Week 5 and Week 6 - almost caught up :)

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Week 5
Feb 16 - Feb 23 ~Group A with Sophie and Xander
We stayed in a adorable flat Sunday night. It was an adorable apartment attached to Mr. Luigig’s house. He was a lovely and though he didn’t speak very much English he made us all feel very welcome and at home, just show’s you how much a persons feelings and personality can transcends language barriers. After our lovely breakfast we went to do our shows and left Monselice by lunch time. In about two hours we had arrived in Cesena. The hotel was very nice. The women at the front desk spoke beautiful English and was always very pleasant and helpful, we had a decent spread for breakfast every morning in their basement breakfast room, everything was great except the wireless was being repaired, very disappointing, so again we were without internet. You never realize how much you use something like the internet or eat a certain food like fudgesicles, until you don’t have them regularly available to you. Sophie and I ventured out for a LONG walk around Cesena. Felt like we did some good bonding and after that day I felt comfortable saying that Sophie and I are close. We walked around the town, saw the old castle, we saw the scaffolding that coves the fountain that is on every tourist information packet about Cesena. We stopped into a few shops. Had a cup of tea, felt badly leaving Xander in the hotel room but he got some serious gaming done and said that he didn’t mind. My friend Federico had and I had been in touch and he had invited me, and whoever else wanted to come with to a beer festival he was going to in Rimini, which is about twenty minutes from our hotel. The school in Cesena had a variety of kids. The first day the children were sent from some the lower circles of hell, the following day the children were awesome. It is kind of nice being at the same school for several days. We can leave the curtain up, we know where to park the car, were the electrical outlet for the CD player is, and we can leave the costumes/props for the following days show. It’s also nice to know the school a little bit, where the bathrooms are etc. We did Addams Family the first two days and Indiana Jones the last day. My friend Federico had and I had been in touch and he had invited me, and whoever else wanted to come with to a beer festival he was going to in Rimini, which is about twenty minutes from our hotel.
Sophie and I had a bit of an adventure trying to find the west parking lot. We found the south, and east parking lot before we found the west, which just to irritate me was closest to where we entered. Met up with Federico and his friends: Mirco (a brew master from Rome), Andrea (currently living and working in Brazil, an old friend, Italian, of Federico), Andrea’s American/Italian friend Tomas (grew up with Italian parents in Manhatten, just stopped working for the UN and is on that late twenties search for the next project/job, in Italy visiting family in Venice. When Federico said fair I was imagining a DC like cultural festival/fair. This was, to my surprise a, for professionals only beer/bar conference. A friend of Andrea’s got us in for free, though we had to pretend we all worked in his bar. Then we were free to try all the free beer we wanted. Sophie had driven, but there was plenty of gelato, and bar snacks to sample as well. We had a good wander around the HUGE business space, there were four airplane-hanger size buildings, and eat WAY too much. Federico is very interested in starting up his own brewery and has been shopping around for equipment, ingredients and so on - the conference/ festival had been going on for four days, and Tuesday was the last day. The guys had been there all four days, Sophie and I just caught the tail end of it. It closed at 5pm/17:00 but people were in a hurry to get out as they had to pack up and get to where ever they were going, however as we had friends working we got to lag behind and chat, with both in play we ended up leaving around 5:30/17:30. Federico invited Sophie and I to come back to his mothers villa, Villa Gulia, yes this is his families second Villa, in Fano. Fano is about an hour and half from Rimini/ one hour from Cesena. Sophie drove me and Federico and the rest of the guys followed in their car. When we arrived Sophie was teased endlessly about her slow driving. I think Sophie drives slowly and I’m American, the average high