How was The Grumpy Olive born?

It was a dark and stormy night in 1987 and…hold on. That’s wrong for sure, I was not even born yet?

Let’s try this again: it was definitely a cold and dark and stormy night, it was the 23rd of December 2013 and I was sitting on my blue IKEA sofa in my flat in Arsenal, waiting for mother and younger sister to land in LondonTown later on that evening.

I was bored, Fred was definitely busy doing something else that I could either not be arsed doing or did not know how to do. Possibly making up a bed and stuff, you know {this is, of course, a joke!}. I was sitting down and had been discussing the possibility of a blog with Fred the whole afternoon – her ears were possibly bleeding, by then… – and that is when she came up with the name for me: The Grumpy Olive.

I do not really like olives, no, even though I used to love those green, juicy olives, the Nocellara kind from Italy that my grandma in Rome used to buy me whenever we went for grocery shopping in the summer. I now eat them rarely, more as a very rare treat than a daily occurrence, and they have to be the same ones, no less than the best…ha!

Am I grumpy, you are asking? No, not on a daily basis. I am a pretty positive person overall, particularly if the weather it’s nice and I got to sleep well. But when I am grumpy, then brace yourselves: I am a pain in the rear, I do not smile, nor make my usual dad-jokes. I want to be left alone, but feel like I own the rights of pissing everyone else off for my pleasure – little side note here, I am a feisty beast if in the mood for an argument, and I LOVE arguing! – but in all honesty, I am possibly quite a cutie usually, but hey!

So, back to the serious stuff…afternoon of brainstorming, boring evening, overall not the best basis to start such a project.

It all started a bit like this, out of boredom, more than a passion. I focused all my energies in running a blog in 2 different languages, cooking up a storm and creating the worst pictures ever taken in the history of food photography.

It was a struggle, and it was all about food, which is a passion of mine, yes, but also limited what I was able to talk about on my own platform. I did abandon it within a couple of years, tired of the schemes and games I had to play on my Italian platform host, even though I did have plenty of support from some good friends I made thanks to the same platform.

I was angry, tired, and in need of a break. I had expectations I did not meet, goals I did not make, it was overall a disaster. I was picturing things differently, and I did not like doing it with so much effort and no results.

I tried again, on and off, for a bit. And always ended up the same way: frustrated, angry and stressed. How could my hobby turn into a nightmare? How did I end up hating all things blog?

I have taken more time, a lot more this time than the few weeks break in between phases. I also decided to open up: at the end of the day all I wanted was a place where I could write, because that is what I enjoy the most about blogging.

And here we are, today, at this: The Grumpy Olive. My corner. I don’t have deadlines, I write if I feel like, I take terrible pictures at times, but I don’t scream, I don’t stress and, most importantly, I do it at my own terms: a post every three weeks? Could be. A post every day? I doubt it, but who knows. For the time being, I will enjoy what comes and see how it goes.

How was your blog experience? How did you start your blog? Tell me all of it in the comments below!