A problem of perception

My mother-in-law is German. She also eats at restaurants sometimes. I know that's something of a non-sequitur, but bear with me.

So, I've noticed in the past few years that she's never been mad keen on my having tattoos visible at restaurants we go to when in Italy. More specifically, on me wearing a vest-type top at a restaurant. But I sometimes have, cos it's been summer and warm and, well, I like to keep things a bit rock 'n' roll.

The funny thing is, often in these same restaurants, of whatever standard, the waiters and waitresses also have tattoos and sometimes engage me in conversation about them. I may occasionally catch her looking disgusted or, sadly, uttering schifo ("disgusting") under her breath, utterly bemused at why anyone would find tattoos appealing, interesting, or attractive even.

So it was that, on a not-particularly warm evening while in Italy last week, the family and a couple of family friends headed out to a nearby pizzeria. While eating, it warmed up a bit and I rolled up the sleeves of my sensible pullover.

Soon after, one of our number, a young woman who I'd not met properly before, asked me about the visible tattoos. She seemed interested, probably never knowing anyone with much tattooage, and so I indulged her and answered as best I could. She asked how many more I had, and among others I mentioned that my entire back was tattooed. She asked what it was.

Given that my Italian is about okay but not great for in-depth explanation of a tattoo, I turned to Red and asked, "Do you think it's okay to show my backpiece?" I should add that I don't usually strip on demand, and I would not normally do so in a public place, but we made up about half of the pizzeria's entire client base at that point in the evening, and nobody beyond our table would be seeing much in the way of skin.

Red approved, so I turned around in my seat and lifted my top (trying to keep my belly as out of view of other punters as possible!). Much gaspage ensued, since it was the first time my back had been seen by five people at the table, but Red's mum was not happy. This didn't surprise me, because apart from her not liking tattoos, she probably thought it was rude to flash. Which is kind of fair enough.

Then the conversation took a most unexpected turn, much of which I could either not hear or not follow. But it seems that she was concerned. She, as a German, seemed to think that most people believe those with tattoos are Neo-Nazis. This was an interesting twist! It had never occurred to me -- and nor, frankly, should it have, since it's really quite an absurd notion.

Other people interjected that there was a clear difference between fascist tattoos and (for want of a better term) art tattoos or enthusiast tattoos -- i.e., the sort of bright, colourful, well-executed, luxury-item tattoos that cost a lot of money.

Of course, even in Germany, which does have its share of Neo-Nazi problems, there are some of the world's best tattooists these days. They are certainly not filling their days making swastikas on people's skin.

I know it's just an age thing on the mother-in-law's part, but I was kind of shocked. And while I assume she doesn't actually believe I'm an undercover skinhead, it's a bit sad that she worries others might think so.

So, I'm interested: Do you know anyone, in this day and age, who might jump to the same conclusion if they saw a fairly heavily tattooed man in their vicinity? Would you? And/or would that opinion change according to the length of their hair?

I think Mexico should become the 51st state of the USA

I can't take full credit for that headline; it was inspired by something Red said. Why? It was just a response to George "W for Wanker" Bush and his assertion that Turkey must join the EU. What the fuck does it have to do with that cock?

Turkey is fast heading towards being an Islamic nation. The current separation of church (or should that be mosque) and state is looking wobbly. And Meathead Bush thinks this is a prime candidate for EU consideration.

Why don't you go back to what you know best, Georgie Boy? Which is... oh yeah: fuck all. Do we come into your house telling who the fuck should be the next US state? No. Why? Because it's none of our business, just like Turkey being in the EU is none of yours. Dickhead.

In other news, the wife and I are celebrating 12 years since our lips first met across a crowded sofa after a day of sitting in the park chit-chatting and eating in cafes in north London. Twelve years! Awww.

And what better way to celebrate than to mourn the appalling performance of the Italian squad in the Euro Cup football tournament last night? 3-0 they lost to the Netherlands (or Holland, or the Dutch). Buffon is a buffoon. Maybe George Bush could have a word with coach Donadoni about who should be in the Italian goal...

Been a bad blogger

It's 6 January, and this is only my second post of the year. And frankly the first one wasn't all that anyway.

