Friday

In the dark early morning. I slept well. Hard for 7 hours. Maybe close to 8. I got home from the small town parade up in Pennsylvania. It’s called Old Home Week. Every three years, they celebrate the area’s history and agriculture. The parade was about an hour long. Lots of old tractors, but there were also bands and horses and kids and lots of candy thrown onto the sidewalk.

The forest was screaming with “dog day cicadas.” Though it was cool, I left the windows closed. I didn’t know if I could sleep through all the cacophony.

It is 62 degrees, and the bugs have quieted. Two bedroom windows are open, and the ceiling fan is bathing me in cool mountain air.

A week ago, I was on Lake Como. A sleek powerboat powered us across to Bellagio. It was the last day of the whirlwind trip through northern Italy. (Winds are magical things on Como. More on that later.)

I feel a little better with the rest. But my right knee aches a bit. I aggravated it either in Italy or on the plane. Mostly I just don’t feel “right.” Kind of “icky.” Maybe I caught something on the trip.

Maybe I’m just exhausted, and my body is rebelling.

It has been a hard week. So many books. So much work to try to get caught up on things.

Today, after this week’s blog is finished, there will be more and more and more books.

A Carolina wren sings good morning outside my bedroom. The morning is brightening. The French-press coffee next to the bed is cooling. It smells so good.

Friends have advised me that I should get some rest. I’d feel guilty taking time off after the budget vacation. I’d feel guilty leaving more work to continue to pile up.

So, I’ll write this til it’s done and then drag myself down the mountain and across the valley to work.

The dog days of summer. At least August has not been very hot.

Yet.

The high will be 80 today. That’s not bad. I can live with that.

Boom!

I got back late on Sunday night. It was too late to work, so I didn’t get off I-70 and check on the warehouse. I just continued on past and went home.

I was in early on Monday to see just how far behind I’d become while overseas. But first, I went to pick up Giles from the boarding kennel. He was coughing and sneezing and dirty. I was not happy. Nor was I happy about the $400 bill. The parking garage in Philly cost $320. Airfare and hotels are just the beginning of travel expenses.

My knee was fine until I got off the plane. All the steps and stairs I took in Italy, and it was fine. Now I’ve been limping all week. Again. How could I have injured it on the plane? Maybe I sat wrong for 9 hours.

I met with Clark about the July sales figures. All three stores were up. The community is embracing the Gaithersburg store and its expansion. I expected sales to be up there. But my expectations were exceeded. There are still a lot of things to get done. It is a work in progress.

The Frederick store sales were up, but not a whole lot. I’ve devoted so much time and energy on Gaithersburg, maybe it needs some attention now.

Hagerstown was the surprise. It has been bumping along the bottom for years. What happened? I don’t know. This means I’ll need to make some decisions. Big ones. Soon.

I was leaning one way. Now I’m being pushed in another.

The stores have been on an amazing run since reopening after COVID all those years ago.

Why? Could be many reasons, but I really think people changed during the plague.

There was indeed a huge backlog of carts and other work waiting for me.

Sigh…

Yet another cost of travel.

Monday

Sunday was an exhausting day. I got up at 5 a.m. in Milan (11 p.m. Saturday US time.) I didn’t get home til 11 p.m. Sunday night. A marathon day for sure.

It was a beautiful evening on the mountain. 56 degrees. I opened the windows and turned on the ceiling fan. Soon I was gone to dreamland.

Andrew is driving us to Gaithersburg. The window signage was finally installed last week while I was away. The pictures don’t look very good. But it was my idea, and we will have to live with it or change it, I guess.

My thoughts were to make the signage “over the top” as that location is “hidden” toward the back of the shopping center. Also, people don’t really get how large the store is or the diverse product assortment we offer.

I hope I didn’t mess up a good thing.

It is August. The trip was great. Therapeutic in many ways. I think all the walking and especially the countless stairs EVERYWHERE stressed my knee.

I’m limping again.

I picked up Giles from the boarding kennels on the way into work today. He seemed very happy to see me. I missed the goofy lunk.

Now that Gaithersburg is pretty much on its own, I need to focus on some other aspects of Wonder Book that I’ve been neglecting.

I don’t hate the images as much as I thought I would. It tells a story. In words. Like a book. The story of the bookstore. Not a cute Ye Olde Booke Shoppe but, rather, a living organic place. Lots of books for lots of people of all kinds. Wonder Book has never been prejudiced or snooty. We are proud to offer thousands of $1 books. Paperback romance. Comic books. We also offer beautiful or collectible books.

This week I went through a large collection of physics texts. “Quantum this.” “Particle that.” “Nuclear this.” “Reactor that.” … We also got the owner’s yearbooks. Columbia 1965. And his bound dissertation (also Columbia 1965.) You’ll find a lot of them in Gaithersburg. They have the most room for them. But a lot went to the other stores as well as on www.wonderbook.com.

The place looks good. Now we will get into fine-tuning.

