Doctors on the Lash

The Combo Empire's Catering Division was busy on Saturday and Sunday, supplying the food and drink for an all weekend thrash at a private house for three doctors from Milan who were celebrating their 50ths. The Ron Combo Combo kept the dance floor packed with a deft blend of hits from the 70s and 80s, Mrs Combo kept the partygoers' energy levels up with some fabulous food and I kept them all pissed with some frightful cocktails and thousands of bottles of wine. The picture above shows the Combo version of the Mojito. The Italians just couldn't get enough of this on Saturday night (although some of them were paying the price at lunchtime on Sunday). I have to say this lot drank like Brits, most unusual for Italians.
Shortly after this shot was taken (I'd been on the gin, this is at nearly three o'clock on Sunday morning and is a glimpse of the dance floor next to the swimming pool; the weird strips are bamboo fronds from the makeshift roof), it all kicked off and everybody started hurling other people in the pool. I didn't make my excuses and left anyway.

San Guido's Birthday

The patronal festival in the local town is a long-enduring marriage of Catholic devotion and awful tat. A major service in the local cathedral is followed by old Guido being carried around the town in his extremely heavy, gilded, glass-sided coffin by a team of red-faced old buffers. The streets are full of market stalls, mostly selling junk like special cloths that absorb 100 gallons of water or 'African' art.
There is also a big funfair with garish rides and the usual collection of chromed-up old lorries, as in Blighty. All the bumper cars have a big flag, which is a nice touch. I took the photographs early this morning with not a soul about. Without people a fairground is one of the gloomiest, most depressing places on earth. A rollercoaster ride in Italian is Una Montana Russa, a Russian Mountain but no one is able to tell me why. Odd.

Mother Nature

Swallowtail, this morning.

The Vicious Wine Circle

About once a month, the local group of drunks who buy a lot of their wine from Smooth Tony (posts passim) get together for lunch, the main purpose being to drink a lot of wine that isn't made by Tony, thus giving all of us a sort of pleasing interval from the wines of Veneto.
The venue yesterday was Casa Combo and the bottle count by 5 o'clock was 16 (including the Jeroboam of Freisa, a raspberryish, highly gluggable local red). Yes, the Jero is still unfinished but I'm going to sort it out tonight. There were ten of us at table, usual rules, women etc so the average consumption was about three bottles per male, maybe a bit more. I apologise for the plastic bottle of water. The two unfinished bottles of white wine were brought by Bruno and were undrinkable; I did not include those in the total. There are two bottles of spirits; one is an excellent bottle of Welsh whisky which got a big thumbs up and the other, towards the foreground, is Norwegian Aquavit which received mixed reviews.
Post Pig Party Update.
Mrs Combo last week went into the local town. One woman who she hardly knows came up to her and said, smirking, "Did your husband manage to get home OK on Sunday morning?" And then she saw the 22 year old daughter of a friend who reported that she saw your correspondent sitting at an outdoor table at a bar, trying to decide which of the five drinks I had in front of me I should take on first. Oh the shame!

Coming Clean

I can't carry on this pretence any more. The last blog was made up. There are no lorries queueing up outside Casa Combo before scattering off to vegetable markets all over northern Italy. Battered Iveco minibuses, each with a pederastic gangmaster and crew of underage illegals don't pitch up to pick the vegetables at four in the morning. Armani's PA doesn't scream down the 'phone to the Maitre d' at La Conca d'Oro in Milan "If you don 'ave ze zucchini flowers of Meester Combo zen Signor Giorgio say you go fuck youself!!!"*
I made it all up. I'm sorry, but I've been trying to give myself some self-worth after some hideous weekends of alcoholic excess, capped off by a virtuoso performance at The Pig Party in a local village on Saturday evening/night/Sunday morning.
There I've come out. From now on, no more fabricated stories, no more wild flings of fantasy.


This is the real truth. A plastic crate of assorted veggies for a local restaurant. Total income: €11.40. I feel better already. Maybe a snifter would be in order? I mean, it's nearly time for luncheon.

* Exactly what I thought. Why on earth would she speak in English with a stereotypical cod Italian accent? Beats me.

Harvest Festival

Combo Garden Produce Srl is now working flat out supplying restaurants and hotels all over northern Italy with the finest organic produce, all morning picked and fresh as could be. The neighbours aren't too keen on the queue of artics outside at three in the morning with their ThermoKing (TM) slave motors throbbing away but that's life I'm afraid when you live next door to a leading Market Garden. Oh yes. Here we have a sample of this morning's harvest, the zucchini flowers are particularly sought after in the best Milanese restaurants.

Tucking in

Paella last night at a friend's, a bottle of something decent from Spain would have gone well with it, but of course here it is impossible to buy any wine other than Italian. Not that I am complaining. Far from it. The Barbera d'Asti from Campazzo, Baccarossa, was excellent. The paella was delicious. Complimenti PierAnna!
Some of the Leicester Gang are pitching up tonight. The hatches are being battened.