Day 85 - Lazy Sundays

6 March 2022

Wake up early. We wake up early every day. Medication for Shell, a chat with Barry after breakfast and we head off for coffee. Our regular is shut. I am trying to convince Shell that our Sunday coffee regular should be our everyday coffee regular. Pergamino Caffè is better in every way, except it does not have the little chocolate Shell eats with her coffee.

“Coffee — a barbaric drink. That poor, tortured bean. All that fermenting and husking and roasting and grinding. And what is tea? Tea is dried leaves rehydrated. Just add water, Mrs. Strickland. All living things need water.” ― Guillermo del Toro

Sitting at coffee, the impossible happens. On Tuesday, we received our booster vaccinations. In a cruel twist, Shell’s name had been entered incorrectly into the Italian Health system and she was unable to receive her certificate. We were told it would need to be corrected with the appropriate paperwork and would take a few days in the Italian Health System. I held little hope. I was wrong. It actually happened. The amazing people at the COVID clinic near Siena continue to buck the trend.

“They did not know it was impossible so they did it” ― Mark Twain

It is a beautiful sunny day. We stroll to the grocery store to get ingredients for lunch and dinner. We need more wine and discover ‘frizzante’. It translates to sparkle. We may have found a substitute for the green wine we drank in Portugal.

Get home, relax. Cook lunch and drink the frizzante. Not exactly the green wine of Portugal, but a good enough substitute. Over lunch, Shell gives me a history of Ukraine's independence. We draw lines on paper and pretend that is what makes a country. Those with power take from those who cannot stop them. Those with the power to stop them, and don’t, are cowards.

Lay about for the afternoon. Update the blog and do some reading. I am avoiding the news. I have been since COVID. Is there a decent news outlet left in the world? The constant hysteria and poor reporting are nauseating. As serious an issue as Russia invading Ukraine is, it is certain news outlets will not report simple facts. They will run clickbait. Modern journalism is a disgrace.

“The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.” ― Thomas Jefferson

Dinner is bread and tomatoes smothered in olive oil. Leftover Chianti.

Watch a movie, The Mule with Clint Eastwood. I don’t like seeing Eastwood as old, weak, and vulnerable.

Bed.