Picasso, Miro, Dali, 2nd time: Osteria del Bricco, 1st time this year

Strozzi Palace

This morning we revisited the show at the Strozzi Palace of the collected early works of Pablo Picasso, Joan (pronounced Juan, yes, I found that confusing) Miro, and Salvador Dali. After our first visit to look at the early work of these moderns a week ago our heads were swimming. We’d hoped that we’d gain a better grip on our second visit.

On our first visit we walked through the gallery several times, quickly the first time, more slowly the next two times. The Stozzi is nine or ten rooms, the entire second floor of the building. It is possible to walk through the whole exhibit in five or ten minutes and we think that it is a good idea to start such a show with a sense for the whole. We were dazzled; afterwards there were lots of images floating around in our heads. One of us hard a hard time sleeping that night.

Today we went through the show once with the audio tour, a little iPod looking device with a pair of earphones. Many of the paintings were marked with a number. Step in front of a painting, note the number posted below the painting, enter the number into the device, and hear a commentary on that particular painting. The narration helped to add context.

Early Picasso
(source)

Late Picasso
(source)

This time the exhibition was easier to take in. The Picassos were stunning. Some of his early work was very conventional, very skilled, and easy to approach and admire. His later paintings take more time. Picasso reinvented himself over and over so you can’t see one style or one approach developing over time. Picasso was a modern, a restless modern.

Dali was interesting but sometimes bizarre. As a young man he was thrown out of art school because he said that none of his professors were good enough to judge his work. He may have been correct but the stresses in his family that resulted were unfortunate.

We found Miro to be very interesting. We knew very little about him. Like Dali he was younger than Picasso and influenced by his work. But Miro seemed to develop a unique visual language and left us wishing there were more of his work to view.

Miro, Small Universe
Two fish, one mermaid
(source)

Dali left an exciting description of his first meeting with Picasso, a dramatic introduction, many hours spent together, sharing works, exchanging no words but only knowing glances. The Dali-Picasso encounter, however, was probably imaginary. The Miro initial encounter with Picasso was real. Miro went to Picasso’s home in Barcelona, met his mother, and took a cake from there to Picasso in Paris, and met the older master.

After the show we crossed over the Arno for a meal at one of Florence’s fine restaurants, Osteria del Bricco. It was quiet on the other side of the Arno, the wave of tourists don’t get very far across the river. It’s a shame because Bricco is a jewel. 

We started our lunch with a sformato appetizer which we shared. A sformato is a shredded or chopped mass of a cooked vegetable, sauteéd in butter, flavored with grated parmignano and perhaps a little nutmeg, held together with egg, bechamel, and/or mashed potato, and baked in an hot oven until a crust forms. The sformato appetizer at Bricco is five small pieces of sformato, one each of the spinach, cauliflower, potato, carrot, and zucchini versions. You look forward to the first bite; you regret the last.

We’ve had this dish before, of course, and the rest of the meal was a wonderful way to celebrate a memorable show of artists and art and a beautiful, sunny day. Besides Picasso, Miro, and Dali, the sformati are what we’ll remember ... until the next sformato appetizer which we’ll have in Monticchiello, a tiny medieval village near Montepulciano.

Tomorrow we pack up our Ghibellina apartment and Saturday morning we’ll drive to Umbria.

The Days of Wine and Vino Sfuso

Tripe stand

The photo (right) shows a sandwich stand a few blocks from out apartment. The stand opens at about 9:30am, continues into mid-afternoon, and serves snacks and simple meals to Florentines who order at the counter, sit or stand, eat, and talk with one another. It’s an inexpensive place to eat but it’s also a place to meet friends and talk. 

One thing here seems remarkable. Of course, wine is offered to the customers but there is no wine list, no wine steward, no vintages, just three magnums of sturdy red wine, two on each side and one on the front counter. The menu lists prices for water, soft drinks, and beer but wine isn’t mentioned. Buy a sandwich, get a plastic cup, pour some wine, and enjoy the break in the day’s routine.

List of offerings

The bottle is replaced when it’s empty. (Yes, I agree with you, I cannot imagine anything like this at home.) The stand specializes in tripe sandwiches and lampredotto (cow’s stomach) sandwiches. Today's special is a sandwich with the tripe or lampredotto cooked with porri or leeks. (This is also hard to imagine at home.)

