Il paese delle marionette

France, morning

I just got another blood test. Hopefully, next week I will have more info with what it is going on with my body.
I have no idea on how to translate the title of this post in English...maybe the clowns' country....In a moment in which the entire world is facing a strong and terrible economic crisis, after a few weeks only from the terrible earthquake that killed a lot of people in Italy, and with so many more important facts to talk about, the Italian newspapers (and the foreign newspapers too) are covered by the story of the back and forth discussion between Berlusconi and his wife. It wouldn't be so bad if Berlusconi wasn't our prime minister. But he is. He has a public function and an important one. Who cares if he attended the birthday of an 18 years old girls. Who cares if his wife is fed up with his behavior. This is gossip. It doesn't benefit anyone. It all started, if I understood well, because Berlusconi proposed to candidate for the next election a lot of pretty tv starts, whom probably know very very little about Italian and foreign policy. Anyway, in all this back and forth of discussions, what is Berlusconi worried about?

But of course: HIS POPULARITY!!!

Before the beginning of this story, the popularity of Berlusconi among Italians was around 75%. So, 75% of the Italians like him (and I am not sure if this is due to a decreased IQ in the Italian population or to due lack of any other better candidate). After the beginning of this story, Berlusconi rushed immediately to have another pool to see if his popularity decreased or not. Apparently, it didn't. And then I wonder, does it exist something else for him beside himself and how much people like and adore him???

Where are we going to end if we keep moving in this direction?

Queen's day

France, evening

I almost forgot! It is queen's day this week end in Holland!!!! Everything will be in orange, in honor of the royal family, there will be parties, free markets on the streets. It is such a cool event. If you want to know more about it, you can check this link on Wikipedia...but if you really want to know more about it, I suggest you to be in Holland for Queen's day. It is very very cool! Too bad that I will miss it.

Even if I still can't manage to speak a single word of Dutch, I think that I must have some Dutch ancestor. I love Holland so much!!!

Jealousy

France, evening

I went for a walk with a friend of mine and she told me to check out this French short comedies "Un gars une fille". I saw a few of them on youtube and I think they are quite funny...especially because I was looking at the woman and thinking "oh she behaves like crazy" and then a second after that I was thinking "oh my God, I behave in a similar way sometimes".

So, I came across this episode about jealousy. Very funny. Sorry, it is in French. Anyway, I am a very jealous person. I don't like to admit it, but I am. Even when I have no reasons. Sometimes I think that I am a bit of a psycho and I will end up as Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction...I am so jealous that as a joke, because I am Italian, the olandesino was always teasing me that if I would get jealous of him, I would call uncle Vito (the classical name apparently for a Mafia guy) to make sure that he was behaving right :-)
Now with this confession, I scared any potential man who would have wanted to come close to me.....But I am working on this....seriously, I am working on it.
Anyway, watching this video I thought of myself and it made me laugh

symptoms

France, night

The most frequent question I heard since friday is: are you pregnant?

I am not pregnant and I didn't gain weight enough to have something like the belly of a pregnant woman. It just seems that whatever person or doctor I talk to, as soon as I say that I have a nausea as soon as I put something in my mouth, the first thing they got to think is that I am pregnant.
Compared to a possible pregnancy, the possibility of having an arsenic intoxication is not interesting enough, so since friday I am begging the doctors I saw to prescribe me the test to confirm or not the intoxication. After the pregnancy, the question I got at the toxicology lab here has been: - did you by any chance eat or drink arsenic?
- No, I didn't.
- Ok, so no reason to get a test.

Except the fact that I have been exposed for a month to arsenic, for at least 5 hours a day. The fact that I developed some symptoms that could be a lot of things, including arsenic poisoning and the fact that I still don't feel well.

I have a bad relationship with physicians. The thing is, I am not going to take medications if I don't need them. If I have something that goes on since quite some time and it is not clear what I have, before bombarding me with random general medicaments, I still believe that it would be better to just run some test and see what I may or may not have. In these days I got prescribed any kind of medicament for stomach problem (which didn't improve anything anyway), some homeopathic stuff to "clean" my organism (which I didn't take it because I don't believe that anything homeopathic is anything different than a placebo), sulfur (which seems to help in case of arsenic intoxication), and nothing more just because I was firmly opposed to get anything else.

