Ciao, Romano

Italy's government has collapsed!!!
Wait- that probably didn't need exclamation points; the collapse of the Italian government seems to happen at least every two years.
Anyway after 20 months in power and after surviving nearly three dozen (!) confidence votes the the Italian government when Prime Minister Romano Prodi lost a vote of confidence in Parliament and was forced to resign.
The final margin of the vote 161-156.
When the vote was announced some senators cracked open a bottle of champagne (actually hopefully it was prosecco)

God I love Italia
Romano of course tendered his resignation.
"According to the Italian news agency ANSA Italy has had 61 governments in the 62 years since the end of World War II. Prodi's lasted 618 days, the seventh- longest." wow wow. Politics in other countries is so much funner than here. I mean this is a story but it's not at all shocking.


What was shocking to me at least was that if elections were held today, as many are urging, that everyone's old friend Silvio Berlusconi would probably be brought back into power. Oh Silvio, oh. I don't know what to say really...hopefully this time around you won't say stuff like this:

At a rally during the 2006 election campaign:
"Read The Black Book of Communism and you will discover that in the China of Mao, they did not eat children, but had them boiled to fertilise the fields."

On left-wing voters at a conference of retailers during the 2006 campaign:
"I trust the intelligence of the Italian people too much to think that there are so many pricks around who would vote against their own best interests."

At the launch of the 2006 campaign:
"I am the Jesus Christ of politics. I am a patient victim, I put up with everyone, I sacrifice myself for everyone."

Promising to put family values at the centre of his campaign:
"I will try to meet your expectations, and I promise from now on, two-and-a-half months of absolute sexual abstinence, until [election day on] 9 April."

To German MEP Martin Schulz, at start of Italy's EU presidency in July 2003:
"I know that in Italy there is a man producing a film on Nazi concentration camps - I shall put you forward for the role of Kapo (guard chosen from among the prisoners) - you would be perfect."

During the controversy raging over the above remark:
"I'll try to soften it and become boring, maybe even very boring, but I am not sure I will be able to do it."

To a German newspaper:
"In Italy I am almost seen as German for my workaholism. Also I am from Milan, the city where people work the hardest. Work, work, work - I am almost German."

At the Brussels summit, at the end of Italy's EU presidency, in December 2003:
"Let's talk about football and women." (Turning to four-times-married German Chancellor, Gerhard Schroeder.) "Gerhard, why don't you start?"

On Italian secretaries (comments made at the New York stock exchange):
"Italy is now a great country to invest in... today we have fewer communists and those who are still there deny having been one. Another reason to invest in Italy is that we have beautiful secretaries... superb girls."

On Mussolini:
"Mussolini never killed anyone. Mussolini used to send people on vacation in internal exile."

In the wake of 11 September:
"We must be aware of the superiority of our civilisation, a system that has guaranteed well-being, respect for human rights and - in contrast with Islamic countries - respect for religious and political rights, a system that has as its value understanding of diversity and tolerance...
"The West will continue to conquer peoples, even if it means a confrontation with another civilisation, Islam, firmly entrenched where it was 1,400 years ago."

His response to worldwide condemnation of the above speech:
"They have tried to hang me on an isolated word, taken out of context from my whole speech."

"I did not say anything against the Islamic civilisation... It's the work of some people in the Italian leftist press who wanted to tarnish my image and destroy my long-standing relations with Arabs and Muslims."

On Italian justice:
"Eighty-five per cent of the Italian press is left-wing and among the judges it is even worse... There is a cancer in Italy that we have to treat: the politicisation of the magistracy."

On judges pursuing former Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti on charges relating to the Mafia:
"Those judges are doubly mad! In the first place, because they are politically mad, and in the second place because they are mad anyway.
"If they do that job it is because they are anthropologically different from the rest of the human race."

On his trial, now suspended, in which he denies charges of bribing judges to prevent the sale of a state-owned food company to a rival:
"I believed and still believe that citizen Berlusconi should be praised for having prevented the state's wealth from being looted... I was expecting a Gold Medal for Civil Worthiness for ensuring the state earned 2,000bn [lire]."

On himself:
"The best political leader in Europe and in the world."
"There is no-one on the world stage who can compete with me."
"Out of love for Italy, I felt I had to save it from the left."
"The right man in the right job."
"I don't need to go into office for the power. I have houses all over the world, stupendous boats... beautiful airplanes, a beautiful wife, a beautiful family... I am making a sacrifice."

