Last Wednesday, Christine went to visit the other architect. Well, let's make things clear. We're not talking about "real" architects here. The Italian title is "geometra", which is only a secondary school diploma in Italy and certainly not a university degree. He was very happy to take over where Danilo left off and made a quick calculation with the geometer's handbook as a reference. Danilo couldn't have billed us more than 3.300 (+ tax) for the work he had done so far. Less than half of what he charged us!
Christine immediately sent Danilo a registered letter, saying that we would no longer require his services and that we were only going to pay the 3.300 (+ tax) as this was in accordance with the official fees and wages. Period.
On Saturday, Danilo tried to call Christine all morning, but she didn't feel like answering. It would certainly lead into an argument and Christine was too tired. He left a message on her voicemail saying: "You're joking, right?". If Danilo knew Christine only for the slightest bit, he would know that she'd never joke about things like that. So she replied with a text message that she didn't want to talk to him over the phone right now and if he had any grievances he should put them in writing.
Unfortunately, Christine also received a phonecall from Nezio, our contractor. He's now caught in the middle and told Christine that he's summoned to Danilo's office next Monday. It is more than likely that Danilo will forbid him to continue working for us, hoping that he can blackmail us this way. Nezio told Christine that 70% of his work comes through Danilo, so we're indeed afraid that we're going to lose him. What's maybe even worse, Nezio so far turned a blind eye when we were late with a number of bills. Given that the mortgage still hasn't been finalised, we're a bit short on cash right now. But Nezio told us he didn't mind and even offered us a loan for a significant amount of money, just to help us out for the time being. This meant that we didn't have to pay him all the money we currently owe him yet. But we're certain that Danilo will try to undo this deal. He knows that we're behind with our payments because these payments have to pass through him. And he will not let go. In fact, this is strange because Nezio has at least two other clients who owe him maybe three times as much as we do and who haven't paid him in six months. Why doesn't Danilo go after these people first, you might ask yourself? We'll see what happens. We now have high hopes that the mortgage will be accepted after all. And Nezio has always been on our side which means that - translating an old Flemish saying - the soup is not eaten as hot as it is served.
And regarding the remainder of the work, the new geometer has a good contractor who's been begging for work. Apparently, he's even cheaper than Nezio and even wouldn't mind working "by the hour" in stead of for a fixed total amount. Given that Christine is always present to check what's going on, this will save us a considerable amount of money. So Danilo can squirm all that he wants...
After weeks of work, both day and night, my audio-book on autism is finally finished. I'm totally exhausted; perhaps even more because of sleep deprivation than of the hard work itself. But in the end, I believe that it was certainly more than worthwhile. Personally, I think it's the most beautiful piece of work I've ever made in my entire life. It fills me with pride, bordering even a bit of arrogance...
I know, the story is told in Flemish/Dutch so it'll probably not be interesting to all of you. However, most of the work went into creating background music and sound-effects. Apart from a few excerpts from e.g. Pink Floyd's "Another brick in the wall", Frankie's "Relax", the Carmina Burana and a couple of other songs I had to use as an illustration, all of it was created by me. I hope that this way I can let the listener "feel" what it's like being autistic. The whole audio-book contains 16 episodes with in total over 4h40 of audio!
I've attached a sample to this post in order to give you an idea. Even if you don't understand my Flemish words, I still hope that you enjoy the music.
In case you'd like to hear the whole caboodle, feel free to visit my website:
Another reason why I've not been too active on my blog is a lack of motivation. Not because I wouldn't want to keep you informed anymore about our Italian adventure. It's just that Christine and I have too many worries on our heads.
I already told you about Danilo, our architect, and how we're seriously displeased with his work. But at the moment we're really heading on a collision course with him and our prospect of beginning a quiet new life in Italy may receive a very nasty blow. For all of his "excellent work", he's sent us an initial bill of 7.500,-. This is absolutely proposterous because, as I already explained, he hasn't done hardly anything. Even if it's because he's so to speak "responsible" for the works, this amount is highly exaggerated. Furthermore we can only guess what his final bill will be like.
First of all, we've never signed any contract with him. We've asked him numerous times how much his services would cost and he always laughed or said that we didn't have to worry about such "triviality". I don't know about you, but considering that his final bill will be equally high, I would not call 15.000,- a "triviality".
