Welcome and Benvenuti to all my Lovely Followers around the World,
August in Tuscany can take your breath away. Yes, it’s beautiful, but in reality I am talking about the heat, humidity and lack of breathable air! Even in properties like our own, which is old and built of thick stone walls, you will struggle to stay cool. The problem is the roof, concrete under tiles, which heats up during the day and fails to cool down sufficiently over night as temperatures are not going lower than around 21 degrees. Today, Monday, temperatures will be up to 38 degrees again and wow, by 4pm we are gasping and changing into our third set of clothes. So, it’s full pelt for our air conditioning unit and fans.
Of course the high temperatures have been perfect for the bathing beauties parading in front of the judges for the Miss Toscana contest. Here in Italy it is still a very popular event, despite the rest of the western world frowning on the so-called exploitation of young women. Lets face it, Tuscany has some very beautiful young women and if they choose to put themselves on show, so be it.
If this is not your cup of tea, and it’s not really mine, there is a lot going on in our lovely province. It is the time of year for outdoor picnics, parties and festas. A favourite site for me to find lots of organised events is at discoverTuscany You may already know this, but you will not find most of the usual places open as Italians, by tradition, go on holiday for most of August. But there is still lots to do.
The 15th August is Ferragosto, or the Feast Day of the Assumption of Mary, which is the ‘taking of the Virgin Mary bodily into Heaven,’ whatever that means! Anyway, everything closes on that day, absolutely nobody works, but they do play! This week the motorways to the seaside will be nose to tail with traffic, cars loaded up with three generations and enough food to feed an army. Unless you have already booked a hotel or apartment with their own bit of beach, you will not have a hope of finding a patch of sand to pitch your sun brolly. Foto torre-mo222.jpg – before the invasion. Extract from discoverTuscany.
Meanwhile, I have been seeing adverts in the paper for Autumn and Winter fashions! I never fail to be amazed at the number of successful Italian designers. I noticed this advert for the man in your life; of course all men’s clothes look better worn by Italians, yes I know I’m biased, apart from my English man who looks good in anything. It seems you can even find Pal Zileri’s made in Italy clothes at Harvey Nichols in London! I must say, I love the slightly half-mast trouser look and the flash of socked ankles. Pity about the model’s long faces though, but we can’t have everything I guess! Pal Zileri
We have just got back from C’era Una Volta our local ristorante, where it was nice and quiet and gently cooled by the air-conditioning. Now Paolo, the owner, has a liking for hot spicy food and makes the meanest chilli sauce. It has been said that in very hot weather you should drink hot tea to cool you down. Well, Paolo came out of the kitchen with his own cooling down recipe, home grown baby tomatoes cooked in a very hot (picante) sauce. Here he is displaying his huge pot of the stuff! My man quite likes the occasional pasta arrabiata but this, whilst smelling delicious, would blow your head off! We declined a tasting (assaggi) and went for the salsa pecoraia instead. If you are a meat eater, Paolo will bring out your huge raw Fiorentine Steak to view before he cooks it! All part of the theatre.
OK, enough already. Must get this blog edited and off to you. Back to the day job!
Have a great week and do drop me a line. june.finnigan@virgin.net
Salute June x
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