A joke about Aids told by Mr Berlusconi:
"An Aids patient asks his doctor whether the sand treatment prescribed him will do any good. 'No', the doctor replies, 'but you will get accustomed to living under the earth'."

His response to critics who said the joke was offensive:
"They have lost their minds; they really have come to the end of the line, indeed they have gone beyond it. I would advise them, too, to undergo sand treatment..."

On his alleged conflict of interest as prime minister and one of Italy's biggest tycoons, with major media holdings:
"If I, taking care of everyone's interests, also take care of my own, you can't talk about a conflict of interest."

On a proposal to base an EU food standards agency in Finland, rather than the Italian city of Parma:
"Parma is synonymous with good cuisine. The Finns don't even know what prosciutto is. I cannot accept this."

On history:
"The founders of Rome were Romulus and Remulus ..."

but I doubt it. Oh, Silvio I guess I'll be able to take some solace (quantum solace) in the fact your government will probably only be around for a year or two.
Can someone convince Beppe Grillo to run? per favore?

Noi fummo da secoli
calpesti, derisi,
perché non siam popolo,
perché siam divisi.
Raccolgaci un'unica
bandiera, una speme:
di fonderci insieme
già l'ora suonò.

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A Few Thousand Words Worth

pics o' the day

All Roads Do Lead To Rome


Mind The Gap

We Fucked Up

We Fucked Up Bad

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TMI: A Fantasy in Brief

(well a different one than in the future money will be replaced by hugs.)

Anyway I really don't have anything on my mind that I want to get off of my chest (what?); it's been a fairly tame time emotionally and any thing I may have worried about I think I hashed out in my almost 20 pages of letters to Hubby last week and various emails to my girls. So for tonight I thought I'd have the shortest TMI by revealing one of my biggest fantasies- I was going to list all of them but some would have been really embarrassing and I'm way too sober to do that.

So I formed this one while I was in Rome and it is so specific that it'll probably never happen (though everytime I'll go to Rome I'll still by on the hunt*) but it's to hook up with an Italian named Enzo in a SmartCar that's parked by the Arch of Constantine and the Colosseum while it's raining and hopefully thundering-roman thunder sounds like the sky is being ripped in two. It's pretty cinematic, but that's how I roll. It never came anywhere close to happening while I was there (another tranny named Laura in the bathroom of a gay club probably doesn't count.)

I know "hook up" is a vary vague and imprecise term and I probably just mean it to mean make out and all that jazz. As I wrote to Suj while explaining that I wouldn't actually become a stripper was I think I'm like the least sexual person ever. I'm really not sure I give off that vibe or that I'd want to right now; the hormones have zapped a lot of my libido and sex is so complicated and a hassle. Of course I'm saying all this while dead sober and when I get a capiriniha or two in me I maybe get a little too loving. Anytime though I'm a bit of a make out whore.

This may have been a little short but, we're out of string cheese so I'm outta here (and yes 30 Rock just ended. I love that show)
*so if you're italian, named Enzo and have or want to rent a SmartCar in Rome sometime...

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Ephemeral Desires: Things that are too cool/trendy for me*

but I still would like to see, see happen or experience

• I wish I had enough disposable income so I could really enjoy Polyvore like I feel I would with an extra few thousands
• I want to find a woman who actually needed a "Her Depot" or a pink gps because they just couldn't handle the real thing.
• According to US weekly, for Scientologist parents: "It's all about being positive and supportive," says the couple's friend (Hubbard advised parents to "try to be the child's friend.") As for discipline, one former church member tells Us that Scientologists do not scold their children, but instead explain that bad behavior (like throwing a toy) is the "wrong action." (A Scientology rep tells Us, "How a parent disciplines their child is left up to the parent.")Cruise and Holmes, says their pal, are very lenient and do not like to give Suri too many rules: "Suri pretty much does whatever she wants, whenever she wants. If she fusses before bed, they let her stay up later. If they want her to go swimming and she cries, they'll take her out. If she whines about food, they'll ask her what else she wants to eat. They always want to please her." Hmm I kind of wish my parents had been Scientologists. No wait, no.
• I wish I liked cookies more because this Cookie Diet by Dr. Siegal would then be AMAZING. Who am I kidding, it's amazing no matter what.
  
