It's autumn and the fountains are flowing with wine ... well, something has been put in them to celebrate the wine harvest.
The mushroom season is at its height and if you eat out, mushrooms come with everything! I love mushrooms and these beauties are for my dinner tonight.
I'll be making a rabbit stew, with local olives and pine nuts as well.
And there are more car rallies this weekend with classic vehicles zooming around everywhere.
Today's race went past my house so I got a free grandstand view!
I bought some warm casual items for wearing as the nights draw in and the days get cooler: leggings, fleece and puffer jacket. Because of the gas crisis, we aren't allowed to turn the central heating on till November 22nd, by government decree. I am a cold mortal and although I find the climate here on the riviera the best tonic for my health, which is why I moved here, I usually want to turn the heating on by early November. Fortunately, my last but one visitor, Roz, brought me some tights from Britain. They do, of course, sell tights here in Italy but continental tights have sizing that even a petite girl like me finds small and tight, so I prefer to stick to the sizing systems I know. So I hope to stave off the shivers in this way. For now, though, the weather is lovely.
A dip in the archives
Last year I had time to write regular articles on trans history, but as life has returned after Covid I've been more active away from the computer, hence shorter posts. But today I read an article about Archduke Ludwig Viktor (1842-1919), brother of Austrian Emperor Franz-Joseph and Mexican Emperor Maximilian.
In this photo, Ludwig Viktor is on the far right with his brothers Karl Ludwig (far left), Franz Joseph (seated) and Maximilian. The middle two sat on important thrones, leaving young Franz Viktor little to do but ogle officers on parade and visit bathhouses.
He also seems to have enjoyed dressing as a woman (and what dresses they had in those days!), either in plays as here
or on other occasions
Whether he was really trans is a question that is unlikely to be answered but I mention him here as being another high-ranking personage who was undoubtedly within the LGBTQ spectrum. I also mention people from the past to show the transphobes that being trans or presenting as another gender has been a thing for as long as humanity has existed and that it cuts through all social tiers and nations.
Sue x
I see your trans positive blog has now got the city's water supply on the turn! 😉
ReplyDeleteI had to pause for a moment when you mentioned mushrooms. Yum! A small amount of butter, maybe some garlic, and freshly baked bread on the side. Ah, I guess it's nearly tea time here 🙂
I'm somewhat surprised by the tights issue. Snag make a bit of a thing about their hosery coming from Italy. Does the country export all the larger sizes to those leggy northern Europeans? 😉
As to young Franz (careful not to type 'Tranz', Lynn 🤦♀️), if they were, while they may have had privileges others did not, they may also have limitations as well. It ain't easy being rainbow 🌈
DeleteThanks for all your observations, Lynn.
DeleteSnag Tights may be manufactured in Italy but they are made for larger ladies so the spec is different. I find tights from France, Italy and Spain seem to have less stretchy elastane (Lycra) and more preferences for older, or at least more rigid, types of fibre. Coupled with smaller sizings because of generally smaller-sized populations than hulking English women (!), this results in sizings that I haven't got used to which feel less comfortable. You can't fault the quality, though.
Puritan Britain tended to frown more on alternative lives than Catholic Central Europe in Victorian times so there were many German and continental princes and nobles in the public eye who actually enjoyed less restricted and condemned lives. The scandal with Ludwig Viktor is not that he was gay and went to seek men out in public bathhouses but that he was slapped by a man in such an establishment. For a prince to be publicly humiliated like that was deemed far worse a scandal than the reason he was in the bathhouse in the first place.
I forgot to put garlic in the mushrooms so they are a bit bland!
Sue xx
That's a pretty pink fountain Sue.
ReplyDeleteI'm a big fan of mushrooms and I have to agree those you're having for your dinner certainly are beauties, enjoy.
That rabbit stew sounds nice and I'm intrigued, do the olives and pine nuts go in the stew?
I normally slip into my sleeping bag when it get's colder. I have had sleeping bags since my childhood and I love them. I had a green one once and my Wife and kids nicknamed me the Slug. They're great for sitting on the couch in during those cold dark evenings.
Love the photo of the cars and how cool was it that you got to see them all go past your home.
An interesting snippet of history, thanks for sharing.
Thank you, Lotte.
DeleteLigurian-style rabbit stew is very much a dish particular to this area as rabbits are the only land animal farmed because the area is too rocky for large animals like cows or pigs. The local olives and pines supply the other ingredients.
I'm happy to discover other mushroom fans in you and Lynn above.
Being a slug in a green sleeping bag made me chuckle. It's not especially cold here, even in the middle of winter, so I think a sleeping bag would be too warm, but winter nights do have a little bit of an edge to them nonetheless, hence my stocking up on garments I can layer.
Sue xx