So many pictures it's like you're living in my eyes!

It’s been sort of rainy in Florence, but I don’t mind because a) I have puddle-resistant and hip Converse, which all Italians covet greatly, b) it’s made it cooler, and c) I am the proud owner of one of these:

All classy Florentines wish they had one.

Yes, that IS the Duomo. Cheesy? Duh. Brilliant? Clearly.

Rain I can handle.  It would take a hurricane, or probably just a strong gust of wind, to crush my Duomo and take me off the streets.  But earthquakes? Those I cannot handle, as I learned during my first one last night.  It was so subtle that many people, including my roommate, didn’t even notice it.  I did notice it, and not it in a calm or collected manner.  You know how I react to stray hairs on me or in a shower? Multiply that by 100.

But I’m trying not to let a crippling fear of the earth splitting apart beneath me get in the way of real life, so here’s some other stuff I’ve (bravely) been up to:

Cooking class where we made gnocchi (from scratch!), veal sauce, and tiramisu (tough)! YUM

Hunting for Florence's best gelato- Vivoli and Gelateria de' Medici are tied

How I spend my lunch breaks during school. How pretty is my bruschetta??

I intentionally picked all food pictures because those will make you guys most jealous, but mostly because pictures of us in class or walking all the time and earning our feasts aren’t as cute.

During those gaps of time between meals called real life, I’m trying really hard to learn Italian so I can chat up hot Italian men feel a little less helpless doing things like grocery shopping or, well, anything.  Unfortunately, our class in school is moving at a positively glacial pace — I’ve learned more from those language tapes they play in restaurant bathrooms than I have from this stupid class!  Today I decided to take matters into my own hands with two moves to improve my Italian, one uncharacteristically intrepid and the other exactly the sort of stupid shenanigans you’d expect from me:

• Bold- I’m volunteering with Florence’s Festa della Creativita to translate/edit the plaques next to the visual exhibits into English.  I’m really excited about this! It’s supposed to be one of the coolest things that happens in Florence and everyone I’ve met around there is really nice and welcoming.
• Typical- As a little kid, I learned to read by working my way through Calvin and Hobbes anthologies.  Today I saw a book of Peanuts cartoons in Italian in a bookstore and decided to see if the trick would work a few years later with Italian… at the very least it will make me adopt a more adorably cynical and practical joke-prone tone.

Fun weekend coming up! Going to Elba for some Napoleon history and Mediterranean beauty, Pisa for shoddy tower engineering, and Chianti for a wine festival!