• Jay Reatard is apparently the new hottness. I feel I need to see him before he gets too popular and I feel he's sold out. I wonder if his name is pronounced Retard- I'm sure those jokes would get old fast.
• Speaking of music NaS' new album is rumored to be titled Nigga. I will actually support that if for no other reason than maybe on a receipt it will say I purchased 1 Nigga for like 13 bucks. So much for the NAACP burying the N-Word.
• Speaking of race, Whoopi has called upon Al Sharpton to apologize to the Duke Lacrosse kids, I mean it is the least he can do, though it won't actually do anything.
• The LA Times did a feature on X-Rated Prestige pictures, all of which I would like to see because I have a dirty mind plus I would enjoy the changing nature of decency and the artistic quality, of course. And some actually seem really interested and cool.
• This movie may not be "prestigious" but I want to see Juno because I love Michael Cera and so would see him in anything (short of a glass box having sex with my friend-that would be weird.) Juno is not a glass box and I don't think any of my friends are working on it so I am definitely there
• A movie I'm not sure I want to see: According to reports there may be a Brokeback Mountain sequel-"Although we won’t be seeing his pal Jake Gyllenhaal, 26, Heath Ledger, 28, is currently in negotiations to reprise his role as Ennis. “It will follow the nasty process of being openly gay in 1963 Wyoming, an insider tells OK!.� “Ennis will finally come out of the closet.” I actually don't know how I feel about that. I think I kind of wanting him to be in his trailer and pine endlessly for his one true love until he died, though this could work too.
• News on the Coming Glorious Socialist Revolution:
• The Chinese are thinking about setting up a Communist Branch in space...whenever they have a permanent space presence. That could be cool, though they may need a new logo. A hammer seems kind of ineffective and pointless in zero gravity.
• Back on this front in the Interplanetary Class War, Mikhail Gorbachev drew loud cheers in New Orleans Friday when he promised to lead a local revolution if the Army Corps of Engineers doesn't keep its promise to improve levees by 2011."We will be coming back," the Soviet Union's last leader said, through an interpreter, during a ceremony in the Lower Garden District. "If this pledge is not fulfilled, we will start a new revolution in New Orleans." though let's not forget Gorbachev let the Soviet Union fall apart with his damn freedoms. Still I'm all about revolution, and if there should be a rallying point New Orleans is the place- the city the government forgot.
• I want to unexpectedly run into a portrait of a saint that J. Michael Walker painted in honor of certain L.A. streets. That was a great part of Rome seeing images of saints on certain tucked away streets.
• Another unexpected surprise- now that I stumbled upon and learned about it I kind of want to put on a performance of Saucy Jack and the Space Vixens. Is that not the best name ever? For anything?
• Viacom is finally offering Daily Show clips online and they're doing it huge, by having 13,000 clips "representing every minute of the show since its 1999 inception" at thedailyshow.com Yes! I missed you Stephen vs. Steven.
  
• Slash, or Guns N'Roses and other sorts of epic rock hedonism has written a book, which doesn't seem like it will disappoint. You can read some excerpts here.
• I don't think there will be nearly as much sex and drugs in this but still:"The 99," an Islam-themed comic book complete with superheroes, hit stands in select U.S. cities. Like U.S. superheroes Batman and Superman, the characters are not overtly religious, but rather promote universal values such as goodness and love.Each superhero embodies one of the 99 attributes that Muslims ascribe to Allah" I wouldn't imagine sampling that, for purely anthropological reasons of course.
  
• The newly planned Star Wars series should be interesting in its own right. I enjoyed Episode II and III and though I refuse to be so intense as to read the novels I do spend to much time in the Star Wars portal on Wikipedia, so I'm nerd enough to probably watch a few episodes.
• And finally I would love to see the guy who posted this ad and the person who would actually respond to it. And more to the point I hope it's real

I am looking for someone to come over and suck me off while I am eating a bowl of Hamburger Helper (orignial [sic] recipe) and chatting on the phone with my mother. Funny Girl will be playing on DVD with the volume off. I plan to ejaculate at the same time I say, “Okay, mom, gotta go, bye.”

