Fluffy

Days without filling the fuel tank: 1 

For the past week, insomnia has returned with revenge and brought friends for the torment as well.  Since about last May or June, I have been sleeping really well, but I think with all of the stress of moving that I inadvertantly allowed insomnia back in.

What to do in situations like this?  No doing laundry, cleaning, studying, or taking a walk because I live in a hotel on a dark street.  I can’t even call people back in the states (not that I call anyone anyway).  All I can do is turn on the TV.

I have watched:

a guy selling Persian carpets

“Murder by Numbers” with Italian dubbing

Ice skating/dancing championships in Canada

Creepy music videos by an extremely unattractive hair metal band called “The Darkness”

Old episodes of “Jackass” (remember midget bowling?)

“South Park” with German dubbing

What I thought was a furniture commercial but turned out to be adult entertainment

And other weird stuff.  Sad thing is, the TV is actually better at 3am than at say 7pm.

On to a new topic.  My Peugeot gets very good gas mileage.  Exact numbers are not available because I never got around to actually calcuting it, though I did take mileage readings every time I filled up on the trip down here.  I filled the tank yesterday and want to see how long I can go before I fill the tank again.  With a 3km ride to work, it should be a while.  For comparison purposes, I lived 9 miles away from work in Germany and had to fill up about every 2 weeks, sooner depending on my social life.

I looked at another apartment this morning, this one smack in the middle of downtown Aviano.  The town square is one block away (good stumbling distance after too much vino), not one but two delightful gelaterias are around the corner, grocery store just down the street, and the cabareineri headquarters (supposedly like police but on the meter-maid side) is just behind the apartment complex.  The apartment also has two bathrooms, though only with small showers, but an extra bathroom is such a nice thing to have.  There is also a very long garage, probably big enough for my Peugeot and a guest’s car if need be.

I told the landlord, this cute little old man who wears a beret, that I liked the apartment and would think about it.  I then went into the office and responded to an email from a former coworker who inquired about my house hunting search.  I wrote something to the effect of choosing between living in the countryside and being a hermit, or taking a small apartment in the city and being sociable.  I was about to leave for lunch when he wrote that I am “…too young not to be sociable”.  Being a person who firmly believes in signs, that one kind of told me what I had been thinking all along: I need to live in the city this time around.

So tomorrow at 11am, we’re signing the housing contract.  Yippee!  The landlord is going to install air conditioning, which  my parents will certainly appreciate, during the two weeks that it will take to get utilities activated and for my stuff to arrive, during which I can still live in the hotel on the company’s dime.  Hehehe.  I love screwing those guys over.

After the bad luck with the bathtub in Germany, I should probably be careful this time, but I think I have a solution for the small showers.  They are not actual ceramic fixtures, but rather a drain in the floor with sliding doors around the drain.  I could simply unscrew the frame and have a Korean style shower, or perhaps purchase larger doors.  The bathrooms were big enough to do so.

There are also 2 balconies, perfect for my hammock.  Happy day.  Ciao!

For those of you who saw my lovely house in Germany (all 2 of you, hmph), you may recall that it was indeed a nice, very nice place to live.  It is also completely atypical of Europe.  Most European houses have one bathroom, two if you are very lucky, and even then the second bathroom is usually in a weird place, like next to the kitchen.  So if you are hankering for a midnight snack and wish to take a shower, you’re all set.  Most European kitchens come with an outlet for the fridge and a gas valve for the store.  It really brings new meaning to the expression “Took everything, even the kitchen sink”.  No cabinets, no pantry, nothing. 

If you are military, then you can get things like a free fridge, washer, dryer, etc.  But as a contractor, you usually have to buy it yourself.  I would rather not have to shuck out several thousand Euros (add 25% to convert to dollars) for stuff that my American mind tells me should come with the house anyway.  If I were going to live in Europe the rest of my life, it would be a no-brainer.  But I still have no idea where I truly wish to settle down.  Problem is, if I want a nice house, then I have to live farther away from work that I would like to, and pay out the nose for rent.