way speed limit in Italy is 130km per hour (about 85 m per hour) and that the legal speed limit..so you can get some idea of how fast Italians like to drive. After our tour around the Villa Gulia, which is smaller then the Villa in San Bonafitcho, but still a Villa, I’m not sure which is older, but I do know that Napoleon stayed at Villa Gulia. Oooo ahh. We all met Federico’s mother, who was when we were introduced sitting on a scaffolding in a navy blue mechanics jumpsuit painting a quail (I think it was a quail - the whole room is bird themed). To my understanding all of the wall paintings at Villa Guila were done by Federico’s mother. We went back down to break into some more beer that we were sent home. I caught up with Federico’s brother who was there working on his thesis, and was introduced to his baby brother, who is thirteen and lives at Villa Guila with Federico’s mother. It was strange chatting and hanging out with such a mature thirteen year old knowing that the next morning Sophie, Xander, and I would be doing Indiana Jones for kids the same age. Sophie and I were put to work in the kitchen before too long by Federico’s mothers slightly exocentric, ex-politician, now organic farmer friend. After about an hour and a half we sat down to a lovely dinner of pasta, veg, and three different kinds of fish. Conversation over dinner was lovely and it continued with café and even after we couldn’t eat or drink another ounce. It was hard to turn down the numerous invitations to stay over with such good food and company but Sophie and I eventually dragged ourselves away and drove back to the hotel around 1am. It was a wonderful evening, the only bad part was that Sophie and I were not able to accept the invitation to join them for their 1pm/13:00 slow food lunch. We would be finishing at school just as they were sitting down. As far as dieting goes it was probably just as well that we didn’t join them, but when we saw Federico and Ander the following night they said it was amazing. Indiana Jones went fine on Thursday, and after Sophie and I went for a little walk we went down to visit, like I said, with Federico and Andrea. Tomas and Mirco had left after lunch. We met F and A in Fano, walked around Fano, helped Andrea find a tea kettle, which he wanted to get for Federico’s mom as a thank you gift and found a movie to watch that eveing, after great deliberation we decided on ‘the science of sleep’, however after dinner we didn’t have time or the energy to watch it. Went back to the Villa and spent the evening hanging out. Federico taught me how to make rassoto, which we eat for dinner with salad. Sophie and I left around 11:30pm/23:00 (half an hour after I had told Sophie we would be home), but still pleased with our day and evening. After our Indiana Jones shows in Cesena on Thursday we drove back to Milano. Went to the boxing gym in the evening. On Friday, Xander, Sophie and I went to a school that I had already been to last year. My first ever repeat school. This time however we were performing for the elementary school. We left a lot of time to get there, but for some reason Milano was not jammed up with traffic and the 30minuet drive actually took us 30minuets. We waited in the car for a little bit, I put on some makeup and then we went into reception. We were directed to set up in the gym. On the walk over we saw another room that could have been a gym, so as Xander and Sophie were setting up in the gym Laura, Chris and I had performed in last time I scurried across the quad to the elementary school building to double check that we were in deed in the correct place. The teacher we were to meet was not there but I told three women attendants who we were, and where we were. They said this was correct. The show was scheduled to start at 8:30am/08:30 at 8:45am/08:45 we got a phone call on the work phone from a very specie teacher asking us where we were. Every night we call the teachers and confirm our start times, shows etc. They then have our contact number and such. She told us that we were not performing in the gym but in the elementary school. So we packed up and took down the curtain and moved everything to the elementary school. The shows took place in the main room of a multi-teared school with balconies that overlooked this main lobby/hall. The entire building was concrete and echoed worse than the gym. Also any time the kids moved from class to class talking the sound was heard during the show, as we were