I am 39, 4′10″, 190 lbs., thinning black hair, gray eyes, bushy mustache, hairy back but smooth everywhere else, 5″ cut cock - often told I look like a handsomer version of George Jetson’s boss.

I can host tonight in my apartment on 39th and Bleecker. Please, no freaks, smokers or Muslims.

My therapist would have a lot of fun with him. But seriously " no freaks, smokers or Muslims" that's funny. Well done, well done.

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On the Extinction of Cultures

I found this story on the New York Times website, which if you haven't read is doing away with the Times Select feature which is fabulous news and makes me really happy, but it is a story about the World's Languages Dying Of. Here's the lede:
Of the estimated 7,000 languages spoken in the world today, linguists say, nearly half are in danger of extinction and are likely to disappear in this century. In fact, they are now falling out of use at a rate of about one every two weeks.

That's pretty frightening. The story goes on to say many of the languages being lost are aboriginal or tribal languages in such places as "Northern Australia, Central South America, North America’s upper Pacific coastal zone, Eastern Siberia and Oklahoma and Southwest United States." I guess it is kind of inevitable that in our world of disintegrating borders and globalization and increasing hegemony of the West that languages would die of,but it's still kind of sad because learning languages, the more obscure the better makes you feel like an expert and a part of some foreign and exotic land that only you have the entry visa into.
Also language is such a big part of culture that with the dying of these languages it also means that these cultures are becoming extinct as well. I remember a conversation I had in Rome with a couple of kids in my program who went to Trinity as we were around Campo dei Fiori (which is already incredibly touristy) and one of them was kind of complaining that the Italians didn't speak English and trying to convince us that the world and traveling would be so much better if everyone spoke the same language and we tried to convince him of how much of the charm and culture and history of a place would be lost in his perfect world and it sort of frightened me that there are people, college educated people at that, who would espouse such an ideal, which was a long long preface and set up to show this Get Fuzzy comic that I found this Sunday that reminded me of this type of view (here is a larger view if the one below doesn't blow your hair back)

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Your Stuck in my Head Song of the Day

Your stuck in my head song of the day comes from Laura Veir's newest cd Saltbreaker and this is one ofthose songs I never would have discovered if it weren't for satellite radio and that wonderfulness of telling me artist and song names. The song is Don't Lose Yourself and yeah it's maybe what I needed right now, blah blah you can see what I mean in the lyrics blah.It may be about losing yourself in a relationship,though I'm too tired to think too deeply and of course the basic message "don't lose yourself" is universal. But it doesn't have an official video or even a live version that I could find so I'm going to post the two entries in the, I guess, "make a video" contest. Once again I'm horrible at making decisions and they both have reasons to recommend them. The first one is made by an Italian, and god knows how much I love that country and the people (roma, te manco). It has whimsy and balloons, which always make good viewing. Visuals by Giacomo Cocci

And this second one is probably technically a better video, one that really impressed me especially with the Take on Me feel of some parts it has a more romantic feel and it was filmed on the streets of L.A. to boot.


See; you're both winners! ::polite applause::
Speaking of L.A. I just chanced to go on LAist and apparently today is the 266th birthday of El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora La Reina de Los Angeles. Who knew? Their coverage is far better than I could do even if I weren't passing out,but I feel really sorry for whoever actually walked 9 miles on what was the hottest day of the year. So happy birthday my lady; you don't look a day over 74.
As for you dearest mythical reader: sogni d'oro.

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Testosterone= Not My Favorite Thing

It makes you dumb, disgusting, crazy and violent. Here are just a few examples:

These two guys hit on or try to strike up conversation with women, by going up to random ones and licking them. Ew. Ew. Ew. I'm not sure this is so funny, though some of the girls seem to take it in stride with good humour after they see the camera, but seriously that's just gross.

Since when has it been okay to do this type of stuff as long as someone is filming?

For this story keep in mind that it is not yet college football season. But a man wearing a Texas Longhorn shirt went into a bar in Oklahoma. And he left without something very important. This is from Deadspin:
"Thomas [the Longhorn supporter] said Beckett[the Sooner Fan], whom he had never met, called him "everything under the sun" for wearing a Longhorns T-shirt into the bar. He said he and his friend sat at a table in the corner and tried to ignore the other man, but other man kept screaming at him. Thomas said he decided he'd had enough after about 20 minutes of Beckett's abuse so he went to the bar to pay his tab. When he turned around, he said Beckett grabbed his crotch and refused to let go. Thomas hit the other man several times before several bar patrons intervened, but Thomas said Beckett didn't let go until Thomas heard his scrotum tear and blood ran down his leg."
Jesus, guys! I know it's a big rivalry and all but... it is still just a game. And a shirt. Poor guy.