At the end, this morning I got the blood test and I brought it to the toxicology lab (at the lab they don't take any sample...you have to get the blood or urine sample somewhere else and then bring those to them)...A normal question for me was to ask when they think the results will be ready. The answer has been: - we don't know.
- you don't know?!? are we talking about a few days or a week?
- it may be longer than a week, this friday is holidays, then we have to mail the results to you and you know, next friday is holidays too.
I should have taken a picture of my face, as I stared at him with my mouth wide open before to ask him: - so, it could be that I don't get any result before 10-15 days, right? can I call or come here to get the results without having to wait to get them in my mail box?
Him: - We will mail them to you. I am not the person in charge of this, he is on a meeting. This is his phone number. Try to call him later.
Me: - How later?
Him: -30 minutes, 1 hour.

I called multiple times during the entire day. None answered. I called the person with whom I spoke this morning
Him: - ah yeah, he is still in a meeting. Call him between 5.30-7.00 pm today.
I did. None answered of course. Not only I don't know when to expect the results, but I was not even able to know how sensitive are the tests that they run.

This is the problem. I don't have anything evidently extremely urgent. I am not pregnant. So, I am a totally non-interesting medical case. Thus, none pays any attention to me. I called my general doctor back this evening. She was not there. I left a message. Basically, the general strategy of whatever physicien, wherever you are (except in Holland I have to say), it is to fill you with any kind of possible multifunction medicaments to just hope that the symptoms will disappear, as most of the time they have no clue of what it is going on.......
Isn't this nice?

PS. I am pretty sure I don't have a swine flu. I don't have any flu-like symptoms.

this is crazy

France, evening

I am sure that tomorrow when I will go to the toxicology lab to get some test for the arsenic contamination, because I don't feel well and I have weird symptoms, they will also test me for this new wave of flue who killed already a lot of people in Mexico.

I just read this article in the NewScientist. Ok that being prepared is always better than being unprepared, but isn't this article contributing to create panic? and isn't more difficult to keep a situation under control when people are in panic?

BOTY 2009

France, evening

I can't believe it!!! I am going to miss the French final of the battle of the year!!! I am not going to be in France that day...it is so cool. I wish I could do some of these moves (I mean the jumping, the sliding, the rolling)....at least now I know where I can take a course of this street hip hop moves. I hope that I can find someone to come with me to take the course, it would be more fun!
Of course, a salsa class would probably be more feminine, but I tried and dances like salsa are definitively not for me!

For now, enjoy this summary of the France final of last year



and a longer video for the ones like me who loves these moves!!!

Podcast

France, afternoon

I just spent a couple of hours in the recently opened tea salon of a friend of mine. We were just us, four girls, drinking tea and chatting. It was very pleasant. I needed to catch up with all what happened here in the last month.

It is nice to be back. I miss San Francisco a lot, the weather especially, the possibility to do so many outdoor activities, but I like to be back.

Before to leave San Francisco, I loaded my iPod with a lot of podcast. Then I also found this podcast to learn dutch, Lauraspeaksdutch. I love it!!! not only I enjoyed a lot all the podcast I downloaded during my long flight from san Francisco to here in France, but now when I walk to work in the morning, I can also practice a bit of dutch or listen to the scientific news and being updated!!! I am so happy that I discovered the podcast! and there are so many podcast about so many different things. It is a great opportunity to learn new things while doing something else, flying, relaxing, walking.

I got a new passion: podcast!

some days

France, afternoon

I am back. And I got back sick. No idea of what I have. Actually, yesterday I got quite scared as I felt like I couldn't breath and I felt a strong pressure in my chest. But I am not having a heart attack, which is good. I got a check. So, I don't know what it is going on. I may have an arsenic poisoning due to my work, which would be quite bad too. If I have it, it shouldn't be a bad one anyway and I will get tested for it on monday. For now, I just have to take it easy.

