A Couple Of Things...

I have just spent the past fifteen minutes out of my now already Much Reduced Life-time attempting to untangle the garden-hose in this photo. A quarter of an hour ago.... Good Grief!!!... it was one mad-mass of knots. Now, it is rather arabesque though it still refuses to coil nicely up into a well ordered ring by the faucet. 

I bought this particular type of garden-hose because, it had come Highly Recommended. Roberto, of the Gragnola hardware-store, said this new-fangled garden-hose would be less prone to sprouting those annoying & unexpected leaks, thanks to its super-strength nylon re-inforced tubing. Fine. I am the proud owner of three other long lengths of garden-hose with a stunning array of leaks. In the meantime, the darn 25 meter length of re-inforced nylon tubing knots up like crazy... BECAUSE... the darn thing won't automatically coil-up. It twists & turns & curls to its own secret notion of coiling. I do not deserve this. I am already socked-in by an hysterical builder, who is now 17 days late with Phase III. Must I suffer the same from what it supposed to be an inanimate object in service to Man? 

So, I think, if there really is A God... and I do so sorely hope on so many other urgent arguments... and, adding the annoying fact of our being smack dab in the middle of 2011, the time has come for the market to have an auto-coil, knot-less garden-hose!!! Am I asking too much here? Gads.

Windows And A Door...

Well, La Casa Grande is beginning to look like a real house now that the windows & a door were installed for the Upstairs Apartment. Our Wonderful Wood-worker, Giorgio, spent the day giving eyes & a mouth to the place. Naturally, while the thermometer hit 98F!!! Here are the hot-off-the-digital photo-documents...

La Casa Grande from the aia... or, Cortile...

the closed mouth of the Upstairs Apartment...

the Upstairs Apartment's Kitchen window captured in the glare of the late afternoon sun... that Construction Trash is due to disappear tomorrow...

a close-up of the same... as the Heat & Humidity brushes overhead...

and, in the cool of the blue inside... minus the scuri... or, interior shutters.

I'll see more of Giorgio tomorrow. He ain't finished yet. Oh, The Excitement!!! Gads.

Beeg Dayes Ahead...

Yes, blues skies are predicted to be over Codiponte!!! 

Tomorrow, Our Wonderful Wood-worker, Giorgio, comes to mount all the windows and the Front Door of the Upstairs Apartment. The two interior doors... one for the Bathroom and the other for the Bedroom... come aboard once the oak flooring is installed next week.

Then on Friday, Our Builder... yes, the same builder who resigned & then asked for his job back... is coming with his Gang of Work-guys to do the following...

1. Bury the ugly black plastic tube which runs across part of the Garden and also along nearly the entire facade of La Casa Grande heading to the La Casetta, so I can shower after a hot morning of gardening...

2. Cement the stone caps for the pilasters of the Terrace. Yes, the same ones which provoked Our Builder's Second Fit of Nerves & Stress precipitating his Resignation & subsequent Apology of last week...

3. Instal the Carrara marble shower platform in the Bathroom...

and...

4. Clear out all his Construction Junk, so Mr. You & I can host the dinner party for 40 out-of-town wedding guests on Friday, the 22nd of July. The junk comes back after the 23rd for Our Builder & Work-guys to continue with completing the plumbing system & Laundry Room. In the interim, there is No Great Joy than to be liberated of Our Builder's Construction Junk!!! Gads.

Reflecting While Stationary...

I am sitting at my Dining Room table listening to the watery spur of the sprinkler on the hydrangeas outside the window... 

The heat is terrific here. Yet, it isn't THAT hot. Not by the thermometer. It is by all other indications the RAI-TV weathermen rarely mention... the type of blazing desert heat shot from North Africa... a vengeance upon us Westerners, I suspect... the sea-bourne humidity accumulated by winds as they brush up past the Italian peninsula, never in direct contact with the cool air of the Apennines Mountains to produce a good afternoon shower... and both helped along by the Global Warming CO2 trails of the massive mid-day air-traffic over-head and from the fumes of the car-traffic of tourists invading the coastal roads towards the heart of Tuscany and the truck traffic bearing the fruits of our poisonous capitalism.

I am temporarily out of harm's way... reflecting on how a builder could dig himself into such a deep hole with what ought to have been a simple, easy & fast construction project to knock-off with some ample earnings for him to boot... the Upstairs Apartment & Laundry Room. But, he has. And, he has sorely wrecked my faith in his ability to render our il Poggiolo sound in its structures, habitable in its spaces & services and more lovely than in its long history. Yes, he has. Not a single item of the three page contract has been fulfilled to satisfactory completion AND in a timely manner. Every day that now passes, Our Builder is being docked Euro 75. He agreed to this at the signing, arrogantly dispensing its threat, falsely secure in having more time than needed to do the job. Well, it hasn't turned out that way. And, I am pretty darn angry AND fed up. In ten day's time, 40 wedding guests will show up on our door for a dinner the night before the actual wedding. I have had to cancel housing a few of them. Now, I am faced with giving a dinner in a building site.
The other failure of this adventure of Phase III is Our Geometra. It was AND still is his responsibility to insure the proper course of the re-construction work. Oh, he showed up a couple of times to take a look, hound us about the wood flooring... a totally cruel & pointless exercise in light of all the other items of the contract waiting to be tackled AND were not!!!... and smoothing the way with us while re-inforcing Our Builder's in-efficiency in tending to our job... like facilitating a drunk... dammit.
I am not having any fun AND I should be having fun. At least that since, I have forked over Euro 250,000 so far. That translates into weakened Dollars as $322,000!!! More than just gads.
    

One Ramp Done...

The Monday after the Saturday. More Toils & Labors. Ditto for the Heat & Humidity. However, no bulldozer. Here...

the stone steps... and what a bitch to find AND carry relatively acceptable rocks!!!

and here... the terrace raked 'till it could be raked no mo'... rolled, seeded, fertilized AND watered in the late afternoon sun. 

This Ramp is done. Went for the white wine to celebrate. Gads.

What You Can Do With Dirt & Debris...

A Saturday morning. Heat & Humidity Factor nearly at 100. One Work-guy... the Ruspa-Wizard, Marcello... and me. It's the Day to re-build the ramps. Gosh. What fun!!!

Dirt & Debris is moved from the Cortile to the Eastern Ramp with the mini-bulldozer. Well, first the Debris is spread over the chosen sight. In this case, it is the area next to the Spianata... or, Our Scenic Overlook of the Commie apartment building on the other side of the river. Then comes the Dirt on top. Rake, rake, rake, and rake and rake some more...

gives you this... another terrace ready for peat-moss, grass seeds, fertilizer AND lots of water!!!

Meanwhile, the Other Western Ramp got more Debris than Dirt. We ran out of Dirt. Fine. There will be bulldozer traffic still to come on this track down to the Cortile. The Debris will resist better. No sense breaking my back with all the rest of the re-building chores until the All-clear for the end of construction has been sounded. And, that ain't for a couple of years!!!

But look!!! No. Not the cat. The Cortile is devoid of the D & D. Cannot wait to sweep. Gads.

Blue A Second Time...

Well, the Blue is still Blue with the second coat. 

However, it's even Blue-er in Real Life. 

Isn't that always the case? Gads.