June 2003 Archives

and so it’s a 5am cab ride to Fiumicino, her eyes are closed and dreaming to the taxi dispatcher’s lullaby, calling over and over for cinque cinque and quaranta sei, with promises of prenotazione and passegieri, until you’re suddenly both awake and there already, hurriedly hauling this thrown-together luggage set, a total of just 3 bags, but in sum nearly a year, and almost a home.

the heat, as singer/songwriter Glenn Frey once poignantly observed, is on. day after day now of inhospitably high temperatures, 30s C and 90’s F, but it’s the whallop (that’s like, a big dollop?) of humidity, stickily slathered across the city, that’s making things unbearable.

our squat little pinguino still loyally conditions the air in our apartment, but in a tactful and rather non-confrontational manner (penguin-ish, to a T), steering well clear of the gruff, freon-oozin’ and temperature-stompin’ attitude which is the more vulgar custom of california’s air-con culture. no, mr. pinguino does not seem to cool the air at all, in fact, but instead hums and gurgles in such a way that suggests an air conditioner might be present, and therefore, ostensibly cooling things.

so, neat, it’s like a psycho-somatic or sub-conscious air conditioner. or maybe it’s just busted.