nonnaB

Better late than never. Just come online. Hope youve had a good birthday.

Lizzie I have been able to find the bridge on Google Earth as I couldnt find anything on film and news clips that I recognised. Its further on after the airport from our end. We would have passed over it many times going to the coast on that side. Can't remember if its before or after the Aquariam. I did notice that Google have already marked the part that collapsed. Again many ideas of why and how .

Lizzie, I think you missed it by a whisker. When we go to the airport at the end of the motorway we turn left but to go towards Ventimiglia we turn right , so it would be opposite for you and we'd have missed it .

Everybody who's who will be enquiring into what and why it happened there are so many "experts" who think they are right but even the real experts have their own theories. And certainly some heads will roll, as with the earthquake in Amatrice when the students house was destroyed.

We are in shock as to the collapse of the Morandi Bridge in Genoa. Weve been watching news 24 since midday. We have travelled over that bridge so many times on our way to the airport. Its so sad especially now as the holidays are in full force. People going for a well earned rest and to end like that, so sad. The traffic in that area. ( l'autostrada dei Fiori) is tremendous always but at holiday times it gets very very busy. Strangely enough although the autostrada is beautiful I have always hated it and been a bit afraid. I was always glad when we were back on the autostrada to home. The

Just heard hes from Nottingham

Its like visitors to a foreign country complain when the locals don't speak English. There's more foreigners speak English than foreigners speak a second language.

Phil don't know if you were in the restaurant one night when there was a lot of hammering coming from the kitchen. it was the chef trying to tenderise a steak. Alex came to the rescue as a client was complaining saying that the chef was having a problem catching the frogs

Jonab the cheese is Piemontese but probably the same sort of thing.It took me ages to appreciate the taste of Cheddar when I was younger, then I began to accept the different tastes of our local cheeses. A cousin makes his own Ricotta Salata (salty ricotta) and its delicious on a plate of pasta with a tomato sauce. Goodness what did we start.

Horse meat is very lean and very tasty. we have eaten donkey meat too especially salami. Don't think they'd get away with stuffing mushroom stalks into snail shells in Italy. Even with a strong garlic taste you'd still taste the mushrooms.I don't like them , I love the taste but not the texture.

Yes I suppose you're right but you have to wait for the mating season when they grow very long feathers and nest in small groups on very rough ground. if you believe this you'll believe anything A Dr customer we had in Radcliffe was Scottish and he used to send us haggis, I love them.

Was he sure they were cat skins Phil as rabbit skins are similar? Yes rabbit is very popular here and we did do a gourmet evening with rabbit as main course. Its not a great deal different to chicken and many years ago rabbit stew was always available, but done in a stew is tasteless. Give me rabbit with peas and rosmary or as my daughter makes it, with chocolate. Weird as it may seem you don't taste the chocolate but its delicious. Wild boar is popular here but for me its too strong. Talking about weird tastes we have a cheese here that if you're not attentive the maggots can run away w

Phil where have you heard that . Never heard of roof rabbits. Hope you're not taking the mickey . I know the italians especially in piemonte eat some strange things but cats?

Back still in a bad way. Went to a osteopath today. The verdict that my spine is completely blocked and in a very bad state ( which I already knew) but will persevere with my exercises etc and still go to see her. She has changed one of my exercises though saying it will help to unblock my spine. I dont think I'll ever be cured as its gone on for so long , my fault because I hadn't realised how serious it was . I'd never been ill until 7-8 yrs ago . Then everything went wrong. This last week I've been in tears more than once. No one would ever know that I was the top vaulter in the school . Di

We have tractors that make a noise at all sorts of times that dont suit us. Making hay bales at midnight because its cooler and doing the vendemmia too. Before dawn.Our neighbours are fine very friendly and we dont have any sort of problems with them, but one side they have too many cats ( strays) which in itself isnt bad but the cats get everywhere and use our plantpots for their loos. The other side have always had alsation dogs ever since weve been here. They have lost two and this latest one is a beautiful huge pup , but has an awful bark and it barks at the slightest thing. When I take my

Years ago we had a plum tree which never did produce much fruit. The next door gneighbour was a keen gardener and he told my dad that trees fall asleep sometimes just like animals that go into hibernation. He told dad to beat its trunk with a solid stick and shout at it Dad did this feeling silly and wondered if anyone could hear. The following year we had an enormous yeild of plums. After hearing that my sister in law tried it with her fig tree ...same result. It does work.

Enjoy your retirement Ben and your holiday in Spain then relax before your hospitalisation and when you're feeling better keep busy visiting your friends and aquaintances in Wetherspoons. Don't let the grass grow under your feet. All the very best.

Not guilty. Yes it always had to be brown sugar, the soft one not demarara. Cold double cream over spoon whichever is easiest. The trick if you're not too sure about it is to get the tip of the spoon on or very near coffee surface and pour slowly. You quicken up with practice. Went to see mum this morning and asked her if she knew what Bernis used on their steaks. From what she could remember was oil, salt and pepper and she said meat tenderiser. I think that was MG.u As regards the steaks , the grills were very powerfull they sealed the meat immediately . It kept the steaks jui

Send some fresher air over here Jonab there isnt even a hint of breath. Our water is awful the washing gets hard after a while. We have a well and the water is icy but although we filled the pool with it we've not had it anylised so dont fancy drinking it. Some of the locals say when they were kids it was the only well in the area and they always asked the owners if they could have a drink from it. We've only used it for watering. When we first bought the house (2000) we planted 130 tomato plants all different. The year after we planted 65 then it dwindled to nothing. Pinching out and staking

Never tried drying yellow tomatoes, if you do let us know how they turn out. Ive dried red ones in the past though.

Anyone interested in a bit of sunshine and heat or have you got some? We have too much, this weather is getting everyone down theres no let up in the high temperatures . The other night it stayed at 37c all night.Theres no air , its really draining. If it was just a few degrees cooler everyone would be happy. Its only supposed to last a little longer then comes the storms, hailstones, wind etc. Relief yes but at what price with all the damage it will cause. Roll on winter, but wait we'll be grumbling about the cold and ice and fog. Which is better? There are no seasons left its either hot or c

https://www.butterfield.com/blog/2018/05/02/piemonte-secret-revealed/ oops sorry wrong topic. Meanwhile enjoy a little tour of my neck of the woods

You're right Oztalgian. We have had origine labels for years but most of our food is from Italy and theyre very strict at where in the country its produced right down to the farm. Theres a very wide selection of fruit and veg from every region and chicken and meat is usually local. Fish is another thing , we are not really near the sea ( an hour away) but fish caught there is quickly transported. Supermarkets seem to be the culprits for imported fish. The Italians are very fussy about where their food comes from and rightly so, we should all be like that and not accept it any other

What a Day. Temperature tonight just a few minutes ago ( 7pm here) was 37 c. Its too much

Enjoy it Lizzie hope the weathers good.