Casa Dolce Casa!

What a difference a nice place to live makes! We have actually moved after 5 months of living at the agriturismo. It was a nice, peaceful, small place and close to the gym but man is it good to be outta there. We will of course miss the chickens and geese but not the cold stone floors or outrageous rent. So briefly, here’s our tale of house-hunting.

The first house-hunting trip we made was in September before moving here. We found a perfect place, brand new, 3 bedrooms, 3 floors, and huge yard for the boys, very close to work, and advertised as furnished. Signed the papers and one week later the landlord backed out. Apparently he was able to rent it to someone else unfurnished (more about furnishings later). But we had the agriturismo to fall back on so ok. We kept looking during the following months but most things were 2 rooms, very small, and as Mama would say ‘you couldn’t cuss a cat without getting hair in your mouth’. Not a good thing when you have 2 cats. Then we found another almost perfect place, went to the real estate agents office to sign the papers and either the landlord or real estate agent changed their mind so that was a no go. We think it may have had something to do with us not being Italian - no lie.

So after 5 months we found it, love at first sight. A house for the same price as an apartment but not an apartment. Close to town – 3 minutes to the office. I don’t know how I’m going to cope when we get back to Houston. My commute in Spain was a whopping 20 minutes, not to mention the beautiful view of the Mediterranean & Gibraltar. One hour each way in Houston is going to drive me bonkers. Anyway, the house has a small yard/garden but enough for Frisco and not too much to take care of. Michael and Troy seem happy and haven’t spent any time cowering under the bed.

But being Italy, nothing is straightforward. The house was described as 2 bedrooms, 2 baths, fully furnished. Reality – 2 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, 3 floors with something like a game room on the top floor which opens to a rooftop patio, and the only furnishings belonged to the previous tenant. Now when you rent something unfurnished in the civilized world you take for granted that the place comes with an oven, refrigerator and sink. You also assume there are closets, kitchen cabinets, countertops, etc. In Italy, you’re lucky to get light fixtures. And when I say lucky I mean we had wires hanging from the ceiling in the kitchen, dining room area, and 2 of the bathrooms. So we were lucky that the tenant left at least the light fixtures in the rest of the house.

The previous tenant was moving because his father died and he’s moving in with his mother. So he didn’t need the furnishings and said we could negotiate a pretty good price. He was willing to sell his things to us for a mere 10,000 euros or in US money $13,000! He was asking $130 for each bathroom mirror! So off to IKEA we went and luckily have been able to furnish the place for much, much, much less than his asking price. The pictures included are the real thing so you can see what you’re in for when you come to visit.

There’s no air conditioning so we’re hoping the summer isn’t too hot or humid. But there are a lot of windows and hopefully we’ll have a good breeze. Another plus, the windows all have screens which, like kitchen appliances, is not a given in Italy.

So now that we're really settled we look forward to having guests. Start searchin' those airfares!

We're still here!!

Wow! It’s been well over 2 months since I blogged last so I have a lot of catching up to do. I hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Year and are looking forward to springtime.

Well, since we last spoke, Artichoke Heart and I have done some traveling. As reported in my last blog, we went to Bratislava, Slovakia before Christmas to rescue Anastasia, Randu, and Grey Bear (picture of Grey Bear just below) from their exile. A 7-hour train ride up and back (Hangar Brat – Europe by Rail has really come in handy!) Bratislava is a nice enough town but nothing to really write home about. Actually it was quite nice but Anastasia had a really bad attitude about it and I'm sure that colored my opinion a little. There was a nice Christmas market in the town square and we ate some very good Spanish tapas. We went to Vienna a couple of times – beautiful city, nice architecture, nice cathedral, good food, etc. Note: I really hope we can do some sightseeing during warm weather; this traveling in the wintertime is getting old. I can’t really get excited about relaying our adventures when most of what I remember is how cold it was. But I recommend Vienna to anyone going to Austria. The coffee was the best I’ve had in Europe, not to mention the Sacher Cake at the Hotel Sacher. Would have loved to do the Sound of Music tour but that was in Salzburg and too far away for our limited time. We wanted to visit Prague and Budapest but Prague was a 5-hour train ride and Hungary was having a transportation strike (they must be related to the Italians who strike probably once a month – nothing major, just a little disruption to let everyone know they’re there I guess). All in all a fun trip but if we ever get to Prague it will be in the summertime!

