Living in San Giorgio di Pesaro and Kingston

San Giorgio is now operating its “differentiated rubbish collection”. After a few months delay the new system started in August. The first day there were only a few bins left out on the street as it was still possible to throw rubbish into old bins used in the previous system. Within a few days the old bins were removed and now the night before collection the street became lined with plastic bins. So far the system seems to be working well although it would be difficult if one lived in a small flat as to operate the system there are 4 bins plus 2 sacks.

The new italian words to help understand the system are:

umido i.e. humid and in this case used for waste food.
carte i.e.paper
vetro i.e. glass
metallo i.e. tin cans etc. – put in a red sack.
plastica i.e. plastic bottles etc. – put in a yellow sack.
secco i.e. dry – used for things that do not go under the other headings.

Sam the cat has had a cat flap for 5 years and in all that time no Italian cat has worked out how to use it, or at least has not bothered to work out how to use it. However, last week we discovered the cat in the picture helping itself to Sam’s food. So we decided to invest in the latest catflap which has a chip reading device. Pressing a couple of buttons on the flap allows it to read the chip in Sam’s shoulder. When Sam approaches the cat flap it reads her chip and allows the door to open.

The old cat flap was dull brown and blended into the door. The new one stands out as it is pure white and also has a small extension which holds the chip reading device. It is appealingly called the “porch” in the installation instructions.

The installation of the new catflap coincided with Sam’s annual visit to the vet. Sam had a thorough checkup and was given a clean bill of health. This means she should be with us for a while longer making the investment in the new system worthwhile.