August 15. Ferragosto. The big official summer holiday. All of Italy is on vacation. All of Europe is on vacation. Except maybe the Georgians, and I don't want to be mean, but are they really in Europe?
Anyway, nothing is getting done in Italy. Rare the emails, rare the phone calls, even rarer getting anyone to perform their professional specialty, eg, printing labels or shipping samples. I realize that when we in America threw out the Blue Laws we lost all sense of the differentness of Sundays and holidays, but they more than make up for our compulsive grubbing over there. A happy medium, anybody?
Art: "Dolce Far Niente". She's been that way for 2 weeks already.
Enough with Mr. Glass Half Empty. Hello, Mr. Glass Half Full.
The euro continues to weaken against the USD. It's at the halfway point between its recent high and its 52-week low. I'm betting on a war in Georgia that would severely impede delivery of Russian oil to the EU. Good for the dollar, good for America. Or at least good for European-wine imports.
Or this latest conflagration in the Caucasus is an early sign of the unraveling of the knit-together global order, as Paul Krugman suggests in today's Times. Bad for me, bad for the world. I think. (I'm no No Global but I have my reservations about it all too.)
Meanwhile, even as the dollar rises, the streets, stores and restaurants of New York are jammed with skinny-jeaned vacationing Europeans exclaiming in French, Italian, German and Russian how cheap everything was at Saks. Good for Saks, depressing for the rest of us.
What else? Oh, the weather is murky and muggy, not great for vacations. I pity, with a shiver of schadenfreude, anyone who spent $40-50K for a rental in the Hamptons.
Sorry I can't report on the glorious wines I've been drinking and the fancy restos I've been dining at. Sort of broke and, I don't know, it's the middle of August, and even if you aren't on vacation, your mind kind of takes one anyway.
Happy Ferragosto.
Buon Ferragosto a te Terry. I always found Ferragosto depressing. Sort of like la provincia on a Sunday. This post reminds me of that one I so liked on Italy on a rainy day.
Buon divertimento,
Susannah
Posted by: Susannah Gold | August 15, 2008 at 01:10 PM
Grazie mille, Susannah! Bacioni da Midtown East.
Buon weekend...parliamo presto, va bene?
Posted by: Strappo | August 15, 2008 at 01:13 PM
Oh, I love Ferragosto!
It's the only time I find a parking in town.
:-)
Have a good summer!
L.
Posted by: Lizzy | August 16, 2008 at 11:25 AM