By the seventh day, God had finished the work He had been doing. Lucky him, I have not.

I hate eating alone. Absolutely, completely hate it. Sure, I got used to it - you have no choice, once you leave home and start living on your own -, but I still hate it.

I hate cooking meals for one, mostly: I usually end up screwing up the quantities, and eat either too little or too much, which is annoying, either way. And I always fall upon the same dishes, over and over again, because there's no point in trying something different when no one can share it with you.

Tuesday night was one of those nights - and, to be honest, during the whole day I have caught myself dreading the thought of the empty house I would go back to at the end of my shift.

Empty house, empty pans, empty stomach.

Food makes me much happier, when I can cook it for someone; as a matter of fact, rather than having dinner alone I prefer not to have dinner.

Screw it, I thought, at least I'll have some time to write.

There's a short story I have been thinking about for weeks, actually, and I have written only half of it, so that night should have been a good time to write further. I thought, and thought, and thought about it - on the office, on the tube - and when I finally sat down in front of the screen, pop! My mind went completely blank.

Which is usually not a problem, as my rule of thumb for writing is "if you can't remember it two hours after having thought about it, then it wasn't worth it from the start"; but damn. The alternative to writing was finding a convenient pastime that didn't consist in sitting in front of a screen, and I didn't have one, so I can safely say that I wasted a consistent part of my ever-shrinking spare time on that Terrible Tuesday.

Well done, yay! As it always happens, the following day, while heading towards the train station praying god that the rings under my eyes were not that evident, all the clever things I wanted to write came to my mind again. And there was not going to be another girl's night in to catch up, because this week - hear this, guys - I was scheduled to work on a Saturday.

No, no, no. Let's be more specifical: yesterday I went to the office because I asked for it.

Yeah, right. File it under "things you are willing to do to get an extra day off and fly back home for a few days at christmas". My holiday'd better be awesome, cause I won't settle for less after such a week.

Speaking of which, here's how it went:

Day one: I try to send a parcel to Halifax, and miserably fail, because after devoting half of my lunch break to the quest for the post office (which was inside a Costcutter I hadn't even noticed - what's wrong with clear directions and signs?), I realise that the recipient's address is written in my daily planner, and my daily planner is on my desk, back at the office.

Day two: I try to go to the bank to cash a cheque, and miserably fail, because the bank is not where it's supposed to be according to the map (thank you Barclays Branch Finder, I'll surely trust you again).

Day three: I try my luck at the post again. I spend ten minutes arguing with the guy at the counter because he doesn't want to print a posting receipt for me, not even after being showed samples of receipts I got from every other single post office I have been to during the past two months. And I have to capitulate, because it's getting late, my break is almost over, and I still have to have lunch.

Day four: Dead calm, for once. Surprising, huh?

Day five: I suffer in silence every time I hear someone saying thank god it's Friday or I'm so much looking forward to the weekend!.  

And it's not actually a bad day, per se; however, I get home so tired that I'd rather shoot myself than wake up at 7 for one more day. But I still try not to complain, because I asked for it, right?

Yeah, Right.

Day six: I go to work, try to get something done at work - well, actually, I do get something done at work, but not all of it. I guess that on Tuesday I will risk being killed, as three of the four 300-page important invoices that had been left there for me to check are still untouched (ah, the perks of sharing the office with the company's Head of Finance!).
At the end of the day, heading to Soho to meet my friends is absolutely out of question for the human derelict I have turned into - so I flee back home for a much more relaxing pizza-and-football night, falling asleep 5 minutes before the end of Real Madrid vs. Barcellona.

Day seven: Despite having earned the right to stay in bed until 1pm, I'm up and dressed at 8am because my throat is [insert swear word here] aching for whatever mysterious [insert swear word here] reason it conjured up on its own, and I can't [insert swear word here] sleep. 

The plan for today is to pretend being in good shape and go meet my parents - who are here because tomorrow there is my awards ceremony, and they are still determined not to miss it, although they admittedly don't understand one word of English (guess who will have the privilege of translating?).
It's going to be...interesting, to say the least. Or it would be interesting, if it was happening to someone else. But it's happening to me, and I'd rather forget about the ceremony and the graduation and all the hype and enjoy my day off without a care.

You'll agree with me that, if I survived this week, that was only be because of what I knew I would find in my fridge at the end of the day.

Amaretti with coffee and mascarpone

(and welcome to today's guest star: my lovely* and amazing* boyfriend, who actually made these mostly by himself. Alas, how I wish I was the daughter of a former chef too.)

I'm not a big fan of mascarpone, actually. I was a little worried about how it would affect the biscuits' taste, especially since no sugar is involved in the preparation, but I changed my mind as soon as I had the first bite.

I should have known better, of course: how on earth can an otherwise reasonably smart human being have doubts about something involving amaretti?

Sorry, Lord Amaretto, I won't do it anymore. These biscuits are simply amazing, and I'm trying really hard to keep myself from rushing to the kitchen and having another one. Two. Three.

As for how to make them, there's hardly anything easier.

Just soak the amaretti biscuits with coffee (I poured the coffee in a bowl and then plunged them in - and that's all I did as far as this recipe is concerned, really), and divide them into pairs: put a teaspoon of mascarpone on the flat side of one biscuit, then attach a plain biscuit, making a sort of sandwich.

As soon as each biscuit is ready, roll it in grated coconut, and put it on a plate (we used the baking tin, and covered it with a plate to protect the biscuits). Finally, put everything in the fridge, and wait at least 4 hours before serving.

See, it's really easy to make. You have no excuses not to try - so buy those [insert swear word here]** amaretti, and head to the kitchen. Now.

(on air: The Cure - Friday I'm in love)

(* = these are not my words, of course. I certainly wouldn't attribute such flattering adjectives to His Remarkable Person*, if he hadn't agreed to pay me a fee of £20 per compliment; this is business, baby, how dare you call it love?)

(** = Yes, I swear a lot, in real life. And  I can't even convince myself that it's a bad thing. But then, you can't really grow up in a country village in North-eastern Italy and talk like a lady, can you?)

Forever alone - hey, that's me!

So we are having this party, tonight: a party that we have been planning for ages, since our former flatmate informed us that he would be moving out in two weeks that later became one whole month, and that, since no one was meant to replace him, we would finally be able to access the backyard, have a living room, and use the house like it's meant to be used: three bedrooms, three people, and one lounge.

Like all potentially good things, the living room craze lasted about one week: we barely had the time to clean up and put the PS3 gloriously beside the television screen, that our other flatmate asked the landlady to swap rooms and take the one downstairs. To which the landlady said yes, but you are going to pay a higher rent, and i'm going to find someone to take the small room.
And here we are: we will soon be four again, four and unable to go outside and pet the neighbours'cat. Or to have friends round and chill out outside the kitchen, for that matter. Yeah, sad story is sad. But what's sadder is that we organised this party, tonight - conceived as house-warming, turned into Farewell Living Room and Social Life - and no one's coming.

I invited my classmates from uni and a few other friends, and my boyfriend fueled my celebrative spirit by promising that all his ex-colleagues would be there; we came up with a list of little less than twenty people, which is a lot for a couple of socially awkwards as we are, and chances are that we will actually be no more than six, because all the others didn't even bother to reply.
Goodbye to my positive disposition and hope that everyone will have fun, then: I suspect that, as always, I will end up feeling responsible for my guests, which means feeling crap because I invited them to something they disliked.

