Christmas Vacation

I'm back!  I've, so far, have had a fantastic holiday.  I go back to school on Monday, and I'm going to spend my last few days of break resting, hanging out with my family, writing thank-you-notes, and eating.  Because it's not a holiday if you're not eating, I always say.  My mama is making baked mac and cheese on New Year's Eve, per the request of Will and me, along with some hotdogs.

Will and I have extraordinarily elegant tastes, no?

Wow, this post is so easy to type.  My fingers are just flying.... everything's so natural... why would that be?  Oh yes.  Because guess what Santa left under the tree for little old me?  A new laptop.  You've heard me moan about the mostly-broken nature of my Dell, and I am now a proud owner of a 13 inch MacBook Pro.  I strongly recommend this exact computer to, well, anyone.  And I'm lucky to have my big brother here to help me set it all up.  He's a computer whiz, that fellow.

Our stay in Tuscany was bellissima.  The most beautiful place I've ever seen!  It was a villa on an olive farm, and we got to see an olive oil factory.

Now that I know how they make supermarket olive oil compared to the real stuff, I don't think I will ever want to use Bertolli ever, ever again.

I'll have some pictures of the whole shebang for you later, but for now I must go to sleep.  The villa was a little dusty, and Pasta and Waffles is highly allergic to dust mites.  Because of this, I've been snuffling, sneezing, and coughing all week, and it will probably take a few days to get all of this out of my lungs and for my skin to quit itching.  But I don't really care, because, overall, the trip was amazing.

I hope you all had a great Christmas as well, and I'll get back to you soon.

Love,

Firenze

Firenze Crest.  Source

Today, Mama and I got on the train (far too early, in my opinion) and headed off to Tuscany.  Specifically, we were going to Florence!  In Italian, Florence is "Firenze."  Dad couldn't come on the trip because he needed to rest; he has been sick since they got back from their last field study.

I slept on the train a bit of the way, but what I did see was FOG, and lots of it.  We were worried when we got to Florence because it was gray and cloudy, but it never did rain, luckily!  When we got there, we hurried off to meet our tour guide, and we walked into several churches and looked around the city.

I played the snob, leaning over to my mom and saying in a thick British accent, "This architecture is raaaather Romanesque, but look at the fan vaults.  It's has some devastatingly LOOOOVELY gothic qualities."

Ok, I didn't say it in a British accent.  But I REALLY wanted to.  It just doesn't feel right talking about features of architecture as just a lowly high school junior.  And I was probably wrong, anyway.

I got terribly excited farther along into our trip because we saw the church, house, and neighborhood of Dante Alighieri!  He wrote The Divine Comedy, and we saw the place where his beloved Beatrice was buried.  (Fellow Omnibus-students: coming to Europe really makes the curriculum come alive!)

We went the Uffizi Gallery, and they had so much lovely art.  I saw a lot of things that I had actually just studied this week.  My jaw nearly dropped when I saw a large print of the Annunciation, and I said to my mother:  "Mama!  I read this in sister Wendy's book on Monday!!"  Now, I'm not Catholic, but I highly appreciated this art.  It's just... breathtaking.  Lots of gold leaf and deep blues.... truly marvelous.  This one is my favorite, though we saw lots of images of the Annunciation.

Source

We saw the one painting by Michelangelo that is in Florence (in which Mary's muscles are oddly pronounced), and lastly we walked through the Caravaggio exhibit.  It's obvious that Caravaggio was very talented, and we saw the Medusa, but most of his paintings are too grim for my tastes.

Caravaggio's Medusa.  Source

Mom, our British buddies, and I all went shopping during our two hour free time, and had a blast.  We bought lots of things, because Florence is known for their leather working and they have great street stands everywhere.  There was haggling, there was purchasing, there was strolling, and there was much happiness with all of our "winnings."

We finally met at the train station at around 7:15 if I recall, though I could be wrong.  I'm very tired.  But, it was a great day!  I really want to live there.  It's a beautiful place, and it's a lot less chaotic than Rome.  I also like the Romanesque qualities of the churches mixed with the Gothic pieces and extravagance.

*snort*

Trick or treat, rub my feet, I think I had too much to eat

What a lovely, lovely weekend!  I wasn't able to blog because I was actually out of town with my grandparents. We went to the magnificent city of Siena, and then to the absolutely breathtaking coastal town of Orbetello.

On Friday morning, I got up, finished packing (noticing later I had forgotten my allergy meds... great) and then we were off.  It's been terribly cold, so we were bundled up!  We took the bus to the metro station, and took the metro to the other metro station, Termini, where there are also long-distance trains.  We got on one of these "real" trains, and we were officially off.  The initial train ride was maybe an hour, and then we took an hour long bus ride to Siena.  So as you can see, public transportation is becoming my forte.

Once in Siena, we walked around after getting a quick lunch.  My goodness!  Siena is unbelievably beautiful.  I want to live there so, so, so badly.  It has great views and quaint shutters and brick buildings and iron balconies and everything else you picture when you think of Italy.  It's built in a very hilly area, so it's interesting to see the dynamics of houses and churches built on different levels.  Y'all should really go.  Really.

After a day and night in Siena, we hopped on a train with our friend David and his friend Angela.  They both teach in Siena, and David is a family friend.  We all went by train to Orbetello, which is a city on the coast.  It's breathtaking!  Except... it's windy.  So windy that I got WIND-BURN.  And I was freezing the whole time.  But, it was all worth it.  We met Sabina and Massimo.  They are friends of David and Angela, and they're lovely.  Massimo (nicknamed Massi) is my age, and we hung out a lot because he's trying to work on his English.  And, this weekend, there was a festival, which was so much fun!   They have the funniest tradition though... people buy a wine glass, wear it around their neck in a baggy, and then are allotted twelve small tastings with that glass.  It was funny to watch people with glasses hanging around their necks!

We also briefly saw a beautiful port town, Porto San Stefano, and it was gorgeous.  And we had some yummy seafood.  I ate quite a lot this weekend.... :)

All in all, I had a wonderful weekend.  I'm exhausted, cold, still damp from all the rain, my feet hurt, and I think I'm coming down with something.  But I wouldn't give the weekend back for anything!  It was marvelous.  I hope to go back soon!!

Ciao, mi amici (and oh, I hope you all had a great Halloween!)