The truth is, I've found myself lost in Guitar Hero III, and it's taken over my life. In fact, it's taken over mine and Red's lives. Of course, we make time for work, too, but almost all leisure pursuits have been abandoned in favour of standing in front of the TV with a pretend guitar strapped across us and pressing little coloured buttons for all we're worth. It's almost absurd!

Until 20 December, we lived a Guitar Hero-less life. Until 20 December. On that fateful day, we visited our friend Ivan at his flat in Italy. Ivan loves his games consoles, and he was keen to show us -- and let us have a go on -- his Guitar Hero II and III. Oops.

We played for not much more than an hour probably -- at the end of this post, you can see video of my first-ever go -- but by the time we returned to the UK on the 26th, we had decided to buy the game. Which actually meant having to buy a console, too. We opted for Playstation3 rather than Xbox 360 because I don't have any faith in Microsoft and don't wish to give them any money either. Whether it was the best choice is a moot point among gamers apparently, but so be it.

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Italy was great. I love being there. In fact, I love being anywhere that takes me away from my work, but Christmas in Italy is great. Well, Italy is great. Hmm, I'm not sure where this is going. I just love eating and drinking good food and wine/beer. And while I can do that here, it's so much easier to do so in Italy. There are so many good places to eat.

Food is so important to Italians that it must be nigh on impossible for a bad restaurant to stay in business. While here in the UK, so many cheap restaurants are shite. It's a fact, and it's a shame. As great as the strides are that have been made by the UK dining industry in recent years, they mostly are only in the expensive sector. Cheap 'n' cheerful is still desperately subpar.

The aforementioned Ivan and his brothers have a restaurant about 20 minutes' drive away from Red's family home, so we always make time to eat there. If we are in the area for more than a week, we make at least two visits. We have even been known to visit for one night only, and even then a beeline was made for Ivan's rezzy.

But another thing that's great about visiting Red's mum is that we get to see how the cats are doing. Over the years that I've been part of the family, I've seen a few pets come (and go, sadly), and there has been a new addition since our last visit.

The fun-lovin', ball-chasin', unconstrictable-eyed Rudy has been joined by a tiny black ball of fluff called Zaccaria. Zac has only one eye and was found on a roadside. (Rudy was a found cat, too, in fact.) The two of these loons together is something to behold, and although they obviously get on well and play together, Rudy was jealous of having to share us with his new lil' brother.

I used to be allergic to cats, but that has all but gone since being a cat owner myself. However, the allergy still rears its ugly head with kittens. Their fine fluffy coats just slay me. The first night I was wheezing like a motherfucker, and so I had to get some tablets (like antihistamines or something) for when I felt it coming on. They helped a lot. Which is good, cos I hate not being able to have the kitties on my lap.

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So, a family tradition is, on Christmas Day, everyone goes to Red's sister's mother-in-law's house. (Got that?) This woman is great. She's really nice and eccentric, but the most incredible thing is, she makes all her pasta for the lunch herself. Her tortellini, filled with pork meat, were great. And she goes to the trouble of making vegetarian ravioli for Red, too. So she made all this pasta for 13 people, aside from the other cooking she did too. Among the food I ate that day was capon. Since the castrating of chickens is illegal in the UK, I've never tried this meat before. It was nice, but not so much so that you'd think it was better than any good-quality chicken.

Hold on, how many lunch guests???!?!!! Yep, 13. Well, the Italians are a superstitious bunch, and 13 at the table just can't be.

For a few minutes heads were scratched about how to get around this. Set another place? Serve an extra plate? But this all seemed silly. Why lose space for no one? Why waste food on no one?

The wise old mother-in-law had the answer: Petronilla can sit with us. Um, who dat? Off she shot, only to return a few minutes later with quite the spookiest doll you've ever seen, and she sat her on a small stool next to herself at the table. She had her own plate and glass and cutlery. And I have a sneaking suspicion they did indeed give her some food too. Ah, I love Christmas in Italy...

Hey there!

So, I'm back from Christmas in Italy but I'm mad tied up trying to get some work done right now, helping out the missus, cos I have no work of my own. (Of course, all our work is our work really, but you catch my drift. Well, maybe you don't...)

Anyway, I hope you all had rad and rockin' Christmases, and I'll be trying to get round all your blogs in the next day or two.