Fuck, I hate organising parties. And I hate the emo-teen-like sensation that I always get in these situation, the kind of feeling that sounds like no one gives a damn about my party, which means that no one gives a damn about me, which means that I screwed up with everyone and I don't know why.
Seriously: why do most people in the world only have to say ah to be surrounded by friends, while I'm unable even to have the people I made friends with over the past year come and have a drink at my house?
It's frustrating; I hope, at least, that the dessert I invented from scratch this afternoon will taste good, but I guess you'll find out in my next post.

For this one, since we're talking about half-failures, let me introduce you to my half-failed muffins. They were supposed to be delicious - and they are, indeed - but they were not supposed to be so small.
Why are they so small, you ask? Well, because the chef is an idiot, for a start: I guess they would have been the right size if I had made eight of them like the recipe said, and not twelve.
They should have also represented my first serious try at decent food photography, but I discovered far too rapidly that my kitchen is the worst location ever for that. I guess I'll try again when I'll have the money to have my own house and my own lifestyle-magazine-like kitchen; for the moment, I cannot even afford Ikea, fancy that.

Ricotta and Chocolate Chip Muffins

(I found the original recipe on an Italian forum, so I guess there's no point in pasting the link)

Ingredients for 8 muffins (eight, understood?):

125g flour;
60g sugar;
50g butter;
50g milk chocolate;
125g ricotta cheese;
¼ glass milk (I use skimmed milk, but you can change that if you prefer);
½ sachet baking powder;
1 egg.

Recipe:

- Melt the butter in a heatproof bowl, over simmering water; remove it from the hob and mix it with the sugar.
- Add the egg and ricotta cheese, and beat well, until the batter is even; then, add the flour and baking powder.
- Pour the milk over the batter; mix well, and add the chocolate, which you will have previously chopped into not-too-small chunks.
- Pour the batter into a greased muffin tin, and bake for 20 minutes, at a temperature of 180°.


That's it, and it's terribly easy, if you are just a little smarter than me (which everyone potentially is, trust me).
In the end, the muffins were so tiny that I could have eaten all of them in one go; I'll definitely try them again, to experience the pleasure of having them full-size.

(On air: Delain - Frozen)

Still looking for god? Read here.

My first weekend after five whole days of work feels totally different from any other weekend I can get myself to remember. It is probably the first time that I can spend a whole Saturday morning sitting here, on my bed, writing on my laptop because I have no other significant plans...and not complain at all, not even one single time.

All in all, it's a much more relaxed feeling - which sounds strange, I agree, if we consider that waking up every morning at 7 is seriously putting my brain to the test, and leaving me dead tired and craving for sleep at just ten in the evening. But compare this to the disquiet, the despair of having little or nothing to do and feeling that you will have little or nothing to do for the rest of your life: whoever says that routine is hell, has probably never been unemployed, because once you finally build one it's impossible not to recognise that to a certain extent there's comfort in it.

My workplace is one hour away from where I live (unless the 7.33 train is late, unless I miss it, unless the tube gets stuck like it did yesterday evening), but even this is no big deal to me: I get to listen to some music, to read the papers, to read much more of the books I used to hopelessly carry around just to find that I didn't have time for them in the end. I plunge into human nature, search for the inspiration I feel I have lost as for my writing. And I relish the moment when I will be back home, looking forward to a satisfying dinner to make up for another tasteless Marks and Spencer sandwich.
Well, it would probably not be so tasteless, if I gathered the courage to go for full-fat tuna mayo or chicken and bacon and follow my colleagues to the checkout without feeling guilty. Forget having reduced fat food at lunch is definitely one of the lessons I learnt from my first week as a team secretary, but I'm afraid that it will take a lot of time before I actually put it into practice.
(The second lesson, if you ask, sounds like no matter how early you get up and dressed, you won't be really awake until you have your morning coffee. And as 7 a.m. is definitely too early to have breakfast at home, I don't manage to have my morning coffee until nine. )

You are free to warn me that I will start to loathe routine approximately at some point towards the middle of my second week, but I will say no more about the matter - not for now.
I guess all the above sounded plain boring, huh? I know, I know, you are waiting for the food; so be it.

There's a long story behind this cake.
I first heard about it from my mother, who had been going on for at least a couple of years about how good at baking this janitor at her school was, and about how amazingly delicious the cake she brought the teachers from time to time had proven to be, and about how much she regretted not being able to offer me a taster.
Give me the recipe, then, I used to reply. At least four times, if I remember well.
The first time she forgot to ask for it.
The second time she couldn't, because the janitor was seriously ill and off work for at least a couple of months.
The third time - well, the third time my mother did something really cute: she cut out a tiny slice of The Cake, sneaked it into a tissue and then into her bag, and brought it home. I remember I found it good. Yeah, well, the slice was too thin to actually call it by its name, which is no less than Divine Wonder. And no, I didn't get the recipe, not even then.
I got if the fourth time, together with another one (an apricot pie that I still haven't tried). So, to celebrate my depart to London, I baked it the week before leaving home, and felt as if I had just found the secret to recreate the most delicious dessert anyone had ever baked.

Since then, I guess I started associating it with celebration - as I didn't bake it again until last week, when I finally could fulfil my promise of making an amazing cake as soon as I got a job. I even took it to the office on Monday and Tuesday, for breakfast; you probably can imagine the pain I felt when I returned to my usual Weight-Watchers-yogurt-and-bran-flakes on Wednesday, but I surely don't wish you any of it.
What I wish you, instead, is to try this cake and go through the same epiphany that I experience any time I eat it. I'll certainly bake it again, one day or another: maybe when (and if) I get a pay rise?

Ricotta and amaretti cake

Base: 

- Mix 100g butter with 100g sugar; add 1 egg, 250g flour, baking powder and 1 tablespoon almond flavouring.
- Knead until firm and even, and spread inside a greased cake tin. 
Careful, though: you should not use all the batter, as you will need a little bit of it later, for the decoration. It's not easy to decide how much exactly to set aside: I tend to use about 3/4 of it for the tin, and my rule is that it has to be spread evenly on the bottom, but the borders should remain clear.

Cream:

- Mix 400g ricotta cheese with 2 tablespoons sugar; add 2 eggs and 150g amaretti biscuits, which you will have previously broken into crumbs.
- Pour the cream in the cake tin, over the base. 
- Decorate with another 50g amaretti crumbs, mixed with the batter you had previously set aside, broken into small pieces as well.
- Pre-heat the oven to 175°, and bake for about 30 minutes.
- MEET GOD. After it has cooled down, of course.

Hello early mornings, goodbye unemployment.

So, apparently the Great News of the Week is that I have a job.

Overall, it took me almost four months, hundreds of refusals, millions of no-replies, liters of tears and tons of mindless self-indulgence, but I finally got here; I still don't know how, and considering my self-esteem issues I probably never will, but hey: does it really matter?
I have a job. I have a job.

I survived a telephone interview during which I had actually sounded like an awkward mess (try answering to questions like what kind of person do you think we are looking for? while walking around Victoria Street in search of a quiet spot that you won't find. Try that, and then we'll talk), I survived a 3-hour trial that brought back to light my ancient troubles with mathematics and Microsoft Excel and answered to a series of tricky questions that the Spanish Inquisition could not have asked better.
(curious about why the hell an aspirant writer should look for a secretarial job? Because not all writers are good and potentially successful writers, for a start. And then because you don't get into publishing with just two degrees and an English as a Foreign Language certificate - but that doesn't mean that you cannot still be the kind of obsessive organisational nazi that makes a good secretary, does it?)
And then, after all of this and just when I was losing my hopes of ever getting back home to the huge pizza that was waiting for me in the fridge, I was offered the job. And I accepted, because I am precisely the kind of obsessive organisational nazi that makes a good secretary, and because I can always be a writer or a freelance translator during the evening, or the weekend, or even the lunch break.

