The "Five Meter House" and other properties

It began about a year ago or even a little more when Max and I were bicycling around the neighborhood. Sort of randomly and without context he pointed out a house to me and said: "this is my house. It's called Five-Meter House." I had no idea where this came from and still don't have but the story has gotten quite elaborate. The Five-Meter House started out being kind of modest but it grows daily and now it's basically a castle with 5 garages and a huge workshop. Originally the Five-Meter House was located in South Carolina - don't ask me why, that was during Max's geography phase - and one day he decided that North Carolina was the place. Subsequently a second Five-Meter House was established on the railroad bridge next to Dumbarton Bridge and the interior design was getting more define. Eventually an unnamed "friend" moved in who seemed to forever be shopping when we asked what he was up to. The friend had another garage suffice it to say. The garages got populated with ATVs, Camry's (Papa has one), Cabrio's (Mama has one), and eventually a Ferrari (the knowledge of fast cars seems to be located somewhere on the Y chromosome). All during the first two months of our trip there was occasional talk of the Five Meter House and that Max had just taken a plane there and back to check that everything was in great working order.
I thought that was it until we reached Frigiliana. After about a week Max decided he had another house there and called it Neely (don't ask). The Neely house is located was across Calle Alta from Alan's house (the one we were renting) and besides Max "Friend Annette" lives there. Daily we had to walk by the Neely House and admire its nice green door and how well Max keeps it. There were more stories about the kitchen in the Neely House and how he and friend Annette are shooting from the roof with cannons. Now in Florence another house got added, the so-called "Paeuschen" House (Paeuschen means short break in German). Paeuschen House is right below us on the fourth floor and so - technically speaking - it is an apartment, not a house. Meanwhile Five Meter House and Neely House moved to Florence as well and are now located on the 3rd and 2nd floor of this house respectively. Since we came here there has been serious addition to the car park - one could almost call it a fleet now. A police car got added, an Alfa Romeo, a Mercedes Benz, another Ferrari and a Seat Micra for the “Friend” (kind of cheap, really). In addition, he has a church, a couple of gas stations, a monastery, and a Roman arch he calls his own plus the usual assortment of backhoes, trucks and cement mixers. He tells us elaborate stories about these places and what great things he and “friend” or “friend Annette” do there, what delicacies they cook up – which always include things like tomatoes or beans that he wouldn’t be caught dead eating in real life. So here we are with a 3 year old real estate tycoon. I hope he is aware of the fact that he will have to work hard get all those goodies for real because Mom and Dad sure won’t be able to afford that lavish life-style.
Back to Italy. Yesterday we did an awfully touristy thing: we climbed the cupola of the Dome. It was 463 steps and Max the mean lean boy machine took off like there is no tomorrow. Mom and Dad followed and eventually Dad ended up carrying Max part of the way. Huffing and puffing tourist were all along the way and the climb on real steep spiral stairs was, well – interesting. Now I suffer from vertigo, serious vertigo, freak me out type of vertigo, I-am-standing-with-my-back-pressed-to-the-wall-and-not-moving-my-ass-a-millimeter type of vertigo and so I probably didn’t get my 6 Euros worth of views and pics but definitely I burned adrenalin for days. Max had a good workout and a sound nap in the afternoon. Every day we go done to the “centro citta” there seem to be more tourists. The piazza in front of the Dome is almost always black with people and the noise level is amazing. We were lucky that we went up the cupola on the early side, by the time we came down the line to get up was wrapping around the corner.
Today we finally went to the monastery that we didn’t get to see due to the wrong directions in the tourist guide the other day. It isn’t far outside Florence but it is outside and I realized how welcome the relative calm and quiet of the countryside was compared to the hustle-bustle of the city. Maybe I am getting old or maybe I never was a big city kind of gal but the endless noise, traffic, crowds of people are definitely going on my nerves big time. We had once entertained the romantic notion of living in Florence, sending Max to the International School there and living the charmed life of ex-expats. Now I am thinking that I would probably start shooting tourist after about three months and so maybe we should reconsider. Not sure Italian prisons are all that much fun.
So anyway, weekend is upon us and we decided to stay put to avoid rushing out of Florence with everybody else on Friday evening or Saturday morning but early next week we’ll be taking a trip to the countryside, hear some birds sing and discuss with Max how they used to shoot canons from this castle or that tower.