in the lobby of sorts. We did Three Little Brothers twice. The first group of kids were five and six and had only been studying English since September. They were very quiet during the show. The second group was six and seven. Totally the opposite, loud, un restrained by the teachers, which means they were crawling all over everywhere; the stage, poking behind the curtain. One or two would not be quiet though out the whole show. Until this tour I have never resented the questions “whats your name” and “where are you from” so much. As these are the only questions the beginner students know how to ask they shout them repeatedly at you over and over well beyond the point of irritation. As if it hadn’t been a long enough day we had to deposit money into the company account as we are not suppose to carry around more than 2000 euro’s on us. The post office in Italy as serves as a bank and a place to submit legal and government papers and so forth. Our bank card is though the post office. Xander and I hopped out of the car on our way home to “quickly” deposit the money. We first tried to deposit our money using my identification but as Washington, DC is not a state I could not give the computer a satisfactory answer for what state in the united states are you from. We had to refill everything with Xanders information, only made more difficult as Xander Black is his professional name and they didn’t understand who this Ian Alexander Black was. It took us 45 minutes to sort everything. Poor Sophie waiting in the car the whole time. It was a strange day. Went to the café to check my e-mail and do laundry to discover that Elyse Ault and Adam Dermer, acting majors from the year above me at UArts were also in Italy doing a tour of “As You Like It”. Isn’t facebook amazing? Made arrangements to see them and their show on Saturday, which also turned out to be Adams birthday. Went to the boxing gym in the evening and then was early to bed. The show was a little over an hour away in Reggio Emila (near Parma). The show, also a TIE show, began at 9am, so to get there in time I would need to take the 6:20am/06:20 train from Palazzolo. Didn’t mind too much, was excited to see some familiar American faces. Got up around 5:30am/05:30, showered, dressed, grabbed something to eat on the train and walked to the Palazzolo train station. The train got me to Cadorna station in Milano with 25 minuets to get to Centrale Station (the big station in Milano), buy a ticket, and catch the train to Reggio Emila. Took a cab as I didn’t know how frequently the Metro trains ran at this hour on the weekends. So I took a cab, just to make sure I had enough time. There was a HUGE line of people to get tickets and I think tiredness and rushing made me panic a little so I decided just to get on the train and pay for the ticket when the ticket checker arrived. The train was suppose to leave at 7:05am/07:05, it would get me to Reggio Emilia with thirty minutes to find the theatre. I looked up and saw that the 7:05am/07:05 train was leaving from Bin (Italian abbreviation for platform) number ten. I sprinted up stairs and just just made the train. I found a seat, set my alarm so I didn’t over sleep and miss my stop and nodded off. When I woke up the conductor was asking for my ticket, I explained to him the situation and he said in a very non Italian accent that I could pay now. “Where are you going” he asked me. Reggio Emilia. He looked at me puzzled, I showed him the paper it was written on. “This is not going to Reggio Emila, this train is going to Munich” he said to me in a now distinctly German accent, which might also explain his brilliant grasp of English. Where are we? It was almost 8:30am/08:30. Get off in Verona, take the train to Modena, then you can transfer to Reggio Emilia. You will arrive at 11:30am/11:30. Dejected as I was going to miss the show for sure, I briefly entertained the idea of staying in Verona, it was cold, and after calling Elyse I decided to hike it back (I was two hours in the wrong direction now) and get myself to Reggio Emila ASAP. The next train to Modena was leaving in five minutes from Verona. I got a ticket from the counter this time, double checked the Bin number and got on. I was angreyly/franticly scribbling in my journal when the ticket checker, a young Italian women this time, asked me for my ticket. She looked at me and then at my ticket again. I told her I was switching in Modena as the ticket said destination Reggio