wanting to kiss the telecom man is wrong

But that didn't stop the desire. I'm baaaack!

The rest of the village had service repaired about a week ago, but there was an additional, mysterious problem with my line. Yes, I made a nuisance of myself at Telecom headquarters (I had a phone operator in an uproar *with* me yesterday!), and it apparently worked because a repairman called this morning and asked for specific directions to my house; I told him if he made it up the mountain, I'd meet him in the piazza (with coffee/wine/beer, I wanted to say, but I didn't want to freak him out). He showed up fifteen minutes later just as he said he would, and within a half hour, I was checking up on PerezHilton.com.

I have priorities, you know.

Anyway, today is Liberation Day in Italy, or the day we celebrate the Allied troops' freeing Italy from the wrath of Germany during World War II. It's a "red" day here, which means the number of the day is literally in red on the calendar signifying that it's a national holiday, so everything is closed--making it even more surprising that Telecom delivered on April 25th.

And the poetic justice of my being liberated to communicate with the outside world on this of all days is not lost on me.

Back to blogging business, I see on my Bloglines account that I have approximately 1300 posts of others to catch up on. Um, we'll see how that goes. First I have a lot of work to do, sending things off and whatnot, and then, slowly but surely, I'll be making my rounds. I'll be responding to emails in due time as well, so please be patient. And again, thanks so much for all the concerned comments and messages; what a wonderful feeling to be missed!

Also, I realize today should be a What's Cooking Wednesday, but you'll forgive me if we get back to the recipes next week, won't you? I'm just too giddy to cook (sorry P).

But here's a photo of our first fig of the season, though, just because.