I will now resist the temptation of singing The dog days are ove-errr, the do-oo-og days a-aaare done while manically jumping on my bed - mind you, just because the mattress will probably breathe its last if I do.
Oh, and because from next Monday I will have to wake up at 7 every morning, and have breakfast on the tube - of course, if I am lucky enough to get a seat.
I also imagine I will have poorer and quicker lunches, but that's not a big deal, considering that I absolutely need to lose some weight before I have to upgrade my whole wardrobe to a bigger size. In the meantime, celebration is mandatory - so, while waiting for a chance to bake the amaretti cake I had sworn I would make as soon as I got a job, I will treat you with another sweet delight, hoping that you will enjoy it as much as I enjoyed it last weekend.

Supposedly Healthy Marble Cheesecake

(freely inspired from here - of course, you can use full-fat ingredients if you prefer)

Ingredients:

- 90g reduced fat Digestive biscuits;
about 30g butter, melted (the recipe said 1 tablespoon, which means around 15g, but while making the crust I found that this wasn't enough - so I simply added some more);
- 680g low-fat cream cheese;
- 200g sugar
- 25g flour
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 4 large egg whites;
- 30g milk chocolate.

Recipe:

- Break the biscuits into small crumbs, and mix them with the melted butter in a bowl. Pour the batter in a greased cake tin, spreading it evenly until the bottom is entirely covered. Pre-heat the oven to 160° and bake for 8-10 minutes, then set aside until cool.
- Place the cream cheese in a large bowl, and beat it with a mixer until smooth (that is, if you are lucky enough to have a mixer. I still haven't got one, so I made do with beating by hand, and gave up on the challenge when my arm started aching. And although the cheese wasn't particularly smooth in the end, the cake was still delicious); add the sugar and flour, and keep on beating.
- Mix the vanilla extract and egg whites in a separate bowl, then add them to the cheese mixture.
- Pour the cream into the pan, above the biscuit base.
- Melt the chocolate; now this was the really difficult part. The recipe says you should just set the microwave to high speed and cook for no more than 1 1/2 minutes, but with my microwave this certainly didn't work: after two minutes, the chocolate was still unmelted, and not a bit softer than before. So I cooked it for one more minute, and after 60 tiny seconds it was...burnt!
Still can't explain that - and I surely won't explain you what kind of an awful smell had filled the kitchen by then. Luckily, there were a few squares of chocolate left in the cupboard, so I melted them in a heatproof bowl over simmering water. And, at last, I poured the heavenly melt over the cream, swirling with a fork to create some sort of decorative pattern.
- Last step, now: bake the cake at 160° for 35 minutes, or until almost set (the cheesecake should leave the side a little). Cool on a wire rack, then cover and chill at least 4 hours in the fridge.

Serve, and enjoy - and never forget the moral of the whole story: always keep some spare chocolate in your cupboard, sooner or later it will come in useful!

(on air: Florence and the Machine - Dog Days Are Over) 

Trust me, this will not aggravate your diabetes.

There's a cat under my window today. A gigantic yet cute white and brown tabby cat (is it just me, or all English cats are actually enormous? No kidding, three different cats used to wander in my previous place's garden, and they were all twice the size of any Italian cat I can recall seeing), with yellow eyes - a shade of yellow I had never seen before, I must say.

Unfortunately, he could only come in from my flatmate's window, and he's already made clear that he won't let a stray cat inside. Besides that it's probably not a stray cat, it's just that it doesn't wear a collar because cats fucking hate wearing collars. Try slipping a collar on a cat's neck, have you ever? There's not an easiest way to have your wrists cut without a blade. (I was ten when I discovered it. There are things that no child should ever learn, amen).

All of this, just to say that I want a cat. I miss my cat, I miss hugging a cat when I feel I need some sweetness, I simply miss being around a cat. And chances are that I'll never be around a cat again, until I have my own house. Or the money to have my own house. Or a job that pays enough money to have my own house one day - that is to say, very late.

Anyway, let's go back to our kitchen business.

I know I have a not-so-subtle preference for sweet recipes, so I'll give you something salty for once. If you want to find out how to invite three friends to a birthday dinner and surprise them with a tasty main dish despite having spent the whole afternoon baking the cake, you're in the right place, guys.

Mediterranean loaf and mini puff snacks

By now, you might have realised that most part of the things I cook look ugly. I try my best, I swear - but cooking something tasty and pretty still seems to be my unresolved challenge.
The good news is that 99% of the ugly things I cook actually tastes great. So, don't be scared by the picture below: you won't be disappointed, once it's ready.

The - uhm - thing in the middle is a sort of savoury loaf, with a Mediterranean twist I'd say. It's terribly easy to prepare, and the puff snacks all around are even easier; besides, if you're more skilled than me at giving an actual shape to the food you make (and I bet anyone potentially is),  it shouldn't be difficult to create a neat and pretty platter.

To prepare the loaf, you will need to:

- beat 2 eggs with 3 tablespoons of olive oil, salt and oregano;
- add 100g flour and 1 sachet unsweetened baking powder;
- remove the seeds from 100g cherry tomatoes, cut them in halves (or smaller, if you prefer), and add them to the batter, together with 100g olives (again, cut as finely as you like; also, it doesn't really matter if you use green or black olives - I personally like the taste of both).
- put the batter in a loaf tin, that you will previously have greased with oil; finally, pre-heat the oven to 170°, and cook for about 30 minutes.

And to prepare the puff snacks, you will:

- Cut 1 puff sheet (yes, yes, store-bought puff: I'm not so skilled to make it on my own yet...) in squares, or circles, or rectangles - or, as I said before, any shape you fancy, as long as the filling fits in;
- Put a little bit of filling in the middle of each square - or whatever it is (you can use anything you like; as for me, on that particular occasion I tried several different combinations of ham, mozzarella cheese, anchovies and peppers - for no reason in particular, but the fact that I already had everything at home);
- Fold the pastry around the filling, and make sure it doesn't leak out; pre-heat the oven to 180°, and bake for around 30 minutes.

See, it's damn simple. And the friends I had invited for dinner really liked it all, despite its ugliness. Besides,  we had this cake as dessert, and that was actually something tasty and pretty I still am proud of. Yes, I like cooking for my friends. I should, um, organise more dinners. Or have more birthdays.
Well, alright, one per year is already enough, considering that I have precociously started dreading the thought of one more candle to blow when I turned twenty.

Of muffins and ingratitude.

Despite not receiving one single piece of advice on the last post (which might mean, now that I think about it, that no one reads my blog), I eventually decided to turn this into a cook-blog.
It might actually do me some good - first, because I need to get used to be a regular at something again, and second, because I am starting to fear that my obsession with diets will rise again if I don't get a job and/or push my life back again on the right track soon. When the angel on the right shoulder says you know, losing some weight sounds so much like a good idea, and the devil on the left replies screw it, if eating makes you happy then it's exactly what you have to do - who does the self-esteem-less food addict listen to?
It's hard, it's always been hard. I guess it always will be. But that's another long and complicated story, and I hope you won't mind if I choose not to tell it.

