post-vacation adventures

It's hard to believe that it's already Wednesday...the time since the break has flown by! The ship got in really early Saturday morning, so we walked to Piazzale Roma to take the vaporetto back to Casa Artom and after I validated our tickets, there was a ticket-checker who saw that I was using IMOB tickets for myself and Mom and Dad and she asked (in Italian) "do you all have the IMOB?" and I said yes and acted way too in a hurry to prove it (thank goodness, because we don't all have IMOB cards). Anyways, we all got ready at Casa Artom, then ran some errands to buy a few gifts for people back home. We got lunch and brought it back to Casa Artom to eat on the porch since the weather is nicer now than it was even in September, then Mom and Dad checked in at the hotel and rested for a while. We went out to dinner at San Travaso that night with everyone back home-Jen, Carolina, Rhianna, Charlotte, and Charlotte's parents. My parents and Charlotte's went on to their hotels as they were both leaving the next day and the girls and I went to Madigans to hang out for a while, which ended up being so much fun! Sunday was perfect...I managed to do laundry, hit the grocery with the girls, and spend some quality time with the handful of people back home while we waited for everyone else to get back. I felt like such a Mom pacing the downstairs hall waiting for the kids to get back, but I missed them all so much and couldn't wait to see them again!

Monday I worked on essays while the kids were in class, then Kayla and I went to join the gym, which was an adventure. The lady who registers people was positively in a horrible mood and so we basically had to force her to take our 80 Euro and our paperwork. Then I bought milk and baked cookies for the kids for our 9pm "what I did on my break" meeting. The meeting ended up lasting a couple hours, but was hilarious as we all told stories about our adventures. Yesterday I was exhausted for some reason so I took 2 separate naps (highly unusual for me, obviously) and finally dragged myself out of bed in time to shower and eat before going to an opera with the group. The opera was really strange-very different from the one we saw in Verona-we barely made it on time and initially all ended up sitting in separate areas in the theater...Kayla and I got perfect seats in the front, but got lonely, so we went upstairs to the very top to join everyone else. At the end, Kayla, Rhianna, Tom, and I left pretty quickly while the rest of the group went out for drinks. I ended up staying up way too late just hanging out, so today I'm exhausted...again. I woke up early (thanks, internal alarm clock) so I tried to go to the gym only to be forbidden entry for reasons at the time I couldn't understand. Apparently it's because I didn't wear flip flops (or something) and change in to my tennis shoes. Lame. I definitely kind of already woke up on the wrong side of the bed and that didn't help. I haven't been sleeping well since break for a myriad of reasons, one of the more obnoxious being the return of the mosquitoes. I was barely bothered by them way back in August/September, but now they're awful for me...they keep me awake buzzing above my head and I have bites all over my right arm and around the perimeter of my face and now in the dead center of my forehead. NOT cute. SO anyways, I tried to rest on the upstairs couch, but there's some sort of crazy intense protest going on in Venice today that's both on foot and on boat, so there were a lot of sirens and whistling that kept me up. I finally crashed for a while, then had lunch with the girls in between classes, and now I'm being totally unproductive and watching Gossip Girl. Tonight it's house dinner, gelato, and house gondonla ride, so it's going to be a busy night. I'm so glad everyone is back home, at least for the weekdays...I really did miss everyone... the hugs, the late night gossiping, the hilarity...this group is great!

I think a fair number of people are sticking around this weekend, so we're planning a "singles" dinner tomorrow(the house couples keep having dinner just the six of them, so Caroline decided we need to have a dinner for everyone who is just plain old single!)...I think we're doing breakfast for dinner, which is AMAZING. Then Friday I think at least Kayla and I are shopping in Vicenza, then Allie gets here Saturday and I think a group of us might go to Treviso for a wine festival Sunday. Huzzah...my post-vacation bad mood is destined to turn around with that line up : )