Moreover, Danilo knew from the start that we needed a small mortgage in order to finish the house. We can probably make the house "habitable" with our own money, given that there are no more unpleasant surprises, but we can't receive guests with merely concrete floors and a camping bed, can we? Danilo said that a mortgage would not be any problem at all. In fact, he advised us to go to a certain bank of which he knew the manager very well. He said he had already spoken to the manager and that the mortgage would only be a "formality". But loyal readers of my blog will already know that this mortgage turned out to be anything but a "formality" and just like all other banks so far Danilo's "close friend" bluntly refused our request four bl#[dy times! With the biggest smirk on his face, I might add. First, of course, he asked us to open up an account with them. Which we did. Then he wanted Christine to already change her residence to Italy. Which she did. Then he wanted her to transfer her social security pension directly to this account. Which she did. Then he demanded that also I would change my residence and transfer my pension... Christine nearly exploded! Danilo, who was sitting next to Christine when she was negotiating with that manager for the last time, told her that it was all her fault because she hadn't been cooperating very well. He suddenly also denied that he knew from the start that we needed this mortgage.
Currently he's playing a very nasty game with us. First he tried to set Nezio, our contractor, against us. Nezio's a wonderful man who's always turned a blind eye when we e.g. weren't able to pay his bills in time. Fortunately, Christine and Nezio both prefer to talk things through before getting into a conflict so Danilo's faul play was quickly exposed. Danilo even had the nerve to call our Italian "mama" Cosetta, urging her to talk some sense into us. Which she of course kindly refused.
Christine and I've decided not to pay his initial bill for the time being. No matter how hard Danilo may be threatening us. Christine's found another architect who is willing to take over the work from Danilo if so required. He will provide us with a proper estimation about how much the work of an architect in our case would cost. Then we'll use this against Danilo in order to arrange a settlement. And we'll continue the work with the other guy. The problem is that before we can start living in our new house, an architect has to declare it "habitable". So Danilo believes he has us by the b... But then he doesn't know us yet.
We're now hearing stories that Danilo has in fact been establishing a very lucrative business in trying to rip off "ignorant" foreigners. We simply fell onto the wrong guy. He was so charming and down to earth. We really had a lot of confidence in him. But he'll be sorry that he betrayed our confidence!
I know, I've been neglecting my blog a bit over the past couple of weeks. One reason is that I'm terribly busy transforming my book on autism into an audio-book. I'm carefully reading my book and recording it on my PC. Then I'm creating background music, special effects and atmosphere sounds so that it's not just a boring read out of the book but that the listener will also have a (hopefully) enjoyable listening experience. I hope that I can let him or her "feel" what it's like being autistic. I'll still have about a week's work or so and then I'll add it to my website on autism. I'll also add a sample on the webpage so you'll get a taste of what I've been up to these last couple of weeks. I hope you like it! Again, it will be in Flemish/Dutch so if you don't speak this language I wouldn't recommend buying the audio-book.
My original e-book is selling quite well for the time being and hopefully this audio-book will also help earning us a bit of pocket money. We could surely use it, but I'll elaborate on that in a next message.
My apologies that it has taken me a while to add another post on my blog. This is largely because there isn't much to tell, really. At the moment there still is about 40cm of snow at our house and temperatures hardly rise above freezing level. This means that the restoration has come to a halt for the time being. Christine is waiting for the electrician and plumber to draw the trenches on the walls which she will cut out for the electric cables and plumbing.
In the mean time she was getting quite aggravated. Since she's still on social security, she has to pass a medical exam every once and a while. Long before she returned to Belgium for the Christmas holidays she informed her health insurance company that she's residing in Italy and that she would come to Belgium for these two and a half weeks. So if they were planning to call her for a medical check, she kindly asked to do it then. I suppose you can already guess what happened. The day before she was going to leave to Italy again, she got a letter inviting her for a check two weeks later. She was furious and called the company, but to no avail. Missing the appointment would mean that her insurance pension would be cancelled with immediate effect. So all in all it would be much cheaper to book a return Ryanair ticket than losing the pension. In the end we were both quite happy to see eachother again, even if it was for such a brief period. When I'm writing this, Christine has just arrived back at her temporary Italian residence and we're separated again. Well, we're in the final stretch towards the realisation of our dream now. Only a couple of month's patience and we can finally start our new life. That's the only thing that matters, isn't it?