Anyway, I want to cook, and cook, and cook again. Because it's fun, because it keeps me from thinking about practically anything else (apart from gosh, do I really have to wait for it to cool down before serving?), and because, trust me, nothing makes me more happy than a recipe gone right.
I also want to write, write, and write, and write again - so, what's better than blogging about food? I'll have one more good reason to cook without feeling guilty, and one more good chance to improve my writing.
Done deal, then. Stay tuned, because here comes something I have created myself.

Chocolate Coconut Muffins

(the chocolate sponge was store-bought, alas! But I hope I'll give a try at that as well, soon)

I was inspired by this recipe, which I actually intended to try on that fateful day. It was a Tuesday, if I can remember well - a typical English Summer Tuesday, whose promise of heavy showers of rain had made me give up on my resolution to dress up, get out, go to the library and work on my master thesis.
I was alone at home, and, as it alwas happens when I'm home alone on a rainy day with nothing to do (obviously the thesis doesn't count), I was sad. Sad, and with a couple spare eggs in the fridge. Which was actually the perfect combo, because cooking muffins would surely have made me happy and given a purpose to my boring afternoon.
Unfortunately, there were no pineapples or white chocolate in my cupboard, and at that point I was feeling too lazy to dress up, get out, walk ten minutes to the supermarket and then walk ten minutes back; this is when creativity became the keyword.

As you can see, the ingredients are slightly different comparing to the original:

- 180g plain flour
- 100g sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt (which I actually think I forgot, on that occasion - nevermind, that's one good reason to try again!)
-180ml skimmed milk (just because I'm a health freak; if you want to use semi-skimmed or wholemilk, that's perfectly fine)
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon Amaretto liquor (again, the only one I had at home)
- 90g milk chocolate chips
- 50g grated coconut.

The recipe per se is quite simple, but I'm proud of the result. You should obtain twelve muffins - and this is why I highly recommend you to set twelve chocolate chips aside before melting all the others. You'll see why...that was actually my own personal touch!

- To prepare the batter, mix the milk, egg and liquor, and then add the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar.
- Melt the chocolate chips (remember, all of them minus twelve!) in a bowl over simmering water, and add them as well, together with the grated coconut.
- Split the batter evenly into a greased muffin tin. First of all, put only one tablespoon in each muffin case; add one of the spare chocolate chips on top of this "base", and then cover it with another tablespoon of batter.
- Pre-heat the oven to 190°, and cook for about 15 minutes.
The outcome? Extremely moist muffins, with a chocolatey surprise in the middle. I usually fail miserably at first attempts, but this was a pleasant exception to the norm.

Then came the moral dilemma: as usual, the angel on my right shoulder, subtly whispering come on, you're most definitely not going to eat twelve muffins on your own.
I usually exploit my boyfriend for tastings, and he is usually more than happy to accept such a task, but we weren't planning to see much of each other that week, and the muffins had to go before they lost their softness. So, I decided to insert my flatmates into the equation.

It had been a long time since I last had cooked for them, and I also wanted to apologise for the way I had treated them during the past couple of weeks: true, they had been unclean as usual, they had let two bills expire and, on top of it all, they had thrown the loudest party ever, up until four in the morning and making as much noise as possible while I was trying to get some sleep (don't worry, if you want to be on your own and study this evening we won't disturb you!) - but I surely had overreacted to it all, and it wasn't fair to blame them for my being stressed, unsatisfied of my job and unwilling to make any effort to get my thesis done.
Let's prove them I'm still a good person, I told myself, leaving eight muffins in plain sight on the kitchen table. I added a funny note, and hoped that, if they didn't want to appreciate the thought, they still would appreciate the food. Well, guess how many muffins they ate? One. Out of eight.

I left them untouched for two more days, just in case they changed their minds, but nothing happened. So, what does this teach me? Indeed, not everyone deserves to be offered your food.
Or, more broadly: stop trying to be kind to people, they just don't care.
But that's a lesson I'll never learn, I'm afraid.

(On air: Phoenix - Armistice)

Here we go again.

My proverbial constancy is shaking.
I apologise to all those who used to read my posts (not that I think you are that many): it has been really a long time since I last felt something that resembled inspiration.

In the meantime, I have done plenty of things. I have completed (it was supposed to grant me some relevant working experience, but here I am, on the edge of a downright Unemployed Graduate's Crisis whose end I cannot actually foresee); I have spent three weeks of holiday between my overseas home and the seaside resort I used to consider as Heaven on Earth, looking for a bit of summer and finding nothing but my old friend, perpetual rain.
I have cried myself to insomnia, dreading the day I would have to step back on a plane and come back to London, because I knew what was expecting me here...and there it was, exactly as I had figured it: one month of excruciating labour, juggling between a master thesis I didn't want to write and a few weeks of house-hunting; a week of preparations for the move (which actually was one of the best things that could happen to me at that time - but hell knows how the positive changes are the ones whose effect lasts the least), and then forced passiveness. I have spent three weeks looking for jobs, without anything else to do from morning to dinner time, and it already feels like ages. Which is not reassuring at all, if I think that three weeks might actually turn into three months, three years, and then a whole life.

But I'll say no more about that: I already vented tons and tons of unrequested sadness on my friends, who certainly have better thoughts to think than me and my beginning-of-depression, and my parents, who deserve better than a whining, despondent, good-for-nothing daughter.
Things will get better; I am sure they will. I have always thought that what makes us suffer more is not our reason for suffering itself, but the fact that we don't know, and we cannot get to know, when bad times will end. And that's it, once again: not knowing when I will actually receive the invitation to the interview that will change my life for good is what really wears me out. If someone came up to me and told me "you'll get a job on that particular day" (yep, I've seen Donnie Darko, why do you ask?), I'd surely strive to enjoy the time in between as it deserves, because at least I would have the certainty that change is on its way.

Speaking about change, let's get straight to the point of this post.
I've been thinking that I maybe should give a little twist to this blog - make it a little more focused, turn it into something well-defined, rather than a simple collection of random, uneven rants by an unpleasant human being who has nothing better to do but complain (at least, not for the moment). The most interesting idea that has come up until now is to turn it into a food blog, each post having its own recipe; as I love cooking, and it is actually getting me through these days.Who knows, perhaps it could be an incentive for my proverbial constancy to come back.

But I'll be a good democrat, for once, and ask for your opinion as well.
Would you enjoy my recipes, or do you prefer the rants? I can do both, of course, multitasking is one of the main skills on my CV. So yeah, let me know. I am aware that I haven't got that many readers, but those who actually stop here and grant me a few minutes of their time are more than welcome to speak out their minds. In the meantime, here's a recipe for you; I highly recommend you try it, because it's far more than amazing, believe me.

Chocolate Truffle Torte
(as found in a huge chocolate cookbook I bought in Dublin for 3, three, euros. Call it a miracle.)

(and yeah, on the cookbook it looked much better. But if you're reading this blog, then looks shouldn't matter to you. Ha!)

Crust: 

Put 50g caster sugar and 2 eggs in a heatproof bowl set over a saucepan of simmering water. Whisk together until pale and resembling the texture of mousse. Sift in 40g flour and 25g cocoa powder, and mix gently. Pour into a greased cake tin and bake in the oven (220°) for 7-10 minutes, until risen and firm.
Transfer the crust to a wire rack to cool, and then put it back into the tin, which you will have washed and dried in the meantime. Finally, mix together 4 tablespoons strong black coffee and 2 tablespoons brandy, and brush the resulting liquid over the cake crust in the tin.

