Exploring the Neighborhood

Monday, January 28, 2019

The morning was reserved for equal doses of laziness and reading, both seemed like good ideas at the time.

In the afternoon, I got busy.

I hitched a ride with Santa Barbara

to the Esselunga for the purchase

of much needed supplies

This special Esselunga edition of Monopoly reminded me of the Monopoly game that Laurie and I recently played against our Robber Baron grandson Jacob.

It brought on a great smile in my heart I must say.

Now if only Esselunga came out with a Jurassic Park edition of Uno . . .

After returning to the Villa Skorpion II, I opted to go for an exploratory walk in the neighborhood.

I was told that this old sign just

around the corner from the Villa

Skorpion II has WWII Fascist roots

This reminded me that Giorgio recently told me the story of an old family friend whose father recently died. Unbeknownst to the friend's family their deceased loved one had been an Italian spying on Fascists during WWII for the British.

Apparently, the British Intelligence Service had decided long ago to not release the names of their WWII spies in Italy until the last one died. They feared that if they did not do this that they would put their former agents lives at stake as there was still strong pro-Mussolini factions alive and well in Italy who might seek revenge.

As it turns out, Giorgio's friend's father was the final spy to pass away and only then did anyone in his family know of his dangerous, heroic doings during the war years.

I'm sure that they were just one of several Italian families who were surprised by the news of their family members' previously unknown boldness in the face of brutal danger.

Fascinating.

I continued my explorations . . .

The new Chiesa Sant'Ambrogio

I say new because it was only built in the 19th-century.

When I walked past it last week it was closed, today it was open so I entered.

 I liked this side chapel

 The ceiling was of interest as well

 The old Chiesa Sant'Ambrogio first

opened its doors in the late 11th-century

It is located only about 200 meters south of the new Chiesa Sant'Ambrosio.

I had not seen it before as it is hidden on a small side street but Santa Barbara pointed it out to me as we returning from our shopping at Esselunga.

Of course, I entered this old church too.

 How old is this mural?

 The old Chiesa is quite small

 It has an interesting ceiling

Unfortunately, some of the frescoes on the left have fallen off over the centuries.

I liked this drawing behind the altar

It was time to hit the road again . . .

The Villa Toeplitz sounded interesting

The Villa was originally built in 1901 by members of the German Frey family.

A Polish banker by the name of Giuseppe Toeplitz bought the property in 1918 and immediately started to renovate, enlarge and transform the Villa and the surrounding land into a wondrous site.

I think he did a good job.

 The long walk to the entrance

of the Villa Toeplitz

Just before reaching the Villa's

gate one find's this interesting building

 At last, the Villa Toeplitz's entry gate

WATCH YOUR STEP!

Yesterday's snowfall was now today's icy pathway.

The Villa looms ahead

with an observatory to boot!

 The view from the Villa Toeplitz

The Villa's gardens will be a great

place to sit and read this Spring

The Villa's main building and the Castiglioni Museum on the Villa's grounds were both closed today which is typical of museum's throughout Italy on Mondays.

The evening was spent planning Tuesday night's practice and organizing our Kicking Game teams in preparation of this coming Sunday's scrimmage in Verona against the Mastini.

Go Skorpions GO!

A snowy Sunday and a Feast with Friends

Sunday, January 27, 2019

An overall peaceful day today which I needed after spending so much time in the decidedly not Southern California weather the last ten days. 

 I did take the bus into downtown

Varese in the morning to see what

the street vendors had to offer

Not much as it turned out as the weather was cold and snow was starting to fall.

When I got back up the hill to the

Villa Skorpion II, it was snowing harder

As happened last weekend my next door neighbors, the Nardi family, invited me over for a truly home made lunch with another of the Skorpions' first families, Pietro, Stefania and Carlotta Caprioli.

As is the norm on the weekends

Giorgio was busy making the meal's pasta

Giorgio in action making

Tagliatelle Pasta

As is always the case, the meal was fantastic but the company was better.

Especially when Pietro donned a . . .