I have high-functioning autism. This means that I've always been able to compensate this wretched handicap with my intelligence. Alas, as I already explained it eventually got the better of me and I don't think that I will ever fully recover from the final blow it gave me last July.
That being said, one should always look on the bright side of things, how unlikely this sometimes may seem. So I decided that finally I'd use my handicap to my advantage. Since I am capable of compensating for my autism, I have the ability to describe more or less how it feels like being autistic. Therefore I believe that I am best placed to explain to the "outsiders" what autism does to a person and how the world appears to us. So I've written a book on the subject. It's written in Flemish so all of you who don't understand this language will have to wait a while until I've translated it and created the English part of my new website. I'm afraid that this will not be for tomorrow because writing this book really wore me out completely. I'm also afraid that I won't be offering this book for free. Christine and I both have to survive on social security pensions and I already informed you about the soaring cost of the restoration of our new house. So if this e-book will generate a bit of petty cash I'd be more than happy. The link to the website is at the bottom of this post.
My apologies if it looks a bit too commercial but apparently if you want to sell, this is what you'll have to do. The trash publicity you receive every day in your mailbox clearly demonstrates that this is the best selling approach, how strange this may seem. If you know anyone who'd like to know more about autism or the Asperger syndrome, please pass on the link. I hope that my book can be quite useful to them.
Since we're having a couple of difficulties at the moment, why not round it off with yet another one? We were already aware that the electricity system in Italy is slightly different from ours and that it is also more expensive as Italy doesn't produce enough electricity on its own. But what we weren't prepared for is that the standard electricity connection in Italy is... 3,5kW! This is barely enough for a washing machine! Since we already consume a constant amount of Watts through appliances like a fridge, a seperate freezer and the odd lightbulb or two we'd already blow the entire fusebox just by washing our clothes. Without mentioning our electrical oven which has a maximum power of 4,5kW. 4,5kW is by coincidence also the maximum "domestic" connection that the few providers we've checked out on the internet offer. It's perfectly clear to us now why electrical ovens aren't a real success in Italy and why most people use gas ovens in stead. If we can believe our Italian friends, you can always get a more powerful connection but this would cost us a fortune. Allright, we've already settled for the fact that we'll have to buy a new cooker with integrated gas oven and that Christine will have to wait with her hairdryer until the dishwasher's finished.
To look at it from the bright side, this "problem" demonstrates how addicted we've become to the luxury of unlimited electrical power. We should all become a bit more modest if we'd still want to save this planet. A limited electrical connection is in this regard a very good lesson which will teach us to become more resourceful with less.
Christine and I would like to wish all of you a very happy New Year! As far as we're concerned, 2010 is probably going to be the most exciting year of our lives. We sincerely hope that also you may feel nothing but the overwhelming happiness that we are currently experiencing. And most important of all, we hope that you, your families and loved ones all enjoy a very good health. Because this is the most important asset in life.
This is our last Christmas and New Year's period in Belgium. Now already we are dead certain that we will never return to Belgium for this so-called period of cheer and happiness. Christine and I both don't enjoy the fortune of good family bonds. I haven't spoken to my parents for a long time and also Christine fell out with her sister some time ago. Let's just say that one doesn't get to choose his or her relatives and that the people who we consider to be our real family all live in Italy.
This Christmas period eventually proved this fact for the umpteenth time. Christine and I came once again last on the priority list, even though to us this seemed a once in a lifetime event - our final Christmas in Belgium. Some people didn't consider it that important however and eventually we had to celebrate on our own. It doesn't really matter. We know that our Italian family still knows what a true Christmas spirit is like and we very much look forward to celebrating Christmas 2010 with them.
Merry Christmas to all of you and my apologies if my post sounds a bit too grim. I know that you'll understand...
I've received a few comments on my first draft for the website for our B&B. Generally, it was deemed a bit too "sad" and perhaps a bit too "old fashioned". And I concur. It should be "warmer" and more "inviting". Therefore I thought that I'd perhaps change the lay-out to something more typical for Italy: their beautiful Terracotta. I know, this is rather something typical of Tuscany or the more southern Italian regions. But I personally like this theme a lot and in combination with the pictures and the curls under the title it should turn out allright.