Cream:

Put 425g plain chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water, and let it melt. Gently add the melted chocolate to 600ml whipped cream; pour the mixture over the crust, and let the cake chill in the fridge until the cream is firm.

Serve with cocoa and icing sugar sifted over the top, if you like. Et voilà!
You'll love it. I promise.

(on air: Bright Eyes - No lies, just love.)

A day in the life (aka: yeah, all of this really happened).

Rotten luck wakes up a few minutes before you, and starts working right away. Once you recognized its mark, there's really nothing you can do: it's up and running, and it won't cross its arms, or sit down and rest, until everything it planned is set up to cause you as much damage as possible.

I had enjoyed a relatively calm period, without its unpleasants twists of plot...and now here it is, back again. Take yesterday, for example: I was the most peaceful person ever when I woke up, relaxed and without a trace of the terrible headache that had prevented me from doing anything productive the previous day...oh heavens, how good you can feel after ten hours of sleep!
No, wait. Ten hours of sleep? Something must be wrong. I went to bed at midnight, and now it's 9.51. Ten to ten. I have to be at work at ten, and look at me, self-conscious in my lounge clothes, with sleepy eyes and the beginning of a guilt feeling that has still not left me yet.
What followed would be worth a grotesque comedy: I almost broke my coffee machine because I unadvertedly forgot to put water in it (first thing I usually do, when my head actually works), I encountered a huge queue at the ticket office because all automatic counters were closed, and...well, I can't say I found a mad and enraged boss when I arrived at the office, but the smile with which she warmly advised me to come and help her with some heavy work today at 8.30 resembled more a hyena's grin than anything human and friendly.
And then, the grades of my exams: all that was left to wait for before booking my holidays...and now, on the deadline for publication, one is missing. The one I am most worried about, the one that can make my vacation plans vanish into thin air. Come on, please, tell me that all this is a joke. And, even if it's not, why the hell is it happening to me?

I haven't killed anyone, harmed anyone, offended anyone - not that I know. Is this some bad karma from my previous life? Come on, what was I in my previous life, a reckless street criminal? A children kidnapper? No way. Besides, I don't believe in reincarnation, or whatever sort of gods, fancy destiny. It is, probably, just a series of unlucky coincidences, and it seems that I'm not skilled enough to go through it without wreaking havoc everywhere I go.
Which leads us to today.

No, I didn't start working at 8.30 in the end, that was my tiny bit of luck. I could avoid waking up at 7...and what for? To be awake at 5.30, perfectly conscious, not at all tired, and furiously thinking about my dissertation.
Do you ever get that feeling, that if you do not put on paper an interesting thought you have right now, you might as well forget it completely in the span of one minute? I get that all the time. And this morning wasn't an exception: here I am, on the road again, awake at 6 with my laptop on my knees, typing madly on my thesis's open file, fearing that words and sentences will escape me if I try to hold on to them for too long.
That's madness, fucking madness. And what follows is even worse: from sending the wrong message to the wrong person, giving away too much of a mood swing that just needed enough time to pass and disappear, to being blamed by my boss for I-dont'-know-what that I surely haven't done, to being almost beaten up by a complete stranger in the queue for lunch.

His reason for punching me in the face? I had jumped the queue and stood for too long in the way of his precious wife and child. Jesus christ, I thought that those things had stopped happening after the Middle Age. 

Calm down, buddy, I'm just looking at the food on display, I should have answered - rather truthfully, anyway. Or maybe I should have sounded annoyed, pointed out to his merry family that he was being quite a bad example for the child, and that, in any case, children shouldn't be allowed to play with the sushi on the display rails.
Quite effective lines, I must say. And guess what I replied, instead, when he finally apologized for being too violent?
Don't worry, it's alright. That's what I replied. And I still don't know why.
Perhaps because I felt tears on the corner of my eyes, the urge to run away, disappear completely, run to the highest peak I could reach, shout leave me alone! at all the people waiting down with their burden of disappointment, spite and bullshit - up and ready to be thrown on me.
I felt the concrete chance that half the world I know in this corner of the world was hating me for my recent less than considerate words and actions, and that the remaining half hadn't begun yet, because, well, they still hadn't come across me during the day.
Really, I just wanted to lock myself in a bathroom stall and cry my heart out. But there was no sign leading to the ladies' room in Victoria Station, so I simply took my sushi box and walked away with my eyes cast down, still wanting to explode, or dig myself a hole into the ground.

Here's to the end of June, then, and to July 1st as well. Sometimes rotten luck simply decides that you're its target, and it doesn't stop shooting until you raise your hands and admit you're screwed.

(On air: Tori Amos - Crucify)

This is fact, not fiction. This is theory, and practice.

I might be growing old inside, which doesn't necessarily mean I'm wise beyond my years. I know that my way of relating to others might look quite weird, and I surely can count my significant others on one hand, plus maybe a few fingers - maybe. I've done wrong to much more people than I'd like to recall, and I often feel this blind fear, the terror that keeping the ones I love close to my heart is not what karma has in store for me. (they call it abandon syndrome, don't they?)
All of this is gospel truth, you're right. Even so, I'm quite convinced that there's nothing more petty, nothing more sad than people who never put themselves at stake.

I'm not talking about changing for someone else's sake, or accepting compromises you didn't want to take. There are people who actually live life as if it was just that, and take it lightly, as if sacrificing didn't really matter...but truth is that it does: these things always end up weighing heavy on your heart, and sometimes you realize it when it's too late to turn back. No, that's definitely not it; what I mean by questioning yourself is rather different.

It's looking at life from a point of view that is not strictly your own, and, perhaps, find out that you do not possess the key to Absolute Rightness - although you probably thought you did.
It's making the effort of adapting to what happens around you, instead of stomping your feet like a stubborn baby when it doesn't fit 100% of your hopes and expectations. And yeah, sometimes it's also swallowing your pride and coping with deception...but isn't it a risk worth taking, after all?
Now stop, and think it over: how often do you imagine you'll be facing something like this, in a lifetime's span?

Yearly, on December 31st, while you wait for midnight and elaborate your new year's resolutions? Once or twice, just because you feel you have no choice? Never, at all?
Well, surprise: it always happens. It's a continuous process.
Sometimes you struggle with its unbearable heaviness, and wish you had never taken the toll on your shoulders; sometimes it's way simpler, it just happens, natural consequence of living, loving, breathing. It might as well be what they usually call growing up - but well, who knows? After all, growing up is a verb I still cannot stand.

Only this I am sure about: if claiming that you've had enough of life seems perfectly logical to you, if shutting your brain and blaming the others looks better than second-guessing yourself...well, don't be shocked when you eventually end up feeling deceived, you had it coming.
The stories that end before even starting, those that get stuck at the first obstacle, the friendships you choose to cut because they give you everything but the words you'd like to hear. The situations that do not evolve, because you had the opportunity to set them in motion, but you were too hasty in dismissing it as bullshit: you probably deserved them - at least, a little bit.

They say second-guessing yourself is bad, but I don't think it's totally so. The secret is asking yourself questions - a lot of questions, actually - and looking beyond your own answers. It's not that you're always, necessarily wrong...it's just that, sometimes, the solution is way simpler than you thought.
 I'd write it on my walls, if I could, because sometimes I dare to forget about it.
Try it, at least once in your life. It might actually work, you'd be surprised.

(On air: No Doubt - Just a girl.)

I sometimes get the urge to listen to French music, and yet I still can't understand the lyrics.

 I have always wondered how it feels to have a place to call home: I have lived in so many places, that I still wouldn't be able to tell where's mine.

