A Most Unreliable Narrator Issue #105 Io mangio la mela / Lei mangia una mela
I eat the apple / She eats an apple
Welcome to A Most Unreliable Narrator, the slice-of-life newsletter of GenXer around town, Lisa Rabey. I talk about anything and everything with a bit of swears. I’m glad you’re here.
Dear Internet,
Come stai?
I’m taking this whole learning Italiano seriously. Much more seriously than when I tried to learn Gaelic. Lots of guttural sounds being made, that Gaelic.
I strolled along the internet looking for easy for beginners’ books to read in Italian. Look, I’m not kidding anyone here. I’m on day four of Duolingo and I’ve mastered i/she/he/you/they eat apples/bread. Also, drinking lots of l'acqua. Really helpful when I am in Rome and Florence for a week. Good thing I’ll be covered eating and drinking. Not asking for it, mind you, but at least pointing out that i/she/he/you/they can do those things.
I’m tag teaming with Mango which teaches you more conversational phrases and uses context for those phrases. Come sta? is the formal (someone you do not know) version of how are you while Come stai? (someone you do know) is the informal version. I even have note cards for those pesky gendered nouns and verbs just like when I was in French class.
My travels lead me to sites that more or less recommended the same books, but they were fairly expensive on Amazon from $30 and up. Some books were more aligned with my budget such as Adriano, Il Cane Di Pompei (Hadrian, The Dog of Pompeii). I CONFESS, I dropped a few bucks towards TERF Rowling for Harry Potter e la Pietra Filosofale which I bought for the Kindle for $9.
I dropped a few coin on Italian All-in-One For Dummies because nearly 700 people on Amazon said it was the best and who am I to argue?
You may be wondering why I’m spending all this time, energy, and dollars to learn a language that I’ll need for a week in December when a phrase book could suffice. A very good question!
There are a few reasons:
I want to learn a new language and Italian was on the list
I didn’t speak Italian when I was last in Italy and I felt hindered by that (yes, there were a lot of English speakers and my butchered French helped a bit but ugh, stupid Americans)
Italy is on the list of places we want to move to when TEH retires in about 10 years
Plus, learning a language doesn’t quite count towards no more classes for 2022. Right? Right.
I joked to Lindsay, who is also learning Italian, how the locals would feel if I’m whipping out my note cards to get the tenses and verbs right when speaking and she said I could just pretend I’m a visiting professor going through my notes. Sure, that makes sense.
I have no energy to tell you much beyond this. I’m going to read a book.
Things I Recently Wrote
If you read #97.5, you’ll recall I’ve ditched the We’ll Read Anything Once (Twice If We Like it) book review blog for a newsletter of the same name.
Werewoofs at No Flying, No Tights
The Jane Austen Dating Agency at We’ll Read Anything Once
What I’m Reading
FINISH A FUCKING BOOK LISA BEFORE STARTING A NEW ONE.
The 7/12 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle An Agatha Christie-esque locked room mystery
Reputation Mean girls with Jane Austen thrown in
Dissolution Lawyer turned sleuth in Tudor England
The Historian A 700 page tomb of the retelling of Dracula
If We Were Villains Did he or did he not commit the murder?
The Book of Life All Souls book #3
To Love and to Loathe Two hearts battle it out. Who will win?
Marvellous Light A magical Edwardian England filled with love and conspiracies
Girls to the Front Oral history of Riot Grrrls
Ten Steps to Nanette Hannah Gadsby’s memoir
all about love bell hook’s classic
Wonderful Thing
Sleeping with the pug.
Get vaccinated! Vote in the primaries! Boop a dog’s nose!
lisa x
(Fuck fascists and Nazis!)
You've just finished reading A Most Unreliable Narrator: the slice of life newsletter from the GenXer about town, Lisa Rabey. You can find me on Instagram, Facebook and Bluesky if you're so inclined. I am everywhere. Copyright © 1996 - 2025 by Lisa Rabey