. . . WWII Gas Mask

Pietro and Stefania's daughter Carlotta's face pretty much matched everyone else's reaction when Pietro did his thing.

You had to be there . . .

 Pietro, Pietro, Pietro . . .

The real question is why Giorgio has one of these gizmos in the garage?

More snow had fallen while we dined

A good day of rest with fun friends, good food and some Prosecco is good for the soul I think.

A Flag Football Practice Saturday

Saturday, January 26, 2019

After sleeping in do to our late night in Milano on our recruiting/mangia excursion, I puttered about the Villa Skorpion II doing some laundry and straitening things up a bit.

The Big-Deal-of-the-Day was the U17, U15 and U13 flag football practices at Skorpion Field from 3:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

U13 Head Coach Enzo Petrillo

setting the pre-practice tone

I would spend most of my time today with the U13 squad.

Working some basic

ball catching drills

It got intense!

Alessandro on a slant

We all believe that he is Italy's lone Arena Football League Iowa Barnstormers fan.

"The ball is my friend,

the ball is my friend . . ."

U15 Post Route

 U15 One-on-One

 U17s having at it

Sun setting on the U15s

U13s practicing flag tackling

I think that all three teams got a lot accomplished today and had fun playing flag football.

But not as much fun as

grandson Kevin had at

DISNEYLAND!

The one in Anaheim, California not in Paris that is.

We will have two more Senior team practices this week before our first scrimmage of the season next Sunday at the home field of the Verona Mastini. It should be interesting.

The following two weekends we will scrimmage at home against the Lugano Rebels and then the Milano Seamen.

Let the fun begin!

A Final Arriverderci and a Recruiting Trip to Milano

Friday, January 25, 2019

Our morning was all about saying a final farewell to . . .

Attilio Chiurato

As compared to the USA, burial rituals occur rather rapidly in Italy. Attilio, 79 years old, passed away in his sleep on Tuesday night, his Rosary was said last night and his funeral Mass was celebrated this morning.

Just as was the case for his Rosary, his parish church of San Maurizio was packed with mourners paying their final respects to this good man. The size of the crowds both nights was a clear sign of what Attilio's life meant in the lives of others.

After the Mass, we all walked him to his final resting place in the cemetery in Vedano Olona about a mile from the church.

R.I.P. Attilio

I saw this GLAM hairdressers

on the way to the train as I headed

to the funeral

In our family, years ago, GLAM was coined as an acronym for, in chronological order, George, Laurie, Andy and Mike.

Many of us gathered at the

Ristorante alle Fontanelle

for lunch after Attilio's funeral

The food and friendship were both at a high level but why the statue of a Native American?

As I sat listening to the conversation, Enzo Petrillo who was the team contact man who along with Dario D'Adelfio convinced me to come to Varese last year, observed me and made a funny comment.

His comment was based on having seen the old film The 13th Warrior, where a Muslim ambassador is exiled from his homeland and finds himself in the company of Vikings heading to their homeland, probably Upplands-Väsby in current day Sweden.

One of the groups many culture clashes with their new Muslim companion is their shared inability to communicate in the others language.

Our Muslim hero sits quietly for about the first quarter of the movie listening to the Vikings in dialogue with each other absorbing their speech patterns. Suddenly and quite unexpectedly, he opens up speaking the Norsemen's language like a native.

This is what Enzo believes is happening with me as we dine.

The actor playing the Muslim ambassador in The 13th Warrior is is none other than Antonio Banderas. While the physical similarity between the two of us is undeniable, my ability to absorb the Bella Lingua that is Italian simply by listening is far off the mark.

But I digress . . .

Buosi Gelato is one of our

Skorpion team sponsors

Their gelato is fantastic and not to be missed if you are visiting Varese at the right time of the year.

By right time of the year I mean Spring, Summer and early Fall. As it turns out, Buosi makes so much money in the warm weather months that they close for the cold weather months.

Nice work if you can get it.

  

Hard to make out exactly what this

old sign says in the light of the

setting sun

It looks interesting to me and will warrant another look when the lighting is improved.

