Fat Tuesday!

March 8, 2011

This morning in Roman Achievement we got our midterms back and I was so excited to see what I got! I ended up getting a 91 out of 104, which she considers an A-. Yay!! I was really happy with how I did on the test, and all of the questions that I was on the fence about I ended up getting wrong, but it didn’t matter, I still got an A! Our next test in there is going to be the Roman Emperors Quiz which will only be over the lectures that we are starting now up until the quiz, which hopefully won’t be too much information because it isn’t very many lectures. Once class was over it was now time to knock out another test…I was officially ready for the Italian Quiz!

Before Gloria handed out our quizzes she first wanted to hand back the last quizzes we took, which we all knew we failed. But before she handed them to us she started giggling and said that she didn’t realize she put a ton of verbs on there that we didn’t know, so she didn’t count that section of the quiz, and she apologized for worrying us…shewww! Without the verbs I got an A- on the quiz, which made me extremely relieved. And when we got our quiz to take I was even more relieved because I flew right through it…it was so easy and was exactly what she told us it was going to be. When I turned in my quiz I realized that it was so early and that I had enough time to go home and eat lunch because we were meeting at Santa Maria Novella for art history, which is right down the street from our apartment. Jackie and I went back to the apartment together and she ate a plate of tomatoes and mozzarella with balsamic vinegar (a typical Jackie dish), while I threw a mini pizza in the oven and ate an apple with Nutella while it cooked…it was fat Tuesday, I had to do it up!

When I got to Santa Maria Novella for class Danielle, Marissa, and Lauren were already there and I saw Marissa was holding a shopping bag, and it was shoes! This week is Marissa’s shopping week where she is going shopping every single day and buying whatever she wants because her mom basically told her she would only be in Italy once, so if she wants something, just buy it. She showed me her shoes which were adorable brown boots that rose up to mid-calf and buttoned on the side…so so cute! After admiring her boots we actually went into the cathedral for class and looked at only one fresco for the entire class: The Holy Trinity by Masaccio. This painting was the first to use linear perspective, which means basically means the painting is 3-D, and was the first Renaissance painting. Rocky said he could teach an entire semester solely on this painting, but I think I was content having a full class period on it.

After class I came back to the apartment to do my powerpoint presentation on Erdogan for European Issues tomorrow. I had all of my research already finished and had gone through and highlighted the stuff I wanted to use, all I had to do was throw it all into a powerpoint and prepare what I was going to say. I was almost finished with my powerpoint when I realized I was STARVING and if I were giving up sweets in Florence for Lent, I HAD to get a waffle with Nutella one last time. So I walked across the street to Very Good and got myself a waffle sandwich filled with Nutella...YUM! This was such a great fat Tuesday!

And to make fat Tuesday even better, Meghan asked us girls to come to dinner at Tijuana tonight because her mom, grandpa, and brother were visiting from the States, and it was her mom’s birthday. We definitely didn’t want to be party poopers, and whenever we have a reason to get margaritas, we bask in the opportunity! So after finishing my presentation it was practically time to meet up for dinner, so we headed towards Tijuana and met everyone there. I ended up getting chimichangas and oven baked nachos with spicy ground beef. The chimichangas were filled with rice, cheese and meet and were just little squares…definitely not like how they are in the U.S….and they had a side of lettuce topped with tomatoes and sour cream and cheese. The nachos had white cheese poured over the top with peppers and tomatoes and the spicy ground beef and oven baked…they were HEAVENLY! The cheese was melted all throughout the nachos and it was definitely plenty to fill me up without the chimichangas…why did the girls tell me that having only one of them was not enough food? And on top of that I had a passion fruit margarita. Clearly we are not on these girls’ level with eating out places because we cook at home like every single night. We had a fabulous dinner and I had a fun time meeting Meghan’s family (although it did make me wish that my family was here), but we headed home after wishing Meghan’s mom Happy Birthday for the last time.

Once at home I did a little bit more of schoolwork before it was time for my skype date with mom and dad. But as a nice surprise my Aunt Jeannie was calling me on skype before I started skypeing with my mom. Today is Joshua’s birthday and they were going out to dinner to celebrate, but wanted to talk to me for a few minutes before they left. Josh was so excited to show me all of his little LEGO guys that my mom sent him in the mail for his birthday, and he showed me every single weapon that came with it, as well as the front and the back of this little jester hat for the clown that came with the LEGO set as well. I think they just really enjoy the fact that they can show me things over the camera, and I just really enjoy watching them…they’re too cute. I got to see Cassie and Brianna as well as Alex, who was helping Josh show me all of the little weapons. But it didn’t take long before time was up and they had to go meet Uncle Brian at the restaurant for Josh’s birthday, but the time I got to talk to them was awesome…I miss my family!

And right after I was done talking to them my mom called me on skype and we got to talk for a little bit before dad came home, and then the 3 of us were skypeing. I told them all about how we have a dryer in our apartment now and how it has this huge plastic container that pulls out and collects all of the water from your clothes, so when you go to empty the lint which is inside of the door, you also have to empty the water since there is no vent to the outside for the dryer. It also is the most basic machine of my life with only three buttons, and it takes up so much electricity that whenever it’s in use it blows the fuses (or breakers as dad told me) all the time. And of course right after I told my parents that it the breakers blow all the time, my internet went out and my computer screen went dark and the dryer stopped…yeppp the fuse blew! I went and flipped the switch and after like 10 minutes was able to get back on and at least say goodbye before the breaker blew again.

After I talk on skype at night I feel like since it’s not that late at home, it’s not late here, even though it’s like 1 or 2 in the morning. So I ended up talking to my friend Max from Kent til really early in the morning before I comprehended what time it actually was here in Italy and freaked out, got a shower, and forced myself to go to bed. I just miss everyone back home and whenever I get the opportunity to talk to them I always want to take advantage of it, even if that means sacrificing an hour, two hours, or even three hours of sleep…it’s worth it! :]