Author: telboy2

Venice

A rip to the busy city. It was packed as you would expect, but in places not as much as you might fear.

A place to walk and take the vaporetto and enjoy the scenes from the water. We did not take a gondola at 80 euros for 30 minutes!

There is the beauty of the place; including the churches and art within.

St Mark’s

Cinque Terre

Last week we were there to enjoy the scenery and the walking. Which we did- but with plenty of other people. There were so many people in the villages and on the trains in between- ir was mad. It brought back memories of Amalfi.

The walking of the coast line was hard to very hard. Part of the usual track was closed for repairs after a landslip. A big job in progress.

The train trip after, our few days, back to Milan was not a great experience. Not a great advert for Italian railways.

Milan and Figaro

As ever I am late.

The following entries will not be in chronological orfer but will give some impression of recent events and activities.

We were in Italy for a week and the final night we went to the opera at La Scala- again- 5 years on. It was the night before our long train ride from Milan to Zurich, then Paris and finally Brittany.

I wanted to see The Marriage of Figaro. Shaz tells me we saw it in Wellington- i can just remember- and apparently we were not impressed then.

Certainly not impressed this time. The production seemed bland in its setting, very traditional – not attempt to modernise and give something different. The performance was too long and not helped by the fact the surtitles did not work in our box for the first act. I think for a place like the La Scala it either wants/ or is under pressure to do it the usual way- do not rock the boat. My memories of innovation are much stronger for NZ Opera.

Oh well- just remember- no more Marriage of Figaro.

Football memory

I went to my sole match of the season at ‘new Griffin Park’- as PB now has the season ticket and we are off to NZ.

I managed to get something on the screen for Peter- which was nice- though they added an error- shame.

And the match itself- terrible! The worst I ahve seen for so long. No single player did themselves any good. Lack of effort, lack of skill and lack of ideas. Everton- who are considered hot favourites for relegation- looked excellent in comparison. Very worrying indeed.

Analysis: Brentford 1-3 Everton

Harry Poole, BBC Sport

This was a rare off day for Brentford, or at least Thomas Frank will hope that proves the case, with Everton leaving west London fully deserving of the three points.The Bees made uncharacteristic errors and ultimately failed to assert themselves on home soil, where prior to Saturday they had suffered just two league defeats since the start of last season.The hosts’ struggles were evident in the first half when Bryan Mbeumo reacted to a misplaced pass by waving his arms in frustration.Of course, the day got off to a suboptimal start when club-record signing Kevin Schade suffered an injury in the warm-up – although his replacement, Keane Lewis-Potter, showed flashes of inspiration.Frank made no excuses for his players, who he will now demand an immediate response from when they host Arsenal in the Carabao Cup on Wednesday (19:45 BST).Brentford 1-3 Everton

RWC 2023

We managed to go to the Ireland v Tonga game in Nantes thanks to Lauren.

I chance for me to wear my green shirt- last seen RWC 2011 quarter final?

Good experience and an excuse to visit Nantes again and see Lauren ‘for real’.

Good atmosphere in the stadium with mostly green shirts around. Match not bad, and relatively easy for Ireland in the end.

I did pick up a bit of the ‘who is real Irish’ with a person were were sitting with and similarly on the bus back to the centre after the game.

Good chats with Lauren’s friends who were sat next to me. Good practice of la langue frainçaise!