Things I'll be posting about include:
Rudy, the fun-lovin' big bro;
Zaccaria, the even more fun-lovin' and allergy-inducin' fluffy little bro;
Guitar Hero (with video footage!);
and Petronilla, the 14th dinner guest.

Oh, it's all happenin', kidz! So let's catch up real soon. Laters!

Wednesday miscellany

Some weeks it feels as though there really is no time to do anything but work and eat. Last night I left my desk at 7:40pm and headed down to the kitchen to start cooking. Half an hour later, Red joined me. One of the things she asked me, within about ten minutes, was whether I wanted her to help me that evening with A.N. Other work project that is sitting on the dining-room table. While the work has to be done, I hadn't even eaten yet and had only just finished a long day's work. It can be kinda depressing like that at times. (It doesn't help that this particular job came to me unannounced and unexpected as the final part of a job I finished six weeks ago, and of course they want it yesterday. I feel pissed off at them and not inclined to bust my balls doing it in the evening.)

Here's something I learned today: After making a bacon sandwich, wash your hands before going for a pee. Otherwise you might smell like you've been fucking Miss Piggy. I tried that lame gag out on the wife first. She was unimpressed. I suspect everyone else will be too.

I gotta give props to my man Shea over at Shea of the Dead. Some of my readers here will know that Shea makes films. I don't know the full ins and outs of the role he plays in the film-making process, but he impressed me yesterday with a two-minute showreel of some of the best bits of his output. You can see it here. Inspirational stuff, for sure. I believe you can even buy copies of his work, proceeds of which help towards keeping the movie-making machine in motion. (Don't you just love alliteration?)

What else? Well, you'll be pleased (no doubt) to hear that the wife and I made up after Monday morning's disruption to normal service. As far as I'm aware, all is now hunky-dory. Huzzah! (By the way, has anyone in real life EVER had make-up sex?)


This week is Jamboree week in the wife's Italian home town. Traditionally we head to her seaside childhood home every summer, and occasionally we catch a bit of the Jamboree, which is a 1950s-themed week of fun and entertainment. It's been running for just three or four years, I think, and people come from all over Europe to celebrate the '50s. It's really quite odd that this town was chosen -- maybe the organizers live thereabouts. And this year they have excelled themselves: not only is The Killer himself, Jerry Lee Lewis, playing there, but international burlesque superstar Dita Von Teese (above) is also performing. That's all happening this coming Friday and Saturday. It's a shame to miss it, but we have bigger fish to fry this summer.

Well, time's a-wastin', and I gotta get on and do some work. Hope you all have a rockin' Wednesday.

Miss Milla, nooo! We will not let you go!

So, Saturday was the big day. The day of the MIRL between me and Red, and Milla and Zorro. We threw caution to the wind when arranging our meet, and it was decided to get together not in public or on neutral ground; rather, the venue was Milla's house, which is about 42 miles (67 km) away from us. It's funny, when we lived in London, it would take us about 75 minutes to drive 12 miles across London to see friends. These days we can do 42 miles in less than an hour when traffic conditions are favourable.

We arrived at 1.15pm to be greeted by Milla walking down her front path towards us. We met at the gate. The two girls kissed and hugged hello. Then I, too, had my turn. Red and Zorro kissed hello; he and I shook hands in a manly fashion. We entered their home and went straight through into the back garden.

It was a glorious day. You could even say it was a touch too glorious: although we stood and sat in it chatting and drinking for a while, when it came to sitting down to eat, we moved to the shade. I felt bad for Zorro, who loves being in the sun, but it was just too hot for the rest of us. It was hot for Pisko the cat, too, who spent much of the time trying to cool his belly in the shade.

Milla had cooked lasagne, and Zorro barbecued a trout for each of us. With the salads and giant mushrooms and the rest of the food, there was enough for a truly long and sociable lunch. Everything was delicious, but I can't remember the last time I ate so much! There were even two tiramisus: one that we brought with us and one that Milla made!


Don't you just hate self-timer pictures?
Someone always gets cut out of the shot...

We ate and drank and chatted. We talked about work and tattoos and chavs and blogs and travel and home and family and cats and how we met our partners -- essentially, all the most important things in life. And the next thing we knew it was 8pm. Where had the day gone? We chatted some more, but knew that the evening would soon have to come to an end. About 9pm we headed to the front door for the 10-minute goodbyes. It's nice when goodbyes take a wee while; it's like you're delaying the inevitable.