Emila, surely that must be why she was confused. “you did not stamp your ticket”. In Italy, even if you ticket has a date on it you must stamp it to confirm that you are using it that day. I don’t know why, I do know this, and in a country where I’m often not even checked for a ticket, and on a day when I was rushed and very very late I had forgotten. I played a little dumb and showed her the date on the ticket, explained that I was American but nothing got me out of the what I first was annoyed to hear a 15 Euro fine. No I did not hear her correctly. Thank goodness. It was not 15 it was a 50 F@#$ing Euro fine! My train ticket cost me 6euro and 70cents. I could go to Calabria (the very very south of Italy) for 50 Euro. I had to pay it on the train, right there. The train was five minuets away from the Modena station, and the Italian sitting next to me consoled me by telling me how they often don’t stamp their ticket and never get fined. How ridiculous. Imagine how wonderful this made me feel. Got off at Modena and all the train signs were out. I asked a nice Italian guy with a lime green suitcase which Bin to go to as I didn’t understand the announcements over the loud speaker. Told him where I was going, he was going on the same train so I followed him. As we were chatting he went to get a sandwich out of the vending machine. The sandwich fell and got stuck perfectly between the glass and the dispenser shelf. It took every ounce of my strength not to cry. Disappointed, late, fifty euro poorer, grumpy, tired and now my bad luck was affecting anyone who even helped me. I really really wanted to cry. I explained to him that I was very very sorry, that it was my fault, that I had no luck today (this is all in my TERRABLE Italian), I tried to give him two more Euro to buy a sandwich but he smiled and said “no grazie bella”. The train to Reggio Emila was fifteen minutes late. When it did finally arrive we said Ciao and then I sat down, as I was writing in my journal, could this day go any worse? The train stopped and we sat on the tracks for another fifteen minutes. Ow what a day I was having and it wasn’t even noon. When we finally arrived the old Italian women sitting next to me and told me she would take me to the theatre where the show was. I didn’t know how long the show was and if it was a three or more hour Shakespeare Elyse and Adam would still be there. I followed her into the station lobby to see Elyse waiting for me. The rest of the day was lovely. Hung out with Elyse in Parma. We saw the National Gallery and the Theatre. We visited the Dwomo. Eat amazing Gilatto and in perhaps a small apology from the universe, the Parma chocolate festival was going on that weekend. It was nice chatting with Elyse, we were never close at University but when you go to drama school together and have two years of acting studio together you get to know a person pretty well. In the early afternoon after buying a chocolate salami for Adam for his birthday we went back to Reggio Emilia and met up with Adam at their apartment. We got dressed, had some wine, I got to snoop though some AMERICAN (not British) trashy magazines, eat some homemade tiramisu, met up with the other actors from the company and headed out for aparatifi and dinner to celebrate Adams twenty fourth birthday. At dinner I tried horse, it’s pretty good….if you don’t think about it too much. It was really nice to hang out with some Philly folks. It was a lovely lovely evening. I spent the evening at Adam and Elyse’s. We slept in…a little. They were off to Venice for Carnival (carnival is like martigrah, it’s a huge party right before lent, although in Italy it’s all about masks, especially in Venice) I couldn’t go as I had to leave Milano that afternoon for the Sunday night hotel. It was really nice to see Elyse and Adam and had they not be returning to the states on the first of March I’m sure I would see them again. It felt a little strange but lovely also just to be a part of Adams birthday. Briskly walked to the train station. Told everyone Ciao Ciao and wished everyone the best. I got back to Milano around noon. Helen and Sophie picked me up at the station (the train was late AGAIN) and drove me back to Palazzolo. I finished listening to my Steve Martin Book, “Born Standing Up”. Went to the internet café with Vic, drove back to say good bye to Sophie, Laura, Helen and Eoghan and then went back to finish up on my computer. Spent a quiet evening with Xander and Vic.