And the mystery behind what Marco Materazzi said to Zizou in that pivotal moment in the World Cup has been revealed. Apparently all Materazzi said, when asked if he wanted Zidane to give him his jersey, was "I'd prefer your whore of a sister." Seriously? Is that it? I've said worse and more horrible things when playing Beirut or scrabble. I'm sure I've heard more horrible things when I played basketball when I was 8. He wouldn't have lasted a day in the States. You can't get yourself kicked out of the last and most important game of your life for that!(though I'm not complaining about the results; oh and Forza Italia!) And what was Materazzi thinking releasing the only piece of information in his upcoming book that people actually care about. That is not a good strategy.

Though Zizou's is the most famous headbutt, it is not nearly as impressive as this:
Did you watch it? I'll wait...
Ha! What the hell is in crystal meth? That's terrfiying (though really funny.) See, this is why you shouldn't do (cheap/trashy) drugs.

And I'm not saying that this Wolverine football player is on drugs, dumb or disgusting or violent, but this is one of the funniest things I've ever read. I literally LOL'd. Read it; it is so worth your time. Maybe he'll let me see his fuck lion or at the least, he'll accept my friend request...

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Xenophobia is Fun but I heart Roma

Just a couple of stories about other countries that I thought were funny. And a couple of stories about another country, that I love (the stories but especially the country)

• A son in Sicily had his house keys taken away, his allowance suspended and was taken to the police station by his mom because he stayed out all night. The kicker is the son is 61! (and seems like una faccia di culo, complaining that his allowance wasn't big enough and his mom's food wasn't good). And then the mom calls him a blockhead (or a zuccone). Ah Italia, I've heard about the mammoni but this is incredible ridiculous. And how old is the mom. Good for her though that at her age she's still so spry and feisty. I wanna be an Italian mother when I'm old.
• I don't know if the Japan obsession with anime and transgender images is a good thing or offensive but things like this are just sort of weird. I haven't taken Japanese for about 7 years now so I'm pretty useless in translation but try to imagine a transgendered Mushroom Kingdom and this is pretty much what you might come up with. And no I don't remember how I came upon it, though you probably wouldn't want to know anyway. [Update: I found it through here]

But enough negativity/weirdness, here's a beautiful story about love and Rome, though of course those are synonyms in my mind. The New York Times had a story about Ponte Milvio, Rome's oldest bridge, which a writer in 2006 used as a plot device:

Last year, the writer Federico Moccia created the second installment of a story of young Romans called “I Want You.” Like many affairs, his hero’s starts with a lie: he convinces a potential girlfriend of an invented legend in which lovers wrap a lock and a chain around the third lamppost on the bridge’s northern side, lock it and throw the key into the Tiber.

“And then?” the girl asks...
“We’ll never leave each other,” he says, with no shame...
Mr. Moccia, 44, said he dreamed up the ritual. “I liked the idea of tying locks to love because it is more solid, tangible,” he said. The book sold 1.1 million copies, then the movie came out and soon life began imitating art.

And now young lovers (because you're always young when you're in love) from all over are tying locks to the bridge and throwing the keys into the water. Sure its corny and touristy but it is still a lovely image and belief and if a couple really means it, for them at least they won't care how overdone it may be. I just wish these ritual had started a year before, when I was there, so I could have "aww"-ed over them as I did the love graffitti that is everywhere.

Finally I saw this yesterday on CNN about the incorporation of a "Gay Street" in Rome. I wasn't sure where exactly it was at first but then they interviewed a barkeep at Coming Out bar and I immediately recognized it as a place I went to a few times, once when I got a really strong Long Island and it was incredibly humid inside the bar, another time when it was closed, and finally during one of my favorite nights in Rome when it was closed but everyone was just sitting outside of it drinking and having a good time with the Colosseum across the street and our backs overlooking ancient gladiator quarters, where I talked with Fabiana and Vivian a lovely couple about me wanting a boyfriend and their love for The L-Word. Such good memories and so this story really makes me happy. Buona suerte miei amici.

