Operator...can you help me make this call?

 After several years living here and bopping around from place to place, I finally found a hairdresser I really like and I am comfortable with.  She doesn't, by the way, speak a word of English.   Anyway....

Since I was hospitalized and operated on and so on and so on....my hair started falling out....then finally stopped falling out and now, at long last, is growing back in again....slowly.  Everything is getting better, but at a snail's pace.  I guess that's because I'm not so young anymore.  But it is growing back and I am getting better.  Yay.

Sooooo, it was time to call the hairdresser.  I hate going out in the cold.  I hate going out in the rain.  And this winter has had a lot of both.  So I watched to forecasts closely and it looked like this week would be a decent opportunity to get out and get my friggin' hair cut!!

I called.  After a couple of rings..."Pronto!"...the Italian version of "hello" which actually means "ready."  I said I needed an appointment.  I could hear a hair dryer, rather loudly, in the background.  She answered me and I couldn't understand what she said...then..."Pronto!  Pronto!"...aggh...I tried again, she said something....more hair dryer and "Pronto!"  Then she hung up.  What a disaster!

I gave up.  I felt stupid.  Incompetent.  I'm not Italian.  I don't speak fluently.  I tried.  I failed.

Then it was the weekend.  I sort of decided I would walk there (it's just around the corner) and make the appointment in person.  However, the weather didn't cooperate.  It was bloody cold today, even though the sun was shining.

So I mustered up my courage and tried calling again.  I called in the early afternoon, when I know it is usually more quiet since that is "pranzo" time...lunch time, in Italy.  She answered right away and thank goodness, the line was clear...no background noise.  I said "Buon pomeriggio"....good afternoon....and asked if there was an appointment this week.  "Si!  Domani o giovidi??"  I said I preferred afternoon.  I was given an appointment on Thursday in the early afternoon.  Hallelujah.  

The moral of the story is....I am not stupid, I can speak Italian fairly well, and she just could not hear me the first time.  I beat myself up for no reason.  And I will look human again on Thursday.  Hurray!

Deja vu

 It seems we are back in the business of acting as the town spay and neuter clinic.  

Sometime early last year another black cat showed up and ingratiated herself with the local gang.  I was in the midst of health and hospital issues, so I don't remember precisely when that was.  But late in the spring or in the early summer this cat, named unoriginally "Black Mamma" had a litter of three.

Only one of those kittens survived, and I think it is a female as it appears to be one of those mottled calico types.  I call her "Callie."  

Yes, not very imaginative, but when you have had a plethora of stray or feral cats, many of them looking quite similar, you tend to find a way to differentiate.  Ink is short for "Incubo" which means "nightmare" in Italian.  She was hell to trap and we had to release her even though I had hoped to keep her inside.  Black Mamma, obviously, became a mother and her body shows the wear and tear.  "Fat Tail" has....a fat tail!! Three black cats, 2 female, one male.  Now both females will be spayed.

The vet arrived today and took Mamma.  He will spay her and bring her back, still knocked out, so we can transfer her to a recuperative cage with a pan, food and water. 

As soon as we can we will have to trap Callie.  She is old enough now and this piazzetta doesn't need any more kittens.  Her mother, Mamma, had a second litter recently.  There are FOUR of them, although it is unlikely all will survive as it is winter.  It is horribly sad, but there is nothing we can do about there.  There is no "service" in these small hill towns, no organizations, nothing.  

And I certainly don't want whoever the sicko is who occasionally sprinkles freaking poison around because of the burgeoning cat population to do it again!

                                                               *********************

On a lighter note, I had a short but wonderful reunion with three dear friends from school....junior high and high school.  Short because of different time zones.

We were able to "Zoom" together in spite of being in radically different places.  

We filled each other in on some current stuff and also clarified some old stuff as it seems our memories all have some blank spots.  Luckily, the blanks are in different spots!

My father left, my parents divorced when I was twelve.  My older sisters were out on their own already.  I was left alone, bewildered, hurt and angry.  These girls, my friends, were my lifeline in those days.  I am deeply grateful to them.  

Yes, I choked up a bit when I had to "hang up."  Seeing them all, hearing their voices, remembering how important they each were and are to me.  💕