Italian Alphabet

I must be getting blind in my old age. Or at least inattentive. Bill Crider responded to yesterday's blog to say that I surely must have meant 21 letters in the Italian alphabet, not 31. I could have sworn that the article I found on MSNBC said 31 letters. But a few moments research on the internet this afternoon found that I was inexplicably wrong. Oh, the shame, the embarrassment. To have to admit it. Is oldtimer's setting in? So forgive me, all, especially any Italian friends out there, particularly Bob Sabella. And thank you, Bill, for setting me straight. I may never write anything again.

I was just thinking that I grew up as an Irish kid surrounded by four square blocks of Italians. And I never learned any Italian. I'm wondering if the Italian kids that I went to school with learned any, either. Surely, they must have. But I never heard them speak it to each other. I did learn to love Italian food, however. Those families were very generous in sharing. There was even an Italian man who came from over the hill with his herd of goats to graze on the vacant land that was there at the time. And the women who came to pick dandelions to make wine. Don't get me started. I'll get all nostalgic.