in the mood for travel

Daniel said he was hoping that Americans would still be welcome when he traveled outside the United States, adding that he could always say he was a New Yorker. That reminded me that I was once rewarded with a hug and a kiss on each cheek in Modena, Italy, when I said I was from New York City.

Christie and I were traveling around Emilia-Romagna in October 2001, just a month or so after the attack on the World Trade Center. On our first night, we found a hotel in Modena and went out for drinks and then to supper.

We were somewhat jet-lagged and tired. The woman at the hotel had noted a few nearby eating places of varying character and none caught our fancy as we walked past them. We got to a small square and noticed a welcoming restaurant across the square. The owner was just writing the supper menu on the blackboard and we talked to her, in a mix of English and Italian and facial and hand expression, about what was on offer that evening. After we'd determined that we were really ready to eat there, she said she was Italian and was from Modena. She said you're American and you are from where? When I said "New York," she said "Il principe" (the prince) and gave me a hug and kisses.

The supper was extraordinary. We ended up chatting with a couple Italians who sat at a small table next to ours. We ended up staying until the restaurant closed and then we four went to a coffee bar and closed it down too.

I had another 9-11 experience on that trip. I was walking around San Domenico in Bologna. There weren't too many other people in the plaza and an airplane flew over. Not particularly low in the sky but a reminder of the airplanes flying into the Trade Center. Gave me a start.

On another trip to Italy, we were looking for a lunch place in Buccheri on Sicily. I went over to the prominent restaurant on the central square that said it was open but no one was around to ask about a table. When I got back to the car and reported that to Christie, she said that lots of people seemed to be coming and going from the Caffè Roma nearby. We checked it out and had a delightful lunch. The lesson I learned is that a bit of patience and observation can be a good travel guide.

what are you reading?

Every week in the New York times book review, there is a box on the "Letters" page with two or three short notes listing "what our readers are reading." Last week, one of them said "I am reading Herman Wouk's Marjorie Morningstar for the second time. I first read it 70 years ago. It's still a great read!"

I was reading Marjorie Morningstar way back in the '80s. When I saw Judith one day, she asked what I was reading and I said Marjorie Morningstar and held up my unjacketed older hard-covered edition, bound in basic black. She said that you shouldn't actually admit to reading Herman Wouk.

Whatever. I remember thinking then that it was a good read. At the moment, though, I'm reading the thoroughly modern Family meal by Bryan Washington.

the country house life moderne

This is the new home of Margot Beste-Chetwynde in the 2017 production of "Decline and Fall" based on the novel by Evelyn Waugh. We never get much closer than this but the interiors are extraordinary moderne. I naturally do not know if the interiors were actually filmed in the house shown here. Googling has not yet revealed the buildings used in the three-episode series from Acorn TV and BBC, streaming on Amazon Prime.

But who cares about the real house? There's plenty of good scenery and architecture jokes. If you are wondering how to say "Beste-Chetwynde," the actors say it something like "beastie cheating." The role is delightfully played by Eva Longorio.

short-term rentals and noise complaints

The Alfred Village Planning Board has been working on revisions to the zoning code. One of the new considerations is short-term rentals like Airbnb. Alfred is a college town, rather overwhelmed by its student population. A lot of the houses in the center of the village and beyond are rental houses. Some are big and can be noisy, particularly on Friday and Saturday nights. There is fear that short-term rentals will be occasional party houses and therefore should be limited to the multi-family zones (R-2 and R-3). Some of the bigger houses in the village are grandfathered for greater capacity than two units.

We board members were having an email discussion about which zones should be allowed to have short-term rentals. Someone brought up boisterous parties they knew about in such rentals. It seems to me ungracious to preclude graduation parties in the "collegiest town" in America. As a resident of the central village in R-2, I know about the noise that can burst from the house and yard of some of those group houses, especially on a warm afternoon. The boom-boom from the speakers can be especially irksome. But I do really appreciate being in the center of town, where I can walk to most every place I need to go.

This morning as I ate my breakfast, I was reading last Sunday's New York times book review, particularly the article on Antonio Di Benedetto by Michael Greenberg. "No writer has laid bare so thoroughly the ongoing predicament of the Argentine, for whom the resolution of even minor problems, such as a noise complaint or the collection of one's modest salary, seems beyond normal human effort. Di Benedetto understands this bitter ingredient of Argentine life, where the middle class is as evanescent as melting ice, subject to impoverishing currency devaluations, corrupt populists, vicious military coups, cynical guerrilla movements and useless reforms."

I don't know whether Di Benedetto's books are exactly the thing to read now, as parallels to the chaos of the moment, or the thing to avoid and let yourself slip into comfortable release. Whatever, it will be pleasant when it's nice enough to sit on the front porch and read, even if the ex frat house across the street is boom booming.