On the way back. The signs were not as bad as I had feared. There are two more windows to cover. Maybe those will be graphics of iconic books or other media. Maybe photos of people reading.

Hmmmm… a little over the top.

More than a little.

But it does tell a story…

And it keeps the brutal sun and heat out.

And customers CAN’T miss it!

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a bookstore like it.

Maybe that’s a good thing.

Malpensa Airport, Milan: Sunday, August 3rd

The guide got me onto a shuttle, saving me a lot of money on cab fare. The problem is that it left the hotel at 7:15 a.m. My flight isn’t until 1:20. It is 8 a.m., and I can’t even go to check-in before 10:20. You’d think I’d relish this enforced downtime.

It’ll be a long day until I get to Philly. And then the long drive to Frederick, Maryland, with Sunday evening traffic.

One of the penalties of travel. The logistics of getting there.

I don’t envy the super-rich. I wouldn’t want to live in a mansion (except for all the books it would hold) with a lot of attendants and assistants. I wouldn’t mind a private jet though. It would be nice to avoid all the lines and numerous checks and follow-up lines.

I can see the Alps in the distance from the airport. Some so high they are still covered in snow.

I was able to kill a couple of hours in the lounge. That was a bit of luxury. I wasn’t very hungry. But the chairs were comfy, and the place was quiet. They had Campari soda in the little iconic bottles. Milan is the city of Campari.

I must have walked a couple of miles in the airport. Everything is far away. Waiting area. Check-in (Waiting was at Check-in #1. My check-in was section #24.) Security. Duty Free. Lounge. Flight gate…

I was able to choose a seat at the bulkhead. More legroom. No one seated in front of me to flop their seat back. I had the window seat. The middle seat was a tall muscular young Italian man. He couldn’t help but invade my space a bit—especially when he unfolded an Italian newspaper.

I refused the meal. “Chicken or pasta?” Binge-watched 1923 with Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren for the 5 episodes offered. Looking at the flight map, we still weren’t very far over the Atlantic. Hours to kill.

I’d brought a couple of yellow legal pads that had pages and pages of manuscript poems written on them. It was a chore, but I typed them all up onto my laptop to be printed out when I got back home. Most were from 2024 and 2025. But few were much older. Occasionally, I couldn’t read my writing and couldn’t think of what word that could be. It was sometimes interesting. Reliving the slices of life, times and places, moods and crises… Then it was done. I stuffed the complete yellow pages into my knapsack. I’d not only gotten a long put-off chore done, but I’d killed a lot of time. I wonder what the Italian neighbor thought of this guy writing pages and pages of poems.

An exercise in futility?

Well, I can’t say I didn’t try.

Maybe I just didn’t try hard enough. Maybe I just never took the “risk.”

We finally landed in Philly. With Global Entry, I walked right through customs, showed my face to a kiosk and was waved through by the uniformed agent in the cubicle without a word.

I still had to wait an hour for my luggage…

Verona

It was Friday, August 1st. Blog day. I wrote feverishly as the bus bounced from Padua to Verona. We would spend some hours there before heading toward our final city of Milan.

The bus dropped us off next to the Adige River. There were Roman structures and a huge medieval castle in view as we crossed the bridge into the old town. We stopped before a large marble Roman gate, still very much intact, that had been built during the reign of Claudius. Then to the heart of the city, where the Roman amphitheater dominates the town square. It is one of the best-preserved structures of that era in the world. More walking. More city sites.

The most interesting was Juliet’s Balcony. We were led into a very crowded courtyard. Looking up to the right, I could see the stone balcony. A couple of tourists were leaning over it. There is some historic basis for this being the house of the “Capulets” (actually Cappellos) upon whom Shakespeare based Romeo and Juliet. (There is actually a theory that Will was Italian.)

Anyway… TMI… The main draw to this place is the bronze statue of Juliet at the far end of the courtyard.

The story goes that if a young woman rubs Juliet’s bronze right breast, she will find true love. Well, everyone wants in on that. The poor woman’s torso is polished gleamingly from all the stroking.

I was tempted to take the chance for true love, but the line was too long. Maybe some other divine intervention will come along.

After a few more things, we were released for free time. Most people dispersed to look for lunch or shopping. I sought a place to sit in the shade. The blog comes first. I found myself on a bench in a park below the walls of the Roman arena, where operas are now performed.

“The most beautiful place on earth,” the posters along the street stated.

It was a lovely serene place to write and think. They had a “graveyard” of old opera props resting on a walkway enclosed in fencing.

It was interesting to imagine the Bread and Circuses that went on here almost 2000 years ago. Just as intriguing was the fact that for many years operas have been performed before a live audience on the other side of the wall.

Then on to Milan. I wasn’t thrilled. I’d spent enough time in that city a year ago. That tour started and finished in Milan. But different guides seem to have different takes on everywhere. And this was currently her hometown. So her tour included gossip about the mayor and his desire to improve the bumpy streets—changing out perfectly good stone cobbles because they weren’t bicycle friendly. (He’s a biker.)

