Winter turns to summer

Well, the summer seemed gone a few days ago. While it had not rained since mid May, suddenly it rained. The sky was as light as noon from three in the morning to four in the morning. The lightning was (almost) unbelievable. Hail came down, hurting the grapes that had not yet been harvested in neighboring Ribera, as well as the developing citrus crop. We lost power with the frequency of a Banana Republic Governor in the bad old days.

The next day, the waves came in, covering the beach with white water, and leaving piles of seaweed on what had been a sandy expanse before. Gone were the summer people, safely back in Palermo, where they had to deal with flooded streets, underpasses turned to swimming pools, and driving conditions more impossible than usual. In other words, it was winter at its worst. It even cooled down enough to use a blanket on the bed, when the thunder did not keep me awake. The wind was bad enough so that I could not even sit out on the terrace to watch the magical light show without getting wet.

Two days later, it is summer again. The views are from Vega de Mullo in the San Michele district of Sciacca. Yes, that is indeed Capo San Marco in the distance, including the apartments in which I live. The beach is still covered with seaweed, but I can live with that, and the beauty.

The train may be late

I always love looking at this railroad crossing.

It reminds me that one of the great things about Sciacca is that it is off the beaten path. There is no autostrade to Sciacca, nor is there a train (now). It keeps easy travelling tourists at a bit of a distance, and that is fine with me.

I also can not help but thinking of Waiting for Godot when I see it, with two characters standing at this crossing, having their conversation, waiting for Godot, waiting for a train, is it the same? Does it matter?

It is easy to find old, unused train stations around, some still having the signage. But to find a crossing, where there are neither rails nor a cross street, somehow that is special to me.

So this is indeed one of my favorite places. If you want to see it, it is right where it has always been.

Time Out

A week ago, in Time Europe, there was an article about the problems in the Italian press. The (assumedly) American reporter for Time wrote about low readership (10 °/o) versus much higher newspaper readerships in the US and Japan. And indeed that is true, I have been surprised at how few people buy a newspaper here.

A few other things have surprised me about the Italian press, which I would like to mention. first of all, there is a far smaller percentage of the newspaper devoted to advertising, and I have yet to find a newspaper that includes cartoons other than editorial cartoons. Most of the articles are written by reporters who work for the newspapers, and few are attributed to UPI, AP, or the New York Times News Service.

When I go to a Newspaper shop, I have my choice of about 10 national newspapers. This would be like going to an average newsstand in New York City, let us say, and having a choice between the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Globe, the New Orleans Times Picayune, The San Francisco Chronicle, the Los Angeles Times, the Sacramento Bee, the Christian Science Monitor, and a few others. And this may be possible in a few places in New York City. Now take it down to a city the size of, let us say, Batavia, NY. I am not sure if you could find one newsstand with such a choice.

Also, when I go to a newspaper shop and I want to know what the right has to say about a certain issue, I can buy one of a few quality right wing journals. The same if I want to know what the left has to say. They all cover the same news, but they all have an editorial slant on things. If I want to read a well thought out essay on current events, I can go to any of the papers.

If I want to know that the US has said that they were not at fault in the killing of Italian secret service agent Lipari in Iraq a few years ago, I can go to virtually any Italian or US newspaper (that even reported the story in the US) and find that out. If I want to find out that US soldiers have been indicted for murder in Italy for the same incident, I can only go to any of the Italian papers.

Yes, the Italian press has readership problems. However, I do not think that dumbing down the news, presenting only one side throughout the US, managing the news, printing pages of cartoons and advertisements, is necessarily the way to improve the press.

The Italian population gets a lot of basic news from television (and radio), and seems to use the newspapers to engage in wide ranging discussions of national and international issues, and thereby the press seems to have found a niche within the country.

This probably should have been sent to Time for publication, however because I live in a 'remote' area, it would not have been considered timely by time. so I stuck you with this rant.

Facebook, butt book

Face book? Butt book? I can't tell anymore. The summer people have left, so I have quiet time again. I got to thinking that I really have ignored this blog for quite some time. Part of that was the summer. Part of that was the time I was spending on facebook.

Some of the facebook time was good, and worthwhile. I got to see what my step children are up to on a semi regular basis, and by doing so, I could hear in my mind's ear the shrieks and laughs as Fran would have discovered all of their doings. It was nice to have her back for that. I could also keep up with my niece and nephew, and a dear friend who retired from the Department of Defense school here and moved back to America. I saw a friend go through a divorce, and moving house. All of that was good and worthwhile.

But then there is the butt book part of facebook. Who likes what pop star, who can put as many links as possible up in one day. All twenty five verses of the Lithuanian National Anthem. Stuff that I really was not interested in before I saw the stuff in facebook, and became less interested in after seeing it.

So while it is not a calendar new year, and a bit late for a new school year by American standards (although most Sicilian kids did not go back to school yesterday, but will wait until next week, most of the rest of Italy did go back this week, and some schools opened two weeks ago) (hmmm, that might make an interesting rant), Did I just digress?? Horrors.

Time for some sort of new year's resolution:

I will save rants for this blog, and make them here, regularly. Some will be pictures, or picture stories, like usual. I am thinking of going to a butcher shop, a fisherman's bar, a gelateria, and a few other places for those. Others will be just photos - I will rewalk the streets of Sciacca with my camera, and this time will use it more. Others, like this one, will be just words.

Facebook will still get my surface, or face reactions to things, and I will still keep up with people on it. But this is where my heart and brain will be.