very simple

Remember how I said earlier that people in Italy don’t talk about politics? That it’s considered rude? Well it’s certainly true. The Italian government basically collapsed yesterday, and the only reason I even found out about it was that I read about it in the NY Times.

Could you even imagine something of this level happening in the US and no one in your office discussing it? Granted, this sort of thing is a bit more common here in a fairly fragile coalition-based parliamentary system than in our country, but I’m pretty sure that if this happened at home, I wouldn’t be getting much work done because everyone in my office would be discussing this nonstop. Heck, we’d probably either take over a conference room to watch the proceedings on TV or head out to a bar somewhere to keep up. Regardless of what “side” we were on.

The closest that I’ve gotten to having a political conversation in the office in the past two months was when Berlusconi’s wife published a letter detailing his neglect and infidelities on the front page of one of the major newspapers. And it was about a five-minute conversation. Our country spent several years and something on the order of sixty million dollars going after Clinton for trying to hide an affair. Here? well, here Berlusconi is probably going to get his job back.

I’m inordinately happy to be going home in two and a half weeks, what with the missing my family and apartment (and spending my birthday all alone yesterday) and finding out that one of my best friends is pregnant and having to travel to two separate weddings (on in montauk and one in florida) within a few weeks of arriving home, but there are certain days when I’m really happy not to be in New York.

Winter Storm Moves to East Coast.

Yeah. Did I mention that it’s been in the 50s all week here?

Oh, and to be fair about the birthday thing, we are having a fairly big office party tomorrow night. Not for my birthday in particular but…just because. So there will be drinking. and other festive things. Mostly drinking. My former office-mate is also moving to New York for six months on Sunday, so that may have been part of the impetus for this one.

26 days until I go home. I’m very excited.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had a good time here. I’ve been out to interesting places, made new friends, and generally have had a nice time. But I’m overwhelmingly homesick. It’s got nothing to do with *here* but rather that I’m not *there*. I’ve realized through this experience that I’m just meant to live in New York. It’s where I’m from, it’s where my family and friends are, and it’s my home (for better or worse). At least now I know for sure. You know it’s bad when I start waxing nostalgic for my office in NY. Granted, the fact that I don’t have to share an office in new york may have something to do with that (again, the actual people that I’ve shared offices with here have been lovely. It’s just that I haven’t shared an office since back in 2000, and it’s really difficult to have someone, anyone, in my space when I’m trying to work).

I should also say that I did luck out here. It’s apparently been the mildest winter in Milan in years. It’s been consistently in the 40s and 50s during the day, and the legendary fog and rain have only been intermittent. And while I did miss the 70 degree days they had in NY in january, I’m also missing the bitterly cold weather they’re experiencing now.

The one thing that I’m disappointed in is that for a pretty long stretch (until Christmas), I had enough work to do that I pretty much had to work at least a little bit every weekend. Certainly nothing crazy (especially for a lawyer), but that pretty much put a damper on my ability to take weekend jaunts to other places. Of course, I’ve actually been to many places in Italy on other trips, so there’s nowhere, at least in northern Italy, that I feel like I need to see before I leave, but now that I’ve got only a few weekends left, a ton of packing to do, and a deal that’s going to close only days before I fly out of here, I’m probably not going to fit in a whole bunch of travelling going forward either. At least I did get to go to Paris – that was really the one thing that I desperately wanted to do while I was over here, and it got done.

So. Specific things I miss about NY…

My family.

My friends.

My apartment.

Sushi from Yama.

The ability to tumble dry my clothes.

Dry cleaning that takes less than two weeks.

Diet Coke (although I’m going to try to limit my intake when I get back).

My oven (seriously. I’ve never wanted to bake as much as I have since I’ve lived in a place with nothing but a two-burner stovetop and a microwave)

My shoe collection.

The Container Store.

American TV (iTunes helps somewhat, but I’m craving a good stretch of crime-TV reruns on A&E. Also, I’d like to watch a few things on my 40-inch LCD rather than my powerbook).

Stores that are open on Sunday.

My super-comfortable couch.

My office (including the 24-hour office support, my aeron chair, a door that closes, my own real-live secretary, and car service home at night).

The Gap and Old Navy.

Fairway.

Easily accessible manicures and pedicures.