What do you think?
PS: Please bear in mind that this is only the Flash file and that it doesn't fill up the entire screen yet.
Legally speaking, our house was already sold the moment that Christine and I put our signature under the sale's compromise. But last Wednesday the sollicitor's act was signed and let's just say that this makes it official: from now on we'll be (temporarily) renting a house that's no longer ours. It feels a bit awkward because Christine and I've worked so hard to build this house and to turn it into a real home. It's a pity that we'll have to abandon it forever shortly. Then again, and now I'm strictly speaking for myself, I've never quite felt at home in this neighbourhood and often wished that I could find a huge crane to move our house and garden elsewhere. On the other hand, I'm aware that technically speaking it would cause a difficulty or two to move this house to Italy. So buying something new and starting all over again was the only viable option. And at the same time, we're quite convinced that the lovely couple who've bought our house will find nothing but joy and happiness here. We'd like to congratulate Marie-Jeanne and Pierre with their acquisition and wish them many happy years in what I'll from now on refer to as their house.
So we've agreed with the new owners that for the remaining time of the restoration I can stay in this house. But slowly I'm already saying goodbye to it and the fond memories that it carries. As if the sky was also a bit sad for me, it showed the strangest evening colours. Unfortunately I didn't have a decent camera at hand and therefore the picture I took with my mobile is a bit fuzzy. But don't you agree that the colours are lovely?
His estimation didn't include the septical fosset. But more importantly, Danilo failed to mention that our house can't be connected to the sewer because there just isn't any sewer where we live. The solution? Well... just let your waste water run into the woods?... Christine nearly exploded. She doesn't really fancy a foaming forest, even if it's clean because of all the soap residues in our waste water. In that case, the only solution is a bio purification station. Just add it to the bill, Danilo...
Right from the start, Christine and I had a massive amount of confidence in Danilo, our architect. He's a very kind man and he's got a very "down to earth" attitude which we like a lot. It has to be said that in the beginning he helped us a great deal with the realisation of our dream. It was he who convinced the former owners of our house to agree with our maximum price. It was also he who arranged a couple of rooms for Christine to stay during the restoration. Even though those rooms are terribly cold during winter (no central heating, single glazed windows,...) and Danilo's uncle just can't leave Christine alone for five minutes.
But now the corpses start to fall out of the closet, as we say in Flemish. Here's a list of things where Danilo made a mistake or at least totally misinformed us.
- His estimation of the cost of the restoration was more than 20% below the lowest offer we received from the various contractors. Between brackets, it was based on his estimation that we decided on our maximum price for the house. - Furthermore, it turned out that Danilo's list of necessary works did not include the concrete topping for the floors. How are we going to lay our floortiles otherwise? An additional hole of 7.000 in the budget... - His estimation also didn't include the plasterwork for the interior walls. 10.000 please, thank you. - He failed to note that the first floor wasn't strong enough and needed an additional layer in armed concrete. Again thousands of ... - He also failed to note that due to this additional layer of concrete, the window sills are now roughly 10cm too low in order to have the house declared "habitable". This means that we either have to install a railing on all windows, or as we prefer have the windows raised by 10cm. There goes another 1.000... - Last week, the guys from the electricity company finally came to our house to connect us to the electricity network. After Danilo's instructions, our contractor had dug a trench from the street right up to our house. It took 3 days to dig this trench because below a thin layer of soil there is nothing but bone-hard rock. Unfortunately, the guys from the electricity company left again after only five minutes. Apparently the regulations have changed and the electricity connection now needs to be done on the border of our land because the company wants to have access to our meter at all times. It is therefore mandatory to build a small pillar at the border and incarcerate a small plastic box with the meters there. This means that a lot of those 3 days' work were for nothing. This also means that after New Year Christine can't start sawing out the trenches for the electricity cables and water pipes because there won't be any electricity yet.
And I've probably still forgotten a blunder or two. Apart from his plans that were full of wrong measures and distances.
When we decided to buy the house, we were a bit anxious because we were going to pay the absolute maximum that we could afford, keeping the restoration in mind. Danilo laughed with our concerns and told us that he would easily save us an additional 10.000 to 15.000. So we went for it. Just before she returned to Belgium, Christine reminded Danilo about his promise and added that so far she had only seen additional cost in stead of savings. Danilo bluntly replied that he had already "given" us those savings by bringing us into contact with Nesio, our contractor, because he's the cheapest of them all. Can you believe that?
