miss me?

so, i am so incredibly sorry that i haven't posted in such a long time... it takes approximately 30 minutes to get to the internet cafe in piaza barberini... and by the time we get done walking around, the last thing on anyone's mind is the internet... blah.

so, anyway... david (the other roommate...) finally showed up on sunday night (school started on monday) and scared the crap out of me... we literally bumped into him in piaza farnese (i thought he was some drunk guy... and low and behold, it's david... yeah, i was so excited to see him...). so now our apartment is crowded, but we got an extra matress the other day (there's a matress store right around the corner from my apartment...who would have guessed?) and things seem to be working out fine...

the class did a walking tour of the area around the studio today, and i finally got to see caravaggio's 'the calling of st. matthew'... yeah. the church that it is in is just around the corner from the pantheon and the inside is really quite lovely... and hudled there quietly in the back is a masterpiece waiting to jump out and say 'boo.' the lighting in the chapel was really lovely and tied and 'made' all three of the paintings in the niche...the calling of st. matthew, st. matthew writing the gospel, and the martyrdom of st. matthew... all that before an espresso this morning... yeah, i most definitely filled three pages (front and back) in my sketchbook this morning...

tomorrow, alenya and i are going to go walking around the city... i just want to see everything. i still just cannot get over how incredibly large everything is... particularly the pantheon. i can't help but smile every time i walk past 'her' - the building seems to surprise me everytime i come around the corner... god. it is just so lovely and large and cold (which has been particularly enjoyable for the past few blisteringly hot days) and inviting. i have to deem the pantheon and castel sant'angelo my favorite buildings in rome, so far.

brad, david and i did run into a local in piaza farnese last night (we were sitting on one of the fountains, having some gelatto)... he was so incredibly nice and showed us around where we live, showed us the cheap places to get beer, the great places to get food and wine, the local hang-outs (as we're getting a little tired of the rediculous crowds of tourists in campo dei fiori after 9:30 every night), and some really incredible places to sit and sketch... one in particular that i will photograph and show to all of my loyal readers... it's a breath-taking little niche in the city that looks like something out of a renoir painting... it will be posted soon, i promise...

i think that this is going to be all for tonight, kiddies... oh - before i make my rediculously long trek home, everyone should read 'the cheese monkeys' by chip kidd... it will rock your socks off... yeah, so here's your long-awaited nugget (this is dedicated to all of those people who have been to rome...):

a major prohibitionist group, the women’s christian temperance union (wctu) taught as "scientific fact" that the majority of beer drinkers die from dropsie

the wctu suggested that school teachers put half of a calf’s brain in an empty jar into which alcohol should be poured. as the color of the brain turned from pink to gray, pupils were to be warned that a drink of alcohol would do the same to their brains.

mmm... yummy.