Parries → The Scrambled Eggs of Yesterday 

Technically I’ve already failed to maintain this blog, as it’s now 12:16am, but oh this is too soon to fail, so here am I.

A welcome to young Aaron, who was kind enough to call and offer praise of yesterday’s entry. We even talked about setting him up with his own site—halelludjah!

This past weekend our friend Lizzy came to stay before heading out next week to New Zealand for a year, and she too has plans for a site called honeypea to show off her clothes designs. She’s such a doll, with that bubbly cheer and rosy cheeks they sometimes have, these English roses. We met in Rome and it’s slightly deflating seeing her here because she makes such a perfect expat. The glamour of a foreign capital city seems a pageant just for her. She had a difficult time at Rome, to be sure—the kindergarten where they all worked was a very tough place, with long hours, a long commute and minimal salary—but the financial limitations led her to share an apartment, actually a room, and that’s how she met and befriended her lovely boistrous locals.

But today no Lizzy, and until Irit’s arrival home I interacted with well nigh nary a soul save mine own. First thing in the morning took me the fifty paces to the Starbucks at the end of the road. There I learned the police letters—don’t worry, it’s the most industrious thing I’ve done in years—because it seems appropriate here in England: All phone-based customer service people seem fluent in them, which is shaming and impressive. Alpha, bravo, charlie, delta, echo, foxtrot and all that. Golf, hotel, india, juliet, kilo, lima, mike, november, oscar, papa, quebec, romeo, tango, uniform, victor, whisky, x-ray, yankee, zulu. Aha, I remember them all now—at least, with the added benefit of the fingers’ own memory, typing them, and all in alphabetical order. So one can still study something.

This is clearly the British system. Is there an American one? The Italians do it much more strictly, predictably enough, basing it entirely on their own city names, again, predictably.

Lately for some reason I’ll have you know I have gravitated away from fried and boiled to scrambled eggs. Scrambled get the best press, but fried have always been more satisfying to me. Ketchup helps. Ketchup doesn’t go with scrambled—why not? And boiled is good with nothing more than salt. Scrambled seem to lose their taste about halfway through, whereas fried stay tasty all the way. Scrambled seem to have a better health reputation, though they’re just as fried as fried, to which,

I’ll be returning shortly.