Escape to a Lake and the Countryside

Saturday, 7 March, 2020

"Take a walk on the wild side . . ."

I channeled my inner Lou Reed today and boldly broke out of the bunker for a run to freedom in the scenic countryside that encircles the Villa Skorpion II.

Of course, I headed north, away from Milano.

I'm felt bold but not reckless.

My journey would include a delicious lunch stop in the Lago Maggiore city of Luino.

That little orange number looked

quick sitting in Luino's small harbor

It was a beautiful day not to be worrying about the Coronavirus with temperatures in the low 60°F range and perfect cloudless skies.

A walk along the shoreline was definitely on the agenda!

It was good to see parents and their

kids out enjoying the weather at

this lakeside playground

My view of Lago Maggiore from

the bench where I sat and read

for about 30 minutes

A golden BVM protecting

Luino's ferry boat dock

I was distracted from my reading when some small boats all set sail from a nearby mini-harbor.

This sailor was fighting the wind

and would skillfully stay afloat

These two were having

a much easier time of it

It was time to move on as it was almost 12:30 p.m. and I was getting hungry.

I thought that he would

have a bigger boat

A GREAT Liberty style

building on the lakeshore

As I said, I was getting hungry and the

"Al Cantinone" Cucina Tipica

sounded awfully good to me

While I had been to Luino on several occasions over the last two years, I had never noticed this interesting looking side street.

No time like the present to explore . . .

Lavender was the color of the day

 Shhhhh . . .

This street is a Quiet Zone, not a problem today as I was the only person on the street and I wasn't speaking in tongues ala Paula White.

The pedestrian street was

quiet indeed!

This was the spot,

"Al Cantinone" Cucina Tipica!

I like the look of the menu

but I wound up ordering

something not listed here

When I walked into the subterranean

entry room I was impressed by

the many wine choices

Ten tables in this room

but I dined alone

It was 12:40 p.m. and the Al Cantinone was still empty. 

Finally, a group of three people were seated in another room through the door on the left.

That was it, only four customers for lunch.

The Coronavirus reared its ugly head again.

I was seated next to a

perfect fire in this old fireplace

 An ACCORDION!

If we just had more people, I'm sure this place would have been ROCKING to some sweet music played on this traditional Italian instrument.

Lunch is served . . .

A Coke Zero, a sack of fresh

sliced bread, Polenta and

Osso Buco ala Milanese

A hardy, stick to my ribs lunch that was perfect!

As was this chocolate dolce

All Italian meals MUST end with

a caffé or, in this case, a macchiato

It was a good dining experience in

a quaint spot that I highly enjoyed!

When I went to pay the bill, my waiter offered me a free, small glass of a lavender based liqueur to aid in the proper digestion of my meal.

It was delicious and I was told that the La Lavanda shop across the way is where I could buy a bottle if I so desired.

I so desired!

Again, I was the only customer in this fine little lavender based shop with a pleasant, helpful owner.

Liqueur in hand, I headed

back to the lake

 The Lago Maggiore ferry boat

was arriving

Pedestrian traffic only, no vehicles allowed on this run.

It was time to start heading back to Varese and I decided to take a new route to see more unexplored, by me at any rate, mountain villages of Lombardia.

In the village of Grantola, I saw a sign pointing to the 11th-Century Chiesa di San Pietro.

I just had to take a look . . .

This church is about 1,000

years old . . . WOW!

A sturdy bell tower is a must

in all old country churches

An interesting bump

in this church's wall

I guess I'm not getting

into this church today

Wait, is that door unlocked?

IT WAS!

A very well preserved and maintained church as it turned out.

How old is this holy water font?

No holy water in it today, Coronavirus countermeasures you know.

The church had an ancient cemetery attached to it but I did not opt to walk through it.

On the other hand, the church's

WWI and WWII memorial to

Grantola's Fallen was moving

 Grantola lost 13 souls in WWI

and three more in WWII

With all of the forest area around

us, it was only fitting that Grantola

would have a lumber mill in

its city limits

Finally, Joe Curly, a fine sportswriter for the Ventura County Star back in California, contacted me this week wanting to do a story about the Coronavirus outbreak in Italy and how it was affecting sports in our adopted country in general and American football in particular.

Here is the link to Joe's article: https://eu.vcstar.com/story/sports/2020/03/07/football-coach-contreras-epicenter-coronavirus-outbreak-europe/4977337002/

It was a good day today.