Each of them was home, for a short while; in each of them I put my hope and my trust, again and again, like a betrayed child who still can't help looking at the world with innocent eyes. But something always led me to leave - a new opportunity, an insurmountable problem, or just life.

I felt a bit like dying when I left France after four months, and when I moved out of the flat I shared as a student as well; and yet I knew I had taken all I could from those places, I knew they had already given me all they could offer to someone like me. After all, in Italian, leaving and dying are two verbs that rhyme; no surprises, right?
On the other hand, the day when flying to London stopped being a pious hope and became a fixed date on my calendar was one of the happiest ever; perhaps, I have been happier when my flight actually landed: hey, I made it, I've been dreaming of this for years and now I'm here!
So long to leaving and dying, then; actually, I prefer much more the English assonance with living.
(I wonder how many times I confused them when I was in school; I remember it took me ages to learn the difference between forgive and forget...but of course this is less subtle, less troubling).

Yes, I'd like London to be my home. Actually, I'd like London to treat me well: to recognize my perseverance, to accord me an accomplice wink from time to time...at least, because I have dreamt of it for years.
Ten years, almost eleven now. Way more than I granted to any of my fleeting, unconfessed teenage crushes - and yet, I can tell you each of them resided in this messy mind for quite a long time, back then.
London has been my true love for almost half of my life; now that we're finally bonded together, I love it even more.
Like all careless lovers, it keeps messing with my mind, continuously asking me for absurd sacrifices that every time I say I won't make...but in the end I just can't help falling victim of its charm, believing its promises, reopening the innocent child's eyes and hoping for the best.
I desperately want London to be my home. I don't want the place I grew up in to make any more maternity claims - see, I AM your home, you just booked a flight to come back on a weekend!
Come on, I answer angrily, you're a shithole, you'll never be more than a hit-and-run retreat...and it relentlessly insists: HA! You just admitted I give you relief, unlike that other friggin' metropolis.

It sounds like an argument between an abandoned, old mommy and her young daughter claiming she must have been a changeling. Who loves who, and who hates who other, is probably destined to remain unclear; what's sure is that I still want to believe in London and me.
I want to see the world, travel, explore, walk upon each and every street until my legs can't take it anymore - and yes, I also want to be looked after in my hate-loved shithole, from time to time. But at the end of all holidays, of all trips, of all vacations, I want to come back to London, and know for sure it still has something in store for me. Something I'll have to struggle to get, perhaps, but I don't really care; not anymore.
Anything goes, as long as this is not another one-way affair.

(On air: Saez - J'Accuse)

Schadenfreude, anyone?

So here I come again, after the umpteenth day of wandering around in search of an open library. Who would have guessed that May 2nd was Bank Holiday? Good for you, vacationers; my Easter holidays terminated today.

Wait: did I say holidays? Actually, during the last two weeks I have been more busy than I have in the previous two...months. And I utterly, definitely, completely, absolutely loved it.

As I said when I started this off, most of my happiness is all about keeping my brain busy. Because I'm a heavy thinker with an unpleasant tendency to pessimism, yes; but also because I 'm more brawn than brain, I love doing things and I hate the eternal, optimistic wait of the day when I will finally be able to achieve them.
Surprise surprise, that's not at all how life happens. Not mine, anyway. I know people who are constantly overwhelmed with opportunities, cues and  chances; I call them lucky, but perhaps there's a little envy, here, and they're just more competent and bold than I am. More, how'd you say it? Entitled: to do what they do, to be who they are, to get what they want.
Yes, I'd so much like to learn how to become the right person at the right time; unfortunately, as Jonathan Coe writes in one of my all-time favourite books, "it is my destiny always to be offstage whenever the main action occurs, always to wander away at the most important moment, drifting into the kitchen to make a cup of tea just as the denouement unfolds".

See, when I say that thinking too much is my doom you can definitely believe me. And yet I've been born, bred and raised to be a thinker; you'd laugh to tears if you saw the reaction my mother has every time I mention to her that I'm definitely not going to study for the rest of my life, as she'd like me to.
"But sweetheart, why don't you apply for that other Master, you know, just to have one more chance to..."
Sure. I'm twenty-four (right, almost), living away from home since when I was nineteen, and all I have been doing is taking one dead-end road after another, rushing to reach the end of one-way streets I entered from the wrong side, and thinking, and thinking, and thinking to escape the count of the hours remaining before the day when I finally would stick my hands in the batter and build a life of my own. And that's how you advise me? Another Master? Thank you, Ma, that was helpful.

It's not that I'm not already trying; probably, one more time, I'm simply doing it wrong.
Again, that's one of those things that would make you roll on the floor laughing if it wasn't happening to you.
In the last six months, I applied for almost any job I thought I could do - any one, from ice-cream seller to press officer, from part-time biscuit cutter to receptionist to editorial unpaid intern -; have a guess on my percentage of success?
Zero, yes.
I can hardly believe it - and careful, not because a disproportionate self-esteem keeps me from realizing that I'm unsuitable for anything but reading academic manuals and losing my sight typing essays I will never pass. What I mean is...come on, do you really  need proof of two years' experience to hire someone who'll sell ice-cream behind a counter? Do you truly ask for relevant experience for an internship...which is supposed to train me? If you're so keen on talking nonsense, sit down, let's have a chat about the green dragon standing right behind the staircase. Sure as hell, it's as real as my chances to find a job before I reach the pensionable age.

At least you've got creativity, says my mother each time I mention a new improbable job I applied for.
Oh, true, I never lacked creativity. That's the one thing I'm proud of, if there really has to be one.
Still, the amount of application received was very high and the quality level outstanding, we're sorry to tell you that we rejected your application for the Creative Writer position. Sincerely yours, the Big Chief Editor of Whatever Serious Publishing House You Just Contacted.

No, please, no more constructive lectures about the utility of dedicating seventeen years of my life to studying. Just give me a good excuse to close my coursework files and have a walk in the sun, and I'll be ok, I swear.

(on air: Arcade Fire - Suburban War)

Brain drain.

My initial proposition was, write at least once a week. Then my lazy brain decided that at least sounded quite bad, and cut it off. Well, write once a week looked way more affordable, didn't it? And here I am, I missed my minimum standard again.

I'll warn you right from the start: I'm about to post a recipe. Which means, sorry readers, that before it you'll have to put up with a little gloom. I'll be quick, promised: I just got to get this off my chest before going to bed - to write my end-of-term scriptwriting project, of course, who ever mentioned sleep? - and I'll be fine.

I'm just, once again, disappointed by how my brain works. You know, when a child spends hours on a drawing, and then hands it to you as if it was the most beautiful and meaningful thing in the world - and you cannot even fake a smile, as all you see is a disorderly maze of nonsensical lines? Well, tonight I feel as if I was the child. And no, taking a breath and repeating myself you're fuckin' 23 and a master student, you should have quit feeling like this when you left middle school isn't of any help.
My adulthood (please forgive me for using such a word) equivalent of the drawing is the presentation I gave tonight for my business class: such a ridiculous thing that no one will ever convince me to speak in public again - not even if any unforeseen event leads me to fame, in that case I'll just pay a stunt and that's it.
No point in talking about it, anyway, I just want to put down in words this recurring thought I have about how my brain works. About how annoying it is, actually, to be so perfectionist not to tolerate that anything that comes from me is less than flawless, and to be so presumptuous not to accept that what presents itself to my mind like a brilliant idea might prove to be irrealistic, or worse, weak, or worse, silly.
It's not that I lack ideas: I just have too many, and they're all too good to be true. You, the normal people who are used to seeing the big picture rather than getitng attached to unimportant details and inconsistent hopes, you can spot unlikelihood since the beginning; I can't. Maybe it's true, like my father says, that I'm an idealist. Or maybe I'm an utopist, not sure whether that's actually different.