UPDATES:
Weight: So I gained 2lbs this week but I figured with a Beer Festival, a Chocolate Festival, and three Italian family style dinners where I allowed myself to eat and drink what I wanted, I wasn’t too supirsed.

Fitness: Feeling pretty good. Tired and really need to make sure I have enough sleep, but more to save my voice than anything else.

Mood: Feeling happy. Was definably the right decision to get out of the house this weekend. Even if it was a VERY expensive trip out, and I’ll live off my savings until next pay day, and I didn’t even get to see the show, I am happy I did it.

Week 6
Feb 23-March 1 ~ Group A with Vic and Xander
Had a nice laid back Sunday with Vic and Xander. Went to be earlyish. Stayed in the flat Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday night. Nice to just be in one place for a while. Worked in Usmate in Milano Monday and Tuseday. The kids were weird. Had a very long break for lunch then returned to a second show. Had a nice long job with Vic after. Weighed myself again and have already lost 1lb since yesterday, half of last weeks gain gone, but won’t weigh myself until next Sunday. Trying to keep in mind it’s how I feel not how much the scale says I weigh. On Monday evening I finished season two of Prison Break. Vic and I also made plans to Couch Surf this weekend so we can stay in Milano for Carnival. Milano is on a separate religious calendar from the rest of Italy and for some reason carnival is one weekend later in Milano. Only had one show on Tuesday but had very difficult workshops, six year olds, very very limited English, but we were finished with work around 11:30am/11:30 so had the whole afternoon for ourselves. Tried to check/track a package at the post office, wouldn’t you know it, I needed to come back tomorrow, tried to buy stamps for postcards for the USA, no no no you have to bring USA postcards to a post office you can’t just put them in a mail box. I HATE THE ITALIAN POSTAL SERVICE! Spent Tuseday afternoon (Feb 24th) catching up on this journal. Wrote Jan 26th - Feb 16th before I got exhausted. (honestly writing this entry on March 4th always playing catch up it feel). Decided to make a late lunch and start the third season of Prison Break. Didn’t really realize it was Fat Tuseday, didn’t do anything too special. Group B came back for the evening. Xander, Vic, Eoghan, and I went to the café we use to check e-mail and watched the Inter vs. Manchester United game. 0-0 not a very exciting game, but nice to be out and about. Wednesday we performed in a Judo studio attached to a school. It was nice considering how much Xander and I like to do physical comedy (mostly as Baloo and Moglie) however it also didn’t just cross our mind, but the kids as well. I have never seen so clearly how much affect a teacher has on a students: behavior, attitude, as well as understanding. We did three shows, the first kids were the smallest, we did 3Lil Bro’s and aside from them getting excited about the wolf and shouting “there” (or more usually Le) they were lovely. The teachers were great. The workshops were even fun, despite all I could play with them was Please (Simon Says). The second show was Jungle Book, the teachers didn’t sit with the kids but on the sides and didn’t participate in the shows, the kids got loud, a few with behavioral problems really weren’t controlled/attended to, and I started to feel like this was “work” not fun. The show was hard work and the workshops were okay, I had a spend most of my time just with one special needs kids but more or less it was fine, but I think Vic and I got the better behaved class. We then did our third show for the oldest kids of the day. We did the Gift, after the first five minutes I knew they were going to be terrible. They kept shouting, they kept trying to look back stage, the judo mats kept tempting them to push and wrestle with one another. The teachers were worst though, I had to walk out early, in character as the Chinese Grandma, and tell the teachers to stop talking so loudly that the echo was too loud. They shut up for about ten minutes. Once the show began none of them even watched, and never once did they monitor the kids behavior. Eventually we just started doing the show for each other and tried to make each other smile during the show. The show was taking so long that all of the time in Mexico (supposedly 1/4th of the show) took three minutes - they were by far the worst kids we ever had. After that show I felt like I was hit by a train, and my stomach hurt from trying to restrain my laughter at Xanders gay hair-dress version of an Arab suitor. Xander, though sometimes quite lacking in life experience and odiously fresh fresh out of drama school, can’t stand to be wrong, really wants people to like him….is growing on me. He is really a very good guy and I’m starting