If it were up to me, Danilo will - to his great surprise - suddenly also become the cheapest architect in the whole of Italy because I don't think that we're going to pay his exuberant 7.500 (initial!) bill any time soon. A bill that he also originally claimed was included in his estimation. We'll let him sweat and squirm a bit first...
When I'm writing this, Christine should be flying somewhere high above the North of France. In less than half an hour the aircraft is expected to arrive at Charleroi airport. A friend of hers is going to pick her up and drive her home. And then we'll be together again for two and a half weeks! My whole body is trembling with anticipation. I've missed her so much, although this time it was only four weeks since we last saw eachother. But the burning desire to see her again, to spend the rest of my life close by her side, has taken total control over me. How I long for the moment that I can take her in my arms again.
I've spent all morning getting the house clean. Not that it was dirty as such (I'm trying to be a good househusband ) but with those four crazy furrballs running around, you have to constantly keep on top of things. Little Chloé must know that Christine is coming because this morning she ostentatively pood in the curtains again. Something she hasn't done for over a month. Probably she was just trying to spur me to do an even greater effort in the whole cleaning bit. Last week I also put up the Christmas tree. Christine is very fond of the Christmassy spirit, which is one of her favourite parts of the year. She'll really be surprised because I didn't tell her yet. And then there is my good old friend Mark Deacon, who was so thoughtful that he brought me a special Harrod's Christmas bear when he came over to Brussels two weeks ago. He remembered that Christine collects them, whenever she gets the chance. That too will be a super-surprise for her. Thanks once more, dear Mark!
It goes without saying that every now and then, during a restauration, you run into unexpected difficulties. Or that you have to spend much more than you originally budgeted. Up till now we've always been very well on schedule, or even much ahead of schedule. And budget-wise, we didn't do all that bad either. Even though the bills we receive are consistently higher than what was planned. Without even mentioning the few unpleasant surprises like Danilo's 7.000 bill last week. We can only guess why he charges so much because the plans he made were not very impressive - a small piece of A4 paper on which the plans were drawn with software everyone can download for free. Moreover, the plans are often wrong because the measurements on his paper are not in line with the true measurements of the house. Anyway, we suppose that these 7.000 are there to compensate for his "responsibility"? Even though he hasn't shown up on the building site very often up till now.
That being said, last week we were really in for a shock. We received the offers from two plumbers we've contacted and... well... they're disastrous. They're at least twice as high as what we planned (which was already a lot of money) and they cast a serious hole in our budget. Up to the point that we're now convinced that finishing the house without an additional mortgage would become impossible. Of course, we are partly to blame in this. We wanted floor heating, which is already more expensive than a "normal" central heating system. And furthermore we wanted a heater on wood pellets in stead of gas. Gas is terribly expensive in Italy because especially in such remote places there is no gas network like there is in Belgium. And propane is only half as efficient as methane, without even mentioning the additional cost for having it delivered to your house by lorry. Wood is a vast natural resource in Italy and pellets are now being promoted as the fuel of the future. Something we surely believe in, also given the fact that we too have lots of wood on our property.
Christine and I are now desperately trying to bring the price down and we may have found a small way out. In stead of a pellets stove, we're now thinking about putting solar panels. These would already save us around 3.000 compared to the heater. It would also mean that we won't have to buy any "fuel" anymore. Pellets may be much cheaper than gas, they don't come for free either. During winter however, these solar panels will not suffice. But we can compensate this by having a connection running through the stove in our living room, something we also already planned. What's more cosy in winter than sitting in front of your fireplace? And what if you can heat the floors of the entire house and produce warm water while you're at it?
This week, Christine will again meet the plumbers and she'll try to bring the price down as much as possible. We've decided to jump into the deep. Staying in Belgium wasn't an option. So now we'll have to swim, one way or the other. It's as simple as that.
Our new home lies at an altitude of 770m. Much higher than the highest point in the whole Benelux, although this is hardly a reference. This means that winters are short, but much more severe than you would at first imagine from Italy. Two weeks ago it already started snowing above an altitude of 1000m. It inspired Christine to make this stunning image of the Monte Cusna (2121m) from our back yard...