In the evening, Giorgio Nardi and I drove down to Milano in the company of Gigi Bravin and Pietro Caprioli to meet with the administration of the 2017 and 2018 Italian DI National Champion Milano Seamen.

The purpose of the visit was to discuss getting one of their young backup QBs to play and develop as our Skorpion signal caller this season.

The reality of the matter is that at the DI level an American import QB will get 95% of the snaps leaving little time for Italian QBs on the roster to get playing time.

Our situation is simply that our stellar QB of last season, Omar Passera, somehow tore his ACL playing Flag Football in the off-season and can not play this year. Our current QBs are iffy at this point so we need help which the Seamen are happy to give so as to further develop their future players.

We had a long talk about and with the Seamen's young third string QB who is also the QB for the Italian National U19 team. Although the Seaman see it as a win-win situation for all of us, I'm not so sure that our prospective young QB was sold on the transfer.

On a brighter note, the Seamen also had us meet with a veteran wide receiver and a rookie defensive end about joining the Skorpions. They both seemed excited about the opportunity to play and develop.

We'll see . . .

As we were leaving, the Seamen

were just starting their 9:00 p.m.

Friday night practice

We stayed for the first thirty minutes of their workout before agreeing that we were all hungry.

There was only one place to go for dinner in Milano on a chilly Friday night . . .

 

Piedra del Sol

Restaurante Mexicano

From left to right you'll find Pietro, Giorgio, Gigi and me.

As usual, the food here was good but I can't really call it authentic Mexican cuisine.

Reading Is FUNdamental

An Uplifting Read

A Simple but Good Day in Varese

Thursday, January 24, 2019

It was a glorious, crisp day today in Lombardia, a good day for a walk.

It started as I left the Villa Skorpions II

complex to go to the local bar for

a delicious cappuccino

There are seven separate apartments in the Villa Skorpion II complex which is a converted 17th-century inn originally built for travelers from Zurich heading towards Rome by horse drawn coaches.

My next order of business was to get myself a library card so as to gain access to English language books and, hopefully, a slew of DVDs as well.

The Varese City Library

was just the spot I needed

GOODNESS, they still have a

classic card catalog

I'm already loving this arrangement!

 Lots of English language books

Some are listed as being in the American language too.

Federica who speaks good English

and visited California a decade ago

helped me get a library card

I am now a full fledged member of the Varese Library body of users.

It was time to celebrate with another café and a small pastry.

STYLIN' at my favorite

Varese café bar

Love those glasses, don't you?

For lunch I had my first Arancini

ball of the New Year

It was a solid ragu arancini by northern standards but it would not fly at Catania's famed L'Etoile D'or where the arancini is straight from Sicilian heaven.

 A shopper in a fine fur coat

at the Carrefour Market

You have to look good when you are going about the city in the wintertime.

The Lions Club is a

fine organization indeed

I just liked this bright

yellow downtown home

A small urban park with

two interesting monuments

This one is dedicated to the Italian

Army's Logistic specialists who passed away

either in combat and/or by freezing to death

138th Anniversary of Glory

138th?

 A great looking soldier

on the 138th Anniversary Statue

Cool feathers in that hat! 

A municipal building with a bit

of a Fascist architecture look to it

What the deuce is an agility dog?

In the evening, we met with others in the Skorpion family in the village of Vedano Olona to attend the Rosary for our friend Attilio Chiurato who passed away Tuesday night.

As a result, our normally scheduled Thursday night practice was cancelled.

 We met at this bar that serves

XXXX Australian Beer

Mexico's great beer only rates XX.

The Rosary was said in an SRO church full of people offering their strength and support to Attilio's family.

This was a strong showing of the positive family bonding experience that is a fantastic by-product of being part of an American football team.

After the Rosary, many team members and their families met at Skorpion Field to share some pizza and a beverage or two while swapping Attilio stories and simply enjoying a meal with one another.

The typically thin crust  pizza

is order one pizza to a customer

  

That means we needed a LOT

of pizzas!

Attilio's funeral will take place tomorrow morning.

There is strength in family.