This morning I donned my beanie and went for a run along the river, armed with a clutch of chrysanthemums. For a while I held off unloading the gift, relishing the sensation of running with flowers. But then I saw a man with a briefcase, and offered him a generous "good morning." He was pretending not to see the obvious, so I said "for you!" which ( Read more... )

Tony was in fine form during the sermon, meditating eloquently on the act of giving. As he pondered good and bad motives for the exchange of gifts I'm sure that my stem of chrysanthemums bent itself into a question mark. My challenge, from the pulpit, was to offer the gift with love. I was talking to Ben and Carol while the vicar shook a line of ( Read more... )

After the power failure I walked to the market for blooms. "What are these?" I asked, pointing to the white chrysanthemums. Then, "what are these?", pointing to the yellow ones. I settled on the former - a bargain at £1.50 - and proceeded to the tea shop where that fine-booted man presides. I prepared myself in a side-lane, removing a single stem ( Read more... )

I lunched on proper Florentine food at the central market. The salad was amazing, but the begging gypsy annoying, so I bought her an orange lily. It was wrapped ornately and inefficiently, which only added to her annoyance upon receiving the gift. So I learnt, today, that the project can be used for all sorts of things, including punishment. I had ( Read more... )

The bank teller was perfectly calm about the whole affair, as if machines were swallowing credit cards on every other day of the week. She simply glanced at my passport and asked me to sign. I was a million times more anxious, and suddenly apocalyptic about what the card's loss might entail. It's the scholarship account, you see, and I need its ( Read more... )