Wine spigots

Italians drink wine. Italians drink wine often, lunch, dinner, sometimes at a cafe early in the morning. Italian adults don’t get drunk drinking wine. Ever. (But Americans students do, unfortunately. Italian young people have some problems, also.) Everyone sells wine, grocery stores, butcher shops, gas stations, bakeries, internet cafés. We’ve seen young children sent to the store by their parents bringing home groceries including bottles of wine. The attitude toward wine is different here. Wine doesn’t go with food; wine is food.

In recent years we’ve bought bulk wine from a wine shop near our old apartment. The shop sells bottles of wine, generally rather expensive wines. The shop also pours wine out of large stainless steel containers into bottles and corks them. The bulk wine is very inexpensive and quite good. The shop offers three reds and one white. In Italy wine sold in this way is called vino sfuso.

Wine in bulk containers

Owner of Bacco Nudo

This year we have a new apartment nearby and we’ve discovered a new vino sfuso shop that we had never gone into before. The shop is called Bacco Nudo, nude Bacchus, and they use the Caravaggio painting of Bacchus as their logo.

The Bacco Nudo shop is a step up from our previous wine shop. Here is a photo (above, left) of the list of their offerings.

Volunteer worker 2

Volunteer worker 1

Bacco Nudo offers 18 reds and 10 whites in bulk. There are large glass containers of wine all over the little store and out of sight in back, all connected by tubes and pipes to a set of labeled spigots. If you’d like some rosso di montalcino, that would be the first spigot in the bottom row. When you pull the spigot toward you, a pump comes on and wine comes out. Actually, the owner does the pouring but he was so amused when we asked to take a photo of the spigots, he insisted that we give it a try and photograph each other.

This is his only shop. In our daydreams we imagine how pleasant it would be if he opened a shop down the street from us at home. 


Sigh.

Wine and the Sacra Serata ballet

We'll talk about this
when we get home.

This morning we visited a wine shop near our apartment. Actually it's a salumeria, a sandwich shop with other light lunch choices. The owner of the salumeria sells wine from this shop (of course, everyone sells wine in Italy) and has a shop dedicated to wine a block away which is watched over by his daughter. Very nice people.

We want to learn more about two wines, Morellino di Scansano and Vin Santo. 

Morellino is a Tuscan red wine made from the same sangiovese grape as Chianti, Vino Nobile di Montepulciano, and Brunello di Montalcino and many other Tuscan wines. Morellino is much admired by Florentines but, as we’ve learned, poorly promoted by the growers. We have found a merchant at home via the internet who carries one label of Morellino and our wine shop owner in Florence has located the same wine here in Florence. With our fingers crossed, we’ll try a bottle of that Morellino here. 

The same US merchant also sells a label of Vin Santo, a Tuscan desert wine, and we’ll try that one here, too. Vin Santo does not sell well in the US and is difficult to find. Again, we’ll cross our fingers and try the Vin Santo while we’re here.

While we were browsing in the salumeria we noticed a violin and bow sitting amongst bottles of wine. One of us picked up the violin, plucked the strings gently, and to our amazement found that the violin was in perfect tune. A friend of the owner plays in the local community orchestra and visits the store often. The violinist cannot help himself; he keeps the violin tuned. One of us understands perfectly the need to pay this kind of respect to musical instruments.

Last night we took in a ballet at the local large concert hall. The ballet was titled Sacra Serata, Sacred Evening. The evening began with something that was not on the program, a piece by two Japanese dancers. Apparently they are from Tokyo and cannot return at this time. Their dance was done beautifully and was well received. The Italians have been very open in their concern for the Japanese. In the midst of the Italian Independence celebrations we found the simple statement of their concern. (See the photo.) The Japanese flag was hung across the piazza from Santa Croce, one of the city’s most important churches.

Building on Piazza Santa Croce

The program that was scheduled had religious content but was not at all devotional. Italy is a secular country, a very secular country, and the interpretations of the dancers and choreographers were very up to date and even jarring but not religious. There was a troop of 25 who danced the first piece set to grim, sad music by Pergolesi (his Stabat Mater) and later the same large troop danced a frenetic piece set to loud, loud electronic music that faded to big choral music by Bach (including a chorus from his Saint Matthew Passion.) 

The first piece was very heavy, dancers hammered nails on a piece of lumber, Christ climbed up on the cross and down again, and the late-Renaissance music by Pergolesi sank and sank. The last piece was less deflating and the large company danced like dervishes. We were exhausted watching them.