Finally, we were in our hotel. This tour company had stated they weren’t going to do luggage service anymore. Maybe enough customers complained. Or voted with their feet to get that service back. My bag was already in my room when the bus dropped us off.

No milling about on the street until the bag was birthed from beneath the bus. No crushing into elevators as everyone is anxious to get to their room and freshen up.

It was “free time.” The blog was posted back in Maryland. The guide recommended some nearby restaurants. I chose Pizzeria di Porta Garibaldi. It was a short walk. It was a family place, opened in 1956. They make their own olive oil at the family farm in Tuscany. I had bruschetta, sardines (smoked and in olive oil), saffron risotto (a “typical” Milanese dish) and Falanghina wine (a favorite variety.)

Saturday, August 2nd

The last day of the tour. Very cool.

“Feels like October,” the guide said.

It is very dusky out at 8:15.

I’m ready to go home.

I feel reset. I hope that lasts a while.

We are on the bus one last time. To Lake Como.

The rain starts.

We pass the “famous cemetery.”

The guide said it is noted for its high-quality sculptures and funerary architecture as well as famous residents. She said Umberto Eco, Verdi…

I got glimpses of it and really wanted to walk through…

Next time.

Lake Como—Bellagio specifically—is only 30 miles away. It is very close to the Swiss border.

The guide said a lot of Italians try to work across the border as “the pay is 4 times as much.”

“The Swiss are all wealthy,” she quipped. “The difference between a rich Swiss and a poor Swiss is the poor Swiss wash their own Mercedes.”

The Alps are beginning to come into view.

The lake is shaped like a walking man. Two long legs extend southward. A long torso extends north. Bellagio, the famous town, is placed on a point of land right at the walking man’s crotch.

She told us that lots of villas and yachts have been confiscated from Russians.

Warm wind and microclimate. Palms, olives… in Switzerland. Wind called Foehn. Winds are a big thing around here: https://www.sportingdomaso.com/lake-como/Winds and https://www.comolakesideblog.com/culture/lake-como-winds. More on that later.

The road along the lake is often too narrow for the bus and oncoming traffic of almost exclusively small cars. We were told that buses can only drive around the lake clockwise now to avoid even more congestion.

There were beautiful views everywhere. Alps all around. The lake and small towns on the shores below.

“That’s George Clooney’s palace…”

The bus stopped at a charming town named Tremezzo.

“If you buy something, you can use the cafes’ bathrooms.”

I ordered an espresso and had my “holy moment.”

The guide I had in northern Italy last year went on and on about Italians and their “holy moments” with espressos. They drink them quickly. Standing at the counter. Essentially, it is a shot of caffeine. It was delicious and only 1 Euro 50.

A sign states Mussolini tried to escape north from near Tremezzo. He and his mistress were captured and quickly executed by communists. “Ending Fascism in Italy.” Their bodies were brought to Milan and publicly humiliated—hung upside down—in a public square.

Then we boarded a speedboat for the trip across the lake to the iconic town of Bellagio.

The guide gave us tips on things to do during the 4 hours we’d be there.

“There’s an old villa whose gardens and grounds you can tour. It is a short walk.” (That was a beautiful place. Lakeside. Classic architecture and numerous garden architectural features.)

“Walk up into the town… shops… restaurants… cafes… views…”

“Then there’s ‘the point where the winds divide’…” She said some thought it was a magic spot. “One of the places on earth that have secret powers.”

Well, I had to see that.

Punta Spartivento.

The point where the winds divide

Three legs of the lake meet here
Alpine mountains loom surround
Stone wind water
Primal gods who rule here still
Combine divide focus disperse
Bathed in winds
The elements focus upon the point
I stand immersed
In wind stone water
Turn my head round
Lapping waters
Swans sailing like galleons
Quiet today.
I can imagine storms
Pouring down the mountains
Slamming into this rocky point
Being halved by it
Sent on their way

Then I headed back to Bellagio. Up and over cobbled streets. Below red terra cotta roofs. A day-tripping tourist.

Well, it is what it is. I am what I am. I’m fine with just a taste sometimes. Immersion others.

I didn’t eat lunch. The lake fish prepared in multiple ways is supposed to be wonderful.

I found a table on the sidewalk at a cafe and had a perfect martini…

Back across the lake, leaving Bellagio and the “point” behind.

It was a tired bookseller on the bus continuing clockwise around the lake—the long way—to Milan.

There was a farewell dinner that evening. I wish I’d skipped and gone back to the Garibaldi. I’d enjoyed a few people’s acquaintance. A young nurse from Baltimore, who had befriended me, was chatty.

“It must be fate,” she said.

Then she tried to get me involved with a single woman we were seated with. On the last night? I was too tired for that. When we got back to the hotel, she suggested we all go for a walk…

I went up and hid in my room until morning.