Simply Friends

We walked to the beach for lunch again today. Simone and Peppe and I left work around one-thirty, stopped at Peppe's car (he drives a black Citroën) for his sunglasses, and set off down the road. Just before we reached the beach, we were nearly run over by Mauro. I'm still not sure where he was going. We persuaded him to return the car to his flat (about 20 meters from Aethra) and come with us. He ended up paying for my piadina, because he's just that nice. Peppe bought me water and an ice cream, and we sat around a table joking half in Italian, half in English about everything from politics to the fact that I should never, ever go into public relations.

If English+Spanish=Spanglish, what is English+Italian? Because this is what we all speak now.

Every day there are less people in the lab. Peppe starts his vacation tomorrow, Pasqui is off this week, Simone was supposed to leave this weekend but changed his flight. This morning, Mauro and Simone and I were the only members of Mini Pony (normally a group of seven) present.

. . . I can't believe my life . . .

I was just the sole witness to Teo's first time crawling.

From an Email to Neil, Which More or Less Sums Up How I Feel

Am feeling sadder and sadder about leaving this place. I'm almost out of meal tickets for the mensa, Simone goes on vacation at the end of this week, Berkeley is sending me frequent emails about Things I Need to Do. I may be a wreck for a little while after I get home, because I have a whole litle life here that I'm leaving behind, complete with friends and children and a job and a home . . .

My ATM card doesn't work for some unknown reason. I think the bank's claim that airport security somehow erased it is bollocks, because it verifies my pin and then tells me it's been told to return the card. I, therefore, have 4,70 euros to my name, which is better than two days ago when I had exactly zero.

Okay. I feel like I'm about to start crying. This emo kick has got to end soon.

My job is wonderful. My friends are a bunch of ex-punk hardware engineers. Alessia said the other day that she loved me a lot. I've seen Teo get his first and second teeth, and start to figure out how to crawl.

Shit, now I'm really close to crying.


. . .

That said, I went out to lunch today (the plan started with an email from me to Simo in which I declared I was sick of pasta) with Pasqui, Michele, Simone, and Manuela (an occasional member of the coffee group). We walked to the beach and ordered piadine and a large bottle of water, and sat under the awning talking and joking, then had ice cream. Michele paid for my lunch, because I am broke and he's a nice guy. This is the kind of thing I'll really, really miss.

Most of my colleagues shave once a week. Every Monday they come in cleanshaven, ready for work (more or less--most of our coffee break is spent discussing how not fun it is to wake up on Monday). By Friday, they are all rugged-looking (and tired). So every weekend I think "You know, Peppe's not actually that pretty" because I remember Friday-Peppe. And then Monday I walk into work and he's sitting at his desk all pretty with no stubble, and that's the way life goes.

On Monday, Lorenzo picked me up about half an hour later than I usually go to work, so, for the first time, I was in the house at the same time as Mira. Every morning until now I've been running out the door as she's arriving, and I say "ciao" or "buon giorno," but she knew I was la americana and assumed I didn't actually speak any Italian. On Monday I asked her if she could lend me her house keys while Roberto was in Israel, told her the kids were sleeping, and generally managed to sort of communicate.

That night, I got home and Silvia said "I think you really surprised Mira this morning . . ."

I have eleven and a half days of work left. Three weekends. Every few days I idly contemplate what would happen if I asked Angelo to give me a full-time job and just stayed here.

But I know it's a bad idea, and I know he wants me back next summer, and I occasionally miss things about home (there is no Thai food in Ancona), so I won't--but the thought of leaving is more painful the closer I get to the end.

Hai fatto la caca?

Okay, three parties in three days is kind of excessive.
But this one was upstairs, so we went up, laughed at the number of parties there have been, got free drinks, went downstairs for coffee (Mauro and I took a sidetrip to the lab to grab Peppe, who works too hard), drank our coffee outside, went back upstairs, got some more drinks, and came back here.
This doesn't mean that we're doing anything now. Mostly we're talking about the fact that my Italian vocabulary mostly relates to two-year-olds (and their bodily functions).

Dorks

When I got to work today, I held up a sign I made this morning that said "Buon giorno!" After this, we declared a truce.

