A Cold Week in Orvieto

Sunday night we were able to watch the Super Bowl at Bar Duomo!  It started at midnight, there were NO commercials, and we only stayed through the half time show because we were tired.  It was nice to have a dose of good ole 'Merica, but I missed the Done's basement with Reese's treats, Reese's brownies, and chili cheese dip. 

Monday we had studio and were introduced to our project...kind of.  We are studying A Pattern Language by Christopher Alexander which is very interesting, but we are still not sure what the final project is going to be which annoys me.  The rest of the day was spent working on the project with a nice cup of coffee at home.   We managed to make Mac and Cheese for dinner.  It was good, but nothing beats Velvetta shells and Bread Co. Wisconson White Chedder Shells.  That night we went to Zeppelin for Ashely's birthday and just have some dessert.  We ended up drinking a lot of wine with that dessert...

Tuesday was Marco's class in the morning which was as interesting as always.  He is such a great lecturer even if he still uses a slide projector!  I was tired but he managed to keep me awake with his antecdotes about his family in Rome and his detailed descriptions of what he's talking about.  We had Italian with Marina where we learned body parts and played a couple games.  We taught her how to play Simon Says (Simone dice...).  Tuesday night I made mini pizzas which were delicious.  Probably one of my favorite solo dinners but I don't buy cheese often enough. 

Today, Wednesday, we went to studio for half and hour and then a group  of us had to go to the police station with Serena our liason to register as a temporary resident (staying more than 90 days) of Orvieto (or something like that).  I was the third of 12 people called in and everything was going fine until the guy plugged some stuff in the computer and then told us something was wrong with the papers and put my passport and stack of papers 'in time out'.  I didn't really want to spend time in Italian jail or go home, but Serena assured me it would be ok.  I went back and waited with the group.  Three other people had issues to so at least I wouldn't be alone in jail!  All and all it turned out ok, they never told me what was wrong though.  Instead of having seminar we met with the Director of CittaSlow (look it up).  He talked about the movement/organization and what it is doing to help small towns preserve their local cultures etc.  It was very interesting, and he looked like Einstein.  After the presentation he took us to the wine cellars under the building which was really neat.  Now we're waiting for the potato soup we made to be done!

The past couple of days the apartment has been really cold (hence the title) so we've been locking ourselves in the kitchen with the oven open on low.  The house is getting pretty small and we've all developed a bit of cabin fever, but hopefully it will get nicer soooon.  The snow has stopped but the slush is sticking around because it's so dang cold.  I've fallen on my butt twice and bruised my elbow.  I cannot wait for sunshine.  For now I'm going to keep bundling up and I'm going to buy a scarf at the market tomorrow :)

Cliff hanger:  Tomorrow is the first market in like a week and a half; Florence on Friday!; We're staying Friday and Saturday night with a trip to Pisa on Saturday :) 

Ciao!