Screw it, just give me sun, a fresh drink and a slice of cake and I'll be the happiest person ever.
Oh, shit, it's as cold as in February. And I should take a healthy break from sugar; do you mind enjoying some for me?

This is the first cake I made that was both pretty and tasty at the same time, so it means quite much to me.
So much that I put it on my Powerpoint's first page, as the logo of my crappy made-up cooking school, perhaps hoping for a good omen. Well, what is it that they say? Better luck next time? Sure. Now eat.

Strawberry orange-flavoured semifreddo:

Crust:
Melt 1 egg yolk and 30g brown sugar in a double saucepan, whipping until they become very soft.
Remove from hob and continue the whipping, until the melt has cooled down. Add 30g flour, 1 tablespoon olive oil and some lemon juice.
Roll the batter in a mould; pre-heat the oven to 190°, then bake for 15-20 minutes, remove from mould and set aside to cool down.
Finally, put the crust back in the mould, which in the meantime you will have lined with cling film. If you want you can put some strawberries on the bottom as a sort of filling for the cake.

Cream:
Leave 8g gelatine leaves soaking in cold water for 10 minutes.While you wait, mix 250g ricotta cheese with 125g low-fat natural yogurt, 50g honey and 1 tablespoon orange zest, until you have a soft batter.
Warm up the juice of one orange in a saucepan, then melt the squeezed gelatin into it and add to the batter. Finally, add 2 beaten egg whites as well.
Pour the batter on the crust and put the cake into the fridge, where you will leave it for at least 6 hours. When ready, take out of the mould and decorate with strawberries.

(On air: Imogen Heap - Hide and seek.)

Spring cleaning.

Among all the things that made up my flat and peaceful north country life, there’s almost nothing I regret leaving. However, things happen at double the speed, here in London, and sometimes it’s just so difficult to keep up with everything. I, myself, feel as if I could collapse at any moment now; and I have always been so good at endurance tests.

My flatmate and I could write a whole novel about all the crazy and dodgy people we shared houses with, and still the past two months can't be described as other than reality overcoming fantasy.

Now that things look almost on the right track, I can unveil the mystery: the Problem I mentioned in my last post was a person: a tacky orange-haired drama student, double-faced as a rattlesnake and dirty as fuck…ok, ok, no more spite, I promise. But here’s some advice, if you are keen on taking it: should you ever meet someone who fits the description, just stay away.

On Saturday she vacated her room and ran away in a rush, stealing our modem in a pathetic attempt of a last laugh. Well, honey, hope you enjoyed it: it was a nice try, but see, we’re all still here.
That during the very next half hour we were utterly and literally upset, it’s a fact that I won’t deny. But how come, then, that hardly one hour later we were already sitting in the kitchen, laughing out loud while we were restoring the civil appearance it had lacked for so long and pulling jokes about the amount of junk food she left behind? (yes, if you ask, we have also eaten tons of pizza and drank white wine. But that came later…)
Memory, you’re a bitch as few others. But let me grant you some credit, here: as if it hadn’t been for your power of erasing bad sensations and keeping the good ones, I would have shot myself not too long after discovering that the whore left us without the modem that’s in my name.

So here I am, now: enjoying a moment of pure peace, looking at the sunny day that’s shining outside my window, inviting me to a liberating stroll. Mrs. Guilty Conscience warns me, and the dialogue is quite surreal:

- Come on, girl, you really shouldn’t, how about your studies then?
- Come on, Mrs. C., it's Sunday.I dare you to find an open library now, and as you probably know I can’t work from home…
- Huh, so what’s your plan? Dressing up and going shopping in town? With a presentation due in two weeks, that you haven’t even started yet?
- Exactly, I’ll treat myself to a pair of shoes. To your face, to the face of the modem thief -  and yeah, of the business teacher as well.

It’s as if I had forgotten that I’m only 23, and forced myself into an adult shape in which I don’t fit at all. I cannot count for how long I have been waking up in the morning, repeating to myself no more weight of the world on these shoulders, please, not today…and at the end of the evening, there it was, again. 
Well, it’s over – alright, it’s not, it never is; but everything looks clearer, without the mask of Gloom on my face. And today, this week, I want to spoil my child inside.

I’d like to have endless runs in the fields, have rides at the fun-fair, walk in the sun eating a frozen yogurt topped with huge amounts of candy – as England’s no land for proper ice cream, alas.
I  miss my mother’s hugs, light-hearted promises, plans for holidays, feeling free. Just like when I was a child, I think – and here she comes again, the traitress: for I can tell you my childhood was everything but that. 

Sure, it had its delightful moments, but I should be aware that for most of the time it was about being called drag and fat geek by other children, and being chosen last at team games because I was the one who ran the slowest. Not to mention the fact that, if I asked my mother for a frozen yogurt while walking in a park, she would reply with a glaring look and a harsh keep quiet, I’m surely not going to waste money on that. I’m not sure she even had the time to take me to parks, for that matter. So what the hell?
Memory, who else. She did a damn good job with me, that’s sure.

I must thank memory if I keep writing, and if I don’t break down even when I’m sure that I have reached the lowest of lows. If I’m here, patiently waiting for lunchtime in a room that hadn’t felt so reassuring for months, going through all the wonderful times I had here in London and yes, those I had in the past as well.
I’ll thank memories if I get my beloved shoes today, and if I come back home with the feeling that I have to celebrate the end of the hardest of times rather than sitting down and creating a new modem from scratch as if I was called McGyver. Eventually, I’ll thank memory if I’ll ever get my frozen yogurt, because I hadn’t been thinking about that for ages, before it came out of nothing the other day.

(on air: Bright Eyes - At the bottom of everything.)

I don't care if Monday's blue...

I can't count the people that have told me slow down, you think too much, and I can't count the times I tried to justify myself; well, game over, I publicly admit it: I'm neurotic and paranoid.
My head is always spinning forsennatamente, looking for solutions to issues I can't solve, or even to problems I do not have yet.

Now here's the point: I do have a problem, unfortunately named after a person whose appetite for destruction runs still too close to my quest for peace. And, since the very notion of life seems to be inseparable from the punchline never forget to fear for the worst, I can't solve it on my own: on the contrary, things have come to a head during the past few days. A weekend that I prefer to remember only because of the  films I watched during the breaks I took from moping alone on my bed, to be clear; so, now that Depression has ended, what's the next phase? Acceptance, sure. And Resolution, if I may add.

Quite a long time ago, someone told me how it feels to wake up in the morning and feel brand new. I tried to figure it in my mind, but nothing, no way - I have tricked myself so many times with that, only to find out that it is just the beginning of the next wrong start.
He mentioned raising your head, at first slowly and without conviction and then more and more boldly; he said it was like when you learn to swim, and you're not sure that you will manage to keep breathing, but then you do, and it feels as if something tore you up from and cleansed all the filth you kept inside. I didn't know the sensation - do I, after all? For sure, yesterday morning I thought I did, and it felt like an unexpected gift.