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TMI: My Sketchiest 24 hours in Rome (that I think I remember)

( I know its TMI Thursday and everyone is so looking forward to it but this week I really haven't had anything pressing or remotely interesting or psychological in my head and now that I think of it I am not in the right introspective frame if mind to hypothesize on causes of transsexuality so I'll put that off again. Anyway this is from an e-mail I sent to my girlfriends back when i was in Rome; my computer says it was created on october 19th and I'm not sure if I was newly drunk or still residually drunk but some of the writing seems like I had been imbibing. It What I posted is about the second half of a very long, maybe like a 5 day weekend, where I was bored and really wanted to hook up with someone, namely a hot Italian named Enzo. This documents friday through saturday which was one of the strangest 24 or so hour periods in my life. Pardon any confusion or inside jokeness or sloppiness, its about two years old and it seems a little jumbly and I'm kind of embarrased about the actual writing but whatever; this is how I wrote it including all my grammatical errors though I did change some of my friends' names to protect their innocence, and a few clarifying comments and editor notes but I mostly just cut and paste. So enjoy and if you have any questions I guess you can always email. We're all friends here. Anyway, on with the show)

Friday. My Italian class in the morning is a joke. Everyone is just hung over and no one says a word. But once again class is unimportant here. Again I am not able to nap. Instead I research some more clubs and mark them on a map. Night comes. I make myself another rum and coke and head off with the words of the Smith’s song “ How soon is now” stuck in my head and on my away message. I head to the metro and then realize I don’t know what time the metro stops running and I really don’t wanna be all the way across the city drunk off my ass with no way to get home. Hell I barely made it home and was shitfaced lost one night when I was only in Testaccio. So I look for clubs that are somewhat close and I pick the Hangar, which is pretty close to the Coliseum on Via Cavour. I figure if I get lost at least I have one hell of an identifying landmark. So I head out and start to look for this place and at one point am behind 3 of the most gorgeous men I have ever seen and I follow them for a bit to see if by chance they’re going to the same place I am. Alas, no. sigh. Beautiful boys, beautiful beautiful boys. So I find the Hangar and it’s on a very small side street with very poor lighting and just looking like the shadiest place in the world. My heart starts beating out of control with nervousness cuz it looks like one of those stereotypically icky and disgusting gay sex places that people like Pete’s dad rail against. I walk around for a bit, make the sign of the cross to Santa Maria Maggiore and go back determined not to go in, because I really don’t wanna be raped. I walk by it just to see if my gut was right and I see two old Brits go inside.[Ed. note- like 50 year olds, bald with bad skin and worse teeth] Yeah it was really sketchy and I have a feeling if I had gone in I would have been the youngest person in there by 25 years. I check my map again and look for the places that are supposed to have young crowds. A lot are in Trastevere, which I know where it is and am reasonably certain I could have found my way back home. So I head there to the main street where a pretty hip place is supposed to be. I walk the area like 4 times and see no sign of any of the 3 clubs that are supposed to be around. I remember how I read how some of this clubs close up rather frequently so I’m crushed and I decided I’m on a mission to obliterate that night. Not the healthiest or smartest thing to do but my disappointment and frustrating had been building.
I go to this Irish pub and get this incredibly huge gin and tonic for like 10 euros and this is one of those drinks where no matter how much you drink it doesn’t seem to be emptying. It was ridiculously fantastic. So I’m down with that, it’s around 1145 maybe but it’s a Friday night and I wanna do something. So I head to the “American Bar” (that’s the name) and its one of those places that seems to try a little to hard with weird lighting and like translucent floors. So I go in and I see about a mojito because they have a 4 euro special and also cuz its empty and I feel bad. The bartender is one of those Italian women who seems like they could be a model or were at some point, just tall with a gorgeous face and long flowing hair. The mojito is wonderful and I head to the Piazza Santa Maria in Trastevere, a square outside of a church and there are tons of people sitting on the steps of the fountain. I hear a guy playing guitar and (this part is pretty damn fuzzy) I meet some Americans and Canadian girls, [Ed. note-I think I remember us talking about nothing important but as always when you're drunk everything seems important and amazing] really nice, and we start singing along to the Italian playing a medley of like American rock/pop songs. Absolutely awesome, such a good time. I talk to the English speakers and rock out with the Italian. If I remembered any of their names they would be always in my heart [Ed. note- Whenever Jenny and I would love something or someone and want to remember the good memory we would declare "so and so always in my heart"]. But eventually at some point I make it back to the convent. I think I may have imed [MLS] cuz in the morning I check my computer and I sent something to her at around 4 or late whenever, this being similar to the message “h $^F&^Rnhjg ,lp[l” So that was Friday. An incredibly fun, incredibly drunken night. I didn’t even and don’t know regret the fact that it was another fruitless night in the hunt. (A side note about that night. Apparently I walked for a good long time with one of the kids in the program back to the convent and he asked me where I was and what I did and apparently I responded drunkenly to all his questions "I don’t know". One of those stealth blackout nights.) On to Saturday. The single most bizarre day of my life.