Anyway, I found a house on Friday that has very reasonable rent, a fenced-in yard, surprisingly large garage, and even has cabinets, a sink, a very small fridge, and gas stove in the kitchen.  It’s a single house too, and the landlord said I could have a pet if I wished.  Only major drawback is that it has one bathroom, one very small bathroom.  It’s roughly the size of my parents’ walk in closet.  Also, it is only 4 miles to work but in a quiet area.  There is a lovely porch, perfect for BBQs and my hammock.  The nearest gelateria is a solid 20 minute walk away (boo, I wanted it within 10) but probably only 5 minutes on bicycle.  I’ll look at a few more listings tomorrow but if nothing catches my eye, then I will probably rent this one and tell guests (all 2 of you who actually follow thru on promises to visit) to use caution in the bathroom.

Seriously, anyone?  Because let me tell you a bit more about last night, in which I went to the library specifically to post to this blog.  I had to walk, which was longer than expected.  Not a problem at first.  The dang Internet connection here is so slow that it took way too long for anything to load, so I had to log off at closing time before finishing my post.  It was then that I realized the sun had set and I had to walk back to the hotel on scary narrow streets carrying my “Italian for Dummies” book.  Blend in with the locals they tell us at security briefings.  Sure.  Whatever.

I am at the library again to finish my post but this keyboard is so sticky and loud that I am going to keep it short.  At lunch yesterday, Fred asked if I knew anyone down here.  I said “Nope, not a soul”.  10 minutes later, we walked outside to the car and I ran smack into a college classmate I have not seen in nearly 5 years.

The first friendly face upon arrival in Italy was a dog.  Seriously.  More later.

It has been a hectic last few weeks, so stressful that I would rather not think about them.  In the last week, I moved in with Jim #3, shipped my Mustang to my parents, bought a Peugeot 107, moved out of my office, spent 2 days in the Hague (Netherlands), ran out of gas on the autobahn, found a delicious brand of Earl Grey tea, got stuck in 2 staus (pronouced “stow”, rhymes with “wow”, German word for traffic jam) on the way to Munich, took a freaking long detour around Munich because the Germans are too lazy to build a 7km stretch of autobahn, got lost in Garmisch, and drove to Italy.

So far, I am loving Italy.  Even just crossing the border from snow covered Austria into rustic, sunny northern Italy was like a sure sign that things would take a turn for the better.  I am staying in a temporary apartment and the only drawback is the screaming baby somewhere upstairs.  Sometimes its mother sings to it, but it still won’t shut up.  I hope they put a cork in it soon because I need some quality sleep.

Update on the Jims: Jim #2 really seems to miss me and I am concerned that he thinks we are a couple.  I just moved to Italy, he just moved to Hawaii.  We are 12 hours of time zones apart and I am not about to attempt a long distance relationship.  I have hardly any leave built up so far and I am not set up here to have him visit anytime soon.  He’s a good guy and had we met sooner maybe things would be different, but no sense on dwelling about what might have been.

Jim #3 has got to be one of the most mellow guys ever.  On the way home from the Hague, we have to pass thru a section of Belgium and Germany in which there are no gas stations.  Maybe there are some buried within the mountain towns, but none that we could find.  The tank was dangerously low but we had no choice but to keep going.  Sure enough, I heard sputtering and began to freak out.  Jim #3 just calmly said to coast down the hill and pull over.  Problem is, running out of gas on the autobahn is illegal and a hefty fine if you get caught.  We both have ADAC membership, a sort of AAA auto assistance club.  Problem was, everything was in German and I was so nervous that I had to call 3 times before I could explain the problem to them.  They called a local mechanic, who called a taxi who came out with 10 liters of gas for only 40 Euros.  I was expecting something like 150 Euros, plus a traffic fine.  What really sucks is that you can’t wait in a car so we had to stand outside in the freezing cold (blizzard the day before we drove thru) for 45 minutes.  Fortunately, no cops showed up.  Whew.  Turns out we were only 18km from another military base anyway.  I have never run out of gas and keep it a rule to never drop below half a tank, but sometimes that can be hard to do in rural Europe.  Moral of the story: take the train.

Other than that, the Hague was an awesome place to visit.  I saw the North Sea for the first time since I was 7 or 8 years old.  It was snowing at times, the wind blowing so hard that birds couldn’t fly, and so cold that my hands were too numb to zip up my camera case.  But also incredibly beautiful and we timed it so that we could watch the sunset.  The “Girl With a Pearl Earring” painting was stunning at the Mauritshaus, but there were other paintings there that I found more interesting.  We also went to the Escher museum, the artist who painted pictures of staircases leading nowhere, mad scientist looking into a glass ball, lizards coming out of paper to crawl on a stack of books, etc.