Sherree (my hairdresser).

and, of course, the greatest skyline in the world.

So I did actually make it to the Pinacoteca di Brera after I finished up at work yesterday. Helpfully, it turned out that I had a lot less work to do than I originally thought, so even though I had a slow start in the morning (and didn’t actually make it to the office until mid-afternoon), I was done in about an hour and really had no excuse not to walk around the corner.The art itself was really quite beautiful. Mainly religious iconography, which I always find fascinating, even though I don’t have any belief in the underlying subject matter (particularly new testament subject matter). Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures, as there was a museum employee sitting in every single room to make sure that you didn’t take pictures. But, you can go here for a virtual tour.

I think my favorite part though, was that in walking around, you actually get to walk past both the storerooms (which have glass walls so that you can still see in), and the special room where they clean/restore art. Since it was Saturday, there wasn’t anyone actually working, but it was still quite amazing to see the equipment involved (the painting being restored was also about ten feet tall, so it was a pretty big room). I might have to take a side trip over there during the week before I leave, so that I can see them in action.

Of course, today, I didn’t do much of anything except clean my dust-magnet of an apartment (seriously – hardwood floors and zero rugs is just a recipe for disaster). It’s like the dust-bunnies breed on a daily basis.

I’ve been a terribly derelict blogger, and I apologize. It’s just that, every time I think about writing a post, it’s either to bitch about something (like getting manhandled by a crazy homeless guy on the bus the other day), or I realize that I’m living the most boring life possible for an American expat. I go to work in the morning, get home around 9 at night, and if I’m lucky, I only need to go to work on one day over the weekend (leaving the other day for exciting things like sleeping in, grocery shopping, and attacking the dust bunnies from hell that inhabit my apartment). Don’t get me wrong. I’ve enjoyed my time here, made some friends, and certainly do go out (even sometimes with other people!). But it’s not markedly different from, say, going to a friend’s apartment for brunch in NY. or going to a bar in NY. except that I can only understand the people I came with, because they’re the only ones who remember to speak English to me. But none of that’s particularly interesting to blog about.As far as current events are concerned, I still voraciously consume all sorts of news and opinion online, but I can’t help feeling particularly removed from american politics. Heck, the state of the union was the other day, and not only did they not air it here (obviously) even if they had, it would have been at 2 or 3 in the morning. Not very practical. It’s probably for the best as I would probably have thrown something at the TV anyway. I’m more upset that I’m going to miss the Oscars, since they’re airing a week before I head home.

So. That’s my long-winded way of saying that yes, I’m just about ready to head home to NY. I actually booked my flight the other day (I’m waitlisted for a mileage upgrade, gotta make use of the massive number of miles I accumulated last year). I’m heading home on March 4th, only a few days after the transaction I’m working on is going to be over. It’ll also be precisely 90 days since I last entered Italy, so I legally need to leave the country that day (not that I really get in trouble for overstaying, what are they going to do? kick me out of the country when they notice as I’m leaving the country? It’s more a concern that they won’t let me back in). And while I certainly don’t want to move to Milan again, I would like to visit, and to go other places in Italy (maybe even on *gasp* a vacation!).

Actually, the most fun I’ve been having is related to my former office-mate here. He’s actually going on secondment to New York in a few weeks, so I’ve been trying to put together some handy, “how to live in NY” info for him. He found out where he’s going to be living today, so I’ve already figured out what bus he’ll need to take to get to work. I know, I’m a dork. It’s a shame he’s getting there a few weeks before I get back, if only because I won’t be there to introduce him around the office. But I’ve already put my group on notice so that he gets taken out for beers and stuff when he gets there (my office in NY has over 200 lawyers, so it can be a bit alienating if you don’t have people looking out for you).

So. I’m going to try to be proactive tomorrow. Yes, I have to go to work for a little while, but it shouldn’t take me very long to get done what I need to get done (basically I got some updates that I need to incorporate into what I’m working on after I left work tonight). Since our office is in the absolute dead-center of Milan, I’m going to really try to make it to the fairly famous museum that’s literally around the corner that I haven’t been to yet (actually, our street abuts the museum property, but you have to go all the way around the corner to via Brera to get to the entrance). I can always clean my apartment on Sunday.

Hopefully it won’t rain.