Escape from Christmas

Well, the plan was to spend Christmas with the Italian in-laws down in Genoa, and we did indeed manage to endure right up until the end of the Christmas day lunch. Then we high-tailed it back to Milan.

A combination of dogs not getting on with one another, lively little son causing the downstairs neighbours to shout and knock on their ceiling every five minutes etc managed to dampen that good old Christmas spirit, and we found ourselves yearning for the, relative, tranquillity of Milan.

At least the gastronomic delights of the Christmas Eve dinner over at our friend’s house managed to perk our Christmas spirit up a little. I should add that my son and I holed up at our friend’s house.

This friend has a lovely appartment with a wonderful view over Genoa harbour, has no barking dogs or grumpy neighbours, and the flat is more spacious and comfortable than our in-laws ‘trapped in the 1950′s’ place, and my little one was happy because he was not being constantly told not to run, not to drop toys, and not to breathe too heavily etc when in the in-laws’ place. In fact, I could not pry him away, and he actually told our friend that he wanted to buy her appartment. Precocious, he is.

Anyway, that Christmas Eve dinner was darned good. We had Oysters and lobster, amongst other things, and everything was washed down with good wine. At least some memories of Xmas ’07 will be good.

Milan on the other hand seems to be all but deserted, and, oddly enough, much less chaotic than Genova. Everyone has probably popped off to the mountain house, leaving the city wonderfully quiet. It’s sort of like the middle of August, but cold.

By heck, it’s good to be home.