I have to go to a weeding in two weeks from now. My cousin will get married. I am looking forward to this family occasion, but I also still don't know what I will wear. It will be at the beginning of May, which in Tuscany can be extremely mild, cold or warm. It will be inside (inside the church first and inside another place after). I have a couple of old dresses that I can wear, but then I would need to put something on the shoulder. I went to look for a nice short jacket or something else, but nothing. If you look for something in black, you can find plenty of things. In another color no way. I am not going to wear a total black to a wedding.

So, I got the idea to try other dresses. One was nice, but I had half of my breast outside it, which I don't think would be right for a church wedding.....While I was trying this dress I got to think "why every time that I lose weight, my breast disappears and the bottom part of my body still looks the same?". In this way the disproportion between my upper body and my bottom is even stronger. If I could think of an ideal shape for myself, I would prefer this disproportion to be less evident. At least most Mediterranean women also have a bigger breast. Look at Monica Bellucci for example. Instead, I am a real pear-looking woman.

Yes, I am in one of these days in which I look at myself in the mirror and I think "bah"! Some days I look at myself and I think "wow, your body is so athletic, you look so good, etc". Some days, like today, I am more for the "mmm, bah". I guess it happens to everyone. I wouldn't change anything in my body, but in these bah days I pick myself apart and I wonder how the parts that the olandesino always loved most of my body are the ones that I like less (like my legs).
I hope that I can find a boyfriend again who looks at my body in a less critical way than I do in these days. My best-friend just told me that I idealize relationships too much...Of course in a relationships also other things count a lot and it is not only the way the person we are with would perceive us for the way we look that makes them loving us for long term......attraction decreases after you know and are with the person since sometime and it is not as it was at the beginning....but it is nice to think that the person we are with still look at us and think "wow, I am very lucky, she is beautiful inside and outside"...So, this friend of mine thinks that only some lucky women find men like that, that look at their partner and still find her beautiful and attractive after some time. Then, I think in my previous two relationships I was a very lucky woman in this sense....and these relationships still didn't work out well....can't everything in life, it seems....but I can't help...maybe because I grew up with no father caring about me (or finding me minimally interesting to pay any attention to me) and no men in my family making me feel special in any way, that I still need today to find a man who adores me and makes me feel I make a difference in his life and I am precious to him (on top of the rest of course....).



PS. it doesn't fit to the topic of the post, but it fits to it in terms of clothes. I love love love the Gothic dresses! They look so feminine!!! does anyone know a nice internet website where I could look around for nice dresses? of course, not for the wedding. My family would kill me if I would show up with something Gothic or anything looking vaguely extravagant!

frog, prince and Disney

Usa, evening

I love cartoons. Together with Calvin and Hobbes comics are among my passions. The Calvin and Hobbes comics don't fit here, but I like them so much, that I just wanted to mention it.

Anyway, there is a new cartoon from Disney coming out in December this year!!!! Yeah!!!!!!!!! and it sounds good: romance, a prince, frogs..perfect!

SF

Usa, evening

Getting closer and closer to my departure from San Francisco. I will miss here. A lot. I like San Francisco. I like to walk on the beach along the Ocean. I like the weather. I like the possibility to do many outdoor activities. I like the calm that you can breath here as soon as you leave the downtown area (where you actually don't even need to go).

I feel home here. And I don't even know why since I never lived here.

I understand why the olandesino always tried to convince me to both get a job here and move here together. It is a wonderful city and a very beautiful area.

I am happy to go back to my things, my apartment, familiar things. But I am really sad about leaving here. Very sad already. I enjoyed being here a lot.

detto Italiano

Usa, afternoon

Chi lascia la via vecchia per quella nuova, sa quel che lascia ma non sa quel che trova....


which means more or less: the person who leaves the known road for a new one, knows what he/she left but he/she doesn't know what he/she will find....


I was thinking about that today.
Anyone knows how to cure obsessions???

