Never gets old.

BREAKING: The U.S. bishops’ Committee on Doctrine just issued a formal statement defending Pope Leo XIV's teaching authority on just war doctrine — less than twelve hours after JD Vance told a Turning Point USA crowd the pope should “be careful” talking theology. This is a serious escalation.

Every time I navigate an off script conversation in Italian I feel SO VICTORIOUS. Today workers in my building were taking giant window shutters to the trash and I successfully conveyed that the owner of my apartment is looking for a part to repair a latch on mine, so they’re keeping one for him

I didn't realize when I posted this that it's Yom HaShoah today, but, well.

The scooter music guy showed up at lunch and the table full of ragazzi adjacent to us immediately LOST THEIR MINDS, fist pumping & chanting along "TUTTI TUTTI TUTTI SANNO CHE MANGIO PASTA, CON TONNO!! CON TONNO! CON TONNO!!!!!"* and “DOPO SERATA MANGIA SOLO FIGA!!”** etc. God i love this town

For those who may have some trouble reading it: “Qui abitava” means “Here lived” “Nato” means “Born” The rest is easy to understand: “Arrested”, “Deported - Auschwitz” and “Assassinated”

Palermo, Via Beati Paolo just above Mercato del Capo. There are another ~110,000 around Europe- and anyone can request one for a particular person or family member who was killed. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolper...

Nothing stops you in your tracks like walking down a street you’ve traveled dozens of times and suddenly noticing a stumbling stone you’ve never seen before. Damn but it hits like a bolt of lightning (which, of course, is the entire point). May your memory be for a blessing, Otto Rosenberg

Proof (it’s very very good and yes it’s really that green; remember to always micro blanch your pesto basil kids!)

Successfully bitched in full Italian with a charming elderly shopkeeper and his large adult son re: an adjacent unscrupulous tourist stall hawking “pinoli 100% siciliani” in cui sono SICURA, NON c'erano pinoli siciliani. Those other pine nuts were way too fat! They were the cheap Asian import type!

Damn, this lunchbox from 1992 goes really unnecessarily hard

My theme this time here has been “lure my Northern European friends to this island and brainwash them into falling for it too” and it’s really going EXTREMELY well

Also, coastal Sicily. Like, what???

portland commute

Sui monti Nebrodi, una giornata perfetta con la mia cara vecchia amica Elina 💜

all these universities kept axing medieval history departments as if they thought tyrants beefing with the Pope was going to stop being relevant

jd vance just can not stop

After many days of experimenting with the (garbage-ass) oven here in this apartment, making various forgiving meats and vegetables, I got cocky and tried a strawberry ricotta cake. Lololololol, sucks to be me, because the damn thing went haywire and burnt it to a crisp

Always exciting to see the Avignon Papacy in the news

Also this deserves its own post; a stunning example of classic Palermitano clarity

Quindi, è un po' così... (Palermo, continua)

Me waking up an hour before my alarm on Central European time feeling this most intensely today

My dear old London friend @neutrondecay.bsky.social is visiting me in Palermo for a long weekend. We’re having a terrific time being total nerds enthusiastically pointing at buildings, mountains, historic plaques, wacky Italian cultural things, etc. It’s been fabulous.Today was Agrigento day trip!

Today, out and about

A few days in Palermo

It took more than an hour and a half because the range top broke mid way through. But since I got my pan I got my goddamn risotto finally (simple saffron; I don’t have to hand it to Milan but when they’re right, they’re right)

On my way to steal your girl in my new ride

I walked 45 minutes to the north side to the restaurant supply store to find a single decent pan that wasn’t nonstick coated and would work on the induction stove in my flat, and when I tried to pay the guy was like “what’s your account code” and I was like “I don’t have one” and he was like 😬

I got gently reprimanded by the supermarket attendant because I tried to grab a shopping cart under a sign saying it was reserved for people shopping with their dogs (it has a special dog compartment)

Oh cool AirPlay tv! Ugh, no work Buy HDMI cable Oh god ew motion smoothing Battle Italian tv settings to FINALLY find & turn it off Fuck, no audio Play audio on laptop? No, is lag Find TV in audio settings Shit, now glitchy Reddit guy says “switch settings THEN restart MacBook” Do that GREAT SUCCESS

It’s drizzling in Palermo and I think I may need to carry an umbrella, not because I need one for the rain (please, lol) but to stop someone from trying to sell me an umbrella every 10 meters

If you wanna see something objectively psychotic, the waste bins in this flat are coded such that green is paper and white is food waste. ??? ????? ????????????

Omg there’s a new Asian grocery a block from me and they have Lao gan ma chili crisp. I don’t need to bring my own anymore!!

This semi is blocking via Roma bc it can’t turn onto a side street due to another parked truck and can’t reverse bc jammed cars, scooters have gone to the sidewalk (the smart car is about to follow), a cop is scolding everyone, and everyone is simultaneously honking as if this will solve the problem

Also, I’ve been outside my flat for fifteen minutes and I’ve already given directions (in Italian) to someone. I swear to god I must have resting “ask me where things are” face, but only in Palermo for some reason???

☺️

The apt I’m staying in has a doorman and I asked the hours he’s there, and I don’t know how to explain to him when I have to ask again later that I didn’t forget because I didn’t understand Italian numbers, I forgot because I can’t retain numbers in ANY language for longer than 30 seconds

It is 8:49 and I am awake and all I have to do is stay awake. Easy peasy no problem, surely I can manage this

Your periodic reminder that there is a website that lets you listen to local radio stations anywhere in the world This is honestly one of the coolest inventions ever, imo. Global access to hyper-local imagined communities

if you have a kid with only 1 dose of the MMR, like this partially vaccinated person who just caught measles did, call your pediatrician right now and schedule the second dose right now. they can get it any time >28 days after the first dose. if they won't administer it get a different pediatrician

Boat to walk to stored luggage retrieval to San Diego airport (for give bags to family) to airport shuttle to LAX to LHR to FCO to PMO: the why did I do this to myself story (hour 1 of 31)

I told myself I wouldn’t interact with any HP media again after Book 5, and I haven’t in the two decades since. It is not hard if you simply Do Not Want To, and given how openly the author is a vicious, harmful bigot obsessed with immiserating and destroying trans people, that should be easy.

Photo description / alt text- a famous photo of Paolo Borsellino smiling as Giovanni Falcone whispers something in his ear at a press conference, taken by Tony Gentile in March 1992. Falcone was assassinated by the mafia about two months later, and Borsellino about two months after that.

Loreto, BCS, MX

I’ll make of the most major of purchases on my phone (pretty sure I literally docusigned for a house once or twice?), but if I’m comparing more than about 6 or 7 simultaneous tabs of something I jump to laptop. That includes where to get a burrito, what hotel in Tokyo to stay in, etc. Not $$& based

Santa Rosa, California Pop: 324,634 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Rosa,_California Images: https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=97382824 https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=96085189 https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=97224776

High speed rail from Portland to Seattle to Vancouver. Maybe limited services that also stop at Olympia and Bellingham. Andiamo!!

Ha ha in a stunning shocking fully unexpected twist, I will probably NOT be getting my ADHD meds refilled before I leave the country. Womp womp

I have a very cool kid (well, I have two, but only one is pictured here)