Another Day in the Bunker

Friday, 6 March, 2020

Before starting on today's updates, I need to comment again on last night's wonderful meal at the Osteria del Centenate.

How good and bountiful was last night's gathering you ask?

Well, at this morning's daily weigh-in, it was noted that I had gained 1.5 kilos/3.3 lbs. over my Wednesday morning mark.

DAMN!

As usual, today was colored

by more news about our health issues

It was good to see that the fashion

industry is heavily involved in

providing aid to those in need during

this health crisis

As mentioned in yesterday's post,

Serie A calcio (soccer) will play

all of its 30 games over the next three

weekends without fans in the seats

The photo above from today's newspaper outlines just who the 480+ people are that about will be allowed in the stadium for these games including:

2 Appointed Federal attorneys

2 Representatives from the league office

2 Anti-doping doctors

4 Photographers

100 Game workers such as ball boys, etc.

100 Security workers

120 Players, staff and referees

150+ Journalists

AC Milan's Zlatan Ibrahimović

seems on board with all of this

Will the famed Giro d'Italia, only

two months away, be cancelled?

Who knows where we'll be with the Coronavirus countermeasures by then.

The 21 stage bicycle race is scheduled to start in Budapest this year. After three stages in the Hungarian countryside the race will move to Sicily and then work its way up the Italian boot. The final stage on Day 21 ends in Milano which is, of course, Italy's Coronavirus epicenter.

We'll see . . .

Today's Italian Coronavirus Totals

3,296 Reported Cases

148 Dead

414 Healed

The bulk of these Italian numbers (1,777/98/376) have occurred in the region of Lombardia where Varese and the Villa Skorpion II are located.

Will the Europe Warriors be allowed to

play this U19 game in Istanbul in June?

I feel more optimistic about our

Women's team's chances of playing

their game in December

But then again, who knows?

As for me, it was yet another stay in the bunker kind of day spent reading, working on Skorpion related issues and . . .

A Charlie Chan Film Festival

courtesy of my computer and YouTube

Not politically correct I know, but I still love this series about Honolulu's great detective and his ever so helpful kids and chauffeur, Birmingham Brown.

Although they are both good in the starring role, I give an extremely slight edge to Sidney Toler's portrayal of Charlie Chan over Warner Orland's.

Skorpion Updates

In the evening, Giorgio Nardi presented me with the newest version of the 2020 Skorpions schedule that FIDAF had just announced, here goes:

March 21 vs. Modena Vipers

March 28 BYE

April 4 at Monza Brianza Hammers

April 11 BYE

April 18 BYE

April 25 at Modena Vipers

May 2 vs. Savona Pirates

May 9 at Reggio Emilia Hogs

May 16 BYE

May 23 vs. Monza Brianza Hammers

May 31 at Savona Pirates

June 6 vs. Reggio Emilia Hogs

June13-14 DII Wildcard Playoff Games

June 20-21 DII Quarter-Final Playoff Games

June 27-28 DII Semi-Final Playoff Games

July 4 DII Championship Silver Bowl 

Expect further changes on the scheduling front in my humble opinion.

Giorgio also proposed a novel idea for the Skorpions to practice sooner than expected.

He had contacted the Lugano Rebels in Switzerland where there have been no Coronavirus protocols put into place in regards to sporting events and practices as of yet.

If you recall, we scrimmaged against the Rebels in Lugano a few weeks ago.

In principle, they agreed to let us come to their practice field where each club would use half the field to practice for about 90 minutes and then scrimmage against each other for about half an hour each night. These practices would be held from 8:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.

It sounds good but our logistics may be a problem.

Lugano is about an hour's drive north from Varese. Our Skorpion's 55 man roster includes 25 players under the age of 20.

I'm just not sure how many of these younger players have cars to use to at least car pool for the proposed two nights a week commute.

The Lugano plan is a good idea if we can get the players and coaches to buy into this potentially unique American football Coronavirus countermeasure.

We'll see . . .

Just Another Interesting Day With Skorpion Football and the Coronavirus Outbreak

Thursday, 5 March, 2020

This pretty much sums up the day . . .

. . . at least I think that is the

correct translation for this oft

used word these days

But, the other possible translation works too.

You could look it up on Google Translate.

This morning started as usual with a short walk to the Bar al Semaforo for my daily brioche and cappuccino.