It was a great day we had for our first MIRL. Within minutes we were comfortable with each other, which came as no real surprise. What was a surprise, though, was the fact that we have mutual friends/acquaintances. Milla and Zorro know some photographers that I used to work with quite regularly a few years back. That was bizarre. London is a big city, and yet it's a small world, right?

One of the strangest things was what to call one another. I think everyone was called at least two names and possibly three in some cases. When you get accustomed to someone being a certain name, it can be strange to have to change that thought process!

Thanks, guys, for a great day. Here's to the next time! I keep thinking of other things that I should add to this post. I feel like there's so much to say. But I have to stop somewhere, right. So I'll stop here. Now. End. Fin.

The weekend approaches

Even though the weather forecast is good, I doubt I'll be doing this...



But I will surely be eating some of this...

Busty ladies (and men)

Busy, busy, busy today. I don't know if it's just me -- and one day this will prove very embarrassing -- but often when I try to type "busy", I end up typing "busty". Can you imagine? There I am typing to a woman who might potentially give me some work: "Hi Geri. Are you still busty? If so, give me a call -- I might be able to help you out." Ouch!

Anyways, Red is still under the weather, so I'm trying to help her out a bit, but I'm also snowed under, and it's only going to get worse.

And tonight we can't even work a straight 12-hour day because we have "men" coming to look at our kitchen, which we are hoping to totally renovate before the summer. It's a galley kitchen, and this has been a long time coming, but it is quite necessary, even though we'll likely only gain three or four inches of walkway space. But show me a man who wouldn't be happy for three or four more inches...

I put a review up over at Such As They Are: it's for Good Night, And Good Luck., so why not go check it out?

In other news (and totally ignoring the real news in the world, such as the Italian prime minister resigning; God help us if Berlusconi gets back in), if recent traffic is any indication, I should receive my 20,000th visitor sometime over the weekend. If it's anyone I recognize from the SiteMeter, I'll give a shout-out. It could be you!

Booking holidays can be tough

We all love a holiday, no? Even those of us who call it a vacation. Deciding where to go can be hard enough, but we got that sorted earlier in the month.

The next thing is choosing the actual hotel to stay in. Wife is always good at this. She really relishes the research. I, on the other hand, have never been much of a research type. So she whittled it down to three choices for me to cast an eye over this morning. We finally came to a decision based primarily on location and refundability should the need arise.

Then we had to consider the actual dates to go. The whole point is to go for Wife's birthday, which is 15 January, so we had a ballpark to aim for. However, when travelling with Italians things are never that simple. The number 13 is bad luck, so we can't travel that day. In Italy, the number 17 is also bad luck, so we can't travel then either...

Furthermore, Wife has a little Italian saying that she likes to mention at these times. Something like venerdì e marte, non si arriva, non si parte, which translates as "don't travel on Tuesdays or Fridays".

So we shouldn't travel on Friday the 12th, Saturday the 13th, Tuesday the 16th, Wednesday the 17th, or Friday the 19th. Well, I suppose that makes it a lot easier to choose the dates we can travel...

Reading Italian comics and loving it!

Partly inspired by ACT's post of a few weeks ago, and partly uninspired by my choice of reading material for the holidays (Machiavelli's The Prince, which I am reading for a second time, and the Bill Hicks Love All the People book), while in Italy I went mad for Dylan Dog comics (fumetti).


They take me a little while to read because I'm trying to improve my Italian at the same time, focusing on sentence structure and the like, but they are great fun. I bought 13 in total (only 12 in this pic, cos one was sitting ready near my bag for today's train trip to London) at €2.50 each. Wife thought I was insane, I think, spending €32.50 (£22, or US$42) on these things over the course of about four days, but I'm hooked, man! And I was amazed that the beachside newsstands had original first editions (even though some of them were a bit tatty) dating back to 1990!

And while at the newsstand I couldn't resist the urge to buy some Italian porn comics, too. More on those later...

I’m back!

Well, a lot can happen in a week, I guess. I think I've put on about half a stone (7 lb, or 3 kg) in Italy. I'm not going to stay at my machine long now because I'm shattered, and I'm not going to get all political straightaway, but you know that's coming, right? But also coming is some dumb fun stuff and part 3 of my cinema post.

