who don’t speak Latin the common grass snake, but as Luigina pointed out it could have been a Vipera Aspis (viper).

I couldn’t find a picture of a Vipera aspis. But this is a Dodge Viper and it will have to do

Luigina is full of praise for Gilda and the snake is still on show for anyone who wants to come and have a look. This coming Saturday Luigina will bury the snake with full military honours near the black fig tree behind the chicken run. Attendees are expected to wear black or full military dress uniform.

The mother of Mrs Sensibles discussing the graveside military honours include firing a volley over the grave

Truffles & Dogs

Posted on November 7, 2012 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, dog training, englishman, expat, fun expats, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, Mrs Sensible, piemonte, truffle dogs, truffle hunting, truffles • 17 Comments

Black Truffles

I have put my foot down and told Mrs Sensible that I am buying a puppy, well maybe I haven’t told her but I have dropped enough hints. One of our neighbours has a dog and they go truffle hunting, the pair of them run up and down the trees at the bottom of the vineyard making lots of noise digging around in the trees for truffles. It looks great fun.

One morning as I stood watching them I asked Mrs Sensible who our neighbour sells the truffles to and does he make much money. Restaurant pay a lot of money for truffles she told me and with one of her school marm looks she asked me why.

Just wondering I answered.

A while ago I broached the subject of buying a puppy and Mrs Sensible pointed out that we already have two dogs. “Really?” I answered more than a little puzzled. “Of course we do. we share Luigina’s dogs”.

Luigina has two dogs, a short fat dachshund called Gilda or sometimes called streger (witch) or even stregona whose only claim to fame is she will eat anything she can catch and despite her short legs and fat body the incredible ability to outrun and outpace anything that tries to catch her, this includes the huge German Shepherd that lives up the road and Luigina armed with a brush.

Her other dog is a one hundred percent pure breed mongrel named Lela or gamba lungo. Lela is a very timid dog that can jump over every fence on the land including the chicken run fence, which she does once or twice a week when she decides she wants an egg.

Lila & Gilda.. the photo doesn’t do justice to Gilda’s belly

Neither of these two dogs are good material for truffle hunting. Lela is impossible to train, she even dares to ignore Mrs Sensible, even I don’t do that. As for Gilda I know she would make a great truffle dog, with her short legs her nose is already dragging along the ground. The problem is any truffle Gilda found would disappear into her belly before I could shout Oye.

So I have decided to get a small sensible house trainable truffle hunting dog.

Meet Fleabag

Now I have heard that it is easier to beg forgiveness than it is to ask permission so I am going dog hunting and later hopefully truffle hunting.

Hey Ho the snow is on it’s way

Posted on October 30, 2012 by Pecora Nera • Posted in home • Tagged an englishman in italy, car, driving, englishman, expat, fun expats, Harry D Weed, humour, Italia, italian, Italians, italy, MIni, Peugeot, piemonte, Rosignano, snow, snow chains • 10 Comments

Snow Chains

Now is the time of year when Italians dig out their snow chains and put them in the boot of their car. Snow chains are a fiendish device; they were invented in 1904 by Harry D. Weed in New York. See I have done my research this time and even added a link to the Wiki page.

We have two sets of chains, Mrs Sensible has some in the boot of her car and I have a set in the boot of my Mini. Despite the fact that last year we had snow up to our armpits, I have never successfully managed to fit a set of chains to either car. Under careful supervision I once managed to fit one chain onto the spare wheel while Giorgio my instructor helped to pull and stretch the chains into position. But it is important to note that the spare wheel was not connected to the car, nor was it cold and wet, nor was I up to my armpits in snow and there were two of us unhindered by wheel arches slush and passing motorists.

Last February under protest I did get out of bed at 6.00 am to fit a set of chains to Mrs Sensible’s Peugeot. When she had finished her breakfast and entered our garage at 7.30 am to drive the car away I was still sat amid twisted chains cursing both the car, Mr Harry De Weed and the beautiful snow that carpeted our garden.

I suggested she took my mini as it was great fun pretty good in the snow. Fifteen minutes later I received a tearful phone call from Mrs Sensible who had embedded my Mini in a snow drift and successfully blocked the main junction at Rosignano. Half of the villages of Rosignano were in their cars stuck behind her and the other half were stuck in front of her.

It took me 35 minutes to walk to her through the snow. By the time I had arrived some thoughtful but angry residents had dug my Mini out and pushed it away from the junction. It was not Mrs Sensible’s fault as she is a good driver, and it wasn’t my fault for not fitting the chains on the car it was Mr Harry D Weeds fault for inventing something so stupid.

Although this morning to comply with Italian law, I have put a set of chains in the boot of both cars I have made a solemn promise to Mrs Sensible that I will buy her a set of winter tyres at the weekend.

The snow chains pictured are not mine, I never intend to see mine again. I have pinched the picture from another WordPress blogger called Salish Sea who it seems has managed the art of fitting snow chains.