To be honest if I had to do it again I don’t know what I would changer, but since I don’t believe in regret it’s a moot point. The day started with me waking up at around 11. I really wanted to go to Cinecitta where Fellini and other famous directors worked. Scorsese filmed some of Gangs of New York there and maybe the Passion of Mel Gibson as well, but anyway its incredibly famous. On the metro there is a Cinecitta stop so I figured I’d just hop on and hop off and see this famous studio. I hate Italians. They were so pushy on the subway and in the station like they really had someplace urgent to be or important work to be done. I mean come on! Every day for 3 hours the whole city basically shuts down. There really is nothing urgent in their lives. After like 10 stops, so far away, standing the whole time I make it to the Cinecitta stop. Outside it’s so dirty and dusty and hot. I look around searching for the studio expecting it to be basically the whole town. I can’t find it or any signposts directing me to where it could be. Its super hot so I walk around looking for something to do. I find what looks to be a mall. Awesome, I think, not cuz I have money but awesome just because I can see what an Italian mall looks like. I enter and its pretty much like any other mall. I window-shop from a distance, y’know respecting the whole separation of gender spheres and what not. I go into a best buy type place and just marvel. I walk around it a few times, getting lost as I look for a record store, but by this time I’m pretty hungry. I see a McDonalds so I head there cuz its always great people watching. The nuggets really leave something to be desired, besides sauce at no additional charge, but the people make up for it. I really hate the sexually ambivalent and androgynous Italian male; they’re so confusing and frustrating. The murals in McDonalds were classic though. One had an ancient statue being torn down and one of Ronald McDonald being set up in his place. It was awesome and said so much. [TMM] may say something about globalization and I’ll just say, eh. So I head out around 5 because I have plans for the evening and I wanna shower and shave. On my way out there is a group of Italian giggly 15 year old girls. As I walk by one shouts “Scusa” at me and as I turn around the one who did it hides herself. I’ve decided I’m incredibly attractive to like 15 year old girls (that happens to me a fair amount), and also apparently to sketchy supposed American high school graduates that are living in Florence straight out of school. I finally make it to the metro after enduring strollers (not the kind with cute babies in them, but rather those people who walk so damn slow and take up the sidewalk) and street merchants who take up half of the remaining sidewalk.
My plans for Saturday nigh were to watch the U.S.C.-Notre Dame game at this really cool sports bar then go to L’alibi for “gay house music” night even though I hate “ gay house music” I shaved and took wit me a violet shirt that reads Buongiorno Princepessa that is soo small I’m not sure it could fit those of you with actual boobs, maybe [Mo]. J/k. [Ed. Note: This has totally changed; I am a solid A cup now; Woo!]
I went to the bar early cuz Notre Dame kids invade it whenever Notre Dame plays. Yeah so Fox didn’t sell the European rights so they weren’t showing it. I watched the OSU-MSU game which was pretty fun but I was secretly relieved because it (U.S.C.-Notre Dame) was a 930 game and would have been over maybe at 1 and then another half hour I would’ve gotten to the club at 130 maybe and that seemed pretty late. So when the first game I ended I went to Trastevere to kill time and pregame. I walked around a bit. Got a few drinks, at one point I was double fisting with a long island iced tea and a mojito. I forgot to add I hadn’t eaten since around 4 at McDonalds so the alcohol did its thing. At around midnight I get to the club, L'Alibi, and I’m pretty toasted. I take off my K-Ville resident shirt and put on this shirt, which amounts to a belly shirt, which combined with what were hip hugger jeans, I looked pretty slutty. There would be no repeat of Thursday. [Background- on Thursday night I had come to this club wanting to hook up and assuming I would be the belle of the ball. Needless to say nothing happened that night] The door guy waves me in and I feel special…until I get in and its pretty empty. I get another drink, which was “free” with the 15 euro cover and wait. I begin to chain-smoke out of nervousness but eventually it fills up. I get another drink and this is when the night devolves into WTF? I