PS. the other day I read an horrible thing. That a lot of men, when they meet a cute girl, lie about having a girlfriend (if they have one) to see if the newly met person could offer something better that their current relationship. And this was not a declaration of a 18 years old guy.......and then some people wonder why I don't trust men.....

Men in San Francisco

Usa, afternoon

Something absurd is happening to me here....

Yesterday, beautiful day, very hot. I felt like going rollerblading in the Golden Gate Park. I rent the rollerblades and I went. A guy who was standing at the shop where I rented the rollerblades (and I thought he was working there too) saw that I was not feeling to secure yet on them. So, he offered to rollerblade a bit with me. He ended up rollerblading with me for about two hours, telling me a lot of personal things about his life, proposing to me and offering me to stay here with him and leave on his boat for whatever destination I wanted to. Just him and me. Of course, I declined the offer. He went on and on about how cool I am, about how sexy I was, about how cool is my job, about how cool is that I traveled so much.....everything about me was cool. Whatever, when a man or a woman wants something is always really good in telling you exactly what you want to hear. No that hard.

Today. Lunch break. I sit waiting for my salad and a guy (he was there with his girlfriend who was momentarily in the bathroom) ask me why I buy a tea there. I looked at him quite surprised and answered: "because I like it". What would you have answered? Well, he thought that I was someone he vaguely know who works at the bakery next door, where they also make good tea, so why buying tea from the concurrency? Of course, I never met the guy before. From there, he asked me where I work and we started to talk about Amazonian forest, animals, he just came back from the Indian tropical forest, where he saw some cool animals. He was very very friendly, but I found it weird. I mean, people here are friendly, but they don't normally approach someone out of nowhere and start to tell them about their life. Or is it normal for San Francisco? In any case, when his girlfriend came out of the bathroom, I friendly smiled to her and started to talk to her. Maybe I am too jealous, but if out of nowhere, as soon as I go to the bathroom my boyfriend starts a conversation with a complete stranger, I don't think I would like it too much....

But again, I am Italian. We are famous for being passionate and jealous....
And maybe men here are famous for being extremely friendly and out forward.

wet suite

USA, afternoon

If you read my blog since a bit of time, you know that one of my fundamental believe in life is that most men are bastard, till they prove to me to be the opposite. However, I still strongly appreciate to look at them, especially if they are worth to be look at.

Here, I am intoxicated! Most women I know find very attractive a man in an elegant suite, with a tie, maybe a nice watch etc. I am weird probably. I still don't know what attracts me or not in a man. Most man do not ring any bell in me, they remain completely indifferent to my senses. However, put the same men in a wet suite and bummmmmmm! they became immediately most of them quite interesting. If they have a nice body, they definitively became attractive. Wet suite on a man is for me the corresponding of a man in an elegant suite and tie for most women. So sexy!
So, being in San Francisco, and living near by Ocean Beach, is like being in a candy store for a kid...so full of interesting things to look at!!!

I don't know what a man in a wet suite represents to me. Thing is, all the important relationships I had so far, have been with men who often wore wet suite. To my defense I have to say that, except in one case, I fall for them even before to see them in a wet suite and in on them the wet suite was an additional good plus! They were all looking very, very sexy in that!

This to say that I enjoyed a lot my walk today.

July 15, 2009

Usa, evening

Something to jump of joy, something to be very excited about!!! The final official trailer of the new Harry Potter movie came out!!! Check out also the other trailers on the website!
To see the movie I will have to wait till July 15....I will use this time to re-read all the Harry Potter books till the sixth one included. I am so, so excited for this movie!!
I am Harry Potter addicted.

awakening

USA, night

No doubt about the fact that the time I am spending here, it is working for me as a therapy to get more in touch with myself.

I realized one thing. I am not an insecure person. I love myself, my body, my sense of humor, the way I am, my feet of course, the way I manage to talk to everyone and make them smiling and feeling comfortable, I am happy for what I achieved in my life and I am amazed by the fact that I already reached some of the dreams I had as a teenager.