So on to Italy.  It’s delightful here.  I already found a neat house, a sort of rustic summer cottage on a mountain path, but I don’t think I am going to rent it.  There is no city water up there, but rather the water is collected from the roof and drains into a cistern.  Gross.  A well I could handle but rooftop rainwater?  I would have to buy bottled water for any kind of cooking and drinking, nor am I wild about doing laundry with dirty water.

P.S.  Beware the Ides of March.

It has been snowing off and over for a week now.  This resulted in some interesting living arrangements.  I have lived in a house, duplex, and hotel in the last 5 days, all because I am too scared to drive in the snow.  I am a proud Mustang owner from Alabama, thank you very much.

Friday, it was snowing so hard that the boss was literally coming around and forcing us to leave.  Jim #2 was stuck at another base trying to outprocess, so my coworker Lee gave me a ride.  She and I were having such fun watching the snow that we instead went to her house for hot chocolate.  We borrowed her landlord’s sled and hiked to a hill and spent the afternoon sledding.  What an adrenaline rush.  I had woken up at 3am Friday with a serious nosebleed, probably stress related from having to find new living arrangements every few days and of course moving to Italy, thus seriously cutting into sleep time.  But the sledding was like a natural caffeine boost.

A cute little German girl saw me sailing past her driveway, so I wound up giving her a few sled rides, much to the amusement of many onlookers.  It was a nice multi-cultural moment and the snow seemed to make people friendlier.  Germans don’t usually say a quick hello to people they pass on the street but they were ultra friendly in the snow.

I called up Jim #2 at the hotel to join us and he good-naturedly humored me and walked up the hill.  The hotel was just a few blocks away.  We had time for a few more sled runs and had to call it a night since it was getting dark, not to mention very cold.  We had ice cream for dinner and I fell asleep around 7:30pm.  Wild Friday night eh?

Saturday, I went furniture shopping with Jim #3, formerly known as Bus Boy.  I had to rename him when I realized that a busboy is an unfortunate fellow who cleans up dirty dishes from messy restaurant customers and having worked in the food service industry for 3 years, I should have known better.  Anyhoo, we found a bed at Mobel Martin that had spring coils for bed frame posts instead of the usual feet or pegs.  I sat on it and joked how it would be cool if the springs bounced and sure enough, it bounces…a lot.  So there we were, 2 Americans bouncing on this crazy bed at a freaking huge and very busy German furniture store.  We agreed it would be good as a second bed.  Not a guest bed because guests would be too tempted to do something in it though.

I helped Jim #3 get some stuff together for his promotion party, but had to bail to meet up with Jim #2 at the hotel for dinner.  It was his last night in town and we had a nice time with some of his coworkers.  He is now in Hawaii, exactly 12 hours behind European time.

But it’s also been really nice having Jim #3 for company.  He is a lot friendlier and funnier than a month ago, when I figured he was more interested in his Star Wars Lego collection than me.  Actually, he probably still is, but at least I seem to have improved in his ratings a notch or two.  We went sledding in his neighborhood on Sunday and I have some cool bruises to show for it.  These German kids were sledding down the hill on plastic skateboard looking devices with straps to attach to their heels, sort of like a surfboard.  They would make it 1/3 of the way down the hill, 1/2 way if lucky, then wipe out, catch some serious air, and 360 down the hill.  The first time I saw a kid fall, I thought he’d broken his neck, but he was okay because he shook himself off and went back again for more.  I was kicking myself for not bringing my camera because these spills would have been awesome Jackass type footage.  Later we went back over to Lee’s place for some more sledding and got into an impromptu snowball fight with at least 6 little German boys. They had built a fort and everything, including a stockpile of snowballs, and were just waiting in the woods for innocent hikers like us.  It was such fun and the kids seemed to appreciate that we were good sports about it, plus Jim #3 has good aim.  On the way back home, we tried one more hill.  This one is extremely steep and very high, covered with rocks and thorn bushes, but we had to give it a try for the “been there, done that” category.  Not quite the brightest idea in hindsight because there were ravines all along the way.  Since they were covered in snow, we couldn’t find them until we crashed into them.  Big ouch factor but also quite fun.  Both of us were limping a bit last night but it was worth it to conqueor that hill.

The snow began melting Sunday night of course to ensure that we could all go to work today.  How thoughtful.  Grrr.