to feel a younger brother affection for him. Strangely enough we actually have the exact same birthday June 22nd, 1986. Technically (if one takes time zones into account) he is 1 hour older than me, even though I was born earlier in the day. Helen is born on the 21st of June but in 1985. Still considering there are only seven actors, how strange that three of us have almost the exact same birthday, and Eoghan is a June baby as well June 6th , so 4 our of 7 of us are June babies, how strange. Astrologically I have no idea what that means, but I thought it was interesting statistically. So Vic, Xander and I slightly traumatized left for our two hour lunch break. We sat in the parking lot of a grocery store we found and just giggled after our initial, do we have to go back? What the hell what that? Talk. Xander chatted about the Lingue style version of Prison Break he was writing and he and I improved the first bit of a song he now wants to actually write based on Biance’s “If I were a Boy” Xander is working on “If I was a Goy” we three make a good group as we all deal with stress and anger by laughter. I don’t know how I would have handled those kids if Laura or Helen was with me, especially since Lent started on Wednesday and all the girls are giving up chocolate, sometimes it’s good to not be a shicksa (sorry my spell check doesn’t include Yiddish slang). We grudgingly returned to school where we had to ENORMOUS groups for workshops. It was 45minuets of slight hell but we got to leave after. We didn’t leave a leaflet about summer camps, we didn’t ever want anyone to have to come back that badly. Drove for an hour and a half to our hotel. No wireless, again. Nice enough hotel though. Near lake Igeo. At the same school for Thursday and Friday which is also nice. On Thursday after Three Brothers and Jungle Book we had a two hour lunch break. Went back to the hotel and I finished season three of Prison Break (it is only thirteen episodes instead of twenty two like the others, writers strike year I assume). We returned and did Peter Pan. The kids were okay at this school, lots of very young teachers 26 and 27 years old. Not a lot to do in town in the evening. We used the time to catch up on sleep and try not to get ill. Vic was feeling particularly poopy, and I was only running on 75%. Friday we did another two shows and workshops then headed back to Milano. Didn’t manage to get a jog in before I left for Milano to go to my first Couch Surfing Italian for beginners meeting. I am falling more and more in love with Couch Surfing every time I use it. I chatted with a lovely guy on the train and then met up with four other couch surfers in Milano. We went to a café and just practiced conversation for a few hours. The other two “students” were much more advanced then myself and the fourth person there was an Italian who had volunteered to “teach us”. Very informal. Everyone was very patient with me. It really did put me in my place in regards of realizing just how little Italian I actually speak. We finished around 8:45pm/20:45. I made my way back to Palazzolo by train, a weird guy who told me where to transfer to the train to Palazzolo followed me a bit, but other then that it was a lovely relaxing evening. Friday I also confirmed with Nikos, a member of the CS Milano group that Vic and I would stay with him and his opera Sara (from Canada) on Saturday night. Xander, Laura, Sophie and Helen went out ice skating. When I got home Eoghan was watching a movie and Vic was already in bed. Watched half of Shrek the Third and made myself dinner and then got into bed, and next thing I knew I was waking up Saturday morning. Woke up feeling very energetic. Went for a nice long run and was in Milano just before noon. Nikos and I planned to meet at 1pm/13:00 in Lombrata of all places. Yes the same Lombrata I worked in for two weeks this past summer. Met Vic and Eoghan in Milano and then Vic and I made our way to Lombrata by Metro. We met Nikos and walked for about twenty five/thirty minuets to his apartment. He lived just a bit further then my host family from the station. It was strange walking by the old army base and seeing the apartments buildings. His apartment was in a collection created out of an old ceramics factory. His office was in another unit just around the corner, seemed like a cool area, big guys with tattoos sweeping the front patio next door as he watched some little kids on tricycles. Nikos is Greek. He went to school in NYC to study photography and moved to Milano about ten or fifteen years ago. Now he has an advertizing agency and runs a music magazine called Beat. Couch Surfers always seem to have cool jobs. The Italian man who was running the CS Italian for beginner’s lesson was a research psychologist who was working with transgender people seeking sexual re assignment