in the trenches

I'm buried in work, but am completely loving it. The pace here is so much more than the undergrad pace and keeping up is taking most of my time. I have a bit of a break coming up and I hope the weather is good so I can get out and see a little of Florence.

I have a visitor coming, Mike and he is going to help me with my thesis and trip around the city with me. I'm looking forward to seeing someone from home and he does make me smile.

Other than school there isn't much to report. There are lots of fun things happening with friends but no one really has a frame of reference so it might sound kinda silly to retell the stories here. We typically go to a bar, let me rephrase that, dive bar called Angies where we know the owners, and bartender and dj...good times!

I think tonight it's to a place for apertivo (snacks served with the purchase of a drink) with a few friends from my department. So at least now there is a bit of social mixed in with the study.

Yes, I am once again in the library writing this, it's turning into my living room of sorts. Off to find jobs, information and reading until class.

Field trips

It was a big week of excursions for me with the class. First is was CNR which is a research center here in Florence. We got an excellent lecture on cleaning with lasers and I even got to try one out. There was a little video shot but I haven't had time to get it ready to post just yet, it was a busy week.

Then off to Pisa we went to see San Rossore for the first part of the day. Here is the link because it's way too long to retype here. Needless to say it was a fantastic guided tour by one of the restorers.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/67475

Then it was bopping around the city to see a few frescos, oil on wall which is unusual. We did an examination and analysis of sorts, or at least our instructor did.

I feel like I can and should be typing in more detail but I'm kinda exhausted so it's links only right now...sorry...

kinder me silly

So while my friend was visiting she introduced me to the world of Kinder Surprise eggs...what fun! Better than Cracker Jacks in a way because the toys are very cool. Apparently people collect them and it's a big deal here in Europe but I had no idea.

It's the little things sometimes...

Catch up blog

I haven’t had much time to blog lately. The semester seems to have picked up at the same pace the last semester ended…light speed education.

My friend came to visit from Germany, and I’m not sure I’m supposed to mention her name here on my blog so I’ll leave it out and play it safe. We had a fantastic time and the weather was picture perfect. We did dinner with friends before the ballet and then went out to do a little dancing afterwards. A little mystery photo of her that she took by happy accident.

The ballet was…um…interesting. It was the Croatian ballet performing Don Quixote and it really wasn’t what I expected. The primary cast was a bit old and the story wasn’t really Don Quixote in my estimation but it was fun none the less. All 7 of us kinda had the same interpretation when we walked out of the building.

Back to my guest…she was a delight to have around and brought me som fantastic gifts from Germany. The German version of Wondera so I can finally make smooth and perfect gravy! For anyone that knows me…you will understand just how important that really is. More green tea, some candy and fantastic bath stuff. I may end up to be 400 pounds now that I can eat gravy again but I’ll smell good!

During the last 2 weeks I’ve begun the restoration on my painting for one class, begun retouching another and am not working virtually on the computer on both. The simultaneous nature is working out interestingly because I get to see the paintings in such pixel by pixel detail that most restorers never get to see. We put in a 10 straight hour day and I LOVED it! Most everyone was complaining a bit about the length and pace but my years of standing on my feet and dealing with people have kept my stamina up. Sure I was tired but it was a good tired. I have a class in chemistry this time and conservation diagnostics. I am preparing a 20 minute presentation on enzymes and need to come up with a treat to serve after the talk. I am still taking a fresco class and we have a detached fresco to clean that seems to be dated in the late 1400’s or 1500’s. We have very little information on it but it’s a good challenge for us all. The post bacc class also has panels to put together for the end of the year student show that illustrates our work. I’m going to try and get together a slide show with some video to show during that kind of lets people know what exactly we do. Most students at the school hardly know since we work “behind closed doors” most of the time and have nothing to show the world. I had to make a list of the “to-do” things last night to keep track and not forget anything.

My understanding of Italian is still doing fairly well although my “speaking” Italian isn’t really improving much. I think it comes from speaking English all day every day and only really hearing Italian. Either way I’m still picking it up even if it is a slow, slow pace.

Back to the books and catching up on some sleep…