And last week the snow came down to our altitude. Christine reported that overnight more than 15cm had fallen. Winter tyres or snow chains certainly aren't a luxury then. Even so, the weather is perhaps cold but yet much more enjoyable than the weather in Flanders, where we always get rain, sleet, more rain and a sharp westerly wind. And in Italy you can be certain of one thing: spring will come soon. Up north you'd be inclined to believe that you get the same horrible weather all year round...
In the beginning, being "lord and master of the house", can be quite enjoyable. Especially when you don't have to go to work anymore and you can live every day just as you please. But after a while this is getting pretty boring and I just can't wait to welcome Christine again, when she'll arrive back on Friday the 18th. It'll be two and a half weeks we're really going to enjoy. And after that, it's just the final effort until the move. We should be able to survive this!
However, being home alone (apart from the cats and the rest of the zoo) doesn't mean that I'm just enjoying the holiday while Christine is doing all of the dirty work. Of course, I can't help her physically as such. But still I try to help her as much as possible with the administrative side. There's not just the administration regarding the move itself we need to think about. There's also the question about banks (see previous message) and insurances. And there are administrative issues with the Belgian social security (given that we're both still on sick leave and that I want to apply for a permanent disability status).
I've also already told you about the work I've been doing on our future website and believe me, this is taking many hours of my time. And if I ever want to make a chance for a (part-time) job as piano teacher, I'd better be ready to wow the academy's principal. Therefore I'm practising at least two hours per day, preferably three. Or until my back is hurting too much. I know that it sounds pretty sloppy compared to chopping off concrete. But believe me that it's very hard work and an additional fixed income will be quite welcome once we've settled.
And then I'm also keeping myself busy with creating things. We're going to advertise our B&B as the ideal place for astronomy or bird watching. With that in mind I've recently bought a pair of giant binoculars. I managed to get a really good deal on them, but wasn't aware that this price had a catch. The binoculars arrived... without a tripod. Considering that you have to be built like the Hulk in order to carry a 7kg pair of binos in front of your eyes, I was quite disappointed. "Oh... you can always order a tripod. It'll just cost you another 160 plus tax and transport!" So I thought... forget it. I'll just go to the local DIY, buy a couple of pieces of wood and a few bolts and I'll make a decent tripod myself. So there you are... the result of weeks of hard work...
I already elaborated extensively on the problems Christine and I had with the banks, both in Belgium and in Italy. Finding a Belgian bridge loan and an Italian mortgage has given us quite a few difficulties, up to the point that we've now decided to do without a mortgage for the time being and see how far we can go. Since I will probably be entitled to a life-long pension (ref. my post on autism), we'll have a fixed income from the start so we don't need to hold on to some financial reserves for the first couple of years. Even though this income will undoubtedly be quite limited, it will certainly be sufficient to live, given that we won't have any financial obligations such as mortgages etc.
With that problem out of the way, I've started browsing the web in search for the Italian bank with the best conditions for a normal account. Unfortunately - again - I was up for a couple of surprises. And I hope that my Italian friends will forgive me my words, but the Italian banks seem to have a totally different philosophy than the banks in the rest of Europe. The main principle of banking in Europe is that you put your money on a bank account. This means that you in fact "lend" your money to the bank. The bank then invests this money or plays on the stock exchange with it and makes a considerable profit out of it. In return for your generosity, the bank will reward you with a meagre couple of percent's interest.
Not so in Italy, however. In Italy you have to pay the bank considerable money for the "privilege" of having an account with them. Yes, of course this is also the case for most of the bigger banks in the rest of Europe. But not only is the amount you pay much higher (the cheapest bank I found will cost us roughly 70-80 per year, just for having an account!), there isn't any interest either! So you do not only lend all of your money to the bank, which generates them billions of profit. No, you still have to pay them a yearly 80 on top of that! And no interest! You can only try to minimise the expenses by not using one of the counters in the bank office but use internet banking in stead. Or by only using your own bank's cash terminals. Or by not wanting any credit cards. Or by automatically forwarding your salaries to the bank. Etc. One could actually wonder why the Italians don't hide their money under their mattresses because this is absolutely proposterous.