The middle piece was titled Annunciation, the time when Mary was told by an angel that she would bear the Son of God. Not surprisingly, this piece was for two dancers and it was a little more clear what was going on. The program indicated that the music would be by Vivaldi and another name that we did not recognize. As it turned out, Vivaldi’s music would play for a bit and then there were long stretches of time when electronic music would be the basis for the dance. Again the electronic music was loud and insistent.

There was no live music and, as the concert began, we were disappointed and surprised. We had expected some traditional Italian religious music and some dancing. What we saw was far too much for live musicians to perform and the dancing was challenging to think about.

The concert ended at about 11:30pm and the crowded poured out into the narrow street in front of the concert hall. Most people left on foot for their homes. Two ladies, however, hopped on their bikes, wearing heels, of course, and pedaled home. 

We love Florence. We love the Florentines.

Picasso, Miro, Dali in Florence

Palazzo Stozzi

Today we visited the Palazzo Strozzi in Florence. The palace, built during the Renaissance for a wealthy Florentine merchant and banker, has been the site of a number of shows devoted to painters and paintings. The current show is called Picasso, Miro, Dali: Angry Young Men. We visited a modern yesterday in Lucca; we visited more moderns today in Florence.

Picasso Harlequins

The Strozzi Palace is a large building in the center of Florence. The building has a central courtyard that is open to the sky. The floors above the ground level give the participant in a show a circular path in a beautiful old building to follow from beginning to end. A few years ago we took in another show here, a very different show called Botticelli and Fillipino which brought together works of the two great Renaissance masters from around Europe. The current show has done the same for Picasso, the artist who had found his vision by the 1920s, and Miro and Dali who were younger and who were influenced by Picasso. All three have their works on display.

Dali self-portrait

The show was overwhelming. There were so many great works to look at and to think about. We plan to collect our thoughts and return for another visit next week. Perhaps  we’ll have more to say then.

Miro still life

One of the interesting things that we saw today was a group of about 20 children, about 6 or 7 years old, being led through the exhibits. The children were instructed by a young woman who had a great manner, great technique. She asked open-ended questions (What do you see here?) and accepted all responses graciously. The kids were very observant. She was careful to place her group down in front of the better examples; they skipped past a Dali showing two women, one dressed demurely, the other wrapped in a revealing sheet. That was a well thought out omission.

Picasso's costume

The kids were most interested in a costume designed by Picasso for a stage presentation called Parade. When the kids saw the larger-than-life-size costume of the “American Manager”, they got very excited. There were two other costumes, even more interesting, a little later in the show.

The Jean Dubuffet show in Lucca also showed that artist's interest in a show performed by dancers in very strange costumes. Yesterday we saw a film of Dubuffet's show; today we watched the excitement of children as they realized that someone actually wore that costume.

There was a bookshop at the end of the exhibit. We found a guide to the exhibit that was so heavy that it needed wheels and a handle. Fortunately, the guide to the show will be available on Amazon in the fall. We'll wait. We also found a good book about Picasso for a grandchild we know .

Lucca and Jean DuBuffet

Today we took the bus to Lucca, a small city northwest of Florence. 

Lucca is a jewel. Much smaller than Florence, Lucca is quiet, a mix of medieval and 19th century, a very walkable city where the streets are full of people instead of cars. Evidently Lucca is on the list of magical places in Tuscany; we saw a number of Americans walking around the town but it’s a pleasant town, nevertheless.

Source

Most pleasant of all is that the town’s medieval walls are wholly intact. Intact and converted to a lovely walkway, or a path for a bike ride, around the city from a height of about 40 feet. Lovely views out to the countryside, lovely views over the city. Bike rentals are inexpensive and a circuit of the city on the top of the old city walls takes 10 minutes for someone with a mission, 30 minutes for someone who enjoys the views, 60 minutes for someone who was digesting a just-eaten lunch. Lucca is a perfect place to visit on a cool, sunny day like we saw today.

LuCCA museum

There are many small shops and we found that the shops were more inviting than the shops in Florence. Instead of being terribly trendy and terribly chic, the shops in Lucca seem sturdy, steady, solid. In fact, many of the shops have kept appointments (such as wood cabinets, curved glass windows, and so forth) that have been long ago been abandoned for more sleek interiors in the big cities. The shops in Lucca seem more approachable, even for husbands.

Lucca, however, is short of great Renaissance art. No Michelangelos, no Botticellis, no Lippis. But the town itself, medieval walls and the streets and shops are quite noteworthy and worth a visit after the great, terribly busy cities of Florence, Rome, and Venice.