This was new . . .

In accordance with our newest anti-Coronavirus mandates in Lombardia, people will no longer be served at the bar. Patrons must now be seated in order to further minimize physical contact, the One Meter Rule's newest incarnation.

The morning paper announced . . .

. . . that for the next three weekends all

of Italy's Serie A calcio/soccer games will

be played but with no fans in attendance

That's a total of 30 games being contested with greatly reduced revenues, things are getting serious.

This would only be the start of today's Coronavirus and sporting events news today.

One interesting line of discussion amid the Coronavirus scare is babysitting. Yes, babysitting.

With school being cancelled the last two weeks in Lombardia and the new announcement today that all schools in Italy will be closed as well next week, babysitting has become a hot topic.

As in America, many families in Italy are in the situation where both parents work in order to improve their standard of living. Thus, these prolonged school closures are stressing parents in part due to the potential cost of hiring babysitters.

On the other hand comes the question of relying on grandparents as babysitters in these unusual times. The financial issue would no longer be the problem but remember that the older among us seem to be more susceptible to the Coronavirus. Would babysitting by these willing grandparents put themselves and others at greater risk of spreading the Coronavirus?

Or, like our neighbor, you

could just put your child in

a balcony swing like this one

to keep them entertained all day

Raffa got his long awaited new,

indestructible iPhone yesterday

A morning selfie was a must on his new device!

As you may know, Milano is one of the world's most important fashion capitals. The world of fashion was pitching in with some good fashion sense notions in these tough times.

Giorgio Armani's newest fashion innovation

to help with the One Meter Rule

I've got to get one of those!

Once safely ensconced back in the Villa Skorpion II, I got busy planning tonight's practice and working on a host of Skorpion related projects.

After about two hours of "smart work," I took a break and peeked at FaceBook . . .

. . . VAFFANCULO!

The Savona Pirates, the Skorpions opponents in this coming Sunday's second attempt at an opening game of the 2020 DII season, just announced that they were suspending all operations until reevaluating the Coronavirus situation again on March 12th.

Thus, for the second successive week, our game was postponed.

Soon after the Pirates announcement, FIDAF sprung into FaceBook action . . .

"We interrupt this program to bring

you an important announcement."

VAFFANCULO!!

The Federation's announcement simply stated that because of the current health issues all practices and games at all three Italian levels (DI, DII and CIF9) of American football are to be cancelled until the Federation reviews the situation again on Sunday, March 15th.

Thus, our third attempt to hold a season opener on March 14th at home vs. the Reggio Emilia Hogs was also postponed.

Thus, as of now we have had three of our eight regular season contests postponed.

Honestly, I don't see our situation in Italy getting much better on either the Coronavirus or American football front any time soon.

Now we could not practice tonight as planned but many of us met briefly at Skorpion Field in order to merely pick up the new away game jerseys that had just arrived. Some of us were also purchasing the the latest in Skorpion swag.

The newest Skorpion clothing included red sweatshirts, gray sweatpants and red t-shirts. I bought all three in, spoiler alert, real men's sizes, not Italian sizing.

What to do since we could not practice?

Running backs coach Cristian "Bumba" Bianchi was our voice of reason.

Bumba's solution was simply to . . . 

mangia, Mangia, MANGIA!

So, from Skorpion Field, five of our coaches headed to another of Bumba's hidden gems of Varese food lore . . .

. . . the Osteria del Centenate

It was my first trip here and the Osteria would quickly move to the top of my list of Great Dining Spots in Varese.

Pye, Fabio, Pietro, myself and Bumba

in the middle of our shared,

ten plate antipasti food orgy

At this point, we still had three more secondo piatti meat dishes to share and consume like the locusts that we were tonight.

Not to mention some perfect Italian red wine.

So, how delicious and varied was the food that we had consumed? When it came time for ordering dolci (dessert) which was included in the price of our meal, we all quickly said, "No, graze."

What were the odds of that happening with five American Football coaches?

Where is everybody?

During our intense two hour meal, I asked our waitress what this large osteria would have looked like on a Thursday night before the Coronavirus outbreak. She said it would have been fairly full.

Tonight, only four more tables were in use by a total of about ten other people.

Tomorrow's daily weigh-in is going to be a tad ugly I suspect.

Finally . . .

. . . wait, I thought that China

was the Coronavirus epicenter?