We spent Christmas here in Rovigo and ate pizza at the Queen Elizabeth restaurant. For a town where most restaurants are closed most of the time, there was a surprising number of places open on Christmas night. And sorry to disappoint you Italian food fans – again – the pizza here leaves much to be desired. You might as well eat it with a fork and knife because when you pick up a piece, it’s so flimsy the sparse toppings slide right off. I have begun carrying crushed red peppers in my purse to add a little flavor.

After Christmas we flew to Charlotte (famous as the birthplace of Ashley) to visit Button, Miss Ellie, W, Betty, Al & Rose, and Lois. Had a fantastic time! Betty was kind enough to take us shopping everyday. We went to Walmart, the grocery store, and a real mall. And I got my hair cut and colored by a person that spoke English. A real treat! I may come back with hair down to the middle of my back because after Artichoke’s latest haircut, I’m really scared to go back to anyone here. We had proper food every single day in Charlotte and it was sheer heaven.

We came back to Rovigo to a snow-covered ‘wonderland’ and it stayed cold for the entire month of January. But things are looking up, we’ve had sun for about 3 weeks now and the ground is drying up from the months of rain. For some reason meteorologists are wildly inaccurate here. Romeo says if the forecast is gloomy, plan a picnic because that’s when the weather turns out to be the best.

Mid-January we traveled south to Ravenna, known as the mosaic city, to see the 5th & 6th century Byzantine churches/basilicas (picture of one on right) and Dante’s tomb. It’s 2 hours away by car or train – a nice town, much bigger than Rovigo and looked to have some nice shopping. The mosaics are really a must see, except for the one that Lonely Planet says is a must see. Part of the problem with sightseeing in Italy is they nickel and dime (more like 5 or 10 euro) you to death. The ‘must see’ cost 3 euros to get in and yes, it had pretty mosaics but after seeing all the others earlier, it just felt like a rip-off. I can’t report on the food because we waited until after 2 in the afternoon to look for a restaurant. When will we learn! So we headed to Ferrara, another town between Rovigo and Bologna. I may have reported in a past blog that we toured the town castle which is very much in tact and has a moat. But this time we walked around the town, visited the cathedral, which I must say is one of the nicest in the area, and tooled around until the Indian restaurant opened at 7:30 p.m. Ferrara proved to be much more than the castle, lots of people milling around, outdoor market/souvenir stands and a fabulous chocolate drink at La Bottega del Cioccolato. It reminds me of when Mama would try to make fudge. It’s a touch thinner version of the fudge right after it comes off the stove. Muy delicioso and served with a spoon!

And last but not least, we went to Venice to experience Carnivale (aka Mardi Gras). Given that it’s in Italy, people (Italians) taut it as the best in the world. Although it’s always nice to be in Venice and if any of you do come to Italy, Venice is a definite ‘must see’, Carnivale in the daytime was pretty tame compared to New Orleans. There were a lot of people walking around in Piazza San Marco (St. Mark’s Square) dressed up in pretty fabulous costumes - colorful, ornate, creative, beautiful. But their whole purpose was to pose for tourists taking pictures (see picture of Grey Bear in his Carnivale mask with a very colorful duck!). I’m sure it would have been fun to stay for the evening festivities but after 5 or 6 hours of walking around, we decided to head back to Rovigo before nightfall. Had we stayed we would have seen the Drag Queen Parade which was really the only thing on the schedule that caught my eye. I’m sure it was something to see.

Since Christmas we’ve had the pleasure of Anastasia, Randu, and Grey Bear here to entertain us and share our Italian experience. They have now left for Ismit, Turkey, just a little south of Istanbul and we wish them the best and really miss them. We also wish them to get a seaside resort apartment for when we visit them! If you want to read more about our Italian experiences in the words of Anastasia and Grey Bear, visit http://thegreybear.blogspot.com or http://thiscatsabroad.blogspot.com
Artichoke Heart and I are Grey Bear’s god bi-pedal attendants whom (or who?) he mentions with fondness on occasion.

Well, I’m going to finish now so you know we haven’t fallen off the face of the earth. Artichoke Heart is cooking hamburgers tonight and I just opened the bag of buns we found at the grocery store. We were pleasantly surprised to even find hamburger buns and unbelievably, with sesame seeds! When I opened the bag to toast the buns, I found that I had to cut them in two. It’s always something – although this was pretty minor. This week we are supposed to move into a new place. We haven’t signed anything yet so it’s not definite but 99% sure. I’ll write about the ‘finding a place to live’ experience in my next blog – remember, we will have been here 5 months and are just now able to find a suitable place to hang our hats…..

Ciao & Hasta Luego!