procedures. A lot of the young members are students, but it’s proved to be a collection of vastly different and interesting people. Usually during the weekend Nikos’s two children stay with him, but this week they were away so the apartment was free to host Couch Surfers, very luck for us indeed. When we came in Sara was playing her guitar. She bounced down the stairs, a slim earth child, full of life. Vegetarian, rocking one dredlock which she wrapped with colorful string that she extended well past her hair and wore as a kind of necklace, she is 19 and just wanted a place to root herself before she goes and sleeps under bridges around Europe. We chatted over tea and coffee for about an hour then made our way back to downtown Milano to see the Carnival festival. We took the very crowded bus to a street next to the back of the Duomo. We met up with Eoghan. Confetti, silly string, arousal foam, was come from every angle. I’m still finding confetti bits in my pockets and bag almost a week later. Kid all dress up in costumes. I was dressed in my rubber cowboy boots, my light blue bandana, a one euro harlequin mask I picked up on Friday at Carifour, and a little pink cowgirl hat. Around 3:15pm/15:15 the parade made it to where we were standing. The floats weren’t Macy’s Day quality but it was still fun to watch, and Vic had never seen a parade before. After the giant multi colored circle/wheels rolled by we decided to join the rest of the “normal” people behind the parade. It took us about forty five minutes to make it a block and a half. The overall vibe was really joyful. Eoghan left us after the parade and the four of us walked back to Lombrata. We did a TON of walking on Saturday. A snack turned into dinner. We had a simple meal of pesto with pasta, brie, gorgonzola, crackers, and wine. Around 9pm/21:00 we left to meet some other Couch Surfers at a club where they were going dancing for Carnival. We arrived just before 10pm/22:00. It was mobbed and the ticket prices had gone up from 5euro to full price. We called the other Couch Surfers who were still on their way, but they only had two extra tickets so we decided to meet up with some of Sara’s friends for a drink at an Irish bar in another part of Milano. More walking. Around 11:00/23:00 we met her friend Ariel (Argentinean who grew up in Italy, speaks wonderful English). We sat down and drank with some of his friends and friends of friends. Three friends from Calabria. One of their work colleagues from England. One Calabrase women. A friend of someones girl friend from Ireland. We stayed until the bar closed then Nikos walked us, as he was the only one who knew how to get there, a disco tec called Rolling Stone. It was perfact. Not too crowded. Ten euro got you in and two free drinks. Lots of room, great music. We stayed till closing at 5am - Nikos kept up with us the whole time, even wore my pink cowgirl hat for a while. We all had, as Vic would say, “a proper boogie” - and a much needed one at that. We then walked about an hour back to the apartment. Vic passed out, Sara, Nikos and I had some lovely apple ecinasia tea and chatted for just a few a little while. As soon as my head hit the pillow I was out. Woke up with Vic around 9am/09:00 and said our “goodbyes” and Thank You’s! Hope to see both of them again. Still never got to hear any of Sara’s music and never got to look at Nikos’s magazine. We told them in return we would do a two person rendition of Peter Pan. Hope we can all get together and make good on our promises. Vic and I got back to Palazzolo around 1:45pm/13:45. Had to wait a while in Cadorna. Planned to leave with Eoghan and Sophie (and Vic). The new four group around 6pm/18:00. Showered, took Vic to the grocery store, weighed myself. Lost 8lbs! I still am afraid I will weigh myself again next week to find out the scale was off. Guess we’ll see in March. How has the time gone so quickly? Had kind of a silly day, just exhausted and finding everything funny with Vic. Got my laundry done and caught up with a little bit of my e-mails. Was late back to the flat so rushed to pack and get going. Hope it’s another good week.

UPDATES
Weight: 27lbs away from my goal

Fitness: pretty good. Not as flexible as I would like but getting close to my three mile goal and did LOTS of walking and dancing this week.

Mood: pretty good. A little tired at times, not always super sharp, but quite happy. Problems don’t seem overwhelming. Haven’t felt particularly self conscious or blue about life, just a little worried about work for summer and the 09/10 season. About a 8.5 out of 10.

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Photos

Carnival
Duomo

Flag Thrower
in the carnival parade

Bubble boy
non lo so in Italian

Confettie
typical condition for the day

Vic
looking at the big color weels at the end of the parade