People in Glass Houses Sink Ships

I meant to post this.
On Sunday, when I finally woke up, everyone else was taking a nap. I wandered into the sala to see what movies were on, and it was the very beginning of The Boondock Saints.
I think the gods must have been smiling on me.

Testardi e Sciocchi

I don't know how these things start.

Somehow Simone and I (recall that our desks are right next to each other) started emailing. This turned into a staring contest of sorts: whoever talked first lost. Everything we've said since lunch has been by email (and we've said rather a lot). We've been relaying packets through a mail server in California to travel the meter-and-a-half between our computers. It progressed to the point that, when he left just now, instead of breaking the silence and losing, he wrote "Ciao, Iris!" on a piece of masking tape and held it up.

I Swear We Occasionally Work

This morning there was another success party--there are still piles of food and drinks on the dedicated lab bench.

I really should have said to hell with it, emailed Lorenzo, and gone to lunch with Pasqui, Simone, and Michele. I'm not in the mood for pasta, no matter how good a cook Mara is.

Cuanto tiempo pasa

This afternoon was one of those times when, to any casual observer, it would look like the Aethra hardware engineers never actually got anything done. About five minutes after I got back from lunch, Giorgio showed up with wine and biscotti in celebration of design success. There goes half an hour of supreme hardware engineer silliness. Fabulous. Then Peppe pulled out a DVD of his band's music video to show Simone, and a bunch of us crowded around his computer to watch it. Twice, because the first time through only Simone and I saw the bassist hiding (in a bright orange shirt, playing a bass) on a couch in the background of a whole series of shots. I maintain that the best part of the video is Peppe completely seriously playing the guitar in a corner of the bathroom. Bloody hilarious. A while later, time for coffee. Which, as usual, took a while, this time because we were talking about the video. Mauro and other-Simone hadn't seen it, so after fifteen minutes we all trooped back upstairs and watched it again. No one who hadn't already seen it saw the bassist. Simone and I started tallying points based on this: +10 for each of us, +9 for Peppe's fabulous bathroom guitar playing, -1000 to Mauro for not seeing the bassist, and -3000 to other-Simone for not seeing the bassist and then making lame excuses.

I'm afraid I'll forget the little things--the signs I pass on my way to work, the songs that play on the radio, the way Peppe smiles.

I Love Thunderstorms

The building is shaking from the thunder, lighting is flashing, and it's pouring rain. Maybe I'll stay here forever.

Yesterday we drove across Italy to Rome (three hours). I've seen the Colisseum, the Fountain of Trevi, the Forum. I've passed the metal detectors and the dress code check to get inside the Vatican, and seen the works of Michelangelo. I've ordered pizza in Italian and drunk wine made by the restaurant where we had dinner (a restaurant that grows some ridiculous percentage of the food it serves, as well as bottling its own spring water). We drove home listening to the Gipsy Kings while the two best travel babies ever slept.

Sometimes I can't believe my life.

I'm going to miss a lot of things when I go home next month.
-Listening to Tegan and Sara with Simone while we work
-Mini Pony coffee breaks with Mauro, Michele, Simone, other-Simone, Peppe, and Pasqui
-The double-takes people do when they find out that (a) I'm working in hardware, (b) I love my job, and (c) I'm going to the Berkeley College of Engineering in the fall
-Having a glass of good red wine with dinner
-Alessia
-Talking about quantum mechanics with the software crowd

. . . I don't know how I'll be able to come home.

Simone's baby son is adorable. And his wife is very nice. I'm in cute overload, will reemerge eventually. Maybe.

My God I Love My Job

Today was measuring day.

What does this mean?

It means that Stefano keep a set of calipers and a chart in his desk drawer and on the fourth of every month he accosts every hardware engineer and measures their body fat. This become a source of merriment for all involved, and no one gets any work done for a good ten minutes because we're too busy laughing. Peppe and I were the only two who fell in the "ideal" category (he was almost too skinny). Stefano, amusingly enough, was the only one declared "overfat" by the chart.

I fucking love my coworkers.

Astrologist sues NASA over Deep Impact crash.

I think the article speaks for itself here.

Fucking Tech Ninja

I have found the easiest and cheapest way to use a laptop as an alarm clock: set a media file as a scheduled task for the desired time, leave computer on, and go to bed. The magic of computers handles the rest.

If a justice had to go, why couldn't it be a conservative nut?