I am really writing this so that I can keep the graphic from the previous home page: a practice I might continue later with other home pages. The point is that I must have designed the home page like this for a reason even if it wasn't clear to me at the time, which is now past - the beginning of the summer just passed. How many summers will there be? Who is to know but last fifteen spent in Italy have all been memorable in their own way.

But today I received a blow. I was asked to leave from the place I was working on account of not having anything left for me to work on. Rationally speaking, fair enough, I guess.

However the good thing is that it's not the end of the world. Somebody I was once friendly with passed away the other day. His name was Paul Hollingworth. He was only 47 or 48 or something. We never really became close friends but once he hired me to do a small design job for him for a country house. He also helped me out one time giving me a graphic design job for a report so I could earn some much needed cash at the time. I was no longer in touch with him but he had been living in Rome all the while. May his soul rest in peace, maybe in the company of the spirit of John Keats, another melancholic Englishman.

This is the first essay that I'm doing that is starting to sound like what they call these days a 'blog' - a word I detest. Why people find the ugly things so attractive these days is beyond me. From music to movies, there is a desire to attain the strange and awkward as if this was a sign of being revolutionary and with 'it'. What is this 'it'? Perhaps it's a new religion simply called 'it'. I believe in 'it'.

I try to remain grateful for small mercies which accords with my desire for a simple life. What is a simple life? Eating potatoes and not much else would simplify things a great deal but much of my money goes to paying bills and over the last few years, travelling enormous distances simply to have a moderately paying job. In a month the job will be over. What I shall do then I do not have a clue. I guess I'll do something. By the time I have a better idea, it will be the beginning of my sixteenth winter in Italy. Good night folks.