The town has developed a focus on modern art. Today we visited the Lucca Center of Contemporary Art to see a show on the 20th century artist, Jean Dubuffet. While modern art in the great cities of Italy is swamped by the deathless treasures of the past, a city like Lucca has found a niche for the moderns. We knew nothing of Dubuffet but we knew that Lucca was an easy city to visit so we took a chance, a small chance, and visited the exhibit at the Lucca Center for Contemporary Art. (Got it? Lu. C. C. A.!)

The building is impressive. The interior has been remodeled extensively to show off the works of art. The ground floor is given over to a reception area, a bookshop, and a coffee bar. Exhibits are on the two floors above. Admission is reasonable. We came on a beautiful day and yet the museum was not at all crowded.

The works were interesting, challenging. Speaking for myself, I especially liked images of figures done by Dubuffet though he experimented in a number of different forms and media. Included in the show was a film of a ballet done to music composed by the artist. The ballet featured what appeared to be works of his carried (sometimes, worn) by dancers. Interesting. He seemed to be experimenting over his career with different media and different effects, never settling for one final method for presenting his vision.

The city is worth a visit because it is a contrast to the busy larger cities that everyone visits. The museum is worth a visit because its content is so fresh and part of the present.

Fiorentina vs. AS Roma

This Sunday's game pitted Florence against Rome and ended in a 2-2 tie. The Florentines we talked to today took the tie well, we think. Rome (at 6th) is ranked ahead of Florence (at 9th) in the league standings and, as a result of the tie, neither team moved. 

Oh, Fiorentina!

The day was sunny and clear but very cool and very windy. In the first half Florence had the wind behind them and they seemed to be going “downhill” for the entire half. In the second half the wind strengthened and Florence had to fight its way “uphill”. The Florentine attack was less effective in the second half and Rome was able to score a tying goal.

Rome had more to lose with a tie. Next year’s UEFA Champions League, a cross-Europe tournament, will include only the top four Italian teams. Florence seems out of that competition but Rome is close but after this game is no closer. For a report on the game written by people who actually know something about soccer, see

Report: Fiorentina v AS Roma

Here is our report. Of course, the most important part of the game was the singing of the team anthem at the beginning. We’ve broken our “filming” of the opening ceremonies into two parts.

The first video is the chorus of “Oh, Fiorentina!” where Fiorentina is the team, also known as La Viola for the color that they wear. Here’s the text of the chorus:

Oh Fiorentina,
di ogni squadra ti vogliam regina.
Oh Fiorentina,
combatti ovunque ardita e con valor!
Nell'ora di sconforto e di vittoria,
ricorda che del calcio è tua la storia.

The two squads take the field, Florence in purple, and face the high priced seats as the crowd sings along with a music track. The music track does not include voices; the singing and the clapping you hear are all from the crowd. They’ll keep up the cheering and the singing for the whole game. It’s really exciting.

The most loyal fans are located in the opposite “end zone” from our seats. These seats are all taken by clubs, fan clubs, crazy fans who wear all kinds of purple. The cheering from the other end of the field is spirited and very loud.

Oh, Fiorentino! (chorus)

The second video is the second verse of the team anthem and, again, the chorus.

Maglia viola lotta con vigore,
per esser di Firenze vanto e gloria.
Sul tuo vessillo scrivi: forza e cuore,
e nostra sarà sempre la vittoria!

Oh Fiorentina,
di ogni squadra ti vogliam regina.
Oh Fiorentina,
combatti ovunque ardita e con valor!
Nell'ora di sconforto e di vittoria,
ricorda che del calcio è tua la storia.

and the final chorus is followed by much cheering. The video shows the people like us who have purchased tickets to this one game. We don’t hear a word of English around us.

As the camera pans there seem to be two empty sections to our right. There are, in fact, very empty with security guards in place to keep them empty. In the middle of the empty zone is the section reserved for the fans of the visiting team. They are surrounded by plexiglass walls, they’ve been escorted to the game by the police, and they’ll be escorted away by the police at the end.

It’s an odd effect; with the two groups of fans totally sealed off from one another does not make them more agreeable. We have learned some interesting new vocabulary while attending these games and we’ve been reminded of certain gestures that one can make. Sealing the fans off from one another does not make the event more civil.