I mentioned Resolution, and indeed yesterday I took a lot of them. The point is that I'm desperately trying to find a bright side in my current situation, and when I say desperately I mean that really anything goes. So, let's think it over: what's the bright side of having my nerves threatened by someone who lives in my own house? Sure, spending more time outside. Not worrying about getting home on time, enjoying long walks in the city,  with just my earphones or someone dear - priceless, now that the sun is starting to show. Besides, that will acquiesce that damn thing - I think they call it conscience - that warns me each time I think about food.

Walking madly and eating afterwards, two things that I love at the price of one: isn't this the perfect life?
Well, I guess that I'll have to consider studying, at some point. Hey, good one, how come I hadn't thought about it earlier? My Problem will make me a better student, just because I'll have a good reason to jump out of bed and go to the library instead of procrastinating at home with mellow music and breakfast in bed. Right, right, and if my grades will be higher than last semester's I'll send her a note on perfumed pink paper: thank you, Nuisance, for pushing me at my best; sincerely, now go and get lost for ever.

I won't lie: deep inside, I'm probably still the same old psycho. But if I survived the past weekend - and I did, although I still wonder how - I guess I made a step forward, at least a little one.
This should serve as a lesson for the future, although actually I know myself too well not to be sure that it won't. Still, let's keep it working, as long as it feels good. There's a huge chocolate muffin here beside me...oh, wait, there was.
Right.
Now, sleep.

(on air: The Raconteurs - Steady as she goes)

Serotonine wanted. Urgent, call during meal hours.

I imposed myself a quite strict rule when I started this blog; no intimate confession or personal rants, it read. Still, today I have this terrible urge to write something, and anything I produce is of no use other than unleashing the gloom I have been in since the past couple of weeks.

It's just one of those moments when I'd rather have anyone around me disappear with a snap of fingers, and what I get in return is four happy-merry-drinking-buddies sitting in the kitchen, eating delicious fish and looking at my frozen pizza with pity and contempt.
Yes, frozen pizza. With a glass of tap water and an episode of Twin Peaks: tonight is's Lonely Single Night, even if I have no reason to be either of the two.
Social skills have fallen below Zero Kelvin, today; reviving them looks like an effort too big to be worthy. And, in case I forgot to mention, those people are laughing out so loud that their damn cheerfulness reaches the most remote corners of my brain - which makes me even more grumpy, as a reaction.
Well, I guess there's nothing to do about it: I'd better keep writing, if I want to avoid a chocolate overdose .

There is a lot that I have been thinking about, these days. No surprise, when what you're reflecting upon is people: something adds up everyday, and frankly, if you can manage to remember what you learnt yesterday you can consider yourself to be quite lucky.
Today, for example, I resat an exam I thought I had successfully passed long ago. That is, "how to cope with those annoying human beings who seem to be alive just to throw their happiness into your face".
I know, I know, I'm unfair. And unbalanced. And radical. After all, that's something everyone does, from time to time.
Besides, age and practice made me pretty good at telling who does it on purpose and who is just extremely, undoubtedly happy; the problem is, that I still can't figure out which of the two attitudes I hate the most. But, again, that's not what I wanted to write about in the beginning. And I see it, clearly - the risk of jumping into something too ardently biased for the time and place.

Let's turn karma around, then: I have spent the week attempting to cook - which is usually my favourite cure for the bad mood - but almost anything I tried turned rapidly into the Disaster.
So, before another Julie-Powell-like meltdown occurs (I swear, I really look like that when I fail a recipe), I'll share with you one of my past successes. Nothing special, of course, but enough to raise my self-esteem, and hopefully give you a little treat, too: ready for some biscuits?

Ingredients:
150g all-purpose flour, sifted with 1 pinch of salt;
60g butter;
50g finely chopped almonds;
50g sugar;
1 tablespoon orange zest and 2 tablespoons orange juice;
1 egg yolk, whisked;
125 g dark chocolate.

Recipe:
Mix the butter with the sifted flour and salt, until you obtain a granuloso paste.
Add the almonds, sugar and orange zest; then, add the egg yolk and orange juice.
Put the batter in the fridge, and leave it there for about 30 minutes. Then, roll it out to about 5mm of thickness and carve it out with cookie cutters.
Pre-heat the oven to 180° and bake for other 30 minutes. Let the biscuits cool down, and melt the chocolate in a double saucepan; finally, dip one half of each cookie in the chocolate melt, and leave them on a grid until the icing becomes solid.

I'm not a great fan of oranges, but I can assure you that they're lovely. Perfect with a little coffee after lunch...well, well, no more words from my part, just enjoy and let me know if you every try them. Alright?

(On air: Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody)

This is a Piccadilly line service to...well, whatever.

Think about it: how many little tube misteries have you come across lately? I'm sure there are thousands.
It took me a couple of months to eye-witness that there is really a train that serves Heathrow Terminal 4; that was my first one, now solved, but there are still a few things I can't explain.  People, for example; too bad that the profession of Human Nature Observer does not exist. 

I'm impressed, for instance, by all those girls who can put on their makeup in the short lapse of time that separates one station from another. With one hand, that's easy, but on a moving train? I'd end up painting my face like a clown, if I tried.
On Monday there was this woman, sitting opposite me, and she was using an eyelash curler. On a rolling, tumbling, trembling carriage: how come she wasn't screaming from excruciating pain?
Let's go back to torture instruments, then, I beg you. I'm sure a cilice would hurt less.
Not to mention the chicks you come across at night: fasciate in flashy, glittery dresses as long as my sweaters, constantly without tights despite London's freezing cold, hoisted upon heels which lift them to the troposphere. Let's leave vulgarity aside - I respect you, girls, really. I can't picture myself walking home from the station when I'm sober, fancy after a night of heavy drinking.

But my favourites, indeed, are those who read the news.
Yes, Ma, I know, we dooooon't dooo thaaaat. But come on, cast the first stone if you never threw a glance to your neighbor's paper - or waited eagerly for him or her to get off the train and leave it behind, for that matter.

I remember the Metro from the glorious time when I still pretended to be a business student - there was no such thing as an early morning class, just because we could hope to come across a paperboy on our way to university, and make those sitting behind, who had not been privileged enough to get their own crossword, green with envy. It was difficult, mind you - the only truly engaging thing the paper could boast, actually.
But Londoners are way ahead than us little provincial peasants: they have the Evening Standard, after all. (yes, if you ask, that crossword is pure hell). And, surprisingly enough, people who pay for The Sun. Take the Asian grandpa I saw one morning: all absorbed by the two-page article he was reading, and what was it? A feuilleton about a woman who was sterilized at twenty-three after the third baby, and regretted not being able to have the fourth ten years later. Are we serious?

Today, while I was heading to the library, half-asleep and frustrated by a morning of useless errands, I jumped on the tube, and there it was. A brand new Metro, right on the seat I had spotted.
Headline news: Libya. Well, not bad, huh? Let's have a look at the featur...
...oh, wait. No Gheddafi here, just an article about Smokey, the cat with the loudest purr ever: an adorable, peculiar meow that sounds "as if she had a dove stuck into her throat". (by the way, many thanks to the owner, for such poetic image).
Page two. Two. I thought that we Italians were masters in the art of useless news, but this is pure insanity.
 Well, let's take it for another little new something I learnt, together with "never engage yourself again with the challenge of giving up on coffee" and "off-licences don't sell any decent puff pastry, so move your lazy ass and go to a proper supermarket if you want to avoid another depressing lunch".
Tube misteries are still too many to solve,but at least I can feel glad for having a normally-sounding cat.

(on air: Blur - Girls and Boys)