Although it isn't all bad. The internet banks have also known a considerable growth in Italy and they offer considerably better conditions, comparable to the rest of Europe. Since we've since long mostly reverted to internet banking, I think that this might be the best option for us.
Again my apologies to the Italian readers. But you know that perfection doesn't exist, otherwise Italy would be a pretty boring country to live in. It's already paradise to us, so what else would we want? Asking for more would be greed!
I suppose that you're all thinking... "This Peter's got it all worked out well! Letting his wife do all the hard labour and letting her live in a cold "dump" during winter while he's living in luxury and just has to take care of the cats..."
Well. I'll show you now how wrong you are! In a next post I'll elaborate on all of my current activities. But in this particular one I'd like to present my first draft for the future website of our B&B. The name of our B&B will be "La Stella" ("The Star"). Christine thought that it goes well with our cosy little hamlet. It further indicates that our guests will receive a star-treatment and as a bonus it also refers to my passion for looking at the stars. So please note already the link I just purchased! It's not active yet because in order to register an ".it" domain you need to fill out a bit of paperwork with the Italian authorities. So I'm still waiting for the official "go" before I'm allowed access to my website management portal.
www.bb-lastella.it
Nevertheless I'd already like to present the Flash file that I've designed for the index page. There's still no clickable buttons or anything. I was until now absolutely not familiar with working in Flash so it took me some time to create all of this. I hope you like it, though. It's just the title page, including a small slideshow I made to show that this particular B&B truly lies in the middle of paradise! Your opinion would be highly appreciated. Christine also hasn't been able to review my work yet and obviously the special Christine's Evaluation and Approval Task Force (in short: the CEATF) will need to have its say. But I'm sure that she'll very much appreciate the Art-Nouveau background...
Oh... and please don't mind the poor quality of the text. This must be caused by this blog's website (perhaps trying to "stretch" the file into a full window). If possible, you should try to play it in Macromedia's Flash Player...
I suppose that you're all curious how the house is progressing? Well, it's going terribly fast. Nesio, the contractor, and his team are doing an incredible job. They work very hard 7/7 from dawn till after dark. Where do you still find such an incredible service? Such a passion for a job? One could argue that the current crisis obliges builders to go the extra mile in order to stay in business. However, with Nesio I don't think this is the case. He's a bit of a shy character, but once you've earned his esteem he shows his true, warm nature. We've invited him and his assistant out for dinner in a very nice restaurant in the city of Castelnovo Ne' Monti. We wanted to show our utmost appreciation for all his excellent work and for his patience when his bills aren't always paid immediately due to the stupid Belgian banks. I'm actually feeling very much inclined to name and shame the bank in question in this blog because of all the trouble they've already caused us with their petty little rules and their arrogance towards us, their clients. Probably in a couple of weeks when we've paid the bridge loan back. Anyway... many many thanks, Nesio and your team!!!
So, here are a couple of pictures which show you progress until Wednesday, when I returned home. First a picture of Christine having a well-deserved picknick after a whole morning chopping off concrete plaster from the walls and excavating floor tiles. I'm so worried that her fraill little body will one day seriously crack. But she just keeps on going. What a wife...
The inside of the house after the old roof had been taken off...
The exterior. For the first time you can see the beautiful stone that appeared after the concrete plaster had been removed...
The structure for the new roof...
The roof waiting for the finishing touch... the tiles. You can also see the newer part of the house that was built in ordinary brick in stead of stone. Like I already mentioned, we're going to cover that part in a kind of beige-brownish coloured plaster. A natural colour that should go well with the Italian stone, the greyish window frames and the environment.
The house as seen from our driveway...
The situation just before I left. Do you like the old-Italian tiles? And what about the chimneys?
below the lowest offer we received from the various contractors. Between brackets, it was based on his estimation that we decided on our maximum price for the house. 
Last week I also put up the Christmas tree. Christine is very fond of the Christmassy spirit, which is one of her favourite parts of the year. She'll really be surprised because I didn't tell her yet. And then there is my good old friend Mark Deacon, who was so thoughtful that he brought me a special Harrod's Christmas bear when he came over to Brussels two weeks ago. He remembered that Christine collects them, whenever she gets the chance. That too will be a super-surprise for her. Thanks once more, dear Mark!
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