Random Anecdotes

Yes, that was incredible… You can imagine their surprise when they started to receive texting by so many people, often with pics of their own cat, taken by strangers! And their surprise when they learnt about the facebook page and its success… I don’t think any of their (or our) other cats had ever been so popular.

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I forgot one nice little part: one day some stranger phoned because they opened the car, the cat jumped in, and sat into the baby’s seat, refusing to go away… :smile:

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Ahahaha, I can just imagine!! :rofl:

That story also kinda reminds me of that urban legend of the the funeral of a man where several wives of the deceased meet for the first time. :grin:

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I thought the same :sweat_smile: I was referring to that when I mentioned the “parallel life”. Anyway I’d not call it a urban legend… it is more a known joke, but it is also a quite plausible situation which surely happened more than once.

Those two mix usually and “it surely must have happened somewhere” is the textbook definition of an urban legend. :slight_smile:

That’s nothing - have you watched “Death at a Funeral”? :wink:

Not really an anecdote, but another “those strange Italians” discussion.

The three-hour post-lunch swimming ban.
I, and I suppose all Italians here, grew up with parents that absolutely forbid me to swim or play in the water after lunch. I had to wait three hours because you’re digesting, and cold water will block your digestion and you will die from it. How one should die was never clear - cramps that made you faint in water, or a heart attack, or whatever. Everyone was scared about the congestione that would get you and kill you if you dared touching the water. Some moms went the extra mile forbidding children to stay chest naked after lunch because, you know, when outside is 35 *beep*ing degrees (95F for the strange people) you’ll get too cold on your belly.

Well, it turns out that it’s (of course) just an Italian urban legend. Probably fueled by cases of people actually drowning after lunch time.

I’ve been observing the ban for around 15 years, let’s say 30 times per summer (surely on Sundays, often on Saturdays, sometimes even after breakfast). That’s 1350 hours of beach I lost for an urban legend. Hours that I’ll never get back. Fortunately my daughters will live without knowing what it means waiting under the umbrella between 13:30 and 16:30, sweating like a mother*beep*er, watching other children that had lunch at 12:00 bathing after 3PM and you still had 90 minutes to wait and you couldn’t go anywhere else because it was too damn hot.

I want my hours back.

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That´s not specifically italian though, that is known around the world.

Really? Here in Switzerland it was unheard of.

You need to rethink your “Italy > Switzerland = Rest of the World” way of thinking.

We have more in common with you than with switzerland I´d say.

The one hour thing is really well known. And at least as hard to get out of parents minds like the “lots of iron in spinach” myth.

It’s a thing in the UK too. But one hour, not three. To be honest I never feel much like going straight back in after I’ve just eaten. But as a kid this probably frustrated me. We were told it was because of cramps.

Oh yeah no three hours here either. I think they belive kids are easier to scare off by cramps than the thought they could vomit into the water or whatever.

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That would have brought my beach credit from 1350 hours to 450. It’s an improvement, isn’t it? No, in Italy it’s three hours because “digestion takes three hours to complete”. I’m not even sure if that is true in average. I’m 100% sure that my digestion today will take way longer than yesterday’s when I had a salad with shrimps.

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No way – I’m hungry again in about 30 minutes :smile:

That’s true. It surely depends what you eat.

I think you should spend a whole day in the sea, eating your breakfast, lunch and dinner off a small float, to make up for this robbing of your swim time. Though hopefully your metabolism isn’t too speedy.

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But an important part of a good digestion is the :poop: :arrow_right: :toilet:

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I just save all mine up for later.

But you still get hungry again in between? :thinking:

I´m beginning to envy your fine* shape more and more…

*As in you know what I mean erm…damn it´s too hot!

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Yeah. I’m weird. It’ll catch up with me one day.

Is that why you stole all my clothes? :laughing:

Or not. Never mind.

Wait, you didn´t say that I stole them?

And I certainly wouldn´t need all of them. I…no wait! Damnit!