But then, when I am in a relationship, I am a disaster. What I think about myself stops counting and all what it counts is what the person I am with may think of me. I continuously look for signals that may show that he loves me less or like me less or thinks I am actually not that interesting. This translates in making the person I am with feeling under pressure and start to behave in a more careful way with me. And so, because I am too afraid of the person I am with not liking me enough if I am just myself, then I start to change to a more plain person.

The end result is that I get frustrated of not being able to be myself, that I start to feel better with myself when I am alone, that I frustrate the person who is with me, that I get to think that I am together with someone who doesn't allow me to be myself and then I get so insecure and unhappy and annoyed that I start to get the feeling of being in a cage and a sense of "itch" that makes me feel the need to break up.

Of course this was not the only reason for which my relationship with the olandesino ended. But now I see that this contributed a lot to make both of us miserable and very unhappy. I always thought it was his fault. I always thought that his being so cool and so full of idea on what it is right and wrong, nice and ugly, good and bad, was what made me not being able of being myself. Instead, I start to think that large part of this was all in my head and created by me and that I seriously largely contribute to screw up something that could have been just simpler, lighter and happier.

And now I am scared of not being able to get out of this sick pattern. The only way I see a relationship working for me is to find someone who loves me as much as I love myself. The problem is that as soon as I am in a relationship, I stop loving myself and I love the other person more than me. And this, clearly doesn't work.

tragedies

USA, evening

Since this morning everyone comes to me to ask me if I heard the news, if my family is ok. The tragedy of the earthquake didn't happen near where my family lives. However, hundreds of people are not ok. Of course I am happy that my family is ok and nothing happened to them. However, tragedies are tragedies and they touch in the same way anyone who has the sensibility to recognize them as such. The tsunami in Indonesia, the numerous earthquakes, the cyclone that destroyed New Orleans and surrounding are all examples of natural disaster which cost the life of many many people. Again, I am happy that my family has not been touch by this disaster, I don't know what I would do if something would happen to them. But I am anyway touched by all these families who lost someone or many in the earthquake of last night in Abruzzo.

I just wanted to send a thought to them, even if it will not make their lives now any better. When these natural catastrophies happen, we should all stop one second to think how little and powerless we are, no matter how many cars or how much money we have or how important we are.
I know that it sounds bad, but when these things happen, my first thought is how lucky I am to not have been involved and that none of the people I love was there.

The real me

USA, night

I spent the day relaxing. I did work a bit this morning. I actually managed to finish something that was bothering me since long time, but mainly, I relaxed. I walked a lot, I sat in a cafe' reading a book and drinking a soy latte, I came back to my room and I spent more time sitting in the sun (on the balcony of my room) reading.

I feel that this stay in San Francisco will benefit me probably more in terms of mental health and recovering myself than in terms of work. Not because my work here is not going in the right direction. Work is going the way it should be, hopefully. But because I am really slowing down. After the first two crazy weeks here , and I was totally out of myself because of stress, now in some way, I am recovering. Fortunately. For sure, this amazing weather helps. But together with this, I am basically without cellphone, so none calls me. I am the master of my own time, where I work, it closes around 5pm and by 6pm I am out of there. I walk a lot, I think a lot, I am just with myself. Why all this didn't happen before, while I was in France or even before when I was in Italy, I don't know. Maybe, it was just not the right time.

I feel I am pulling the pieces of myself together. Of course, I still have some very bad day. Some day in which I am down and negative. Some day in which it doesn't matter how beautiful is the weather outside, I just want to hide in bed. But in general, I think I am slowly realizing that I have been very down, very depressed in the last two years because of a together of different causes and now I start to climb up again and learning how to be the real me again.

At work, everyone is surprised because I make smiling also people who normally never smiled at work before. It is good! :-)
I also got some colorful nail polish...it is not really easy to see it from this picture...but I have a bright green on my finger nails and a bright yellow of my toe nails. The yellow looks better! I love it! By the way...the person who gave me the nail polish on my toe nails told me that I have beautiful toe nails!!! I was so proud of my feet!