Oh, Fiorentina (verse 2 and chorus)

Show tickets,
match with documents

Security at these games is high because of the fear of disturbances. To purchase a ticket you must show your identity papers (or in our case our passports). Your ticket is personalized with your name. When you enter the stadium on the day of the game you must show the same identity documents and be “wanded” for any forbidden metal objects. Then you present your ticket to a computerized turnstile that grants you entrance.

Of course, this is Italy. 

Computerized turnstiles

After all these precautions, there are no ushers and the sections are not very well marked. But that is not a problem because the medical emergency people we talked with said that the tickets in the “end zone” that were sitting in were “tutto uguale”, all the same. In other words we could sit wherever we wanted. We chose seats in the center a few rows from the top so we could have the best possible view of the action. 

The seats were terrific. The action on the field was fun to watch. And the spectators were the best show of all.

A Visit to Antella

Home in hills outside
of Antella

Yesterday we spent an early spring afternoon on a terrace in a home in Antella, a small town a few miles into the hills south of Florence. We visited the home of two sisters, one retired, the other a semi-active child psychiatrist. The sisters are elderly but sharp, sharp in general, sharp in Italian, and sharp in English.

Antella town center

The views to the north show the hills around Florence and the Colli Fiorentini, the hills around Florence where Chianti of the highest quality (that is, chianti classified as DOCG)  is produced. The landscapes are beautiful and the people are warm and engaging.

Chianti DOCG is
produced in this area

The child psychiatrist studied at Duke and practiced in New York City for 16 years. She said that she ate in Italian restaurants only a few times during her time in New York but was always disappointed. What passed for Italian cooking in New York was pretty much unrelated to the Tuscan cooking that she was accustomed to. 

We agree.

The outskirts of Florence are to the left.

Independence Day in Italy

The streets were full of happy Italians last night, young people, old people, children, families. Our apartment is on a fairly busy street and the atmosphere was festive (errr, noisy) well past the wee hours. In fact, the announcement that the party was over was the street cleaner that came by under our window at about 6am or 7am. After that the street fell into silence.

Sundays are very, very quiet here. Once you get out of the touristy area in the center of Florence, most the stores and many of the cafes and restaurants close down on Sunday. The streets are quiet until afternoon and then people come in from the outskirts to walk around the town. 

Today, Thursday, March 17, the first Independence Day ever celebrated in Italy, seemed like a Sunday. Red, white, and green flags were flying everywhere but lots of places were closed. Others had limited hours. And the streets were very, very quiet in the morning.

We were out in the morning and found a special way to celebrate Italian independence at our favorite coffee bar and pastry shop, Pasticceria Nencione on Via Pietrapiana, a few blocks from our apartment. We stopped for cappucino but as you can see we asked for something that seemed especially appropriate to the holiday.

Independence Day, a little later

Even though it’s a rainy, cool evening the birthday party for Italy is going full tilt at 8pm. We’ve just come in from our first walk through the festivities and we’d like have a glass of wine and share a little of what we’ve seen with you.

There are three venues for the celebration in Florence. The Piazza del Duomo, the religious center, is the site of some artisans showing off their craftwork. There were crowds of people milling around but it was pretty quiet there.

The Piazza della Signoria, the civic center, had a show with a singer and a small orchestra that was being televised. Bright lights, cameras on a huge boom, trucks with satellite uplinks. Most impressive was the tower of the Palazzo Vecchio lit up in green, white, and red and Michelangelo’s David (a copy, of course) standing guard next to tricolored banners. Very impressive.

Piazza Santa Croce, the great Franciscan church with a large rectangular piazza, was just setting up for some kind of show. Part of the show, however, was already underway; a huge hot air balloon in the center of the piazza.

We’ll have some baccelli (raw, young fava beans), some soft creamy pecorino cheese, and some red wine and go out again to check on the progress of the birthday party.






Still later


At 11:30pm the streets are full of people, all having a good time. The museums are open and free. The restaurants are open. The bars are full of young people.


Almost all the people we've seen are Italians, including in the places normally haunted by tourists. With a few exceptions, we only heard Italian, no English, no German, no other languages. The Italians were out with their families, including young children. Tomorrow is a holiday so the cranky, tired children will be at home. 


Hope tomorrow goes well for the parents; tonight looked like a good experience for all.