I'm really looking forward to catching up with what people have been writing in my absence, too (though this is the point when I'm happy that many of my fave blogs don't update as frequently as I do...).

We have taken lots of pics in Italy -- somewhere in the region of 400, I guess -- and I daresay some will make their way here. Many others will probably just go on a Flickr account, so I'll keep you all informed. I'll also go through all the comments you've left and reply to them one and all (well, those that I can find, anyway).

Looking forward to getting back into the saddle.

My busted lip

That woman of mine! A darkened room, my lip, her elbow. Which do you think came off best? Hint: Something beginning with "elb". Good pout, though, huh?

Anyway, apropos of nothing, a friend said to me the other night, "I dunno how you do it, mate. How do you live with someone who supports a team in the World Cup that's not England?"

I was flummoxed. Not because I was offended in any way, but just because I'd never even thought it important that Wife wanted Italy to win. She and I have the following arrangement: she'll be sad if England go out (she's been here 20 years, for God's sake, and has a British passport!), and I'll be sad if Italy go out (one day I'll get an Italian passport, dammit); equally though if one of the teams win, we can both be happy bunnies.

And... I can't remember if I mentioned it... Italy did win! So, that's how I do it. How I can be with her. I knew there was something: I get TWO teams to support!

Italy winning the World Cup rocks!

And you can check out my Six Line Review by clicking here.

Go on - you know you want to!

Azzurro is the colour

How great were Italy last night? Okay, so Germany were good, too. But at the end of the day, Italy raised their game and Germany didn't. I'm no football connoisseur, and I don't have a great sporting memory. Indeed, my interest in Italian football dates back only about ten years, but I've never seen Italy play better than they did last night. Fantastic.


I must go on record, too, though, and say that I really don't like Alessandro Del Piero. When I saw him come on, I though we were in for 15 minutes of diving from the dive-master. At best I thought that even that old, played-out motherfucker had quarter of an hour of good football in him. But to go on and score that second goal in the last minute as he did... Sheer magic.

Normally when Italy score, be it in the first minute or the last, you can expect them to stop attacking and go into defence mode. But last night to score two goals - no, two great goals - in the last two or three minutes of the game... Unheard of. Un-Italy. Unadulterated genius.

And still no team has put a goal past Italy in the whole of the World Cup. The only goal they have conceded is the own goal against the USA.

Best commentating moment? "It's lovely to see two strikers playing with each other."

Let's hope the French get a caning tonight and that we see an Italy v Portugal final.

How to avoid the sun when it’s 32°C (90°F) outside and you really don’t want to risk burning again

Yep, it was something of a scorcher over the weekend down here in the southeast of England. But those of you who know that my superhero super power is to turn into Lobster Man (thanks, 4D!) as soon as the sun takes his hat off will understand why I needed to keep a low profile.

So what to do when the sun prevents you from venturing outdoors. No, this isn't that sort of site, you know (not yet anyway, but who knows what might happen if and when desperate measures are needed).

Wife (ever obliging when I must remain indoors) and I turned to the gift of television to entertain ourselves. That is, once we'd got bored of working and had done about as much blogging as one can reasonably do before the realization that it's taken over you life and turned your brain to mush. (Actually that last bit is a tad unfair, since "studies" apparently show that blogging increases your IQ. I imagine that's probably true, but the fact that I read it on Blogger leads me to at least be uncertain until I've done my own investigating.)

Apart from the copious amounts of Big Brother and footie that had to be consumed, we also had a couple of movies from LoveFilm sitting on the side costing us money. So I'll put some notes here about what they were and how they were.

First up was an Italian movie, The Consequences of Love. I'd heard quite good things about this. Unfortunately I was disappointed. The concept was good, and the ending was good, and there were even some good bits in it. I chuckled a couple of times (although it's not a comedy; I just laugh at everything). Wife has a theory that Italian films are all head and no heart. That's often the case. Shame. To be fair, though, there is a lot of good stuff that has come out of Italy in recent years, but often these films star young actors in the lead roles - people like Luigi Lo Cascio and Giovanna Mezzogiorno (pictured here for no good reason) are good names to look out for.