have to use the bathroom so I go to the restroom and there’s this couple; guy with a shave head and eye makeup dressed in all black and this girl with dirty blonde curly hair. I’m waiting and they both go into one stall, or door, they see me and I think they signal me to come in; it was like a beckon with the index finger. I looked shocked and point to my chest asking Me? They giggle. I use the bathroom. I come out and go to the terrace, because I hate the music that’s being played. I meet up with them again. They both had been giving me eyes all night. I head over and we begin to talk in both our broken languages. The guy buys me a drink; I don’t refuse. They ask me how old I am. I tell them 22. They both seem a little disappointed. You’re just a baby the blond says. I ask them how old they are; he’s 31 she’s 33. I’m like that’s not that old. They then walk away and the guy leaves me the rest of his drink, which at this point I don’t refuse, even though I’m really confused. Pretty sure I was being sized up for a three some. Looking back I wondered what would’ve happened… The thing is I’m pretty confident if I ever wanted a totally sketchy experience like that, I could get it any time I wanted it there.
There had been a girl who had been there almost as long as I had been. I was pretty sure she was a transvestite if not a m2f transsexual (for a difference email I’d be happy to explain) [Ed. Note: wow this was a really long time ago; I'm pretty sure they knoe the difference now...], I could tell by her jaw. She intrigued me and I really wanted to know where she got her estrogen cuz I’ve decided that is the next and only step. Either way one of us approached the other. I asked her name, she said Laura and asked if she was a natural woman and she answered that she wasn’t. We talked for a bit more in bits of Englian or Italish if you want, me confessing that I’m transgendered and all that good stuff. I then kiss her cheek and we begin to make out. We go to a couch in a pretty dark corridor and things begin to get intense. Really quite intense. She suggests we go to the bathroom and me in my innocence agree. She leads my by the hand through the club past the Italian matron who collects tips for the bathroom. Laura talks to her for a second then she takes me in. To spare details when two guys who both think their girls are trying to hook up it’s a very complicated bizarre experience. [Ed. note: let's just say I learned that night that I was definitely not made to be a Top] People start to bang on the door so we compose and collect ourselves and she tells me to go first for appearances sake. I meet her on the terrace and we talk for a bit then some of her “[trans] sisters” comes and she says hi. I’m very confused a bit weirded out, quite tired and very drunk so I tell her I’m headed home. I leave and walk back to the convent wondering what exactly had happened and all of a sudden realizing how cold it was. I got back around 430, I think I saw the score of the game and began to devour articles about it. Very strange night. It even tops the Roundtable night when I hooked up with 6 people [Background: I think I made out with 4 guys and 2 girls that night, one girl the length of the c-2 bus ride from West back to East. The next morning I woke up with the taste of one of the guys in my mouth, it was bizarre]. It was one of those days that sort of makes things clear in your mind but also makes you wonder deeper questions.[Ed. note- I don't actually remember what this line meant or referred to except maybe to make clear that I'm not that dominant, don't know what I wondered] So I did technically hook up with an Italian guy, I guess. I just wish I had been the girl in the relationship. That distinction will be clear next time. So I guess on the last night of the hunt I made a kill. Va bene.

{Ah Roma, Ti Manco}

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Holy Sh*t; Henry's going to Barça...

this makes the Yankees look like the Brewers. Thierry Henry, one of the 5 best players in the world just signed with Barcelona, the Barcelona that lost La Liga this year on a tiebreak with Real Madrid. The Barcelona that already has two time world player of the year Ronaldinho, the only good player on Portugal, Deco (you heard me Cristiano) and Lionel Messi who is living up to all the "next Maradona" hype.
That's a f*ckin' lineup. Wow. doesn't seem far does it? I'm not worried though they'll still lose to Roma if only for the sole reason that Totti is the hottest footballer in the world. Definitely. (::swoon::) Forza Roma

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