Independence Day History

Source of map

Tomorrow, Thursday, March 17, is Independence Day in Italy and the country will celebrate the 150th anniversary since the unification of Italy in 1861 under King Victor Emanuel I. The unification was late, of course, England and France had had national identities for centuries. Further the unification of Italy in 1861 was also partial in that the Pope held political control of Rome and the nearby Papal States in the central Italy. There was a “hole” in the middle of the newly independent country.

The Veneto (in yellow, including Venice) and Rome and the Papal States were added by 1870. In 1871 the capital of the country was moved to Rome from ... well, from Florence. The movement toward independence had been spearheaded by northern Italians who wanted to establish the new capital in Rome but in 1861 Rome was not part of unified Italy. For 10 years Florence served as the seat of the new Italian government.

In the 1850s the northern Italian leaders were concerned about a charismatic leader named Garibaldi and the trouble he might cause for them with France. They convinced him to leave Genoa in the north and sail south with 1,000 men to see what kind of trouble he could cause in the south. Garibaldi first conquered Sicily and then moved up the peninsula to the outskirts of Rome and handed over the territories he had conquered to the new King. Though he didn’t have such a mission, he doubled the size of the Italy. As a result of his heroic efforts there is a Piazza Garibaldi in every Italian city, town, and hamlet.

Via Lambertesca, near
the Uffizi museum

Tomorrow’s celebration is odd, however. This will be the first time in 150 years that Italy has celebrated its day of independence. Florence is decorated in red, white, and green, the colors of the Italian flag, for the first time in our experience.

This brings something to mind regarding loyalties. In Italy, one’s first loyalty is to the family. Shops and restaurants are operated by families and there are no chains, no Wal-Marts, no Denny’s, no Olive Gardens, no national businesses. The next layer of loyalty is to the city; Italians refer to this kind of loyalty as campanilismo. A campanile is a bell tower and campanilismo is “bell towerism” or loyalty to those who recognize, see, and hear the town’s bell tower. Past that everything else is an abstraction, including loyalty to the country.

A very old giglio

The problems of the current Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, have pressed Italians to think about enlarging their loyalties. In the demonstrations last week people were asked to carry the Italian tricolor and, for the most part, they did. It was a different kind of protest with only one large protest instead many unrelated protests all happening simultaneously in the same place.

A new giglio

Even this year’s initial Independence Day celebration is seen, however, through a Florentine lens. The photo shows the Florentine civic symbol, the giglio or the Florentine lily, which is built into the city walls in the 1300s. The civic symbol is everywhere in Florence (and in our kitchen in Syracuse, too.) The poster for the Florentine celebration of the national holiday on the night before March 17 speaks with an unmistakeable local accent. A gentle form of campanilismo.

There may be nothing more fundamental than family and food in this country. The final evidence of national awareness and national feeling is shown in the cake we saw in a bakery. 

Buon Compleanno a te, ...

Viva Italia! Buon Compleanno, Italia!

And Happy Saint Patrick’s Day to those outside Italy.

Meditation on Toilets

Travel is relaxing and can drain stress if the pace of travel is reasonable. Travel can also be stimulating, exciting to our senses and to our sensibilities. If we’re lucky, travel can be both at the same time. We’ve been stimulated and we've noticed two interesting things about bathrooms here, things that ought to be interesting to our senators and representatives in Washington.

A US senator recently went on a rant to a representative of the EPA regarding the high efficiency toilets in his home. "Frankly, my toilets don't work in my house, and I blame you, and people like you," said the senator. Of course, the senator is not well informed. If his toilets don’t work, he has a problem with his plumber. The high efficiency toilets in our home work very well, much better than the toilets they replaced. (Note to Rand Paul. Call the people at Inland Plumbing Supply in Syracuse. If you’re polite, they’ll be able to help you out.)

Note to senator; large button on left,
small button on right, the rest is easy.

If the senator has a fixed, ideological view regarding toilets then I suggest foreign travel, perhaps to Italy. One of the interesting things about toilets here is they often have two buttons on the wall. One button is large, the other button is small. The large button produces a large flush, the small button produces a small flush. The choice is yours, no government official is involved. This level of simplicity might be attractive the the senator; it seems like a good idea to us. Why don’t we have this at home?

Another thing strikes us about public restrooms. At home a few places have water faucets that come on automatically when you break a light beam. This is good. Most places do not, however. The same is true here; only a few public rest rooms have automatic faucets. But many public restrooms here have sinks with foot pedals. Sometimes two foot pedals. One blue, one red. Low tech. Simple. Easy. And you have one less thing that you have to touch.

Travel opens the mind to new possibilities.