Next up, it was Candy Minx country and - about 17 years too late, I know - Jesus of Montreal. Having recently (ish) watched both The Barbarian Invasions and The Decline of the American Empire by the same director, it seemed the right time to give this old movie a go. I loved The Barbarian Invasions; I found it really quite stunning, and I'm glad I watched it before The Decline of the American Empire, even though it is the sequel and should have been watched after. Why glad? Because Decline suffers the same problem as Jesus of Montreal: looking old before its time. And of course, movies of that period (mid- to late 1980s) often also suffer from what I call Michael Mann syndrome, with terrible terrible incidental music à la Miami Vice. Indeed, I had to reach for my air guitar on more than one occasion.

That said, Jesus of Montreal was quite fascinating; at least for the first 90 minutes. It started to drag a little then. I was still going with the flow, but out of the corner of my eye I noticed Wife reaching for Leonard Maltin's Movie Guide to check the running time; I knew right then that we'd lost her. Still, as I say, good till then. The ending not so great. And a couple of scenes just weren't that well directed. In one in particular, the two actors seemed as though they were playing in totally different films, so incompatible with one another were their performances.

So one duff film with a good ending, and one good film with a duff ending. To paraphrase Maurice "Bosco" Boscorelli (right) in Third Watch, "together they make one good film".

Then, at last, the Survivor tape came out of its box and restored our faith in videokind...

Come on, you Azzurri!

Being in an Anglo-Italian household, I have to give full support to Italy during the World Cup, as well as to England. And this year, the Azzurri are playing particularly well (that is, in comparison to their old ways when Trapattoni was coach). At least they are attacking a bit under Lippi's control.

So they've gone through at the top of their group, due in no small part to this man, Gennaro Gattuso.
In our household, Gattuso has long been hailed as something of a hero, and yet again he proved his worth today. He even got name-checked for his greatness by the English commentators.

But what has always struck me is how much he looks like Captain Caveman, below.
What do you think?

V for visitors

Poplear people that we are (that's poplear in the way that Bush says nucular), Wife and I have yet more visitors descending upon us tomorrow. This time for a long weekend, arriving Friday afternoon and leaving Tuesday morning. Now, don't get me wrong. We're not crotchety whiny fucks who don't like having guests. We have lots of (well, perhaps not lots, but several) very good friends who we are only too happy to socialize with and accommodate. But sometimes the timing is just so so bad.

I really thought that the long weekend would give us some time to get on top of our workload without interruptions from those 9-to-5, Monday-to-Friday types phoning and e-mailing every five minutes as if I've got nothing better to do with my time than talk to them. But no. It's all gone bollocks-up. And we were, to paraphrase Chris Moltisanti from The Sopranos, just a cunt hair away from being on top of things.

Still, what's done is done, and it'll be nice to see them. And they might even bring us some gastronomic goodies (they're coming from Italy). But if you happen to see the four of us pounding the streets of London and Canterbury gabbling on in a mix of English and Italian, don't forget to say hi. If I look confused by your greeting, then it's probably not me you're speaking to. And if I don't get round to blogging much over the weekend, that's why...

Nicole Kidman a bigger man than Silvio Berlusconi

Nicole Kidman has congratulated Tom Cruise on the birth of Suri.

Meanwhile, Silvio Berlusconi still hasn't congratulated Romano Prodi on winning the Italian election, saying there are "irregularities" to be sorted out. At least the media-mogul politician slowly appears to be recognizing that his days are numbered. He added: "We are the moral victors."

However, George Bush did finally call Prodi, several days after most other world leaders. "See you at G8," he said during the call, which he made from Air Force One. Tosser.

Berlusconi a “sore loser”, says FT

No shit, Sherlock. You didn't think Silvio would give up without a fight, did you? Ah, now there's a man with dignity. Minchia!

World news: Italy

Pope Benedict XVI gave his first Easter message as pontiff on Easter Sunday, which was also his 79th birthday.

The only reason to include this story was because I like his two funny nicknames.

In the UK he is known as "God's Rottweiler", while in Italy they call him "PapaRatzi" (papa meaning pope; Ratzi an abbreviation of his surname, RatzenburgerhofmeisterHitlerjugendmarktplatzenzellerungerstraße).